Kerry: Invoking Vietnam to defend failed Iraq policy "is ignorant of the realities of...those wars"

[ProSense]

08/22/2007

Kerry Statement on Bush Speech to the VFW



FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: August 22, 2007
CONTACTS: Amy Brundage/Vincent Morris, 202-224-4159


BOSTON – Senator John Kerry (D-Mass.) today made the following statement in response to the speech today by President Bush to the Veterans of Foreign Wars in Kansas City, Missouri in which the President invoked comparisons to the Vietnam War to defend his war policy:


“Invoking the tragedy of Vietnam to defend the failed policy in Iraq is as irresponsible as it is ignorant of the realities of both of those wars,” Senator Kerry said. “Half of the soldiers whose names are on the Vietnam Memorial Wall died after the politicians knew our strategy would not work. The lesson is to change the strategy not just to change the rhetoric. We want democracy in Iraq, but Iraqis must want it as much as we do. Our brave soldiers can’t bring democracy to Iraq if Iraq’s leaders are unable or unwilling themselves to make the compromises that democracy requires. No American soldier should be sacrificed because Iraqi politicians refuse to resolve their sectarian and political differences.


“It is unfortunate that President Bush would want to invoke a false comparison of Vietnam to Iraq, but not surprising that he would oversimplify the differences and overlook the tragic similarities. As in Vietnam, we engaged militarily in Iraq based on official deception. As in Vietnam, more American soldiers are being sent to fight and die in a civil war we can’t stop and an insurgency we can’t bomb into submission. If the President wants to heed the lessons of Vietnam, he should change course and change course now.”

Edited to add links to these two Kerry-related Daily Kos diaries:

The propaganda war has begun. Where are the Democrats?

What's Petraeus going to report in September?

[acmavm]

1. Oh for fuck sakes, would would he know about war except how to

get out of serving?

edit: bush** is who I'm talking about in case any of the literally impaired are reading this post.

[TahitiNut]

4. Junior knew how to get out of Viet Nam ... and the TANG.

:shrug:

[lutefisk]

36. Actually, Poppy and friends knew how to save Junior's ass.

Junior could never have figured out how to get all those deferments like Cheney did. Can you imagine him trying to do that on his own? He would have screwed that up, for sure. He has never needed to figure out anything, he just does what he's told and things are taken care of for him. :hi:

[Kagemusha]

2. Kerry still can't express himself in short, simple sentences.

I'm plenty literate so I can understand what his statement contains just fine, and it sounds lofty, and that's the problem, it's so lofty it's not anchored; the meaning seems to float away and melt through the gaps between one's fingers rather than be grasped with straightforward ease.

Heart's in the right place and all...

[ProSense]

3. I have to say it:

This comment seems stupid to me! Lofty? To who a first grader?

[wisteria]

9. LOL n/t

[Cha]

6. Jeeze! I like Kerry's style..sorry

it's too elevated for ya.

[goodgd_yall]

20. I do too

I think it's an effective statement.:shrug:

[politicasista]

21. Me too

I don't understand either what the big deal is. :shrug:

[wisteria]

10. Bush's speech is not something you can reply to in a sound-byte. n/t

[Kagemusha]

16. Yes, it is. And failure to do so gives the speech more power.

The reply above suggests that I don't like Kerry's style and that it's too lofty for ME. That's not the problem. It's too long for easy consumption by the American public at large. I'm not the one Kerry needs to convince; he needed to express this to as many Americans as rhetorically possible. And he just can't. He can't write an effective sound-byte to save his life or, in '04, his campaign. And that's just unfortunate.

And why do I criticize this? Because I used to write like that, too, and I learned that it might be fine literature, but it's not effective politics and it's not effective communication with a wide audience.

Bill Clinton did. He "focused like a laser beam" on the economy. Four words. Something people understood. An image in their minds. And Kerry somehow just... can't.

Kerry should just say, Bush doesn't intend merely to repeat the mistakes of Vietnam - he wishes Vietnam never ended. Case closed.

[ProSense]

25. Kerry doesn't need lessons from Bill Clinton, but

Hillary could use a few.

About that last line in your post:

Kerry should just say, Bush doesn't intend merely to repeat the mistakes of Vietnam - he wishes Vietnam never ended. Case closed.

Huh?

If you're writing "Kerry should say...," then you must believe your own hype.

I still prefer Kerry's comment to yours.

[Kagemusha]

26. Kerry's comment is more beautiful, yes.

Were this a beauty contest and not a war, I would not comment as I have.

[wisteria]

27. That is good, if we were actually talking about Vietnam here- we are not.

We are talking about the Iraq War. It is important to try and get across that any success from the surge in Iraq is fleeting at best and cannot be maintained for long. The real progress must be politically based and must come from the Iraq government themselves- something they seem unable or unwilling to do.
You have a sound byte for that?

[Kagemusha]

28. If I was using biting sarcasm that day I'd refer to Humpty Dumpty.

And how all the Prez's Hummers and all the Prez's men can't put Iraq together again.

But no one's going to say THAT.

[karynnj]

42. Actually , who was to first to speak of:

outsourcing the effort to Afghan warlords ....

Wrong war, wrong time, wrong place

America does not torture PERIOD.

America should never go to war because it wants to, only when it has to.

War should be a last resort.

Katrina stripped away the curtain, and we found there was no wizard (Kerry was the first to use the apt Wizard of Oz analogy.)

Kerry has had any number of sharp, succint clear comments - that the media and others have sometimes taken. Here this statement is doing many things - he is the Democrat who has the natural credendials to speak of both Vietnam and Iraq - he is making that case, fixing the historical underpinning to challange Bush's speech so others don't have too.- though I would not be surprised if there is a Senate follow up speech correcting Bush's mistakes point by point - especially the conflation of Vietnam and Cambodia.

[wisteria]

46. Thank you. I should have remembered these. n/t

[Squatch]

12. I'm with you, man.

I read the first sentence and then my eyes begin to glass over. I'm sure there's a good message in there someplace, so if somebody can just summarize the high points with 2 or 3 bullet statements on a powerpoint slide, that'd be great.

[ProSense]

15. Here goes (takes out crayon):

Invoking the tragedy of Vietnam to defend the failed policy in Iraq is as irresponsible as it is ignorant of the realities of both of those wars.

The lesson is to change the strategy not just to change the rhetoric.

As in Vietnam, we engaged militarily in Iraq based on official deception.

As in Vietnam, more American soldiers are being sent to fight and die in a civil war we can’t stop and an insurgency we can’t bomb into submission.

Done, crayon broke!

[Squatch]

17. Perfect. Set it to some animation and sounds and you've earned

your Powerpoint Ranger Tab

[Kagemusha]

18. 2nd sentence needs a comma, "As in Vietnam" repeated twice....

I could go on, but what's the point? It is what it is.

[sandnsea]

40. And 30 years later, that hasn't quashed the lies

It takes facts and figures. It isn't enough to tell the right they're wrong because we said so.

[tabasco]

49. You need it in crayon?

"Half of the soldiers whose names are on the Vietnam Memorial Wall died after the politicians knew our strategy would not work."

Seems pretty clear to me.

[MODemocrat]

30. I must be iliterate, your post doesn't contain simple sentences

It sounds pretty like a poem; maybe that's what John Kerry was trying to effect. :shrug:

[Poiuyt]

31. I agree with you Kagemusha. If I were Kerry, I would have said:

"Is Bush out of his fucking mind? He actually wants to compare Vietnam and Iraq? Holy shit, what the fuck is he smoking?"

[WildEyedLiberal]

35. Yeah, neither did this guy. I just can't seem to understand WTF he was going on about:

Four score and seven years ago, our fathers brought forth on this continent a new nation: conceived in liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal.

Now we are engaged in a great civil war. . .testing whether that nation, or any nation so conceived and so dedicated. . . can long endure. We are met on a great battlefield of that war.

We have come to dedicate a portion of that field as a final resting place for those who here gave their lives that that nation might live. It is altogether fitting and proper that we should do this.

But, in a larger sense, we cannot dedicate. . .we cannot consecrate. . . we cannot hallow this ground. The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here have consecrated it, far above our poor power to add or detract. The world will little note, nor long remember, what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here. It is for us the living, rather, to be here dedicated to the unfinished work which they who fought here have thus far so nobly advanced.

It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us. . .that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion. . . that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain. . . that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom. . . and that this government of the people. . .by the people. . .for the people. . . shall not perish from the earth.

Or this guy - geez, was he trying to see how many SAT words he could cram into his run-on sentences?

When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. --That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, --That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security. —Such has been the patient sufferance of these Colonies; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former Systems of Government. The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States. To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world.

Personally, I find the ability to utilize the English language to be a GOOD thing, and the glorification of "short, simple sentences" to be indicative of the disease that has afflicted America - the lack of critical thinking, in-depth thought processes, and logical reasoning that have resulted in a president that says crap like "bring em on" and panders to the most superstitious, benighted anti-intellectual traditions in our history.

[Kagemusha]

38. You know how much it burns me to say Bush is the better politician?

It burns me. A lot.

And yet Bush is by far the more effective communicator. Like I said above, if it was a beauty contest and not a war, I'd just sit and admire Kerry's prose.

But it is a war, and Kerry brings a pocket knife to a gunfight.

[ProSense]

39. The burning sensation may

be constipation!

[karynnj]

43. You know - it may be because a lie can be made extremely simple

it has no ornry little exceptions that must be noted for accuracy sakes. Kerry's comments are almost always extremely well structured and easy to understand. (When asking questions in committee, his are the shortest and most precise - and he never rambles.)

I am still trying to figure out what the HELL Hillary was even speaking about when she spoke of old tactics and new war - we don't have a new war. That one paragraph is more confusing to me than anything Kerry ever said - that might even include the botched joke - because at least it was explained the next day.

[WildEyedLiberal]

48. Sorry, I just don't think we should pander to the lowest common denominator to win

If we did that, we'd be Republicans. If that makes them better politicians - and I'm not even arguing that because I think politics has become synonymous with lies and taking advantage of the dumbest and most gullible elements of the populace - then so be it.

[Kagemusha]

50. Parties that view the general public as a collection of idiots deserve to lose.

They're your countrymen, and if you can't be bothered to explain yourself to them in a way that can be clearly and effectively understood, your loss. Same goes for any politicians following such practices. To equate strong communication skills with lying is just sad. It's conceding that the truth can only be shared with the privileged few and that the masses are unworthy of it. When such people fail in democratic elections, somehow, it's deemed shocking.

[WildEyedLiberal]

51. So do you really think Lincoln and Jefferson, were they alive today, "deserve" not to be heard?

I will never accept the dumbing down of America and I will never pander to it. If the quality of our discourse has literally sunk to such pathetically inane blatherings as "bring em on" and "you're with us or you're against us", then maybe our country deserves whatever it gets, if it determines that this is the kind of intellectual level that it wants to display. Do you think people were somehow magically 100x more intelligent in the eras of Lincoln and Jefferson? No, but then again, much more was expected of them, and they in turn expected much more of their leaders. You're asking me to accept that people are incapable of thinking and reading beyond a third grade literacy level, and I'm not going to ever accept that somehow that's a good thing.

[Kagemusha]

52. You don't pander to the people. You talk to them.

But I guess some people just can't understand that.

[WildEyedLiberal]

53. What I don't understand is why you think people are incapable of understanding what Kerry said.

Your original post in this thread chastised him for not speaking in "short, simple sentences." Do you really think the only thing people are capable of understanding is short, simple sentences? I don't - I'm not willing to assume that all people are barely literate. If you want to think that's the only way to win elections - to assume that people can't understand a sentence that contains clauses and high school level vocab words - well, I think that's sad.

[Kagemusha]

54. It's not a question of 'can understand,' it's a question of dilution.

It takes a lot more work to understand Kerry's statement's nuances than Bush's. I would attribute this less to a stupid public than a lazy one, but nonetheless, here's the bottom line:

Short and simple is proven to work better with a larger slice of the electorate.

There's a place for speeches and a place for soundbytes. Embracing one and refusal to do the other is simply choosing to do only the half of politics you think is worthy of you. Works on DU, but it's not a winning electoral strategy in the real world. Kerry's not living in the real world either. That's why his message is diluted and a lot weaker than it ought to be, even if his statement eventually gets around to saying a lot of good things.

[ProSense]

58. That's ridiculous!

You are critiquing Kerry's statement yet your own comment makes absolutely no sense. You are really talking out of your burning sensation!

[Kagemusha]

56. I'll give you an example of what I mean...

From the article posted on this thread:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=103x303257

The original writer summarizes Bush's message: (note that this is paraphrasing)

"We cut and ran in Vietnam. We let our allies down. We allowed a rag tag group of insurgents to win against the great American military. And that's why we're in the mess we're in today. Our enemies today, another group of rag tag insurgents called al-Qaeda - have been emboldened by our retreat from Vietnam."

That's the message people get from Bush's speech. Unlike Kerry's, Bush's speech can be reduced to soundbytes and simple thoughts, and for that reason, even though his arguments are crazy-wrong, they resonate with the public. (Might backfire for him here mind you - it's a double-edged sword - but nonetheless, his words resonate.)

As I see it, you respond to such a speech with soundbytes; you make your own speech on your own terms later.

[ProSense]

59. It appears that you understand Bush and like his style of speaking

because his problem with logic appeals to you.

"We cut and ran in Vietnam. We let our allies down. We allowed a rag tag group of insurgents to win against the great American military. And that's why we're in the mess we're in today. Our enemies today, another group of rag tag insurgents called al-Qaeda - have been emboldened by our retreat from Vietnam."

That's a nonsensical statement!


Clarity:

The lesson is to change the strategy not just to change the rhetoric.

More clarity:

As in Vietnam, more American soldiers are being sent to fight and die in a civil war we can’t stop and an insurgency we can’t bomb into submission.

And notice, there are also fewer words in both (also fewer when combined).

But as others have pointed out speech and comprehension shouldn't be a race to find the lowest common denominator.

Otherwise rebuttals would simply read: Idiot!

edited typo.

[sandnsea]

41. 2004 redux

I just don't even know what it would take to get these people to shut up and let the leader lead. I don't see them being elected to anything.

[BlueIris]

45. Oh, NOOOOO! Believe it or not, "short, simple sentences" aren't the ideal to all voters.

If yer gonna poke, bring a bigger stick.

[Cha]

5. Bravo for Senator Kerry..in his own

inimitable style he nails buSHIT as the catapulter of propoganda enabled by the corporatewhoremedia.

"OFFICIAL DECEPTION"!! Ya got that, bush? Or is that too complicated for your feeble, cocainerattled, brainless head?

[Johonny]

7. What? He doesn't believe

... Asia," he said, "is a freer, more prosperous and stable continent whose people want to live in peace with America not attack America."


Cept you know Pakistan, Afganistan, Iran, Syria, Iraq...

[wisteria]

8. Great response! n/t

[Supersedeas]

11. so, what celebrity event will the Powder Puff media focus on while this Heavyweight bout take place!

Bill Murray refused to take a breath test...
Bill Murray refused to take a breath test...
Bill Murray refused to take a breath test...
Bill Murray refused to take a breath test...
Bill Murray refused to take a breath test...
Bill Murray refused to take a breath test...
Bill Murray refused to take a breath test...
Bill Murray refused to take a breath test...

Meanwhile, Kerry is pummeling the pRetzeldent with a history lesson. Too bad the Barbie and Ken Doll powdered face chattering class can keep track of the substance of the argument.

[LSK]

13. Bill Murray refused to take a breath test???

OMG This is Hugh!!1!1!!

[WildEyedLiberal]

34. "the Barbie and Ken Doll powdered face chattering class"

Brilliant! And TRUE!

:applause:

[ProSense]

14. delete.

[Blue_In_AK]

19. Have I expressed lately

how much I love John Kerry? :loveya: As for "lofty" language, it's refreshing to me to hear what a grown-up has to say about things.

[goodgd_yall]

22. I can't wait to have a president

who can use "lofty" language.

[tridim]

23. My former defense contractor father tried to compare Vienam to Iraq once

And all I had to ask was, "Do you ~really~ still believe Vietnam was a just and worthy war?"

He thought hard for about 10 seconds and responded, "No". Anyone who says yes is either evil, dirt stupid, or both (Bush).

[Jack Rabbit]

24. Response to Senator Kerry

This is in response to a campaign e-mail received today, but it could also be a response to this.

Please click here.

[ProSense]

29. Kick! n/t

[arewenotdemo]

32. Like the Goldwater Girl, Kerry BLAMES THE VICTIMS for the murder and mayhem.

OTOH, I didn't see any Kerry reference to "success in Iraq".

That's something, I guess.

It seems to me that only Kucinich has the stuff to call a spade a spade.

[globalvillage]

33. Excellent response from JK

Here's Harry Reid's:

“President Bush’s attempt to compare the war in Iraq to past military conflicts in East Asia ignores the fundamental difference between the two,” he said. “Our nation was misled by the Bush administration in an effort to gain support for the invasion of Iraq under false pretenses, leading to one of the worst foreign policy blunders in our history.”

Have other Dems commented on the delusional Mr. Bush's speech?

[karynnj]

44. That is funny

In fact one similarity is that both involved deception of the Congress and country - in Vietnam it was the Gulf of Tonkin that was not at the beginning, but was the event that enormously increased the committment.

Kerry, himself, has compared Iraq to Vietnam - except he knows his history and has said repeatedly that half the men were lost when the leaders knew it wasn't working - a statement that has to hurt as that was the time he was there - and was hurt by the war - and when he lost 5 close friends and likely more people he simply knew.

[wisteria]

47. it was delusional and historically incorrect. It looks like Bush didn't study hard again. n/t

[simmonsj811]

37. The lesson that we should have learned

The lesson that we should have learned was not to send the military into a country where we do not understand the culture.

[Supersedeas]

55. Call'em like ya see'em: ignorant is ignorant. Ignorant in Chief-reaction Perino?

[BornagainDUer]

57. The key difference between Vietnam and Iraq...

(((Bush got out of Vietnam)))

[politicasista]

60. kick n/t