I’ve got to give today’s MVP in debunking to Fred Kaplan at Slate.
Here, one more time, is the truth of the matter: Kerry did not vote to kill these weapons, in part because none of these weapons ever came up for a vote, either on the Senate floor or in any of Kerry’s committees.This myth took hold last February in a press release put out by the RNC. Those who bothered to look up the fine-print footnotes discovered that they referred to votes on two defense appropriations bills, one in 1990, the other in 1995. Kerry voted against both bills, as did 15 other senators, including five Republicans. The RNC took those bills, cherry-picked some of the weapons systems contained therein, and inferred that Kerry voted against those weapons. By the same logic, they could have claimed that Kerry voted to disband the entire U.S. armed forces; but that would have raised suspicions and thus compelled more reporters to read the document more closely.
What makes this dishonesty not merely a lie, but a damned lie, is that back when Kerry cast these votes, Dick Cheney—who was the secretary of defense for George W. Bush’s father—was truly slashing the military budget…
I’m not accusing Cheney of being a girly man on defense. As he notes, the Cold War had just ended; deficits were spiraling; the nation could afford to cut back. But some pro-Kerry equivalent of Arnold Schwarzenegger or Zell Miller could make that charge with as much validity as they—and Cheney—make it against Kerry.
The whole thing is great.
P.S. In the comments to a thoughtful Obsidian Wings post, a few people have said that delegates were chanting “Hang ‘em” when Kerry or Edwards (or maybe just Edwards) were mentioned. Can anyone confirm or deny? Is there a reasonable story behind this?
Ted, I think your link is wrong. I think the Kaplan article you want to link to is at:
http://slate.msn.com/id/2106119/
Thank you; sorry about that.
I was just reading the Kaplan article saying to myself “I wonder why I haven’t seen any bloggers cite this yet.”
It’s the kind of thing I’d like Chris Matthews to hand Zell on-air, and wait for a response ;-)
“I’d like Chris Matthews to hand Zell on-air, and wait for a response”
Zell would respond by challenging Matthews to a duel again. Well, aparently Miller wants to be known as the modern Andrew Jackson . . .
one problem with the networks, cnn anyway, is that they pretty much limit themselves to the talking points they’re given by the parties (statements about tone and strategy notwithstanding), and the democrats are pretty inept about making good, clear, critiques of facts that a non partisan interviewer can use in cross examination.
so basically you have america’s mayor leading a hit parade of misleading statements from the previous days speeches and the only response (other than “zig zag zell looked awfully angry”) is the “cheney supported reducing those programs too” which is a lot weaker than some of the things we’ve read here and even on instapundit, which is sad because he’s usually a pretty lame apologist for misleading statements if it will score points for the home team.
I don’t know how that usually got in there. my mistake.
I don’t know how that “usually” got in there. my mistake.
I honestly don’t understand Kaplan’s point. If weapon system q is a subset of appropriation Q, and one votes against Q, isn’t one voting against q? Why is that only “inferred”? Thus, when Kaplan says that “none of these weapons ever came up for a vote,” doesn’t he actually mean only that none of them came up for an individual vote? Or am I missing something?
I can’t help but point out that Kaplan elides his facts; obviously Cheney was not defense secretary at the time of the 1995 vote. I think it behooves him to be a bit more devoted to precision when accusing someone else of “a damned lie.” Somewhat similarly, the argument that “Cheney was cutting the military budget anyway” seems like an inaccurate misdirection in this context, because Kaplan’s doesn’t say that Cheney disapproved of these particular weapons systems. Indeed, if Kerry one of only fifteen senators to vote against these appropriations, it suggests that the weight of consensus was in those systems’ favor, and one might more reasonably infer that Cheney was in favor of those systems, or at least the ones at issue in the 1990 vote.
Note that I hold no brief for Miller’s speech or the particular weapons systems at issue. Those weapons may or may not have been worthwhile, and Kerry’s votes may or may not have been wise. I leave those questions for others more knowledgeable than I. I’m just suggesting that the particular tack Kaplan has taken to defend those votes strikes me as confusing and inaccurate.
I think the idea is that one votes for or against entire bills, so pulling out one piece of a bill is disingenuous — while the legislator may have an opinion about a bill as a whole, that opinion may not apply to a given portion of a bill. About the only thing you can do is to take bills or amendments sponsored by a legislator, make certain that they were not strategic ploys, and put that forward as likely to reflect the legislator’s views.
Tom T.,
Read Kaplan’s first article—it clarifies all (or most?) of what you are asking.
The problem of course is that the votes are an imperfect notion of opposition. Fortunately, we have much better evidence, which makes the whole Kaplan piece disingenuous. See http://vodkapundit.com/archives/006566.php Whatever his votes, does anyone doubt that Kerry was against all of these weapons? Now there may have been good reasons — the weapons may have been inferior to feasible alternatives. But Kerry has to make that argument, not the argument that he never opposed these weapons — loudly and often.
I’ve poked into this a little; here’s the scorecard, with criticism to go ‘round:
Kaplan cherry-picked his Cheney quotes. He characterizes one quote as boasting about the peace dividend, but the quote itself gives no positive indication whether Cheney was boasting, lamenting, or simply stating the facts. It doesn’t make much sense to suppose he was boasting; as SecDef he didn’t control the budget, and only had limited control over allocation.
Defense budget cuts in 1992 were politically inevitable; at the same time many in Congress feared the shutdown of defense contracts in their districts during a recession. There is no reason to suppose Cheney was happy about any of this. Where he takes members of Congress to task for not cutting defense programs, he specifically complained about pork-barrel spending that didn’t serve America’s military interests as he saw them. Do you think we needed the Seawolf nuclear-powered attack submarine in 1992? Neither did Cheney. Kaplan draws the wrong conclusions, in favor of his partisan argument.
On the other side, it is disingenuous to say that Kerry voted against such-and-such a weapons system, when in fact he voted against a requisition of which that system was only a line item. Perhaps Kerry rejected the bill on balance, despite wanting the system in question. And Kerry shouldn’t take blame for cuts on which there was powerful consensus.
The problem for Kerry is, he seems to have argued and voted consistently for the least possible military spending, preferring to spend government money on entitlements and such, regardless of the situation. I say, “seems to have”; the question is open whether an examination of Kerry’s record would bear this out.
Kerry’s defense, if applicable, would be to point to instances where he argued or voted for greater military spending. Did Kerry ever oppose a military budget cut? Did he ever propose greater spending than anyone else? Did he ever demonstrate principled understanding of military needs, when arguing for a cut or reallocation?
“It doesn’t make much sense to suppose he was boasting; as SecDef he didn’t control the budget, and only had limited control over allocation.” — dipnut
Control, perhaps not. Strongly influence, yes. The Secretary of Defense has a large input to budget formation by the executive branch. He certainly is the primary decision maker within the Pentagon about allocation, especially regarding weapons systems, as well as an influential voice within the administration as a whole.
Do domestic political considerations (job loss at defense contractors, e.g.) factor into these decisions? Of course, and Cheney was as capable of assessing these concerns as anyone in the Bush 41 administration. That doesn’t mean he wasn’t strongly influencing priorities and decision-making about the budget.
À Gauche
Jeremy Alder
Amaravati
Anggarrgoon
Audhumlan Conspiracy
H.E. Baber
Philip Blosser
Paul Broderick
Matt Brown
Diana Buccafurni
Brandon Butler
Keith Burgess-Jackson
Certain Doubts
David Chalmers
Noam Chomsky
The Conservative Philosopher
Desert Landscapes
Denis Dutton
David Efird
Karl Elliott
David Estlund
Experimental Philosophy
Fake Barn County
Kai von Fintel
Russell Arben Fox
Garden of Forking Paths
Roger Gathman
Michael Green
Scott Hagaman
Helen Habermann
David Hildebrand
John Holbo
Christopher Grau
Jonathan Ichikawa
Tom Irish
Michelle Jenkins
Adam Kotsko
Barry Lam
Language Hat
Language Log
Christian Lee
Brian Leiter
Stephen Lenhart
Clayton Littlejohn
Roderick T. Long
Joshua Macy
Mad Grad
Jonathan Martin
Matthew McGrattan
Marc Moffett
Geoffrey Nunberg
Orange Philosophy
Philosophy Carnival
Philosophy, et cetera
Philosophy of Art
Douglas Portmore
Philosophy from the 617 (moribund)
Jeremy Pierce
Punishment Theory
Geoff Pynn
Timothy Quigley (moribund?)
Conor Roddy
Sappho's Breathing
Anders Schoubye
Wolfgang Schwartz
Scribo
Michael Sevel
Tom Stoneham (moribund)
Adam Swenson
Peter Suber
Eddie Thomas
Joe Ulatowski
Bruce Umbaugh
What is the name ...
Matt Weiner
Will Wilkinson
Jessica Wilson
Young Hegelian
Richard Zach
Psychology
Donyell Coleman
Deborah Frisch
Milt Rosenberg
Tom Stafford
Law
Ann Althouse
Stephen Bainbridge
Jack Balkin
Douglass A. Berman
Francesca Bignami
BlunkettWatch
Jack Bogdanski
Paul L. Caron
Conglomerate
Jeff Cooper
Disability Law
Displacement of Concepts
Wayne Eastman
Eric Fink
Victor Fleischer (on hiatus)
Peter Friedman
Michael Froomkin
Bernard Hibbitts
Walter Hutchens
InstaPundit
Andis Kaulins
Lawmeme
Edward Lee
Karl-Friedrich Lenz
Larry Lessig
Mirror of Justice
Eric Muller
Nathan Oman
Opinio Juris
John Palfrey
Ken Parish
Punishment Theory
Larry Ribstein
The Right Coast
D. Gordon Smith
Lawrence Solum
Peter Tillers
Transatlantic Assembly
Lawrence Velvel
David Wagner
Kim Weatherall
Yale Constitution Society
Tun Yin
History
Blogenspiel
Timothy Burke
Rebunk
Naomi Chana
Chapati Mystery
Cliopatria
Juan Cole
Cranky Professor
Greg Daly
James Davila
Sherman Dorn
Michael Drout
Frog in a Well
Frogs and Ravens
Early Modern Notes
Evan Garcia
George Mason History bloggers
Ghost in the Machine
Rebecca Goetz
Invisible Adjunct (inactive)
Jason Kuznicki
Konrad Mitchell Lawson
Danny Loss
Liberty and Power
Danny Loss
Ether MacAllum Stewart
Pam Mack
Heather Mathews
James Meadway
Medieval Studies
H.D. Miller
Caleb McDaniel
Marc Mulholland
Received Ideas
Renaissance Weblog
Nathaniel Robinson
Jacob Remes (moribund?)
Christopher Sheil
Red Ted
Time Travelling Is Easy
Brian Ulrich
Shana Worthen
Computers/media/communication
Lauren Andreacchi (moribund)
Eric Behrens
Joseph Bosco
Danah Boyd
David Brake
Collin Brooke
Maximilian Dornseif (moribund)
Jeff Erickson
Ed Felten
Lance Fortnow
Louise Ferguson
Anne Galloway
Jason Gallo
Josh Greenberg
Alex Halavais
Sariel Har-Peled
Tracy Kennedy
Tim Lambert
Liz Lawley
Michael O'Foghlu
Jose Luis Orihuela (moribund)
Alex Pang
Sebastian Paquet
Fernando Pereira
Pink Bunny of Battle
Ranting Professors
Jay Rosen
Ken Rufo
Douglas Rushkoff
Vika Safrin
Rob Schaap (Blogorrhoea)
Frank Schaap
Robert A. Stewart
Suresh Venkatasubramanian
Ray Trygstad
Jill Walker
Phil Windley
Siva Vaidahyanathan
Anthropology
Kerim Friedman
Alex Golub
Martijn de Koning
Nicholas Packwood
Geography
Stentor Danielson
Benjamin Heumann
Scott Whitlock
Education
Edward Bilodeau
Jenny D.
Richard Kahn
Progressive Teachers
Kelvin Thompson (defunct?)
Mark Byron
Business administration
Michael Watkins (moribund)
Literature, language, culture
Mike Arnzen
Brandon Barr
Michael Berube
The Blogora
Colin Brayton
John Bruce
Miriam Burstein
Chris Cagle
Jean Chu
Hans Coppens
Tyler Curtain
Cultural Revolution
Terry Dean
Joseph Duemer
Flaschenpost
Kathleen Fitzpatrick
Jonathan Goodwin
Rachael Groner
Alison Hale
Household Opera
Dennis Jerz
Jason Jones
Miriam Jones
Matthew Kirschenbaum
Steven Krause
Lilliputian Lilith
Catherine Liu
John Lovas
Gerald Lucas
Making Contact
Barry Mauer
Erin O'Connor
Print Culture
Clancy Ratcliff
Matthias Rip
A.G. Rud
Amardeep Singh
Steve Shaviro
Thanks ... Zombie
Vera Tobin
Chuck Tryon
University Diaries
Classics
Michael Hendry
David Meadows
Religion
AKM Adam
Ryan Overbey
Telford Work (moribund)
Library Science
Norma Bruce
Music
Kyle Gann
ionarts
Tim Rutherford-Johnson
Greg Sandow
Scott Spiegelberg
Biology/Medicine
Pradeep Atluri
Bloviator
Anthony Cox
Susan Ferrari (moribund)
Amy Greenwood
La Di Da
John M. Lynch
Charles Murtaugh (moribund)
Paul Z. Myers
Respectful of Otters
Josh Rosenau
Universal Acid
Amity Wilczek (moribund)
Theodore Wong (moribund)
Physics/Applied Physics
Trish Amuntrud
Sean Carroll
Jacques Distler
Stephen Hsu
Irascible Professor
Andrew Jaffe
Michael Nielsen
Chad Orzel
String Coffee Table
Math/Statistics
Dead Parrots
Andrew Gelman
Christopher Genovese
Moment, Linger on
Jason Rosenhouse
Vlorbik
Peter Woit
Complex Systems
Petter Holme
Luis Rocha
Cosma Shalizi
Bill Tozier
Chemistry
"Keneth Miles"
Engineering
Zack Amjal
Chris Hall
University Administration
Frank Admissions (moribund?)
Architecture/Urban development
City Comforts (urban planning)
Unfolio
Panchromatica
Earth Sciences
Our Take
Who Knows?
Bitch Ph.D.
Just Tenured
Playing School
Professor Goose
This Academic Life
Other sources of information
Arts and Letters Daily
Boston Review
Imprints
Political Theory Daily Review
Science and Technology Daily Review