He voted for Kerry before he voted against him

Oxblog on Kerry's talk show performance last Sunday. Kerry was explaining his plan to withdraw from Iraq within 40 days. I argued with my Grinnell 76 classmates that Kerry was a blood thirsty sort of guy. That his War of Last resort doctrine was a blood thirsty one; leaving no options but devasting bombardment.

Here's Oxblog on Kerry's answer to Russert Sunday: ...and if they can’t put a government together under the threat that the United States is going to withdraw, they’re not going to do it. Then they want the civil war, then they have to fight their civil war.

Moreover, Kerry's cavalier acceptance of the idea that civil war may be necessary suggests that he just doesn't understand what a civil war entails. Mass slaughter. We already know how the Sunnis would wage their war, and their provocations have been increasingly effective at forcing the Shi'ites to descend to their level. Think another Bosnia or, worst comes to worst, another Rwanda.

In a different day and age, a Massachusetts liberal would have paled at thought of issuing an ultimatum that had the serious potential to provoke that kind of civil war.

Imagine the horror of Kerry as President confronting Iran today. He'd dither and do nothing until it was too late and the only choice nuclear retaliation.