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Conservatives For Kerry
The Intellectual Conservative ^ | June 2, 2004 | David Vance

Posted on 10/05/2004 7:42:14 AM PDT by Taft in '52

Conservatives for Kerry

by David Vance
2 June 2004

Several prominent British conservatives are joining up to help John Kerry beat President Bush in November.

There's a very pertinent old British press nostrum that begins:
You cannot hope to bribe or twist, thank God! The British journalist. But, seeing what the man will do unbribed, there’s no occasion to!

At this time of sustained liberal media attack on the Bush administration, which rather like the threat from Al Queda is likely to increase in the months ahead, it is informative to read what prominent British conservatives have to say on the outcome of this year’s election.

Frank Johnson, a former editor of the conservative UK Spectator, spells out where he stands on the matter in his weekly column 29th May;

We British Tories who believe that in the best interests of Britain -- and Toryism -- it would be good if Senator Kerry defeated President Bush look forward to the neoconservative and Republican right denunciation of a Kerry administration. Then we can accuse them of anti-Americanism.

Johnson is not alone in what he thinks.

Sir Max Hastings, a former editor of the conservative Daily Telegraph, penned a recent column entitled "I hate George Bush" (upfront if nothing else!). Sir Max denounced American conservatives as "lunatics" and proclaimed that "every single bleak forecast about their follies has been fulfilled." To back up these vicious arguments, Sir Max declared that America is a land of gun-toting religious zealots; that the Bush administration thinks that democracy can be marketed in the same way as Enron shares. He then urged his readers to pray for John Kerry's victory in November!

This new phenomenon of British conservatives joining up to help Kerry beat President Bush is not limited to the predictable spineless media elite. (One must remember that sixty years ago the British media joyfully endorsed Chamberlain’s appeasement of Hitler.)

Conservative MP Alan Duncan has said he is prepared to work for the Democrat campaign of John Kerry to prevent a second Bush term in the White House. This British Conservative “constitutional affairs” spokesman says he feels that Neo-Conservatives such as Defense secretary Mr Rumsfeld are making the world a "more dangerous place" because of the way they are dealing with the threat from international terrorism.

Meanwhile another Tory MP, Simon Burns, said he too supports Mr Kerry's bid to win power. "I am probably a bit of an aberration in the Conservative Party in that I have always identified with the Democrats, but there may be a shift of emphasis going on in our attitude to the current administration."

Earlier this year, George Osborne, a Conservative member of Parliament, took a straw poll of legislators from his party. The subject was President Bush. The results were not pretty. "George Bush scares the hell out of me," one Tory said, according to an article by Mr. Osborne. Another told him: "Bush is a man who might wail at the moon. I don't feel comfortable with him." A third said that while he would vote for Bush in November if he could, "I think Anglo-American relations would be better if Kerry won." This was long before the liberal feeding frenzy over Abu Ghraib. And the people Mr. Osborne polled were all Conservatives, by tradition and temperament the Republican Party's natural friends across the Atlantic.

In Britain, America's staunchest ally in the war in Iraq, a poll of 1,007 people taken last month for The Times of London by the British polling company Populus found support for Senator John Kerry over President Bush by a margin of 56 to 22 percent. The Express, a British tabloid, for instance, ridiculed Mr. Bush's news conference last month in an article titled, "The President's Brain Is Missing," saying his performance had revealed him as a "bumbling embarrassment." The Daily Mail, another right-wing UK conservative newspaper, has also joined in the attacks on the US administration.

All of this is profoundly disturbing to those British conservatives who realize that George Bush’s cause is our cause. Defeating the Jihadists should unite all decent people. Al Queda wants to kill us all and so we must bring them to justice first. Our lives depend on this. It is all about right triumphing over wrong and our future liberty depends on us comprehensively winning this war on militant Islamic terror.

Each of those British “conservatives” who now cheer-lead for Senator Kerry brings dishonor on their once proud Party led by political giants such as Winston Churchill and Margaret Thatcher. Both those distinguished conservatives understood the value of standing by the United States in times of crisis. Sir Winston Churchill got it right when he said, "To have the United States at our side was to me the greatest joy. Now at this very moment I knew the United States was in the war, up to the neck and in to the death.”

Times change and this is the time for the United Kingdom to be standing at the side of the United States by supporting war leader George W. Bush. Alas, those wretched Lilliputians in the contemporary British Conservative Party who salivate at the prospect of the amelioration of US military power and the subjugation of US sovereignty to the corrupt United Nations, are unfit to even call themselves conservatives.

David Vance is a UK-based political commentator. Having previously been the Deputy Leader of the UK Unionist Party, he decided it is better to be outside the tent peering in! His web site is A TANGLED WEB (http://www.atangledweb.blogspot.com).



TOPICS: News/Current Events; Philosophy; Politics/Elections; United Kingdom
KEYWORDS: conservativeparty; kerry; toryparty; unitedkingdom
I sure hope these "conservatives" are a tiny minority.
1 posted on 10/05/2004 7:42:14 AM PDT by Taft in '52
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To: Taft in '52

Title should include "British Conservatives".....


2 posted on 10/05/2004 7:44:11 AM PDT by b4its2late (John John Kerry Edwards change positions more often than a Nevada prostitute!!!)
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To: b4its2late

You would have to be insane to think a British Conservative could vote for F'n.


3 posted on 10/05/2004 7:46:22 AM PDT by Patrick1
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Comment #4 Removed by Moderator

Comment #5 Removed by Moderator

To: Taft in '52

Wow I didn't KNOW that Brits could vote here?


6 posted on 10/05/2004 7:51:34 AM PDT by funkywbr
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To: Taft in '52

This is VERY funny!

Similar groups:

Red Sox's Fans 4 Yankees

U. of TN students 4 the Gators

Pro-Lifer's 4 Daschle

Vegetarians 4 Thick Burgers


7 posted on 10/05/2004 7:58:06 AM PDT by j_k_l
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To: Taft in '52

with "friends" like these...


8 posted on 10/05/2004 8:00:48 AM PDT by xp38
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To: Patrick1

It appears that there are some insane British Conservatives then....


9 posted on 10/05/2004 8:09:41 AM PDT by b4its2late (John John Kerry Edwards change positions more often than a Nevada prostitute!!!)
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To: Taft in '52

They aren't conservatives.

They may be in a once conservative Party, but that doesn't make them conservative anymore than it it makes the Libs in our Republican Party conservative.


10 posted on 10/05/2004 8:10:18 AM PDT by Soul Seeker
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To: Taft in '52

That's like "Turkeys For The Axeman".


11 posted on 10/05/2004 8:12:36 AM PDT by RichInOC (Bring Maggie back.)
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To: b4its2late
It appears that there are some insane British Conservatives then....

Yes, I fear that there are, however most I have spoken to even if they are not firmly behind the President realise what a disaster Sen. Kerry would be. I think that much of the problem is that the Senator sounds good; given our adversarial parliamentary system, we are used to an incredibly high standard of rhetoric (watching the Prime Minister locking horns with Michael Howard demonstrates this), and it is undeniable that Sen. Kerry can sound better; those who watch closely (such as the British FReepers) can see that whatever noises he makes, Kerry would be a disaster. I will also note, that it is likely that he would severely despress Anglo-American relations given his recent insults to us, and the other coallition nations.

Times change and this is the time for the United Kingdom to be standing at the side of the United States by supporting war leader George W. Bush. Alas, those wretched Lilliputians in the contemporary British Conservative Party who salivate at the prospect of the amelioration of US military power and the subjugation of US sovereignty to the corrupt United Nations, are unfit to even call themselves conservatives.

I could not agree with this paragraph more.
12 posted on 10/05/2004 9:01:45 AM PDT by tjwmason (Coerced and bribed window-dressing.)
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To: Taft in '52

"moronic oxes"


13 posted on 10/05/2004 9:03:12 AM PDT by stocksthatgoup
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