Monday, August 18, 2008
John Kerry as Barack Obama's foil
Barack Obama took off the gloves yesterday, pounding away at John McCain and claiming that Republicans were going to smear their way to the presidency. This bit, though, seemed like poor salesmanship:
Obama added, "They say this other guy is unpatriotic, or this guy likes French people. That's what they said about Kerry," referring to the 2004 Democratic nominee who lost narrowly to Bush. "They try to make it out like Democrats aren't tough enough, aren't macho enough. It's the same strategy."
Why does Obama keep bringing up the Kerry campaign? The Democrats want you to believe that Republicans launched some sort of sophisticated smear campaign, but the ugly truth was this: During his short tour in Vietnam and his resulting career as an anti-war activist, John Kerry made a lot of enemies among veterans of that war and said a lot of things that were, in fact, unpatriotic. Democrats who came of age during roughly 1967 - 1975 and who then espoused what were very left-wing opinions (and in some cases committed crimes) want the rest of us to give them a big life mulligan. See, for instance, Barack Obama's radical friends Bill Ayers and Bernadine Dohrn. Unfortunately, that does not work. It was fair to paint Kerry as unpatriotic because, during that era, he was unpatriotic, and all you have to do is watch the Winter Soldier hearings to know it. In fact, all you had to do was run the devestating tapes of the youthful Kerry's bloviations about Vietnam and the damage was done.+
Of course, Republicans did not attack Kerry on this basis in a vacuum. Kerry ran for president on his putative record for military heroism -- remember "reporting for duty"? One cannot "winter soldier" your way to fame in one decade and then run for president as a pro-military tough guy in another. If you want to run for president you have to plan for it your entire life, as Barack Obama well knows.
As for the French thing, it was not that John Kerry "likes" French people. There's nothing wrong with that -- I like French people. It was that he looks French.* Which he does. And even that would not have been a political problem if he had dealt with it in some amusing way. But instead he blurted out some really stupid shit to avoid any association with France, and that made him look really weird. See, e.g., this gut-busting exchange in which Kerry claimed he "hated" Evian bottled water. Seriously? He hates it? Who hates a particular brand of bottled water that tastes just like every other brand? A freaking weirdo, that's who.
John Kerry lost because he is an unattractive person who was easily damned by his own words and who ran an incompetent campaign besides. His example is hardly evidence that Republicans are any more inclined to dirty pool than Democrats.
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+Kerry was very effective in his testimony, and there was certainly some merit to his position. As we have learned all over again, it takes extraordinary discipline to wage a counterinsurgency without doing damage to innocent people, largely because insurgencies try to provoke atrocities. But even if you agree that Kerry's position was truthful (a point of violent disagreement), it is much harder to position it as patriotic.
*I'm going to go out on a limb and say that nobody is going to suggest that Barack Obama looks Kenyan, so at least he does not have that to worry about.
5 Comments:
By 
, at
Mon Aug 18, 10:29:00 AM:
Kerry's campaign was very much like Obama's. Both, want the voters to not look at broad portions of the background and accept the candidate's characterization as factual and final.
Kerry was rejected by Harvard Law School because of (I believe) issues related to his military service. Kerry has never released details of his military file or explained the forgeries in the documents that he has released.
Obama wants us to accept all sorts of things. He refuses to release his medical records, his undergraduate thesis and a true copy of his birth certificate. Obama cites the Kerry campaign so frequently because he wants lie to America just as Kerry did.
By , at
Mon Aug 18, 12:39:00 PM:
Many people now wish they had voted for Senator Kerry rather than the George Bush. People were devistated when he lost by a slight margin and even that is questionable given the antics and disenfranchisment in Ohio and elsewhere. Senator Kerry ran a tought campaign against and president presideing over a made to order war. Kerry came closer than any candidate in our history to unseating a war time president. And, much of what he said about the war, Bush and this country has come to past. Kerry is a visionary and a true patriot. It is easy to say and do nothing when faced with tough choices, but Kerry had always taken the honest and hard road. He is a decorated vetaran, war hero and ture patriot whether you like it or not. Far from being a "weirdo" he is a compastionate, caring dedicated public servant. He would have made a damn good president, more so than the fool people like yourself supported and voted for to the detriment of our country and its people. Your lies, childish references and idiotic comparisons and simplton accusations worked to keep a good man out of the White House. You are the one who is not a patriot.
By 
Dawnfire82, at
Mon Aug 18, 01:58:00 PM:
*laughter*
Repeat vote fore disallowing anonymous comments...
By joated, at
Mon Aug 18, 02:45:00 PM:
Anonymous at #2 above is a hoot! He/she/it is a riot.
As for your origial post:
"John Kerry lost because he is an unattractive person who was easily damned by his own words and who ran an incompetent campaign besides."
So far I see Barack Obama and his horde of 300 + advisors as two for three...although, I hasten to add, I do not find him terribly attractive and would, therefore give him a perfect 3 for 3. Wrong gender for me and Michjelle is NOT attractive. Much prefer Mrs. McCain who is attractive as all get out. The beer thing is a bonus.
By JPMcT, at
Mon Aug 18, 07:17:00 PM:
Looks like we have finally found a true Kerry supporter. It sounds like Anonymous got to spend a little time with Genghis over a little bris at the club.
As I recall, the 'decorated" veteran got his medals for the equivalent of a papercut and threw them away an an anti-war rally...easy come, easy go, as they say.
Seriously, people imply that Kerry and Obama are unpatriotic because....well...they ARE! Both are public figures with well manicured images who stray from the teleprompter at their peril.
