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COLUMBUS, Jan 14 (AP): President George W Bush's statement that a "handful" of people are willing to kill to stop progress in Iraq is another blunder that shows he's avoiding reality, Democrat John Kerry said the news agency.
"George Bush let Osama bin Laden escape at Tora Bora," the Democratic presidential candidate said in a brief interview Wednesday. "George Bush retreated from Fallujah and other communities in Iraq which are now overrun with terrorists and threaten our troops. And George Bush said on the record we can't win the war on terror.
"And even today, he blundered again saying there are only a handful of terrorists in Iraq," Kerry said. "I think he's living in a make believe world."
Bush, campaigning in Pennsylvania Wednesday, said: "It's hard to help a country go from tyranny to elections to peace when there are a handful of people who are willing to kill in order to stop the process. And that's what you're seeing on the TV screens. You know, these people cannot beat us militarily."
Bush said the insurgents "use the only tool at their disposal, which is beheadings and death, to try to shake our will. They understand the nature of America. ... We weep when we think about the families affected by those who have been brutalised by these terrorists."
Kerry said if he were elected president in November, he also would not negotiate with the terrorists who threaten to decapitate hostages.
"You never negotiate with terrorists ever," Kerry said. "You never negotiate with terrorists. You win the war and you take the steps necessary, which the president has simply not taken."
Kerry spoke to the AP in West Palm Beach, Florida, shortly before boarding a flight to Ohio and after Vice President Dick Cheney delivered a scathing attack on the Democrat.
Speaking to reporters after meeting with Republican leaders on Capitol Hill, Cheney argued that Kerry has a penchant for wavering that makes him a weak alternative to a "steadfast leader, which is exactly what we have in President George W Bush."
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