READ THIS BEFORE YOU VOTE..PLEASE

Kirby Wilbur KVI - Seattle - 570 AM read this op-ed Friday morning 10/15/04 on the program. The commentary is from Matthew Manweller, a political science professor at Central Washington University. Here's the text of that commentary:

"In that this will be my last comlumn before the presidential election, there will be no sarcasm, no attempts at witty repartee. The topic is too serious, and the stakes are too high.

This November we will vote in the only election during our lifetime that will truly matter. Because America is at a once-in-a-generation crossroads, more than an election hangs in the balance. Down one path lies retreat, abdication and a reign of ambivalence. Down the other lies a nation that is aware of its past and accepts the daunting obligation its future demands. If we choose poorly, the consequences will echo through the next 50 years of history. If we, in a spasm of frustration, turn out the current occupant of the White House, the message to the world and ourselves will be two-fold.

First, we will reject the notion that America can do big things. Once a nation that tamed a frontier, stood down the Nazis and stood upon the moon, we will announce to the world that bringing democracy to the Middle East is too big a task for us. But more significantly, we will signal to future presidents that as voters, we are unwilling to tackle difficult challenges, preferring caution to boldness, embracing the mediocrity that has characterized other civilizations. The defeat of President Bush will send a chilling message to future presidents who may need to make difficult, yet unpopular decisions. America has always been a nation that rises to the demands of history regardless of the decisions. America has always been a nation that rises to the demands of history regardless of the costs or appeal. If we turn away from that legacy, we turn away from who we are.

Second, we inform every terrorist organization on the globe that the lesson of Somalia was well learned. In Somalia we showed terrorists that you don't need to defeat America on the battlefield when you can defeat them in the newsroom. They learned that a wounded America can become a defeated America. Twenty-four hour news stations and daily tracing polls will do the heavy lifting, turning a cut into a fatal blow. Except that Iraq is Somalia times 10. The election of John Kerry will serve notice to every terrorist in every cave that the soft underbelly of American power is the timidity of American voters. Terrorists will know that a steady stream of grizzly photos for CNN is all you need to break the will of the American people. Our own self-doubt will take it from there. Bin Laden will recognize that he can topple any American administration without setting foot on the homeland.

It is said that America's WWII generation is its "greatest generation." But my greatest fear is that it will become known as America's "last generation." Born in the bleakness of the Great Depression and hardened in the fire of WWII, they may be the last American generation that understands the meaning of duty, honor, and sacrifice. It is difficult to admit, but I know these terms are spoken with only hollow detachment by many (but not all) in my generation. Too many citizens today mistake "living in America" as "being an American." But America has always been more of an idea than a place. When you sign on, you do more than buy real estate. You accept a set of values and responsibilities. This November, my generation, which has been absent too long, must grasp that 100 years from now historians will look back at the election of 2004 and see it as the decisive election of our century. Depending on the outcome, they will describe it as the moment America joined the ranks of ordinary nations; or they will describe it as the moment the prodigal sons and daughters of the greatest generation accepted their burden as caretakers of the City on the Hill."

I did.

John Kerry's record indicates that the will take the troops out of Iraq.

John Kerry's [hereafter referred to as His] record indicates that he will confinskte all privately owned firearms in the United States.

His record indicates that he will deactivate most of the units which make up the Armed Forces.

His statements that are on record say that he will place the United States of America under the control of the United Nations.

His statements that are on public record indicate that he will appoint judges that will legalize every perverted sex act that a degenerate mind can imagine.

His statements indicate that he will either have Congress to enact a Hate Crimes law with a hate speech provision in order to persecute Christians. Failing that, he will go the same route via Executive Order[s]. Also he will revoke the Church's 501 c exepmtions.

His statements indicate that he will nationalize the medical profession thereby destroying the medical profession.

His statements have indicated that he will allow the drug companies to be bankrupted by frivolus lawsuits thereby destroying the medical research they are now doing.

I personally believe that while the election of John Kerry to the office of President will be the best thing that the deadbeats, perverts, degenerates, terrorists,dictatos. murderers and all haters of America could wish for.

The other side of the token is that it will be the worst thing that could happen to freedom loving decent people world wide.

There are two sides:1. The degenerates and perverts.
2. Decent, moral, freedom loving people.

Which side are you on?

Another DUer. How nice.

For one thing, this speech presumes that John Kerry will immediately pull up stakes in Iraq when he takes office. Kerry has made it clear that Iraq is too important a country strategically to pull out, absent a stable political infrastructure firmly in place.

He's also called it the "wrong war, at the wrong place, at the wrong time". Considering how many times he's flip-flopped on the matter, and how much of his support is dependent on the anti-war Democrats, as well as his own proclivities, he'll likely try to pull out of Iraq as soon as possible, win lose or draw.

The US cannot let Iraq drift into civil war or allow it to be annexed by Iran. That is Kerry's policy.

Was it Kerry's policy to let South Vietnam fall to North Vietnam? He certainly didn't seem to give a flying rip about North Vietnam winning there. Why would he care about an annexation by Iran, or Iraq falling into chaos?

Kerry would like other countries to share the pain and expense of containing the Iraq insurgency. It is realistic to believe that Kerry can get this cooperation

No it's not. France has already said no to troops, even if Kerry is elected President. And frankly, where are other countries supposed to get the troops, anyway? There's a reason the US is the worlds ONLY super-power. Those troops we see in Iraq from other countries like the UK and Italy are pretty much all they CAN send. Aside from the US, there aren't a whole lot of military powers in the world, at least ones that are capable of transporting and supplying a respectable body of troops to Iraq.

since "old Europe" knows that the US was led into an attack on Iraq--virtually alone-- by the arrogance and deceit of President Bush and his top advisors.

So did he fool Clinton, Kerry, and congressional Democrats in 1998, when they all said the SAME EXACT THINGS that Bush has been saying about Iraq? Hell, they even put it in harsher terms, calling Iraq an imminent threat, something which Bush has never done.

They feel that Bush cannot be let off the hook for his truly irresponsible behavior as the leader of the world's only super-power.

Either that or it was IN THEIR INTEREST to leave Saddam in place, and it's NOT in their interest to see a democracy flourish there, or for the US to succeed. Oil For Food, anyone?

This speech also presumes that the US attacked Iraq in order to spread Democracy in the Middle East. That is NOT why we attacked Iraq. The Iraq War was sold to the American people as a pre-emptive attack against a country that was just about to attack us. We were told that Iraq posed an imminent threat

That's a bald-faced LIE! Bush never ONCE said Iraq was an imminent threat. In fact, he said the exact OPPOSITE! He said that we SHOULDN'T wait til Iraq was an imminent threat, because by then it would be to late. The ONLY ones who've ever labelled Iraq as an Imminent Threat have been Clinton, Kerry and Congressional Democrats in 1998.

And yes, Iraq WAS about spreading democracy, as well as WMD's. Bush has made COUNTLESS speeches on the subject, that a free Iraq would help lead to the spread of democracy in the Middle East. You'd have to either be living under a rock, or be dissembling the truth, to say such a thing.

Iraq never attacked us, and it was likely never going to attack us.

Do you know this for a fact? Hell, couldn't the same be said of Afghanistan? Not like the Taliban had the means to invade the US. The key issue comes in terms of support. To say that Saddam Hussein wasn't an enemy is like saying that the Soviet Union wasn't an enemy. Saddam hated the US and would've loved to have been able to strike at us. It's not a stretch to consider that whatever weapons he developed, he would've passed on to al-Qaeda in a roundabout way of attacking the US.

We had to try to bribe Turkey--Iraq's next door neighbor-- billions of dollars just to let us cross their territory so that we could carry out a land assault on Iraq from the north. The bidding got up to $26 billion in aid, and Turkey still said no. Turkey didn't seem too afraid of Iraq-- why should the US have been so frightened when it is half a world away.

The vote failed by only a couple of votes, interestingly enough, with the Turkish liberals voting against it. What a thing, huh? Besides, they were concerned about retaliation from Saddam with whatever WMD's he may have possessed. It's OUT of fear that they didn't help, not because they thought there was nothing to be afraid of.

Many Bush insiders have spoken of the administration's active plans to depose Saddam and take over Iraq-- long before 9/11/01. Many people believe (me included) that 9/11 was just a convenient excuse to get into Iraq.

You're a DU troll, so that's to be expected.

Bush and Co. were banking on the probability that average Americans wouldn't try too hard to distinguish between Middle Eastern countries; that there is a difference between Afghanistan (which was actually harboring 9/11 terrorists, hence legitimately attacked by the US) and Iraq (which had NO CONNECTION with 9/11).

This is a War on Terror. That stretches beyond the borders of Afghanistan. You think the War on Terror will be won by just bombing Afghanistan further into the Stone Age and calling it a day?

Advisors like Perle and Wolfowitz really thought Iraq was going to be a cake-walk. Advisors like Rove thought that Iraq could be a great, feel-good vehicle to a second term.

Riiiggghhhttt. What I wouldn't give for a roll-eyes Emoticon right now. They just went to war with Iraq for an election issue. Give me a break.

Our soldiers are under attack in Iraq now because we invaded a sovereign nation.

They're under attack because it's easier for terrorists to go to Iraq and attack our soldiers, there, then it is to get into the US. Or are you denying that there's an al-Qaeda presence there? Yeah, there're Iraqis, too, but you know what? There was a German insurgency after World War II, too, because we "invaded a sovereign nation". Does that mean, then, that we never should have gone to war with Germany in the first place?

I wish to God we weren't there, and I do not feel like endorsing--with my vote-- the administration that created this disaster. It will be a long time before we dig our way out of this one.

There's no need to "dig" our way out of anything. It's not all peaches and cream in Iraq, but neither are we staring at utter defeat. We're making headway every day, and one day Iraq WILL have a military and police force capable of dealing with whatever's left of the insurgency on its own, with an elected government to oversee it. That's certainly a better proposition than a goverment under Saddam Hussein, continuing to tortue and murder his own people by the thousands, and working to develop weapons which he could've potentially shared with terrorists in a bid to strike at the US or elsewhere.

I hope and pray that people will think about these things before they cast their votes.

We've certainly given it more thought then you, who just regurgitated what you saw in Fahrenheit 9/11.

I love America, and I know that y'all do too. I feel that even though people are divided up between red and blue positions, we still at heart want to protect our beautiful country and do right by her. Please independently research anything I (or anyone else) tells you about the candidates' positions, and think long and hard before you cast your vote. Thanks. Peace.

Already done so, and know that you're thoroughly full of it. Now go back to DU, troll.

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