Say What?

Judy Woodruff, interviewing Democratic Presidential hopeful John Kerry, asked him a pretty simple and direct question: "What exactly - right now - would you do differently?" Kerry's response is telling:

Right now, what I would do differently is, I mean, look, I'm not the president, and I didn't create this mess so I don't want to acknowledge a mistake that I haven't made. The president needs to step up and acknowledge that there are difficulties and that the world needs to be involved and they need to reverse their policy that countries that were not involved in supporting us are not going to be part of the reconstruction.

Got that? Woodruff, being a good soldier, gave Kerry a chance to back away from that nonsense:

Senator, you said it was a mistake, not your mistake, but you called it a mistake and also said you wouldn't cut and run. You've acknowledged there may need to be more troops. If there were a President Kerry, he might have to send in more troops. I want to ask you the question you asked during the Vietnam War. How do you ask a man...to be the last to die for a mistake?

Kerry remained elusive and seemingly incoherent:

Well, the mistake that I'm talking about, Judy, is not the effort to fight and have -- not the effort to have a stable Iraq. The mistake is in the way that they are going about it. So I would change the way you're going about it. I mean again and again I have said, I laid out with great specificity months ago, the steps that they should have taken, and I believe that those people who have been in touch with people in the international community know there is a different and better way to put together an effort that could legitimize a government in Iraq. If we insist on doing this through our provisional government authority, if we insist on being totally in control the way we are today, we're going to having an impossible time legitimately bringing people to the table.

There it is! Buried in the middle of that stream of unconsciousness is the answer to the question. Sort of. So I would change the way you're going about it. I mean again and again I have said, I laid out with great specificity months ag. . .

Got that voters? Pay attention to Mr. Kerry. Continual attention. Daily, continual attention. He told you months ago, with great specificity no less, what he would do, and if you missed it, that's your fault.