I listened to a little bit of the speeches of the Republican National Convention last night.  I was irritated from the start but I forced myself to listen.

Within the first few moments, the esteemed Dennis Hastert was nailing John Kerry, by name.  He went on the attack almost from the beginning.

Instead of telling me how wonderful his candidate is, he wanted to tell me how awful the other candidate is.

I don’t want to hear that.  The world is negative enough.  Give me something positive to consider.

On NPR this morning, a correspondent went to Vietnam, to the area where Kerry and other swift boat vets engaged the Viet Cong.  The correspondent asked residents of the area what they thought about the upcoming presidential election.  While he said that response was sporadic, at best (they do have better things to do than contemplate an election they have no say in, afterall), when there were responses, they were overwhelmingly in favor of Kerry.  Why?  Because even though he was there, firing upon the residents, they also understand that he knows what war does and that he will be less likely to jump into battle than someone who has already shown the world that he will engage in battle for no reason.

I think that should give us pause.