Centerfield

John Kerry: Still out for number one, still an a$%hole.

Oh and Pat? Remember last week when you took away my righty stooge card for claiming that GWB fostered the environment that led to the public outrage that scuttled the Dubai port deal?

Well, I'm earning a new one today, buddy, and there's nothing you can do to stop me!

Bwu-huh-huh-haa-haa!!
Bwu-huh-huh-haa-haa!!
Bwu-huh-huh-haa-haa!!

Of course, I have to give back the lefty stooge card you awarded me. C'est la guerre, :-)

While this article in particular doesn't really get my juices going, I did take notice of the animosity towards Kerry.

Why? I did vote for him but I'm no fan of his by a long shot. Nor do I dislike him. He's just...Kerry.

At a centrist site, I'm a bit puzzled to see such "Red-State-like" rancor towards him.

Say what you will about your impressions of him personally, but I felt his policy proposals and intent were quite moderate and reasonable and he would have made a good and capable president and that's what should matter more.

That said, it's safe to say he doesn't stand a chance at winning the nomination though you can't blame the guy for trying. I mean, if I were a Dem voting in the primaries, I'd pick someone else...no offense to Kerry. I just think the Dems have better and viable candidates (who can knock Hillary off the favorite list) to put forward like Warner, Richardson and even Gore.

Say what you will about your impressions of him personally, but I felt his policy proposals and intent were quite moderate and reasonable and he would have made a good and capable president and that's what should matter more.

It's not his policies that I dislike, but his approach to them. I find centrists dislike Bush for the same reasons, and with the same vigor at times... It isn't the vision, it is the implementation. Kerry, IMO, doesn't do anything without asking first how it impacts his career... An empty suit, if you will.

John, it's not red-state rancor, it's HOME state rancor. That sentiment you voiced? "He's just...Kerry." Imagine enjoying it for 20 years. He's smug, self-serving, has no real accomplishments that I can think of, and not a word comes from his mouth before he puts his wet finger into the wind. The force of my dislike has built over the years. I didn't even notice a thing until two terms had passed and I started noticing that he only ever showed up as "mr. national politics." And then he turned into a reliable bigmouth critic once the democrats became the minority party. He's a big talker.

I freely admit that my dislike for the guy at this point is no longer wholly rational and may even have become visceral. But bear in mind that I can count the number of Republicans I have voted for on one hand, without using my thumb, while i've voted for countless democrats.

BK,

"John, it's not red-state rancor, it's HOME state rancor."

"The force of my dislike has built over the years."

"I can count the number of Republicans I have voted for on one hand, without using my thumb"

I take it then that you supported Bush's re-election in spite of your "Dem-friendly" voting history.

I totally understand your personal feelings. I got some of the same sense towards him but considering Bush's record (which really bothered me)and his folsky, cowboy persona, Kerry got my default vote without a second thought.

Kerry's "smug, wordy NE liberal perception problems" didn't really come into play for me even though I preferred it to Bush's countering steadfast, folksy persona since policy...especially foreign policy was my main beef with Bush. I simply thought Kerry's positions were more right than Bush's.

It's funny how I've warmed up to Bush a bit lately, in light of recent events, since he's started acting more like I would have expected Kerry to act on the world stage.

It's not his policies that I dislike, but his approach to them. I find centrists dislike Bush for the same reasons, and with the same vigor at times... It isn't the vision, it is the implementation.

they sound like two peas from the same pod

I will happily award you a "righty stooge card", valid for one week only, Brian!

I agree completely with your post. I didn't like 1-Senator holds when Republicans did them, I don't like them now when Democrats do them. I don't favor that level of secrecy in our legislative bodies. I might not mind it if the customs of the Senate allowed them to be valid for just a short time, a month or two, but indefinite? Nope.

Classic Triumph lines:

"Robert Guillaume was the first African American to star in a really s#$tty television show. I have a lot of respect for that since I am a black dog who likes poop."

Rick James was such a gentlemen. He would take a ladies coat right before he burned her with his crack pipe.

Actually John, I advocated a McCain-Lieberman ticket here, encouraging others to write it in. And ultimately I wrote in McCain. But then, my vote didn't matter anyway. Kerry was certain to carry MA.

My thinking is that if you are certain your vote won't affect the outcome, you should really vote for some person who you actually believe deserves the job, not choose the least smelly buttpipe. I think there is also some merit to, say, designarting some person as the proxy candidate to represent "no confidence." I had no confidence that either guy was up to the task.

Of course, if I were from, say, Ohio, I'd have felt it to be my duty to ultimately choose the least smelly buttpipe. Of course, I argued to little avail here that I didn't actually think our foreign policy would change that much if Kerry got elected.

Were I to say what I think my choice might have been , it'd be pure speculation. I dislike both of them. And never entertained the notion of supoorting or voting for either. Were I to have chosen Kerry, it would have been because I decided Bush was too simple and impatient a man. Were I to have chosen Bush, it would have been because i felt that Bush at least knew what he stood for. Kerry is a serial vacillator.

My favorite Triumph line? Said to the sole female fan at a Star Wars fan gathering;

Ahhh, dear lady, how does it feel to be surrounded by all these men....who have no idea how to satisfy you.

No, she wasn't me, but I've been there, done that. ;-)

If John Kerry can prove substantively that Richard Capka is an incompetent hack, let him make his case before the whole senate. If he knows for a fact that this guy is overmatched for the job and is nobly standing up against hackery, let him show it, and I'll retract every word, and literally eat a crow. Feathers and all.

So you are saying that if JK made a good case that Capka was a hack (I don;t have any idea myself) the fair minded R's in the senant would vote Capka down? Just asking.

BK, being from Mass., what's your impression of Kerry's generally safe and postive poll numbers?

Do you think he could serious primary challenge next time or GOP challenge? For all his negatives, he seems pretty comfy in his senate seat....

If John Kerry can prove substantively that ... let him show it, and I'll retract every word, and literally eat a crow. Feathers and all.

That's a bit of an overreaction Brian. He would still deserve a bit of what you've said here for resorting to such tactics before even presenting an argument.

As for rob's comment: with Bush's flagging poll numbers, it would be possible. Even without doing so, if the people are convinced, a filibuster would likely be politically sustainable which at least diffuses the responsibility to more than one person's whims.

One other thing. Is there any chance Kerry could make this hold stick (making the whole thing even more farcical)? When Helms did it, he was chairman of the responsible committee which gave him the power to effectively block what his whims didn't like. Anyone familiar with Senate procedures as to how they would effect a group trying to overturn a hold?

Rob,

Yup. Nominees have been voted down for some pretty small sins, such as hiring an immigrant nanny, paying worker under the table. Pretty venal stuff.

Suppose Kerry could muster an office of people who worked under this guy, and to a person, each said he was an unqualified buffoon. In the post-Brown climate, suppose he had no relevant experience, or could be shown to have been a main cause of failure in his executive role. That'd do it, IMO. Again, I'm a MA guy. Kerasiotes was the guy at the wheel for most of the overruns, and I don't even know that HE necessarily was to blame. If Capka really can be demonstrated in specific instances to not have been up to the task, I DO think the senate would vote him down. I think it's unsupportable to suggest that the senate is in a rubber-stamping mood for Bush nominees. Bush is a lame duck, and the senate knows that their constituents are the ones to butter their bread.

But more importantly, I just don't think that a single senator should ever be allowed to kill a nomination all by himself or herself. in that respect, it has ZERO to do with either Kerry or Kapka.It's an archaic informally allowed practice. Score-settling is not something the founders thought to include in the powers enumerated to the various branches.

John,
the MA senators are about as safe as you can get unless someone else emerges. The GOP is a hapless joke in MA, which is really a shame. One party dominance is a bad thing. Man, you should see some of the jokers the GOP fields around here. It's mostly wealthy businessmen running vanity campaigns. And every time someone like that shows up asking to join the GOP club, the price for showing your loyality is this: they ask you to waste your time and your money running as cannon fodder for Ted Kennedy's victory lap. Not that undeserved a request, the rich vanity guys always want a ticket to the head of the line, so they always get offered a choice between, say, district rep, lt. governor, or run against Kennedy. It' actually pretty comical.

The only way I can imagine Kerry getting beaten is if, say, Romney decides not to officially run for President (he's running unofficiallly now), and decides later to oppose Kerry for Senate to polish his resume and to use the national prominence of a senatorial position to re-burnish his socially conservative credentials. And ultimately, I think Romney would lose that fight too. The only winning attack to make on Kerry is his vanity-driven pre-occupation with national matters. Romney isn't the guy who can make that argument. But we all know that Kennedy is the bacon delivery man and Kerry just seconds every motion.

Well, Scott, I guess what I'm really allowing for here is that John Kerry truly is very familiar with the guy and really knows he can't do the job. Suppose I were a senator and knew some guy was getting appointed to an important position, and he was just a boot-licking buffoon without the right experience and who shouldn't be trusted running a road race let alone a federal agency.

If I were in that spot, I would put a hold on such a guy. I might not go public with an attack, but I'd make sure the appointment wouldn't happen if I was sure it was a mistake, and had that sort of power.

"John Kerry: Still out for number one, still an a$%hole."
..............
This describes your worthless hero, the phony john mccain, who in your sychophantic worship of that bum, fail to acknowledge the truth.

In Defense of John Kerry
By David Gopoian

As George W Bush’s approval ratings sink deeply in late 2005, Democrats can conveniently dismiss what we never fully accepted in 2004 – that Bush was as popular an incumbent among Republican followers in the last campaign as Ronald Reagan was at his zenith in 1984.

[The remainder of this post has been removed by the thread originator since it appears to be a copyright violating cut-and-paste of an entire essay by a 3rd party. A friendly reminder to all our visitors...play nice, or play elsewhere.]

Laura, now you seem to be copying blog posts which are themselves already violating copyright by copying the full text of a column. Not appropriate, and your conduct of late has not been helping promote the principles and ideals you purport to have.

Brian, I would recommend you delete all but the first paragraph of Laura's comment with Tully's standard copyright violation notice. Had she included a link to the column or the blog post she got it from, that could be left in its place, but as she didn't bother, too bad.

What I was just about to say. But it's not a first offense. I deleted one from Laura a few weeks ago in one of my threads for the exact same thing. Strike two.

EVERYONE: If you think a post or column somewhere else is worthy of notice, link to it and try to entice people to go read it. Most writers and bloggers appreciate the attention.

Don't spam the thread with someone else's copyrighted intellectual property, no matter where you found it. That's theft, and is not appreciated at all.