KERRY'S "FLIP-FLOPS"

Over at the American Prospect, Matthew Yglesias addresses the "Kerry is a flip-flopper" line of attack from Bush and the right. In short, it's an example of conservatives manipulating the nuance of the positions Democrats take and trying to cast it as hypocrisy and waffling. For example, on Iraq:

The situation in Iraq is a somewhat more complicated matter. Kerry's position here has been genuinely nuanced, neither dogmatically hawkish nor reflexively dovish, but rather changing to reflect an evolving factual situation. In the fall of 2002, when Bush asked Congress for a resolution authorizing him to threaten the use of force if necessary to ensure Iraqi compliance with U.N. dictates, three situations held: inspectors had not visited Iraq for years, the consensus of the global intelligence community was that Iraq possessed prohibited weapons of mass destruction, and it remained an open question whether the United States could attract substantial international support for military actions. Kerry supported a resolution.

Months later, when the war actually began, much had changed. Inspectors were in the country, casting doubt not only on the administration's more extravagant claims but on much of the intelligence community's earlier work. Saddam was not cooperating fully with the inspectors, but they maintained that they were engaged in productive and useful work. A series of botched diplomatic moves had left the United States internationally isolated, not only lacking a U.N. resolution because of the opposition of veto-wielding France, but lacking even majority support on the Security Council. Global public opinion had turned dramatically against the American position, with majority support for war limited to the United States, Israel, and (on some days, at least) the United Kingdom. A compromise resolution was on the table that would have tightened the screws on Saddam somewhat and given the inspections process more time. It was clear that Saddam did not pose an imminent threat to the national security of the United States or any other country. Nevertheless, Bush chose to go to war, though his administration had failed to even assemble a reasonable plan for the postwar occupation or conduct an honest assessment of the costs. Kerry opposed this course of action, and rightly so.

Matt makes a concession on the "why did Kerry trust Bush?" question, which mostly came from the Dean campaign, and then makes an interesting point about it:

Many liberals questioned the propriety of having delegated so much authority to Bush the previous fall, especially in light of the president's general record of dishonesty and ineptitude. This is a legitimate issue to raise (and it was raised, many times, in the Democratic primary), but it's hardly a criticism available to conservatives, and has nothing to do with flip-flops or inconsistency. Criticism of Kerry's record on the war, moreover, cuts against the notion that he is an opportunistic panderer. His vote for the authorizing resolution was deeply unpopular within the Democratic Party and nearly cost him the nomination, forcing him to spend months trailing behind the more forthrightly dovish campaigns of Dean and Gen. Wesley Clark.

And lo and behold, the Democrats are united around Kerry, Dean will support Kerry and is in fact metting with the Senator this week.

Go read Matt's piece, it also features a handy list of Bush's flip-flops, since the Prez is opening up that line of argument, and just in case those don't satisfy you, here are plenty more.