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- - Flip-Flop (https://thetfp.com/tfp/tilted-politics/70800-flip-flop.html)

to be fair and for completeness

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2004/...in646435.shtml

Quote:

(CBS) In Part Two of our series examining how the candidates have changed their minds on the issues, CBSNews.com Chief Political Writer David Paul Kuhn looks at John Kerry's most notable flip-flops.
Senate's Role In Wars With Iraq

Following Iraq’s invasion of Kuwait in January 1991, Kerry broke with the majority of senators and voted against authorizing the first Gulf War. He said on the Senate floor, “It is a vote about war because whether or not the president exercises his power, we will have no further say after this vote.”

Kerry thus voted against war after Iraq took aggressive military action. He said a vote in favor of military action was tantamount to giving Congress “no further say” on the war.

In October 2002, he supported the current war in Iraq, despite the fact that Iraq took no aggressive action against its neighbors.

In announcing his candidacy for president, in September 2003, he said his October 2002 vote was simply “to threaten” the use of force, apparently backtracking from his belief in 1991 that such a vote would grant the president an open-ended ticket to wage war.

Read Part One of our series:
President Bush's Top Ten Flip-Flops

If I Knew Then What I Know Now…

“We should not have gone to war knowing the information that we know today," Kerry said Wednesday on ABC’s “Good Morning America.” "Knowing there was no imminent threat to America, knowing there were no weapons of mass destruction, knowing there was no connection of Saddam Hussein to al Qaeda, I would not have gone to war. That's plain and simple."

But on Aug. 9, 2004, when asked if he would still have gone to war knowing Saddam Hussein did not possess weapons of mass destruction, Kerry said: “Yes, I would have voted for the authority. I believe it was the right authority for a president to have.” Speaking to reporters at the edge of the Grand Canyon, he added: “[Although] I would have done this very differently from the way President Bush has."

The Kerry campaign says voting to authorize the war in Iraq is different from deciding diplomacy has failed and waging war. But Kerry’s nuanced position has contradicted itself on whether it was right or wrong to wage the war.

In May 2003, at the first Democratic primary debate, John Kerry said his vote authorizing the president to use force was the “right decision” though he would have “preferred if we had given diplomacy a greater opportunity.”

But then in January 2004, Kerry began to run as anti-war candidate, saying, "I don't believe the president took us to war as he should have."

The $87 Billion Vote

In September 2003, Kerry implied that voting against wartime funding bills was equivalent to abandoning the troops.

"I don't think any United States senator is going to abandon our troops and recklessly leave Iraq to whatever follows as a result of simply cutting and running,” he said.

Then, in October 2003, a year after voting to support the use of force in Iraq, Kerry voted against an $87 billion supplemental funding bill for U.S. troops in Iraq and Afghanistan. He did support an alternative bill that funded the $87 billion by cutting some of President Bush’s tax cuts.

But when it was apparent the alternative bill would not pass, he decided to go on record as not supporting the legislation to fund soldiers.

Kerry complicated matters with his now infamous words, “I actually did vote for the $87 billion before I voted against it.”

On Wednesday, he acknowledged that his explanation of his Iraq war votes was "one of those inarticulate moments."

The Israeli Security Fence

In October 2003, Kerry said Israel’s unilateral construction of a security fence was “a barrier to peace.”

“I know how disheartened Palestinians are by the decision to build the barrier off the Green Line," he told the Arab American Institute National Leadership Conference. “We don't need another barrier to peace. Provocative and counterproductive measures only harm Israelis.”

But less than a year later, in February 2004, he reversed himself, calling the fence "a legitimate act of self-defense," and saying "President Bush is rightly discussing with Israel the exact route of the fence to minimize the hardship it causes innocent Palestinians.”

Patriot Act

Kerry joined with 97 other senators and voted for the Patriot Act in October 2001. Campaigning in New Hampshire in June 2003, he defended his vote, saying, “it has to do with things that really were quite necessary in the wake of what happened on Sept. 11.”

But last December in Iowa, Kerry advocated “replacing the Patriot Act with a new law that protects our people and our liberties at the same time.”

Death Penalty for Terrorists

In 1996, then- Massachusetts Gov. William Weld asked Kerry, a longtime opponent of capital punishment, whether the death penalty should be applied to terrorists. Kerry replied that the idea amounted to a “terrorist protection policy.”

He said then that such a policy would discourage other nations from extraditing suspects because many U.S. allies preclude extradition to countries that impose the death penalty.

Kerry now favors the death penalty for terrorists, though extradition remains a problem.

Kerry still opposes the death penalty in general, but says if elected he would not interfere with state executions.

Releasing the Strategic Petroleum Reserves

In 2000, Kerry called the release of oil from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve “not relevant” to solving the problem with high fuel prices.

But in recent months, Kerry has pressured President Bush to start pumping oil into the government's emergency reserves. Kerry has called for the release of some of the reserves, as well.

In a switch from his earlier position, Kerry now argues that a sizable release would lessen U.S. demand and thereby fuel lower prices.

Affirmative Action

Though he has long supported affirmative action, in a speech at Yale University in 1992, Kerry called the program "inherently limited and divisive," and said it had "kept America thinking in racial terms." He added that it was failing those most in need of assistance: African-Americans.

At the height of the Democratic primary race in January, Kerry reiterated his support for affirmative action. Kerry’s critics question how he can support a program that he once called “divisive.” Kerry says he was speaking about racial quotas, which he opposes.

Trade

Kerry backed trade pacts with Chile, Singapore and Africa. In 2000, he voted to grant China most-favored-nation trading status.

Having supported the major trade deals of the last decade – including the 1993 North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) – Kerry was heavily critical of U.S. trade policy during the Democratic primaries.

As the primary race heated up against now vice-presidential nominee John Edwards, who criticized Kerry for supporting NAFTA, Kerry received the prized endorsement of the AFL-CIO by insisting he will insure “workers rights” in trade agreements. Kerry also blamed trade for creating "a race to the bottom" among poverty-stricken nations.

No Child Left Behind

Kerry voted for President Bush's "No Child Left Behind Act” but now campaigns against it. He says Mr. Bush failed to adequately fund the legislation by not linking student-testing requirements with school funding.

I still stand by the position of this should all be dropped.

Wow, someone posted both sides of the coin! I'm impressed!

Kerry's big 'flip flop' is the war on Iraq, period.

Its center to his hope for the White House.

He went from a Dove, to a Hawk, to a Dove, and a few more flips in there.

Its all nicely laid out in that early link.

He even advocated ground troops in Iraq in 97.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ustwo

According to ,factcheck.org the assertion that Kerry has reversed his positions on Iraq is a false one:

Quote:

Summary

Kerry has never wavered from his support for giving Bush authority to use force in Iraq, nor has he changed his position that he, as President, would not have gone to war without greater international support. But a Bush ad released Sept. 27 takes many of Kerry's words out of context to make him appear to be alternately praising the war and condemning it.

Here we present this highly misleading ad, along with what Kerry actually said, in full context.

Analysis

This ad is the most egregious example so far in the 2004 campaign of using edited quotes in a way that changes their meaning and misleads voters.

Kerry is shown saying it was "the right decision to disarm Saddam Hussein." What's left out is that he prefaced that by saying Bush should have made greater use of diplomacy to accomplish that.

The quote is from May 3, 2003, at the first debate among Democratic presidential contenders, barely three weeks after the fall of Baghdad. The question was from ABC's George Stephanopoulos:

Q: And Senator Kerry, the first question goes to you. On March 19th, President Bush ordered General Tommy Franks to execute the invasion of Iraq. Was that the right decision at the right time?

Kerry: George, I said at the time I would have preferred if we had given diplomacy a greater opportunity, but I think it was the right decision to disarm Saddam Hussein, and when the President made the decision, I supported him, and I support the fact that we did disarm him.

(Note: We have added the emphasis in these and the following quotes to draw attention to the context left out by the Bush ad.)

"As he should have"

The full "right decision" quote is actually quite consistent with the next Kerry quote, "I don't believe the President took us to war as he should have," which is from an interview with Chris Matthews on MSNBC's "Hardball" program Jan. 6, 2004:

Q: Do you think you belong to that category of candidates who more or less are unhappy with this war, the way it's been fought, along with General Clark, along with Howard Dean and not necessarily in companionship politically on the issue of the war with people like Lieberman, Edwards and Gephardt? Are you one of the anti-war candidates?

Kerry: I am -- Yes, in the sense that I don't believe the president took us to war as he should have, yes, absolutely. Do I think this president violated his promises to America? Yes, I do, Chris.

Q: Let me...

Kerry: Was there a way to hold Saddam Hussein accountable? You bet there was, and we should have done it right.

"Winning of the war was brilliant"

When Kerry said "the winning of the war was brilliant" he wasn't praising Bush for waging the war, he was praising the military for the way they accomplished the mission. He also repeated his criticism of Bush for failing to better plan for what came next. This was also on "Hardball," May 19:

Q: All this terrorism. If you were president, how would you stop it?

Kerry: Well, it's going to take some time to stop it, Chris, but we have an enormous amount of cooperation to build one other countries. I think the administration is not done enough of the hard work of diplomacy, reaching out to nations, building the kind of support network.

I think they clearly have dropped the ball with respect to the first month in the after -- winning the war. That winning of the war was brilliant and superb, and we all applaud our troops for doing what they did, but you've got to have the capacity to provide law and order on the streets and to provide the fundamentally services, and I believe American troops will be safer and America will pay less money if we have a broader coalition involved in that, including the United Nations.

"Wrong war, wrong place"

When Kerry called Iraq "the wrong war, in the wrong place, at the wrong time" he was once again criticizing Bush for failing to get more international support before invading Iraq. He criticized Bush for what he called a "phony coalition" of allies:

Kerry (Sept 6, 2004): You've got about 500 troops here, 500 troops there, and it's American troops that are 90 percent of the combat casualties, and it's American taxpayers that are paying 90 percent of the cost of the war . . . It's the wrong war, in the wrong place at the wrong time.

Earlier that same day at another campaign appearance he repeated pretty much what he's said all along:

Kerry (Sept 6, 2004): "I would not have done just one thing differently than the president on Iraq, I would have done everything differently than the president on Iraq. I said this from the beginning of the debate to the walk up to the war. I said, 'Mr. President, don't rush to war, take the time to build a legitimate coalition and have a plan to win the peace ."

We May Find WMDs

Nine months of fruitless searching have gone by since Kerry said on Dec. 14, 2003 that weapons of mass destruction might yet be found in Iraq. But what's most misleading about the Bush ad's editing is that it takes that remark out of a long-winded -- but still consistent -- explanation of Kerry's overall position on Iraq:

The exchange was on Fox News Sunday, with host Chris Wallace:

Q: But isn't it, in a realistic political sense going to be a much harder case to make to voters when you have that extraordinary mug shot of Saddam Hussein...looking like he's been dragged into a police line-up?

Kerry: Absolutely not, because I voted to hold Saddam Hussein accountable. I knew we had to hold him accountable. There's never been a doubt about that. But I also know that if we had done this with a sufficient number of troops, if we had done this in a globalized way, if we had brought more people to the table, we might have caught Saddam Hussein sooner. We might have had less loss of life. We would be in a stronger position today with respect to what we're doing.

Look, again, I repeat, Chris, I have always said we may yet even find weapons of mass destruction. I don't know the answer to that. We will still have to do the job of rebuilding Iraq and resolving the problem between Shias and Sunnis and Kurds. There are still difficult steps ahead of us.

The question that Americans want to know is, what is the best way to proceed? Not what is the most lonely and single-track ideological way to proceed. I believe the best way to proceed is to bring other countries to the table, get some of our troops out of the target, begin to share the burden.

The $87 Billion

The final quote is the one in which the Bush ad takes its best shot. Kerry not only said it, he did it. He voted for an alternative resolution that would have approved $87 billion in emergency funds for troops and reconstruction in Iraq and Afghanistan, but it was conditioned on repealing much of Bush's tax cuts, and it failed 57-42. On the key, up-or-down vote on the $87 billion itself Kerry was only one of 12 senators in opposition, along with the man who later become his running mate, Sen. John Edwards.

It's not only Bush who criticizes Kerry's inconsistency on that vote. Rival Democratic presidential candidate Joe Lieberman, a senator who also had voted to give Bush authority to use force in Iraq, said: "I don't know how John Kerry and John Edwards can say they supported the war but then opposed the funding for the troops who went to fight the war that the resolution that they supported authorized." Lieberman spoke at a candidate debate in Detroit Oct. 26, 2003.

Another Democratic rival who criticized Kerry for that vote was Rep. Dick Gephardt, who said beforehand that he would support the $87 billion "because it is the only responsible course of action. We must not send an ambiguous message to our troops, and we must not send an uncertain message to our friends and enemies in Iraq."

But aside from the $87 billion matter, this Bush ad is a textbook example of how to mislead voters through selective editing.

I believe that you've quoted this site before so I assume that you'll trust it's objectivity.

Edit: on the matter of the $87 billion, it's worth noting that Bush himself threatened to veto an earlier draft of the bill because it didn't meet his criteria, exactly what John Kerry was attempting to do with his no vote. In either case, the funding of the troops was never in question.

Quote:

Originally Posted by irateplatypus

sorry stompy, but that list you posted in that thread was full of inconsistencies. it really didn't prove anything but the author's partisanship.

hm, are we talking about the same post? Probably not because there was a list mentioned a few times that was pretty factual. Those decisions Bush made DID happen. You can check em yourself. In fact, people ignored the multiple postings that showed Bush's flip flops! That's pretty funny. I guess the truth is hard to accept sometimes, eh?

That pretty much sums up politics though: you give a list of arguments against something and the other side TOTALLY ignores them and goes on like nothing ever happened. I really don't get how this country continues to operate...

If you feel they are inconsistent, then say so. You can't just sit idle and let it go unchallenged while you think in your head, "hm, these aren't right."

Sorry, but you can't have an intelligent political discussion ANYWHERE if you call Kerry a flip-flopper without acknowledging the fact that Bush does the exact same thing. It just can't happen, and if one thinks it CAN, then the discussion gets nowhere because it's like talking to a brick wall.

You can deny that the sky is blue, but in the end, it really is blue..

[edit]
The whole point of me making that thread was to try and stop all the sheep-like behavior. People just aimlessly regurgitate what they hear others say without checking the facts for themselves... or if they do, they grossly misinterpret the facts to suit their party. Both sides do it.

In this case, republicans got some weird idea to bash Kerry as a flip-flopper, which is REALLY pointless. That would be like makinga campaign against him saying, "He lies". Well, guess what? You lie. I lie. Everyone lies or has lied.

People need to realize that you can't sit here and ramble off something like this and expect to gain in advantage in a discussion, because in actuality it creates the opposite effect. Someone losing their ground and resorting to "Kerry is a flip flopper" and other hypocrisy in an attempt to slam or belittle the other person is on par with getting fed up and saying, "Yeah? Well he sucks just because." It's not very intelligent at all and makes the poster look dumb, IMO. If Bush never flip-flopped and was true to his vision, that's one thing.. but that's not the way it is.

It's not about Bush, it's not about Kerry.. it's about having intelligent discussion that goes beyond "he said/she said, so it must be true" crap.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Stompy

In this case, republicans got some weird idea to bash Kerry as a flip-flopper, which is REALLY pointless. That would be like makinga campaign against him saying, "He lies". Well, guess what? You lie. I lie. Everyone lies or has lied.

Some weird idea eh? Pointless? lol
True or not. Like it or not, it has been a very effective campaign. You can argue that they are lieing if you'd like. And you can argue it's negative campaigning, but it's not pointless. The point is to make Kerry look bad and gain favor in the Bush camp. Guess what, that has been working. Perhaps Kerry can reverse what has been lost. But it HAS been working ;)

Quote:

Originally Posted by edwhit

It's been working so well that the race is too close to call at this point.

Quote:

Originally Posted by cthulu23

It's been working so well that the race is too close to call at this point.

Hey, I frankly call that as working DAMN well.

Look at the facts. We have a president who's an economic idiot, who's turned us into a nation that wages wars of aggression against non-enemies, who fails utterly to protect us against terrorism (think maybe it's a good idea to catch the guy that attacked us rather than Saddam who did not?), who changes his story routinely to fit the facts that he just can't hide (Iraq has WMD's, well not really but Saddam is a terrorist, well not really but he's a really bad guy, yeah that's it). In short we have a president who has done more harm to this nation than any enemy country ever has, yet instead of running away with the voters, Kerry is in a close, tooth and nail fight for the presidency.

Any campaign that can take a blundering, ignorant buffoon like W and still make roughly half of the country want to give him another 4 years in office is a DAMN effective campaign.

Hehe, you may have a point Shakran. Too bad more of the electorate doesn't see it that way.

Edit: of course, the similarity to the 50-50 split of the 2000 election points to a stasis in the electorate.

Quote:

Originally Posted by irateplatypus

oh come on now. you're proposing that the mud throwing is weighted heavily to one side? surely you don't believe that. venom towards GWB has never been in short supply, i'd be surpised if someone could argue otherwise. i think the main difference is that the republicans are throwing their "shit" at kerry while the democrats are crapping more out... but just prefer to bath(sic) in it.

Thus back to my first point: that you are biased (as, admittedly, am I) toward one candidate, and so you are no one to judge(nor am I) who is doing better or worse. If you were honest with yourself, you would admit this to me, but more importantly to yourself.

George W. Bush's Resume:
1976-77: Bush Oil
1978-80: Independent oil operator
1981: President, Arbusto Energy (oil company)
1982-84: President, Bush Exploration Co. (oil cimpany)
1985-88: Chairman of the Board, Spectrum Seven Energy Corp. (oil company)

A quote from yesterday:
"Keeping America competitive requires affordable energy. And here we have a serious problem: America is addicted to oil, which is often imported from unstable parts of the world."

Psst... flip flopper much?

Quote:

Originally Posted by willravel

Will, you dug up this thread for this?

Please explain how this is a 'flip flop'. Oil is something needed by the US, Bush worked in that field, but it would be nice if it were not needed. Because you worked for an oil company, despite the parinoia crowd who thinks the oil companies are hiding all alternative energy sources, does not mean you can't see the need for other energy sources.

Let's put it this way.

I am a drug dealer. My family makes a lot of money off drug dealing. I deal with bad some people to get these drugs. Turns out these bad people hurt others. I get famous and (obviously in order to distance myself and my past from the drugs and thus the bad people) tell people that drugs are bad. Am I a hypocrite?

Edit: is there really a statute of limitations on calling bullshit?

Quote:

Originally Posted by willravel

You know whats funny I thought of the drug dealer analogy myself but it was so ridiculous I didn't bother to post it. This may strike you as odd but oil isn't illegal, its not bad, its very important in fact, and there is no 'taint' for 'dealing' it.

If we had no oil tomorrow, the US would be in chaos. We NEED oil, we need oil company CEO's, exploration, drilling, and gas station attendants. If we had no illegal drugs tomorrow, tomorrow would be a better day (unless you sell snack foods or get withdrawal).

My brain still recoils from your analogy, I think I'll just back away smiling, not showing my teeth.

Quote:

Originally Posted by willravel

So we are comparing an illegal substance that 1) people make the specific choice to take and 2) is inexhaustable anyway to a major energy source that is the basis of the entire world's economy and is running out?

I don't think we have to wait on the statute of limitations here...

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ustwo

Let's use another analogy then.

I sell cell phones (something that can be very benificial to our modern society). My family makes a lot of money off cell phones. I deal with engineers and designers who fudge numbers and cut corners to make it seem like using your cell phone too much doesn't increase the risk of cancer (there is no definitive answer to the question of whether cell phones cause cancer or not, but this is for the sake of the analogy). Over the years, it is proven that cell phones can be dangerous, but more imporantly, some peope knew they were dangerous and hid it. I get famous and (obviously in order to distance myself and my past from the cell phones and thus the bad people) tell people that cell phones are bad. Am I a flip flopper?

Of course.

I am an oil dealer. My family makes a lot of money off oil. I deal with bad some people to get this oil. Turns out these bad people hurt others. I get famous and (obviously in order to distance myself and my past from the oil and thus the bad people) tell people that oil are bad. Am I a hypocrite?

Quote:

Originally Posted by willravel

How about this one?

I am an oncologist. Or a cancer surgeon. I am a vocal opponent of tobacco.

Does that make me a flip-flopper? A hypocrite?

Quote:

Originally Posted by Marvelous Marv

How about this one?

I am an oncologist. Or a cancer surgeon. I am a vocal opponent of tobacco.

Does that make me a flip-flopper? A hypocrite?

You would if you asked your patients to smoke.

Quote:

Originally Posted by willravel

You would if you asked your patients to smoke.

I'll turn off that part of my brain.....ok that one too....one more piece....ok I think I've got it!

If you have anything to do with the oil industry, by default you can not talk about alternative energy or you are a hypocrite!

HOLY CHRIST!!!

I sold candy for fundraisers as a child and now I'm a dentist! My god I am as bad as a drug dealer or Bush!

Will, if you reach any futher with this one you are going to pull something.