Kerry & The Questionable Intelligence

Are Democrats blind? I mean honestly they must be. It never fails. You get into a political debate with a democrat and one of the first things that comes out of their mouths is "Where's the WMD's?" or "Sure Clinton lied, but nobody died!"

Let's just get one thing straight. John Kerry was on the Senate Select Committee for Intelligence. For those who do not know what this legislative body does, I'll tell you. They are responsible for ensuring that the nation's intelligence community provides the legislative and executive branches of the U.S. Government with good intelligence. To quote directly from their site:

JURISDICTION

Created pursuant to S.Res. 400, 94th Congress: to oversee and make continuing studies of the intelligence activities and programs of the United States Government, and to submit to the Senate appropriate proposals for legislation and report to the Senate concerning such intelligence activities and programs. In carrying out this purpose, the Select Committee on Intelligence shall make every effort to assure that the appropriate departments and agencies of the United States provide informed and timely intelligence necessary for the executive and legislative branches to make sound decisions affecting the security and vital interests of the Nation. It is further the purpose of this resolution to provide vigilant legislative oversight over the intelligence activities of the United States to assure that such activities are in conformity with the Constitution and laws of the United States.

What this means my liberal friends is that Kerry firstly would have had access to the same intelligence that George Bush did. What did Kerry think of the intelligence that Bush used to justify going to war?

Well, if his own words are to be trusted (and that's debatable since his stance changes with the slightest of breezes) , here's what he thought at the time:

"We urge you, after consulting with Congress, and consistent with the U.S. Constitution and laws, to take necessary actions (including, if appropriate, air and missile strikes on suspect Iraqi sites) to respond effectively to the threat posed by Iraq's refusal to end its weapons of mass destruction programs." - Letter to President Clinton, signed by Sens. Carl Levin (D-MI), Tom Daschle (D-SD), John Kerry ( D - MA), and others Oct. 9, 1998

"I will be voting to give the President of the United States the authority to use force-- if necessary-- to disarm Saddam Hussein because I believe that a deadly arsenal of weapons of mass destruction in his hands is a real and grave threat to our security." - Sen. John F. Kerry (D, MA), Oct. 9, 2002

"Without question, we need to disarm Saddam Hussein. He is a brutal, murderous dictator, leading an oppressive regime .. He presents a particularly grievous threat because he is so consistently prone to miscalculation. And now he is miscalculating America's response to hiscontinued deceit and his consistent grasp for weapons of mass destruction... So the threat of Saddam Hussein with weapons of mass destruction is real." - Sen. John F. Kerry (D, MA), Jan. 23. 2003

Clearly John Kerry, after having viewed the self-same intelligence that George Bush did, came to the same conclusion. The conclusion that Sadaam Hussein was a mennace to the peaceful nations of the world and the United States.

Now you see the question remains, did John Kerry actually see this intelligence or was he simply following the herd's opinion. The fact of the matter is that John Kerry did not take his membership on this rather important committee too seriously. His attendance (as best we can tell) was lack-luster at best. Numerous reports have surfaced that he did not attend the majority of the public meetings of the committee and this has been independently verified. Now the fact of the matter is, we don't know about John Kerry's attendance at the closed committee meetings as that is confidential information. Information that Pat Robertson, the Republican committee chairman quickly offered to make public when interviewed on Meet the Press on August 15th 2004, an offer Kerry quickly declined. Obviously if the Republican chairman of the committee was so anxious to get this information out and Kerry was not interested in seeing it get out, then the information must be damning.

The Democrats (Michael Moore most of all) are so quick to point out that George Bush was a "do little" president prior to 9-11, and this is a reason why he should not be reelected. They claim he spent the vast majority of his time at his Ranch in Crawford Texas. This claim by the way could very easily be shot full of holes, and has been quite often in articles I've read (but unfortunately I don't have one at hand) But the fact remains, if this is a reason that George Bush is unfit for the office of the presidency, what's your excuse for John Kerry. The president certainly stepped up when it was important and his service was needed. It was George Bush who pulled this country together after the devastation of 9-11. Where was John Kerry when he was needed. Indeed, if John Kerry had been doing his job in the Senate Select Committee on intelligence, perhaps we would have had adequate intelligence to prevent those attacks. Further, after the attacks, the tax-payers flipped the bill for a commission to look into what had gone wrong (the 9-11 commission). Indeed if John Kerry had been working dilligently under the jurisdiction of the committee of which he was a member, perhaps many of the suggestions made by the 9-11 commission would have been realized a long time ago.

Now, since the 9-11 commission has released their report, John Kerry states he endorses their findings whole-heartedly. This however is rather disingenuous. One would think, because of his background in the intelligence community, he would have known that these changes needed to be made, but in fact He opposed the center point of the commission's findings in the past.

The other question that remains is what did happen to the WMD's that not only our intelligence community, but nearly every other intelligence community on the planet believed Sadaam of having. There are some pretty solid leads to where these might have gone. First off we know that Sadaam squirrelled away parts to reinvigorate his WMD programs after the spectre of international attention was lifted. We know that Syria has designs on WMD's. We know that Sarin and Mustard gas have been found in Iraq, and more importantly, that Al Quaeda has been smuggling Iraqi sarin into into Syria. If you want Iraqi WMD's look buried in Iraq's vast deserts and watch as Al Quaeda swoops in and swipes it right out from under your nose!

We know that eliminating Iraqi WMD's was one goal of our invasion, but the other and most important was:

"An initial goal in going to war was to democratize Iraq, so that, gradually, neighboring peoples would feel the positive pull of a more open political system at the heart of the Arab world. As the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks proved, American, indeed Western, national security depends on the success of this endeavor."
-George W. Bush

The question that confronts us as voters at this juncture is this: "Who is better to lead this nation in these perilous times?" The Democrats would be quick to hold up their candidate as the man of the hour, but I ask you. Is he going to do a good job? I mean how many bills has this "man of action" introduced in the Senate in his 20 years of tenure that went on to become laws? Research it and you'll find that only six Kerry introduced bills were thought worthy by his peers to become laws. You'll also find that the majority of these were for such important matters as renaming highways or buildings in someone's honor. Ask yourself if he is going to take this job more seriously than he did his role in the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence. When it comes to leading this nation at war. We already know he is an avowed pacifist and we also know that three small scratches will cause him to abandon "his band of brothers" in a combat zone. Now I ask you again, how could Kerry be the right man for the job? I know, you'll tell me "at least he served in combat, Bush didn't". That is neither here nor there. You see if you had any military knowlege at all you'd understand that there is a difference between tactics and strategy. Kerry's command of a small naval vessel in Vietnam taught him "tactics". What is required in the role of Commander in Chief is experience with "strategy".

For those of you who are a little fuzzy on the subtle difference between the two, I would offer this. Merriam Websters defines tactis as:

"a method of employing forces in combat"

...and strategy as:

"the science and art of employing the political, economic, psychological, and military forces of a nation or group of nations to afford the maximum support to adopted policies in peace or war".

These are clearly two different things. One deals with the best way to deal with a machinegun emplacement, while the other revolves around the best way to deal with a hostile nation.

Of the two men running for president, only one has any experience in strategy and that man is George W. Bush.

What this means my good Democrat friends is that your man's heroics, thirty years ago in Vietnam while commendable, are not applicable.

Thank you very much!