KERRY ADVOCATED GUTTING AGRICULTURE DEPT

[RUexperienced]

http://www.drudgereport.com/**Exclusive**

In 1996 Senator John Kerry proposed to "get rid of the Agriculture Department," the DRUDGE REPORT can reveal. A move -- that if successful -- would have likely resulted in subsidies cuts and programs for Iowa growers. "I think we can reduce the size of Washington," Kerry said on January 6, 1996.<B> "Get rid of the Energy Department. Get rid of the Agriculture Department, or at least render it three-quarters the size it is today; there are more agriculture bureaucrats than there are farmers in this country"...
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Drudge again. Take it for what it's worth.

Not a good quote to have floating around right before Iowa.

[fob]

1. Oh I don't know. I think this sentence here...

there are more agriculture bureaucrats than there are farmers in this country"...

has probably been said by more than a few farmers, Iowa or otherwise!

[Democrats unite]

2. Remeber the drudge incident yesterday?

Nuff said.

[westman]

7. Drudge left paragraphs out,

But Clark still said what he did. He can't spin his way out of this.

[Democrats unite]

9. and added sentences that wern't there.

it's been debunked, if you want to believ drudge go right ahead, he's a lying asshole!

[westman]

12. It hasn't been "debunked",

as much as I hate to admit that. Clark DID SAY WHAT WAS REPORTED. Best case: his verbal testimony differed materially from his prepared statement. That's just as disturbing.

Lieberman is looking much better in comparison.

[Snoopy2]

16. Here is a link that debunks what was said

http://www.sunherald.com/mld/sunherald/news/nation/7720762.htm

And see Talking Points Memo - JMM has several posts debunking the claims

And from Counterspin from the end of the 9/26 testimony after Clark left -

PERLE: "So I think General Clark simply doesn't want to see us use military force and he has thrown out as many reasons as he can develop to that but the bottom line is he just doesn't want to take action. He wants to wait."

[westman]

17. Read (pt) that.

It doesn't alter what Clark actually said. We even have an audio transcript. He sounded like a member of the Bush cabinet.

Again, that's disturbing.

[KittyWampus]

19. When You Say "We" Have An Audio Transcript.... Who Are You Referring To?

[westman]

21. The human race.

We've all heard it. It wasn't doctored.

I actually made a misstatement in my earlier post. It's not a transcript--it's a recording.

[Democrats unite]

22. Then I suggest you get the wax out of your ears.

eom

[westman]

24. Ouch! That's a stinger!

I know it's tough to accept, but Clark has stepped in it big time.

[DrBB]

23. Richard Perle debunked it

Not on purpose of course. But supposedly Clark was speakin in support of the war? That's not what Perle thought. Here's his summary of what Clark said, thanks to TPM:

Schrock: Sure, I would love to know Mr. Perle's, you know, the general said time is on our side. My guess is you do not believe that.

Perle: No, I don't believe it and frankly I don't think {Clark} made a very convincing case in support of that cliche but it was one of many cliches. At the end of the day when you sought to elicit from him a reconciliation of the view that time is on our side with what he acknowledged to be our ignorance of how far along Saddam Hussein is, he had no explanation.

He seems to be preoccupied, and I'm quoting now, with building legitimacy, with exhausting all diplomatic remedies as though we hadn't been through diplomacy for the last decade, and relegating the use of force to a last resort, to building the broadest possible coalition, in short a variety of very amorphous, ephemeral concerns alongside which there's a stark reality and that is that every day that goes by, Saddam Hussein is busy perfecting those weapons of mass destruction that he already has, improving their capabilities, improving the means with which to deliver them and readying himself for a future conflict.

So I don't believe that time is on our side and I don't believe that this fuzzy notion that the most important thing is building legitimacy, as if we lack legitimacy now, after all the U.N. resolutions that he's in blatant violation of, I don't believe that that should be the decisive consideration. So I think General Clark simply doesn't want to see us use military force and he has thrown out as many reasons as he can develop to that but the bottom line is he just doesn't want to take action. He wants to wait.

Looks like Perle took it as an anti-war position, huh?

[ParanoidPat]

3. A: It's OLD (1996) news and B: It's from Drudge!

And do ya think you can fix your caps lock? :)

[RUexperienced]

5. I just cut and pasted the title.

The caps are the way it read in the original.

[Must_B_Free]

6. no scheiss

the first thing I thought was "I'm SURE that's YET ANOTHER baseless distortion"

the second thing I thought was "It sounds like he's talking about getting the taxpayer what they pay for; essentially making it more efficient and less wasteful." How is this a disservice?

[oldleftguy]

4. The Republicans are...

...:scared: of Kerry!

[DrBB]

8. "Not a good quote..."

Not a good quote to have floating around right before Iowa.

Gee, do ya think that's why Dredge is pushing it, huh, maybe?

What I'd like to see is people taking the attitude that just about anything like this will turn out to be bunk, once someone's had the time to examine it. Which if we help out so much by uncritically transmitting it, will be far too long to do our candidates any good.

I'm not a Kerry supporter, but I believe this--at least, in the way it is being framed by Dredge--about as much as I believe there is a big cache of WMDs still waiting to be found in Iraq.

[jburton]

10. And he's having an affair !

...with Howard Dean's non-campaigning wife!

Impacting hard...


:eyes:

[MaineDem]

11. Rove now worried about ALL the Dems

It's only just begun.

[Frodo]

20. Sorry. No. This was predictable years ago.

I know that because I did.

Politics is an ugly business. Nobody who thinks they have ANY shot just "steps aside" to let the other guy win. And nobody says "gee, we'd all make great presidents, I'd just be 2% better".

No, they've all won competitive elections before and this is what happens in a close election.

Democratic primary politics is particularly ugly (I can't speak much to the other side - not having paid as much attention). Remember the "Willie Horton" thing? Al Gore first brought it up in the Primary. Jennifer Flowers? Primary. "Monkey Business"??? Yep.

Sorry guys. It IS ammunition for the other side later on (so particularly distressing)... but THIS is US eating our own.

[bluestateguy]

13. Does anybody see a pattern here?

Everytime a candidate surges a new dirty story surfaces in the media. The obvious intent is to sully and bloody up any potential candidate. They won't let us have a Prince Charming.

[arcos]

15. yes...

First it was Dean, yesterday was Clark, today is Kerry...

Edwards will probably be next.

[DrBB]

18. I think it's a leetle more devious than that

I mean, yeah, pattern's obvious enough. But everyone around here keeps interpreting ti as "Rove is afraid of \
on edit: oops--this shouldn't have posted. Dunno what happened. Please check this thread instead.

[not systems]

14. Good.

As a former Iowan I say good idea.

These people have contributed more to the elimination of
the family farm and rise of the corporate farm than anything else.

They also pushed the policies that stripped the state of it's
forests and wetlands leaving it with bad surface and ground water
and a collapse of the natural environment.

[Moderator]

25. Locking.

This story has been "verified" by the Washington Times, per the new Drudge link on his homepage, but this thread doesn't link to that story, but, rather the Drudge Report homepage. Anyone who wishes to begin a new thread about the Washington Times story is welcome to do so.

It's time to re-think the way LBN is going to treat Drudge-source "stories" through the primary season. For the time being, let's try to limit our LBN posting to more legitimate news sources.

Thanks!

LBN-DU Moderators