It occurs to me that the Kerry's “global test” is not about why or how we've gone to war. A history of Kerry votes in favor of the use of force comes down to two. The first was in Bosnia in 1995, the second in Iraq 2003. In his Senate career there has been only one president of Kerry's own party, Bill Clinton. When Clinton proposed action in Bosnia, Kerry supported him. In all instances except one, when a Republican was in the White House, Kerry opposed the use of military force. And even in the case of the one – Iraq – Kerry was really opposed. It just wasn’t in his political interest to say so.
Instead, while rattling off a laundry list of conditions under on which he would predicate his support, he voted in favor, making it clear in his speech from the floor, that he would protest as soon as the President strayed from the conditions he laid down. Opportunity knocked quickly. France would not join the coalition, therefore the coalition was fraudulent. On that pretext Kerry reverted to classic protest form, and once again he began to speak “truth to power”.
But the truth he spoke seemed to come straight from Mainstream Media. He claimed he was misled about WMD, and this was MM’s rallying cry. He took it up and he kicked that dead horse until the 9/11 Commission announced its conclusion: The intelligence was flawed, but it was neither pressured nor misrepresented. Next the headlines in the press trumpeted “no connection between Iraq and al Qaeda.” That became part of the Kerry-Edwards game plan, but recently that plan has had to undergo modification. The 9/11 Commission said yes, there were Al Qaeda connections to Iraq, and lots of them. Now the “no connection” line has morphed from no connection between Iraq and al Qaeda to no connection between Iraq and 9/11.
Positions come and positions go, but Kerry is constant in his towering and unrelenting ambition. When a Democrat lived in the White House, the presidency was out of reach and there was nothing to be gained by attack. He supported the use of force in Kosovo and talked very tough about Saddam, even going so far as to vote to make regime change in Iraq a national policy. But that was then and this is now. Now there's a Republican administration, and that presented opportunity for advancement, so his positions shifted accordingly. Now it seems regime change in Iraq wasn't such a great idea after all. Positions taken solely for political advantage often appear to make no sense from a policy standpoint. That's because they don't make any sense from a policy standpoint. Consider his votes for then against the $87 billion to support the troops in Iraq. They make sense only when measured for their anticipated effect on a left wing constituency. Didn’t the Vice President put it well?
Kerry attacks well, and now that he’s free to attack again, he takes whatever appears to be a promising line, and if things change and his line turns sour, no matter Lord Kerry will adjust his attacks. What doesn’t change is the ambition. In all instances he has one objective and one objective only. Advance Kerry. That’s the “global test”. Will it advance Kerry.
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