The Magic Hat Returns
Oh for heaven's sake. John Kerry is "reluctantly" participating in an effort to discredit the Swift Boat Veteran's group. By giving a two-hour interview to the New York Times.
He moves on to the photographs: his boat leaving the base at Ha Tien, Vietnam; the harbor; the mountains fading frame by frame as the boat heads north; the special operations team the boat was ferrying across the border; the men reading maps and setting off flares.
"They gave me a hat," Mr. Kerry says. "I have the hat to this day," he declares, rising to pull it from his briefcase. "I have the hat."
Three decades after the Vietnam War and nearly two years after Mr. Kerry's failed presidential bid, most Americans have probably forgotten why it ever mattered whether he went to Cambodia or that the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth accused him of making it all up, saying he was dishonest and lacked patriotism.
But among those who were on the front lines of the 2004 campaign, the battle over Mr. Kerry's wartime service continues, out of the limelight but in some ways more heatedly — because unlike then, Mr. Kerry has fully engaged in the fight. Only those on Mr. Kerry's side, however, have gathered new evidence to support their case.
Two hours is reluctant?
I wasn't blogging when that little tempest broke, so I might as well throw in my two cents now since Kerry wants to reopen things. One: I could not care less about how he earned his medals. Two: his "Christmas in Cambodia" story was completely blown - he was not telling the truth. Three: Four months or so in Swift Boats do not a "war hero" make. Four: who cares? Frankly, the way the article is written, I don't much think the reporter cares much, either.
UPDATE: Yeah, Pat's really impressed with Kerry's offensive.
UPDATE: And the Confederate Yankee has an inconvenient map. Whoopsie.
UPDATE: Patterico has more.
By Black Jack, May 27, 2006 @ 6:41 pm
Horse feathers:
Those who refuse to learn from past mistakes are compelled to repeat those mistakes on ever larger stages. The famous memories which are so seared in Kerry’s mind are also the stuff of ridicule. Kerry made himself the butt of jokes for late night comedians. His own whoppers are what brought scorn down on him and doomed his candidacy. Now he’s going to do in all over again. Only this time we see it coming 2 years out.
This guy is too dumb to be in public office. The pampered poodle of rich women, he fills a stuffed shirt adequately on the rubber chicken circuit, but comes up short when it’s time to back up his big talk.
By Gaius, May 27, 2006 @ 6:56 pm
This is one lame offensive. He would have been better off to leave it alone, I think.
By beth, May 27, 2006 @ 11:08 pm
Yeah - he’d been better off to let this whole thing drop off to distant memory.
His offensive is offensive…
By Warren, May 28, 2006 @ 5:56 am
Bush says he’s released all his records…if that’s true, then has anyone seen:
* Any pages from Bush’s flight log
* Records from the Flight Inquiry Board convened after Bush was suspended as a pilot
* Any evidence of Bush’s reclassification into another AFSC after suspension as a pilot
* Any photos of George Bush in a military uniform after 1972
* Anything at all from any Alabama unit with Bush’s name on it
* Any copies of form 44a from the Alabama National Guard certifying attendance
* Air Force Form 142 (Aviation Service Audit Worksheet)
* Anything proving service (not just receipt of pay) by Bush between May 1972 and May 1973?
By Gaius, May 28, 2006 @ 6:08 am
Warren,
What does this post have to do with Bush?
By Donna, May 28, 2006 @ 1:27 pm
Yeah, Warren…. only some who served in our military deserve to be treated with the broad tarring brush: they have to have been to war, received military honors, and also be Democrats who don’t keep their mouths shut about what breaks their hearts, and torments their conscience. Democrats by broad brush definition are ‘unpatriotic’ partisans [this untruth conveniently denies civility], just like Iraqis by broad brush definition are ‘hadj’ [this untruth conveniently explains away much that needs to stop]
Sorry for my rant, but I am personally ashamed that John Kerry’s miitary service was considered fair game for destruction by those who have every right to and should disagree with him about other issues.
John Kerry has every right to present his side, just as do the Marines at Haditha.
By Gaius, May 28, 2006 @ 1:48 pm
Donna,
I think you’re missing the point here. As I said above, who cares? It simply doesn’t matter what Kerry or Bush did going on forty years ago. The real difference is Kerry has tried to inflate what he did into something heroic. People tend to laugh about people who get caught bragging.
I maintain he would have been better off to leave it alone.
By Donna, May 28, 2006 @ 2:57 pm
I hate to tell you how many years have passed since I was maligned and accused of doing something the exact opposite of what I was in fact doing. [This was on a working my way through college waitress job, in which I took on all the sidework, which waitresses hate, and I was told this must mean I was slacking]. But, you know, that maligning of me still lives as unfair, because the maligner [the boss's wife] was so righteous and superior in her incorrect assumptions that, even after all the facts came out, she just avoided me, too cowardly to apologize to the 17 year old girl [me] whom she had so misjudged.
Like you, I have a very keen sense of right and wrong. It is not alright for the swift-boat smear to go unchallenged if additional information can show that Kerry was in fact heroic in Vietnam. To say otherwise is to say his military honor is not important.
It is not a matter of what happened forty years ago, it is a matter of what happened less than two years ago during a nationwide campaign with national coverage. And, what from what happened only 20 some months ago, you are content to conclude with another dig: “Kerry tried to inflate….Kerry bragged.”
When I was 17, I did leave it alone, because I just did not know how to respond to this woman who was so meanly judgemental. Her cowardly refusal to adknowledge her wrong-headedness meant to me that she wanted to hold on to her view that ‘all employees try to slack off.’
By Gaius, May 28, 2006 @ 3:15 pm
Donna,
The point is Kerry himself brought it up. He tried to use his service as an election tool - that makes it fair game. He also tried to straddle by saying he was also the anti-war guy, who happened to be a hero.
I honestly don’t care about Kerry. I wrote him off years and years ago as just a particularly sleazy politician who would do or say anything to get elected. I don’t think I was wrong.
By Black Jack, May 29, 2006 @ 4:42 pm
Pots calling names:
Donna, who is very sensitive to false charges, maligns and accuses the Swift Boat Vets by saying, “It is not alright for the swift-boat smear to go unchallenged if additional information can show that Kerry was in fact heroic in Vietnam.”
Unmentioned is that John Kerry himself is the only one who can release that “additional information.” He has the records, but strangely declines to make his record public, while at the same time he maintains over and over that the record backs up his claims. I’m sorry, but Kerry can’t have it both ways.
Kerry refused to reveal his records two years ago during the campaign, and he continues to withhold those records now. It may well have cost him the election. But, his constant flip-flopping and Osama’s eleventh hour endorsement didn’t help him much either.