VIETNAM ALLUSION TK (Kerry took BOTH sides on Gulf War in letters to same constituent! ROTFL ALERT)

The New Republic (&c. Blog) ^ | 28 January 2004 | Noam Scheiber

[Stultis]

VIETNAM ALLUSION TK: Monday I dwelled a bit on one of John Kerry's many yet-to-be-exploited-but-blindingly-obvious vulnerabilities: his vote on the 1991 Gulf war. I noted in that post that the vote could be potentially devastating to Kerry, not so much because it portrays him as soft on national security, but because it makes him look like he takes whichever side of whatever issue happens to be most politically advantageous. (Or, as Mickey Kaus would have it, whichever side he thinks is most politically advantageous, however wrong he turns out to be.)

Turns out I was giving Kerry too much credit. Rather than take a side--albeit the one he thought was most expedient--Kerry actually stood on both sides of the first Gulf war, much like he did this time around. Consider this "Notebook" item from TNR's March 25, 1991 issue, which ran under the headline "Same Senator, Same Constituent":

"Thank you for contacting me to express your opposition ... to the early use of military force by the US against Iraq. I share your concerns. On January 11, I voted in favor of a resolution that would have insisted that economic sanctions be given more time to work and against a resolution giving the president the immediate authority to go to war."

--letter from Senator John Kerry to Wallace Carter of Newton Centre, Massachusetts, dated January 22 [1991]

"Thank you very much for contacting me to express your support for the actions of President Bush in response to the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait. From the outset of the invasion, I have strongly and unequivocally supported President Bush's response to the crisis and the policy goals he has established with our military deployment in the Persian Gulf."

--Senator Kerry to Wallace Carter, January 31 [1991]

Will someone PLEASE put this guy out of his misery? Please?

NOTE: Special thanks to TNR reporter-researcher Josh Benson for dredging up this item.

UPDATE: Ramesh Ponnuru was all over this story back in October of 2002. (As he points out, eerily self-consciously, what better evidence is there that conservatives will use this stuff against Kerry in the general election?)

[piasa]

bttt

[doug from upland]

This will be a great commercial.

[Ichneumon]

Bumparoo.