This is how Kerry explains his vote against the use of force in 1991:
“I did indeed vote the way I voted in 1991. I thought we ought to kick Saddam Hussein out of Iraq. I said so on the floor of the Senate. But with the memories of Vietnam, I also thought we ought to take a couple of months more to build the support in the country.”
From an interview with Chris Wallace during the 2004 election cycle.
Now… I guess we can give him the benefit of the doubt and say he meant to say kick Saddam out of Kuwait, not Iraq. Either way, the current John Kerry claims that he wanted military action against Saddam in both 2003 and in 1991, and he just wanted more time in 1991 to build up support within Iraq. But that makes me think that he was actually claiming that he wanted to depose Saddam in 1991, otherwise the need to build up support within Iraq makes no sense.
Either way, he has personally backed away from his 1991 vote against military intervention. And in the late 1990’s he was considered one of the more hawkish Democrats, and called for substantial strikes against Saddam - in his words, “not just a few symbolic cruise missiles.”
“and he once was a warrior hippie who threw, sort of, his combat decorations over the White House fence”
I watched a video about Kerry, and sure enough, as all the others actually threw their medals, you could see him pretend to throw his, but they never left his hands.
He was a murderer then. When he couldn’t murder anymore, he continued his sociopathic lifestyle by getting as much attention as he could, and turning that into raw political power. Now he seeks to murder people on a much larger scale. Nothing happened.
After we got involved, of course, popular support rose sharply (as did the President’s approval ratings), but prior to engagement I can’t say that there was a full-throated push for liberating Kuwait.
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Funny, that’s a lot more support than there was for invading Iraq when he voted for that AUMF in 2002. Sounds like after-the-fact justification for his “no” vote in 1991 to me.
Two different votes, two different spins. The Kuwait incursion was to liberate the poor downtrodden Kuwaitis from the yoke of Saddam, and bones about it were not made. Allegedly, the AUMF was supposed to strengthen GeeDubya’s negotiating position for diplomatic advantage, in pursuit of a peaceful solution. Most of us knew he was a lying sack, but you will recall there were those amongst us who didn’t.
John Kerry is no different than any other politician that licks his finger, sticks it into the wind and decides “Ah, that’s the way the winds are blowing…better set sail in that direction”
