Support for Kerry speech - Tom hayden

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/tom-hayden/support-for-kerry-speech_b_9632.html

Support for Kerry speech

RESPONSE TO JOHN KERRY GEORGETOWN SPEECH THIS WEEK

I think the Kerry speech is a good step, especially in the context of the appalling silence of other Senate Democrats. It is an anti-war speech that contains a more detailed alternative than yet elaborated. It will not satisfy “out now" advocates but at least it says "out soon"�.
The defense of dissent as patriotic is a nice addition. The demand for 20,000 troops out by Christmas is excellent and will prevent Bush from taking total credit if it happens.

...

What has been proposed are "benchmarks"� for US senators. We should demand that the Democratic Senate bloc respond to the Kerry speech with their own ideas for an exit strategy, or sign on as supporters. I would hope that Sen. Kerry keeps giving and elaborating this speech as a year-long effort.

.

every Dem needs to offer up their own ideas on how to get the heck out of Iraq, they all need to talk about it, and then nned to do something ASAP! I think that would get a load of attention; as far as Kerry, I loved his speech and the idea of 20,000 troops out by Xmas would be a great start.

Whether he goes far enough as far as troop withdrawal is open to debate. However this is significant progress. I see the signs of a bit of spine forming. Finally! Kerry now joins Feingold in the Senate in calling for a pull-out. Now if only his Democratic colleagues like Clinton, Schumer, Biden, etc. would only see the light...

:kick:

When I was president of the College Democrats at my school in 2003, he sat down with us for two hours after he spoke about his book "Rebel".

He's a real American icon, IMO.

But he needs to learn how to do bullets and numbering in his HTML blog code.

Sorry.

Love the guy. Really. I mean it.

:kick:

Kerry or Hayden will not be sacrificed in this war. Yet, hundreds of US mothers and thousands of Iraqi mothers will grieve over their children who will be killed in the coming months because Democratic leaders, unlike the rank and file, refuse to fully repudiate this insane, illegal, immoral war.

Out now is the only sensible route.

...for this unjust war. He didn't hide behind "we were lied to." I never thought I'd hear those words from him or any of the Dems who voted for Bush's war.

But the situation is one of such egregious, thieving, traitorous behavior by the Bush junta--and utter lack of democracy, with Americans opposing every Bush policy, foreign and domestic, way up in the 60% to 70% range, for some two years now, and NO ONE IN WASHINGTON LISTENING TO US--that I CANNOT accept, and will not praise, any "benchmark" policy. I'm sure I'll have to swallow it. Neither my party nor my government cares the !@#$% what I or the vast majority of Americans think. They have Diebold and its SECRET, PROPRIETARY programming code to "select" whomever they want to rule over us.

I'm just saying--from my personal point of view, from my thoughts about the man--I'm glad he took some of the blame.

Gore is far, far, far tougher in his thinking. He called them on the torture, early on--raked them over the coals for it. That's what I want to hear: a politician on fire about the outrages of this junta.

good first step and that the conversation must continue.

Of course, we can all sit and expect it will happen, or we can push those who are proposing something to go farther.

You may want to listen more often to Kerry before you say he is not tough, though this is not a competition and we will be happy to have more than one politician that is tough. So I will settle for Gore and Kerry.

And it was the second time he made the demand, the first time was for sheer incompetence for his Iraq failures.

The media underplayed it, as they did most of Kerry's toughest attacks on BushInc during the campaign. What media didn't take the effort to lie about, they deliberately chose to ignore.

But, now, with the media focusing on very few Dems' words and then ignoring completely the toughest attacks of others, I don't see how Dems can even be compared for positions when there is no discussion of their actual positions that allows for analysis or effect afterwards.

I wonder if more Dems supported Kerry at the time he demanded Rumsfeld be fired over Abu Ghraib, if that would have had a greater impact on the media's discussion of it?

"I wonder if more Dems supported Kerry at the time he demanded Rumsfeld be fired over Abu Ghraib, if that would have had a greater impact on the media's discussion of it?"

It disturbs me to no end that Democrats don't occasionally get together and employ try that old political practice of "caucusing". Seems we have way too many Democrats doing their own thing and doing a pretty shitty job of it. It's great to be a free thinker and march to your own drum. But too many drummers out of synch just make a lot of noise. We need to try getting on a message for a change....the Republicans are just the opposite, you can't get them off message to think for themselves.

You'd think the guy that won the last election would garner a more cohesive support group to amp the message...