Robert Scheer: Kerry a Bleeding Heart? Hardly

[Larkspur]

http://www.commondreams.org/views04/1012-26.htm

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I like liberals. They gave us the five-day workweek; ended child labor; invented unemployment insurance, Social Security and Medicare; and led us, despite fierce opposition from "America First" pseudo-patriots on the political right, to victory over fascism in World War II. Liberals also ended racial segregation and gave women the vote.

But when Bush used the L-word in the second presidential debate, Kerry did not defend that proud progressive tradition. Nor did I expect him to. Kerry is one of those New Democrats who rejects the "liberal" label that I find so honorable. After all, Kerry, as he bragged in the debate, voted for the atrocious 1996 welfare reform bill, which has contributed to the 4 million additional people, mostly children, pushed below the poverty line during Bush's tenure.
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As is his habit on so many things, Bush had the facts wrong. The career voting record of the "Massachusetts liberal" ranks him as only the 11th most liberal, behind current colleagues from Iowa, California, Illinois, Minnesota, Rhode Island, New Jersey, Vermont and Maryland — and his running mate is a miserable 27th.

It turns out the duo moved up in the journal's 2003 rankings only because they were both out campaigning and, just as Republican presidential nominees have in the past, missed many congressional votes. As the journal later explained in disclaiming the GOP's misinterpretation of its ranking system, the 2003 rating of Kerry as the top liberal was based only on the 19 votes he cast on economic issues.
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