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Politics : The TRUTH About John Kerry -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: American Spirit who wrote (172)	2/27/2004 2:37:26 PM
From: JakeStraw	Respond to of 1483

An image of America with Kerry at the helm By John Lovejoy February 27, 2004 in Viewpoints In the mid-1930s, France was confronted with the rising threat of Nazi Germany. While France had the power to crush the incipient menace single handedly, it did not, preferring to wait until it had assistance from Britain or the U.S. As Hitler took one aggressive step after another, France responded with appeasement. They also built the Maginot Line, an extensive security barrier on their border with Germany. They counted on this static defense to protect them right up to the moment when the German Army swept through Belgium, around the Line, and into Paris. So many lessons can be drawn from this historical example: the risks of inaction, the folly of waiting for allies to appear, the ineffectiveness of passive defense. Unfortunately John Kerry, despite the lessons of his French forebears, has learned none of them. Consider John Kerry’s comment that combating terrorism is foremost a law enforcement issue. This is how Bill Clinton, and to be fair pre-9/11 George W. Bush, treated terrorism, all while al Qaeda was perpetrating increasingly bold attacks and the U.S. was taking no serious action to disrupt their plans. That mindset is as discredited as the notion that appeasing Hitler was the way to reduce his aggressiveness. When he speaks of a “global manhunt,” Kerry implies that that we can round up terrorists when they operate within the borders of hostile regimes like Syria and Iran. This is total nonsense. When the U.S. asked the Taliban to cough up Osama and company, they refused. We had to invade Afghanistan and drive its rulers from power before we were able to achieve the successes we’ve had, rounding up, by some accounts, 75 percent of al Qaeda leadership and closing a ring around bin Laden. Accusing the Bush administration of moving too rashly, and without the aid of traditional allies such as France and Germany, suggests that a Democratic president would wait indefinitely for assistance that would never come. France, Germany, and Russia have had it in for us since the end of the Cold War. Events in the Balkans and relative power disparities have created an abiding resentment of the U.S. that would forestall serious cooperation in fighting terror, whether our President were a blunt Texan or a clean-fingernails Bostonian. So what would John Kerry do as president? The modern-day equivalent of the Maginot Line. He would fork billions of dollars over to local governments for them to spend on homeland security. First, as an aside, does anyone doubt that local jurisdictions like New York and San Francisco will find ways to classify HIV awareness, themed puppet theater, and anti-Christian fecal artwork as homeland security measures? But even if some of the money goes to legitimate expenses, it is inefficient to have thousands of investigators traipsing around hoping to happen upon incipient terrorism. By the time local law enforcement comes on the scene of attacks it is too late, because the terrorists have already eluded federal authorities. Unfortunately, that possibility is increasingly likely under Kerry’s strategy, because like most Democrats, he soundly denounces the Patriot Act and its implementation. This sensible measure, in sum, allows intelligence and law enforcement agencies to cooperate, and provides them with the same tools for fighting terror that they already use against mobsters and drug runners. Despite many successes in disrupting terrorist cells and attacks, the Patriot Act has provoked a truly bizarre uproar. The absurdity of whole books being written with titles like How the Patriot Act Is Repressing Dissent does not occur to hysterics like Kerry. Nobody can really provide a cogent description of how exactly civil liberties are being violated by the Ashcroft Justice Department, but, then again, vague screeching is much harder to refute than specific examples, especially when such examples do not exist. George W. Bush and his administration know that the U.S. cannot duplicate the mistakes of pre-war France and hope to survive as a free society. Mercifully, terrorists have not struck on U.S. soil since 9/11. Ascribing this result entirely to coincidence requires an amount of chutzpah the whole Democratic Party combined just might possess. We may never know the relative roles the killing of al Qaeda members overseas, the fear of God the U.S. strikes in former terror-sponsoring regimes such as Libya and Pakistan, the vigilance and skill of the Justice Department, and other Bush initiatives all played in protecting this country. One thing we should know is that our country is at war, and to abandon any of these weapons, as John Kerry would have us do, is to court catastrophe. maroon.uchicago.edu

To: American Spirit who wrote (172)	2/27/2004 2:41:21 PM
From: JakeStraw	Respond to of 1483

Democrat Tap Dance Christopher Adamo, 02/27/04 It is an election year, which means the Democrats are feverishly attempting to engage in complete image reconstruction. What makes things particularly interesting is the manner in which they, on the one hand, decry every word spoken by the President as somehow abhorrently wrong, while on the other hand they seek to convince the people that if elected, they wouldn’t risk the security of the nation by doing anything different. Among the major issues of the day is, of course, the question of Saddam Hussein’s weapons of mass destruction. Yet because Hussein didn’t leave them in boxes, complete with ribbons and tags, on the steps of his palace as he fled for safety, we are now expected to presume that such things never existed, and that Hussein wouldn’t have supported their development and deployment against Americans. Likewise, his regime certainly could have had nothing to do with the terrorist organization that perpetrated the attacks of September 11, despite the fact that Afghanistan, that organization’s former base of operations, is a nation in that same region of the world, that had been governed by Islamist fanatics who hate Western civilization with a mindless passion (and Iran, the only nation separating the two, just happens to be governed by Islamist fanatics who hate Western civilization with a mindless passion). Furthermore, we are expected to ignore Salman Pak, a virtual suburb of Baghdad, where terrorists used the fuselage of a commercial airliner to train in methods of boarding and highjacking passenger aircraft. The Democrats’ end game is obviously to convince the American people that war with Iraq, and indeed President Bush’s entire response to 9-11, has been unnecessary and even ineffectual. Ostensibly it has only served to undermine freedom in America, while destroying this nation’s credibility among many of its long time allies, such as the French, Germans, and Russians. That other nations in the region are lining up to “come clean” regarding any nuclear or biological weapons programs they might have once contemplated is, of course, irrelevant. Despite all of this, George W. Bush apparently chose Iraq out of a hat and proceeded to concoct an entirely bogus scenario about the need to destroy its government, knowing full well that his plot would come to light before the next presidential election to be relentlessly used against him. Surprisingly, Senate Minority Leader Tom Daschle (D. SD), a key player among the President's not-so-loyal opposition, is singing a completely different tune these days, at least when speaking to his constituents back home. Recently, in a speech to the South Dakota Chamber of Commerce, he publicly applauded President Bush’s efforts in the war on terror. But Daschle’s words should not be interpreted as anything other than a transparent attempt to pander to South Dakota’s overwhelmingly conservative population. One really has to wonder just what the people of South Dakota are thinking. They elect a state legislature with the courage and principle to enact a law recognizing and protecting the inherent right to life of the unborn, yet they send a Senator to Washington who, in service to the liberal agenda, leads the fight to fill the courts with activist judges who will work diligently to undermine those very things. Do south Dakotans really believe the fallout from Daschle’s rank partisanship won’t return to haunt them, merely because he is pragmatic enough as a politician to know better than to voice his true feelings in their midst? Of course the biggest issue lately causing Democrats to scramble for cover is the push for so-called same sex “marriage.” While liberals have always sought to define morality downward, many of them nonetheless realize that a presidential election year is a very bad time to be doing so. Some of the presumably more slippery ones, like Senator and Presidential contender John Kerry (D-MA), attempt to stand firmly on both sides of this issue by claiming to oppose same sex “marriage” while supporting “civil unions.” Such high-handed and silly rhetoric is ultimately no more meaningful or believable than claiming to support the use of force against Iraq, while opposing the war (Come to think of it, John Kerry did claim to support the use of force while opposing the war). The bad news is that these verbal gymnastics will only worsen between now and Election Day. If Americans are to see their way clear, they must continually look beyond the latest sound bites and consider them against the backdrop of each candidate’s record americandaily.com

To: American Spirit who wrote (172)	2/27/2004 2:42:59 PM
From: Glenn Petersen	Read Replies (3) \| Respond to of 1483

Kerry is no Gandhi on corporate donations boston.com DERRICK Z. JACKSON By Derrick Z. Jackson, 2/27/2004 ODD, JOHN KERRY has not yet spanked Viacom for its raunchy Super Bowl halftime show. This is interesting because Kerry fancies himself the warmonger on special interests who gouge us for our medicines and pollute our environment. Kerry warns he's coming, you're going, and don't let the door hit you on the way out. But even though Viacom and CBS put on a show verging on S&M, Kerry has not yet said on the stump: "I want to say this to the Viacoms and the special interests in Hollywood who poison our airwaves. We're coming, you're going, and don't let the popcorn hit you on the way out." To be sure, on a scale of 1 to 10, with 1 being Gandhian suffering and 10 being unbleachable filth, Kerry cannot possibly smell like President Bush, Vice President Dick Cheney, and the Republican Party. The polluters, bomb makers, big oil, and big tobacco give the current administration a solid rating of 14, with the bonus points coming from the no-bid Iraq reconstruction contracts to Halliburton and cancerous Philip Morris, the Republican Party's top donor for the last quarter-century. Kerry is not a 14. Nor is he Gandhi, according to Charles Lewis, executive director of the campaign finance watchdog group the Center for Public Integrity in his new book, "The Buying of the President." In the mid 1990s, Johnny Chung illegally funneled $8,000 to Kerry. This month arms contractor Bob Majumder pleaded guilty to illegally funneling between $13,000 and $25,000 to Kerry. Kerry wrote 28 letters from 1996 to 1999 supporting Majumder for federal funds for a proposed missile system. The company received $150 million in federal funds. Kerry was not accused of wrongdoing himself, but he has come to the aid of those have done wrong. In 2000 Kerry worked to defeat a proposal by Senator John McCain to kill $150 million in Big Dig spending after it was discovered that the American International Group insurance company had been overpaid $130 million in federal funds for worker compensation and liability insurance. Instead of giving back the money, the company used a loophole to invest it for its own profits. After Kerry salvaged the loophole, the company and its executives gave Kerry $50,000 in senatorial or presidential campaign contributions in 2001 and 2002. The company also paid expenses for a Kerry trip to Vermont. Kerry has denied any connection between his assistance to American International and its assistance to him. That sounds about as clean as Halliburton's no-bid contracts. On the stump, Kerry castigates "Benedict Arnold" companies that evade taxes and take jobs overseas. But this week, The Washington Post reported that Kerry's presidential campaign has received more than $540,000 from either companies that have moved operations overseas to avoid taxes or from fund-raisers run by executives who help companies move to tax havens such as the Cayman Islands and Bermuda. Then there are the media and telecommunications. Kerry's top career contributor ($231,000), the law firm of Mintz, Levin, Cohn, Ferris, Glovsky and Popeo, is heavily involved in telecommunications. Kerry's third-biggest donor is media conglomerate Time-Warner ($141,000). Fourth is the law firm of Hale & Dorr, which is significantly involved in telecommunications and biotech. Fifth is the law firm of Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom, which does work for nearly half of the Fortune top 250 industrial and service corporations. Media companies, including Viacom, have given more than $300,000 to Kerry. Viacom has contributed a total of $3.2 million to political campaigns in the 2000 and 2002 election cycles, with 81 percent of the money going to Democrats. Kerry has played a role at helping telecom lobbyists control the timing of airwave auctions and helping media conglomerates by voting for telecom deregulation in 1996. In "The Buying of the President," Lewis writes of Kerry, "Over the course of his Senate career, he has not been averse to taking campaign cash from companies and firms with a direct interest in his work. Federal Election Commission records reveal that their money has been as much a part of his campaign as it has been of anyone in US Congress." The "Anybody But Bush" crowd will surely be tempted to ignore this. Viacom is no Halliburton: The latter is directly profiteering off a needless war that has taken thousands of lives. But the media and telecommunications play a significant part in our freedom of expression. Bush's filth should not stop voters from pressuring Kerry on his rhetoric. In the Democrats' dreams, Bush is going and Kerry is coming. But for all the special interests Kerry claims would be going out, it is clear that Viacom and media conglomerates would be coming in. Viacom is no Halliburton, but as it reminded us so vividly during the Super Bowl, it can deliver weapons of mass cultural destruction. Derrick Z. Jackson's e-mail address is jackson@globe.com. © Copyright 2004 Globe Newspaper Company.