ARROGANT, MISGUIDED, RUTHLESS AND IDEOLOGICAL”

Kerry’s Frontal Attack on Bush

By Spiegel Online

[This article originally published in: Spiegel Online May 27, 2004 is translated from the German on the World Wide Web, www.spiegel.de/politik/ausland/0,1518,301706,00.html.]

When the US administration issued another nebulous terror warning, that was the last straw for Kerry. The country needs a president for whom national defense is not a photo-op. The head of the firefighters’ union agreed. The terror warning of the administration is only a tactical election maneuver.

The designated Democratic presidential candidate John Kerry who earlier spoke reservedly on the anti-terror policy of the administration sharply attacked Bush at an election campaign event in Seattle. Bush pursues “the most arrogant, most dangerous. most ruthless and most ideological foreign policy in the history of the United States.” With the rainy Seattle harbor as a backdrop, he criticized the administration for inadequately guarding the container docks, trains, chemical factories and nuclear power plants. “We need a president for whom national defense is not a photo-op”, Kerry said in a clear sideswipe at the recent terror warning issued by the government. “We need a president who will make America more secure”, Kerry exclaimed to 2000 hearers.

The Washington police chief Charles Ramsey said the same thing in the “Washington Post”. The government had not given him any new specific information, Ramsey said. “The city itself is a target but we knew that before.”

The White House tries to dispel doubts. Government spokesperson Scott McClellan appealed to a “series of credible secret service discoveries” in the last months that could not be exaggerations of the threat. The White House only had a verbal reaction. Alarm-level “yellow” continues and merely represents an “increased” risk of attack.

The Bush administration sees itself reproached for making public the terror warning intentionally late for tactical election reasons.. “The government knew about the threat for months” criticized Harold Schaltberger, chairperson of the firefighters’ union. “I regard it as suspicious that the warning was joined so conveniently to Bush’s speech to the nation and falling poll ratings.” Several democratic members of Congress worried that Bush only wanted to divert from the situation in Iraq, the “Seattle Times” reported.

Attorney General John Ashcroft and FBI director Robert Mueller warned yesterday that the terror organization al-Qaida plans another massive attack on US territory in the next months. While names and photographs of seven suspects were released that have connections to al-Qaida according to Ashcroft, a direct connection of the presumed terrorists to the planned attack was not established. Those sought-after actively collaborated in planning the domestic and foreign attacks.