There they go

[erikred]

I watched the debate tonight and came away thinking that Kerry had done a good job of defining his position and pointing out glaring errors in Bush's policies. I thought that Bush did a fine job of hitting his talking points, but since they mostly centered on Kerry's inability to define himself, they sounded pretty flat to me.

Now how the heck, I thought, will the GOP spin this into a victory? The answer? Easily!

I just watched Rudolph Giuliani on the Daily Show, and he stated, verbatim, the same talking points Bush spoke during the debate. The GOP's strategy? Pretend the debates never happened, and just keep hitting those talking points. If they say it's so enough times, maybe the American people will buy it! What the hell, it's been working so far.

Comments

[therobbergirl.livejournal.com]

Cuz of course people can't actually agree with them! ;)

[erikred.livejournal.com]

Sure, people can agree with them all they want; it happens all the time. The difference is that usually there's at least some modicum of truth to agree with. This time around, agreeing with them means ignoring everything that was said during the debate.

If I tell you that the guy over there (yeah, him) is named Bob, and you buy it, that's fine. If the guy over there then comes over and shows us a driver's license that identifies him as Ben, but I continue to insist that his name is Bob, you're welcome to agree with me, but I'd hope you'd be doing so because you think I'm making a joke, not because I'm making a valid point based on any real evidence.

Bush says that Kerry is a flip-flopper because Kerry said Saddam Hussein was a threat, that he voted to give the Pres. war powers, and that he now says he didn't support the war in Iraq; Kerry said last night that he did say Saddam Hussein was a threat, that he did vote to give the Pres. war powers (on the condition that the Pres. would build a strong coalition, would plan the war carefully, and would only go to war as a last resort), and that he now says that since the Pres. did not build a strong coalition, did not plan the war carefully, and did not exhaust all other avenues before going to war, he did not support the way the Pres. ran the war in Iraq.

People are free to agree with Bush that Kerry flip-flopped on the war; the mental acrobatics they'll have to do to ignore what Kerry said in the debate, however, are stupendous.

[tagryn]

"on the condition that the Pres. would build a strong coalition, would plan the war carefully, and would only go to war as a last resort"

Maybe that's what Kerry thought he was voting for, but that's not what
the actual resolution was.

I personally found Kerry's proposals about giving Iran nuclear material and abandoning multilateral talks with NK much more disturbing. The former makes it seem like Kerry places much more faith in sanctions as a deterrent than recent history in NK/Serbia/Iraq shows they merit, and the latter would leave the Chinese and Russians off the hook in their responsibility to help us resolve the NK problem, and would probably result in the very kind of unilateral action which so many anti-Bush folks abhor right now.

[erikred.livejournal.com]

According to Kerry and other Democrats, the White House assured them that an invasion of Iraq would only take place after the President built a strong coalition, planned the war carefully, and exhausted all other means to peacefully resolve the situation. That the resolution does not reflect these assurances by the White House is not surprising; that the President went ahead with the invasion without satisfying the conditions his White House laid out to gain support for this resolution is simply disappointing.

Also:

(b) PRESIDENTIAL DETERMINATION- In connection with the exercise of the authority granted in subsection (a) to use force the President shall, prior to such exercise or as soon thereafter as may be feasible, but no later than 48 hours after exercising such authority, make available to the Speaker of the House of Representatives and the President pro tempore of the Senate his determination that
(1) reliance by the United States on further diplomatic or other peaceful means alone either (A) will not adequately protect the national security of the United States against the continuing threat posed by Iraq or (B) is not likely to lead to enforcement of all relevant United Nations Security Council resolutions regarding Iraq; and
(2) acting pursuant to this resolution is consistent with the United States and other countries continuing to take the necessary actions against international terrorists and terrorist organizations, including those nations, organizations or persons who planned, authorized, committed or aided the terrorists attacks that occurred on September 11, 2001.

The implication is that the use of force will hinge on the absolute failure of diplomatic or other peaceful means; by invading before the inspectors were allowed to complete (or at least make a decent stab at completing) their inspection, the President demonstrated an unwillingness to see whether peaceful means would have succeeded in keeping Iraq disarmed.

I agree with you insofar as I'm not a fan of giving nuclear material to Iran. As for the other point, bear in mind that Kerry has proposed starting bilateral negotiations with North Korea while maintaining multilateral negotiations between NK and its neighbors. The President's policy of benign neglect toward North Korea has done nothing to further NK's disarmament. Opening a direct line of communication between Pyongyang and Washington does not mean we can't shut that door if NK becomes unreasonable.

As for unilateral action along the lines of Iraq against North Korea, we really do like the people of Seoul too much to even consider this an actual option.

[tagryn]

- Apparently Iran has said this week that they're not interested in being given nuclear fuel. Maybe this is for national prestige reasons, but it sure doesn't reassure anyone that they're not interested in the Bomb. We'll see if the EU's preferred approach of negotiation and engagement can succeed in preventing Iranian proliferation, but it isn't looking good.

- My read on how the situation has developed is that the Chinese will be all too happy to be off the hook for taking responsibility for NK, and the minute we move towards bilateral talks, China is going to bail. Getting them back if we need to return to the multilateral route may not be easy, or possible, since their interpretation of bilateral talks may well be "well, you agreed that this is a problem between you and Pyongyang, so solve it."
I'm also not sure what bilateral talks will accomplish, since we tried that route with the 1994 Agreed Framework, which has apparently failed in its primary purpose of preventing North Korean proliferation. Without Chinese pressure, I don't see how we could enforce NKorean compliance any better than we did during the '90s.

- The average South Korean apparently believes that North Korea is not a threat to them, and that the U.S. is the real problem. There is a cynical side to me that wants to see us just withdraw totally from SK and let them rely on Kim Jong Il's good will, but we aren't contrary enough to do that. Well, yet, anyway.