GOP Chairman to Single Out Kerry, Clinton
2 hours, 12 minutes ago
WASHINGTON - The head of the Republican Party, launching a broad indictment of the Democratic Party six months before midterm elections, is expected to charge Friday that the opposition can't find an election-year slogan, let alone agree on a broad agenda.
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In an address to the Southern Republican Leadership Conference in Tennessee scheduled for Friday afternoon, Ken Mehlman will single out party leaders and two potential 2008 presidential candidates — Sens.
Hillary Rodham Clinton and
John Kerry — for criticism on a range of issues, from national security to the economy to judicial nominees.
"Not only can they not settle on an agenda, they can't even agree on a slogan," Mehlman's remarks prepared for delivery said. He is expected to offer some suggestions, albeit critical ones.
"If they really want the American people to know what they are going to do, then how about, 'Together, Americans can pay more in taxes,' " the text said. "Or, 'Together, we can retreat from the central front in the war on terror.' "
Mehlman will assail some Democrats for calling for a withdrawal of U.S. forces from
Iraq, for challenging
President Bush's warrantless surveillance program and for pushing for greater attention to civil liberties in a revision of the Patriot Act.
Mehlman's speech cites a list of achievements in the war on terror. "It is amazing that some of the other party's leaders seem to want to take away the tools making us safer."
The speech comes amid growing concerns in the Republican ranks over Bush's diminishing standing with the American people and the GOP's fears about maintaining its majority control in the House and Senate this November.
The three-day conference in Memphis, Tenn., is attracting not only the party faithful but several potential Republican presidential candidates in 2008.
Mehlman's text reflected his intention to argue that Clinton's solution to support U.S. troops in Iraq was higher taxes and poked fun at Kerry for joining in the unsuccessful challenge to Supreme Court justice
Samuel Alito's nomination from a conference in Davos, Switzerland.
In the 2004 campaign, presidential nominee Kerry was widely criticized for his comment about voting for $87 billion for U.S. forces and then voting against it. Mehlman will parody that line in his speech.
"They say one thing come election time, but their records show that they mean — and will do — another," the text said. "They were for the Iraq war before they were against it. They were for the Patriot Act, until the far-left came out against it. ... I've bought used cars and I know a bait-and-switch when I see it." |
