Mario Cuomo on John Kerry


Last night on The Daily Show with Jon Stewart (one of my favorite shows, by the way), Mario Cuomo was a guest. He had this to say about the Presidential race and the message John Kerry needs to convey:

I don't think the United States will allow Kerry to win because Bush loses, because there's a war, and there's terrorism, etc.

At one point they will turn to Kerry and say, "Now show us what you have. We're ready to replace this guy, but you have to show us..." What he has to do is say something that makes an impact on the people. And I was thinking about it, and I think if he did something like this... If he said to the people of the United States:

"Look, you don't know me very well yet. You should, and maybe I'm at fault. But let me say this. I'm like you. I love this country because it's been so good to me and my family, and in my case maybe even better than it has been for most of you. I loved it so much I volunteered to risk my life. And I did. And I got medals for it, and maybe I deserved them and maybe I didn't. But I did something much more important than that. I agreed to KILL for my country. And I did it more than once. And I came back with such a detestation of what I had to do in a war that looked to me like it should never have happened. And I said to myself, 'For the rest of my life I'm going to fight to make sure that we NEVER go to war unless beyond a reasonable doubt it's essential to do it.' And that's why I'm so unhappy about what happened here. I was misled. I voted for this war. It will never happen again ... because I remember Vietnam."

Posted: Fri - June 4, 2004 at 08:14 PM        

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