This is what Kathleen Parker says about Kerry

[dsc]

For the record I consider Ms. Parker unworthy of being quoted. She is carried in my local paper. I saw this column but chose not to quote it at the time. I think Ms. Parker's thoughts on just about everything are utterly worthless and shed no light at all. But clearly people here think differently. Clearly they consider this harpy a goddess of wisdom. Well, let us see what this goddess said recently.

http://www.orlandosentinel.com/news/opinion/columnists/orl-edpparker02110203nov02,1,1904181.column

Miller is not alone, though some are more sanguine when it comes to evaluating the roster of contenders. Here's a note I got recently from a friend and former Delta Force member, who has been observing American politics from the trenches: "These bastards like Clark and Kerry and that incipient ass, Dean, and Gephardt and Kucinich and that absolute mental midget Sharpton, race baiter, should all be lined up and slapped.

"All this carping and undercutting of our foreign policy -- whatever happened to politics stops at the water's edge? -- is giving strength and hope to our enemies. That makes them fight harder and longer and in the end costs the very lives they claim to care so much about."

OK, so he's a little emotional. We'll pardon him given that earlier in the day he had learned of a pal's death in Afghanistan with whom he served several years. His friend was no kid, but a veteran of many wars. A Native American Indian, they called him "Chief," which he liked just fine, so everybody in the ethnic sensitivity guard can relax.

snip

It is disingenuous to vote in favor of war, as some of the candidates did, and then to declare when the going gets tough that you favored war only if everything went according to plan -- a plan, incidentally, that was visible only in a rear-view mirror.

Sens. John Edwards and John Kerry, for instance, say they supported getting rid of Saddam Hussein, but disapprove of the way Bush has executed the war. Shoulda, Coulda and Woulda are brilliant on Monday mornings, but no war goes according to anyone's plan.

Then retired Gen. Wesley Clark, who's still attached to the fraudulent "imminent threat" meme, says he was always against the war, even though he's on record contradicting himself. Clark is like the news on eggs. One day eggs are good, next day they're bad. Whatever they are, he always knew it.

end of quote

Admittedly the first quote is of someone else, and considerably cleaned up BTW the original was shot, but she seems to approve. Then the second quote is all hers. This column is hardly unique. On her website is a link to several of her columns. None of them are pretty. I think she is a shrill harpy, Dean bashers seem to think she is some sort of goddess given the number of threads they have posted. She is an unfit source. I knew this. Why didn't they?

[dsc]

1. How far the goddess has fallen!!

amazing. Four threads on this woman and they all have plenty of responses but now silence. Gee, wonder why.

[realFedUp]

2. She's still an unfit source

I don't like her stuff posted here at all.

[TXDemGal]

3. She has always been an unfit source

She's a wingnut shill and always has been. The only reason I can see that papers carry her drivel is that 1) she's a female, and 2) she's hauls water for the Rethugs. Thus, she helps balance out their roster of wingnut opinion.

[DrFunkenstein]

4. This Is About Kerry? Well, The One Part That Is Gets It Dead Wrong

"Sens. John Edwards and John Kerry, for instance, say they supported getting rid of Saddam Hussein, but disapprove of the way Bush has executed the war. Shoulda, Coulda and Woulda are brilliant on Monday mornings, but no war goes according to anyone's plan."

Um, I'm pretty sure that Kerry has consistently provided an excellent alternative to Bush's plan at every single stage of this entire fiasco. You may disagree with his vote, but he has definitely put out very excellent plans of action.

---

Though his emphasis has shifted, Mr. Kerry's writings, statements and speeches from before the vote on using force through now do show consistent underpinnings. He argued for using the threat of force to support the weapons-inspection program, but only using force when all other options were exhausted. And he often warned that the greatest challenge would be in stabilizing postwar Iraq.

Mr. Kerry said the difference between his votes on the two matters was the administration's record.

"They're not promising some course, they're on the course," he said. "What they've done is visibly mistaken. What they're doing is visibly wrong."

He added, " Now there's a clear track record and a clearer set of very bad choices, and I'm voting against those choices."

Asked, however, whether he would still have opposed the $87 billion had his vote been the decisive one, Mr. Kerry dismissed the hypothetical as "unrealistic" but added, "I would never desert the troops."

In any case, Mr. Kerry said he took solace from a poll last week finding that many voters in three early primary states said they wanted a presidential nominee who supported the war in Iraq but was critical of Mr. Bush for not assembling an international coalition. And, Mr. Kerry noted, he received an ovation on Saturday in Waterloo when he spoke of his vote against the $87 billion.

http://www.nytimes.com/2003/10/24/politics/campaigns/24KERR.html?pagewanted=2&ei=5070&en=c0acaed1f901beca&ex=1068613200

[dsc]

5. He is in the first part too

or didn't you read that?

[RichM]

6. 'Scuse me, but she's exactly right. Kerry & Edwards DID both vote for

the IWR for lousy invalid reasons; their criticism DOES now largely consist of superficial disapproval of the way Bush has executed the war, and Clark IS on record contradicting himself.

Parker is a jerk -- but those particular points can't be sneezed at.

[DrFunkenstein]

10. Superficial Reasons - Like Rushing Into An Unnecessary War?

Kerry has said he would be willing to be continuing inspections even up until today if he were President. Kerry has been attacking Bush's moves consistently and deeply, but people are deafened by his vote. You may not like his vote, but you can't pretend he hasn't been on Bush like white on rice.

[Cocoa]

7. explain why a Parker column is being taken seriously?

That column is notable for the death threat against dems that was in the original, and the fact that since it was scrubbed then Parker is misquoting her friend.

Other than that, how is this column, like any she writes, the basis for any discussion other than to ridicule it?

[dsc]

8. We have a winner

yet Kerry supporers quoted her not once, not twice, but in three separeate threads in order to bash Dean. Did you ask them?

[Padraig18]

9. They surely did!

:grr:

[DrFunkenstein]

11. I Don't Know These Examples, But

I judge arguments on their own merits, not on who is saying them. Otherwise, America would be hopelessly polarized along Party lines for all time. That may sound like a good idea, but it doesn't to me.

[Cocoa]

12. anything she said about Dean would be equally worthless

I'm curious to see those threads, if you have a link.

[dsc]

14. Here is one from GD

and there is one in P and C.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=104&topic_id=685575&mesg_id=685575

Also a second GD thread on the same subject by the same author but it merely quotes the GOP directly. The one sited has her article on Dean.

[Cocoa]

15. thanks

just like I thought, worthless.

Did you notice that thread was locked? Best just to drop it don't you think.

[Name removed]

13. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[Zomby Woof]

16. it was never true

Even during the darkest days of WW2, the Republicans griped about FDR and his handling of the war. The myth of monolithic and unwavering unity in our nation's history is a MYTH.

Dissent is ESSENTIAL to freedom and a plural society. It is a sign of STRENGTH to our enemies, whomever that may be at this particular moment. Americans who demand unconditional conformity of thought demean what the veterans we are supposed to honor tomorrow sacrificed.

It is the politics and division within Bush and Rumsfeld's Pentagon that endangers soldiers' lives, not the intelligent and reasoned dissent of the peace advocates and others who dare speak truth to power and criminal absurdity.

[RetroLounge]

17. Parker is Ann Coulter

plus a few sandwiches...

Ignore her.

[eileen_d]

18. Why don't you just come out and say it?

Quit equivocating - just say "Kerry supporters should not be allowed to post on DU" and be done with it. We're such fatally flawed human beings. Dean Underground, I mean Democratic Underground, would improve without us vermin. :eyes:

[Padraig18]

19. I'd never say that.

I just wish they'd quit taking their material from RW talking heads and the RNC. It says much more about the state of the Kerry campaign than it does about Gov. Dean... :eyes:

[dsc]

20. I have no problem with Kerry supportes posting

I do have problems coming to read Democratic underground and instead seeing an Ann Coulter want to be.