This week's issue of The BlackCommentator comes out in support of Kerry for President, weakly:
http://www.blackcommentator.com/104/104_cover_kerry.html
Here's my response to the editor.
Just wanted to record support for your position on Kerry. However, I think the quote you reference,
Asked his timetable for pulling troops out of Iraq, Mr. Kerry told a few hundred people in Canonsburg, Pa.: "My goal would be to get them home in my first term. And I believe that can be done." He said he would make it clear that "we do not have long-term designs to maintain bases and troops in Iraq."
is a very significant policy statement, since the redeployment of American forces FROM Europe to the Persian Gulf region was the REAL reason for the invasion of Iraq. I suspect it will be shown that Saddam was offered a choice between "welcoming" in the Americans to set up shop in Iraq or being attacked. Since he had already been tricked once by the elder Bush, he didn't go for the deal. And what are his Arab neighbors saying? Better him than me.
We keep forgetting that we have effectively been expelled from Saudi Arabia. Qatar and Kuwait just aren't big enough. Iraq seems ideal because it has large expanses of "unused" land and access to the Gulf. Guam, to which "we" have been relocating submarines, is just a little too far away from our area of interest. Sitting in Iraq and Korea we would effectively have China in a vise.
The reason it is significant coming from Kerry is because this redeployment has been in the works for a long time with "planning money" appropriated in many budgets.
One wonders how much of that $87 billion he voted against was actually intended for the construction of new bases, rather than the reconstruction of what has been destroyed in Iraq. Sending the National Guard over was not an unintended consequence of not having enough regular man-power. Dispatching national guard units with all their heavy equipment was done on purpose. They were supposed to build the bases and airfields the military needs. Why else have they spent their time building roads in Kuwait while they waited until Iraq was safe? Surely Kuwait has enough money to build its own roads now that its access to oil is secure.
You know, I can remember past elections where the mantra was that electoral politics should stop at the country's borders so as not to give our enemies an advantage by seeming to be conflicted about our international goals. As a result, the American public never concerned itself with international relations, the one area where the executive actually has virtual autonomy. And, as a result, all sorts of crimes have been committed against other people in our name. Don't you think that ought to change? Don't you think that regardless of who gets the Presidency we are going to have to pay closer attention to what's being done in our name? Granted, Kerry can't be relied on to do the right thing. But, should he be? Where's our responsibility?