This Monday Morning's anti-Kerry/ anti-Dem media postings

[papau]

From the New Republic's Michael Grunwald re Kerry problems in GE:
--"his opposition to mandatory minimum sentences for dealers who sell drugs to children"
--"voting against the death penalty for terrorists"
--"efforts to provide cash benefits to drug addicts and alcoholics"
--"onetime opposition to a modest work requirement for welfare recipients"
--"supporting more than half a trillion dollars in tax increases--including hikes in gas taxes and Social Security taxes"
--"accepting free housing and other goodies for himself from friendly influence-peddlers"
--serving as LG under Dukakis when Massachusetts "famously furloughed more than 500 murders and sex offenders under a program Kerry later defended as tough"

Grunwald points out that Kerry has altered some of these positions during his current run for president. He "now favors a death-penalty exception for terrorists," for example. Grunwald also notes how Kerry has skillfully employed his record as a combat veteran to diffuse many of these charges when they came up in the past.

Stephen Sherman writes in a Wall Street Journal op-ed that despite his war record, Kerry hasn't been a friend to veterans — with testimony on atrocities, stopping an investigation into POW/MIAs and supporting trade with South Vietnam while not forcing it to hold to human rights standards.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A47276-2004Jan25.html
the Post's David Broder and Mike Allen report that the president's strategists are ecstatic over their possible opponent-no matter who he is...the Democrat is 'liberal, liberal, liberal-- they will say they are delighted at the prospect of running against a liberal tax-raiser who is soft on terrorism...

a ticket combining Sens. John F. Kerry (Mass.) and John Edwards (N.C.) "could be very, very competitive" in New Hampshire and nationally. "The country is still very polarized," Spaulding said, "and I don't see a lot of Gore-Lieberman people who wouldn't vote for that ticket."

after creating that general picture of an ideological liberal, they will add specific attacks, such as tying Edwards -- a former trial lawyer who has won multimillion-dollar verdicts -- to the high cost of malpractice insurance, which has caused some obstetricians to stop practicing. RNC Chairman Ed Gillespie first signaled this strategy last fall when he said that former Vermont governor Howard Dean had pushed the pack leftward. "They're all Howard Dean, now," he said. Jim Dyke, the RNC's communications director, said Democrats have "already decided" that their nominee will be for increasing taxes, for repealing legislation on what opponents call "partial birth" abortions and against extending the law enforcement powers granted under the Patriot Act. <snip>

"Kerry has a competence to him that is attractive," Rath said. "Edwards looks to be the candidate with the biggest up-side potential." "If experience is the criterion for leadership," Dwight said, "Kerry could be the most formidable." Edwards, she added, "has really matured as a candidate" from the time she first saw him a year ago. Dwight and Dennehy both volunteered the thought that however he might fare nationally, Kerry as the presidential nominee could well make New Hampshire a battleground. "He might give the president a race," Dwight said. But Dennehy said he thought "any Massachusetts liberal will be challenged to carry any state in the South. That's why I think he'll turn to an Edwards or a Gephardt" as a running mate, hoping they could put their home states of North Carolina and Missouri into play. <snip>

Republicans close to Bush said campaign strategists think Dean would be the easiest to tag with their preferred description and would play to the caricature they hoped to create of him. However, the campaign is concerned about Dean's proven ability to raise money, because he -- along with Kerry -- chose not to accept federal funds and the spending restrictions that come with them.

These Republicans said they worry most about Edwards, because he is so little known and has such a comparatively short public record. That combination would give him the easiest time morphing into whatever his campaign decides that swing voters want. "Personally, I'm the most concerned about Edwards, because he has a huge attractiveness to him," a senior Republican official said. "The only negative is the lack of experience." <snip>

http://www.nytimes.com/2004/01/26/politics/26LETT.html

This Time in New Hampshire, Bush Can Sit Back and Watch
By ELISABETH BUMILLER Published: January 26, 2004
Senator John Kerry....49 percent to 46 percent....may be why Mr. Bush chose to swipe at Mr. Kerry in some off-the-record jokes in a speech on Saturday night at the Alfalfa Club dinner, an annual banquet for Washington's political upper class. The official position of Mr. Bush's advisers is that he is too busy running the country to pay attention to the campaign, but someone must have forgotten to tell the president.

"I think Kerry's position on the war in Iraq is politically brilliant," Mr. Bush told the Alfalfa Club guests at the Capitol Hilton, according to a guest who heard the remarks. "In New Hampshire yesterday, he stated he had voted for the war, adding that he was strongly opposed to it."<snip>

The line got a big laugh, the guest said, as did this one about Howard Dean's "I Have a Scream" postcaucus speech in Iowa: "Boy, that speech in Iowa was something else," the guest reported Mr. Bush as saying. "Talk about shock and awe. Saddam Hussein felt so bad for Governor Dean that he offered him his hole."<snip>

In fact, Bush officials said in November that they expected the race to be neck and neck in the spring, when the Democrats were likely to settle on a nominee. No one predicted it would happen this early.

[THUNDER HANDS]

1. gee that's funny

I don't remember this quote:

The line got a big laugh, the guest said, as did this one about Howard Dean's "I Have a Scream" postcaucus speech in Iowa: "Boy, that speech in Iowa was something else," the guest reported Mr. Bush as saying. "Talk about shock and awe. Saddam Hussein felt so bad for Governor Dean that he offered him his hole."

In the thread about how Kerry is unelectable because Bush teased him.

[Tesha]

2. Get used to it. The media wants a "Horse Race".

Get used to it. The media wants a "Horse Race", and they
will position the news to keep as many horses as neck-and-
neck as possible for as long as possible. That's what sells
the daily fish-wrap!

And after that, they want a nice, safe corporatocracy where
they can keep on selling as much fish-wrap as possible with
as little actual work as possible.

While Dean was in front, it was important to slow him down,
move him back into the pack with the other horses. While
Kerry looks to be out by a nose, well, then they'll slam
him for a while. And all the while, keeping the whole
Democratic pack slowed down serves their real goal, the
re-election of Bush.

Face it, you'll all get your chance to feel like Dean
supporters as the race drags on...

Tesha

[NewYorkerfromMass]

3. Note to shrub: John Kerry voted for

the responsible use of force. Think about it. Or have someone with a brain think for you.

[girl gone mad]

4. He voted to give Bush..

the authority to use force. All evidence pointed to Bush being an irresponsible person.

I was very upset that day. I listened to all of the testimony and watched the vote, and it is very hard for me to get past thsi issue, though Kerry seems eager to move on and ignore the Iraq war altogether.

We went to war on false grounds, and that should be reason enough to get rid of Bush. I want someone who will confront Bush on it, not someone who enabled him.

[NewYorkerfromMass]

5. and when did we "know" the grounds were false?

[RUMMYisFROSTED]

8. The first time they were trotted out.

Not WMD. No one could be certain about that. But as far as SH being a threat to the US? Pure, unadulterated bs.

[bigtree]

6. The republican views and defenses are irrelevant

unless you plan on leaving Sen. Kerry defenseless to their bullshit. I always ask if the posters of republican-sourced attacks if they agree with all of the republican garbage or just the drivel about John.

That said, I don't see anything in the rest of the stories that John hasn't already defended effectively. Some folks think if you repeat the distortions often enough than they will become truths.

Beginning with the Post article,

-'liberal, liberal, liberal- This we can and should stand up against. This is a nanny nanny boo boo attack.

-against extending the law enforcement powers granted under the Patriot Act. - At least the republicans got this right. No Democrat has come out in favor of extending the odious provisions that they had the foresight to make temporary.

-Sen. Edwards -- a former trial lawyer who has won multimillion-dollar verdicts -- to the high cost of malpractice insurance, which has caused some obstetricians to stop practicing.- I'm not sure what they are arguing here. Sen. Edwards has an impressive record of standing up for those who found themselves up against big industry abuses. This is a plus which any Democrat should feel comfortable defending.

-Sen. Edwards, The only negative is the lack of experience. More than Shrub if you are talking about actually helping people.


-"I think Kerry's position on the war in Iraq is politically brilliant," Mr. Bush told the Alfalfa Club guests at the Capitol Hilton, according to a guest who heard the remarks. "In New Hampshire yesterday, he stated he had voted for the war, adding that he was strongly opposed to it."- Delightful. After lying to the nation that Saddam posed an imminent threat and pushing past Congress, the American people, and the international community to unilateraly, and preemptively invade and occupy Iraq . . . well, good luck with that.

-"Boy, that speech in Iowa was something else," Wasn't it though? Passion. Commitment. Substance. All of the things that Bush lacks.


I'm certain that each of the candidates in turn, look foward to comparing their record of commitment to Bush's term of failure should one of them become the nominee.

Thanks for sharing!

[Feanorcurufinwe]

7. So what is your opinion about these Republican attacks?

[Cocoa]

9. who writes Bush's "overheard" comments?

Why do Bush's spontaneous jokes sound like Leno rejects?

[Old and In the Way]

10. cindyw, forgive me, but

I plan on using your quote rather often over the upcoming weeks-

"If you cannot admit Kerry and the Congress was lied to then you cannot say that Bush lied."

I guess I expect the Executive branch to be truthful to Congress, if not, the whole system breaks down. I beleive that Bush lied to Congress about the urgency of reacting to WMD in Iraq. Nonetheless, a resolution was passed that gave the President power to wage war IF UN inspections were not working. They were working, they were finding no weapons, and Bush used the resolution to declare unilateral war without basis.

Bush lied, lots of people died...and are still dying. He broke his trust with Congress and if we had a Republican Party that was not propping up this unelected fraud, we'd have impeachment proceedings underway.

Something else, too. Let's assume President Dean or Kerry or Edwards or Clark is elected next year and they have hard intelligence that says North Korea is ready to light the nuclear firecracker on, say, Japan.

If our President goes to Congress and says that this action is imminent, would we not expect Congress to react and support a resolution if the evidence is presented? Would we be pissed off if the Republican majority decided this was a political ploy and rejected the Resolution? If we're right and the nukes are thrown, who is responsible? I would think the American people, certainly the Japenese, would hold the Republican majority responsible.

As a member of the minority party the gamble was vote against and be proven wrong or support and qualify. Choosing the former, in hindsight, would be right but if we were wrong, the Party would be as good as toast. I think our Democratic Senators played the best hand they were dealt. I guess you can choose to hate Kerry and Edwards for their vote, but I think if I had been an elected Senator, given that this administration controlled the debate and the evidence, I'd have opted to protect my constituents.