Moyers and Bob Kerrey on PBS....Kerrey still spinning and twisting.

[madfloridian]

I have just been reading the transcript from Bill Moyer's interview with him last week. Will post that next. Moyers kept referring back to the WSJ op ed. Here is some background on that column which infuriated many of us.

DLC Spotlights Kerrey's column that spun Iraq as a greater danger since 9/11

He had the nerve to call it The Left's Iraq Muddle. Yes, he really did call it that.

No matter how incompetent the Bush administration and no matter how poorly they chose their words to describe themselves and their political opponents, Iraq was a larger national security risk after Sept. 11 than it was before. And no matter how much we might want to turn the clock back and either avoid the invasion itself or the blunders that followed, we cannot. The war to overthrow Saddam Hussein is over. What remains is a war to overthrow the government of Iraq.

...."Yes, it is central to the fight against Islamic radicalism"

...."Suppose we had not invaded Iraq and Hussein had been overthrown by Shiite and Kurdish insurgents. Suppose al Qaeda then undermined their new democracy and inflamed sectarian tensions to the same level of violence we are seeing today. Wouldn't you expect the same people who are urging a unilateral and immediate withdrawal to be urging military intervention to end this carnage? I would.

American liberals need to face these truths: The demand for self-government was and remains strong in Iraq despite all our mistakes and the violent efforts of al Qaeda, Sunni insurgents and Shiite militias to disrupt it.

Then he had the nerve to go on Bill Moyer's Journal and try to defend his statements. Here is the transcript link, and a few snips from it.

Bill Moyers talks with former Senator, Bob Kerrey.

BILL MOYERS: So we're wasting our resources on this guerilla war?

BOB KERREY: Well, I don't think necessarily it's been said that we're wasting our resources. I would say that it's-- it's-- I personally believe it's not an appropriate use of our resources to be a police force for Iraq.

BILL MOYERS: So pull them back, put them on the bases?

BOB KERREY: I think you could get--

BILL MOYERS: People want to know. They-- they really that that we can't unilaterally pull out--

BOB KERREY: Well, I'm not--

BILL MOYERS: They don't know what we should do.

BOB KERREY: Bill I'm the president of The New School at the moment. I'm not in the Senate, so I haven't worked out all the details.

BILL MOYERS: They didn't quote that piece in THE WALL STREET JOURNAL and the blogs all weekend because you're the President of the New School.

BOB KERREY: No, I understand.

BILL MOYERS: They quoted you because you were a Democrat--

BOB KERREY: No, I understand.

BILL MOYERS: --identifying with the President's policy.

And then Moyers added this:

BILL MOYERS: I know you don't write headlines of the essays you do in THE WALL STREET JOURNAL. The headline on the one the other day said, "The Left Iraq Muddle". Now, it's well and good to call the liberal left a muddle, as THE WALL STREET JOURNAL and Rush Limbaugh do. But in all seriousness, it's not the liberal left that created the quagmire in Iraq or the disaster that seems to have no end, right?

Kerrey responds that both the left and right are muddled.

He should have said a lot more than that about that awful op end. He should have apologized.

Here's the Kerrey Moyers video clip:
http://www.pbs.org/moyers/journal/06012007/watch2.html

[orleans]

1. argh. what a JERK! n/t

[Tarheel_Dem]

2. I watched it last night, and honestly I could barely keep down....

my supper. I never knew that Bob Kerrey sounded so much like Lieberman. When you've got Rush Limbaugh quoting you, and calling you a great patriot, it's probably time to change your party affiliation. Kerrey is one of the reasons the MSM can get away with calling Dems "divided", and get away with it.

Edit to Add: Recommended....Everyone should see this.

[rurallib]

3. I was screaming at my TV

what a fucking idiot!

[Tarheel_Dem]

4. I know...I just wanted to slap him...

and that stupid inappropriate grin made me want to wretch. I am so sick of hearing Dems speak as if they have no problem with this fiasco, just the way it's been prosecuted. I mean, it's not like people are dying everyday, right?

[madfloridian]

5. I see the DLC link to Kerrey's WSJ op ed is no longer there.

http://journals.democraticunderground.com/madfloridian/1324

I posted it, and it has disappeared now. I just did a search and can not find it.

Maybe they just spotlight things for one day in the Ideas Primary. Just wanted to clarify.

Now the Ideas Primary link goes to the Politico and an article by Paul Weinstein.

[papau]

6. WSJ/Kerry link below

http://www.opinionjournal.com/editorial/?id=

[madfloridian]

15. And...I found the link to the Ideas Primary where Harold Ford promoted it.

Here is the Ideas Primary website.

http://ideasprimary.com/

Here is the link to Kerrey's column being praised by the DLC.

http://www.ideasprimary.com/?p=109

[karynnj]

17. I don't see the KerrEy article on that page

[madfloridian]

7. I did not know about this.

http://www.nytimes.com/2001/04/25/magazine/25KERREY.html?ei=5070&en=d75d7250b1c661e0&ex=1180929600&pagewanted=all

If this be true, then he of all people should know the anguish our troops in Iraq might suffer. They are doing things they are not trained to do, and much of it will haunt them.

It makes me sad to hear this from Vietnam.

[madfloridian]

8. NYT slide show

http://www.nytimes.com/library/photos/20010429war-link.1.html

[madfloridian]

9. Well, goody goody, I see other talking heads tomorrow...Shrum and Carville.

I am sick and tired of seeing them on TV. They do not care about our party or our country. They only care about themselves and being cutesy and smart ass.

I do not like either of them, and they are always trying to divide the party.

:banghead:

And since they mess around in other countries' election and polls, how do we know they don't do the same thing here?

Video
http://journals.democraticunderground.com/madfloridian/770

And why doesn't anyone else wonder about it.

Aren't we lucky. Kerrey last week and Shrum and Carville tomorrow.

Egg on head on MTP...maybe he'll do it again tomorrow.

[madfloridian]

10. Updating this thread with a video from that same Moyers show.

This was just posted here. When I heard this, I remembered our Democrats giving Bush carte blanche on Iraq and on attacking Iran for four months. It just made me sick to hear LBJ's words. Thanks to whomever posted this. I missed it.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cM2QTimBoeo

[smoogatz]

11. Kerrey's solution is apparently to stop calling the occupation

an occupation. If we call it something else, then the Iraqis will magically accept the presence of American troops, and sectarian violence will die down. That's pretty much the Kerrey plan, as far as I could make out (it was hard to hear the whole thing, though, over the sound of my own derisive snorts).

[Tarheel_Dem]

12. kick....n/t

[Hissyspit]

13. I saw that. Kerrey was full of shit.

Not much more to be said.

[madfloridian]

14. Succinctly said, hissyspit, short to the point.

:hi:

[live love laugh]

16. I couldn't finish watching the clip. Kerrys a DemPublicon. No wonder he was chosen for the 9/11

commission. He is one of them--a plant if I ever saw one. I'm betting he will be "elected" again in
08.

[karynnj]

18. This is Bob KERREY - not John Kerry

John Kerry is doing as much as anyone to get us out and has a solid liberal/moderate record. He will not be elected President in 2008 because he is not running - though overall on terrorism, Iraq, enviropnmentalism and health care, he is far better than anyone currently running.

[live love laugh]

19. OK so I spelled his last name wrong--the meaning of the post is unchanged. nt

[karynnj]

23. It made the comment very ambiguous

because there is a KERRY. Kerry of course was not on the 911 commission.

[gratuitous]

20. Okay, Mr. Kerrey; suppose we hadn't invaded Iraq

Sorry, just smiling to myself; here's my point: Let's take Bob at his premise, that we didn't invade Iraq and Saddam is overthrown by Shiite and Kurdish folks from his own country. What then?

Well, for starters, we don't have all kinds of credibility problems, we don't have the onus of killing tens if not hundreds of thousands of Iraqis hanging around our necks. We have billions of dollars in our Treasury that's not there right now to provide financial aid and assistance to the new government in the form of loans, in-kind contributions, and as seed money for others to pitch in. We have a decades-long record of opposing the Saddam regime, so the new government has a reason to trust us.

But yeah, you're the president of the New School, so you're probably a lot smarter than me, and can see all kinds of eventualities that are undeniably worse than the situation that now obtains in Iraq. I'll bow to your superior dumbassitude, Mr. Kerrey.

[Toots]

21. "American liberals need to face these truths: "

Suppose the Kurds had doen such and such, suppose Al Qaeda undermined their new government. All suppositions and then he says Americans need to face these truths. He twists words worse than Cheney..

[beachmom]

22. What's weird is that if you pull out what Kerrey wants to do, it is no

different than the Reid resolution:

End occupation of Iraq (police action)
Do massive diplomacy
Continue counterterrorism efforts

Unfortunately, he couches it all in right wing frames. I also think it is too simplistic to talk about "fronts" against al Qaeda. There is the main group, al Qaeda, in Pakistan/Afghanistan, and now there is a sister group Al Qaeda in Iraq, which took advantage of the American invasion and subsequent power vaccuum. Al Qaeda in Iraq has been successful in a) fundraising and b) attracting new recruits and training them and c) adding to the chaos in Iraq. They also have launched a very successful propaganda campaign against the U.S. which Bush and now Kerrey are endorsing and furthering. Al Qaeda in Iraq is never going to run Iraq -- they are hated by the Iraqis as are all foreigners. What they CAN do is create chaos and try to frame Iraq in terms of America losing to al Qaeda. If the Bush administration were smart (which they aren't), they would stop furthering al Qaeda propaganda goals. Kerrey should do the same.

[madfloridian]

24. Or is he saying just don't call it "occupation" anymore?

I am wondering if he just wants to change the name and let the Iraqis ask us but not use the word "occupier". He is not very good with words considering his position as college president. He is confusing in many ways.

"BOB KERREY: --and you target those individual groups and target the individuals that are leading young people astray using technology to do it, you can build a bipartisan policy. Iraq is more difficult. Personally, this is what I would do. I would say to the Iraqi people, we're ending the occupation.

BILL MOYERS: When?

BOB KERREY: I would say we end the occupation today. Our mission should not be to occupy Iraq. Our mission should be to be a reliable ally of the Iraqi government in their effort to survive. Now, I would--

...."BOB KERREY: I think it's likely that the Iraqi government will say, we need some kind of U.S. force to make certain that a much stronger in Syria, much stronger military in Iran, and much stronger military in Turkey don't take advantage of a potential power vacuum. But they have to ask us what they want. And I would say in some-- I would say yes to maintaining some kind of military force for that purpose. And if they ask us to have forces left not as occupiers, but to help make certain that those borders are protected, I would say yes. But they ask us for economic and military assistance, I would say yes, up to a point. But I would not-- I think where we get in trouble is where we are out there operating their prisons, operating their jails, operating and even training their police force. It's very difficult to get that done in a fashion in the modern age, without these images of us knocking down doors, which I think undercuts essentially what we're trying to do.

[PegDAC]

25. I used to really like Bob Kerrey. nt

:(

[madfloridian]

26. Bob Kerrey is on AAR on week-ends?

http://www.airamerica.com/schedule

With Arianna Huffington and Mark Green.