John Kerry for President? You Must Be Joking

I wish I had the audio clip of John Kerry whining about how he crossed the country to vote on a bill only to have the vote delayed. All of a sudden, Kerry wants to actually show up for work, and is mad that he wasn't catered to. I am quite sure we'll hear Kerry cry about this for months, to cover the fact that he isn't really a working member of the Senate right now.

Keep your eye on the Viking Pundit's Kerry Vote Watch. The last tally:

Different week – same story. The Senate was unusually productive last week, holding 19 roll call votes on judicial nominees and defense legislation. Kerry missed them all, even though he was in Washington for a period when the Senate was in session.

Days worked this session: 3
Missed vote percentage: 116/130 = 89%

A great point to ponder:

QUESTION:
If Kerry couldn't even talk McCain into something good - like having, what looks like now (according to all polls), a better than 50:50 chance at being the second most powerful person in the world; how does he expect us to believe he could talk Chirac, or Schroeder, or Zapatero -and whatever Third World tyrants happen to be on the UN Security Council at the time - into something even bigger - like going to war?

Daniel Aronstein
NY, NY

Thanks again to Dan for his contribution.

Even Howard Fineman of Newsweek, one of Kerry's biggest media boosters, knows that they best thing for Kerry to do is stay invisible, because the more people hear him, the more they don't like him. of course, Fineman can't come out and say that, so he acts like Kerry should just let Bush self-destruct.

Best Advice for Kerry: Be Invisible

June 16 - I’ve figured out what Sen. John Kerry needs to do to win the White House this November: wrap himself in Harry Potter’s Invisibility Cloak. If the Massachusetts senator can only stay out of sight for long enough, George W. Bush’s presidency may sink into the sands of Iraq.

Wishful thinking cloaked as strategy advice. Fat chance Bush will self-destruct, no matter how much people like Fineman hope for it. (They surely won't pray to God, since they think religiousness is a joke) Fineman goes back to the Carter of 1980 line like Business Week was running a few weeks back. There are no gas lines, double-digit unemployment, 20% interest rates, a hostage crisis that the President did next to nothing about, or a gutless leader at the helm blaming the American people for everything. (plus, notice how the "Reagan was lucky" meme gets snuck in there too)

As I see it, nothing much is going to matter in this campaign besides the TV debates—particularly the first one. If Kerry is going to win, the historical analogy to look at is 1980. The American people had had it up to here with Jimmy Carter. They were ready—desperate—for an alternative. They weren’t paying all that much attention to the former governor of California.

In the first debate, they finally looked at Ronald Reagan and decided that, while he certainly wasn’t perfect, he was safe enough—and that was all they needed. Carter’s brilliant polltaker, Pat Caddell, always said that the decision to debate Reagan cost his boss the election. Bush has no choice in the matter, I don’t think. He has to debate. Indeed, there will be three of them.

Liberals like Fineman might be fed up with Bush, but the American people in general surely aren't. Of course they want Kerry to shut up, to keep him from saying dumb things like this, via David Brooks:

Sometimes in the unscripted moments of a campaign, when the handlers are away, a candidate shows his true nature. Earlier this month, Andres Oppenheimer of The Miami Herald asked John Kerry what he thought of something called the Varela Project. Kerry said it was "counterproductive." It's necessary to try other approaches, he added.

The Varela Project happens to be one of the most inspiring democracy movements in the world today. It is being led by a Cuban dissident named Oswaldo Payá, who has spent his life trying to topple Castro's regime. Payá realized early on that the dictatorship would never be overthrown by a direct Bay of Pigs-style military assault, but it could be undermined by a peaceful grass-roots movement of Christian democrats, modeling themselves on Martin Luther King Jr.

No matter how much the media tries to shine up Kerry, more than enough voters will see Kerry for what he is. A zero.

One of Kerry's PR firms, more widely know as the New York Times, has this headline today: (Considering that most people, if not all, have already made up their mind on John Kerry, this might be true.)

G.O.P. Offensive Puts Small Dent in Kerry's Image

WASHINGTON, June 19 — When John Kerry effectively nailed down the Democratic presidential nomination on March 2, the White House was waiting. With relentless precision, it began a 90-day campaign to weaken Mr. Kerry's candidacy, a blast that included record spending on television advertisements and attacks on Mr. Kerry's credentials and ideology led by President Bush himself.

The Republican spring offensive — unusual in its early timing, its toughness and the decision of Mr. Bush to personally engage his opponent so far before November — effectively ends on Sunday, as the Bush campaign suspends its broadcast television advertising until next month.

Three months and $85 million after Mr. Bush began, pollsters and independent analysts said that while Mr. Bush had raised doubts about Mr. Kerry, he had not scored as much damage as some Democrats had feared — or some Republicans had anticipated — with this unusually expensive and early assault, particularly given the size of the investment and the use of Mr. Bush.

Bush's ads haven't changed my image of Kerry one bit. I think think he is the flip-flopping, conviction-less, one-world Socialist liberal I always thought he was.

This article is nothing more than a morale-booster for those liberal Democrats who, in their heart of hearts, know that they have nominated a dud of a candidate.

Our understanding of the relationship between Iraq and al-Qa’ida is evolving and is based on sources of varying reliability. Some of the information we have received comes from detainees, including some of high rank. We have solid reporting of senior level contacts between Iraq and al-Qa’ida going back a decade.

Credible information indicates that Iraq and al-Qa’ida have discussed safe haven and reciprocal non-aggression. Since Operation Enduring Freedom, we have solid evidence of the presence in Iraq of al-Qa’ida members, including some that have been in Baghdad.

We have credible reporting that al-Qa’ida leaders sought contacts in Iraq who could help them acquire WMD capabilities. The reporting also stated that Iraq has provided training to al-Qa’ida members in the areas of poisons and gases and making conventional bombs.

Iraq’s increasing support to extremist Palestinians, coupled with growing indications of a relationship with al-Qa’ida, suggest that Baghdad’s links to terrorists will increase, even absent US military action.

-- George Tenet, 9 October 2002

So President Bush is to be censured for ingoring the 6 Aug 2001 PDB whil eon vacation in Texas, and excoriated for heeding the Congressional testimony of the Director of the FBI.

Got that?

The Record

Not only has the Philadelphia Daily news become the first newspaper in the country to officially endorse John Kerry for President, they are the first to openly admit that they will do everything in their power to make it happen, by helping him in the crucial swing state of Pennsylvania.

(to read link, use this registration: user: ewban001@umn.edu password: read4free)

The Philly Daily News has always been a liberal rag with a great sports section. But this is possibly the dumbest thing they have ever done. Who could possibly take any story they run seriously now?

However, I am not surprised at this. That paper has been a left-wing fish wrap for years. 10 years ago, I applied for an summer internship there, and was told indirectly, "whites need not apply." (What they actually said was that "I was not eligible for their internship program.") Plus, supporting a Democrat isn't exactly a difficult thing to do in a city that hasn't had a Republican mayor since 1930, and has a Democrat political establishment in hock to the labor unions.

I pray that there is a circulation backlash similar to the one the L.A. Times faced after they tried to bury Arnold Schwarzenegger, especially after this howler:

[T]his newspaper, the first in the nation, endorses John Kerry for president. Unlike the current White House occupant, Kerry can lead America to a brighter, better future. He has shown the personal courage, compassion, intellect and skill to lead this country in a time of war abroad and economic troubles at home. He is a serious man for a serious time.

Serious man? Who are they talking about? Not the John Kerry I know. Plus, read the part titled "The Case For John Kerry." It is full of hilarious nonsense. My favorite part:

He is not the indecisive waffler the Bush team would have you believe. Instead, he is offering a concrete, pragmatic direction for the nation.

Really? What is Kerry's plan on Iraq? I still don't know. Do you? What is Kerry's plan to fight terrorists? Oh, here it is. He plans to make sure that we are ready to respond after another one.

On homeland security, Kerry understands that if we are attacked again, the first to respond will be firefighters and emergency medical teams, which have been largely ignored by the Bush administration. Kerry is proposing recruiting an additional 100,000 firefighters.

Gee, proposing all those new firefighters has nothing to do with the huge support Kerry has recieved from the firefighter's unions now, does it? This country does not need 100,000 new firefighters, unless we relegate ourselves to attack after attack, the product a defeatist attitude that Kerry surely possesses. Or, at best, it would be nothing more than a massive social welfare program. How can anyone take this proposal seriously? And there's this:

On Iraq, there's little evidence that Bush can enlist the international help necessary to bring more of our troops home. There's reason to believe that Kerry, who understands the human cost of war, will.

What are these "reason[s] to believe?" The Daily News doesn't say, because they can't. It is pure wishful thinking.

Because he respects the intelligence of the American people, he rarely talks in sound bites.

He understands that sound bites aren't solutions. Kerry's positions, while sometimes complicated, are grounded in reality, not in doctrines developed in think tanks.

Well, at least they didn't use the word "nuance."

The Philadelphia Daily News has embarrassed themselves once again. This endorsement and their reasoning are both shameful and shameless.

Lifted from Bill Hobbs:

You'd think John Kerry, who has caught a lot of flak for flip-flopping on whether or not to adequately fund our troops in Iraq ("I actually voted for the $87 billion before I voted against it") would have shown up for a vote for an amendment adding $25 billion in funding for the war effort. But, no, he was too busy giving a campaign speech about helping the military to actually, you know, show up and do his job and vote for legislation to help the military.

Maybe Kerry figured there was no way to vote both for and against the funding, so he just decided to go AWOL from the vote.

And this on the heels of being the only senator to vote against funding to increase the nation's preparedness to cope with a bio-terror attack, two weeks before going out to campaign for increased preparedness for coping with a bio-terror attack.

Does he really think Americans are gonna fall for his two-faced stance?

Since 2000, all we ever hear about is the outrage over the Florida election and how the people in Florida will respons forcefully in this election. if what happened yesterday in Tampa is any indication, Kerry is in deep shit.

DEAF DONKEY EARS

On several occasions, Kerry paused, seemingly expecting applause for his lines. For example, at one point he said, "I will do what I think is best for the country," then waited for applause that only developed after one of his advance staffers began leading a weak round of applause.

His lukewarm reception was so bad that Kerry lost his cool, telling his audience, "I know you don't want to be here anymore."

"That line actually generated more real cheers," says a bemused Florida Democratic Party official. "If this is the kind of response our campaign is getting elsewhere, we're dead. This was awful. He was awful."

Kerry's Vietnamese legacy, via Kerry Lied.

John Kerry never ceases to amaze me. Yesterday, the one-world liberal spoke in Florida, complaining about bunker-busters:

Kerry, who stood before a banner reading "New strategies for new threats," said the Bush administration had not done enough to work with "our greatest allies" to prevent the spread of nuclear materials. He said the administration had set a bad example by trying to develop new nuclear weapons while asking other nations not to do the same thing.

"What kind of message does it send when we're asking other countries not to develop nuclear weapons but we're developing new ones ourselves?" asked Kerry, who said he would end development of the nuclear bunker-buster bomb.

Read that astonishing statement again. Moral equivalence of the worst order. Can any rational person really think that we would use such weapons nefariously? No one can say the same about Pakistan and North Korea, that's for sure. Doesn't Kerry remember that North Korea agreed in 1994 to stop nuclear weapons production in exchange for bribes, er, aid? And they did anyway? And, doesn't he understand that Russia and China have never adhered to any reduction agreement they ever signed? Kerry has proven once again what we already know. He will go back to the failed Clinton policies of national defense.

The lapdog press knows this, which is why these statements were buried in the story. Instead, they chose to emphasise Kerry riding a Harley. (Gee, I'm sure Bush getting the endorsement of Rolling Thunder, a pro-veteran and pro-Bush biker group had nothing to do with that story angle.)

Kerry is offering up nothing on national security, excpet new ways to weaken the United States, which his entire career has been all about. Without the bunker-buster, all our enemies have to do is build deep tunnels, which they have already done. Our military needs bunker busters, and they surely don't need this idiot as their Commander-in-Chief.

Good grief.

Nowak remembers returning from Vietnam in 1973 aboard an aircraft carrier loaded with thousands of sailors in their dress whites. "As we passed under the Golden Gate Bridge, there were people waiting for us. And they threw garbage on us," Nowak recalled. "That was about the time Kerry was throwing his [ribbons] away. It's kind of hard to forget either of them."

Focus Swings to Vietnam, With a Roar

This was found, along with a few humorous pics, at Instapundit.