Keeping up with the Kerry blog

QandO ^ | March 16, 2004 | Jon Henke

[optimistically_conservative]

More blatant misrepresentations at the Kerry blog. I'll discuss a few, for posterities sake....

In a post titled: STATEMENTS MADE BY BUSH ADMINISRATION WHICH PROVED FALSE, the Kerry blog writes...

2. There was “no doubt” Iraq had “reconstituted” nuclear weapons and other weapons of mass destruction

As discussed yesterday, the administration didn't claim Iraq had "reconstituted nuclear weapons".....the quote Kerry refers to is a mis-speak, which when viewed in context, was clearly a reference to a "program", not a weapon.

In fact, I'd argue that nobody has done more to tell the American people of an Iraqi nuclear "weapon" than the administration critics, who constantly unearth this quote while leaving context buried. The Kerry campaign knows better, but they're guilty of doing the same thing they accuse the Bush administration of doing....they "will say anything or do anything to achieve their political ends".

3. Iraq was an “imminent” or “uniquely urgent” threat to the U.S.

We all know by now that the administration never said it was an imminent threat. Spinsanity dealt with this.

5. Telling the American people in the State of the Union that Iraq had gotten nuclear material from Africa.

Lie. No exuses, that's a willful and intentional lie. In fact, the quote is: "The British government has learned that Saddam Hussein recently sought significant quantities of uranium from Africa."

Kerry knows as well as any of us the difference between "sought" and "had gotten".

6. That an operational tie existed between Al Qaeda and Iraq

Specifically, the claim was that "Saddam Hussein aids and protects terrorists, including members of al Qaeda". Kerry moves the line between the "links" that were claimd and virtually everybody concedes existed between Iraq and Al Qaeda....and actual "operational ties", which were speculated, but not claimed.

10. Bush said that Iraq’s possessed missiles posed as serious threat to U.S. allies in the Middle and Near East, but UN weapons inspectors found that the missiles Iraq possessed could travel less than 200 miles.

Here's a partial list of our (to one degree or another) allies within 200 miles of Iraq: Turkey; Kuwait; Saudi Arabia. Israel would be close to that line.

11. Brookings Institution Fellow Ivo Daalder said that assertions made by Bush administration officials that the coalition of the willing (2003 coalition of countries supporting the war in Iraq) was larger than the coalition in the 1991 war “a bald-faced lie.” Daalder, a former Clinton administration official, said, “Even our great allies Spain, Italy and Bulgaria are not providing troops.”

The 1991 coalition included 32 nations. The current Iraqi coalition numbers 49 nations. The remark about Spain and Italy not providing soldiers is especially tactless, considering the Spanish and Italian soldiers who have lost their lives in Iraq.

But John Kerry says Bush lied, and John Kerry is an honorable man. Right?

[optimistically_conservative]

Worth bookmarking?

I'm fascinated how the lies and exaggerations about the Bush administration's carefully worded rhetoric concerning an uncooperative reality becomes the accepted view and is reported as fact in the press.