john kerry accuses bush of letting bin laden go free at tora bora

[Gato Moteado]

if you saw kerry's appearance on hardball this week you undoubtedly saw tweety repeatedly try to cut kerry off at the end of the program after an audience member's question prompted a rant by the senator aimed at bush for knowingly letting bin laden and 1000 al qaeda members get away after 911. this is an incredible charge that, up until that point on msnbc, i had only seen in the alternative press. here's the link to the transcripts http://www.msnbc.com/news/983074.asp

the exchange i am talking about is this:

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Hi, Senator, my name is Andy Lipinski (ph), I am a senior at Harvard College, and you said if elected president, you’d be more diplomatic and work through the United Nations, but the people who flew planes into our buildings on September 11, the only language they understand is force. So my question to you is, should we be speaking with these people, or should we just be smoking them out of their caves like President Bush says?
(APPLAUSE)
KERRY: Well, if the president had smoked them out of their caves when he had a chance, we’d be a lot better off. But he failed at Tora Bora, when he had 1,000 people, all al Qaeda, including Osama bin Laden, in the mountains and he didn’t do it.
MATTHEWS: OK, thank you. We’re out of time.
KERRY: My answer is, you have to do both.
MATTHEWS: OK, Senator, thank you very much.
KERRY: Btu you have to do it smart.
MATTHEWS: Thank you very much. It’s great to have you. Senator John Kerry. (UNINTELLIGIBLE).
END

[unfrigginreal]

1. Clark has been saying this since it happened...

Even before he declared he was most vocal about it.

[Fabio]

4. Actually, John Kerry was vocal about this

long before anyone.

http://www.truthout.org/docs_02/08.01E.kerry.bush.htm

in fact, he was talking about it during the operation.

[DrBB]

6. Kerry has too

It's not that new--it was party of Kerry's spiel that provoked those attacks on him for being "unpatriotic"--the ones where he replied he wouldn't take lessons in patriotism from the chickenhawks. Really his best moment so far, and too few of those for my taste. He's very good when he's on this track.

[DoYouEverWonder]

2. I caught that one too

Tweety is such a weezle.

If they were out of time, why did Tweety allow the person to even ask a question. Normally they would allow the guest to make some kind of closing comment and tell him how nice it was to have him on. These TV guys know to the second where they are at and when it's time to break for a commercial or end the show. Cutting Kerry off in mid-sentence had nothing to do with suddenly being out of time.

[Gato Moteado]

3. exactly!

now, will kerry bring this damning message about bush to the campaign?

[Armstead]

5. Um he didn;t say "knowingly"

Kerry is not saying Bush let Bin Laden go on purpose at Tora Bora. Rather, that they bungled it.

Personally, I don't think that position really holds water. I'm no fan of Bush, but I don't think he can be personally blamed for a military operation that went wrong at Tore Bora. It's not like Bush was there in person in a flak jacket directing the operation.

Bush has screwed up big time in many ways. But the problem I have with Kerry is that rather than really point out the fundamental errors of Bush's policies, he basically says he would have followed the same policies, but he would have done it better. That, to me, isn't offering an alternative.

[Cocoa]

8. look at the question he was answering

a Freeper Youth was attacking Kerry's calls for diplomacy, implying Bush s cave strategy was some kind of success.

I think it's a perfect response from Kerry.

I hope he responds similarly when some moran points to some imaginary proof that the tax cuts were successful.

[Armstead]

9. It was an okay response

I agree, it's a perfectly appropriate response when the freepsters claim that we want to "negotiate" with terrorists.

But I saw that Hardball (and seen him elsewhere) and Kerry seldom challenges WHAT Bush did, but rather how he did it in terms of effectiveness. There's always the underlying assumption that Bush was correct to go to war with Iraq -- it's just a matter of the trappings.

[Cocoa]

12. that's his position

are you really disappointed that Kerry said what he thought, rather than what you thought?

At least your observations about Kerry are accurate about his consistency, unlike the Tweety/Fineman-style accusations about his position being incoherent, which is purposeful B.S.

[NewYorkerfromMass]

10. Kerry's policies might resemble Bush's to a certain degree

except with the added bit of "competence". It will get him elected in the general but he's got to get approval from all the Bush hating Dems in the primary.
I am very worried by the short sighted attitude that promotes Dean over Kerry when Dean is in no way a threat to Bush in the general.

[Gato Moteado]

11. he didn't say knowingly....

...but he implied it.

also, i don't think the transcript is totally accurate. it seemed like kerry went off more on bush in that exchange than what was represented in the transcript.

[Octafish]

7. Kerry talked about it in October 2002...blm reported it on DU.

And caught right heck for saying Kerry was on the case at the time...

http://www.democraticunderground.com/forum_archive_html/DCForumID60/10171.html