# Kerry's New Iraq Policy - Cut and Run **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [September 7, 2004, 3:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kerrys-new-iraq-policy-cut-and-run/263442 "2004-09-07T03:49:36Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![PatriotX](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/c4cdca/32.png) [@PatriotX](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/PatriotX)\ **Post date:** [September 7, 2004, 5:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kerrys-new-iraq-policy-cut-and-run/263442/21 "2004-09-07T05:12:08Z")
I’m glad that Kerry is (verbally at least) backing away from the permanent US military bases in the region. The Endruing Camps seem like a worse and worse idea daily. ---
**Author:** ![RedFury](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/ec9cab/32.png) [@RedFury](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RedFury)\ **Post date:** [September 7, 2004, 5:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kerrys-new-iraq-policy-cut-and-run/263442/22 "2004-09-07T05:23:25Z")
> [@Sam Stone](#): > > Well, it’s a new day of the week, so it was about time for Kerry to shift his position on Iraq again: > > [Kerry vows to withdraw troops from Iraq](http://www.reuters.co.uk/newsPackageArticle.jhtml?type=worldNews&storyID=578182§ion=news) (fixed link) > > This is idiotic. It’s also a change from what he was saying just a few weeks ago, when he said the problem with Iraq was that Bush wasn’t sending enough troops there, and he was pledging another 40,000 troops. Now he wants to pull them all out. Actually, what’s “idiotic” is your parsing of Kerry’s statement. For nowhere in the link provided does Kerry say or even imply that the additional 40,000 troops won’t be sent. Perfectly reasonable to assume that with a four year window to work with, he could increase the troops short-term _while_ he works to get other nations on board and _then_ start the withdrawal. > [@](#): > > I know there are a lot of Kerry supporters here who have said that even though the war was wrong, it would be disastrous to cut and run. Do you now agree with Kerry’s new position, or do you agree with the ‘old’ Kerry, from say a couple of weeks ago? “Cut and Run”? What in the world are you talking about? How’s a four year minimum target date even in the _same league_ as a “cut and run”? > [@](#): > > And even if you think the troops should come home, don’t you think it’s stupid to announce a timetable before hostilities have ended? Doesn’t that just give the enemy more strategic options? (“The Americans want to go home, Aziz. Let’s calm down, let them think everything is okay, and then after they leave we will take over.”) It’s probably news to you since Iraq has mysteriously disappeared from front-page news as of late, but US forces, under The Great Misleader, have _already_ begun to withdraw: [One By One, Iraqi Cities Become No-Go Zones](http://www.nytimes.com/2004/09/05/weekinreview/05filk.html?hp) – NYT, free registration required. > [@](#): > > In Iraq, the list of places from which American soldiers have either withdrawn or decided to visit only rarely is growing: Falluja, where a Taliban-like regime has imposed a rigid theocracy; Ramadi, where the Sunni insurgents appear to have the run of the city; and the holy Shiite cities of Karbala and Najaf to the south, where the Americans agreed last month to keep their distance from the sacred shrines of Ali and Hussein. > > The calls are rising for the Americans to pull out of even more areas, notably Sadr City, the sprawling neighborhood in eastern Baghdad that is the main base for the rebel cleric Moktada al-Sadr. There, leaders of his Mahdi Army are demanding that American soldiers, except those sent in to do reconstruction work, get out. > > Negotiations with rebel leaders foundered last week on precisely the issue of the freedom of American soldiers to enter the area; the Iraqi government, possibly with American backing, refused to accept the militia’s demand. **Even so, the point seemed clear enough: where Iraqis once tolerated American soldiers as a source of stability in their neighborhoods, they increasingly see them as a cause of the violence. Take out the Americans, the Iraqis say, and you take out the problem. Leave us alone, and we will sort our own problems.** > > “All we want is for the Americans to stay out,” said Yusef al-Nasiri, a top aide to Mr. Sadr. “When the Americans come into the city, they insult our people. That’s when the people get nervous. It makes them uncomfortable.” > > That certain Iraqis believe their cities and neighborhoods would be better off without American soldiers is neither new nor surprising; that is what the guerrillas’ insurgency, now in its 17th month, is all about. **What is new, however, is that the Americans, in certain cases, appear to agree or have decided that the cost to prove otherwise would be too high.** (bolding mine) Seems to me, a pull-out by any other name, is still a pull-out. You know, in Bushspeak, this is just like 'Mission Accomplished." > [@](#): > > Finally, from a tactical election standpoint, is this not just idiotic? Kerry’s biggest problem is that he has been pigeonholed as a waffler who can’t stand the heat. How does changing his position again help his campaign? Well, reading what Kerry says in your own link doesn’t lend the support you think it does to your charge: > [@John Kerry](#): > > Kerry, like Bush, promised that the United States would stay the course until Iraq was secure, saying: “We have to do what we need to do to get out and do it right.” IOW, Republican Spin Points aside, he’s basically saying what he’s said all along. Namely, securing Iraq, internationalize the peace-keeping operations by gathering the international support this Administration has squandered, and get the hell out of Dodge. ---
**Author:** ![Blalron](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/35a633/32.png) [@Blalron](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Blalron)\ **Post date:** [September 7, 2004, 5:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kerrys-new-iraq-policy-cut-and-run/263442/23 "2004-09-07T05:31:18Z")
In four years, Iraq should have an established democratic government and a trained police and military force. I’m fully confident that they will be able to handle security threats on their own. Why are you Republicans so eager to pour billions of dollars in **welfare** to Iraq for an indefinite number of years? I thought you guys hated welfare? ---
**Author:** ![Brutus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/91b2a8/32.png) [@Brutus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Brutus)\ **Post date:** [September 7, 2004, 5:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kerrys-new-iraq-policy-cut-and-run/263442/24 "2004-09-07T05:38:01Z")
> [@Blalron](#): > > In four years, Iraq should have an established democratic government and a trained police and military force. I’m fully confident that they will be able to handle security threats on their own. As we go into our 9th year in Bosnia? This stuff takes time you know, especially when dealing with so many ethnic groups and concerns. > [@](#): > > Why are you Republicans so eager to pour billions of dollars in **welfare** to Iraq for an indefinite number of years? I thought you guys hated welfare? Only for poor disenfranchised voters inner-city minority immigrant elderly voters. For everyone else, it’s OK. ---
**Author:** ![elucidator](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/8edcca/32.png) [@elucidator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elucidator)\ **Post date:** [September 7, 2004, 5:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kerrys-new-iraq-policy-cut-and-run/263442/25 "2004-09-07T05:47:12Z")
I broached this subject once before - the cold equations say that there _is_ a cut-and-run point, the point where America would simply say “To hell with this, being between Iraq and hard place,we’ve sunk a gazillion bucks into this pain pit and we’re outa here”. I’m not suggesting I know what point of time that is, but it has to exist somewhere out there. I heard tell John McCain said this weekend he expected 10-20 years (Cite Boy! Go fetch that cite, This Week with George S.) I gotta wonder about that, that is one _hell_ of a long time! And when I heard, I kinda did a mental countdown: how long before the WH clarifies that. You would think a prediction like that, from a heavy Republican, would draw a reaction. Not much. So, I think its a smoke out. Kerry is saying he would _try_ to get the troops out within 4.5 years but who wouldn’t, thats like promising to be good. So that don’t count for much. But it poses the question, in a backhanded sort of way. What is the WH estimate? How long do the Bushiviks, who presumably are in charge of this desert donnybrook, think we’re going to be there? Anybody here have a fixed number, however approximate? All I ever hear is “staying the course”, “as long as necessary on not one day more”, etc. Which is rather indefinite. So I think that’s one line of thought the Bushiviks would prefer we avoid. They don’t talk about how long we’re going to be there because, mostly, they don’t know. My guess is as good as theirs. But one thing they know for sure: any remotely reliable and truthful estimate is gonna be a number we _don’t_ want to hear. Its an issue they would very much like to avoid discussing in public for the immediate future, say, about 56 days. Roughly. Kerry’s trying to manuever them into a position where they have to say _something_, and they can’t say anything good. ---
**Author:** ![Marley23](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@Marley23](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Marley23)\ **Post date:** [September 7, 2004, 6:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kerrys-new-iraq-policy-cut-and-run/263442/26 "2004-09-07T06:30:17Z")
How is saying “I’d like to bring the troops home within four years if it’s possible” cutting and running? Speaking of which, what exactly IS the Bush plan for leaving Iraq? I assume there must be one… ---
**Author:** ![John\_Mace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_mace/32/185_2.png) [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)\ **Post date:** [September 7, 2004, 6:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kerrys-new-iraq-policy-cut-and-run/263442/27 "2004-09-07T06:43:17Z")
I think you’re wrong, here, **Sam**. Leaving aside for the moment the possibility of more claims about “flip-flopping”, this is very smart of Kerry. Bush is weak on Iraq, and support for the war has been generally trending down for some time now. Why not hit Bush where it hurts? And I have to agree with the other posters that getting out by 2008 is hardly a “cut and run” strategy. I liked it a lot when Bush set a date for transfer of civil authority to Iraq as June of this year. That’s what leaders do-- set the hard goals and tell their people to execute. Getting all or most of our troops out of there in 4 years is a perfectly reasonable goal. It makes a hell of a lot of sense to head in that direction and make sure we are doing the things necessary to achieve it. If we wait for the “right moment” to exit, that moment will \*\*never \*\*come. Now, dealing with the flip-flop issue… Yes, this leaves Kerry open to some more sniping from the Pubs, but it’s unclear to me that there would be any less sniping if Kerry didn’t take this stand. The Pubs have the flip-flop line as a major part of their campaign effort, and that won’t change no matter what Kerry does. ---
**Author:** ![Polerius](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/d78d45/32.png) [@Polerius](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Polerius)\ **Post date:** [September 7, 2004, 7:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kerrys-new-iraq-policy-cut-and-run/263442/28 "2004-09-07T07:27:11Z")
> [@Sam Stone](#): > > \ I’m curious: do you two actually believe that leaving in 4 years is “cut and run” or are you just pretending that you do in hopes of convicing some feeble-minded lurkers on this board? ---
**Author:** ![Sam\_Stone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecccb3/32.png) [@Sam\_Stone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sam_Stone)\ **Post date:** [September 7, 2004, 7:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kerrys-new-iraq-policy-cut-and-run/263442/29 "2004-09-07T07:32:47Z")
He doesn’t say ‘four years’. He says “within my first term”. You’re giving it the most generous spin. But stating even that it will be in his first term is an announcement of the intention to leave Iraq. Even if that’s what you want to do, it’s a stupid thing to say. Bush has it exactly right when he says, “We will not stay one day longer than we have to, or one day less than is necessary.” Putting any kind of a timetable on your plan to leave just emboldens the enemy. If FDR had said, “We will leave Europe no later than 1946”, it would have told the Germans that they could run the clock out. And that’s exactly what announcing a withdrawal timeframe does for the insurgency in Iraq. In wartime, it is important to display steely resolve, to let the enemy believe that they simply can’t win. And like it or not, this does represent a shift in policy for Kerry, because for a long time he was saying the same thing as Bush when he was prodded about how long the U.S. should stay. “As long as we have to”. Which is the correct answer. Now he’s put his finger to the wind and decided a policy shift will help him in the polls. ---
**Author:** ![John\_Mace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_mace/32/185_2.png) [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)\ **Post date:** [September 7, 2004, 7:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kerrys-new-iraq-policy-cut-and-run/263442/30 "2004-09-07T07:42:24Z")
> [@Sam Stone](#): > > And like it or not, this does represent a shift in policy for Kerry, because for a long time he was saying the same thing as Bush when he was prodded about how long the U.S. should stay. “As long as we have to”. Which is the correct answer. Now he’s put his finger to the wind and decided a policy shift will help him in the polls. It might be that Kerry really doesn’t know exactly what he’ll do if he’s elected. It might be that he won’t make up his mind for quite some time into his presidency. I’m actually OK with that. He may actually not have been fully apprised of the situation by those running things at the moment. But… it’s a very good thing for him to say, politically. Kucinich and Nader are nuts with their truly “cut and run” strategy. It’s a non-starter. But saying, in effect that he will bring our men and women home during his first term in office can only help him in the election. ---
**Author:** ![elucidator](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/8edcca/32.png) [@elucidator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elucidator)\ **Post date:** [September 7, 2004, 8:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kerrys-new-iraq-policy-cut-and-run/263442/31 "2004-09-07T08:01:47Z")
> [@Sam Stone](#): > > …In wartime, it is important to display steely resolve… I’ve heard that said a lot. Especially from men who credit themselves with possessing that quality. Number one, most important thing, steely resolve. But you glance over history, and you gotta wonder, maybe that principle is tinged with romanticism, maybe it ain’t what its cracked up to be, know what I mean? Take the Alamo. Those guys had your basic steely resolve, no two ways about it. And they were up against Santa Ana, one of historys truly magnificent failures, the very model of Gen Jubilation T. Cornpone, leader of Cornpone’s Defeat, Cornpone’s Rout, and Cornpones Utter Humiliation. Vastly outnumbered, they were still crushed by this doofus, steely resolve and all. And Santa Ana still managed to screw the _perro_, and lose Texas. Which he most likely would have done _anyway_. Whether they got their peckerwood asses shot off or not! So maybe its best to say, show steely resolve up to the point where it becomes clear you’ve really fucked up big. Then you show adaptability and flexible strategic thinking. Thinking outside the bog. The path to catastrophic success is not always so cut and dried, **Sam**. May even be cut and run. So it may be ok to _appear_ unshakeably resolute and determined to proceed at any cost. Just as long as you know you’re bluffing. ---
**Author:** ![Polerius](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/d78d45/32.png) [@Polerius](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Polerius)\ **Post date:** [September 7, 2004, 8:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kerrys-new-iraq-policy-cut-and-run/263442/32 "2004-09-07T08:08:35Z")
> [@Sam Stone](#): > > But stating even that it will be in his first term is an announcement of the intention to leave Iraq. Even if that’s what you want to do, it’s a stupid thing to say. Bush has it exactly right when he says, “We will not stay one day longer than we have to, or one day less than is necessary.” Putting any kind of a timetable on your plan to leave just emboldens the enemy. Sam, did you actually \*read \* the article you linked in the OP? > [@](#): > > Kerry, like Bush, promised that the United States would stay the course until Iraq was secure, saying: “We have to do what we need to do to get out and do it right.” > > … > > He also said Washington should make it clear to the world that the United States had no “long-term designs to maintain bases and troops in Iraq.” > > “We want those troops home and my goal would be to try to get them home in my first term and I believe that can be done,” he said. So, he is saying that he will be staying for as long as necessary, just like Bush. But, he will \*try \* to get the troops back within four years. Nowhere does he say that this is a strict timetable. Honestly, did you read that far into the article? Did you not understand what it was saying? Was the OP dishonest, or just an honest mistake? ---
**Author:** ![Brutus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/91b2a8/32.png) [@Brutus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Brutus)\ **Post date:** [September 7, 2004, 8:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kerrys-new-iraq-policy-cut-and-run/263442/33 "2004-09-07T08:27:44Z")
> [@Polerius](#): > > So, he is saying that he will be staying for as long as necessary, just like Bush. Heh, and that’s better for you guys? Kerry is trying to play to all sides. It’s not going to work, but it does (and will continue to) make for these amusing little ‘We must not cut and run!/We should tell Al Sadr to cool it for 4 years, we’ll didi mau by then’ moments. ---
**Author:** ![Mr.Moto](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/9de0a6/32.png) [@Mr.Moto](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mr.Moto)\ **Post date:** [September 7, 2004, 10:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kerrys-new-iraq-policy-cut-and-run/263442/34 "2004-09-07T10:15:52Z")
My question is, why on earth would he announce this in Canonsburg, PA? I grew up about 20 minutes from here. Washington County is chock full of union Democrats, elderly voters, and veterans. None of them would be favorably disposed toward a message of American weakness and vacillation. Who is running things over there, anyway? With so many new hires I hardly know who to blame for the idiotic timing of this idiotic announcement. ---
**Author:** ![Polerius](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/d78d45/32.png) [@Polerius](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Polerius)\ **Post date:** [September 7, 2004, 10:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kerrys-new-iraq-policy-cut-and-run/263442/35 "2004-09-07T10:56:16Z")
> [@Brutus](#): > > Heh, and that’s better for you guys? What’s better for “us” guys? That Kerry thinks the U.S. should stay as long as necessary? Anyone with a brain knows that, no matter how the U.S. got into Iraq, it should not just pack up and leave things in the state they are in right now. It would be disastrous for just about everyone (except maybe for Bin Laden and his cronies) Just because Bush wants to stay as long as necessary doesn’t mean that Kerry has to have a different opinion from that. ---
**Author:** ![Spavined\_Gelding](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/958977/32.png) [@Spavined\_Gelding](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spavined_Gelding)\ **Post date:** [September 7, 2004, 11:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kerrys-new-iraq-policy-cut-and-run/263442/36 "2004-09-07T11:52:43Z")
We are returned from vacation. As the more astute and attentive may have noticed I have not been adding my partisan blather to this floating pissing match for the past two weeks or so. I am delighted to see that things continue as before – lots of smoke and heat but precious little illumination (see also the current thread in the Pit about our Presidents fractured syntax on OBY-GYNs). Having gained ten pounds (five kilos) while eating my way through Alsace -Lorraine I bring the necessary gravatas to this knife fight posing as a discussion of the issues of the day. “Cut and Run” is of course a loaded phrase based on a naval technique of cutting the anchor rope in order to make a fast and hurried departure. I can only suppose out friend **Sam Stone** , ever the even handed and fair minded participant in these discussions, chose the phrase deliberately in order to extract the greatest partisan implication from Senator Kerry’s otherwise fairly innocuous statement. I would have said that the President seeks to Bug Out of Korea but that is just me. “Bug out” has a special meaning for old soldiers. In fairness, a damned scarce commodity around here and in political discussion generally, it is also the President’s policy to sooner or later leave Iraq. That is the whole reason for the temporary occupation government that Mr. Bremer was running and the interim government of limited sovereignly – it prepares for a termination of the occupation and the establishment of an Iraq run by Iraqis. The goal of both the President and the Senator is the same. To denigrate one while exalting the other is just dishonest. The real question is which one of the candidates is more likely to actually pull it off. The accompanying question is whether the officials who got the country into this quagmire (a word chosen deliberately for its implications) should be entrusted with the job of extracting the nation from what looks to me like an ill-considered and ill advised foreign adventure with precious little connection to the security of the nation. All rational people are agreed that the US cannot precipitously abandon Iraq now that we have created our own special brand of chaos there. The issue is how we best do that with minimal injury to the nations already battered credibility and without surrendering Iraq to a civil war that will turn all the apparent real policy objectives in going there in the first place into a cocked hat. ---
**Author:** ![Shodan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9f8e36/32.png) [@Shodan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shodan)\ **Post date:** [September 7, 2004, 1:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kerrys-new-iraq-policy-cut-and-run/263442/37 "2004-09-07T13:04:11Z")
> [@Spavined Gelding](#): > > All rational people are agreed that the US cannot precipitously abandon Iraq now that we have created our own special brand of chaos there. Which is precisely why Kerry’s latest flip-flop (and that is exactly what it is, as **Brutus** ’ article demonstrates) is so worthy of contempt. Methinks the Empty Suit is hoping to pull off a Nixonian “[I have a secret plan to end the war](http://vietnam.vassar.edu/overview.html)” strategy. And the Democrats are proposing a candidate who bases his foreign policy on flash backs he is having from 1968. Regards, Shodan ---
**Author:** ![MEBuckner](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mebuckner/32/2896_2.png) [@MEBuckner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MEBuckner)\ **Post date:** [September 7, 2004, 2:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kerrys-new-iraq-policy-cut-and-run/263442/38 "2004-09-07T14:04:49Z")
> [@jayjay](#): > > Where IS that puking smiley? The carpetbagger congratulating the neanderthal for imitating Nelson Muntz…have we fallen this far? > [@jayjay](#): > > And I just realized this is Great Debates and apologize for the characterizations above\*… :smack: **Moderator’s Note:** **Jayjay** , you almost had me with the apology. “Oh, he just slipped up and forgot which forum he was in…probably had too many windows open.” > [@jayjay](#): > > \*even if they are accurate… However, the fine print kind of renders the “apology” pretty meaningless. Keep the personal insults and the flames out of this forum and in the Pit where they belong. Don’t apologize for it, definitely don’t “apologize” for it, just don’t do it. ---
**Author:** ![Hambil](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/3be4f8/32.png) [@Hambil](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hambil)\ **Post date:** [September 7, 2004, 2:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kerrys-new-iraq-policy-cut-and-run/263442/39 "2004-09-07T14:09:39Z")
> [@Shodan](#): > > Which is precisely why Kerry’s latest flip-flop (and that is exactly what it is, as **Brutus** ’ article demonstrates) is so worthy of contempt. > > Methinks the Empty Suit is hoping to pull off a Nixonian “[I have a secret plan to end the war](http://vietnam.vassar.edu/overview.html)” strategy. And the Democrats are proposing a candidate who bases his foreign policy on flash backs he is having from 1968. > > Regards, > Shodan Come on people. Let’s not make this a forum of rational thought vs. [instapundit.com](http://instapundit.com), or visa-versa for liberals. There are a million boards for ‘discussing’ politics that way. This is Straight Dope. ---
**Author:** ![ElvisL1ves](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/5daacb/32.png) [@ElvisL1ves](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ElvisL1ves)\ **Post date:** [September 7, 2004, 2:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kerrys-new-iraq-policy-cut-and-run/263442/40 "2004-09-07T14:24:09Z")
The mission was accomplished a year and a half ago, said the banner. Iraq is now free and self-governing, says the Bush Believers’ Brigade. One might well ask the loyalists why the US troops are still there and still getting killed _now_. Oh, hell, why don’t we? > [@Sam Stone](#): > > He doesn’t say ‘four years’. He says “within my first term”. You’re giving it the most generous spin. Perhaps this is an example of “two countries separated by a common language”, but you might well explain where you get the idea that Presidential terms are something other than four years long. For anyone using “the most generous spin”, “within Kerry’s first term” would mean four years \*plus four months \* from now. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kerrys-new-iraq-policy-cut-and-run/263442.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kerrys-new-iraq-policy-cut-and-run/263442.md?page=3)