Centerfield

Mathew:

I'd be perfectly content with publicly financed campaigns for all elections and eliminate private financing. But I don't know that you could get it to past muster with the USSC.

In terms of Kerry's giving testimony regarding what he saw in Vietnam...it's entirely possible that he did it for naked ambition as his top priority. But frankly...at least he did it. At least he showed up...fought bravely and showed leadership.

Bush's family pulled strings that kept him about of Vietnam. Bush couldn't manage to even finish that much. His career as a businessman was an utter failure. His time as Governor of Texas has some real problems..namely with education. And his tenure as POTUS is, from my perspective, an unmitigated disaster.

Why does the fact that john Kerry went to Vietnam 35 years ago and George W. Bush didn’t make Kerry any more suited to be Commander-in-Chief than Bush? Were Kennedy, Johnson, and Nixon better wartime presidents than FDR? Bush has been CIC for 4 years; if the worst complaint anyone has about him, as CIC is that he didn’t go to Vietnam 30 years ago, he must be doing an outstanding job. On the other hand, if Kerry’s main qualification for CIC is that he was a Lt. jg. In Vietnam 30 years ago, his qualifications are pretty slim. Based on the recent DNC Kerry apparently does think his Vietnam experience 35 years ago is more significant than anything else he has done.

"Were Kennedy, Johnson, and Nixon better wartime presidents than FDR?"

The mudslinging is getting to your head!

Certainly we can think beyond our petty partisanship to see the ONLY issue here is one of credibility.

"his qualifications are pretty slim"

You know of course the military service alone makes him much more qualified than Bush was in 2000. But the real issue again is not one of military service existing as a qualifier for the office of POTUS, Kerry's bio necessarily includes that service along with his time in the senate.

Recently Bush said results were important... He was right. Unfortunately he has more failures to hide from than results to trumpet. Unless you consider his success to include the as yet unfinished war against terror; the failed peace in Iraq with nearly 1000 US forces dead; the tepid-at-best economy; the division in our society; the discredited SBVFT commercial.

"However, I think Veterans who oppose Kerry have as much right to run their ads as Moveon.org has to run its ads."

Yes they do. If the SBVFT folks had stuck to their complaints about Kerry's actions after he got back from Vietnam, we wouldn't be trudging through all of this. Remember that what the debate is about... credibility. Its not the same as recharacterizing policy, it is about having some truth to what you say, its about not abusing our free speech rights by trying to cloud the issue beyond all recognition.

Where the debate moves from here is likely to the 527's and therefore our right to freedom of speech.

Fr33d0m,
Why does Kerry's military service make him more qualified than Bush was in 2000? That was my point in comparing FDR, who did not serve in the military, with Kennedy, Johnson and Nixon who did. Johnson received a silver star, and Kennedy probably received medals also. The points you raise about Bush's record are all legitimate issues, but they are not really addressed by Kerry's comments about "reporting for duty" and surrounding himself with veterans.

Whether they "have a right" to run their ads and whether it's "right" to run their ads are quite different questions.

It's "right" if they're right on the facts. It's very wrong, morally speaking, if they're not.

A lot of us seem to be operating on the theory that it's all about what Kerry did when he came back from Vietnam. You didn't bring up the fact -- and neither did Dole -- that Kerry has already expressed regret for his more extreme statements as an anti-war activist (the very ones highlighted in the new Swift Vet ads).

How come the Swifties didn't acknowledge that? Or Dole? How come he's asking for an apology for something Kerry is already sorry for?

And why, if it's all about the anti-war stuff, is Dole saying stuff like: "Three Purple Hearts and never bled that I know of. I mean, they’re all superficial wounds."

Dole is probably wrong on his facts, here. Which makes his statement pretty offensive. Again, it's that "right to say something" versus it being right to say something.

I've really been a bit flummoxed by Dole's remarks -- someone of his stature and achievement wading into this. I perceived it initially as almost entirely political -- e.g., he's not saying what he's saying because of some underlying truth, but almost purely to achieve some political end.

Josh Marshall points to the clearest evidence of that. From Dole's own campaign autobiography from 1988, his description of the events leading up to his first Purple Heart:

"As we approached the enemy, there was a brief exchange of gunfire. I took a grenade in hand, pulled the pin, and tossed it in the direction of the farmhouse. It wasn't a very good pitch (remember, I was used to catching passes, not throwing them). In the darkness, the grenade must have struck a tree and bounced off. It exploded nearby, sending a sliver of metal into my leg--the sort of injury the Army patched up with Mercurochrome and a Purple Heart."

Dole knows far, far better than most people what's involved in a Purple Heart. And now he's pretending he doesn't.

Bill,

I agree if that is what they are doing than it is wrong, but I am not absolutely convinced of that or that it really can be proved either way, although I personally have not found the "SBV's for Truth" to be that convincing. Isn't there something inherently wrong with how both sides are using the 527 loophole?

I also agree that what Dole says about Kerry's purple heart is a little weird, he is sort of acting like he doesn't know if Kerry was injured or not, when I think it was pretty clear that he was. However, I think Dole's comments on Kerry's Congressional testimony is pretty representative of how most Veterans view the situation, fairly or not. Also, if you read Colin Powell's autobiography you will see the same sort of skepticism about medals in Vietnam and how they where distributed.

Which is morally superior: War – or – Peace AND Genocide?
See Weekly Standard http://www.weeklystandard.com/Content/Public/Articles/000/000/004/493kldgc.asp

This only-slightly leftist article says:
“A veteran who volunteered for combat duty, spent four months under fire in Vietnam, and then exaggerated a bit so he could go home early is the inferior, morally and otherwise, of a man who had his father pull strings so he wouldn't have to go to Vietnam in the first place.”

No. The “moral inferiority” of Kerry comes 1) from exaggerating the US war crimes (as stated): that our boys in Vietnam had "personally raped, cut off ears, cut off heads . . . cut off limbs, blown up bodies, randomly shot at civilians," and so on, as young John Kerry testified they did.”
2) From LYING to the Senate that he was illegally in Cambodia, Christmas 1968 (why not mentioned here? Easily checked; but Kerry refuses to sign Form 180)

Yet most importantly, 3) choosing the “moral choice” after 1968 between a) more fighting in Vietnam, or b) “peace”, leaving SE Asia, and letting evil commies commit genocide.
Kerry, and the whole anti-War Left, claims “moral superiority” with their choice of peace (and genocide) rather than fighting.

Also remember, the US refused to attack N. Vietnam on the ground, just bombs. My Slovak wife reminded me that the Vietnam war movies don’t mention that the US chose to (basically) never invade, nor really threaten to invade and control, N. Vietnam. Today this is an obvious “mistake” – fighting with no hope of winning. [perilously close to NOT invading Najaf or other holy shrines]. Yes, there are arguments for other actions before Johnson’s Gulf of Tonkin Resolution and the war escalation, but by 1968 and after, the choice was fight or run.

So, there should perhaps be more choices: (a2) stop the draft, fight with higher paid volunteer/ mercenaries, and (a3) support S. Viet troops attacking North against N. Vietnam; possibly use US troops. – I’m no expert on what the US needed to do to win; I wasn’t comfy with my Grandmother’s advice: mine Hai phong harbor, nuke Hanoi – but following HER advice, and winning, would have been a better result than (b) peace & genocide.

Cambodia’s genocide SHOULD be the moral question in Kerry’s non-wimp psychology. Was peace AND genocide morally superior?

I was afraid that the "failures" in Iraq were going to become cliched ("1000 dead", "quagmire", etc) and they have. I believe that it's just a platform to get Kerry in office. I don't see anybody else coming up with alternative solutions, even extreme ones like, "let's leave now, we're making it worse"

Matt, I think you hit all the points just right. From the beginning, the swifties true axe to grind has been over kerry's post-war conduct, which he had mixed motives for...the stuff about the purple hearts and Cambodia is mostly trumped up nonsense. No one has any evidence that Kerry lied about being in Cambodia unless they want to insist that he lied because he got the date wrong. Now Kerry may possibly have made this story up or exaggerated it, but there's no real way to tell for sure, given that it was CIA related. And those who insist on the idea of Kerry signing a release to get at CIA records have to pretend that everyting the CIA did was documented, which is of course absurd.

I think both sides are making way too much of this becuase of what's at stake. IMO it's all a foolish partisan distraction. The effort to suggest Bush skipped out on National Guard service was an effort to highlight "Kerry went and GWB did not." The current swiftie effort is geared towards obscuring that same difference. Exaggerations and and unanswerable questions have been raised to cast doubts on Kerry's service, but Kerry's best answer is "I went."

Whether this makes him more quailifed to be commander-in-chief is a suspect notion. Bush will be judged by the sensible, for better or worse, on the basis of his performance as commander in chief.

Kerry? Despite efforts to make his Vietnam service look questionable. people are going to give him credit for going, and the fact that there's a soldier out there who will state for the record that Kerry pulled him out of the water while their boat was taking fire is going to be is going to carry the day among undecideds. Most people already know that Kerry is in large part an ambitious opportunist and prone to political doubletalk. It will be taken into account, but the only people who are going to judge Kerry as unfit to serve as President on the basis of this tempest are those who are unqualified Bush partisans already.

I think this is the sort of thing that, if anything, will push the undecideds towards Kerry, just as MoveOn and ugly protests during the NYC GOP convention will push them towards Bush,

Criminey, this whole issue is just out of control. I just don't see what this has to do with the ability of one to be president. Clinton dodged the draft, Dole was a war hero, Clinton won and was president. If war heroism mattered *that* much, then why didn't Dole win?

What I *do* care about is the soldiers who are being wounded and who are dying in Iraq and Afghanistan *today,* right now as we speak! Who *cares* about 30 years ago? It's done and over with. You can't change the past, and reliving it does no one any good. Bush and Kerry were *kids* 30 years ago! I don't care if Bush ducked out of service or if Daddy pulled strings, I want to know how the heck he's going to fix the mess in Iraq and how and when he's going to bring our people home. I don't care if Kerry was wounded or not, I don't even care if he fought in a war. If he wins the election, what's he going to do to take care of the vets that were wounded in *this* war? What are either of them going to do to help those people who are dying in scores in the Sudan? What are they going to do to make sure that terrorists don't nuke us off the face of the planet? Show me leadership *now,* not 30 years ago! Let's move ahead, not back!

Brian, the odds of a Swift boat being used for CIA insertions is nil. Too big, too noisy. Kerry's Cambodia tale is simply bunkum--his own crewmates dispute it, and he didn't run upriver with that boat by himself. Saying there's no evidence he somewhere, somewhen might have touched the Cambodian border with his pinky finger is an irrelevant negative "proof," not sustainable. He made the Xmas claim, repeatedly, specifically, and often--it's up to him to prove it, but all the available evidence says it never happened. But as I've said elsewhere, it only hurts him if he keeps defending it. It's just a BS war story, after all.

William, Kerry has made a few generic "statements of regret," sure. So what? Let me make one. "I deeply regret all the excesses of my youth." Now, should everybody I ever screwed over big-time, especially in sworn testimony on the Senate floor and on national television, forgive me and hold me harmless? Including those million-plus Vietnam vets who were stigmatized and stereotyped for an entire generation as emotionally crippled baby-killing village-burning body-mutilating torturers and rapists and suspected mental cases, in large part because of my very prominent and public words on the national stage? Kerry has never apologized for Winter Soldier. He's simply uttered some generic politician's equivocations.

Vets can forgive Kerry for getting out of Vietnam as quickly as he could. Not respect it, perhaps, but forgive it. They can forgive him Dewey Canyon, when Kerry threw "his" medals over that fence. But they will not forgive him for Winter Soldier based on a few generic statements of regret.

Was John Kerry a self-aggrandizing medal-chasing sailor out for a political resume point? Maybe. I don't really care all that much--he served, and his DD-214 says "honorable." And if he didn't keep waving the bloody shirt, that would settle the issue of his war record in the minds of most voters. But because he insists on waving it, because he touts it as his prime qualification for the office of President, that war record is fair game. I don't care what you trot out as your prime qualification for President, it will be fair game for assault.

As Douglas Brinkely said..Kerry went to Cambodia. I know Tully is going to argue here that Brinkley only has Kerry's journals to go by...which I'm skeptical about...mostly because I think Brinkley has likely cooberated it. Further, even if it were only according to Kerry's journals...what's the point of lying in a journal? Seriously...it's such a major stretch to go down this road it's insane.

But to the real point...this is about Kerry testifying about atrocities in Vietnam. Period. I understand that a lot of veterans feel hurt by Kerry testifying. Unfortunately for them...the truth can be a bitter pill to swallow. As I read in Business Week Online:

Unfortunately, soldiers -- including American soldiers -- commit atrocities in all wars. That was true even of the so-called Greatest Generation in World War II, it was true in Korea and Vietnam, and it's undoubtedly true in the current conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan. Denying that is to deny the reality of war. And failing to face the harsh realities of war is what makes it so easy for the U.S. to slide into nasty, unnecessary conflicts -- like Vietnam and the Iraq War now.

Americans should never go to war except in the full knowledge that it's going to wreak terrible pain on the enemy, the civilian populations involved, and our own troops. That doesn't make the service of those who served honorably any less honorable. But anyone who denies that some American soldiers committed atrocities in Vietnam is kidding themselves. You can quibble over the exact words Kerry used and whether he should have said them when he did, but in broad terms he spoke the truth.

http://www.businessweek.com/bwdaily/dnflash/aug2004/nf20040823_6115_db045.htm

Frankly...that piece in Business Week is about the best item of seen on this entire thing.

As someone else said....if you're going to judge these two men on what they did during the Vietnam era...Kerry wins handily.

Carla, the Cambodia incident isn't in Kerry's journals. Period. Brinckley's source was a biography book treatment Kerry started in the 1980's, and Kerry himself. The story doesn't appear until after Kerry saw APOCALYPSE NOW--it was not in any of Kerry's earlier accounts. And Brinckley is laying low and not returning phone calls at this point, so if he's got any corroborating evidence, he's doing a good job of keeping it secret when the campaign would love to have it trotted out. Now, it's conceivable Kerry might have boated out to that invisible border line in the middle of the river and stretched his pinky finger out to cross it, but so what? The specific tales he has told about Cambodia are not supported by anything anywhere other than Kerry's word, and his much-touted loyal crewmates say it didn't happen, and his own journal contradicts the account he claims was "seared into his memory."

I'll do an info post on Winter Soldier this week. It was one of the most devestatingly effective pieces of anti-war propaganda of the Vietnam era, one that painted an entire military as psychotic monsters. And it was based on wholesale fraud from the beginning. Kerry did not testify to his own experiences, he testified to the tales of a band of imposters and liars, gathered together by anti-war zealots, and his testimony wasn't even really his own words but was ghosted by RFK speechwriter Adam Walinsky, who also tutored Kerry in his delivery skills before his appearance.

Fact: Not one single atrocity or war crime of the thousands alleged in Winter Soldier has ever been verified, despite a third of a century of hungry reporters and military investigators and ranting Congresscritters anxious to do so.

Not one.

I don't find the claim that Kerry couldn't have taken a swift boat into Cambodia simply because they are "too noisy" to be especially compelling.

I freely admit that Kerry's story might have been manufactured. i don't even like the guy, as all here should not. But if he didn't participate in clandestine ops, there's really little way to prove that's so. All that has been done is casting of doubt. To my knowledge, Kerry hasn't gone into much detail regarding who was on the boat when he went.

I'm looking forward to more on the Winter Soldier affair. From what i have read of it so far, it seems Kerry's only conceivable crime here is credulousness. Given the number of Vietnam atrocities that have been documented, it's not to hard to understand why Kerry would have believed them. Surely he is too shrewd an opportunist to have knowingly testified about others accounts if he knew they were simply manufactured incidents.

I'd like to see transcripts of what Kerry actually said. His detractors seem to leap to the idea that he cast aspersions on all soldiers. If he really did that, instead of just suggesting that the testimony he had heard suggested it was a serious problem, then I'd side with the vets. Of course, vietnam vets have every right to be bitter over the wretched way the public treated them upon their return home, but that doesn't mean Kerry was wrong to report atrocities if he truly believed they happened.

A short sample:

I would like to talk, representing all those veterans, and say that several months ago in Detroit, we had an investigation at which over 150 honorably discharged and many very highly decorated veterans testified to war crimes committed in Southeast Asia, not isolated incidents but crimes committed on a day-to-day basis with the full awareness of officers at all levels of command....They told the stories at times they had personally raped, cut off ears, cut off heads, taped wires from portable telephones to human genitals and turned up the power, cut off limbs, blown up bodies, randomly shot at civilians, razed villages in fashion reminiscent of Genghis Khan, shot cattle and dogs for fun, poisoned food stocks, and generally ravaged the countryside of South Vietnam in addition to the normal ravage of war, and the normal and very particular ravaging which is done by the applied bombing power of this country.--John Kerry in Senate testimony April 22, 1971. [Actual words by Adam Walinsky]

Parse away.

Dole's needs a research staff to vet his words. Kerry already apologized: http://civicdialogues.org/comments.php?id=825_0_1_0_C

Well, no, he didn't, Erasmus. He said he would have framed it differently today (now that he's running for President). But he didn't apologize. Nor do I think most of the Swifties would care if he did apologize at this late date, having ridden that horse for 30-some years.

Well, how about: Kerry expressed regret for the words chosen? That's much of what framing is, right?

If that's NOT an apology, then let's change the entry at dictionary.com:

"An acknowledgment expressing regret or asking pardon for a fault or offense."

(note the 'OR')

That was quite clearly the sense of what Kerry said, even if it was not the precise wording "I apologize to my fellow veterans for what I said."

If your point is that we can't believe him because he's a candidate, then I've got a TON of issues to raise about the president's credibility. If we turn cynicism to 100% then you're in a position of not believing anything at all.

If your point is that he did not retract the substance of his testimony, then you're right. But that's a separate issue...and it happens to be the one that the GOP noise machine wants to conflate with the choice of frame.

I -- and many others of my generation -- are able to make that distinction. Did then. Do now.

Every time atrocities are brought up, the brass, which usually has known about such incidents for some time before the stories eventually leak to the press, insists the incidents are isolated and not at all characteristic of daily events. Seems to me Kerry was trying to refute the expected brass response that atrocities were isolated incidents, being handled, and not worth a big brouhaha.

There were an awful lot of vietnam vets that felt we were doing things that were terribly wrong in Vietnam, and the brass vehemently resisted all attempts to bring these things to light. Surely it's a tragedy that all Vietnam vets were tarnished by the acts of the few, but I think it's a case of shooting the messenger here that people are trying to blame John Kerry. Kerry did not do his due diligence in investigating things, and his eagerness made him wat too credulous. He should surely be faulted for this. But to be fair, Kerry, like many others, was in an atmosphere where such stories were coming to be believed. Unless Kerry knew the stories were true or didn't care about atrocities, then he geta a pass from me. The people that should be blamed for all this are first, the policymakers and commanding brass who allowed our waging of the Vietnam war to be a tragic joke, the psychos who so lost their sense of humanity in a chaotic nonsensical environment that they became monsters convinced that the ends justified the means, and the misguided anti-war idealists who made up stories to tell to Kerry, also because they felt that the ends justified the means.

The proper way to put this to bed for Kerry is for him to issue a more clear apology for his sincere but misguided and poorly executed role in which, while trying to right some wrongs, he became an accomplice in the crime that much of the public committed: that of treating all vietnam vets as pariahs, blaming them for our nation's failure and treating all soldiers as criminals. In fact, most of them were just kids caught in the middle. It may be our nation's greatest tragedy, and the scars run so deep that they still hurt, and the boomers running things are still bitter and still fighting about it. Most likely, the distance needed from time will not be enough until the boomer generation passes, and then history can look more honestly at the failings of all involved, from the French to the McNamara crowd to the ticket-puncher culture to the longest and largest @ss-covering festival known to humankind to the quarter-informed rage of the general public, etc etc.

LOL, Erasmus. Your argument is that Kerry has apologized to himself, for muddying his own political waters, thus the millions of veterans he publicly slandered and defamed should just forgive him! So what is the meaning of the word "is," Erasmus? If Kerry expressed regret to Theresa for a bad dinner in Phoenix, does that also count?

If your point is that we can't believe him because he's a candidate, then I've got a TON of issues to raise about the president's credibility.

I have some myself, Erasmus, but we were talking about Kerry and Winter Soldier. Don't change the subject.

If we turn cynicism to 100% then you're in a position of not believing anything at all.

Nope, I'm in a position of believing what I can reasonably discern from the publicly available and verifiable evidence, rather than blindly accepting the reflexively dogmatic assertions of the Faithful who would like me to worship at the True Altar of the Righteous by accepting their candidate as The Chosen One, born without sin. Which has been my position on partisan politics for many years now. Cynicism usually comes from experience, and I have a good bit of experience in applied politics.

I'll save the rest of my commentary on Winter Soldier for that WS post I'm writing this week.

I think Tully pretty much nails it on the head. What Kerry read into the Congressional Record during Winter Soldier is called "heresay" (i.e. I heard from some guy....), at the very least it was an incredibly irresponsible act and at the very worst treasonous.

He was in vietnam on a swiftboat for at least 4 months. He was in a position to KNOW whether those things were daily occurances or not because, if they were, he would have had ample opportunity to have SEEN them himself. Yet he didn't offer testimony of anything he had seen himself or had direct knowledge of.... all he did was repeat stories that he said other (unamed) people had told him. That was wrong of him. If your going to make allegations about something that serious then you should only offer testimony of things you have direct personal knowledge of.....and you should include specifics....that's the only responsible way to get at the truth. If Kerry didn't have any personal knowledge of that then the responsible thing for him to do would have been to NOT offer testimony about it. He should have let some-one else who DID have direct knowledge of such events testify about them.

As it turns out, the Winter Soldier campaign was largely a pack of lies and fabrications that slandered an entire generation of american servicemen. Kerry had a large part in that and he should apologize to the men he served with for it.
Yes, there WERE atrocities during Vietnam, as there were in all wars, however they were, by far, the exceptions not the rule....and it was vile to characterize the service of all soldiers by the actions of the few. As it turns out many of those "veterans" who Kerry touted told him stories of atrocities were never actualy in the millitary, let alone Vietnam. He should have known better.

Kerry has never offered a sincere apology for what he said. The closest he can come is to say that he may have been "a little over the top".
That just doesn't cut it as an apology.

As far as Kerry's actions in Vietnam. The truth is it is a "he said/she said" situation. The only people who really know the truth are the ones who were really there..... that includes Kerrys detractors as well as his supporters. Personaly, I find the Swiftvets stories more credible. I think they have more weight and have held up better under scrutiny. I'll admit I am predisposed not to trust Kerry though. It is right of the Swiftvets to bring thier side of the story to light if they honestly believe that Kerry is misrepresenting the facts of his service. Kerry made those 4 months he served in Vietnam a large part of his campaign.....to ask whether he is being truthfull about it is, therefore, a legitimate question.

Finaly, alot of this goes beyond politics for me. I don't really care who you vote for in November. The record needs to be set straight. The truth about Vietnam and the claims of the Anti-War movement needs to be laid bare for all to see. The wrong that was done to a generation of honorable american soldiers needs to be corrected..... and then finaly maybe the ghost of Vietnam can be laid to rest.

It's truely sad to me that this issue has gotten all caught up in the partisan politics of the current campaign. Bob Dole was a war hero, he never focused his campaign on it. George Bush Sr was a war hero , he never focused his campaign on it. McCain was a war hero, he never focused his campaign on it. Al Gore served in Vietnam he never focused his campaign on it. Kerry should have spent 60 seconds during his convention speech on it and then moved on. Instead he chose to pimp his record for political gain (just like hed did in 1971). That was like rubbing salt in the wounds of all those vets who heard him testify that they were "baby killers" during Winter Soldier. It was a cheap move, and he is paying for it now.

Tully:

The Cambodia stuff is in Kerry's journals. It's been published in the Washington Post, I believe.

Secondly, atrocities were committed by our guys in Vietnam. We can sit here and pretend they weren't...but that just change the historical record. Kerry's certainly not the only one who has testified to this. It seems like many are eager to point a finger and claim "liar!" at Kerry on this...when the record shows it to be true.

The brass saying that the incidents were isolated doesn't seem especially trustworthy. The brass denied that we were committing torture in Iraq too..until the pictures came out.

To claim it's somehow treasonous for Kerry to tell the truth to the Senate Foreign Relations Cmte is beyond ludicrous.

Another thing this group seems to be fond of (generalization, sorry) is that Kerry has brought all of this on himself. What a joke. It's Kerry's fault that the Swift Boaters have been lying and continue to lie about Kerry's record in Vietnam? It's Kerry's fault that Bush isn't honest enough to disavow these lies?

The stretching and twisting some who write comments for this blog must endure to attempt a point make me wonder why they aren't up against Paul Hamm in the Olympics.

"rather than blindly accepting the reflexively dogmatic assertions of the Faithful who would like me to worship at the True Altar of the Righteous by accepting their candidate as The Chosen One, born without sin." - Tully

Oh-kay-dee! I guess that [tone] leaves us...somewhere.

"Personaly, I find the Swiftvets stories more credible. I think they have more weight and have held up better under scrutiny." - Cengel

And you've really been paying attention?! I guess that's a testimonial to independent thought.

I'm left with the impression that many are determined to focus on the glass half-empty rather than the glass half-full. Such is life.

Carla,

1) Is everything that a person writes in a journal 100% factual. If I wrote in a journal that I saw John Kerry steal candy from a baby and then hand the journal to you will you believe me?

2) Atroctities were commited by our guys in Vietnam.... and in Korea ....and in WWII.... and in WWI...and in pretty much every war since the creation of time. That is historical fact. However the extent and frequency of occurance of such attrocities do matter. Degree does matter.

It is historical fact that tales of atrocities by american soldiers in Vietnam have been vastly over-exagerated in popular culture, the press and the anti-war movement. Genuine atrocities DID occur but WERE actualy fairly rare. The vast majority of men who served never particpated in any and never witnessed any. This is historical fact. People don't actualy have to take our word for it here. They can check the actual historical record.... or they can talk to people who are verified veterans (as opposed to just those who claim to be veterans). It is also a historical fact and part of the historical record that many of the "veterans" who the anti-war movement put forward as first hand eyewitness to atrocities... were in fact fakes... who had, in fact, never even served in the millitary, let alone Vietnam.
Again this WAS done....people can check the historical record.... they don't have to take our word for it.

3) If Kerry HAD testified to the truth before the Senate Foreign Relations Cmte very few of these vets would be pissed at him. The truth was conspiciously ABSENT from Kerry's testimony.... that is why it borders on the treasonous. Oh sure, he didn't directly commit perjury. He danced around the issue by testifying about heresay....repeating "stories" that other people had told him and giving them his opinion and conjecture. Read the transcript.... if you can find 1 actual fact that he gave direct evidence of....you can call me Nancy and put me on the DNC mailing list. The substance of his testimony, however amounted to a falsehood...... that's why people are so bitter toward him.

4) No, it's Kerrys fault that Kerry lied about his record and then made that record the centerpiece of his campaign.

Carla...sorry to inform you but your saying the SwiftVet guys are "lying" does not make it so. No more then Richard Nixon saying he was "not a crook" makes it so.

You are making a claim that they are lying. Fine, that's your perogative...just like it's mine to make a claim that they are telling the truth. Where does that leave us?

The fact is that neither of us know whether the SwiftVets are lying or telling the truth for sure. I do assume you weren't standing on the boat next to Kerry for the 4 months that he was in Vietnam, right? I know I wasn't. We are both making assumptions based upon the conflicting evidence we have heard .....assumptions which are colored by our own predispositions.

The only people that really know the truth are the people who were there....and that includes both the Swiftvets and Kerrys supporters. The rest of us are just going to have to examine the available evidence and decide for ourselves. I think the Swiftvets side is compelling and holds up better under scrutiny.... feel free to disagree. Just don't try to pretend that your opinion is law.....the Pharohs are long dead.

However Kerry could have avoided all this by simply stating that he served his country honorably in Vietnam and moving on to his stance on the issues and why he is better qualified to be President then Bush. I wouldn't have wasted a second thought on his war record and neither would most of the rest of the public. He MADE this an issue by trying to pimp his war record into getting him elected.

A valiant war record alone does not neccesarly qualify you for President...even over a man who has never served. If that were true you should have voted for Bob Dole over Bill Clinton... did you Carla?

Even if everything Kerry has said about his record were true. It wouldn't automaticaly make him more qualified then Bush.

Look I think Kerry badly exagerated his Vietnam record. Not the worse sin in the world, in my book. At least he served. I respect that, I really do. He went over there and put his butt on the line for his country....which is more then most of us ever do...and certainly more then George W. Bush did. Points for Kerry.... no question about it.

It's legitimate for the SwiftVets to question his record if they believe he exagerate it. However, even if everything the SiftVets claim about Kerry is true (and I suspect it is) then he still gets points over Bush for serving.

It's what he did AFTER he got back from Vietnam that I can't stomache. You belive he went before Congress and the Nation and testified honestly about a war he believed had gone horribly wrong. If what you believe is true then he should be lauded for it...no question about it.

However, that's not what I believe. I believe he went before Congress and the Nation and knowingly said things which were false in order to launch a political career. I believe he betrayed his comrades in arms and the nation. I believe he slandered an entire generation of american servicemen for his own political ambition. That is why I will never vote for him for President.

Furthermore, I think his record in Congress has been abysmal. I think he's beed dead wrong on most of the issues....and I think he still is. That's ALSO why I won't vote for him. Just my opinion....I'm not Pharoh either.

Erasmus,

Yes, I really have. As much as I can while trying to maintain the semblance of a normal life. If you feel I am mistaken or stupid please feel free to educate me. I am willing to listen to arguements that contain specific evidence which will disabuse me of my beliefs.

It would actualy be a bit refreshing. All I seem to here from the other side is opinion stated as fact. Such as "thier liars" or "they've been discredited" or "they've been proven false" without a shred of evidence presented to support such claims. The few mangy scraps of support which were brought forward were easly debunked or refuted. It would be refreshing to see actual evidence presented.

Just please don't assume I am ignorant or stupid (or dishonest) just because I happen to hold an opinion that is contrary to yours.

Somewhere indeed, Erasmus. The tone may be snooty but the feeling is quite genuine and non-partisan. I don't buy the Second Coming propaganda of political candidates. Any of 'em. I've been in the trenches and seen the process at work. I want verifiable evidence, not sermons on Faith and the Holy Word.

(You should see me rolling my eyes when Bush starts talking about making health care more affordable...or hear the reflexive gagging noises I make whenever I hear the phrase "compassionate conservatism.")

Well, heck, Carla, I'm not going to repeat what others have said, but I will note that Bush said that Kerry "served admirably and he ought to be proud of his record", while the Kerry web site continues to display attacks on the service record of Bush. There are no equivalent attacks against Kerry's service record on the Bush site. (

The Kerry campaign refuses to release the journals on the grounds that Brinckley has the pub rights. Brinckley remains "unavailable for comment at this time." Maybe he was lying to his journals. If Kerry ever releases them we can find out. I'm not holding my breath in anticipation.

We keep saying that Kerry brought the Vietnam flap on himself simply because it's true. At the moment, that also seems to be the prevailing wisdom of political columnists everywhere. But only a few of us have been saying it since before Kerry won Iowa, when he used the Vietnam card to move up in the pack. At the time I noted that it was a very risky strategy, trying to be on both sides of the war. Something that might (did!) work in Congressional runs, but would wither under the heat of a Presidential campaign.

ROA: "Why does Kerry's military service make him more qualified than Bush was in 2000?"

For one thing President Kerry wouldn't have displayed contempt for the already enormous dangers facing the soldiers on the ground by stupidly taunting armed killers to "bring 'em on" while hiding behind the skirts of the secret service knowing full well that the "bringing on" would be to the soldiers in Iraq and not the President. Why? Because Kerry knows what it's like to be shot at for wearing the uniform of the United States military. Bush knows what it's like to pick up chicks in Texas' bars while wearing the uniform of United States military.

But Kerry DOES know how to provide the enemy with new reasons to hate us, by explaining that all US soldiers are war criminals, baby killers, and eager committers of atrocities, and that it's actually official US policy to do such things. As the Vietnam POW's who made it home can attest, their captors derived great motivation from Kerry and comrades in this regard. Hard to feel too guilty about torturing and beating and killing those baby-killin' monsters from America.

Not really serious, Kevin, just thought one round of ad hominem campaign invective deserved a counterweight of approximately equal stature.