All Over the Place
Who knows what Eleanor Clift is going on about in her latest online Newsweek column? Although she acknowledges the cynical truth that "most Democrats are willing to cut Kerry whatever slack he needs just so he dislodges Bush from office," she's still shilling for him under the guise of criticism:

John Kerry disappointed a lot of Democrats when he said that he would have voted for the resolution that gave George W. Bush the authority to invade Iraq even had Kerry known then what he knows now--that Iraq had no weapons of mass destruction and no ties to Al Qaeda. What then would be the grounds for war? That Saddam Hussein was a despicable human being?

Kerry tried to explain. He stood by his vote, but he would have handled the warmaking authority differently. Bush, on a five-state campaign swing, taunted Kerry for "finally clearing that up."

It was classic Kerry, full of subtleties that get lost in translation. Kerry's position is actually quite responsible, but he's getting no help from the national press corps in conveying it to the voters.

"Quite responsible" is a joke of an opinion. So is Clift's fantasy that Big Media isn't doing enough to propagate the Kerrion's message. What else do they do? No, the problem, madame, is that Kerry's "subtleties" are so vacuous and inane in their substance that not even the fabled powers of Katie Couric or Peter Jennings can elevate them to the level of serious consideration. It is not enough for Middle America to hear that Kerry would have handled the authority ---that he himself voted to give the President--- in some "different" or "better" way because there are no reasons to believe that he even could have! There is no reason to believe that the French or the Germans or whoever the fuck Kerry imagines would have constituted a "real" Coalition were ever willing to send troops to help in the liberation of Iraq. There is no reason to believe that our Turkish "allies" weren't intent on extorting us from the start because of their own political problems in liberating the Kurds. On the other hand, we did have reason to believe that Saddam had weapons of mass murder and we did have reason to believe that the Blixites were just stalling for time and helping their UN masters string us along for the benefit of those on the take from Saddam himself! After all, the only reason why the inspectors even got back in was because Saddam had us breathing down his neck. We were in theater and waiting for their fucking show to stop. Were we supposed to wait a while longer so that we could process more of their lies? Gibberish!

As Clift points out:

In October 2002, when Bush asked Congress to give him war powers, the administration was in the midst of a diplomatic negotiation with Saddam. The threat of force passed by Congress pushed Saddam into allowing the weapons inspectors back into Iraq. Denying Bush the authority would have emasculated American diplomacy.

That's right, Eleanor! How is it possible to state the obvious and not recognize its significance? The French were actively working to stop us from going in. Not just protesting the actual enforcement of the very resolutions that they themselves had voted for ---but lacked the balls to work towards--- but actually intimidating other Security Council members into resisting us. Fucking ungrateful backstabbers. Bribe-happy obstructionist fucks!

I am sick of bullshit and I am sick of watching this slow-motion threat to America's foreign policy called the Kerry campaign. Kerry has nothing to say on the question of Iraq that can't be refuted through his own votes and words and the logic of pre-emptive war. All this talk about "subtleties" and "nuance" is usually an insult and a laugh ---but not when there are millions of shitforbrains out there who actually believe that these are qualities that qualify Kerry for anything. Jesus!