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Can John Kerry hold on to his lead? (Zumwalt:"virtually had to straight-jacket him ")
Taipai Times ^ | Feb 11, 2004,Page 9 | By W. Scott Thompson

Posted on 02/11/2004 7:08:43 PM PST by 11th_VA

Harold Wilson, that British politician more canny than admired, usefully reminded his audience that things can change very quickly in politics.

"A week is a long time," he said, in politics, and we have seen this over and over in the American scene these past months.

After all, only nine weeks ago former vice president Al Gore blessed the insurgent campaign of Howard Dean and most pundits thought the race was over. All that was needed was the anointing of the former Vermont governor as Democratic party standard-bearer to take on US President George W. Bush in November.

Overnight Senator John Kerry, whose campaign had almost imploded late last year, turned the race upside down by winning big in Iowa's caucuses and then the weeks following in New Hampshire, Missouri and other primaries -- not only showing he has the "Big Mo" (or momentum) essential for winning in America, but a hammerlock on the nomination.

Or so it looks. After all, Senator Joe Lieberman has withdrawn, Wesley Clark's hopes are forlorn and John Edwards is resting his case on a single win, in the state of his birth.

But can it happen again? Dean's hold looked airtight until folks actually went to the polls. He had money to burn and endorsements from across the country, and now he is barely maintaining viability as a serious candidate. What could go wrong with Kerry's campaign at this point, and are there any implications for Asia?

Not a lot, but no one yet considers it over. The lanky and experienced Massachusetts senator has money to burn. No one wants to say it, but his wife's near billion-dollar fortune at the very least permits him to spend all his own, more modest, fortune to smooth his way. She can't shovel money directly into his campaign, but the mere fact of her fortune gives confidence to other contributors or lenders that they're backing a winner. He has seemingly unlimited self-confidence, despite many trip-ups in his long career.

But no senator has won the keys to the White House since John F. Kennedy.

There's a reason why senators don't tend to win. They've been on the record for too long on too many issues. There are too many interest groups they have had to cultivate and satiate to stay in politics. Sam Nunn, a powerful senator from Georgia who didn't even have to face serious re-election opposition, left the Senate in 1996 because he tired of spending his evenings entertaining his major supporters and running over to the Senate to vote. At the prime of life, he wanted to rediscover his family.

The real issue that Kerry must resolve is, however, character. Now that he is the front-runner, he must not only answer to all the charges of serving special interests that have risen and will still rise, he has to satisfy the public that he is, not to put too fine a point on it, an honorable man. There are questions.

Kerry has managed to straddle many issues and so it is difficult to discern his real beliefs -- other than in himself. He votes for the war in Iraq so he doesn't look "wet" and then votes against Pentagon budget rises, so he can please the liberal Democrats, who give him one of their highest ratings. When he looks at an acquaintance, he always seems to be looking just past, to see if someone more important lurks behind his interlocutor. Of course that's just standard politics. But people want something more.

He now makes much of his decorations from the war in Vietnam, to appeal to centrists and conservatives, without reminding those audiences that he for long was a leader of Vietnam veterans against the war. Indeed, assiduous searchers, looking for his vulnerabilities, will find much of interest in that period of his life.

For example, the fabled and distinguished chief of naval operations (CNO), Admiral Elmo Zumwalt, told me -- 30 years ago when he was still CNO -- that during his own command of US naval forces in Vietnam, just prior to his anointment as CNO, young Kerry had created great problems for him and the other top brass, by killing so many non-combatant civilians and going after other non-military targets.

"We had virtually to straight-jacket him to keep him under control," the admiral said. "Bud" Zumwalt got it right when he assessed Kerry as having large ambitions -- but promised that his career in Vietnam would haunt him if he were ever on the national stage.

It is that sort of thing that senators don't have to worry about. But if they become a front-runner for president, the whole ball-game changes. Their past is scrutinized with a fine-tooth comb. In Kerry's case, for example, he has shown precious little interest in Asia since his tour in Vietnam, and there is little doubt that he will follow the standard Democratic party, pro-Beijing, line. But every word he's ever spoken on it will be scrutinized.

That is why it is not only true that a week is a long time in politics. But, as they say in American politics, "It ain't over until the fat lady sings."

W. Scott Thompson is an adjunct professor at the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts University in Boston, and a former assistant secretary of state in the Reagan administration. He has visited Taipei eight times and now lives in Bali.


TOPICS: Front Page News; News/Current Events; Politics/Elections
KEYWORDS: 2004; johnkerry; kerry
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Interesting ...
1 posted on 02/11/2004 7:08:43 PM PST by 11th_VA
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To: 11th_VA
"We had virtually to straight-jacket him to keep him under control," the admiral said.

So, then: nothing's really changed, in other words... right? :)

2 posted on 02/11/2004 7:10:26 PM PST by KentTrappedInLiberalSeattle ("The Clintons have damaged our country. They have done it together, in unison." -- Peggy Noonan)
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To: KentTrappedInLiberalSeattle
It looks like Kerry is finally getting the beating he's been seeking. i see Joe Scarboro ran "the picture" and had a guest speaking about the newfound anger of vets.

The democrats were sadly mistaken in thinking that Kerry would be off limits as they attacked the presidents past.
3 posted on 02/11/2004 7:16:02 PM PST by cripplecreek (you win wars by making the other dumb SOB die for his country)
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To: 11th_VA
To John Kerry: 'Bring it On!' He spins so fast you can't tell who's on the seat.
4 posted on 02/11/2004 7:16:23 PM PST by txzman (Jer 23:29)
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To: 11th_VA
young Kerry had created great problems for him and the other top brass, by killing so many non-combatant civilians and going after other non-military targets. "We had virtually to straight-jacket him to keep him under control,"

Very interesting. How reliable is this?
5 posted on 02/11/2004 7:16:44 PM PST by Delphinium
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To: 11th_VA
young Kerry had created great problems for him and the other top brass, by killing so many non-combatant civilians and going after other non-military targets.

I don't understand how a swift boat commander could be offing so many civilians by himself. Maybe we should be checking Kerry's service record and talking to his commanders.

6 posted on 02/11/2004 7:17:08 PM PST by Mike Darancette (Bush Bot by choice)
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To: 11th_VA
Several members of the media are tooting John Freakin' Kerry's horn and that the President had better watch out for this accelerating jaugernaut!

This whole last year has been a major pollution of the airwaves by the buffoons "campaigning" for the DEMOCRAP nomination. Surprise, surprise, A DEMOCRAP WILL WIN THE DEMOCRAP NOMINATION! The entire exercise has been supported by the media (as though there was no other news) and the cost of these activities will NOT appear on any of the Financial Disclosure Statements filed with the FEC (Senator Mc Lame please take note!).
7 posted on 02/11/2004 7:18:44 PM PST by leprechaun9 (Beware of little expenses because a small leak will sink a great ship!)
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To: 11th_VA
I thought it was Nebraska Sen Bob Kerry who whacked a whole bunch of civvies during his tour. Are they talking about the right Kerry when referring to the Zumwalt quote?
8 posted on 02/11/2004 7:20:50 PM PST by SBprone
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To: 11th_VA
Unfortunately Zumwalt is dead.
9 posted on 02/11/2004 7:22:01 PM PST by js1138
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To: 11th_VA
If Lt Calley had been a Boston left wing blueblood, instead of a good ole boy from Georgia, he wouldn't have gone to prison, he would have gone to the US Senate.
10 posted on 02/11/2004 7:22:48 PM PST by Chris Talk (What Earth now is, Mars once was. What Mars now is, Earth will become.)
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To: leprechaun9
Did you listen to Rush today about the media being on the Kerry bandwagon? I cracked up when he talked about Kerry winning a DemocRAT primary in the south. Your post reminded me of that fact -- big surprise.

You are so right -- McLame needs to take note!

11 posted on 02/11/2004 7:25:14 PM PST by PhiKapMom (AOII Mom -- Support Bush-Cheney '04)
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To: Mike Darancette
>>>do you like your Mini? They are the coolest little things! (I've rented them before. Just wondered about maintenance.) <<<

Maybe this is why he make that rant in congress about "his fellow vets" killing and brutalizing civilians and cutting ears off and raping and pillaging.....maybe he was talking about himself.

Maybe Kerry was a one man MaiLai!

Vote Kerry, and you'll get Kofi as Sec Def!

12 posted on 02/11/2004 7:25:49 PM PST by HardStarboard (Dump Wesley Clark.....he worries me as much as Hillary!)
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To: 11th_VA
Very interesting. I vote to leave it alone until JFK gets the nomination.
13 posted on 02/11/2004 7:26:29 PM PST by There's millions of'em (John F. Kerry: a decorated VN war criminal.....)
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To: SBprone
Are they talking about the right Kerry when referring to the Zumwalt quote?

That sure would be embarrassing after writing this story.

14 posted on 02/11/2004 7:27:42 PM PST by 11th_VA
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To: 11th_VA
" Admiral Elmo Zumwalt, told me -- 30 years ago when he was still CNO -- that during his own command of US naval forces in Vietnam, just prior to his anointment as CNO, young Kerry had created great problems for him and the other top brass, by killing so many non-combatant civilians and going after other non-military targets."

I'll bet the farm that you won't see THAT in the New York Times, or on CNNABCMSNBCCBS....

Perhaps Kerry's complaints of war crimes -- was his own self admission, then like a true Democrat pushing the blame on to "Everybody was doing it".....

This %$#%^$## has to go down...

Semper Fi

15 posted on 02/11/2004 7:29:59 PM PST by river rat (Militant Islam is a cult, flirting with extinction)
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To: Mike Darancette
"I don't understand how a swift boat commander could be offing so many civilians by himself. Maybe we should be checking Kerry's service record and talking to his commanders."

Caution is indicated. And research required before proceeding further.

But the fact that Kerry has openly accused others of these same charges serves as a certain kind of corroboration. Liberal Democrats excel at accusing others of what they themselves have done.

16 posted on 02/11/2004 7:30:27 PM PST by okie01 (www.ArmorforCongress.com...because Congress isn't for the morally halt and the mentally lame.)
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To: 11th_VA
Kerry had created great problems for him and the other top brass, by killing so many non-combatant civilians and going after other non-military targets.

I am willing to bet money that, in the unlikely event this ever make it into the mainstream press, it will be brushed over with the ease Clinton shrugged of Gennifer Flowers in 1992.

Kerry's lapdogs in the press will pass it off as either (a)youthful indiscretions or (b)paint him as a traumatized victim whose environment in an immoral war forced him to act that way-- which is why he went overboard as Hanoi Jane's lapdog in denouncing the war after he was discharged. If forced to choose which, I'd pick (b) because it kills two birds with one stone.

I'd rather see Kerry being the nominee than that oleaginous John Edwards.

17 posted on 02/11/2004 7:30:42 PM PST by Vigilanteman
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To: 11th_VA
"young Kerry had created great problems for him and the other top brass, by killing so many non-combatant civilians and going after other non-military targets."

John Kerry's My Lai?

18 posted on 02/11/2004 7:31:13 PM PST by Uncle Miltie (Mullahs swinging from lamp posts.....)
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To: 11th_VA
save
19 posted on 02/11/2004 7:31:25 PM PST by Jackson Brown
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To: 11th_VA
Since the story is about John Kerry i assume thats exactly who Zumwalt was speaking of. Also the odds of both men being in the same branch under the command of Zumwalt and then ending up in the senate seems pretty low.

Keep in mind, im not speaking from military experience.
20 posted on 02/11/2004 7:33:42 PM PST by cripplecreek (you win wars by making the other dumb SOB die for his country)
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