If you were following politics in 2000, you might remember Real Clear Politics. They were the clowns (I say the although there were probably others) who were predicting a >400 electoral vote sweep by Bush the weekend before the 2000 presidential election. Despite their lack of prowess in electoral predictions, they have somehow acquired a reputation as serious political bloggers on the right side of the spectrum. Don't ask me how; it must be some sort of an affirmative action thing for intellectually challenged conservatives. Personally I prefer Tacitus, who at least manages to occasionally temper his intellectual dishonesty and actually write something thoughtful. But that's beside the point.
Let's look at this post from yesterday by Tom Bevan, which goes by the descriptive title "Kerry's meet the press lie." Mr Bevan starts with a quote of Kerry's that Russert presented:
You "voted to authorize military action but has accused President Bush of rushing into war, [but he] said he will cease his complaints once the shooting starts. `It's what you owe the troops,' said a statement from Kerry. `I remember being one of those guys and reading news reports from home. If America is at war, I won't speak a word without measuring how it will sound to the guys doing the fighting when they're listening to their radios in the desert.'" Are you concerned that you're sending the wrong message to the troops by not showing solidarity in terms of the war in Iraq? And have you broken your pledge?
So far, so good. Kerry promised that he wouldn't criticize the president about Iraq while the troops were fighting. And, in light of Kerry's recent (justifiable) criticism of Bush's post-war policy, Russert wants to know if Kerry has broken his pledge. Kerry's response:
No, I haven't. Because, number one, I did adhere strictly to that through the period of the success of the war, when we finally had taken control of the country.
Fair enough. He couldn't hold off forever and, given that he is speaking out months after Bush was prancing around on the Abraham Lincoln celebrating the end of hostilities, you can't really say that he broke his promise. But let's see what Mr Bevan has to say:
Yeah, right. This must be a different John Kerry than the one who said on April 3, 2003 that ""what we need now is not just a regime change in Saddam Hussein and Iraq, but we need a regime change in the United States."
But wait a minute. Let's track back up to Kerry's first quote where he says he won't criticize the president about Iraq. Now let's look at the second quote. Do you see anything about the war in there? Of course not. In fact, it could even be construed as support for the war: seeing as how he would view a Bush loss in 2004 as a positive thing, it is hard to imagine how he could see regime change in Iraq as a bad thing. Apparently nothing short of an endorsement of Bush's reelection by the eventual Democratic nominee would satisfy Mr. Bevan.
But that's splitting hairs. The important thing is that Mr. Bevan somehow sees this as going back on his pledge to support the war. But Kerry didn't violate his pledge unless you conflate a lack of support for Bush with a lack of patriotism. Hmm. Let's scroll further down to a post from a couple of days earlier in which Mr Bevan writes:
In the four years we've been running this site neither John nor I have ever said that disagreeing with or criticizing the President means you aren't patriotic.
Oh really? Perhaps this is technically correct in that Mr. Bevan doesn't use the word "unpatriotic," but in comparing Kerry's general criticism to a lack of support of the troops one is left no doubt about how he feels about the issue.
And that's why these conservatives don't deserve to run the country. They are not only completely dishonest, but also lacking in common decency. If someone has the gall to have an honest disagreement with them about what is best for the country then they are painted as unpatriotic. I've noticed that people tend to project their own faults onto others and, in light of this mantra of "unpatriotic" and "dishonest" coming from their side, my advice is for them to look in a mirror.
Comments