Silicon Investor (SI) -- The First Internet Community

STOCKTALK

We've detected that you're using an ad content blocking browser plug-in or feature. Ads provide a critical source of revenue to the continued operation of Silicon Investor. We ask that you disable ad blocking while on Silicon Investor in the best interests of our community. If you are not using an ad blocker but are still receiving this message, make sure your browser's tracking protection is set to the 'standard' level.

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

To: tonto who wrote (1446)	6/15/2004 3:10:44 PM
From: JakeStraw	Respond to of 1483

Good for America, Bad for John Kerry by Andy Obermann 14 June 2004 The past few weeks have been bad news for the Kerry Campaign -- but good news for the American people. It appears Democratic senator and presidential hopeful John Kerry is losing on many of his campaign issues. Two consecutive weeks of political good news for President Bush appears to have stymied the Senators once formidable campaign. Kerry and Bush, in a show of class, halted campaigning last week in the wake of the death of former president and American icon, Ronald Reagan, but even before the somber news, Kerry’s bid for the White House was wavering. The bad news (for Kerry, that is) began in Iraq, where the handover of authority to the transitional Iraqi government went over with great success. Kerry and his ilk, in typical liberal fashion, were predicting doom and gloom for the interim government -- expecting some sort of gridlock between the US-led Iraqi Governing Council (IGC) and the transitional authority. Nothing could be farther from the truth. In fact, the transition went so well that only two weeks later, the IGC is completely dissolved and Iraqis are finally beginning to take control of their own affairs -- and have already had some success by securing the problematic city of Najaf and instituting social policies in preparation for elections and a truly representative Iraqi Republic. Kerry’s cries for United Nations involvement and authority have been solved as well. Last week, the Bush Administration and our British allies presented a resolution to the UN Security Council giving their full endorsement to the interim Iraqi government. After only two days of debate, the 15-member council unanimously approved the measure -- including the adversarial French and Germans. Iraqis also gained full control of their oil revenues and security issues. If this weren’t enough, Kerry’s demands for stronger international alliances have apparently been met through the success of the G-8 Conference at Sea Island, Georgia. Now, some pundits claim the summit is nothing more than a "grip and grin" session for world leaders, but no one can deny the message of western unity it sends to the international community’s common enemy (i.e. Islamic Terrorists). Domestic news hasn’t been looking up for the Kerry Campaign, either. Sen. Kerry’s main criticism of a "jobless" economic recovery has fallen by the wayside as American businesses added an unexpected 248,000 jobs last month -- tallying nearly a million jobs in the past three months. With unemployment at 5.6% (a figure considered low under the Clinton regime), Kerry seems to be losing grip on his most appealing issue. He will obviously continue to preach the negative by pointing to the troubling fact that these new jobs don’t pay as much as the ones they replaced, but to Americans facing the alternative, unemployment, any job is a good one. Gas prices have also stabilized -- falling more than a dime a gallon nation-wide with the news that OPEC has agreed to increase oil exports by two million barrels per day. This neutralizes Kerry’s criticism that President Bush hasn’t done enough to pressure OPEC member nations into increasing output. Kerry may shift the focus of his campaign to inflation, which has taken hold in this booming economic situation. Fed Chairman Alan Greenspan has hinted that interest rates could be on the rise in early July -- elevating from record low levels to as much as 1.75%. Kerry could make an issue of this, however, inflation is a good thing under our current situation. It shows that the positive economic indicators are truly successful and the economy is truly growing through general price increases. Defense strategy could be another area of interest for the senator, who has already called for an increase in the general size of our current military force, but seems to be jumping on a losing issue. Recently, a report from the Pentagon indicated that Defense Secretary Rumsfeld has called for a general realignment of American troops overseas. By pulling troops from secure areas (such as Germany and Britain) and reducing force sizes in South Korea, the military could redeploy troops to problematic areas such as the Middle East and Central Asia -- as opposed to Kerry’s plan of a blanket increase in troop numbers. I suppose he is attempting to apply the liberal tax and spend philosophy to defense policy by making the army larger, but less effective and versatile (think Great Society and the War on Poverty). Honestly, I’d rather have a smaller army that is used more efficiently. All in all, the past few weeks have been bad news for the Kerry Campaign -- but good news for the American people. This simple fact sheds a great deal of light on the wrong-headedness of his beliefs.