Specifically, a staunch PNAC stooge.

not fond of Kerry's investigative efforts that ended up exposing IranContra, the funding of both sides in Iran-Iraq war, BCCI, S&Ls, and CIA drug running.

and the chief negotiator assigned by Obama. Not to mention, you could look at what he did re Syrian chemical weapons use - although many on the far left prefer to credit Putin - Kerry was instrumental in the negotiation of the UN resolution and the deal. He (and Obama) had pushed the idea for Russia to use its leverage long before the big August attack.

Why do the known PNAC advocates - ie Kristol etc HATE Kerry and argue that he is moving Obama in the wrong direction.

Not to mention - read Kerry's Yale (or BC) graduation speeches -- or for that matter the recent Obama one that is very similar foreign policy --- it is closer to anti-PNAC than anything from a top American leader.

To be fair, he is not the only one in that boat. I'll never support Hillary Clinton for the same reason. But Kerry deserves special disdain for defending and justifying the war against Iraq throughout his presidential campaign. And no, I did not vote for him in 2004, nor will I ever vote for him for anything, if given the chance. But I'm in California, so unless he runs for national office again, I'll just lick the wounds of the IWR and hope he has the good grace to retire from public office some day soon.

Did you forgived to other congress people who did the same, and even more; since, they, unlike him, did vote for the bilion of dollars funding?

that you changed the post.

But since it's so hard to you to admitt it, that you use the classical defense mechanism on fucusing onmy ESL mistakes, in a way to obstruct and put me on defensive. Sorry, fellow, It dosn't work!

Apparently, you are a mind reader, but I don't claim to be. "Forgot to him" is nothing like "forgive him."

Your claiming that I missed your meaning on purpose is a foul slur.

...but if you're asking whether I have similar disdain for everyone else who voted to invade Iraq, the simple answer is generally "yes." Recall that many democrats did not vote in favor of the IWR, and so far as anyone knows, none ever suffered any particular political consequence for doing the right thing, which makes the ones who didn't do the right thing all that much more apparent. John Kerry is one of the people who DIRECTLY enabled the direction the U.S. took after 9/11, and in particular the war of aggression against Iraq.

The fact is I needed to put on the table, in a non offensive way and with personal observations, that sadly there is a quite "fashionable" movement of bashing some personnalities, and Kerry is among them in those present time, and that this kind of behaviour, again , I said, led by a minority but noizy one, Is, I thing, unecessary, uneusefull.....and quite childish at time.
That's said, in a general perspective.

On IWR, I think the time has passed now, and that instead of blaming fellow dems, the real issue of IW heritage should be gaven prior to expose former administration, instead of searching vendetta. Sorry for my English......LOL. Hope you will understand

and he had no intention of sticking to ANY resolution's guidelines. They had already decided to go to war and planned to use the 1991 UN resolution to go in if they had to.

You give Kerry no credit for being the one aye vote to promise to stand against any decision to go to war if it was found that there was no need via weapon inspections. He stood with the weapon inspectors against Bush's decision to invade which resulted in an onslaught of criticism against him from every direction, including yours.

It's called discernment, mike....I love ya, but, discernment is a trait you haven't been willing to demonstrate whenever Kerry is the subject.

Strange how some people have a so desperate need to point at designated targets! An army of psychists could not even completly resole that enigma.

But the issue is worth disscussing it.

I'm sure you've read it-- there is only ONE "guideline" or requirement that the president must perform. He must inform congress in writing within 48 hours of the use of military force. You might recall that he fulfilled that requirement with a terse letter to the speaker of the house on March 21, 2003.

There is only one stated purpose for the bill, despite the argument that it was only meant to put "pressure" on Saddam Hussain or a whole bunch of other motives that have been kicked around since it's passage. The first line of the bill defines that purpose: "To authorize the use of United States Armed Forces against Iraq. <<NOTE: Oct. 16, 2002 - [H.J. Res. 114]>>". Period.

Section two is often described as requiring the president to work through the UN Security Council, but it places no constraints on the administration at all, but rather merely expresses congress's support for any such action the president might have taken in the past or might want to take in the future:

Bush's decision to invade.

Discernment. It means you make an effort to be FAIR in your judgements.

The IWR that Kerry supported did not place any constraints on Bush other than that he report back to congress. It gave him complete authority to make whatever determination he wanted, under any conditions he liked. He "determined" it was necessary to invade Iraq and he reported that to congress. That's it. He didn't lie. He didn't have to, because the IWR placed ZERO constraints on him before the fact, and only required him to report to congress within 48 hrs of attacking. It didn't even require that he provide any proof or other information to justify his "determination." Kerry voted for that.

Discernment indeed, blm. Read the bloody bill. Bush followed it TO THE LETTER. Kerry broke ranks with the anti-war democrats and voted to give Bush the tools to do that, and then he justified his vote and the war repeatedly during his subsequent presidential campaign. All I ever hear from his supporters is "But that isn't what he meant" and other such nonsense. What Kerry says or said is meaningless-- his only action that counted, that produced real world consequences, was his vote in support of "the use of United States Armed Forces against Iraq."

to stand AGAINST Bush's DECISION to invade. And did so publicly while you and others joined in with the Rove squad to mock his efforts to further the position of the weapon inspectors.

That is the discernment you refused to make then and still do. Easier to lump them all together.

Later.

It doesn't have to be that way.

When it comes to almost any Kerry topic, when out of DUJK, some posters makes me think to schoolyard bullies followers kids.....really.

very strange how it seems sooooo fashionable to target Kerry for almost everything he states on.......

This has been litigated to death. In fact, in 2007, on the floor of the Senate, there was a comment by Joe Biden speaking of Kerry on Iraq - and his comment was that Kerry consistently said the same thing -- from his speech before the vote to his actions trying to get the Congress to demand a dead line for Iraq and move to get out - aka Kerry/Feingold. The fact is that Biden, who wrote Biden/Lugar the resolution that both Kerry and HOWARD DEAN supported, was there - at the time - in the same position - and he knows more than either you or I could on what Kerry's (and his own) reasons were.

The members of the SFRC worked on that alternative resolution - but that was not the resolution put up to the vote. The summer before the vote, Kerry was a leader in arguing that Bush could not use the 2001 vote (that every Senator voted for) to attack Iraq. He, with other Democrats, argued that Bush needed to go to Congress and to go the UN. When Bush moved to do both, this group split - some voted against and some, like Biden and Kerry, argued that the vote could give Bush the leverage needed internationally to force Iraq to comply with invasive inspections. Another point, that Biden spoke of in the 2008 debates was that the sanctions on Iraq were likely to be dropped by many European countries. This made the timing of getting the inspections more compelling.

Kerry in 2005 and 2006, said both that his vote was wrong and that the war was immoral. The latter he had IMPLIED even in 2003 - before the war started - and throughout 2003 and 2004. He said in January 2003, that Bush should not rush to war and that he had not exhausted the diplomacy - and that it was not a war of last resort. For a Catholic, the definition of a just war includes that it must be a last resort. (In 2006, when Kerry spoke on religion and politics at Pepperdine University - he more directly referenced St Augustine -- while also using words that were exactly what he said in 2003/2004.)

The fact is that had the Congress passed the better written Biden/Lugar - Bush would STILL have taken the country to war.

It's purpose could not be much clearer.

I presume you've listened to the politicians trade doublespeak, but you haven't actually read the bill they voted on? It is quite short and to the point. Here's a link: http://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/pkg/PLAW-107publ243/html/PLAW-107publ243.htm

Talk is cheap, and none is cheaper than that of politicians trying to spin what they "really meant." Votes lead to actual consequences, like criminal wars of aggression.

I think the reason that Kerry should have voted no - given his speech, which would not have had to be significantly changed - other than the obvious mention of his decision to vote for it - he says there is not reason at that point to justify war. In fact, there was far less reason by March 2003 because by then the inspectors had been in and found nothing. The problem with a yes vote was that they should not have trusted Bush to follow the process he said he would. This would have been the same problem with any resolution - including Biden/Lugar.

The worst thing the vote did was it was used by Bush, who unilaterally made the decision in March, to claim the Democrats were for it too. In Kerry's case, he was one of the few who did speak out before Bush chose to go to war.

...I'll never forgive Kerry for his vote in support of the IWR. He might have changed his mind ten times over since then as events have proven that vote such a disaster, but he wasn't particularly quick with the mea culpas while he vigorously defended the war against Iraq during his presidential campaign.

Recall that 68% of the House democrats and 42% of the Senate dems voted AGAINST the resolution. Those voting against it in the senate included: Sens. Akaka (D-HI), Bingaman (D-NM), Boxer (D-CA), Byrd (D-WV), Conrad (D-ND), Corzine (D-NJ), Dayton (D-MN), Durbin (D-IL), Feingold (D-WI), Graham (D-FL), Inouye (D-HI), Kennedy (D-MA), Leahy (D-VT), Levin (D-MI), Mikulski (D-MD), Murray (D-WA), Reed (D-RI), Sarbanes (D-MD), Stabenow (D-MI), Wellstone (D-MN), and Wyden (D-OR).

Kerry (and Clinton, too) voted against their own party members to give Bush carte blanche for a war of aggression against a country that was never any threat to the U.S. Their subsequent moral contortions mean nothing, as far as I'm concerned. Let them justify their actions to their own consciences.

and he vigorously defended Bush's war decisions during his high profile book tour, while Kerry, the nominee at that point, was continuing his vigorous attacking of Bush's decision to invade and his military leadership.

And THAT is why you fail the discernment test, mike.

...of war against Iraq and his defense of his IWR vote: http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/fact-checker/wp/2013/09/10/kerrys-claim-that-he-opposed-bushs-invasion-of-iraq/

Many politicians have a tendency to look back at their past statements with rose-colored glasses. But given that Kerry has now twice in recent months made the claim that he opposed the war in Iraq, this is clearly not a case of a momentary slip-up.

For Kerry, the uncomfortable fact remains that he voted to authorize the use of force against Iraq, he believed the intelligence that Hussein had weapons of mass destruction and he said there was little choice but to launch an invasion to disarm him. Kerry may have been highly critical of Bush’s diplomatic efforts in advance of the invasion, but that is not the same thing as opposing the war when it started.

It’s time for the secretary to stop making this claim. In trying to make a distinction between his vote to authorize the war and his later dismay at how it turned out, Kerry earns Four Pinocchios.
Four Pinocchios

Follow the link, read the article. Then tell me he didn't receive those liar awards.

Here's another:

A strategy almost as old as political life. Works everywhere, in every campaign from every country.

...making that right wing support all the more important, don't you think?

If no Dems would have used this strategy, No Dem candidate would have been elected.

I know that it blows some people's minds to think that it could really be that simple, but that might just be it.

asking them.

hanging out on political blogs. There seem to be a far greater percentage on such blogs than in the general populace...

And they are THIN-SKINNED psychics, too!

into doing something stupid. I don't really have a huge issue with someone saying it, but I'd like to think the Secretary of State, the person who travels the world representing the US to foreign leaders, wouldn't resort to such childish tactics.

It seems clearly that sometimes, in a matter to be heard, you are by the force of thing, quite obliged to "lower yourself" in provocative behavious. That's how the system works.

and I did support him, and have supported him since.

That doesn't mean that I agree with everything he says. The "man-up" shit just seemed like a really uncouth way of expressing what the government wants Snowden to do (i.e. come back and face trial).

while speaking?

Thanks to you for this post.

The real reason is - He's a smart man talking stupid.

He's just entitled by marrying well.

Kerry wasn't always that wealthy, fisrt. Second: if he as you are inplying, were so interested in money, would not have left his lawyer job in the early 1980'ths to seek public office of Lt Gov. and then, Senator.

That remark proved it.

which means you aren't even qualified for the posting of comments.

So you aren't qualified to post comments. How stupid is that.

countries re: russia as the US continues its occupation of afghanistan.

Putin is soooo nice!!!! Proof? He almosts genocides Chechens. He wants to violate Ukraine sovereignty..... Yes, WHAT A WONDERFULL LEADER!!!!!!!!

People thought he was a fighter, that he honestly beat Bush, but he caved even faster than Gore did in Florida.