Cheneys go after Kerry
Democrat's Senate record, 'sensitive war' comment criticized
 |  Vice President Dick Cheney speaks Thursday in Dayton, Ohio. |
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JOPLIN, Missouri (CNN) -- Vice President Dick Cheney made a pointed attack Wednesday on Democratic nominee Sen. John Kerry, criticizing his attendance record on the Senate Intelligence Committee.
Cheney also charged that Kerry's pattern of "hesitation and uncertainty" makes him an unacceptable choice for the White House in November. (Special Report: America Votes 2004)
"We don't want to turn that responsibility over to somebody who doesn't have deeply held convictions about right and wrong," Cheney told a town hall meeting in Joplin.
Appearing with her husband, Cheney's wife, Lynne, also went after Kerry's comment to a minority journalists' convention last week that he could fight a "more sensitive war on terror."
"With all due respect to the senator, it just sounded so foolish," she said. "I can't imagine that al Qaeda will be impressed by sensitivity."
Lynne Cheney said Kerry's comment was an expression of an "extreme left" idea that Americans bear responsibility for the terrorism threatening them.
"If we'll just adjust our attitude seems to be the idea," she said. "This is the kind of left-wing foolishness that certainly isn't appropriate for someone who would seek to be commander in chief."
She was responding to an audience question about Kerry's remarks last week to the Unity 2004 conference in which he said, "I believe I can fight a more effective, more thoughtful, more strategic, more proactive, more sensitive war on terror that reaches out to other nations and brings them to our side."
As the Cheneys stumped in heavily Republican southwest Missouri, President Bush stopped in Albuquerque, New Mexico, and Phoenix, Arizona, accompanied by his one-time bitter rival for the 2000 Republican presidential nomination, Sen. John McCain of Arizona. (Bush speech drops 'turning the corner')
Kerry was in Henderson, Nevada, where he talked to seniors about prescription drug coverage and urged Bush to allow importation of cheaper drugs from Canada.
Kerry pointedly noted that McCain and other prominent Republicans support legalizing imports of Canadian drugs, which Bush has blocked. (Bush, McCain in the Southwest)
"People like Trent Lott, John McCain and others believe that we ought to be able to import lower-priced drugs from Canada, but George Bush stood in the way of that," he said.
"George Bush stood right there and said, 'Nope, we're not going to help people get lower-priced drugs in America, we're going to help the drug companies get a big windfall,' and that's the wrong choice for America."
At a town hall meeting in Albuquerque with McCain and Republican Sen. Pete Domenici of New Mexico, Bush touted his roots from growing up in next-door Texas, telling the audience that "we don't need to have somebody explain to us how the people of New Mexico think."
The president suggested history will vindicate his decision to invade Iraq to topple dictator Saddam Hussein, who he said "was a threat because he behaved like a threat."
"Someday an American president is going to sit down with an elected Iraqi leader, and they're going to say, 'Thank God old Bush, McCain and Domenici believed in freedom," the president said, drawing sustained applause.
During his appearance in Joplin, Cheney said Kerry was trying to hide his 20-year Senate record, noting that the recent Democratic National Convention focused instead on Kerry's early years, including his military service in Vietnam.
"We have the highest regard for that service. I don't want anyone to think to the contrary. But they left out the next 20 years during his time in the United States Senate," Cheney said.
He said Kerry was trying "to portray himself as somebody who's capable of being commander in chief in a very difficult time ... and ignore those 20 years in the Senate when nearly every time an issue came up that might have some bearing on that capability, he went the wrong way."
Specifically, Cheney went after Kerry's service on the Senate Intelligence Committee, in light of the Democratic nominee's embrace of intelligence reforms recommended by the 9/11 commission.
"He has taken to spending a lot of time talking about and pushing very aggressively on reform of the intelligence community. If he's president, by golly, he's going to fix the intelligence community," Cheney said.
"But if you look at his record when he served on the intelligence committee back in the '90s, a couple of things stand out. First of all, he missed 39 out of 48 meetings ... [and] he did introduce legislation in 1993 that would have dramatically cut the intelligence budget by over $7 billion. This was after the first attack on the World Trade Center."
Responding to Cheney's criticism, Kerry campaign spokesman Phil Singer issued a statement saying the vice president "is out of credibility and is representing a campaign that is so desperate it will say anything to distract attention from a record that has made the country less safe and secure."
The Kerry campaign also released a series of statements by Cheney that it said showed he had changed his positions through the years on gay marriage, education, federal spending and deposing Saddam Hussein.
CNN's Catherine Berger contributed to this report.
