i support Kerry because i'm a liberal

[JI7]

i'm tired of people who hate Kerry claiming they are the only ones who are liberal. it's like the Republicans who claim to be the only ones who love America and act as if anyone who supported someone else is any less.

i supported Kerry largely because i'm liberal on the issues and he has always and continues to support those issues.


http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=132&topic_id=2142967&mesg_id=2143135

[WildEyedLiberal]

1. I don't know what that crowd wants

I hate single issue people who focus on only the war. I've even seen support for Paul, Buchanan, etc. on DU just because they were against the war. Nevermind all the horrible policies they support and how they want to screw the poor and middle class and don't give a shit about people.

[karynnj]

3. I joined you in posting

It is stupid that they continue to insist Kerry is pro-war. He proved he can not even read a survey question and interpret it. (The question was approving / disaproving of Bush's handling of Iraq.) He claimed it was reputiating the war, so he said the 89% of Democrats repudiated the war and Kerry didn't (except he only did about 9999999999 times last year.) Then he placed Kerry with the Republicans - who APPROVED of Bush's handling of the war. This is not debatable - a 6 year old watching the debates would pick up that Mr Kerry thought Mr. Bush was doing a very bad job.

The other one, who first implied Kerry was bad on gay rights and the environment - moved on to votes since 2000 - of which I guess there were only 2 - The patriot act, IWR - because he said Kerry was a centrist (when he fought Dean and Kucinich - who never had a non-liberal thought ever I guess.)

[JI7]

4. that's what they do with the current polls of people opposing the war

they interpret it as meaning those people want immediate withdrawal. but looking further into it they don't want immediate withdrawal. they want a plan in place which is what Kerry was made fun of last year for by the right and left. remember the mocking of "i have a plan".

[paulk]

2. that was well done...

I supported Kerry because he was the most liberal candidate running.

It's only here in DU fantasyland that Kerry is a centrist. It's only here in DU fantasyland that I'm a centrist...

That someone could say they would support Buchanan over Kerry because of Buchanan's anti-war thing shows where these people are really coming from. There's a small distance between far left and far right down on the bottom of the wheel.

[emulatorloo]

5. well done, agreed 100% and I am REALLY glad I missed that one. . .

there are one or two in that thread that I feel could be "attack from the left" rovean infiltrators.

But maybe I,m paranoid.

[Mass]

6. That thread shows exactly the problem with the Democrats right now.

There are not 2, but 3 parts in the party:

- conservative democrats (those are those who are behind this report: Bayhs, Landrieu,...).

- ultraliberals (they are the crowd that wants all now, whether it can happen now or not). Not sure who represent them in the Congress right now, may be half a dozen individuals, but I am not even sure.

- moderate liberals: This is whom I identify with: people who agree with liberal principles, but also understand that they have to live with the rest of the country. I would put people like Kerry, Dean, Clark, Durbin in this category.

The basic problem that the party has is that both sides are attacking the middle rather than understanding this is the solution. Bayhs and co think they cannot succeed in the South, that only a conservative moderate can. They will attack the other ones calling them liberal as if it was a bad word. The DU crowd on the contrary will say they compromise with liberal principles. Results, not only the center of the country disappears, but also the center of the Democratic Party will disappear and people will have to choose between two really different views of the Democratic Party: an utopian one that is vowed to stay in the opposition or a conservative one that does not satisfy people's aspiration.

What the Republicans have done during the last 30 years is unify all these different branches by giving something to everybody. Our only chance to be in power again is to benefit of the fact Bush has broken this unity, but we need to reunify for that and both branches of the party have to stop attacking each other and the middle.

[sandnsea]

34. My current phobia

I do not trust this Ann Coulter neocon assault on Bush, not one bit. What I always hoped would happen is that we would force the Todd-Whitman Republicans to lump the neocons with the fundies and call them all crazy. Instead, I think the neocons are pushing George over to OUR side, labeling him an FDR big spender who isn't really anti-choice, a traitor. Then the neocons will keep their fundies and rise again another day. In a few months, they'll be telling the people not to vote Democratic if you want a President like George Bush. Call me crazy, but that's what I'm really beginning to see. The latest poll had way too many people calling him a moderate and even a liberal. On top of the three groups you've identified, if we have to fight off some whacked out George Bush liberal label too, well, fuckity fuck, no good at all.

[JI7]

38. so that's why it's not translating into support for Democrats

they view Bush as being too "dem like".

it just points to the problem Democrats have in getting our message out.

the people need to see that the current mess IS a result of right wing REaganism , anti workers policies.

[Mass]

7. Rereading the thread, I am really fed up by both sides

- ultraleftists (or trolls?) thinking that Kerry is RW
- DLCers trying desperately to link Kerry to the DLC and opposing him artificially to Dean the leftist.

[TayTay]

8. I think Kerry is a liberal or progressive or whatever the latest

label is now for someone who wants to move the country forward, not backward. Kerry is not a down-the-line old-school liberal. He is a bit of a deficit and spending hawk and keeps a very close eye on the bottom line. He did vote for the Gramm-Rudman deficit reduction act back in the '80s. He mentioned about a million times last year that he believes in PAGO: Pay as You Go on programs. That is lefty-center, IMHO. Some of Kerry's most withering comments this year on the Rethugs are due to the Rethugs having no concern at all for how much money they are burning up. (Kerry was livid about the Iraq War and the Medicare Drug program and so much else being put off-the-books. We don't even know how far in debt we really are because the REthugs are keeping two sets of accounting books.)

Kerry is a social progressive. He favors civil rights and voting rights for all. He is an economic progressive in that he fights for the middle-class and for ways to increase the middle-class and keep good paying jobs in the USA. He favors more access to health care (curiously, a lot of his arguments on this stem from the point of view of small business, which is being killed by health care costs.)

I think he's a progressive. I don't think he's a cloud-dwelling revolutionist, I think he's a realist who won't propose something unless he has figured out a way to pay for it. (I like that.)

People use big and famous public people as a sort of mirror of what it is they really want to see. Kerry becomes, to these people, a sort of Rorschach test and they see what they want to see. (I sometimes do that with Bush, it's a pretty human thing to do.)

[WildEyedLiberal]

9. Yeah, both extremes suck

Usually, to me though, the people trying to make Kerry into a big DLCer and oppose him to Dean are the Dean partisans, not the DLCers. They want to pretend that Dean was so vastly more liberal than Kerry and so call Kerry a centrist DLC moderate, pro-war, etc. I've seen a few of them do that, but a lot of them try to argue that Kerry is why we can't run a northeastern liberal and so let's run Warner or Clinton or Bayh or whoever.

[TayTay]

10. This argument is false on the surface.

Kerry didn't lose in a landslide like Dukakis and Mondale did. He barely lost Ohio. If he was such ballot box poison, then he wouldn't have been so close. He would never have gotten those huge crowds in Wisconsin or anywhere else. It defies logic. It is making a conclusion based on a radically biased point of view.

People see what they want to see. To some people, Dr. Dean is a perfect candidate because they wanted him to be a perfect candidate. He didn't lose, he was betrayed, as all martyrs ultimately are. There is no reasoning with these people. They can't see that Dr. Dean was a moderate as Gov of Vermont and played ball a lot with the corporate interests of the state. They don't believe it ever happened which is just sad. (And very unrealistic. It is not an all together bad thing to say he played ball with business. You have to do some of that in order to move things forward.)

[WildEyedLiberal]

11. I know that

I didn't even take that article seriously. The Clinton DLC conservative Dems will say Kerry was too lefty, and the frothing lefty freepers will say he's too centrist. They're both wrong. Kerry's viewpoints reflect a strong but realistic liberal worldview, and if the media (and our own party's surrogates) hadn't sucked so damn bad, and if Diebold hadn't helped Bush cheat, he'd have won in a landslide (I'm not altogether convinced that he didn't).

BTW, what happened to the Sox avatar? Anger, or disappointment?

[TayTay]

12. Seasons over. I moved on.

(I do that really quickly don't I?) It will come back next year, when the Sox do. I had the Constitution icon, but someone else also had it, so I went with the generic kickin Dem one. I really need to find an icon that screams TayTay. Sigh!

Suggestions? Maybe a nice 'Bite me!

[WildEyedLiberal]

13. You should get a sexy, wonky Kerry

The icon I had forever would do - it's that incredibly hot pic of him in committee, looking pensive and OH SO SMOLDERINGLY HOT. I will put it back up after the Cardinals win the World Series :D

[TayTay]

14. Hey, The Yankees might lose too!

Which might be just as well. I thin the rest of the country is tired of all the emphasis put on Sox/Yanks and all the media oxygen that uses up. (Cards-Houston had a great NLCS last year. A real nailbiter. But it kind of got ignored because of Boston and NYC going at it again.)

I love the Cards fans. They are incredible! I secretly hope it's a Chicago - St Louis Series. That would be amazing. I don't have a dog in this fight anymore, so it's just pure love of baseball in autumn now.

[WildEyedLiberal]

17. I WOULD love to play the Sox, but...

... see, last year, we played the Sox, who hadn't won a WS since the '10s... let's just say I don't want a redux of that. :D

I'd actually love to play the Yankees. I think a Cardinals-Yankees series would be some good old fashioned hardball.

I'd like for the White Sox to win eventually... just not this year :D

[TayTay]

15. Hey WEL, how about this one?

Now, how do I turn it into an icon?



Cheesus, this is also the anit-botox argument pic, isn't it?

[WildEyedLiberal]

16. Shit that's hot

I dunno how to resize it. Firespirit did mine :P DAMN that's a hot pic. DAMN.

*pants*

*swoons*

Um, I gotta, uh, go, uh, do some, uh, stuff, uh, and things...

*groan*

[TayTay]

18. Well, you told me to go out and get a hot, wonky pic

And I think I found one. I love that pic. (I know it's just me, but that is prelude to a Mass "Bite me' comment. I know one when I see one. It must have come from the Condi hearing earlier this year.)

I just adore that look in Kerry's eyes, cheesus, if I was testifying in front of a committee and I saw that look I would recheck all my docs and make sure I had everything in tip-top order. That is an intense look in an otherwise fairly casual head-shot. I mean, really, the lights are all on and somebody is definitely home in that shot. When was the last time, if ever, that * had a pic that made anyone say that. (Never. His mental house is always dark and full of creepy shadows and corridors that don't go anywhere.)

[ginnyinWI]

21. if it were me--

You'd hear a thud--me hitting the floor, passed out from fear!

Seriously, on the liberal question--Kerry is a mixed bag: socially liberal but fiscally conservative (pay as you go), and strong on national security/defending the nation. That's why he is not flatly anti-war; he's anti-stupid, pointless, corporate-driven war (and always has been--he went to Vietnam when he believed in the cause, protested it when he no longer did).

But I think he would order troops out to defend America if necessary. Is that purely liberal? I don't know--it's probably more of a moderate position. Definitely not like the neo-cons, but perhaps closer to where moderate repubs like Hagel or McCain would be than a lot of progressives would like.

And he appeals more to the center because of it. But that's where the votes also happen to be.

[TayTay]

19. Definitely hazel eyes,, btw n/t

[Crunchy Frog]

20. I apologize for crashing your thread, but I like doing avatars

and ended up doing one for this pic.

Hope you don't mind.

[wisteria]

22. How funny! What a contrast!

The listening and the thinking man compared to the bored,annoyed little boy.

[karynnj]

23. Funny

They are doing about the same thing to such different affect. Thank you for adding it. The difference is amazing. Even in the difference in their hands is amusing - Kerry's are elegant, Bush's almost not human. (that is one really bad Bush picture)

[Crunchy Frog]

24. Thank you for the complement on the Bush picture.

:evilgrin:

Anybody wants me to make an avatar for them, I'd be happy to.:)

[TayTay]

26. Hey, thanks!

And you are most welcome here. We are a picture loving crowd in hee, so browse all you want.

And please, feel free to jump into any conversation. We love newbies and good questions, comments, funny bits, etc.

And thanks! I love the avatar and have added it already!

[Crunchy Frog]

27. Kerry is very photogenic. Similar to Clark in that respect.

Thanks for the invite to jump into conversations. I may take you up on it. You often have more sane discussions in here than can be found in GD and GDP.:-)

Glad you like the avatar.

[TayTay]

28. Gen. Clark is a good man.

And a most welcome addition to the group of effective Democratic speakers for sanity and against the idiocy of this Administration.

In line with our great Kerry pics, saw this great Clark pic that showed the GEneral in a cooooool pose. It was mui macho and hot. Now I can't remember where I saw it. Now I'm going to have to surf for Clark pics until I find what I remember, cuz I'm supplying enough details to get the pic I want. Did Gen. Clark ever get photographed by Richard Avedon, maybe I'm looking for an Avedon pic.

[Crunchy Frog]

29. I'm looking forward to seeing it, if you're able to find it.

I have no idea about Richard Avedon.

[ginnyinWI]

30. I would have been happy to have had Clark on the ticket

for VP. He was my second choice during the primaries (started out first, but then Kerry caught my eye :) )

[TayTay]

25. Boy, they certain;y are different

* looks bored as hell and his hand looks like a pudgy little kids hands. (What is up with that?) Plus there is nobody home when you look in his eyes. He would be terrible in a committee because he doesn't listen and already has his mind made up.

Kerry looks both smart and formidible. You do not want to cross this guy. No wonder he was such a good prosecutor, that look would have telegraphed that he knew what people were up too and the bullshit stops here.

I love that pic! That's really Kerry as Senator with that deep, deep knowledge and wisdom that I expect from my Senator. (Hey, I do.) I would never vote for a pretty boy or a 'he's not bright but his heart is in the right place' guy. I want a forceful, smart, probing and curious person repping me in the Senate. Fortunately, I do have that. And that goes for Teddy too! (Though, ahm, dirty little secret time, I think Kerry is a wee bit more of that than his senior partner in the Senate. Shhhhh, don't tell anyone I said that.)

[karynnj]

31. No No No his hands don't look like pudgy little kids' hands

Pudgy little kids hands are cute and look really sweet. Bush's hand looks ugly and malformed.

Otherwise I totally agree. On the last thing, do you think that once he was in the Senate, it initially hurt Kerry that he was so striking looking and so dynamic.

[TayTay]

32. Maybe. He didn't play well with some folks up there

I thought he did a good job. The Globe loved him as a freshman and endorsed him for re-eelction with big wet Globbie kisses.

Massachusetts voters face difficult and confusing choices on this year's ballot for statewide candidates and referendums. Fortunately, the choice at the top of the ballot, between the candidates for the US Senate, is neither confusing nor difficult. The Boston Globe enthusiastically endorses John F. Kerry for reelection.

In his first term, Kerry earned a national reputation on issues of concern to Massachusetts: jobs, the environment, drug traffic and political-campaign financing.

Kerry is as intelligent, hard-working, broadly accomplished and respected as any freshman senator in many a year. In Washington, he has proved his ability to build consensus in favor of legislation that benefits his state.

I think the media enjoyed the fact that he was single and very, ah, eligible. There were a number os stories about KErry showing up at parties and such. (Hmm, Chris Dodd was also single at this time. I will have to go back and compare and contrast news stories about Kerry vs Dodd. Okay, Kerry got more 'eligible and handsome' Senator stories, but, ahm, well his State had more newspapers. So there.) All the same, he was viewed as highly qualified and not a lightweight.

[TayTay]

33. Thought number two, on your last point

You know, I thought about this today as I did my 'fall cleaning.' (I am more of a fall cleaning than spring cleaning person. LOL!) I tried to remember what I, as a Mass voter actually thought during that period. (There has been a LOT of water under the bridge since then and I think current events can back-color my perceptions.)

I don't remember being all that interested in the 'rumors' about John Kerry, International Man of Mystery. (Sorry, but that's how I view all those rumors. It's kind of silly. It's an attempt to fill in a blank canvas with pre-selected information. I always thought a lot of the rumors were there because there had to be rumors. I mean he was a striking figure, a powerful man with a very powerful job, and the image demanded two kinds of press: one that dealt with his actual work and one that dealt with the human being. I didn't really pay that much attention to the latter. There were a few times when 'gossip' sort of came up, but, it's gossip. There's always gossip about powerful people, that's just human nature.) I am very wonky by nature, honestly, and I never really gave that much thought to the gossipy stuff, ironically enough, until I started posting in here. (Sigh, tis true.)

I liked Mr. Kerry. He was a damned interesting guy. He had a really fascinating background that wasn't like the usual pols in MA. He stood out. And he went and won a Senate seat, a damned pearl in the Mass political hierarchy, based on two years as Lt. Gov. That was friggin amazing. (Most pols in MA have to work their way up. City council elections, state rep or state senator, maybe a state-wide run as Attorney General or something. Who wins a Senate seat with two years as Lt. Gov under their belt? That was damned interesting and I have been interested ever since.) There are a lot of people in-state that have never forgiven Kerry for getting that Senate seat without 'paying his dues.' There are a lot of people who think he got in because he looked good on tv or something. (Idiotic assumption. Nobody wins a Senate seat in MA by accident. There would have to be a statewide lobotomy for that to happen. He won it fair and square and based on talent and hard-work.)

So, the long answer to your question is that the 'good looks' seems to have only damaged him with the Globe. (Can you say ironic? Isn't the press supposed to be the ones who focus on hard issues, not the soft gossipy stuff?) I had enough to focus on without that. I mean here is a delicious human being, incredibly smart and very talented, who had the chops to get that seat ahead of all the 'blessed locals.' I have always found Kerry fascinating, not least because of the inherent contradictions in the man and the intensity that he has. He has always stood out for me. He's just so different.

Some pols are basically pretty easy to figure out. They are 'pork-collectors' who go into office with the idea that they can stay forever if they just take care of the home folks and bring home the bacon. Mr. Kerry has never forgotten the Bay State and he did a lot to help people and businesses here. But he is also a 'deep thinker' on the national scene. I just found that incredibly riveting. I guess I still do. I still play guessing games as to what he is thinking. That's because he's someone who is worth paying attention to. He doesn't respond the way a lot of people do with his own self-interest at the top of the list. There are dips and valleys in this thinking, some U-turns when the facts warrant it and this wonderful ability to think years ahead of the current situation. I always loved that.

Sorry for the length. I got to ruminating and trying to remember what *I* thought, which is kind of difficult, given the info overload in the last few years.

I like this commentary from the Frontline show last year:

Question: Perhaps you can put him in historical context. I mean, you don't often get investigators of his type in Congress...

Jack Blum: Well, there are very few people who come to the Senate with a beginning as prosecutors who are also war veterans, who have a burning interest in foreign policy because they've come out of a war that was fought on dubious grounds for dubious reasons. And are motivated to try to make an issue of that. To try to follow their own instincts.

This guy had a certain set of skills and a capacity to do things that very few members of the Senate have. Most people who come to the Senate get there by a kind of chair-sitting which is in the state legislature or they come up through the ranks -- maybe they've been a governor of a state. But they haven't been the prosecutor or the investigator, the person who picks the case apart. And he did have that background. …

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/choice2004/kerry/senator.html

Very different kind of Senator. He bore watching.

[whometense]

35. Great post.

From my perspective, Kerry's looks certainly didn't hurt back in 1971 and 1972 when he was making his first public impression, but they were just one part of a very appealing package. I remember him being in the news and being riveted not only by his testimony, but also by the force of his seriousness and sincerity.

His sincerity seems to me to have been a double-edged sword for his entire career. I think it's a very large part of what makes him so attractive to women (certainly worked for me!) On the other hand, there are legions of the cynical who invert his sincerity 180 degrees and interpret it as disingenuousness and political positioning. For me, and I daresay I'm not alone in this, I love Kerry because I don't have to parse his words for opposite meanings. He says exactly what he means to say (except when overtired :D, like the rest of us).

Kerry has never let me down in the 35 years I've been following his career. He makes decisions I disagree with, but he follows his own inner logic even in those decisions, and I respect that. The way I see it, pleasing me 100% of the time is not part of his job description.

The thing about Kerry for me is in all this long history I have never seen him behave in any situation with less than rock solid integrity and honesty. I can count on him.

[karynnj]

36. Wow, that's a lot to take in and explains your (and some of the

other MA people's) comment that some of the snark is just jealousy. He really is different. It's strange that they still are annoyed after over 20 years that he didn't work his way up before becoming Senator, when they conceded from the beginning that he was an excellent Senator. He really is unique in his ability to analyze situations. His willingness to re-look at thinks and change when warranted is unusual. His comments and questions at hearings seem to be by far better than virtually any other Senator and that has to be what's needed.

I'm amazed by the things that he and Teresa have done this year. (I loved Teresa's editorial) His recent speeches have been brilliant in laying out in a very far sighted way problems we are facing then outlining how he thinks we need to proceed to get solutions. All the speeches have the same core values, then deal with different facets of the problems/solutions.

What has amazed me is that although I read everything on his web site last year, there has not been a major speech yet this year that didn't cause me to think about the subject matter differently. It's almost like he is integrating everything new that he learned last year traveling the country with his view of how government should function and information on possible solutions to specific problems.

He's mentioned writing a book which might explain why the speeches seem all related back to some high level vision that integrates them into a consistent plan. This is so much more productive then the "political" Carvelle nonsense or some of the re-framing stuff - where they recommend just renaming things.

[jillan]

37. One of the comments I am starting to hear come out of the dems is

about those on the very left being just as much of a concern as those on the very right. I don't recall the first person I heard that from, possibly Clinton?, but the last one I heard say it was Durbin. I consider Durbin to be one of the more liberal senators, so I was surprised. But it is the truth. We have to take this country back in steps. First we have to appeal to the moderates, especially now when the republicans are so digusted with the repigs, the neo-cons. If we had someone like Conyers be the dem nominee for Pres, we would not be able to bring people over from the other side. Once we get the American people back to 'normalization' we can become even more progressive.

And when it comes to Kerry, I have to laugh. When he was running for the nomination, he was labelled as being too liberal! Now he's not liberal enough. Give me a break. To me, Kerry's ideals are just about perfect. He sees the whole picture. He gets it. He's not in it to get rich, he's in it to make America a better place. So was Gore. Sigh!

Clark would have been a great addition to the ticket. I thought Edwards was great, energetic, wanting to take the country back. But I preferred Clark because of his military experience, and I thought that was important with the disaster in Iraq. Oh well, means nothing now.