20003: radtimes: Kerry: I'd have sent Aristide US troops (fwd)

[Bob Corbett <corbetre@webster.edu>]

From: radtimes <resist@best.com>

Kerry: I'd have sent Aristide US troops

http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,5744,8898017%5E2703,00.html

By Roy Eccleston, Washington correspondent
March 08, 2004

DEMOCRATIC presidential candidate John Kerry has struck out at Republican
attempts to portray him as a weak commander-in-chief by declaring he would
have sent troops to protect the democratically elected president of Haiti
who fled just over a week ago.

Senator Kerry said he would have been prepared to use the US military,
unilaterally if necessary – a swipe at President George W.Bush's claim that
under the Democrats the US would need the world's permission to use its troops.

He previously has accused the White House of effectively backing Haiti's
rebels in their attempt to force out President Jean-Bertrand Aristide, but
he added yesterday that the US has sent a "terrible message" to democracies
in its own region.

"Look, Aristide was no picnic and did a lot of things wrong," Senator Kerry
told The New York Times in his first foreign policy interview since
becoming the Democratic presidential nominee last week.

"But we had understandings in the region about the right of a democratic
regime to ask for help. And we contravened all of that."

His shot was one of several fired as the two sides prepared for an
eight-month tussle for the presidency.

Mr Bush, meeting Mexican President Vicente Fox at his Texas ranch, was
forced to defend his economic policy in the face of continued weak job
growth, as well as his use of the September 11 terror attacks in election ads.

But he also made a push for the votes of Hispanics – now the largest
minority in the US – with a promise that Mexicans who travelled frequently
to the US would bypass the requirement that foreigners be fingerprinted and
photographed.

At a press conference after the meeting with Mr Fox, Mr Bush rejected calls
by some families of victims of the 2001 attacks to withdraw the ads.

They feature a fleeting image of the ruins of the World Trade Centre in New
York and a flag-draped firefighter's coffin.

Mr Bush told reporters he had an "obligation" to keep talking about the
attacks, and how his administration had handled that day and the war on
terrorism that followed.

"I will continue to speak out about the effects of 9/11 on our country and
my presidency," Mr Bush said.

"I have an obligation to those who died. I have an obligation to those who
were heroic in their attempt to rescue. And I won't forget that obligation."

Senator Kerry has declined to comment on the ads, but lashed out yesterday
at Mr Bush's failure to live up to his promises to create 4million jobs in
the wake of poor new employment figures last month. Just 21,000 new jobs
were added in February, well below an estimate last year by Treasury
Secretary John Snow that the improving US economy would create an average
of 200,000 new jobs a month.

"The economy is getting stronger," Mr Bush insisted. "We've overcome a lot.
We've been through a recession. We've been through an attack. We've been
through corporate scandals. We've been through war."

In Houston, Texas, Senator Kerry seized on the job numbers to attack Mr
Bush's record on the economy, the most important issue in voters' minds.

"Didn't he promise 4 million jobs would be created with those tax cuts?"
Senator Kerry asked, referring to three sets of tax cuts that have been the
centrepiece of the Bush administration's economic strategy.

.