Kerry rallies support in Iowa, braces for hits

DES MOINES -- Senator John F. Kerry, girding for new Bush campaign commercials questioning his support for the US military, and new questions about how he protested the Vietnam War, returned yesterday to the embrace of Iowans and veterans who stood with him in the darkest days last winter, telling a rally of 1,200 that Republicans ''traffic in fear" and that ''we have to make democracy in our own country real again."

Holding up a four-leaf clover, given by an Iowan before Kerry's surprise victory in the state's Jan. 19 caucuses, he thanked voters profusely for launching him toward the Democratic presidential nomination, then declared himself the optimistic candidate and Bush, a negative one. ''This race is not about attack ads, it's not about the destruction of personality, it's not about party," Kerry said in his first visit to the state since the caucuses. ''It's about living up to our hopes and dreams at a time when Americans are wondering whether Washington hears them, whether people in public life really get it."

''I have confidence in America, I have confidence in each of you," he added, speaking in Veterans Memorial Auditorium where he delivered a speech in November -- centered around his ''Bring It On!" challenge to Bush. ''The question is, will you give your confidence again to those who ask?"

Kerry campaign officials disclosed last night that the senator is scheduled to appear this morning on ABC's ''Good Morning America" to respond to a 1971 television interview, obtained by ABC, that reportedly raises questions about whether Kerry threw at least some of his own Vietnam War medals away during an antiwar protest in Washington that year.

The clip from that time shows Kerry speaking about throwing away some of his own medals, according to a report on ABC News's website last night. Kerry's longstanding comments on the subject have been that he did not discard his medals -- a Silver Star, Bronze Star, and three Purple Hearts -- in protest, but instead his own ribbons, as well as medals given to him by two other veterans. Kerry described his actions to the Globe in 2003, according to a new biography of the senator by Globe reporters. ''As he prepared to throw his ribbons over the fence, he reached into his jacket and pulled out the medals from those two veterans. He said his own medals remained in safekeeping," according to the book.

A Kerry campaign official familiar with the 1971 interview said of this morning's appearance on ABC, ''He'll defend himself against the Republican smear effort to attack his honorable record in Vietnam and afterwards."

Bush campaign officials, meanwhile, said yesterday they would unveil a $10 million ad campaign tonight in 18 states. The ads assail Kerry's national security credentials and point out some of his past votes against weapons systems. In nine of the states, Republicans will air ads that describe weapons systems included in Senate bills that Kerry opposed at times.

According to scripts of the commercials obtained by the Globe, one ad will run on New Hampshire cable and broadcast stations that asserts Kerry ''opposed weapons vital to winning the War on Terror: F-18 Fighter Jets, Apache and Blackhawk Helicopters, components of which are all built here in New Hampshire." In a similar ad to air in Maine, the Bush campaign says Kerry voted against bills to support B-2 stealth bombers and Patriot missiles constructed there, as well as Aegis warships built at Bath Iron Works.

Kerry cast the Republican attacks in graver language than usual yesterday.

''We have to stand up and fight back against ignorance and untruth, we have to fight back against the misleading, we have to fight back against those who traffic in fear -- we have to make democracy in our own country real again," Kerry said. Then, offering a new twist in his Iowa mantra, Kerry added: ''We have to reclaim it. And for those who stand in the way, I have three words for them that I know they understand -- bring it on!"

Bush and Kerry have toggled between attacking each other on national security or the economy. Kerry begins a three-day bus tour today through swing states Ohio, Pennsylvania, and West Virginia to talk about jobs, while Republicans, with the new ads and a speech today by Vice President Dick Cheney on national security, are hammering Kerry over a handful of the votes he has cast during 19 years in the Senate.

On board his campaign plane yesterday, Kerry reiterated his view that ''the war on terror can be waged much more effectively." But he added a new corollary suggesting that America will face threats for the long haul and will persevere no matter what role politics play.

''America is not going to lose the war on terror with any president over the next 25, 30, 40, 50 years," Kerry said.

In a brief chat with reporters en route to Iowa, Kerry passed up a chance to comment on Governor Mitt Romney's new plan to bar same-sex couples from getting married in Massachusetts if they are not residents of the state. Romney is contacting governors and attorneys general in the other 49 states to notify them of the plan, which is based on a 1913 law that says couples cannot be wed in Massachusetts if the marriage would be void in their home states.

A Kerry spokesman, Michael Meehan, said the campaign would have no comment on Romney's proposed moves.

Patrick Healy can be reached at phealy@globe.com.