Kerry presses assault on Bush foreign policy(Assertions on a plan to avoid

[papau]

war based on conversation with Annan asserted. But the Globe and the ABCNote choose to focus their spin as a dump on Kerry -Kerry "acknowledged that he did not know the specifics of such a plan but said that UN Secretary General Kofi Annan assured him 'there were specific discussions' about a nonmilitary compromise that senior Bush aides 'shut the door to.'"

http://www.boston.com/dailyglobe2/298/nation/Kerry_presses_assault_on_Bush_foreign_policy-.shtml

Kerry presses assault on Bush foreign policy
Assertions on a plan to avoid war disputed

By Patrick Healy, Globe Staff, Globe Correspondent, 10/25/2003

Senator John F. Kerry, who has insisted that the Bush administration ignored a French-Russian plan to avoid war in Iraq last March, acknowledged yesterday that he did not know the specifics of such a plan but said that UN Secretary General Kofi Annan assured him "there were specific discussions" about a nonmilitary compromise that senior Bush aides "shut the door to."

In televised remarks Monday night, the Democratic presidential contender from Massachusetts said that three days before the war began March 19, he "knew at that moment in time that the Russians and French were prepared to in fact make a further offer" at the UN to find diplomatic alternatives to war. But the Bush administration told Annan at the time that "the time for diplomacy is over," Kerry said, citing a conversation between himself and Annan on March 16.

Several American officials at the UN disputed Kerry's assertions, saying that the Bush administration never shut the door on serious diplomatic overtures, even though the White House had concluded that the French and other nations opposed to the use of force would never move aggressively to disarm Saddam Hussein's regime.

"We didn't have any marching orders that diplomacy was over or close any doors -- we were trying until the last minute to find a way to get a UN buy-in to get Iraq to disarm," said Rich Williamson, who was a senior US official for Security Council issues at the time. "Kerry is smart on Iraq, but wrong on the facts here."

<snip>

[papau]

1. Why is it not a plan to say no to war and yes to 4 months of inspections?

Amb Negroponte's defense of Bush is that "All the French and the Russians were saying was, we need more time to negotiate, to do weapons inspections, and we shouldn't go to war over this"

Yet the French Amb Jean-Marc de La Sabliere said that "There was a Franco-Russian-German proposal that was made public." And Kerry notes that "I don't know what they're saying today,I can only tell you that I had a conversation with Kofi Annan Sunday afternoon , prior to their going to war. I'm not going to betray what Kofi Annan -- it's not appropriate to tell you every specific. But I'm absolutely accurate in saying . . . there were specific discussions taking place about alternative ways that resisting countries could have been brought along."


So the ABCNote tries to present this as Kerry saying he was wrong about saying Bush rejected a no-war approach/plan? Why is the ABCNote spinning anti-Dem?

Of course "Dem" Donna Brazile is doing everything she can to protect Bush and tear down all 9 over any objection to the war - even just as the continuing lack of security and deaths - by saying to Fournier of the AP:"There's a huge credibility gap our party has on national security — not because we don't have enough military medals, but because we have no plan of action." - Is She on the Bush payroll? - When is not doing what Bush is doing NOT A PLAN?

[Wickerman]

2. The note was HORRIBLE today

I don't read it daily any more, its been leaning more and more right, but today was worse than usual.

This particularly irked me:

Democrats on the Hill and the hustings, who are still trying to figure out how to talk about Iraq in order to score points, just might have to figure out how to explain why a president who presides over this much growth is still a "miserable failure."

I'm not seeing that growth here in mid america - I am seeing me friends and neighbors losing what were once "secure" jobs.

[NewYorkerfromMass]

7. Isn't the note also "leaning Dean" nt

[Wickerman]

8. hmm, I'm not sure about that

but haven't seen it overtly so... Will pay more attention.

[sandnsea]

6. How do we get rid of her?

She hasn't said a decent thing about the Democratic Party in all the time I've listened to her. I simply do not understand what she thinks she's doing. She helped perpetuate the notion Democrats weren't talking against IWR before the vote. They WERE, they just couldn't get any media attention and people like her wouldn't point to them and say LOOK. We've got to get different people on the talk circuit or we are doomed next year, no matter who we run. Go to your candidate blogs and demand that she NEVER be allowed to represent our party again!!

[killbotfactory]

3. Bush shut the door on diplomacy long before he went to the UN

That much was obvious. He said he was going in with or without the UN, and he meant it. You don't build up 100k troops on a border and keep them there indefinatly. You don't say inspections have failed only weeks after they started.

I don't think anyone will be very impressed or shocked with this revelation.

[blm]

4. Who to believe...US officials at the UN or Kofi Annan?

Gee...that's a tough one.

[sandnsea]

5. "serious" diplomatic overtures

There's the word. Sure there were diplomatic overtures, Bush just decided they weren't "serious". Anybody who was paying attention knows France, Germany and Russia were pleading to let the inspections continue.

[blm]

9. Kerry has a relationship with Annan. I don't doubt his info

came straight from him.

Too bad so many can't understand that Kerry was working to PRESERVE the UN as an international institution in his negotiations for his vote.