Lies, Damned Lies, and Kaplan

Lies, Damned Lies, and Kaplan - There's working hard, and then there's working smart.

When you are trying to paint John Kerry as responsible on foreign policy and defense, working hard is not enough.

Problem is, either is working smart. You have to work fictional.

Last week, a fair chunk of the blogging left jumped on a piece by Fred Kaplan in Slate Magazine that purported to show that Kerry was actually no worse than the GOP - or parts of it - on defense voting.

Kaplan starts out cutesy, with a mystery quote:

After completing 20 planes for which we have begun procurement, we will shut down further production of the B-2 bomber. We will cancel the small ICBM program. We will cease production of new warheads for our sea-based ballistic missiles. We will stop all new production of the Peacekeeper [MX] missile. And we will not purchase any more advanced cruise missiles. ? The reductions I have approved will save us an additional $50 billion over the next five years. By 1997 we will have cut defense by 30 percent since I took office.

Needless to say, the quote was by George H.W. Bush, in the 1992 State Of The Union address.

That's right. 1992. The dust from the fall of the Berlin Wall had barely settled. Some where hypothesizing that history had ended. Congress was already busy figuring out how to spend the peace dividend. In this world - which seemed so safe and peaceful at the time - John Kerry voted along with so many legislators from both sides of the aisle.

But it's not even close to the whole story. Will Collier at Vodkapundit responds:

That'd be a nice argument, Fred, except that you didn't bother to fact-check your own statements against the rest of the public record. Like, say, this 1984 Kerry memo, which Kerry's campaign has admitted is genuine. It lays out, in Kerry's own name, plans to "cancel" all of the above programs, plus several others.

In other words, Fred, you're either completely misinformed, or you're lying. Based on your previous "work" regarding defense issues, I might have given you the benefit of the doubt. You clearly don't know a damn thing about how weapons systems are designed, tested, used, or bought (repeatedly quoting a fraud like John "I'm not an engineer, but I play one on TV" Pike doesn't help your credibility), but since Mark Steyn has had that memo linked for the better part of a month, I'm inclined to think that you're just ignoring it.

In other words, lying.

And voting against these weapons in 1984 was a very different thing than it was seven years later - votes that Kaplan glosses over at the very least.

Kerry voted, among many other things:

• to halve the size of the Tomahawk missile program - which allowed us to attack targets from Libya through Afghanistan and Iraq without risking our pilots to do it.
• To cancel building enough M1 Abrams tanks to re-equip our entire armored force, as well as the upgrading of the M1 to the current A1 standard (with a bigger cannon and thicker armor). Had Kerry had his way, a large part of the US tank force would have remained in the 1950's M60 tank. There's an Israeli joke that goes "What's the difference between an M60 and a Zippo lighter? The M60 lights up on the first try every time". In two wars, no Amerian tanker has been killed by a through-the-armor hit in an M1 Abrams.
• The AH64 Apache, which has been so essential to depriving the enemy of the ability to maneuver on the battlefield in two wars
• The F14A and D, the F15, the AV8 Harrier - most of the planes that are the mainstays of our air power

Worse, he voted against them not only after the Cold War, as Kaplan noted - but during the height of it. His contempt for the military at that time was unforgiveable - and shouldn't be forgiven.

Posted by Mitch at March 10, 2004 05:06 AM