Reply #25: Kerry's service in-country was during that time as well

[TayTay]

He served after the period in which America's leaders knew the policy wouldn't work. He served with people who died after America's leaders knew the policy wouldn't work. He talked with the families of people killed in VN who all died after America knew it wouldn't work. I think that's why he gave that famous testimony before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee back in April of 1971. Someone had to say, if it's not working, then why are we still there?

I am glad that he is saying this again today, because that question matters in this war. I am very glad that Sen. Kerry is addressing some of his comments to the families of those killed in Iraq. That is an audience that everyone in the Congress who talks about Iraq and what to do going forward, should be addressing.

In April Sen. Kerry put out an editorial in the NYTimes that said the time had come to begin a withdrawal of our forces from Iraq according to a timetable. He was attacked on the Senate floor by Sen. Wayne Allard of Colorado who said that Kerry was "an individual being spun in the political winds" and implied that Kerry was only doing this to garner favor with liberals and the antiwar crowd.

Kerry rebutted Allard by talking about the immorality of this war and the immorality of pursuing a course that wouldn't work. He said:

Do you want to run down the list of things that are egregious with respect to this war? I will tell you one thing that I know well, and I will remind the Senator from Colorado that half the names on the wall of that Vietnam Memorial--half the names on that wall --became names of the dead after our leaders knew our policy wouldn't work.

Our policy isn't working today, and I am not going to be a Senator who adds to the next wall , wherever it may be, that honors those who served in Iraq so that once again people can point to a bunch of names that are added after we knew something was wrong. We have a bigger responsibility than that.

Keep doing that Senator Kerry. It is the right and moral thing to do.