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The Morning Grind / DayAhead |
Vets rule!
By John Mercurio
CNN Political Unit
 |  Vet appeal: President Bush addresses the Veterans of Foreign Wars Convention Monday. Kerry appears before the group today. |
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|  VIDEO |
 Kerry releases a book listing wide range of proposals.
 CNN's Tom Foreman reports on why Bush needs Ohio.
 Howard Kurtz sets the record straight on political ads.
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WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Speaking in Ohio before the same veterans group President Bush addressed Monday, John Kerry today will say that Bush's call to redeploy as many as 70,000 troops could hurt U.S. relations with key allies in the war on terror.
In his first public critique of Bush's plan, Kerry will use his appearance at the Veterans of Foreign Wars convention in Cincinnati to charge that depleting Cold War-era bases in key posts in Europe and Asia will cause unnecessary tension between the United States and allies in countries where al Qaeda is currently based. (Bush announces major troop realignment)
Kerry's speech -- which, like Bush's on Monday, is sure to be met with a rapid response from his critics -- guarantees that veterans remain the campaign's top focus this week. Make that, this month. Heck, they're the soccer moms of 2004.
Further illustrating that point, Kerry plans to break with tradition and speak to the American Legion convention in Nashville, Tennessee, on September 1. It's the only public event the Democrat will hold during the Republican convention.
"Veterans issues have been at the center of John Kerry's career and campaign, so it's only natural that he would speak at the convention," Kerry spokeswoman Allison Dobson told the Grind.
Kerry, a member of the American Legion, will spend the rest of convention week in Nantucket.
In his speech today to the GOP-friendly crowd of veterans, Kerry will paint a more broad-ranging critique of the Bush administration's policy toward veterans, all while he challenges Bush's newly minted campaign slogan, "Getting the job done."
"The job will be done when 500,000 veterans are not excluded from the Veterans Administration healthcare system. The job will be done when we're not closing VA hospitals. The job will be done when veterans are not asked for co-payments, enrollment fees and other charges to shift the burden of care to other veterans and drive more than a million veterans out of the system," Kerry will say, according to a campaign memo.
"The job will be done when 400,000 military retirees get concurrent receipt. The job will be done when there are no homeless veterans on the streets of America. The job will be done when more than 320,000 veterans no longer are waiting for decisions on disability claims and another 100,000 are not awaiting appeals decisions. The job will be done when the VA Secretary does not have to complain that he needs more than the White House wanted to give him," Kerry will say.
Bush-Cheney spokesman Steve Schmidt says Kerry "will likely deliver a backward looking defense of the status quo that does not properly address the threats before our nation."
"After watching Kerry's shift from voting for the Iraq war to being an 'anti-war' candidate to being 'proud' of voting for our troops before he voted against them, veterans ... are unlikely to trust John Kerry to lead the men and women currently in uniform," Schmidt says in a campaign memo.
Bush today begins his third bus tour of Wisconsin since May, and his fifth trip this year to the Badger State. He'll campaign in the northern reaches, which appear to be tilting Republican these days.
He stops first in Chippewa Falls, an area he won by 700 votes in 2000. His second stop is in an area that includes Hudson, the state's fastest-growing city, where voters narrowly backed him four years ago.
Breaking away
Also today, a key House Republican breaks with the Bush administration on Iraq. Rep. Doug Bereuter, the senior member of the International Relations Committee, who leaves the House on September 1 after 26 years to become head of the Asia Foundation, says, "It was a mistake to launch that military action."
Bereuter's comments, reported this morning in the Lincoln (Nebraska) Star-Journal, will come in a four-page letter he's written to constituents who have contacted him about the war.
"I've reached the conclusion, retrospectively, now that the inadequate intelligence and faulty conclusions are being revealed, that all things being considered, it was a mistake to launch that military action. Knowing now what I know about the reliance on the tenuous or insufficiently corroborated intelligence used to conclude that Saddam maintained a substantial WMD arsenal, I believe that launching the pre-emptive military action was not justified."
Bereuter, the vice chairman of House Intelligence Committee, also takes aim at the U.S. intelligence community. "Left unresolved for now is whether intelligence was intentionally misconstrued to justify military action," he says.
In New Jersey today, Charles Kushner, the largest campaign contributor to Gov. Jim McGreevey, is expected to plead guilty at a hearing in Newark. Kushner is charged with hiring prostitutes and using videotapes to try to entrap his brother-in-law to stop him from cooperating with the Feds. (Sources: McGreevey's top donor to plead guilty)
Celeb alert
Elsewhere, country music fights back. Saying, "We're certainly not going to let Hollywood choose who we vote for," a group of country-music stars last night kicked off their own get-out-the-vote campaign.
The "Your Country, Your Vote" campaign involves performers like Ricky Skaggs, Randy Travis, Billy Dean and Marty Raybon, all of whom are taping public service announcements. The effort is officially non-partisan, though Skaggs is taking part in Bush's rally in Minnesota later today.
And finally today, speaking of GOP celebs, the Washington Post reports that Jenna and Barbara Bush may not be speaking to delegates at their dad's convention in New York, but the twins will host "R: The Party" August 29 at Manhattan's Roseland Ballroom.
The A-List includes Stephen Baldwin, the GOP brother of Democrat Alec; actress Barret Swatek of "7th Heaven"; Angie Harmon, late of "Law and Order," and her husband, former NFL cornerback Jason Sehorn; and Aaron Buerge of "The Bachelor." Also anticipated to be on hand: the Gatlin Brothers, Bo Derek and pro wrestler Ric Flair.
Bo Derek. It just wouldn't be a grand old party without Bo.
