It seemed pretty bizarre that John Kerry was portraying himself as pro-war and a strong defender of the nation

I felt like John Kerry distanced himself from the base of the Democratic party in his speech at the convention. I understand that a high percentage of delegates to the convention were anti-Iraq war. John Kerry, himself, built his career on his anti-war stance. I still hold his 1971 Senate testimony against him. I had not remembered that John Kerry was the speaker, but had vivid memories of the testimony about supposed warcrimes and atrocities in Viet Nam. They seem to have existed only in the imagination of John Kerry, although at least one account credited him as saying that he had committed some of the war crimes. Why doesn't John Kerry just run on his record? He is solidly anti-war, anti-defense spending, socially liberal, pro-Choice, friendly with Socialist governments and movements, in favor of all sorts of national liberation movements, and a natural ally to the French. He is of French ancestry, so what more could you ask? Supposedly, when he wants to communicate with his brother with reduced risk of disclosure while in public, he speaks French. Why pretend to be something that he is obviously not? Who is he kidding? Perhaps it is for Andrew Sullivan and Daniel Drezner, who obviously are looking for reasons to vote for him. Mickey Kaus desperately wants to vote for John Kerry, and I am sure would appreciate a better performance than John Kerry has given to date. Those to the left can always vote for Ralph Nader. Those to the center could always vote for President Bush.

John Kerry comes across as an empty suit with what he considers to be "good hair"

My take on John Kerry is that the things he values most are: his resume, his hair, and his billionaire wife (he likes money). Oh, and I left out one thing: his initials are JFK. He has long liked that a great deal. Especially after he got to socialize with President Kennedy about 1962. I thought it a nice touch that John Kerry had met with the Sandinistas in 1985. They would seem to be his ideological fellow travelers. Them, the Communist Vietnamese, and Fidel. Has he spoken with Fidel? I would be surprised if he at least doesn't like Fidel. Cuba, that great workers paradise, on a par with that other workers paradise, North Korea. I'm sorry to say this, but I think that Gary Trudeau correctly nailed John Kerry in 1971. He is an egocentric self-promoter. The only thing John Kerry knows is that he wants to be important. It seemed to him, in 1970 on, that being a radical anti-war lefty was the way to go, for him.

So, John Kerry says that he will wait for the terrorists to attack us, not go after them

The theme of John Kerry's speech seemed to have been that we will not try to pre-empt terrorist attacks, but wait for them to happen, before we respond (with a police investigation, presumably). My reading is that he wants to go back to the Clinton administration stance, where we let the terrorists bomb the World Trade Center in 1993, Oklahoma City in 1995 (if you believe the Iraqi connection), Khobar Towers, the African embassies, and the USS Cole, without taking any substantial action. I would prefer to be fighting the enemy in the Middle East, Africa, and South Asia, not waiting for the attack that would kill 4 million (including 2 million children) that has been promised.

I suspected that Barak Obama's story had a dark side

Yes, sadly, Barak Obama's story is not all lighthearted and inspiring. His father abandoned he and his mother when Barak was 2 years old. His father went back to Kenya, and left his mother and her parents to raise Barak. The fact that neither his mother nor father were alive raised a flag. Apparently, his mother was this idealistic little leftist, attending college in Hawaii. I'm sure that connecting up with a Kenyan seemed very progressive to his mother. The idealism died when Barak's father left for Kenya. Apparently, Barak's father, at some point, was an important official with the Kenyan government, with a portfolio for economics. Perhaps he served the recent dictatorship. I'm sure that Barak is a fine fellow and would make a great senator (as least from looking at his press releases). That is a feature of Democrat politics: picking people based on press releases and spin. I apologize for geing so negative on this, but I find it hard not to be, when addressing this subject.

There is a goofball editorial in today's Washington Post

There is an editorial, in today's Washington Post that objects to the 9/11 Commission's characterization of the war we are in as being with Islamist terrorists. Apparently, that is not PC enough. It is too near the truth. We are at war with Islamist terrorists because they staged a Pearl Harbor-like attack against us, on September 11, 2001. We didn't choose to have this war. In fact, we spent the 1990's denying that there was anything wrong. We ignored the first attack at the World Trade Center in 1993. We turned our head in reaction to the embassy bombings in Africa. We ignored the Kobar Towers attack. The Islamists were getting frustrated, because they couldn't get our attention. Finally, the staged a dramatic enough attack that we noticed. It didn't hurt that we had changed administrations, as well. We had turned down an opportunity to accept Osama Bin Laden from Sudan. We had Sandy Berger four times stop attacks to capture or kill OBL After September 11, 2001, we attacked and defeated the Taliban in Afghanistan. We drove Saddam Hussein from power in Iraq. Daily, our troops are battling against Islamist terrorists in Iraq. We are taking action. We are taking action because we have a strong and relentless leader who is determined to keep us safe. Compare that with the fecklessness displayed from 1993 to the end of 2000. Compare that with the Viet Nam anti-war activists who have taken over the Democrats. They think we are the problem, not the Islamists. Hence, the 9/11 Commission shouldn't have said that we were at war with Islamists terrorists. They stick their heads in the sand. If John Kerry is elected, they Islamist terrorists will have to stage another massive attack to get our attention, again. Actually, they would be trying to get the Democrats' attention, as they have consistently denied that we are at war.

the Democratic convention has pushed Sandy Berger off the tront page

I'm not surprised that the Sandy Berger story is no longer the big story. What could revive the story is if the document is declassified, so we can see what Sandy Berger removed from the National Archives (repeatedly). There is still more to the story than has been made public. I will be very angry if Sandy Berger is given special treatment simply because he had been an important official in the Clinton administration. My guess is that there are more stories like this that will become known between now and the election. Certainly, the Democrats have more ammunition in their arsenal that they intend to use to smear President Bush. I expect that the Bush campaign committee also as a large store of ammunition, and that they are holding it ready for release in October and right up until the election eve. Their opponents will be doing the same, so we need to be prepared to be shocked and appalled about many things.

More buzz about Sandy Berger

We know for sure that Sandy Berger took documents home that were classified at the Top Secret Codeword level. Just to put things in perspective, if I had done that in the early 1980's, I would still be in prison. It would have been a lot of work, because our briefcases were searched, and we would have had to hide the documents in our clothes (hey! that sounds like Sandy Berger). Even more bizarre is that he may have been switching out documents. The reason being that there were penciled comments on the copies of a particular document, and he may have been bringing in replacements with either no comments or else comments that were more politically acceptable. The problem centers around Sandy Berger's blocking four opportunities to capture or kill Osama Bin Laden, between 1998 and 2000. There is that, and the fact that President Clinton declined to take OBL when offered him by the Sudan. This obviously makes President Clinton uncomfortable, as we have heard him on tape say that he had declined to take OBL. I heard the audio several days ago of President Clinton saying this very thing. I am sure that it was very inconvenient for him to have had someone record his speech where he admitted this incriminating fact.

Who leaked the news?

I think that it is pretty interesting that it is likely to have been a Democrat who leaked news of the Sandy Berger investigation. The idea is that it was done to prevent the story coming out in late October, and hurting John Kerry's chances in election. Another twist is that the leaker might have been Sandy Berger's rival, Richard Holbrooke. I can see that Sandy Berger and John Kerry are a "good impedance match" (using techy terminology), in that both are Leftists. Richard Holbrooke is widely perceived as being Center-Left. I was reading a story yesterday about someone who should have been a natural ally of Sandy Berger who wrote that he had disliked him from the first time he met him. Part of the problem really is Sandy Berger's sloppiness. He is sloppy in his dealings with the facts. Only in the Clinton fantasy land can Sandy Berger say that it was just a mistake and his carelessness. I heard about a poll, yesterday, where 95% of the respondents polled thought Sandy Berger should be prosecuted. This morning, an online poll said that 82% thought he was lying. Those on the Center-Right have gotten so cynical, however, that they expect that Sandy Berger will get off, just because the Democrats wouldn't like it if he were prosecuted.

Did President Clinton ask Sandy Berger to take documents?

The question has been raised, in the last several days, whether President Clinton had asked Sandy Berger to do some legacy polishing at the National Archives. A different slant focuses on the content of the missing documents. Mainly, they are said to pertain to the Clinton Administration's tendency to treat terrorism as a law enforcement issue, rather than as potentially involving military action. I had not realized that Sandy Berger was a McGovernite. While President Clinton governed as "Center-Left", Sandy Berger was "Left". The present administration talks like they were "Right", but have governed as "Center-Right" to "Center". In either case, whether Sandy Berger was careless and incompetent, or if he was actively criminal in his actions, it doesn't speak well for his handling of national security issues for the Clinton Administration. Some wag has asked about John Kerry, "What did he know and when did he know it" about the investigation of Sandy Berger. After all, one explanation of Sandy Berger's document pilfering was that he used them to brief John Kerry, last fall.

Sandy Berger

Apparently, the best explanation of Sandy Berger's actions at the archives is that he is incompetent. There are other, more sinister explanations that might explain his actions. The explanation that it was "just a mistake" doesn't hold up, however. Apparently, he took all five drafts of a counter-terrorism document that he had drafted. A conflicting story is that he only had access to copies. That is not certain. There is a very tiny possibility that he removed information that the "9/11 Commission" needed to see. There is at least one denial that this is true. One story is that President Clinton asked him to do what he did, and that it happened about October of last year. President Clinton has made light of all this, and has laughed about it. The usual Democrat operatives are spouting talking points. They won't answer questions, but only read their talking points. They are trying to spin the whole thing, saying that the problem is that the investigation was leaked now, not that Sandy Berger did anything wrong. The thing is, though, he appears to have willfully taken documents and notes that were classified above the Top Secret level . One source in the press said "codeword". When speaking of classified information, you might say "Top Secret Codeword", which means that there is a one or two word name associated with this classified topic. Someone has to be specifically cleared to have access, and access is carefully controlled. The only reason that Sandy Berger MIGHT have had access to original documents is that he was a former high official who had been trusted with the most important classified information that was available. You don't expect someone like that to betray the trust we have in them.