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The Swift Boat Veterans gather to assess their impact on the campaign. Monday, November 15, 2004 12:01 a.m. BOCA RATON, Fla.--"The last mission of Vietnam War veterans ended on Nov. 3, at 2:08 p.m. Eastern Time, when John Kerry conceded the presidential race to George W. Bush," announced James Warner, a lawyer who was a Marine pilot in Vietnam and spent five years and five months in Hanoi as a prisoner of war. On Saturday night, Mr. Warner gave a "debriefing" on the role that two controversial groups of veterans played in raising doubts about John Kerry's fitness to serve as...

Election-related quotes… . • Former (Bush I) White House Counsel Boyden Gray, on John Kerry's concession: "It was absolutely the right thing to do, because it headed off a long nightmare of litigation, which could have cast a pall on the election, whoever was confirmed as the winner. And it would have embarrassed this country at a time when the United States is trying to spread democracy abroad." • Retired General Norman Schwarzkopf, livid about Kerry campaign phone calls telling voters he endorsed Kerry: "[Kerry's] attempt to make up for [his] deficiencies [such as opposing the Reagan defense build-up and...

You are given the chance to listen to two decently humorous audio files from a NJ radio staion (94.5 The Hawk). The first is a parody of Kerry's concession speech, with, uh, some coarse language added in a broadcast radio-acceptable kind of way. The second is Donald Trump bringing Bush and Kerry into the Boardroom after the election. Pretty good. I did not link to the audio files directly (no idea about copyright), so, you'll need to click on the link above, then maybe scroll down a bit, THEN click on either "Real Audio: John Kerry" or "Bush and Kerry...

NEW YORK - Here’s an interesting little sidebar of our system of government confirmed recently by the crack Countdown research staff: no Presidential candidate’s concession speech is legally binding. The only determinants of the outcome of election are the reports of the state returns boards and the vote of the Electoral College. That’s right. Richard Nixon may have phoned John Kennedy in November, 1960, and congratulated him through clenched teeth. But if the FBI had burst into Kennedy headquarters in Chicago a week later and walked out with all the file cabinets and a bunch of employees with their raincoats...

Mr. McAuliffe and Senator Kerry, I and thousands of others have worked/volunteered, contributed time and money and energy to the Democratic Party and John Kerry to the point of exhaustion - and you have severely disappointed me by not waiting eleven days for all the military and absentee ballots to be counted, by not challenging the broken and rigged results in many states, as you promised the thousands of volunteer lawyers would. You promised to fight and you had 10,000 lawyers, many who were here in Palm Beach County Florida, but you did not use them. At 6 PM I...

There were a lot of things John Kerry could have done with his concession speech and didn’t – like pulling an Al Gore, trying to set the table for 2008 or just being Kerryesque. But of all the things he didn’t do but should have, Numero Uno is already coming back to bite him very quickly. That would be forgetting, inexplicably, to thank Sen. Edward M. Kennedy. Kerry had kind words for tons of folks, everybody from his wife, Teresa Heinz Kerry, and daughters to running mate John Edwards, his wife, Elizabeth, and their kids. Not surprising that. But then...

The Reverend Jesse Jackson is criticizing Sen. John Kerry for conceding Tuesday's election, and the Democratic Party for concentrating its presidential campaign in a handful of states. Speaking at the weekly Rainbow/PUSH meeting, Rev. Jackson said, "Mr. Kerry has conceded too quickly." He said in Ohio and in other states, there were still irregularities to check, absentee votes to count, provisional ballots to consider, and challenges to be mounted against the poll challengers. Rev. Jackson said he considers the GOP poll challengers, who targeted heavily-Democratic precincts in Ohio, to be blatantly racist. "Can you imagine a group of black challengers...

Lets take a quick look at Kerry's motivation for conceding: 1. He waited until the analysis showed he would lose. 2. If he was to wait 11 days for the full count, he knew he would lose anyway. He would be perceived as a sore loser. 3. This way he is the gracious loser so he can still be welcomed to drink wine on the sidewalk cafes of Paris and Antwerp and else where in the Continent. Plus real surf-boarders are sportsmen 4. If he had extended the process, he would have been regarded as a sore loser and much...

I watched parts of Kerry's concession speech several times on C-SPAN and some of the cable channels.There is no doubt in my mind that Terry Kerry, Traitor John's current wife had been drinking. Try this, if you see the portion immediately after Kerry's speech, turn off the sound and watch carefully.Terry appears to move ackwardly; see actually bumps into Kerry a couple of times. Kerry graps her hand, not in an affectionate way but in a controlling way and locks fingers with her and controls her arm for an extended period of time. She turns her head up at him...

Sen. John Kerry [related, bio], insisting that ``America is in need of unity'' and that it is time ``to find common ground,'' missed an opportunity to advance that cause yesterday.      In his concession speech Kerry - as is his habit - lectured President Bush [related, bio] without ever extending his own support, his help in advancing that ``healing'' agenda he so appropriately called for.      ``America is in need of unity and longing for a larger measure of compassion,'' he said. ``I hope President Bush will advance those values in the coming years.''       Bush, on the other hand, spoke directly...

Stunned Dems ponder. . .What went wrong? What to do next? By David R. Guarino Read Guarino's Road to 1600 Blog Thursday, November 4, 2004 Flailing in disarray after resounding Election Day defeats, Democrats are struggling to regroup under new leadership they hope will get them back on track. Roundly beaten by President Bush [related, bio], squeezed out of power again in Congress and facing voters hostile to their old-style politics, the party of FDR and JFK is looking for a savior. One name is always at the top of the list: Hillary Rodham Clinton, the former first lady and...

It was the best of times; It is the worst of times/ John Democrat, Canidate He makes big promises Flipping, Flopping, Talking, Racing Kerry George President, Rebuplican Talking, Helping, Supporting He has already won Bush John Proud Democrat Relaxing, Watching, Convincing He has won the West Coast and Northeast Kerry George Scared Republican He is afraid Kerry could be President Watching, Trying to stay calm Bush John Scared Dmocrat Watching, Hoping, Panikking I will not win Was flip flopping right for me Kerry George Proud Republican Winning the South Watching, Looking, Calling Bush John Nervous Democrat I may not win...

If there's one place where Democrats know they'll receive a warm reception, it's The Today Show. So take it as a sign of the depths of Dem depression that Katie Couric had to admit this morning that "with Dems licking their wounds" it was difficult for the show to find a Dem willing to come on! You'd think that it would have been a cinch to find a leading Republican insider to talk about W's plans for the second term. So who did Today choose? Gillepsie, Frist, Hastert, maybe even Cheney? Nope, they went to a guy firmly on the...

Many of us have been mystified and delighted by Sen. John Kerry's early election concession. A point that was first addressed here on Free Republic by "Bloody Sam Roberts" in This Thread was this:"You are all whining about how Kerry betrayed you all by not counting ALL of the ballots in Ohio. Here's another news flash for you. He didn't dare. If additional scrutiny was placed on all of those provisional ballots, many of them would have been exposed as fraudulent. Further more, it is likely that the fraud could be traced back to DNC operatives and there would have...

-snip- Kerry aides originally believed there might be enough provisional ballots -- those cast by voters whose eligibility was in doubt -- to win Ohio. At that point, Kerry's running mate, Sen. John Edwards (N.C.), made a speech at Boston's Copley Plaza in which he vowed that "every vote would be counted," a thinly veiled warning that the Democrats were prepared to begin legal action to contest the state. At the time, Kerry aides said, there was pandemonium inside the campaign. Overnight, the Kerry campaign's senior staff, in a series of calls with the boiler-room leadership in Washington and political...

Kerry concedes the election. The final Daily Kerry Crack-ups ends with four photos of the result of all the previous Kerry crack-ups. Last day of Daily Kerry Crack-ups.    1Sen. John Kerry gives a thumbs up to the crowd as Sen. Ted Kennedy, D-Mass. looks on after Kerry's concession speech in Boston's Faneuil Hall, Wednesday, Nov. 3, 2004. (AP Photo/Amy Sancetta)    2Democratic presidential nominee John Kerry points to the crowd as he arrives to concede defeat in Boston following the national election, November 3, 2004. Democratic Sen. John Kerry conceded defeat on Wednesday to President George W. Bush...

BOSTON — Three hours after he woke up in his 19th-century Federalist townhouse on Louisbourg Square, Sen. John Kerry was told his lifelong dream to become the president of the United States had died in Columbus, Ohio. The news came in a phone call from Mary Beth Cahill, Ted Kennedy's hard-nosed chief-of-staff, who took over Kerry's floundering campaign in the primaries, when all but his most loyal supporters had written him off. [snip] But there was no way around it — there were just too many votes for Bush on the ballots being counted in the statehouse in Columbus....

Dans son premier discours après l'élection présidentielle américaine, prononcé mercredi devant des partisans et les membres de son équipe de campagne à Washington, George W. Bush s'est félicité de sa "victoire historique" et a lancé un appel à l'unité. "Je vais avoir besoin de votre soutien et je vais agir pour l'obtenir", a-t-il déclaré. Le président républicain, George W. Bush, a remporté un second mandat de quatre ans à la Maison Blanche, son rival démocrate, John Kerry, lui ayant concédé la victoire, mercredi 3 novembre, sans même attendre le décompte final de l'Etat contesté de l'Ohio.

Edwards sure doesnt like being seen in the reaverview mirror.. 'What took Kerry so long,' all the pundits have been asking.Well, we hear for all of his Lurch like slugishness, the real stick in the mud was John Edwards, who didn't want to concede. Presumably, he sees his politcal future now shrinking into the blinding glare of Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton's pantsuits..

Hello? Oh hi, John. Yes, you did run an admirable campaign. What? What? You have a secret plan for Iraq? No ... no ... no, John. Surrender is not an option here, John, but thanks for calling. Say what? No, John. Tereeeza can't stay in the Lincoln bedroom for the weekend. Bye, John. Bye. I said bye. I really have to go, John. Bye, bye!