Leaving the community

"C J Campbell" wrote in message
...

"Cecil Chapman" wrote in message
m...
Unlike the man whose words you mouth, Kerry didn't pull special favors
to
get into the National Guard to avoid the draft (he VOLUNTEERED for
duty),

Kerry, by his own admission, volunteered for the Navy RESERVE...SPECIFICALLY
to avoid duty in SEA.


Bush volunteered for duty, too, and was subject to being sent to SEA.

He also volunteered for rather hazardous duty...duty that was patently
hazardous even if he never left Texas, much less tha US. He also volunteered
for duty in VietNam, but was turned down.

In the same vien, Kerry was sent to the Swift Boats, not voluntarily, but
becasue he was a pain in ths ass "Sea Lawyer" (the Navy equivalent of a
civilian "****house lawyer") and his commander wated his off his ship.


Unlike
Kerry, he did not incite the enemy to abuse prisoners of war, commit war
crimes, or make false claims that everyone else in SEA was committing war
crimes.

And that says a lot, even aside from his overt acts of treason. That is why
there are still serious question that his first discharge was "less than
honorable". Of course, his massively hypocritical hiding his record (why?)
can only fuel the question.


--
Matt
---------------------
Matthew W. Barrow
Site-Fill Homes, LLC.
Montrose, CO

The problem isn't so much that he is too far left, Kerry is simply
unlikable. The republicans often have a similiar problem in CA, the only
candidates that can win the nomination are too far right to win the election

Mike
MU-2

"Jay Honeck" wrote in message
news:k_bid.351511$MQ5.252777@attbi_s52...
These people are mad Kerry didn't run a liberal campaign and can't stand
that he "was just as pro-war as Bush."

That is SO ironic.

If the Democrats has nominated a middle-of-the-road guy to run against
Bush -- say, Dick Gephardt -- this election would not have even been
close. The Democrats would have swept the nation, and never by less than
25 percentage points.

Stupidly, they nominated a guy whose political positions were to the left
of Ted Kennedy's, absolutely ensuring a Bush victory.

There were many traditional Republicans out here -- myself included -- who
would have voted for a conservative Democrat in this election. But there
was just no way for any of us to vote for a guy like Kerry.

The moral for the Democrats: Don't ever nominate an ultra liberal to run
for president again.
--
Jay Honeck
Iowa City, IA
Pathfinder N56993
www.AlexisParkInn.com
"Your Aviation Destination"

I'm not sure I agree... I think Gephardt lost out because of nothing
short of a lack of charisma. I don't think people were paying that much
attention to positions or character during the primaries, and there were
way too many people on the list to go very deep. But if he wasn't
charismatic enough to beat Kerry on the Primaries, I'm not sure he would
have had what it took to beat Bush either. After all, Gore lost on
charisma too.

I think where Kerry blew it worst is that he never really recovered from
the whole "flip-flop" persona. He had opportunities to. But basically,
his only comeback was to say that he misspoke when he talked about
"voting for it before voting against it." From a public perception, he
was saying that he made a mistake by poorly describing his flip-flopping,
but never actually addressed the issue of flip-flopping itself.

He didn't focus (as I think he should have) on the reality that
sometimes it is better to change your opinion in light of new facts than
to hold firm to a lie. He could have very easily turned the whole thing
around and put Bush in a defensive position - either the President of the
United States had the wool pulled over his eyes by his own intelligence
agency and is incompetent, or he had hidden motives and went into Iraq
based on a lie and pulled the wool over the eyes of the American people
and is undeserving. Instead, he left his own trustworthiness unaddressed,
and the public just didn't trust him. It didn't help, either, that he
constantly spoke about how he had a "better plan" for Iraq, but never
really qualified that with what the plan was... Basically it left his
credibility completely in question.

Either way, I think this is a much more serious issue than stem cell
research, or Gay Marraige. I strongly suspect that what the news media is
labelling "Moral Values" is not about the latter issues nearly as much as
about just general credibility. I guess liberals like me prefer to give
Kerry a chance, rather than let Bush go on pulling the wool over our eyes
(or allowing it to be pulled over our eyes by his staff). Where
conservatives would rather have someone they are comfortable with in
office than give the new, unpredictable guy a chance, especially if he
has shown he might not be perfect either.


No, I think the biggest problem in this election was simply that there
was not much difference at all between the two candidates, or if there
was, it was so clouded by nonessential issues that the general public was
left to vote on whether they are more comfortable with or without change,
and not much else.


"Jay Honeck" wrote in
news:k_bid.351511$MQ5.252777@attbi_s52:

These people are mad Kerry didn't run a liberal campaign and can't
stand that he "was just as pro-war as Bush."

That is SO ironic.

If the Democrats has nominated a middle-of-the-road guy to run against
Bush -- say, Dick Gephardt -- this election would not have even been
close. The Democrats would have swept the nation, and never by less
than 25 percentage points.

Stupidly, they nominated a guy whose political positions were to the
left of Ted Kennedy's, absolutely ensuring a Bush victory.

There were many traditional Republicans out here -- myself included --
who would have voted for a conservative Democrat in this election. But
there was just no way for any of us to vote for a guy like Kerry.

The moral for the Democrats: Don't ever nominate an ultra liberal to
run for president again.

Actually, come to think of it, where Kerry really went wrong was by taking
all of the spotlight away from Edwards after the "pat on the ass" incident.
Had he plastered Edwards' face on the front of the ticket prominently next
to his, he would have gotten more of the women and gay men to come out and
vote for him - enough to win several of those borderline states!


Judah wrote in
:

I'm not sure I agree... I think Gephardt lost out because of nothing
short of a lack of charisma. I don't think people were paying that much
attention to positions or character during the primaries, and there
were way too many people on the list to go very deep. But if he wasn't
charismatic enough to beat Kerry on the Primaries, I'm not sure he
would have had what it took to beat Bush either. After all, Gore lost
on charisma too.

I think where Kerry blew it worst is that he never really recovered
from the whole "flip-flop" persona. He had opportunities to. But
basically, his only comeback was to say that he misspoke when he talked
about "voting for it before voting against it." From a public
perception, he was saying that he made a mistake by poorly describing
his flip-flopping, but never actually addressed the issue of
flip-flopping itself.

He didn't focus (as I think he should have) on the reality that
sometimes it is better to change your opinion in light of new facts
than to hold firm to a lie. He could have very easily turned the whole
thing around and put Bush in a defensive position - either the
President of the United States had the wool pulled over his eyes by his
own intelligence agency and is incompetent, or he had hidden motives
and went into Iraq based on a lie and pulled the wool over the eyes of
the American people and is undeserving. Instead, he left his own
trustworthiness unaddressed, and the public just didn't trust him. It
didn't help, either, that he constantly spoke about how he had a
"better plan" for Iraq, but never really qualified that with what the
plan was... Basically it left his credibility completely in question.

Either way, I think this is a much more serious issue than stem cell
research, or Gay Marraige. I strongly suspect that what the news media
is labelling "Moral Values" is not about the latter issues nearly as
much as about just general credibility. I guess liberals like me prefer
to give Kerry a chance, rather than let Bush go on pulling the wool
over our eyes (or allowing it to be pulled over our eyes by his staff).
Where conservatives would rather have someone they are comfortable with
in office than give the new, unpredictable guy a chance, especially if
he has shown he might not be perfect either.


No, I think the biggest problem in this election was simply that there
was not much difference at all between the two candidates, or if there
was, it was so clouded by nonessential issues that the general public
was left to vote on whether they are more comfortable with or without
change, and not much else.


"Jay Honeck" wrote in
news:k_bid.351511$MQ5.252777@attbi_s52:

These people are mad Kerry didn't run a liberal campaign and can't
stand that he "was just as pro-war as Bush."

That is SO ironic.

If the Democrats has nominated a middle-of-the-road guy to run against
Bush -- say, Dick Gephardt -- this election would not have even been
close. The Democrats would have swept the nation, and never by less
than 25 percentage points.

Stupidly, they nominated a guy whose political positions were to the
left of Ted Kennedy's, absolutely ensuring a Bush victory.

There were many traditional Republicans out here -- myself included --
who would have voted for a conservative Democrat in this election.
But there was just no way for any of us to vote for a guy like Kerry.

The moral for the Democrats: Don't ever nominate an ultra liberal to
run for president again.

I'm not sure I agree... I think Gephardt lost out because of nothing
short of a lack of charisma. I don't think people were paying that much
attention to positions or character during the primaries, and there were
way too many people on the list to go very deep. But if he wasn't
charismatic enough to beat Kerry on the Primaries, I'm not sure he would
have had what it took to beat Bush either. After all, Gore lost on
charisma too.

I agree with you there, but it's my belief that Bush was ideologically
vulnerable, and that a guy closer to the center (ala Gebhardt) would have at
least grabbed enough of the popular vote (and people like me, who weren't
100% enthused with Bush) to have tipped the scales his way.

But we'll never really know...

The Democrats simply have to figure out a way to select their nominees
better, if they ever want to win the presidency. They've got to find
someone who hones closer to the beliefs of mainstream America, without
alienating their huge (and incredibly vocal) left wing. The Republicans
have figured this out -- I'm surprised the Democrats haven't.

If anything, they seem to be learning precisely the wrong lesson from this
loss, blaming Kerry for not being "Democrat" enough. This seems
ludicrous, given the mood of the nation (at least outside of the big
cities), and how diametrically opposed Kerry's positions were to what most
Americans want and believe.

Mark my words: If they nominate Hillary next time around -- as they appear
to be angling toward -- it will set the Democratic Party back 50 years.
They won't see the White House again in our lifetime.

And now, back to flying!
--
Jay Honeck
Iowa City, IA
Pathfinder N56993
www.AlexisParkInn.com
"Your Aviation Destination"

In rec.aviation.piloting Jay Honeck wrote:
I agree with you there, but it's my belief that Bush was ideologically
vulnerable, and that a guy closer to the center (ala Gebhardt) would have at
least grabbed enough of the popular vote (and people like me, who weren't
100% enthused with Bush) to have tipped the scales his way.

I agree, but Gebhardt was never gonna be the answer. He's way too boring.
He has no carisma. There was no way he would have been able to win.


The Democrats simply have to figure out a way to select their nominees
better, if they ever want to win the presidency. They've got to find
someone who hones closer to the beliefs of mainstream America, without
alienating their huge (and incredibly vocal) left wing. The Republicans
have figured this out -- I'm surprised the Democrats haven't.

The problem is that the "Party" (ie, the party leadership) doesn't
neccessarily pick the nominee. A group of individuals decide to run, and
then the primaries pick the nominee.

--- Jay



--
__!__
Jay and Teresa Masino ___(_)___
http://www2.ari.net/jmasino ! ! !
http://www.oceancityairport.com
http://www.oc-adolfos.com

"Jay Honeck" wrote in message news:K7iid.294493$wV.71039@attbi_s54...

I agree with you there, but it's my belief that Bush was ideologically
vulnerable, and that a guy closer to the center (ala Gebhardt) would have at
least grabbed enough of the popular vote (and people like me, who weren't
100% enthused with Bush) to have tipped the scales his way.

If either party is able to nominate a centerist, they have an
excellent shot at the presidency. The problem is that both parties
are largely influenced by their more extreme factions. In the primary
system, these folks are the ones who have the most influence (and
money) to determine who will ultimately represent their party. Also,
look at the difference in voter participation between primaries and
general elections. You know that the hard-core left and right is
going to participate, but I'll wager that the center is
under-represented at that stage. What you end up with in a general
election is usually a choice between the least scary of two extremes.

In this past election, a strong centerist candiate (from either
party) would have resulted in a landslide, rather that what we got.

John Galban=====N4BQ (PA28-180)

Jay Honeck wrote:

Mark my words: If they nominate Hillary next time around -- as they appear
to be angling toward -- it will set the Democratic Party back 50 years.
They won't see the White House again in our lifetime.

And now, back to flying!

I agree on both counts! Now if it just wasn't so cold here in PA already.


Matt

I'm not sure I agree... I think Gephardt lost out because of nothing
short of a lack of charisma. I don't think people were paying that much

When Gephardt and Lieberman and other Democrats who are toward the central
of the political spectrum "dropped" out, there was a feeling the GWB was
unbeatable. When they dropped by the wayside, further left of center to
dominate the selection process.

Unfortunately / fortunately depending on one's political perspective, the
DNC has not put forward a candidate who could pull voters from the center
and right of center except for Kennedy and Clinton. Dukas was a "old style"
Eastern Liberal. Gore was an "heir apparent" because he serviced with
Clinton but move to the left of center during the campaign and lost the
center votes he needed.

No party can win the poplar vote unless they can pull voters from the other
side of center from their base. Be too far to the extremes of the spectrum
and they loose the cross over vote.

Judah wrote:

snip


No, I think the biggest problem in this election was simply that there
was not much difference at all between the two candidates, or if there
was, it was so clouded by nonessential issues that the general public was
left to vote on whether they are more comfortable with or without change,
and not much else.

I think you've hit it exactly right.

If there is one thing I that both sides agree on it is the lack of real,
open discourse on real issues. The "two party" system is really just one
big self serving machine.

One thing that will improve the situation is for all of us "we the people"
to work to allow more third party ideas into the debate. It does us all a
great disservice when not all the voices are heard.

I heard some good ideas from several of the third party candidates (and some
pretty looney ones too). Injecting them into the mix might have forced
Kerry/Bush to be more specific. It certainly would go a long way to
"un-polarizing" the country.

snip

--
Frank....H