Kerry to skip 2008 race

Kerry is a good guy who got hosed by the rightwing propoganda machine (with help from the corporate media), but I only have two words:

Thank. God.

Let’s get some fresh blood out there to represent the Democratic party (and yes, I’m looking at you, Mr. Obama).

I still can’t quite figure out how Kerry got nominated in 04. It seemed like the fix was in somehow. He’s a good man, but he was brought down by the wingnuts at a time when the country was a little insane and the Wingnuts were at full power. He’s still got lots of good work to do though.

Perhaps he decided not to run because he has yet to release his military records as promised. There is a question concerning his receipt of an honorable discharge.

Another piece of Hillary’s plan for world domination slides into place.

Kerry, a weak candidate, got destroyed by the swiftboaters in 04, allowing Bush to have another term in which to definitively screw up, and become so radioactive that he drags down whoever the 08 GOP nominee is, allowing Hil to waltz in.

Kerry’s weakness, a byproduct of the smearing he received in 04, means he won’t be any sort of opponent for Clinton as she fights for the nomination.

(I was joking as I wrote this, but looking at it, it doesn’t seem either funny or implausible.)

Thank G-d! Kerry was an easy target for the ‘Publicans. Glad to have him off the presidential field and securely in the senate, where he can continue representing Massachusetts and doing good work.

I didn’t want to see Kerry, a bona fide hero, embarrassed. This is the right call.

Agreed. Now for the really interesting call: who does he support? If he throws his support (logistical, organizational and financial) behind Edwards or Obama they immediately become a seroius threat to the Hillary machine. If, however, he backs Hillary, she will win the nomination with very little effort. IMHO.

Mr. Kerry was a warrior in a difficult time. The smear perpetrated by his comrads in arms has left me angry at the vetrans and individuals who for political reasons demonstrated their contempt for those who served. He served honorably and with distinction. His observations on the nature of young men dying in wars created by an elite who have no understanding of the repercussions of the actions they persue will one day haunt the children we leave behind. I believe he would have done no worse than the current administration we have. I am equally sure that our present situation would be less divided if he had attained leadership in this country. I am a veteran of the conflict he served in. He has a right to his opinions. He was there. Only thing I can say is don’t dis him in my presence.
EC Sedgwick

The Caped Composer,

good point. Add that “certain former VP” to the Edwards/Obama side of the equation.

My main point was that his support could play a critical even possibly decisive role in determinig the Dem nominee.

****There is a question concerning…***
—————————–fallen-and-can’t-get-up-woman

…the legitimacy of the current administration to make any decisions related to military matters—as the entire “Bushista” herd of yellow-bellied lemmings “combined” have less military expertise than Mr. Kerry?

Go “fatwa” yourself, fw….

Israel faces nuclear Holocaust warns Gingrich

Newt Gingrich: Haifa, Tel Aviv, Jerusalem facing mortal Iranian threat, says former US Speaker of the House; emphasizes ‘three nuclear weapons are a second Holocaust’

Yaakov Lappin Published: 01.23.07, 19:51

The Israeli people are facing the threat of a nuclear Holocaust, former US Speaker of the House of Representatives Newt Gingrich warned the Herzliya Conference held by the Institute for Policy and Strategy at IDC Herzliya on Tuesday afternoon. Meanwhile, he said, the United States could lose a few million people or a number of cities to a terrorist attack with weapons of mass destruction.

Gingrich, who addressed the conference via satellite from the United States, said he thought Israel’s existence was under threat again for the first time in 40 years.

“Israel is in the greatest danger it has been in since 1967. Prior to ’67, many wondered if Israel would survive. After ’67, Israel seemed military dominant, despite the ’73 war. I would say we are (now) back to question of survival,” Gingrich said.

He added that the United States could “lose two or three cities to nuclear weapons, or more than a million to biological weapons.”

Gingrich added that in such a scenario, “freedom as we know it will disappear, and we will become a much grimmer, much more militarized, dictatorial society.”

“Three nuclear weapons are a second Holocaust,” Gingrich declared, adding: “People are greatly underestimating how dangerous the world is becoming. I’ll repeat it, three nuclear weapons are a second Holocaust. Our enemies are quite explicit in their desire to destroy us. They say it publicly? We are sleepwalking through this process as though it’s only a problem of communication,” Gingrich said.

http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7…356103,00.html

Just for fun…try to count the number of times the word “holocaust” is used in the article.

As I heard the Chimp-in-Chief recognize the brave winner of the Silver Star who was in the gallery for the SOTU last night, I could not help but wonder whether – 30 years from now – he would have to justify the receipt of his medal. All the applause from those who still hail the Chimp stood in stark and shameful contrast to the behavior many of them directed at Kerry during his campaign.

I’m glad Kerry has decided not to run. I hope he can find fulfillment and achievement in the Senate.

Please let’s not wax poetic about Kerry. He blew the 2004 election. Bush may be incompetent as a President but he ran a competent campaign; Kerry however, did not.

Like most Democrats, I am infuriated that Kerry had and failed to spend $14 million on his 2004. However, maybe now that money can be put to good use: let’s urge Kerry to give that money to the Democratic Party so that Howard Dean can further implement his “50 state strategy”.

As for Kerry’s future? Frankly, I always felt that his ambition took away from his message. Maybe now people might find it worthwhile to listen to that long droning voice. But please – let’s not promote him for a cabinet post.

I voted for Kerry in 2004 but was utterly dismayed by his anticharisma. I believe he’s a smart guy and could have done a decent job as president, but then I had to go dig back into the Congressional Record for a book I’m writing and found that Kerry had taken an obstructionist position at one point that really didn’t have a leg to stand on. It was political posturing in the extreme, and he resorted to every bogus debate tactic including repeated baldfaced lying and misrepresentation and misdirection. Ironically, it reminded me of the tactics of the swiftboaters, though it was in regard to a research portion of a budget bill and not a personal attack. But after that my already tepid regard for the man plummeted. I’d still vote for him, of course, if the choice was between him and Bush, but I’d have a pretty strong gag reflex pulling the lever, I can tell you. I’ve come to detest overweening ambition and pomposity, and he has both in ample quantity. Not the kind of person I’d want leading the country. I’m glad he’s bowing out, partly because I wouldn’t have wanted my book (which will come out during the campaign) to be an attack on the Dem nominee. Though I don’t think he’d have had a snowball’s chance anyway, but still…

I love this site, but I wish CB would raise the anti-troll fence a little higher. Fallenwoman is just a dimwitted sheep bleating the usual Partei Line; that anti-Semitic scumbag is intolerable. Isn’t there a hole in Idaho into which we can drop excreta like him/her?

As for Kerry, I’m inclined to agree with Barry #24. He had a great shot and he blew it, largely IMO because he failed to fight hard enough for his convictions. Think about how Rahm Emanuel, Howard Dean, Jim Webb, even Hillary Clinton (of whom I’m no fan) would have pushed back against that Swift Boat smear. Kerry just let it bleed him for weeks. He never got beyond being the vehicle for opposition to this administration rather than a champion for something positive, worth fighting for in its own right.

And he hired Bob Shrum, the gaseous windbag jerkass who’s probably done more to elect Republican slime than Lee Atwater and Karl Rove combined. Bad judgment.

Taking the long view, it might turn out for the best that he lost the election; the ensuing two years gave the Bush/DeLay/Cheney/Rove/Norquist/Dobson crew a lot of rope, and they’ve made great strides toward hanging themselves with it. But it still hurt like hell at the time, and a lot of damage has been and will be done in human terms as a result of that defeat.

“As for Kerry, I’m inclined to agree with Barry #24. He had a great shot and he blew it, largely IMO because he failed to fight hard enough for his convictions”

You are deeply deluded. You have bought the spurious Leftist line (so like the rightwing line it’s a marvel) all the way.

• Kerry WON the election. The evidence of that is overwhelming.

• Kerry SIGNED ONTO the Ohio vote challenge, when he returned from Iraq.

But unlike the heroes in the blog chatrooms, he realized that if the Ohio SecState was Bush’s campaign chair, then there was no way we would get a recount, because this is a COUP.

Now we are making headway against that coup and that vote-fraud, but rather than APPLAUD KERRY FOR OUTING THE PNAC AND THE PERMANENT AIRBASES IN IRAQ DURING THE FIRST DEBATE OF 2004 the leftists and the bleating blogs ignored the courage, ignored the vote-fraud, and ignored the man’s character, training, intellect, and qualifications — which make the current occupant look like the janitor’s drooling son.

Kerry is going to make an EXCELLENT president in 2012. He has my vote, and my support in this fight. The SAME people here who bemoan the Dems for being weak don’t applaud the strengths, because it’s so much easier to feel superior if you ignore the evidence that there are better people serving YOU than you deserve.