What's Kerry going to say about this?

The was a horrific suicide bomb attack in Baghdad today that killed over 40 people, most of them children. Will John Kerry bring up these deaths in the debates tonight and try to lay them at George Bush's feet? Is he that desperate and depraved?

You would think he wouldn't be, but last week John Kerry gave a speech where he essentially painted the picture of Iraq being a hopeless disaster. And then there was this defeatist TV ad:

"Over 1,000 US soldiers dead, kidnappings, even beheadings of Americans," an announcer says as images of Iraqi explosions and street battles fill the screen. "Still Bush has no plan what to do in Iraq. How can you solve a problem when you can't see it?"

If it's fair game to blame these things on Bush, then certainly Kerry will jump at the chance to cash in on a bunch of dead kids, right? Well, no. I really don't think he will; he doesn't dare to seem to be that crass. But why are brutal kidnappings and murders okay to use as weapons against Bush while the mass slaughter of children isn't?

There was an editorial in the NY Times last weekend denying that there was anything wrong with a presidential candidate 'accentuating the negative' in the war on Iraq and stating that it was "despicable politics" to suggest "that Mr. Kerry's criticisms dispirit the Iraqi people and American soldiers". Well, it's not. It's the truth, and it's very simple to understand.

The goal of terrorism is to terrorize. They want their targets to feel fear, to feel helpless, and to give up hope. Anyone amplifying their negative message is doing their bidding, giving them a public victory and making them stronger. The media does this all the time; I call it the media-terrorist feedback loop. Can anyone doubt that these bastards feel very pleased with themselves when John Kerry uses their work to attack George Bush?

So do I think terrorism should be off limits as a subject for debate in the election? Mostly, yeah. Both candidates should be very clear that they are serious about terrorism and that there will be a democratic Iraq -- whoever wins. This a war -- there's a common enemy and it's important not to forget that in the heat of the campaign. Kerry should make it very clear that it is the terrorists that are responsible for the atrocities in Iraq, not Bush, and make his hay with objections to the rationale for the war, not the final result.

Posted by Bruce Gottfred at September 30, 2004 02:49 PM | TrackBack