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RedditIn 2004 Republicans had a strategy: turn John Kerry's biggest strength into an electoral liability. Democrats nominated Kerry largely because of his decorated military service in Vietnam, believing that Kerry's Purple Hearts would insulate him from Republican attacks on national security.
Kerry's military service was indeed an asset, until the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth attacked both his combat experiences in Vietnam and his antiwar activism after.
Now what Wesley Clark said about John McCain is being compared to what the Swift Boaters said about John Kerry. I can't imagine a more ludicrous comparison. Clark, a retired four star general and former commander of NATO, was offering his opinion about whether McCain is supremely qualified to be commander-in-chief. As my colleague Ari Melber wrote today, others who wore the uniform have made similar points (including McCain!), without inciting the least bit of controversy.
The Swift Boat campaign, on the other hand, was based on outright lies and distortions. That's why McCain himself quickly denounced them as "dishonest and dishonorable."
But McCain seems to have had a change of heart. On his campaign "truth squad" yesterday was none other than Colonel Bud Day, a prominent member of the Swift Boat Vets in 2004.
Via Ben Smith, here's what The New Yorker wrote about Day in 2006:
Day was also prominently featured in ads prepared by the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth, which attacked Senator John Kerry's Vietnam service last year. In one commercial, Day addressed himself to Kerry, asking, "How can you expect our sons and daughters to follow you when you condemned their fathers and grandfathers?" When McCain defended Kerry and denounced the ads, Day was upset with his old comrade. "Something that made Bud such an ideal leader in prison was his tunnel vision," McCain told me later. "That makes him behave on the outside-well . . . " He trailed off, chuckling."
Tunnel vision is an apt metaphor for the McCain campaign of the moment. McCain has accepted over $70,000 in campaign contributions from Swift Boat donors, second to only Mitt Romney in the GOP primary. As John Kerry told my colleague Chris Hayes in January:
"I'm surprised that the John McCain I knew who was smeared in 2000 and thought so-called Swift Boating was wrong in 2004 would feel comfortable taking their money after seeing the way it was used to hurt the veterans I know he loves."
McCain is milking the Clark "controversy" for all it's worth, while surrounding himself with the very same people who slimed Kerry's military service. That's the real scandal.
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maybe you guys should just measure each candidate's gun to see who wins.
Posted by frosty zoom at 07/01/2008 @ 11:50am
That's certainly one of the real scandals, no doubt.
I'd also nominate as scandalous Obama's sequence of moves toward GOP orthodoxy since the close of the primary stage: from FISA to his support for the Scalia side of last week's brutal 5-4 decisions.
What a disappointment this "opposition party" is.
Posted by jlister at 07/01/2008 @ 11:51am
maybe you guys should just measure each candidate's gun to see who wins.
Posted by frosty zoom at 07/01/2008 @ 11:50am
I'm not so sure McCain really wants to accept that challenge.
Posted by MATTMAN at 07/01/2008 @ 11:55am
This stuff really gets stranger and stranger. the "Swift Boat Group" was funded by none other than one Mr. T. Boone Pickens of the oil patch Pickens. Yesterday I watched one Ed. Bagley gush all over one T. Boone Pickens as a conservationist and the greatest visionary of this century. I assume this is the same Pickens of the 800% profit Pickens. I was becoming a little tentative about Obama, but not any more. How did these guys ever graduate from kinder garden?
Posted by jlp38 at 07/01/2008 @ 12:20pm
John (McSame) McCain graduated at the very bottom of his class and was promoted in the military because of his admiral father's connections.
He was shot down in Vietnam because of his own lack of skill and recklessness, and cracked under pressure as a POW. His father was ashamed at his cracking under pressure, but somehow this is now misconstrued as "heroism".
McCain is a FRAUD!
McCain can't claim the mantle of "honor" while interfering with a federal investigation of his fraudster pal, Charles Keating, as part of the Keating 5!
John McSame McCain is just more of the same Republican deception, false heroism, and defenders of the rich and powerful at the expense of everyone else.
It really is time for "change we can believe in" not a straight-talk express with a crooked smile that continues to deceive America.
Posted by Metteyya at 07/01/2008 @ 12:48pm
Posted by jlp38 at 07/01/2008 @ 12:20pm
Boone Pickens graduated from THE Oklahoma State University to which he recently gave 168 million dollars.
Posted by Benchrest at 07/01/2008 @ 12:49pm
Boston Globe -- 17 August, 2004
'...Kerry's statements about Cambodia do have traction for opponents. He has referred to spending Christmas or Christmas Eve 1968 in Cambodia and coming under fire. At the time Cambodia was neutral and supposedly off-limits to US troops. "I remember Christmas of 1968 sitting on a gunboat in Cambodia," Kerry said in 1986 at a Senate committee hearing on US policy toward Central America. "I remember what it was like to be shot at by the Vietnamese and Khmer Rouge and Cambodians and have the president of the United States telling the American people that I was not there, the troops were not in Cambodia. I have that memory which is seared -- seared -- in me."...'
Posted by HonestLiberal at 07/01/2008 @ 12:52pm
maybe you guys should just measure each candidate's gun to see who wins.
Posted by frosty zoom at 07/01/2008 @ 11:50am
Frosty, I'm guessing you are commenting on the supreme court NRA gun fiasco.
Damn it, we have the right to our damned guns...arms I mean. And I, personally think I have the right to have my very own warhead in my backyard because someone may want to come get me so I want to be able to destroy his (Freddy Krugar or some ME type guy, or anyone else who is scary) entire neighborhood if he comes near my house. Oh, and I also have the right to automatic warheads for target practice.
Posted by Wolfgang1 at 07/01/2008 @ 12:55pm
Wolfgang, the SCOTUS opinion specifically limited itself to weapons that weren't specifically made for the military. The right to keep and bear arms for self-defense was well-known enough in the Framers's time to have been mentioned in Blackstone's Commentaries.
Posted by brunowe at 07/01/2008 @ 1:23pm
The right to keep and bear arms for self-defense was well-known enough in the Framers's time to have been mentioned in Blackstone's Commentaries.
Posted by brunowe at 07/01/2008 @ 1:23pm
True, but it was also during the time the framers wrote said articles, it was also within the rights aristocracy to own slaves. Point being that not everything they wrote was perfectly consistent.
Rifles are needed for game hunting, but handguns and automatic weapons are made only for killing people. If manufacturers didn't make the damn things, you wouldn't need to purchase one for self defense because they wouldn't exist or be out on the street.
The blame in every gun related death lies at the footsteps of gun producers and the NRA. Guns don't kill people, but people who make guns, sell them and then put them into the hands of murderers do kill people in an indirect way.
Posted by Wolfgang1 at 07/01/2008 @ 3:19pm
Slimy politics as usual. McCain is not a "maverick". He is not different. He is not somehow above the fray. He is just another politician plain and simple. He has no principles or principled stances. He blows with the wind and votes where the votes are. He will exploit anything to gain the Presidency.
Posted by Cccomfo1 at 07/01/2008 @ 3:20pm
Now here's another Obama move to the right that I'm interested in seeing a response on from the liberals and leftists supporting him.
"Obama wants to expand faith-based programs
Says challenges faced today are 'too big for government to solve alone'
CHICAGO - Reaching out to religious voters, Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama called for expanding President Bush's program steering federal social service dollars to religious groups and -- in a move sure to cause controversy -- supported some ability to hire and fire based on faith.
Like Bush, Obama was arguing that religious organizations can and should play a bigger role in serving the poor and meeting other social needs. But while Bush argued that the strength of religious charities lies primarily in shared religious identity between workers and recipients, Obama was to tout the benefits of their "bottom-up" approach."
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/25473529
Posted by lvliberty1 at 07/01/2008 @ 3:22pm
Posted by lvliberty1 at 07/01/2008 @ 3:22pm | ignore this person | warn this person
Now, is this a Muslim faith-based program?
Posted by MATTMAN at 07/01/2008 @ 3:45pm
The only reason that they're knocking Wesley Clark is because he made a weak argument. Sure, being captured and tortured doesn't qualify you for President. But it doesn't disqualify you, either.
That's really all that needs to be said about General Clark. All the people who are insinuating that he has unfairly smeared McCain or somehow "questioned his patriotism" are simply reading things into the general's statement that aren't there.
Folks, I hate to say it, but experience or inexperience as a soldier is pretty much a non-issue in a Presidential election. There are all kinds of soldiers. There's John Kerry, and there's John McCain ... and then there was Timothy McVeigh, a "decorated United States Army veteran," according to Wikipedia. All three are or were former soldiers, but probably only two ever qualified for President.
McCain's supporters shouldn't use his military experience as a selling point, and his detractors shouldn't use it as a point of attack. It's pointless!
Want to defeat McCain? Talk about issues that matter, like McCain's very long and very checkered experience as a Senator.
Posted by JakobFabian at 07/01/2008 @ 3:57pm
Want to defeat McCain? Talk about issues that matter, like McCain's very long and very checkered experience as a Senator.
Posted by JakobFabian at 07/01/2008 @ 3:57pm
Hopefully this will blow over soon and we can all get back to that.
Posted by MATTMAN at 07/01/2008 @ 4:15pm
Equating Kerry's Vietnam experience to McCain's Vietnam experience is preposterous.
John Kerry threw his medals over a fence, lied about being in Cambodia, and spoke out against his country and fellow soldiers and talked about their atrocities while comparing them to Gengis Khan. The Swiftboat Veterans that criticized him were not political operatives that didn't know him...they were the soldiers who fought beside him. They were there with him. Regardless of what they said, McCain had the decency to stand up for him as a fellow Vet. He would have done it for anyone, because he's a man of honor.
Do you see soldiers who fought alongside McCain turning on him like they did on Kerry? Why do you think that is? The people that are criticizing him are either people like Wesley Clark, an Obama surrogate who is doing what he can for the campaign, and leftwing bloggers who probably wore no other uniform than that of their high school band.
And before you discredit Bud Day, keep in mind that he is a Congressional Medal of Honor winner, the highest award given by the U.S. government. He was being tortured alonside John McCain by the Vietcong and surviving alone in the jungle on berries and frogs during an escape attempt while half the readers of this publication were dropping acid and enjoying free love in the safety and comfort of their American universities. Do yourselves a favor and read a little bit about HIS Vietnam experience and perhaps you'll understand why he takes issue with people like John Kerry.
Posted by jimmylove at 07/01/2008 @ 6:02pm
"On Tuesday, the campaign hosted a conference call with reporters during which chief surrogate Sen. Lindsey Graham said that McCain was "the best-qualified person to be commander-in-chief" since a previous military-political figure: Dwight Eisenhower.
McCain himself has downplayed the role that military backgrounds play in election seasons. In February 2003, the Arizona Republican said "Absolutely not," when asked whether "military service inherently makes somebody better equipped to be commander-in-chief."
"Harry Truman was in the artillery in World War I, which was magnificent," he continued. "Ronald Reagan did most of his active duty in the studio lots in California. It might be a nice thing, but I absolutely don't believe that it's necessary."
A year later, McCain cast his ballot for George W. Bush, a national guard member, over fellow Vietnam veteran John Kerry.
But a more telling example may have come more recently, when McCain found himself campaigning against one of the few Iraq War veterans who was running for office. In 2006, the Senator appeared at a late-stage but crucial fundraiser for Illinois Rep. Pete Roskam, who was being challenged by Democrat Tammy Duckworth, a veteran who had lost both her legs in Iraq. The nail-biter campaign for the open seat, which was won by Roskam with 51 percent of the vote, was marked by heated rhetoric over service and war. Roskam, who won the endorsement of the organization Veterans of Foreign Wars, accused Duckworth of wanting to cut-and-run from Iraq. McCain held his fundraiser shortly thereafter."
http://tinyurl.com/5ks7qc
So McCave's campaign will use his vet cred's but no one can challenge their negligibility for any office except for habitually untruthful new con repub pervs that believe in dic'tator philosophy...
Posted by hsuBfools at 07/01/2008 @ 6:28pm
The Swift boaters served with Kerry so they had every right to do what they did. Bud Day won the Medal of Honor so that gives him credibility.
Posted by pyeatte at 07/01/2008 @ 6:42pm
T o lie?
Posted by hsuBfools at 07/01/2008 @ 6:43pm
And thanks to the lies-- more vets are getting killed in another war of choice, another unnecessary war, this time in Iraq.
Posted by hsuBfools at 07/01/2008 @ 6:46pm
No manner of heroic feats justifies lying us into a war for corporate no bid profit. One does not justify the other and all credibility is lost.
Posted by hsuBfools at 07/01/2008 @ 6:49pm
All new con pervy repub dic'tator philosophy MIC MAD GOP candidates must be voted out. Stop the swift boat propaganda machine. Stop the ever growing corporate march to dic'tatorship now. Vote no to all repubs. Send a clear message.
Posted by hsuBfools at 07/01/2008 @ 6:54pm
OK, Here's the scoop on The Swift Boat Vets and John Kerry during 2004:
============ http://campaignspot.nationalreview.com/post/?
q=MTZmMTIxMGIwZWY4YWRiYTRhNDJiNGZhNzg0NTI4MmM=
(Link broken up so it will post)
Remembering What the Swift Boat Vets Actually Said
I'm not the first to make this point, but it seems the attacks on John McCain's war service stem from prominent Democrats completely misreading what happened with the Swift Boat Vets for Truth. The Democrats' conventional wisdom is that A) everything the group said was a lie and B) they attacked Kerry's wartime service.
Go back and reread what they charged. (Take a walk down memory lane from the Kerry Spot here, here and here and Byron's assessment of the impact here.) A lot of their stories came down to their word against John Kerry's. Some of the points of contention were inconclusive, and some of the reactions their comments triggered, like convention delegates wearing "purple heart band-aids" on the floor of the convention, were crass. But they scored several major points. The first was when they pointed out the impossibility of Kerry's story of "Christmas in Cambodia" that was "seared, seared" into his memory. When one of Kerry's oft-cited war stories had such a glaring impossibility at its heart (Richard Nixon wasn't president, and thus couldn't be denying bombing in Cambodia, on Christmas 1968) it raised doubts about all of his other accounts of the war.
Second, no Kerry supporter could dispute the candidate's postwar "Genghis Khan" testimony before Congress, which many Vietnam veterans saw as a betrayal. When it became clear that Kerry was referring to secondhand accounts, and had not himself seen soldiers cutting off heads and ears, many veterans saw that as reckless at best and most likely slander. I'd argue that this was the Swift Boat Vet argument that really gained traction, and I suspect many voters saw it as a situation that revealed Kerry's character.
Third, there were about 200 members of Swift Boat Vets for Truth. Maybe some of them had faulty memories, or were down-the-line Republicans, or just plain didn't like Kerry. But all of them? Many Americans looked at the sheer volume and detail of their stories of Kerry, and concluded that where there was smoke, there was most likely fire.
If we see hundreds of men who served with McCain come out and denounce him, the American people will reconsider their opinion of him, as well. But I would not hold my breath waiting for that to happen...
==================
We have been "told" for 4 years now that it was "wrong" for the Swift Boat Vets to "attack" John F. Kerry. Those "telling" us it was "wrong" have never come up with sufficient justification as to why it was "wrong", other than it obviously is wrong to say anything negative about a Democrat for president. With one exception - leftists can criticize a Democrat if he or she is not Left enough, or anti-war and appeasement enough, or socialist enough.
Posted by sjchermak at 07/01/2008 @ 7:22pm
I saw the item in the news this morning that lvliberty1 is talking about in the post above:
"Obama wants to expand faith-based programs Posted by lvliberty1 at 07/01/2008 @ 3:22pm "
This is fascinating to me. President Bush has been crucified for this program, accused by leftists of trying to institute a Christian state theocracy here in the United States. All because he has advocated a program to help people in poverty that may actually do some good.
A program which is similar to ideas advocated in the 90's by BOTH Newt Gingrich ("To Renew America" - 1996) and Mario Cuomo ("Reason to Believe" -1996).
Democrats and leftists proclaim they are fighting for people in poverty, but adherence to strict liberal orthodoxy ("separation of Church and State") apparently comes before helping people in poverty.
Now, since Obama is proposing this, does that mean that President Bush's program was OK after all, and that he was not wrong for doing it?
What say you about this, libs?
Posted by sjchermak at 07/01/2008 @ 7:34pm
Great post Sjchermak. Nailed it.
Posted by jimmylove at 07/01/2008 @ 7:34pm
Maskbeta, you obviously haven't bothered to check into the "Swifties" for yourself. More than 250 veterans denounced him, including 12 of his Divisional peers (who commanded boats that fought alongside him) and every single one of his immediate superior officers. Not one of these was a member of the Bush campaign or his administration. You can still visit http://swiftvets.com to see what was said...and you're perfectly entitled to disagree, as John McCain did. But don't fool yourself (or let others fool you) about what was said and who said it.
Certainly Gen. Clark had nothing quite so scathing to say about McCain's military background. McCain's service doesn't automatically qualify him to be president, as he himself has said. He still makes no claims like that. But Clark misses the point. McCain's service speaks to his CHARACTER in ways that Kerry's did not: while Kerry left early in circumstances of only moderate personal risk (at best), McCain unquestionably did his duty and stayed in hell when offered a dishonorable early reprieve.
Some people think character matters.
While McCain's squadron commander job was nowhere near as tough as running NATO or the US, it was a command assignment at which he acquitted himself very well, and offers a legitimate contrast with Obama's very light resume. On top of this, McCain has a political history and experience far exceeding Gen. Clark. Clark clearly meant to imply that McCain wasn't the best qualified candidate to be president...and this is why he's drawing the heat; it's a laughable suggestion.
Posted by man00ver at 07/01/2008 @ 11:50pm
RE: Swift-Boating ... This is ugly, dangerously ugly. This is an assault on patriotism. If you didn't serve, and not many people know that McCain did and Obama didn't, you just keep shuting up and make proud face.
---------
Gen. Clark won't back off critique of McCain
Jul 1, 9:38 PM (ET) By DAVID ESPO The McCain Campaign - The New York Times reports on the senator's run for the presidency
WASHINGTON (AP) - Retired Gen. Wesley Clark rejected suggestions he apologize Tuesday for saying John McCain's medal-winning military service does not qualify him for the White House. Elaborating, Clark said a president must have judgment, not merely courage and character.
Barack Obama, the Democratic presidential hopeful, said Clark's comments had been inartful. McCain said Obama should go further than that.
Posted by HelenDAO at 07/02/2008 @ 12:13am
What say you about this, libs?
Posted by sjchermak at 07/01/2008 @ 7:34pm
Er, there's no problem as long as they, the religious communities, comply with the fed no discrimination clauses in hiring and dispensing of drawn-down fed funds, since they are public funds. Obama is for adhering to fed rules and increasing the funding-- whereas the hsuB/cHeney admin wants the fed discrimination adherence waved for religious entities. Big big dif.
Posted by hsuBfools at 07/02/2008 @ 01:53am
That's all McCave's got is his war prisoner cred as everything else is lock step with the hsuB/cHeney admin and they're lock step with the pervy new con corporate dic'tatorship philosophy. And since hsuB is sinking fast-- McCave is whining about his prisoner record as a distraction. Otherwise McCave is hsuB and hsuB is currently the worst president in modern US history:
PRESIDENT BUSH – Overall Job Rating in national polls
Survey_Dates_Approve_Disapprove_Unsure_Dif
L.A. Times/Blmbrg_6/19-23/08__23__73__4__-50
CBS_________5/30 - 6/3/08__25__67__8__-42
http://www.pollingreport.com/BushJob.htm
Posted by hsuBfools at 07/02/2008 @ 02:01am
Posted by hsuBfools at 07/02/2008 @ 01:53am
In addition, one can easily say that the dif is comparable to a no bid hand out to buy votes and the other is adherence to fed law that applies to all that receive fed funding.
Posted by hsuBfools at 07/02/2008 @ 02:10am
Going neg is all McCave's got:
June 25, 2008
Number of electoral votes based on the latest polls for each state:
Barack Obama - 300
John McCain - 238
http://www.presidentpolls2008.com/
Posted by hsuBfools at 07/02/2008 @ 02:24am
Yep all McCave's got is war shit:
http://www.pollingreport.com/wh08.htm
So might as well focus as much attention on just his and by fiat hsuB's war as much as possible. Transforming a petty dic'tator hsuB failure and lied us into criminal war for corporate profit to that of a McCave heroic prisoner endurance and triumphant war story. Otherwise McCave hasn't got a prayer...
Posted by hsuBfools at 07/02/2008 @ 02:47am
The swiftboaters did not serve with Kerry. The guys on his boat tell a diffferent story; one of them, a Republican, showed up in Iowa before the '04 primary and said he knows he owes his life to Kerry.
And his second hand report to the Fulbright committee - he was enlisted to deliver the testimony of many vets to the Senate, in their words, not his own.
And Clark was answering a direct question by Schieffer, who had exclaimed that Obama hadn't been shot down in a fighter jet when Clark was saying that neither of them had stratgic planning experience.
Lefties for truth!
Posted by ramara at 07/02/2008 @ 07:41am
"SJChermak" complained: "We have been 'told' for 4 years now that it was 'wrong' for the Swift Boat Vets to 'attack' John F. Kerry. Those 'telling' us it was 'wrong' have never come up with sufficient justification as to why it was 'wrong', other than it obviously is wrong to say anything negative about a Democrat for president."
How about this: It's wrong (no quotation marks here) to try to smear the reputation of a decent man based on groundless innuendo. There is no solid evidence whatsoever that Kerry did not fully earn the medal he received for his service in Vietnam. But there's plenty that credulous men can be made to believe based on a selective presentation of purely circumstantial evidence.
The so-called Swift Boat Veterans for Truth are a small party of true believers in the If-Only-We-Had-Stayed-Longer-In-Vietnam-We-Would-Have-Won theory, who are also dim-witted enough to believe that any man who does not accept this theory, or worse, one who perhaps once did and then changed his mind, simply cannot possibly have served honorably as a soldier. This is why they made themselves the willing pawns of a Texas oil tycoon's carefully crafted smear ads against Kerry, which, as I've said above, provide no solid evidence for their insinuations.
John McCain, incidentally, is also a believer in the in the If-Only-We-Had-Stayed-Longer-In-Vietnam-We-Would-Have-Won theory. Actually, many US-Americans are believers in this theory. Indeed, if you do the math and consider that US-Americans lost "only" about 58,000 lives in Vietnam, while the Vietnamese lost an estimated 2 million, clearly in a purely numerical sense, we were "winning" all along. Had we simply dispensed with moral scruples and reduced the war to a numbers game, in which the winner is simply the one who kills the most people on the other side (including civilians), then, yes, we could have won in Vietnam eventually - at the cost of a rather large fraction of this country's rather small native population, that is, at the cost of genocide.
Fortunately for the Vietnamese people, a majority of US-Americans came to accept Kerry's view, which was that victory at any cost is ultimately a genocidal proposition. However, a minority never accepted this view and continues to resent this majority for stopping the Vietnam War. If there is a "character" gap that still divides us as a nation, even three decades after the Vietnam War, then surely this is it.
Ever since this "police action" that was never quite officially a war was called off, the myth-makers of the right (Sylvester Stallone et alia) have done everything they can to obscure the numbers that I have presented above (the numbers of the dead, which do not lie) and, more importantly, their moral significance. It is a measure of the success of these myth-makers that we would even consider electing as President a man who still cannot see what a majority of US-Americans could see during the 1970s - that pursuing the Vietnam War further would have been morally wrong, and that to let the Vietnamese be Red rather than dead was indeed the right thing to do.
Posted by JakobFabian at 07/02/2008 @ 09:11am
"it was also within the rights aristocracy to own slaves. Point being that not everything they wrote was perfectly consistent.
Rifles are needed for game hunting, but handguns and automatic weapons are made only for killing people. If manufacturers didn't make the damn things, you wouldn't need to purchase one for self defense because they wouldn't exist or be out on the street."
First, comparing the 2nd amendment to the ownership of slaves is totally ridiculous. Second, handguns for killing people are exactly what the intrinsic right of self-defense is about. The right to keep and bear arms wasn't about deer hunting but about a people's intrinsic rights of resistance and self-defense.
Posted by brunowe at 07/02/2008 @ 09:32am
"The Swiftboat Veterans that criticized him were not political operatives that didn't know him...they were the soldiers who fought beside him. They were there with him. "
No they weren't. The fact that they also served in swift boats doesn't mean that they were with Kerry at the times and places that he served. In fact, very few of the SBVT members actually served with Kerry and none were with him during the incidents for which he won his medals.
"John Kerry threw his medals over a fence, lied about being in Cambodia, and spoke out against his country and fellow soldiers and talked about their atrocities while comparing them to Gengis Khan."
No, he spoke out against the war. That isn't close to being the same as speaking out against his country. However, that McCarthyite attitude shows quite clearly what SBVT was actually about.
Indeed, the founder of the organization was, in fact, a Republican political operative going way back. John O'Neill was recruited by Nixon to oppose Vietnam Veterans Against the War.
Posted by brunowe at 07/02/2008 @ 09:52am
Lets go over the situation, Berman
I don't expect you saw my post under John Nichol's blog on this issue you begin by summarizing so well:
"In 2004 Republicans had a strategy: turn John Kerry's biggest strength into an electoral liability." So they attached him with "lies and distortions".
Why don't (you recommend that ) Dems do to Repubs what they did to Kerry? -- turn their biggest strength into an electoral lability. Are you too good to do that? Or maybe too afraid.
You don't need to necessarily resort to lies and distortions. All you have to do is recognize the existence and fortitude of a group called "Vietnam Veterans against John McCain" who came out against the official version of his war record as POW. You don't have to agree with them that he:
-was never severely tortured, though it is commonly implied that he was. -received special medical treatment and other considerations as son of the Admiral in charge of Pacific Fleet. -Expressed no gratitude for humane treatment by Vietnamese rescuers when shot down.
-collaborated with the enemy, for propaganda and information purposes.
-blamed anti-war protesters at home for undermining POW morale
-has parlayed his name and silence about the 5 1/2 years in captivity -- by Reversing the disapprobative facts -- into Presidential heroism.
You could hide behind their documentation, Berman, if you didn't want to do your own research. You could just say "This needs discussing." After all, it is the ONLY consistent wellspring of support for McCain, his distorted, lying war record. There is no other issue he hasn't flip flopped on, only aggressive silent defensiveness about his conduct unbecoming an officer in the U.S. Navy. I'm not saying I would have done better in his shoes. I'm saying I hope I know myself enough to say I would not run for President of the United States on the strength of my heroism if I had. Nor let them call what it is "character".
But, no. Ari Berman has to go after the true-false* comparison between W. Clarke and the Swift Boaters (*see Brailliard, Simulacra and Simulations)
(note: John Kerry was the "We're in there" Democrat candidate in '04, when the powers-that-be overruled the 9 out of 10 delegates to the convention who wanted a strong anti-war plank in the platform.
He deserved to be Swift Boated for flip flopping on his stand against the Vietnam war. WTF does he think it/anythiong is all about.
These, with him, stand as dishonored, cowardly ones, weaker than Republicans, who will at least kill for their lies and deception. KerryCohen democrats will be forever taunted by Buchananed repubs, like today: "What does it say about Obama, that he won't even stand up for his allies? (=>Wesley Clarke's plea-copping whine)? -- Answer: it says he -- and all of them -- are pieces of shit. They willing to lie and distort what is supposed to matter the most.
You don't have believe in the Bible to see this is Satanic.
Posted by jones at 07/02/2008 @ 11:04am
Lets go over the situation, Berman
I don't expect you saw my post under John Nichol's blog on this issue you begin by summarizing so well:
"In 2004 Republicans had a strategy: turn John Kerry's biggest strength into an electoral liability." So they attached him with "lies and distortions".
Why don't (you recommend that ) Dems do to Repubs what they did to Kerry? -- turn their biggest strength into an electoral lability. Are you too good to do to them what they did unto you? Or maybe too afraid.
You don't need to necessarily resort to lies and distortions. All you have to do is recognize the existence and fortitude of a group called "Vietnam Veterans against John McCain" who came out against the official version of his war record as POW. You don't have to agree with them that he:
-was never severely tortured, though it is commonly implied that he was. -received special medical treatment and other considerations as son of the Admiral in charge of Pacific Fleet. Expressed no gratitude for humane treatment by Vietnamese rescuers when shot down.
-collaborated with the enemy, for propaganda and information purposes.
-blamed anti-war protesters at home for undermining POW morale
-has parlayed his name and silence about the 5 1/2 years in captivity -- by Reversing the disapprobative facts -- into Presidential heroism.
You could hide behind their documentation, Berman, if you didn't want to do your own research. You could just say "This needs discussing." After all, it is the ONLY consistent wellspring of support for McCain, his distorted, lying war record. There is no other issue he hasn't flip flopped on, only aggressive silent defensiveness about his conduct unbecoming an officer in the U.S. Navy. I'm not saying I would have done better in his shoes. I'm saying I hope I know myself enough to say I would not run for President of the United States on the strength of my heroism if I had. Nor let them call that "character".
But, no. Ari Berman has to go after the true-false* comparison between W. Clarke and the Swift Boaters (*see Brailliard, Simulacra and Simulations)
(note: John Kerry was the "We're in there" Democrat candidate in '04, when the powers-that-be overruled the 9 out of 10 delegates who wanted a strong anti-war plank in the platform, helped by him. He deserved to be Swift Boated for flip flopping on his opposition to the Vietnam war. Let these be the dishonored, cowardly ones -- forever tauinted by P.J. Buchanan repubs, as today: "What does it say about Obama, that he won't even stand up for his allies (Wesley Clarke's plea-copping whine)? -- answer: it says he -- and all of them -- are pieces of shit.)
You don't have to be a liberal to cry.
Posted by jones at 07/02/2008 @ 11:09am
McCave wants as much publicity on his war prison record as possible so that it overlays the enormous failure, the disaster of the corporate petty dic'tatorship that is the hsuB/cHeney admin and that McCave is marching lock step with.
In order to get even close to being elected-- McCave would have to come out and literally denounce the hsuB/cHeney admin as a criminal corporate petty dic'tatorship that it it is. McCave lost that kind of honesty a long long time ago. Ergo any chance of being elected president of the USA.
Posted by hsuBfools at 07/02/2008 @ 12:42pm
Hello JakobFabian,
You forget a few things.
1. It was John F. Kerry who absolutely belabored beyond the point of absurdity his Vietnam service, reminding everbody every chance he got. It was John F. Kerry who came to the podium at his acceptance speech at the Democrat convention and said "John F. Kerry - reporting for duty".
He was the one who put his Vietnam service front and center as an issue - you are trying to tell me that no one has a right to raise questions about that because they then are trying to "smear the reputation of a decent man based on groundless innuendo"
How was it groundless innuendo about questioning what Kerry said about going into Cambodia in the latter part of 1968 and how President Nixon was lying about it - when Richard Nixon was not yet President of the United States. Kerry's comments are in the public record - yet you are telling me no one dare question them, or his activities, because they are trying to "smear the reputation of a decent man based on groundless innuendo"
Somthing doesn't add up here - and what doesn't add up is your analysis of this situation.
2. Kerry did not merely oppose the war when he got home, he claimed we were commiting atrocities in Vietnam, claims that were groundless themselves. He was the one who was busy "smearing the reputation of a decent men based on groundless innuendo"
No one has a right to take issue with this and question this?
3. You said "and that to let the Vietnamese be Red rather than dead was indeed the right thing to do."
As always, the actions of the Communists are not questioned. You seem to forget that there was a complete truce in 1973. A complete and supposedly honorable truce. THE WAR WAS OVER at that point. The communists had no justification for going back at it again. They went back at it again because they knew they could get away with it - there was not any action the United States took that they (or libs in this country) could cite as a "provocation" that gave them any justification for going back at it again.
If war is wrong, then why is it not wrong for Communists to wage war with no provocation or justification, once a full complete honorable truce has been reached? I have never seen a lib even address this question much less satisfactorily answer it.
Posted by sjchermak at 07/02/2008 @ 12:51pm
McCave wants as much publicity on his war prison record as possible so that it overlays the enormous failure, the disaster of the corporate petty dic'tatorship that is the hsuB/cHeney admin and that McCave is marching lock step with.
In order to get even close to being elected-- McCave would have to come out and literally denounce the hsuB/cHeney admin as the criminal corporate petty dic'tatorship that it it is. McCave lost that kind of honesty a long long time ago. Ergo any chance of being elected president of the USA.
Posted by hsuBfools at 07/02/2008 @ 1:28pm
McCave is such a sellout to the new con hsuB/cHeney petty dic'tatorship philosophy:
"McCain sources say Schmidt, who ... was a top communications aide in Bush-Cheney '04, will coordinate the campaign's daily pro-McCain and anti-Obama message, but also will have an increased role in shaping most every facet of the organization including scheduling, policy, coalitions and surrogates."
http://tinyurl.com/58rlt8
Posted by hsuBfools at 07/02/2008 @ 1:47pm
If war is wrong, then why is it not wrong for Communists to wage war with no provocation or justification, once a full complete honorable truce has been reached? I have never seen a lib even address this question much less satisfactorily answer it.
Posted by sjchermak at 07/02/2008 @ 12:51pm
because their country was occupied.
Posted by frosty zoom at 07/02/2008 @ 2:38pm
Hello frosty zoom,
You said in response to my question about the communists in Vietnam "because their country was occupied."
Their country was occupied? It was not the communist's country!
First off, as I said, there was an honorable truce in 1973 which maintained the division between North and South Vietnam.
South Vietnam was not the communist's country and never was.
From what I have read, at the beginnings of the Vietnam question, back to the time of JFK and even Eisenhower, the Viet Cong wanted representation in the South Vietnamese government. Obviously the whole way South Vietnam was being governed was problematic, but the communists had North Vietnam, they did not have South Vietnam, and had no business trying to make inroads there.
I have not seen reference to any desire for those in power in South Vietnam at the time to have governance over all of Vietnam, including the North.
Thus it developed not into a war for control of the whole country but for South Vietnam to remain free of communism. The South Vietnamese government was lousy but still the communists had no right to interfere. Remember- you libs say we had no right to go into Iraq even though Saddam was running people through shredding machines.
In Vietnam, we were not occupying the "communists's country" and thus the communists had no business meddling in South Vietnam to begin with and no business starting up a war after there had been a truce.
Posted by sjchermak at 07/02/2008 @ 5:30pm
actually,
vietnam had existed as one piece since 938.
Posted by frosty zoom at 07/02/2008 @ 10:30pm
Fosty Zoom,
Actually, that is fantastic, but not one piece under communism.
Vietnam, after World War II, was in 2 pieces. The communists had the north. They had no business going beyond that.
If you say they did, that Vietnam had been one country since 938 so they had a right to try and unify the country according to their specifications, then people opposed to communism had every right to fight to make sure a unified Vietnam was not a communist Vietnam.
But then in 1973, if communists agreed to a truce, and then ignored the truce with no provocation or justification for doing so, then what does that say about agreements made with communists? Answer- not much.
Posted by sjchermak at 07/03/2008 @ 11:49am