Kerry (speech last Monday): No torture!

[ProSense]

Last Monday, Senator Kerry gave a speech and during the Q&A portion respond to a question about the McCain, Warner, Graham compromise, which was at the time in progress. Senator Kerry gave an awesome detailed repsonse that began

"No torture!

The question begins at about 1:03:00 in this video:

http://www.pepperdine.edu/smedia/asx/seaver/dean/20060921_svr_dean_jkerry.asx

[texpatriot2004]

1. Thank you Senator Kerry nm

[brentspeak]

2. How come the Democrat-bashers on these boards haven't mentioned this?

[WildEyedLiberal]

3. I think your subject line says it all

They might have to admit that some Democrats are, in fact, opposed to torture, which doesn't support their current "Dems are spineless" meme.

[IndianaGreen]

5. How many Democrats stood alongside Kerry and Feingold

on the Iraq war exit resolution?

Kerry has been great since he repented of his IWR vote, and he has taken the lead on more than one occasion, only to be thwarted by the leaders of his own party, i.e., the Alito nomination.

[WildEyedLiberal]

6. I differentiate between people who attack ALL Dems

And people who get pissed at certain Democrats on specific issues. Kerry gets attacked all the time here for being "spineless" despite the fact that he's one of the few who consistently speaks out against Bush and his policies. Those kinds of people can kiss my ass because they are helping the Republicans by demonizing the entire Democratic party including those who are most voiceferously criticizing Bush.

[IndianaGreen]

9. Kerry has shown tremendous and fearless leadership in opposing

the Bush regime's attempt to turn our country into a despotic nation. While Kerry has certainly not been alpne, I wish we had more like him and less people like those Democrats that took offense at someone calling Bush the same thing that we call him in DU every day.

[IndianaGreen]

4. Democrat-bashers?

:eyes:

[gully]

7. Gosh, that IS puzzling.

*ehem*

[ProSense]

8. Sept. 14 Op-ed

Forget Jack Bauer

Insure CIA agents against a reckless administration, not terrorists' lawsuits or my subpoenas.

BY JOHN KERRY
Thursday, September 14, 2006 12:01 a.m. EDT

Your Sept. 12 editorial "Jack Bauer Insurance" was a disservice not to me or to fictional characters like Jack Bauer, but to the very real CIA agents whose commitment to the truth didn't fit the administration's neoconservative agenda on Iraq, and to agents endangered by reckless administration policies.

It's been reported that CIA officers refused to be trained in the administration's controversial interrogation techniques, and in at least one instance these techniques yielded questionable information aimed at pleasing the interrogators. The Supreme Court, not Democrats, ruled administration detainee policies out of bounds, and it was the outrage of Republican senators that forced the administration to apply the Geneva Convention to enemy prisoners in order to best protect captured Americans.

Iraq has been an endless abuse of the CIA. CIA operative Tyler Drumheller said top White House officials simply brushed off the warning that "reliable intelligence" suggested Saddam Hussein had no weapons of mass destruction, saying they were "no longer interested" in intelligence. Former CIA operative Paul Pillar wrote that "intelligence was misused publicly to justify decisions already made."

Former CIA case officer Jim Marcinkowski argued the Valerie Plame leak hurt "the credibility of our case officers when they try to convince an overseas contact that their safety is of primary importance." Former CIA agent Larry Johnson, a registered Republican, said it "speaks volumes" that President Bush held no one accountable for the leak of an agent's identity. Forgotten is President George H.W. Bush's admonition that those who expose our agents are "the most insidious of traitors." CIA officers don't need Jack Bauer insurance--they need insurance against the recklessness of this administration.

http://www.opinionjournal.com/extra/?id=110008939