Kevin D. Korenthal, October 4, 2004

So here we are nearly 48 hours after the 1st debate between John Kerry and George W. Bush. As soon as the debate ended, many in the media, even Fox News handed the win to John Kerry. But as the day after descends to evening, the transcript of the debate reveals some interesting points that were obviously lost on the pundits that called this debate for Kerry.

"My position on Iraq has been consistent." Sen. Kerry said at least half a dozen times Thursday night. In my opinion, nothing could be farther from the truth. I think it is pretty much consensus that Senator Kerry (who voted for the authorization of war, against the $87 Billion to fund the troops, said he supported the ousting of Saddam and now calls this the "wrong war in the wrong place at the right time) has taken every side of this issue.

Even in the debate, John Kerry flip-flopped. Highlighting the "consistency" of his position, over the course of 90 minutes Kerry managed to say the war with Iraq was a "colossal error of judgment" on the part of the President and referred to the war as a "distraction" from "the real war on terror," but he managed to add that he believed Saddam was a threat when he voted to authorize the use of force, that the Iraqi people deserved to be free, and that he could "win the peace," while beginning to withdraw U.S. forces within six months, making our "bribed and coerced" allies, whose contributions he "respects," pick up the slack.

On the subject of Iran, Kerry was obviously confused on the whole issue of nuclear technology, as well as the historical facts concerning the sanctions against Iran.

The man who thought he spent Christmas in Cambodia first said we needed sanctions against Iran, then, when confronted with the fact that there are sanctions against Iran -- and you can't sanction them again -- Kerry blamed the President for the "unilateral" nature of those sanctions, to which Mr. Bush corrected, again, that those sanctions were in place "long before I came to Washington." Indeed, 29 October 1987, for the first set of sanctions, under President Reagan. 16 March 1995, under President Clinton, for a second set. 19 August 1997 for another set of sanctions, again under then President Clinton. Again, consistent?

Another telling misjudgment on the part of the Senator (and a flip-flop of huge proportions) is his claim that America needs to engage North Korea in bi-lateral talks as opposed to the 5-party (China, Japan, Russia, NK and The U.S.) that the present administration has been engaging in. For some reason, when President Bush employs multilateral diplomacy it's a bad idea; Kerry would return to Clinton's tried-and-failed diplomacy of appeasement -- the same diplomacy under which North Korea was able to advance its nuclear program in secret, even adding enriched uranium to its plutonium-based weapons development.

In the most telling example of how a Kerry Administration might address foreign policy, Kerry said,

"No president through all of American history has ever ceded, and nor would I, the right to pre-empt in any way necessary to protect the United States of America. But if and when you do it, Jim, you've got to do it in a way that passes the test. That passes the global test [original emphasis] where your countrymen, your people understand fully why you're doing what you're doing. And you can prove to the world that you did it for legitimate reasons."

Did he say that American foreign policy must pass a "global test"? How can one claim they would never cede America's foreign policy decisions to a foreign power and in the same sentence claim America's polices abroad must pass a "global test"?

This is the type of gobbledygook John Kerry has been spewing throughout this campaign. Kerry would seek UN approval for "preemptively" defending the United States -- approval of the same agency that so effectively issued no fewer than 17 resolutions against Saddam's Iraq and refused to enforce any of them, with Kofi Annan recently declaring the resolutions' enforcement "illegal." Is the United Nations up to the task (or even interested in) defending the cause of Freedom in the world? The evidence seems to say, no!

Like "America's Mayor", Rudy Giuliani said recently "Senator Kerry has taken so many different positions on the issues facing the country that we thought he would benefit from the overview of the most interesting debate -- the one John Kerry is having with himself. He's been for the war, against the war and for it and against it again. Last week, he became an anti-war candidate again. This is a fatal flaw and the American people see through it. John Kerry is not able to take a principled position and is the wrong choice to guide America through this critical time."

Copyright © 2004 Kevin D. Korenthal