I support Kucinich. I like him and at this point he has my vote. Kucinich getting the nomination would be like Lincoln getting the nomination in 1860, only bigger.

Actually there was just this one moment with Edwards, a kind of unguarded moment during his 04 run, where he turned to people from the media in his trailer - i think it was cnn, and said that it was "their job to get him elected" or something like that.. it was a joke, and he laughed but that creeped me out. Dean at the time, was running against media consolidation and Edwards came off looking just like an FCC media industry pal.

I think the gay vote gravitated towards Edwards so strongly in 04 because he adopted language that stated he was opposed to the gay marriage ban, but in retrospect, didn't he lose his debate against a guy who voted for the gay marriage ban, and also had a gay daughter being artificially inseminated with her partner holding her hand backstage?

This is a nice resource but I can't shake the feeling that edwards is running for some other reason, than to win the presidency. This is a Gore/ Obama/ Clinton race.

Fair enough.  I agree that he has done a lot to get past his involvement.  I think you are right that co-sponsoring is done sometimes without much thought or the ramifications behind them.  In this case, of course, co-sponsorship of the four Democrats was seen as insuring the bill to sail through.  Many on both sides take their cues from co-sponsors for their votes, and on an important vote like this one it made it even more crucial.

Like I said, I don't hold it against him.  It was understandable in the context of what they had to work with, and knowing the context that this bill actually replaced a complete free-pass Bush was to get (remember, the GOP was in the majority) and stipulated "diplomacy first, war only as last resort, let UN bring in weapons inspectors."

I want to set the record straight, because I actually came within one degree of separation between myself and Kerry, and heard him speak directly - and frankly, he is a very, very strong senator and ran an incredibly strong race against a seated incumbent president during wartime.

First, no candidate in american history has been able to take away a sitting president during wartime.  So before we commiserate about the loss of an entire election that boiled down to 50,000 votes in a single state = lets get that point clear.

Second, Kerry BLEW AWAY his opponent in the debates. No question about it. The first debate, Kerry left bush  all hat and no cattle.

Third, and the most important point I can make today - if anyone reads this, I will be happy =

The "I voted for the war before I voted against it" thing was and is the underpinning of the problem America has suffered through for nearly 15 years now - ever since lobbyists have begun to write legislation; and the american process has become one in which bills are attached anonymous riders - that bulk up a bill to make it meaningless.

Kerry had a record as a war hawk. He opposes wars of convenience - Gulf War 1, and the Iraq War both smacked of oil revenue. Bush Sr. was dropping in the polls, Kuwait gets invaded - nobody disagrees it was the wrong thing to do, but Kerry voiced disagreement over going into Bagdhad, then - and Bush sr. never did march onto Bagdhad (sp?) but - in his opposition to the Iraq war, he was steadfast.

So, what happened was, the 87 billion - voted for, and then against - was, a vote for a straight funding of the troops that would've included armor

And then, after the republicans and Tom Delay attached a big payout to their corporate funded pals, a vote against cutting taxes during wartime.

Try sending this one past your grandmother at the kitchen table one morning - we go to war, and corporations and wealthy donors get a tax break bonus for supporting it.

This war was marketed with unprecedented use of american taxpayer money, and the interests that helped take us to war, were writing their own ticket. He called them "the most corrupt bunch of people he's ever seen". These moments, are the ones you remember. The ad campaigns - are secondary.

I saw a bumper sticker that said "I voted for John Kerry before I voted against him". I thought that was the funniest implementation of it.

But it was a bumpersticker.

The truth of it is, that John Kerry was , in his vote, battling against the thing that is eating america alive - riders on bills, big 10,000 page bills that go through the house with all kinds of attachments - for ex., a rider to hurricane katrina relief (by gop rep. john cornyn of texas) that ups the level of mercury that pennsylvania coal fired power plants can dump into the air... that was an all time classic...

So would you have voted against corruption?