CLEVELAND – Sen. John Kerry accused President Bush Monday of sending U.S. troops to “the wrong war, in the wrong place at the wrong time” in Iraq, and found himself dragged back into a debate on the war issue that he had hoped to avoid in favor of a traditional Labor Day focus on the economy.
Within hours, Bush rebuked Kerry for taking “yet another new position” on the war in Iraq that has bedeviled the Democratic challenger because he voted first to authorize it, then voted against additional funding for it, and finally, last month, admitted he still would have voted to authorize it even if he had known that no weapons of mass destruction would be found.
Coming at a time when Kerry is reorganizing his campaign staff as many Democrats are voicing concern that his campaign appears to be spinning its wheels, Kerry’s sharper tone against the Iraq war may reflect determination to fire up his base of support following the Republican National Convention’s dominance of politics last week.
Bush responded: “After voting for the war, but against funding it, after saying he would have voted for the war even knowing everything we know today, my opponent woke up this morning with new campaign advisers and yet another new position.
“Suddenly he’s against it again. No matter how many times Senator Kerry changes his mind, it was right for America and it’s right for America now that Saddam Hussein is no longer in power,” the president said, according to prepared remarks released by his campaign for delivery at an evening rally in Missouri.
In Cleveland, Kerry fired back, saying he had not changed his position that the war should have been waged with greater international support and that its $200 billion cost had “shortchanged” domestic needs like education and health care.
“George Bush wishes we had the same position … but as we’ve seen with this president, wishing and saying something doesn’t make it so,” Kerry said at a Labor Day picnic in Luke Easter Park. “It was wrong to rush to war without a plan to win the peace.”
Kerry had intended to keep his Labor Day focus on pocketbook issues, shifting away from the rhetorical quagmires of Iraq and Vietnam that bogged his campaign down last month.
He blamed Bush for what he called the worst economy since the Great Depression, but his theme was overshadowed by Iraq, which came up in response to a question from a fellow Vietnam veteran at a front-porch forum in Canonsburg, Pa.
Kerry returned to the economic message of the day later in Racine, W.Va., seizing on a common campaign sign that features President Bush’s middle initial: “W stands for wrong.”
He also retooled his campaign team on the fly, amid concerns from fellow Democrats that it was wobbly.
“As the president likes to say, there’s nothing complicated about it,” Kerry said, speaking to a crowd of about 2,000 at a United Mine Workers Labor Day picnic. “It all comes down to one letter: W. W stands for wrong. Wrong choices, wrong judgment, wrong priorities for our country.”
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Aides said that Kerry intends to jettison talk about his own Vietnam war record that dominated his campaign throughout the summer and will hit Bush on the economy hard, believing that job losses, falling wages and rising health care costs will convince millions of voters that they are worse off than they were four years ago.
Kerry’s day began with a front-porch question and answer session with supporters at the home of Dale and Jody Rhome on West College Street, a tree-lined block in Canonsburg, Pa.
Boisterous pro-Bush protesters at the end of the block screamed “flip flop” and “four more years,” drowning out speakers at the event. As Kerry blasted Bush for deficit spending driven by tax cuts and a $200 billion war in Iraq, the catcalls grew louder.
“They don’t like to hear the truth – it’s kind of funny,” Kerry said. “Every one of those people screaming over there, they all have a bigger debt to pay.”
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