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Wednesday, Aug. 11, 2004

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  Seeking to shore up his support in the military rich, GOP-leaning Florida panhandle, Bush assailed Kerry on the dominant issue of the campaign as the incumbent made his 24th trip to the swing state that narrowly ensured his election in 2000.

"Now, almost two years after he voted for the war in Iraq, and almost 220 days after switching positions to declare himself the anti-war candidate, my opponent has found a new nuance," Bush said. "After months of questioning my motives and even my credibility, Sen. Kerry now agrees with me."

Bush added sarcastically that Kerry still had time to change his position: "There are still 84 days left in the campaign."

In October 2002, Kerry voted to give Bush the military authority to oust Iraqi President Saddam Hussein — a vote he said Monday that he stands by despite the failure to find weapons of mass destruction. But the four-term Massachusetts senator added that Bush used the authority poorly, rushing to war with limited allied support and little thought to an end game.

Kerry's national security adviser, Rand Beers, said Tuesday that "the issue has never been whether we were right to hold Saddam accountable, the issue is that we went to war without our allies, without properly equipping our troops and without a plan to win the peace."

Beers was the No. 2 anti-terror official in Bush's National Security Council until he resigned in March 2003, just after the Iraq invasion. He posed questions for Bush, among them, "Knowing what you know now, do you still believe that you made no mistakes in how you took this country to war?"

Kerry's Factors

Kerry also said Monday that he hoped to begin reducing the number of U.S. forces in Iraq within six months of taking office if he is elected. "It is an appropriate goal to have," he said, but added that achieving it would depend on broader international assistance, better stability within Iraq and other related factors.

Bush said Tuesday he opposed Kerry's proposal.

"What we don't want is to cut short the mission. We don't want politics to decide the mission," Bush said at a question-and-answer session with supporters in Niceville, Fla.

"The key is not to set artificial timelines" that would, Bush said, signal to the enemy, "'Gosh, all we've got to do is wait them out."

Joining Bush was McCain, the Arizona Republican who has come to Kerry's defense on several occasions during the campaign. Most recently, McCain called on the White House to repudiate an ad that accused Kerry of lying about his decorated military record in Vietnam.

The White House declined.

McCain was a POW in Vietnam for 5 1/2 years, and his maverick voting record in the Senate has won him support among some moderates and swing voters, especially during the 2000 Republican presidential primary. That background could help Bush, who served stateside with the Texas Air National Guard during the war.

After hosting McCain at his Crawford, Texas ranch Tuesday night, Bush was bringing him to the senator's home state of Arizona and New Mexico on Wednesday — two battleground states.

Among the top political advisers aboard Air Force One was Mark McKinnon, the president's ad man. The re-election campaign sought to wring maximum political mileage from the McCain-Bush tour by filming TV ads for broadcast nationwide.

McCain and Bush were foes in 2000, who displayed little mutual admiration. McCain joked in the 2000 campaign that as a prisoner of war in North Vietnam, he slept more soundly knowing that Bush was defending the shores of Texas from invasion.

There was no talk of disputes Tuesday.

"My friends, this president understands the challenge," McCain told nearly 10,000 Bush supporters in Pensacola.

At a time when violence erupted anew in Najaf, McCain gave Bush a welcome boost on the Iraq war.

"It is a noble and just cause, and believe me: America, the world and Iraq is a better place for having been liberated," the senator said.

© 2004 Associated Press. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

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