What is this message?
Kerry is a flip-flopper. He doesn't know where he stands. You can't be a leader if you don't know where you stand.
The war on terror is going well. The Iraq War is part of the global war on terror. If I had it to do all over again, I would do it the same way. I would trot out that sign on the aircraft carrier that said "Mission Accomplished" all over again. Kerry is against the liberation of Iraq and would prefer that Saddam had stayed in power. I will stay the course, and God is on our side. Our soldiers will not have died in vain only if we complete the mission. I will not waver from the war to liberate the Iraqi people, and I want you to stand with me as commander in chief. And no, we don't need a draft. If you make the wrong choice on election day, we could suffer more 9-11s.
The economy is recovering. My tax cuts are working. Elect me and we'll keep them.
Some "message." Elect me and we'll do everything the same way we have been doing it. To change course would be "flip-flopping," and I would never do THAT. I would never dream of learning from my mistakes.
Never mind my own flip flops. I first said that Saddam was contained, so no worries. Then 9-11 happened, and I said Saddam had to be disarmed so WMDs wouldn't be given to terrorists, and that Iraq was an Al Qaeda base. OK, so first I said I needed the authority from Congress to make war to give me a strong negotiating position at the UN, and that I would work with the UN to disarm Saddam. So some Democrats like Kerry supported me.
Then a few months later I said Saddam must be disarmed, so we must invade him with only token support from a few nations. The UN inspectors must not be given a chance to do their job, I said, because they are all phoneys. I blamed my own flip-flop on Kerry, who opposed this preemptive, preventive war against a nation that had had not attacked us.
Then it turned out that out there were no WMDs in Iraq, just as inspectors had said. The intelligence was wrong, mostly because it was selective intelligence based on Iraqi traitors and Iranian agents like Chaleby. And it turned out that no connection could be made between Saddam and 9-11, or even Saddam and Al Qaeda. Iraq was not a threat to our national security, as I had claimed. So now the Iraq invasion became a war of liberation for Iraq, and I don't even mention Osama bin Laden anymore. We must be more interested in the rebuilding of Iraq than the recovery of America. In any case, America needs no attention because all we need for recovery are tax cuts for the rich. It doesn't matter that my Vice President's former company got no bid contracts for rebuilding the Iraqi oil industry. It doesn't matter that former members of my administration now say that I was planning an Iraqi invasion even before 9-11, from my first day in office, and that in order to plan this invasion I ignored the warnings given me about terrorists attacking buildings with airplanes, and didn't attend meetings where meeting this threat was discussed. So I did nothing to prevent the attack that killed 3000 Americans, because I was busy planning an invasion that would kill over 1000 more-- and since my friends at PNAC said we needed a new Pearl Harbor in order to carry out our invasion plans.
Because I know where I stand, I can lead America in wartime! It does not matter that I stand on the quicksand of a quagmire that I created. It does not matter that my leadership had been the most incompetent in our history. It does not matter that I invaded Iraq under the delusion that everyone would welcome us with cheers and flowers. It does not matter that I told the post-war planners to take a hike, and thus had no plan for how to build the peace. It does not matter that I invaded Iraq with too few troops to occupy the country. It does not matter that I gave the troops inadequate tanks and body armour, so that hundreds have been blown up by make-shift road-side bombs. It does not matter that I have cut veterans benefits, and that not only have over 1000 soldiers died in this needless adventure, not counting those who died after returning home, but tens of thousands have been maimed for life, and are given inadequate medical treatment and that military hospitals are being closed or poorly staffed.
It does not matter that I try to hide these facts by not attending any funerals for the dead soldiers. It does not matter that the USA doesn't even control the centers of Sunni power and resistance which were the basis of Saddam's power in the first place. It does not matter that I told the troops to invade Faluja, then on the verge of success told them to back off to ensure the peaceful "transfer of sovereignty;" then when that didn't happen, told them to invade and bomb again. It does not matter that I promised a national election in Iraq for January, but that because many areas both Sunni and Shiite are not secure and are controlled by insurgents against the occupation, the election won't mean anything.
It does not matter that I interrupted and diverted resources from the incompetent and unsuccessful campaign against the terrorists who really attacked us, to conduct this foolish and deadly adventure. It does not matter that therefore many Al Qaeda and Taliban leaders are still at large and still conducting terrorist acts all over the globe against our friends and allies, and that because we have wasted billions of dollars in Iraq, we have no funds for adequate homeland security and funds for first responders have been slashed instead of increased. It does not matter that though there were no terrorists in Iraq before I invaded, I have now made it a plush and easy home for terrorists who are attacking our soldiers and our allies whom we put there in harm's way, and attacking and killing Iraqis by the thousands. It does not matter that the billions in Iraq are not even counted in the national budget, which because of my tax cuts, and because of an economy that has created a net loss of 1 million jobs for the first time since Herbert Hoover, is racking up the largest deficits in our history, after my predecessor had worked hard for eight years to create a surplus, and to end the huge budget deficits-- also the largest in history-- created by my hero and predecessor Ronald Reagan.
None of this matters. Elect me and I will "stay the course," and we will protect you from the "terrorists." I might even invade more countries-- Iran, Syria, North Korea, Uzbekistan, China, Vietnam-- gosh how many more nations are ruled by dictators; God has so much more work for us to do!!!-- although our soldiers are strained and overstretched beyond their limits, and are forced to stay longer than planned, and although recruiting is falling off dramatically and thus we will have no soldiers to invade these other countries with, let alone continue the wars I have already started. I will "stay the course," and because we don't have enough soldiers for this course, I am forcing soldiers to go fight from the very same National Guard and Reserves which I once joined in my youth in order to successfully evade fighting the previous deadly incompetent, preventive and preemptive military quagmire that didn't need to be fought, but which I enthusiastically supported.
And I called those who didn't support this war in Vietnam traitors; like John Kerry, who bravely fought in the war, became a decorated hero, and then came back to take a leading role to correct our country's mistake in waging the previous war that some president decided to fight although we didn't need to.
And of course we won't need a draft-- OH NO!-- the same way we only needed 100,000 soldiers to occupy Iraq. We can get away with this future flip-flop too, because the American people will forget what I promised again. Just as they forgot why I said we went into Iraq-- to disarm Saddam-- and now believe me when I say we went to war to liberate Iraq, which the people would not have supported in the first place. They will forget, just as they forgot that I and others said there was no connection between Iraq and 9-11, but now they are bowled over by the big lie, the more often repeated the more often believed, that Saddam was linked to Al Qaeda and helped bring down the World Trade Center. With the media my corporate friends control at our side, we can keep deceiving and fooling the people and conduct yet another fraudulent election, and then just "stay the course." It does not matter that this course is taking our country off a cliff. All I care about is that I got my tax cuts for my rich friends, and they are happy. :-)