Kerry once never missed an opportunity to align himself with Ted Kennedy or the Kennedy clan, or to play up his supposed Irish heritage.

Is Kerry a Democratic liberal or a centrist, as sometimes is claimed? The rating services of both the left and right report that he votes with Sen. Edward Kennedy of Massachusetts about 96 percent of the time in support of a strong tax-raising and government-knows-best platform. In the 1972 campaign, Kerry ads displayed photos of Kerry and Kennedy together.

John Forbes Kerry no longer trumpets the fact that his initials are JFK, and he has expunged his middle initial from his bumper stickers. Political operatives in the Bay State say this is because it is believed his close association with the Kennedys and Massachusetts liberalism might hurt his presidential candidacy, especially in the South. When it is remembered that he was Democratic presidential-nominee Michael Dukakis' lieutenant governor, Kerry campaigners note that the two were elected on separate ballots.

There are other image problems that still have not been handled. The week that included Kerry's appearance before Congress included another incident that produced an embarrassment that took years to be exposed. In a protest on April 23, 1971, Kerry led his shocked countrymen to believe that, weeping, he and his VVAW comrades had tossed their war medals onto the steps of the Capitol where a large sign nearby proclaimed: "Trash." It stirred the emotions for those on both sides of the conflict and again spurred media attention for Kerry. But then in 1984 a reporter noticed that Kerry's medals were displayed on the wall of his office and the Wall Street Journal reported that, when confronted, Kerry claimed he actually tossed away his combat ribbons, not his medals. Kerry says he threw someone else's medals. Whatever the truth, he had let the fabrication continue for years.

But enough for now of Kerry's life many years ago when the Earth was flat. Anyone past the age of 40 knows that people change their minds and even reform their character during the course of their lives. Perhaps the question should be, "Is Kerry still saying whatever needs to be said to get elected?" You bet, critics say.

Last December, after arriving a half-hour late to speak and answer the questions of 175 politically savvy Dartmouth College students on the cold and snowy New Hampshire campus, Kerry spoke of the need for increased investment in renewable energy sources such as wind, geothermal, ethanol, biomass and solar. "Twenty percent of all electricity to be produced by renewable energy sources by 2020" is his battle cry. He calls for "a new Manhattan Project" for alternative energy. He says he disagrees with the Green Party platform on only one issue, but doesn't say which. The kids love it.

Naturally, when a private company came to Massachusetts recently and told of plans to generate electricity with the winds that blow through the 18 miles of ocean between touristy Cape Cod and wealthy Nantucket Island, one would expect that Kerry would jump up and down with glee. Wrong. He is waffling. With super-rich landholders and yachtsmen such as Walter Cronkite, the Kennedys, Kerry himself, and his neighbors concerned about the possible sighting from the shore or their yachts of a few sea-based windmills, the candidate is unwilling to give the project his support at this time - a critical period when the alternative-energy company needs as much help as it can get. Critics call it hypocritical, but a Kerry spokesman provides this disclaimer: "The facts aren't in on Cape Wind and its environmental effect. ... John Kerry is waiting for all the information to come in the environmental-impact statement before he makes a decision on whether to support the project."

Those opposed to the project are not saying they don't want to have to sail around the windmills, but are talking about such concerns and sensitivities as whether birds will fly into them and be hurt or killed - a worry that never stopped the erecting of a skyscraper or a barn or house or even a telephone pole. Needless to say, environmentalists who favor use of alternative energy to replace fossil fuels wherever possible, and who considered Kerry to be a strong ally, indeed a very strong ally, are beginning to use the "O" word for opportunist and the "P" word for phony.

Kert Davies, research director of Greenpeace, has put it this way: "Kerry is the one who really needs to be called out on this stuff. He's been pretty mum so far. We don't know where he stands." And many on the left who were expected to support Kerry's candidacy, but have drifted off to Howard Dean, say there is a pattern to all of this. Most cite the invasion of Iraq, currently a more important issue than renewable energy. They note that Kerry voted to give Bush authorization to wage war in Iraq, and they say they are not likely to forgive him for it.

In a speech Jan. 23 at Washington's Georgetown University, this longtime member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee said, "We need a new approach to national security. A bold progressive internationalism that stands in stark contrast to the too-often belligerent and myopic unilateralism of the Bush administration. The blustering unilateralism is wrong, and even dangerous, for our country. In practice, it has meant alienating our longtime friends and allies, alarming potential foes and spreading anti-Americanism around the world. I say to the president, show respect for the process of international diplomacy because it is not only right, it can make America stronger. And show the world some appropriate patience in building a genuine coalition. Mr. President, do not rush to war."

Columnist Jeff Jacoby of the Boston Globe also wonders whether Kerry tries to be all things to all people. Jacoby reports that, when in the early 1990s a constituent wrote Kerry expressing support for an invasion of Iraq, Kerry's office responded by sending two letters - one saying he opposed the war and another supporting President George H.W. Bush's response. Kerry blamed it on computer problems and the failure to dispatch a third letter - one opposing the war but supporting the troops.

With antiwar candidate Dean moving ahead in New Hampshire and Iowa, Kerry continued to try to present himself as both for the war and against it, say Democratic political consultants in the Bay State. Now, they say, he may be writing off those states in favor of a last-ditch stand in the South as a national-security veteran.

An experienced Kerry watcher reminds that in 1984, when he first was trying to win election to the Senate, his chief rival in the tough Democratic primary was U.S. Rep. James M. Shannon. Kerry had been outscored by Shannon, 100-94, on the endorsement questionnaire of a group opposed to America's then-growing military. In Massachusetts, the antiwar vote was and is significant, and the two liberals were vying for their vote. A member of the group favoring a reduction in funds earmarked to build key weapons systems contacted a Kerry lieutenant and advised that Kerry change his answers on the questionnaire so that both candidates would have an equal score. Kerry changed his answers, both got a perfect score and the maneuver kept Shannon from receiving the important endorsement.

In seeking approval of this disarmament group, Kerry formally expressed approval of canceling a host of the very weapons systems that helped defeat Iraq so quickly, including the B-1 and B-2 stealth bombers, the AH-64 Apache helicopter, the Patriot missile system, the F-15, F-14A and F-14D jets, the AV-8B Harrier jet, the Aegis air-defense cruiser and the Trident missile system. Kerry says of this 1984 campaign posture, "I'm sure that some of it was driven at the time by the nature of the beast I was fighting politically."

Kerry said recently he does not remember changing his answers on the questionnaire, even though it was well-publicized at the time, and that his first responses may just have been a misstatement of his position or misinterpreted. "I wasn't trying to be on both sides of it," he soothes.

The problem for Bay Staters who know him, and for Democrats in nearby New Hampshire who are swamped by Massachusetts media with tales of his comings and goings, poses and postures, commitments and causes, is that this man thinks nothing at all of being mercurial and contradictory. It is a joke among local politicians that Kerry will simply say or do anything for the slightest advantage. For instance, they point out, Massachusetts has lots of folks of Irish decent who vote out of proportion to their numbers and being Irish there is a strong advantage to winning election - especially for Democrats, as the large number of Irish surnames at the Massachusetts Statehouse will testify. "It is how you become one of the boys," says Mike Gilleran, the former deputy chief of the Massachusetts Republican Party.

To Kerry's advantage his surname sounds Irish and his facial features look Celtic to locals. Virtually everyone has always assumed he was Irish-American. He isn't. And not only is he not Irish-American, his mother's people are New England Brahmins. For some Massachusetts Democrats, voting even once for a Yankee Brahmin requires three "Hail Marys" to cleanse the soul.

The maternal ancestors of John Forbes Kerry include the Forbeses, who made their fortune starting the Boston-China trade, and the Winthrops, one of whom led the English settlers overseas to Boston and was the first governor of Massachusetts in the 1630s. Another Winthrop was governor of Connecticut from 1676 to 1683.

While Kerry's maternal forebears were known by all, he was forgiven that accident of birth for the sake of his father's presumed Irish stock. Kerry says he has known for only about 15 years that his father's mother was in fact Jewish and from the former Austrian empire. He also says he only found out recently, when a Boston Globe reporter informed him of it, that around 1902 his grandfather Kohn, a Jew from Bohemia, changed his name from Kohn to Kerry. Not only that, he says he was completely unaware that grandfather Kerry shot himself to death in the men's room of the Copley Hotel in Boston, a story so notorious that it appeared at the time on the front pages of Boston newspapers.

Although a Kerry spokesman says that he continually corrected reported misstatements about his supposed Irish heritage, it immediately became clear to the scoffing Boston press that the senator had manipulated the misunderstanding to his advantage, having tried to correct the record in only the most tangential way if at all. Other Massachusetts politicians also have lied about their supposedly Irish heritage to gain electoral advantage. But, says Gilleran, "If it were understood by the population that he was not Irish, he would never have risen in Massachusetts politics.

Pretense to imaginary forebears may be a misdemeanor as these things go, but breaking and entering is not. Heard of Watergate? Get ready for Lowellgate.

On Sept. 18, 1972, the evening before the primary election during his second attempt for Congress, Kerry's brother Cameron and one Thomas Vallely, both part of his current campaign team, were arrested by Lowell police at 1:40 a.m. and charged with breaking and entering with the intent to commit larceny. The two were apprehended in the basement of a building whose door had been forced open, police said. It housed the headquarters of candidate DiFruscia. The Watergate scandal was making headlines at this time, and it was called the Lowell Watergate.

"They wanted to sever my telephone lines," DiFruscia said recently. Had those lines been cut, Kerry's opponent would not have been able to telephone supporters on Election Day to get out the vote and coordinate poll watchers, vital roles in a close election. "I do not know if they wanted to break into my office," says DiFruscia today. At the time he said, "All my IBM cards and the list of my voter identification in the greater Lowell area are in my headquarters."

Cameron and Vallely, along with David Thorne, who was Kerry's campaign manager at the time and has been close to him since they attended Yale together, did not deny the two entered the building in which they were captured. They said at the time they were in the cellar of the building to check their own telephone lines because they had received an anonymous call warning they would be cut.

This reporter heard an allegation that another congressional candidate placed the alleged anonymous call, which was denied. But if the Kerry campaign was concerned about someone breaking and entering to cut off its telephone service, why didn't they just call the police? Why break the law? And what does any of this say about Kerry's mind-set? Kerry campaign officials did not answer important Lowellgate questions.

The case was transferred to superior court and continued without a finding, where it was dismissed about a year later. But since it happened at the last minute, and Kerry won the primary but went on to lose the general election, this ugly business did not receive intense media scrutiny. Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein were busy investigating another break-in.

To tease Kerry, the editors of his Yale yearbook listed him as a member of the Young Republicans. As the Democratic primary grows more heated, says a top Democratic political consultant, the issues are likely to become: "What is a Democrat?" And, "Is John Kerry one of them?"

John Pike is a contributing writer for Insight magazine. Read "The Many Faces of John Kerry," Part 1.

All comments this article generated that I know of:

Reader Offers Evidence That Sen. John Kerry Is Two-Faced

I just finished reading John Pike's in-depth report about John Kerry again ["The Many Faces of Sen. John Kerry," Sept. 16-29, 2003]. As before, it was excellent! But have you noticed anything odd about Kerry? Look at the picture of him on p. 31 of that issue. Cover the right half of his face with a piece of paper and then take a look at the left side. Now cover the left half of his face with the paper and notice the right side. I think it honestly can be said that this man is two-faced.

I know we all have basic differences between the right and left sides of our faces, but I think it's a little odd that one side of Kerry's face is "happy," while the other is not exactly sad, but serious.

Just thought I'd offer an observation. And thanks for all that Insight does to get the facts out there.

Judith Moore
Strasburg, Va.

 

Kerry out-of-sync with mainstream America By Carol Devine-Molin web posted February 9, 2004 Presidential politics have always been rough and tumble, but this election year is gearing up to be worse than usual given the vitriol that abounds in both partisan camps. Senator John Kerry is apparently poised to become the Democratic presidential nominee as he continues to rack up those victories in his party's primaries and caucuses. However, what do we really know about him? Increasingly negative press has been hurled Kerry's way, with some conservative pundits readily dubbing him botox boy, and others even less delicately describing him as a gigolo and gold-digger who replaced one fabulously rich wife with another to ensure his ongoing meal ticket in life. As to the former, Kerry has every right to improve his rather craggy facial appearance in today's superficial world of media and politics, and as to the latter, Kerry is a New England Brahmin, albeit a less-wealthy one, who was always part of the upper-crust and naturally socialized with heiresses. This all makes for interesting gossip, but it's media prattle that's basically irrelevant to Kerry's presidential bid and will have little impact on the all-important independent voters. That begs the question, what's really pertinent to evaluating Kerry as candidate for this nation's highest office? Certainly, it's necessary to examine his voting record in the Senate, and the manner in which he's conducted himself in public life over the course of years. Moreover, it may boil down to the answer to one vital question in these crisis times: Can we depend upon John Kerry to properly protect this nation during this war on terror? In light of his overall background, the answer is clearly no. And I believe that the majority of swing voters will come to the same conclusion once all is aired for their consideration. That said, the GOP plans to exploit Kerry's voting history and background to the fullest extent with myriad documentation at their disposal. Essentially, Kerry is a Leftist who has exhibited a pattern of anti-defense and anti-intelligence votes in the Senate, despite his rhetorical attempts to be on all sides of issues. In large measure America's national security is predicated upon our well-trained and high-tech equipped Armed Forces and intelligence services, which require sufficient funding and congressional support. Unfortunately, it would be fair to say that Kerry's political leanings are not conducive to our national security interests, and Kerry's overall character is questionable. He was part of the pro-Hanoi Jane Fonda crowd of the early 1970's, which viciously maligned American soldiers during the Vietnam era. Simply put, when Kerry spoke before the Senate after his Vietnam experience, he not only trashed the military as an institution, but the soldiers who put their lives on the line. Many who have served in the military, and their families as well, perceive Kerry's public disparagement of our troops as unforgivable acts bordering on treason. Veterans groups against Kerry are reportedly sprouting up all over the nation in response to his presidential bid, calling him Hanoi John. Kerry, seen in this 1960s photo, receives a military decoration during the Vietnam War In fact, Vietnam Veterans Against John Kerry has announced a national coalition with Vietnamese-Americans for Human Rights in Vietnam and Vietnamese-Americans Against John Kerry. Their recent press release indicated, "We represent hundreds of thousand of American veterans who do not want to see John Kerry anywhere near the Oval Office, said Ted Sampley, founder of V.V.A.J.K, and a U.S. Army Green Beret and veteran of two combat tours in Vietnam". Dan Tran, speaking as a member of Vietnamese-Americans Against John Kerry, espoused: "On behalf of tens of thousands of Vietnamese-Americans, we are determined to demonstrate against Senator Kerry all across this nation…John Kerry aided and abetted the communist government in Hanoi and has hindered any human rights progress in Vietnam". The Coalition plans nationwide demonstrations against John Kerry beginning with the New York and Massachusetts primaries. Interestingly, at the website of Vietnam Veterans Against John Kerry, it avers that Kerry received his Silver Star for administering a coup de grace to a wounded Viet Cong. If that's accurate, then a formal investigation into this incident is definitely warranted. In a recent Washington Times piece, reporter Joseph Curl noted that during "a speech at the winter meeting of the Republican National Committee, Mr. Mehlman (Bush campaign manager) laid out how Mr. Kerry's own voting record has compromised U.S. security. Even after the first World Trade Center bombing, Senator Kerry voted to gut intelligence spending by $1.5 billion for the five years prior to 2001. In 1996, he voted to slash defense spending by $6.5 billion. Both bills were so reckless that neither had any co-sponsors willing to endorse his plans." Another top Republican appalled by Kerry's egregious behaviors stated: "He (Kerry) not only has never tried to help our intelligence community or our Armed Forces, he has vehemently fought us every step of the way when we try to protect the American people from threats. He is the last one who should ever criticize this president." Everybody for liberal extremism raise your hand According to an informative two-part series on Senator Kerry by John Pike of Insight magazine, it stated that: "Often he (Kerry) is ambivalent or obfuscates to try to satisfy those on both sides of antithetical issues. Many editorial writers and commentators have dismissed him as a transparent self-promoter, a phony and an opportunist". Senator Kerry, who ostensibly supports environmental causes and alternative energy resources, is waffling on a proposal for windmills (to generate electricity) near Nantucket Island – Why? Because the super-rich residents can't tolerate any obstruction of their view. That's blatant hypocrisy on the part of these Massachusetts liberals including Kerry. And Pike further related that, "The rating services of both the Left and the Right report that he (Kerry) votes with Senator Edward Kennedy of Massachusetts about 96% of the time in support of a strong tax-raising and government-knows-best platform". Americans, by and large, are not going to react well to all that's being unearthed about Senator Kerry simply because we're a Center-Right nation, not a Far-Left nation. The liberals, who have never been pro-military, are foolish to think their war hero Kerry will trump Bush -- The truth is that Kerry is not going to be warmly received outside the realm of Left-leaning Democrats. I would venture to say that most of the South and the West will be decidedly turned-off by this haughty New England Leftist. Moreover, John Pike of Insight magazine cited Kerry's amazing testimony before the Senate as an anti-war activist: "Kerry's first national media attention and the first in which the epithet 'phony' was directed against him came on April 22, 1971, when he testified before the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations as part of a carefully orchestrated buildup to an antiwar protest in Washington…Kerry slipped away from the manuscript to add rhetorical bombs of his own design, saying he had heard U.S. soldiers relate how they had personally raped, cut off ears, cut off heads, taped wires from portable telephones to human genitals and turned up the power, cut off limbs, blown up bodies, randomly shot at civilians, razed villages in a fashion reminiscent of Genghis Khan, shot cattle and dogs for fun, poisoned food stocks and generally ravaged the countryside of South Vietnam in addition to the normal ravages of war. Kerry also was quoted during this period as saying war crimes in Vietnam are the rule, not the exception. He spoke on television of crimes committed on a day-to-day basis, with the full awareness of officers at all levels of command." In essence, Kerry was accusing his fellow GIs of systemic war crimes. I'm of the opinion that Kerry's comments as anti-war activist were: a) substantially hogwash, b) notably biased against members of the military, c) very damaging for anyone aspiring to be President and Commander-in-Chief, and, d) unworthy of any American, as the clear intent was to comprehensively besmirch the Armed Forces and its members. Kerry might try to chalk up his remarks to youthful indiscretion. However, the fact that Kerry has consistently voted in the Senate to eviscerate military and intelligence spending only reinforces the notion that his radical views persist and are not in step with mainstream America, which is especially troubling since our nation is currently under siege. Make no mistake; Kerry's overarching political philosophy has changed little throughout the years. He's a Massachusetts Leftist who appears to be even more extreme than Ted Kennedy. Carol Devine-Molin is a regular contributor to several online magazines.   Printer friendly version Send a link to this story

Home Site Map E-mail ESR Musings - ESR's blog Conservative Site of the Day   Search WWW Search this site   Get weekly updates about new issues of ESR!   e-mail: Subscribe Unsubscribe     Like what you see? Please make a donation so we can stick around!   Civilization and Its Enemies : The Next Stage of History at Amazon.com for only $18.20!       This week's poll   Is George W. Bush a true conservative?   Yes   No   I don't know   I don't care

Home

© 1996 - 2004, Enter Stage Right and/or its creators. All rights reserved.

1. Jas 1:8 A double minded man is unstable in all his ways. 9 Let the brother of low degree rejoice in that he is exalted: 10 But the rich, in that he is made low: because as the flower of the grass he shall pass away.
I have no quarrel with Kerry or Mizz Hillary if they want to be president. I think that comes under our unalienable rights. But why would YOU want them to be president? That comes under something else. We can consider their qualifications and when we find them wanting, there is no obligation to cast a vote in their favor. And if you do, perhaps it is yourself that you need to examine. What are you expecting from someone who cannot lead?

Leaders have convictions which they will honor above who is following. They will not compromise their conviction to get someone to follow. George Washington was such a leader, Abraham lincoln was such a leader and Ronald Reagan was such a leader. The list is long enough to fill the whole issue of Insight.

Leaders have been known to make mistakes and perhaps George W. Bush has made a mistake in trying to lead some liberals to common sense but he has stuck with his convictions when he came to the breaking point. That is the important point.

If these liberal candidates represent your interest then you don't represent my interest which is to make an honest living with the resources I have under my control without having to get the permission of some central authority that knows nothing about my business and couldn't care less. In timber harvesting in Louisiana and elsewhere we have what is called Best Management Practices which does have some excellent points worthy of consideration. That is not the point. The point is that what they interpret as best management practices may not be MY best management because I may have something different in mind than they have. What it amounts to is that some government authority has usurped my right of ownership.

This situation is being repeated in all phases of our lives by our government. Some of these candidates, Kerry and Hillary included, are in favor of the government running my business, I am not. Do you favor the government running your business? If not why vote for those who do?

My point here is not to berate these candidates. Let them say what they will. It is you, my reader, that I am concerned about. Are you going to chose poverty -- from poor thinking thinking poor -- or are you going to choose prosperity with its personal sweat and risk? Do you want a government that cannot create a nickel's worth of wealth to take care of you with the income it can make? You understand that the government cannot make the money to take care of you so if it takes care of everyone we will all have nothing which is the only thing the government can produce.

Our government is to provide the order that allows us to prosper but it can not make us prosper. That we must do on own management. That is why all Social governments must come to poverty. You don't step of the top of a building because of the law of gravity. But you will step off the edge of prosperity reaching for the promise of the gold at the end of the rainbow. That law is just like the law of gravity, you better have something solid under your feet when you make that next step.

BC

2.

Search WWW Search brothersjudd.com

FreeRepublic.com "A Conservative News Forum"

Click to scroll to commentary.

John Kerry's Watergate
Insight on the News ^ | Sept 16, 2003 | John Pike
 

Posted on 01/25/2004 1:19:08 PM PST by Hon
 

Heard of Watergate? Get ready for Lowellgate.

On Sept. 18, 1972, the evening before the primary election during his second attempt for Congress, Kerry's brother Cameron and one Thomas Vallely, both part of his current campaign team, were arrested by Lowell police at 1:40 a.m. and charged with breaking and entering with the intent to commit larceny. The two were apprehended in the basement of a building whose door had been forced open, police said. It housed the headquarters of candidate DiFruscia. The Watergate scandal was making headlines at this time, and it was called the Lowell Watergate.

"They wanted to sever my telephone lines," DiFruscia said recently. Had those lines been cut, Kerry's opponent would not have been able to telephone supporters on Election Day to get out the vote and coordinate poll watchers, vital roles in a close election. "I do not know if they wanted to break into my office," says DiFruscia today. At the time he said, "All my IBM cards and the list of my voter identification in the greater Lowell area are in my headquarters."

Cameron and Vallely, along with David Thorne, who was Kerry's campaign manager at the time and has been close to him since they attended Yale together, did not deny the two entered the building in which they were captured. They said at the time they were in the cellar of the building to check their own telephone lines because they had received an anonymous call warning they would be cut.

This reporter heard an allegation that another congressional candidate placed the alleged anonymous call, which was denied. But if the Kerry campaign was concerned about someone breaking and entering to cut off its telephone service, why didn't they just call the police? Why break the law? And what does any of this say about Kerry's mind-set? Kerry campaign officials did not answer important Lowellgate questions.

The case was transferred to superior court and continued without a finding, where it was dismissed about a year later. But since it happened at the last minute, and Kerry won the primary but went on to lose the general election, this ugly business did not receive intense media scrutiny. Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein were busy investigating another break-in.
 

TOPICS: Front Page News; News/Current Events; US: Massachusetts
KEYWORDS: 1972; 2004; JOHNPIKE; KERRY; SCANDAL

Navigation: use the links below to view more comments.
first 1-50, 51-100, 101-115 next last

Note: The caption in the cartoon reads: "You say the Fifth in Massachusetts? I'll be right up."