Friday, February 20, 2004
Sen. Tom Daschle on Iraq: This item was found on Rapid City Journal.com, February 20th 2004
Rapid City Journal.com
Daschle satisfied with war progress
By Denise Ross, Journal Staff Writer
PIERRE - Sen. Tom Daschle, D-S.D., on Thursday praised the Bush administration's war and nation-building work in Iraq and said he has no serious concerns about the lack of weapons of mass destruction.
Daschle told state chamber of commerce representatives meeting in the South Dakota capital that he is satisfied with the way things are going in Iraq.
"I give the effort overall real credit," Daschle said. "It is a good thing Saddam Hussein is no longer in power. It is a good thing we are democratizing the country."
He said he is not upset about the debate over pre-war intelligence on weapons of mass destruction, an issue that has dogged President Bush as Democratic presidential contenders have slogged through the primary season.
"We can argue about the WMD and what we should have known," Daschle, the Senate minority leader, said.
Daschle took a different tone when he and other congressional leaders met with Bush in late January to discuss the intelligence snafu.
"I think it is critical that we follow up and find out what went wrong," the New York Times quoted him as saying just before the meeting.
Rapid City Journal.com
Daschle satisfied with war progress
By Denise Ross, Journal Staff Writer
PIERRE - Sen. Tom Daschle, D-S.D., on Thursday praised the Bush administration's war and nation-building work in Iraq and said he has no serious concerns about the lack of weapons of mass destruction.
Daschle told state chamber of commerce representatives meeting in the South Dakota capital that he is satisfied with the way things are going in Iraq.
"I give the effort overall real credit," Daschle said. "It is a good thing Saddam Hussein is no longer in power. It is a good thing we are democratizing the country."
He said he is not upset about the debate over pre-war intelligence on weapons of mass destruction, an issue that has dogged President Bush as Democratic presidential contenders have slogged through the primary season.
"We can argue about the WMD and what we should have known," Daschle, the Senate minority leader, said.
Daschle took a different tone when he and other congressional leaders met with Bush in late January to discuss the intelligence snafu.
"I think it is critical that we follow up and find out what went wrong," the New York Times quoted him as saying just before the meeting.
Tuesday, February 17, 2004
Senator Kerry- Congressional Testimony:
Is this the testimony of someone that respects the mililtary or even understands it?
Statement of John Kerry VIETNAM WAR VETERAN JOHN KERRY'S TESTIMONY BEFORE THE
SENATE FOREIGN RELATIONS COMMITTEE, APRIL 22, 1971
"I would like to talk, representing all those veterans, and say that several
months ago in Detroit, we had an investigation at which over 150 honorably
discharged and many very highly decorated veterans testified to war crimes
committed in Southeast Asia, not isolated incidents but crimes committed on a
day-to-day basis with the full awareness of officers at all levels of
command....
They told the stories at times 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 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 ravage of war, and the normal and very particular
ravaging which is done by the applied bombing power of this country."
"...I don't want to get into the game of saying I represent everybody over there,
but let me try to say as straightforwardly as I can, we had an advertisement,
ran full page, to show you what the troops read. It ran in Playboy and the
response to it within two and a half weeks from Vietnam was 1,200 members. We
received initially about 50 to 80 letters a day from troops arriving at our New
York office. Some of these letters -- and I wanted to bring some down, I didn't
know we were going to be testifying here and I can make them available to you --
are very, very moving, some of them written by hospital corpsmen on things, on
casualty report sheets which say, you know, "Get us out of here." "You are the
only hope he have got." "You have got to get us back; it is crazy." We received
recently 80 members of the 101st Airborne signed up in one letter. Forty members
from a helicopter assault squadron, crash and rescue mission signed up in
another one.
I think they are expressing, some of these troops, solidarity with us, right now
by wearing black arm bands and Vietnam Veterans Against the War buttons. They
want to come out and I think they are looking at the people who want to try to
get them out as a help.
However, I do recognize there are some men who are in the military for life. The
job in the military is to fight wars. When they have a war to fight, they are
just as happy in a sense, and I am sure that these men feel they are being
stabbed in the back. But, at the same time, I think to most of them the
realization of the emptiness, the hollowness, the absurdity of Vietnam has
finally hit home, and I feel is they did come home the recrimination would
certainly not come from the right, from the military. I don't think there would
be that problem...."
"...You see the mind is changing over there and a search and destroy mission is a
search and avoid mission, and troops don't -- you know, like that revolt that
took place that was mentioned in the New York Times when they refused to go in
after a piece of dead machinery, because it doesn't have any value. They are
making their own judgments.
There is a GI movement in this country now as well as over there, and soon these
people, these men, who are prescribing wars for these young men to fight are
going to find out they are going to have to find some other men to fight them
because we are going to change prescriptions. They are going to have to change
doctors, because we are not going to fight for them. that is what they are going
to realize. There is now a more militant attitude even within the military
itself...."
I see him imputing views to military members that he himself held. Not very respectful to me....
Is this the testimony of someone that respects the mililtary or even understands it?
Statement of John Kerry VIETNAM WAR VETERAN JOHN KERRY'S TESTIMONY BEFORE THE
SENATE FOREIGN RELATIONS COMMITTEE, APRIL 22, 1971
"I would like to talk, representing all those veterans, and say that several
months ago in Detroit, we had an investigation at which over 150 honorably
discharged and many very highly decorated veterans testified to war crimes
committed in Southeast Asia, not isolated incidents but crimes committed on a
day-to-day basis with the full awareness of officers at all levels of
command....
They told the stories at times 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 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 ravage of war, and the normal and very particular
ravaging which is done by the applied bombing power of this country."
"...I don't want to get into the game of saying I represent everybody over there,
but let me try to say as straightforwardly as I can, we had an advertisement,
ran full page, to show you what the troops read. It ran in Playboy and the
response to it within two and a half weeks from Vietnam was 1,200 members. We
received initially about 50 to 80 letters a day from troops arriving at our New
York office. Some of these letters -- and I wanted to bring some down, I didn't
know we were going to be testifying here and I can make them available to you --
are very, very moving, some of them written by hospital corpsmen on things, on
casualty report sheets which say, you know, "Get us out of here." "You are the
only hope he have got." "You have got to get us back; it is crazy." We received
recently 80 members of the 101st Airborne signed up in one letter. Forty members
from a helicopter assault squadron, crash and rescue mission signed up in
another one.
I think they are expressing, some of these troops, solidarity with us, right now
by wearing black arm bands and Vietnam Veterans Against the War buttons. They
want to come out and I think they are looking at the people who want to try to
get them out as a help.
However, I do recognize there are some men who are in the military for life. The
job in the military is to fight wars. When they have a war to fight, they are
just as happy in a sense, and I am sure that these men feel they are being
stabbed in the back. But, at the same time, I think to most of them the
realization of the emptiness, the hollowness, the absurdity of Vietnam has
finally hit home, and I feel is they did come home the recrimination would
certainly not come from the right, from the military. I don't think there would
be that problem...."
"...You see the mind is changing over there and a search and destroy mission is a
search and avoid mission, and troops don't -- you know, like that revolt that
took place that was mentioned in the New York Times when they refused to go in
after a piece of dead machinery, because it doesn't have any value. They are
making their own judgments.
There is a GI movement in this country now as well as over there, and soon these
people, these men, who are prescribing wars for these young men to fight are
going to find out they are going to have to find some other men to fight them
because we are going to change prescriptions. They are going to have to change
doctors, because we are not going to fight for them. that is what they are going
to realize. There is now a more militant attitude even within the military
itself...."
I see him imputing views to military members that he himself held. Not very respectful to me....
