But in recent decades it has become the Republican Party that has championed the cause of democracy and freedom in countries of need. Under Ronald Reagan¹s stewardship, we toppled the evil of Soviet Communism. Under George H.W. Bush, we liberated Kuwait from the grip of Saddam Hussein. And now, under George W. Bush, we¹ve embarked upon a new, immensely important project: democratizing the first Arab nation in the Middle East. While the circumstances in Iraq may be difficult and tragic at times, we must press on in the name of something higher‹eventual genuine democracy for the Iraqi people, and the transformation of a tumor in the Middle East into a shining beacon of freedom. These were the themes that pervaded the Republican National Convention.
But now, look back to Boston and to the Democratic Convention, and try to discern where Senators John Kerry and John Edwards even stand on the war in Iraq, let alone if their positions have any grounding in principle. In October of 2002, both Senators voted to authorize the war, but voted against the $87 billion supplemental bill to fund the troops, much of which went to body armor and health care. Only four other Democratic congressmen out of 254 shared this baffling experience of casting votes to support the war, but to oppose supplying the troops. Some argue that Senators Kerry and Edwards¹ votes against the costly $87 billion bill were ³protest votes² against the Bush tax cuts. If this theory is true, which it probably isn¹t, then the senators, if they had garnered a majority, would have made their political point at the expense of the troops.
The more likely explanation is that the vote on the $87 billion took place in the heat of the Democratic primaries, when Howard Dean was taking Kerry and Edwards to task for their initial support of the war. Both Kerry and Edwards flew back to Washington to prove their liberal mettle with a vote against the $87 billion. And so the decision to support the war but to oppose funding the troops was a fundamentally political ploy, designed to do nothing more than pander to the Democratic base, at the expense of hundreds of thousands of troops in the field. At the Democratic Convention, Kerry offered us no plan and no ideas for the situation in the Middle East. He is content to criticize whatever President Bush does, hope that Iraq self destructs and make sure that he is around to pick up the pieces.
This sharp contrast between the themes at the Republican Convention and the Democratic Convention illustrates an important difference between the character of the Left and the Right in this election. For Kerry and Edwards, no issue is too important to evade the reach of partisan politics. It doesn¹t matter whether it is foreign policy such as the war in Iraq or domestic policy on gay marriage and abortion, Kerry will say whatever he thinks his audience wants to hear. In 1996, for example, Kerry voted against the Defense of Marriage Act, which was designed to allow the states to decide the issue of same-sex marriage. He compared the traditional marriage laws to a caste system akin to bans on interracial marriages back in the mid-20th century. But now, his official position is that the issue should be left up to the states, and he has offered no explanation of how he¹s managed that reversal. Furthermore, Kerry somehow manages to support abortion on demand, while simultaneously believing that life begins at conception.
Putting together all of the pieces, we are inescapably driven to the unpleasant conclusion that John Kerry has no awareness of any political principle other than getting elected. He has taken both sides of the war in Iraq, both sides of the gay marriage debate, and has flipped and flopped on almost every issue imaginable. His campaign for the presidency has been an exercise in politics devoid of moral restraint, and lacking any grounding in principle. And this man may be the next president of the United States of America.