A Tangled Web

FLIP FLOP MAN NUMBER TWO.



OK - we all know that John Kerry is Mr. Flip Flop. As Jay Leno put it, "We make jokes about it but the truth is this presidential election really offers us a choice of two well-informed, opposing positions on every issue. OK, they both belong to John Kerry, but they're still there."



But what about shiny happy clappy John Edwards? He's supposed to be the foil to the charismatically challenged Kerry. Jean Pearce provides a good analysis of Edwards here;



The key facts:-



In September, Edwards said Congress needed to send to the troops in Iraq “what they need” because “they’re in a shooting gallery, a very dangerous situation.” A month later, he voted against $87 billion in funding for those same troops, parts of which would have paid for body armor, increased imminent danger pay for soldiers and family separation allowances, things that would help that struggling military wife he now claims he’s looking out for.



Edwards has promised to “invest in the new equipment and technologies so that our military remains the best equipped and best trained in the world. This will make our military stronger so we're able to defeat every enemy in this new world.” Of course, it remains unclear how Edwards’ vote in 1999 to reduce defense spending by $3.1 billion furthered his goal of “defeating every enemy.”



Edwards, a member of the Senate Intelligence Committee since 2001, has long been screaming about the Bush Administration’s failure to detect and stop the terrorist plot that led to the 9/11 catastrophes. But when Edwards was asked by PBS’ Margaret Warner in May 2002 whether the intelligence committee had been briefed before September 11 on Osama bin Laden or the possibility of airline hijackings, Edwards couldn’t answer the question. “We're just responsible for sort of broad oversight,” he told her. “So you don’t really remember?” Warner pressed. “I don’t remember the specifics of what we were told about this,” Edwards finally admitted.



Back to Jay Leno......



"The attacks have already started. John Edwards is too inexperienced to be president, he's too flashy, he's not up to the job. And those are just the things John Kerry said in the primary."