Kerry's Biggest and Most Obvious Flip-Flop Goes Unnoticed by Millions Watching the Debate!

Congressional Budget Office (CBO) ^ | September 3, 2003 | Congressional Budget Office (CBO)

[X180A]

Here is an excerpt of the CBO report.

"Increase the Army's End Strength. In this option, the active Army would grow by 80,000 personnel--enough, CBO estimates, to provide the service with another heavy division, one more light division, and 19,000 additional support personnel.(21) CBO assumed that the additional support units created would be largely military police, civil affairs, and psychological-operations units. Those types of support personnel have been in high demand in peacekeeping operations over the past decade and are concentrated in the Army's reserve component. Thus, creating additional active units of those types could reduce the levels of mobilization and deployment needed for reserve personnel. If the Army's end strength (the level at which DoD is authorized to recruit and maintain the service) was expanded by 80,000 personnel, the size of the occupation that could be sustained in Iraq over the long term would increase by 18,000 to 23,000 military personnel--equivalent to another 1 2/3 to 2 combat brigades. Excluding the costs of creating the new divisions and paying for their peacetime operation and support (which are discussed below), using those personnel in the occupation would cost an additional $3 billion to almost $4 billion annually, CBO estimates. This option would also increase the average number of reserve personnel mobilized by about 10,000 to 11,000."

The report goes on to say that such an increase "would take several years to accomplish" in one place and five years to accomplish in another.

[X180A]

I am so surprised that nobody is talking about Kerry's self-contradiction, flip-flop, that he makes approximately one hour into the debate. Kerry contantly criticized Bush for calling up so many National Guard and Reserves and he warns Bush will bring back a draft to meet personnel shortages. Then ten minutes later Kerry says he plans to create two more divisions and double the Special Forces. What he is refering to is one of many options that was considered by the Congressional Budget Office last November. The result is not only an 80,000 man increase in active forces, but it also requires a 10,000-11,000 increase in reserve forces. It would cost $3-4 billion annually and it has tremendous one time costs for training and equipment. After all, 90,000 pair of boots are expensive.

The current administration chose its course of action from many that were considered. The one Kerry alluded to was considered but not chosen for obvious reasons.

Come on guys! Kerry can't decrease the number of soldiers called to duty and increase the military by 2 divisions at the same time. Kerry can't cut the cost of military expendatures in Iraq and increase military spending by over $3 billion at the same time. Kerry can't claim that Bush has a secret plan to institute a draft because the army can't get enough volunteers and then tell us Kerry as president will increase military manning by 90,000 more people - from where? And Kerry can't criticize Bush for calling up so many reserves when he wants to add two new divisions that would require an additional 10,000 reserves.

Hey, you guys on Bush's team. How did you let that slip by?

[pipecorp]

This is what he truly meant by a back door draft. ( or it could be the cool breeze you feel when he gets done with you.)

[Veto!]

bttt

[Ernest_at_the_Beach]

Everyone is going after the real biggie, the Global Approval:

Thread here:

"Kerry's pre-emptive Global Test" CARTOON featuring Kerry's REAL Band of Bros...

I want to let everyone know about this great resource:

The ultimate John kerry Ad

Contains John Kerry's actual statements in his own voice covering both sides of major issues!

Turn your speakers up!

Just outstanding!!!

[DaveMSmith]

I wrote cBS evening News and asked them to investigate ;=) Give our old pal Dan a little project...

evening@cbsnews.com

[blanknoone]

Not to get totally off topic, but I don't think this qualifies as his BIGGEST flip flop. I think the biggest flip flop is his constant demand that 'allies' do more, but when our Afghan allies played a major role, he denigrated them, referred to it as 'outsourcing' and said it was a mistake because they are not as capable as American troops. Newsflash to Kerry: no military on the planet is as capable as ours....if being as capable as Americans is the qualification, everything we do will be unilateral. And when I say unilateral, I don't mean with 30 allies, I mean it in the true sense of the word...alone.

[Read2Know]

"Kerry can't decrease the number of soldiers called to duty and increase the military by 2 divisions at the same time"

If Kerry gets elected, I predict a fall in numbers of enlistees. Think about it, would you want to serve for a guy who stabbed his shipmates in the back, betrayed all his fellow soldiers in Viet Nam and disgraced the uniform by meeting with the enemy in Paris?

[BluH2o]

What I find most disconcerting (and I have posted several related comments since the debate last night) is that Bush, in addition to being inarticulate in his responses, let so many opportunities to slam dunk Kerry slip by. Dubya was asleep at the switch last night.

[MikeA]

How do you post a picture? Any help would be appreciated.

[e1ectric]

Isn’t this another inconsistency with Kerry?
A community of nations would have worked in Iraq we just needed more time and we are now going it alone. (Both by the way are false!)
This Kerry says is the wrong way to get the job done and we should have done the exact opposite.
However, In North Korea
The community of nations we are working with should be set aside and we should go it alone.
Stated more clearly.

In Iraq Kerry position is….
We need to build a strong alliance with the community of nations and not act unilatterly.
In North Korea Kerry position is…
We need to set aside (alienate?) our community of nations and act unilatterly.



Is this just fussy logic or another flip-flop?

[Ernest_at_the_Beach]

First, the picture needs to be on a server that is accessible via the Web ...

Then you use this command :

<. . . img src=web URL for the picture. . .>

Removing the . . . following the "<" and preceding the ">".

[TMSuchman]

There was another one gaff.
When they were speaking of the miltary budgets katsup-boy let slip something about cutting budgets. Did anybody get this?

[SunkenCiv]

It will appear in the attack ads. I saw one here in Michigan today, but couldn't hear the specifics because I was talking with my mom at her house. I could tell that some of the Kerry images were from the debate.

A lot of people around here seem to be peeing their pants about the debate results. The "results" were engineered before the fact. The partisan media shills are just doing what they always do. They don't control what GWB's campaign says in ads.

[Ciexyz]

Just outstanding!

That "Kerry Band of Brothers" cartoon is a hoot!