# Johm Kerry: Evil sez Drudge **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [August 4, 2004, 4:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/johm-kerry-evil-sez-drudge/258249 "2004-08-04T04:55:30Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 5
**Author:** ![PatriotX](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/c4cdca/32.png) [@PatriotX](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/PatriotX)\ **Post date:** [August 5, 2004, 4:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/johm-kerry-evil-sez-drudge/258249/81 "2004-08-05T04:04:22Z")
> [@elucidator](#): > > What, he served on one ship, and everybody likes him, and his evil twin served on the other? Ships and boats ---
**Author:** ![PatriotX](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/c4cdca/32.png) [@PatriotX](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/PatriotX)\ **Post date:** [August 5, 2004, 4:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/johm-kerry-evil-sez-drudge/258249/82 "2004-08-05T04:12:07Z")
I’m still waiting on my free chapter to arrive. ---
**Author:** ![Atticus\_Finch](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/ec9cab/32.png) [@Atticus\_Finch](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Atticus_Finch)\ **Post date:** [August 5, 2004, 4:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/johm-kerry-evil-sez-drudge/258249/83 "2004-08-05T04:35:41Z")
> [@SimonX](#): > > Ships and boats What do you mean? We know he served on a ship earlier on (the USS Gridley IIRC), and commanded a swift boat later. Was there ever another boat? ---
**Author:** ![elucidator](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/8edcca/32.png) [@elucidator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elucidator)\ **Post date:** [August 5, 2004, 4:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/johm-kerry-evil-sez-drudge/258249/84 "2004-08-05T04:46:02Z")
**Simon’s** been channeling Yoda lately, getting all zen and obscure. He’ll explain it as soon as he becomes sufficiently exasperated at our thick-witted inability to grasp the obvious. Unless is something really obvious, like some of the testimony is from people who served with Kerry on the _Grisly_ and didn’t like him. Which would explain the overlap and lack thereof. And the fact that all but one of Kerry’s crewmates (boat) liked him but several of his crewmates (big honking ship) didn’t. Nah. Too obvious. ---
**Author:** ![dry\_gear](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/bcef8e/32.png) [@dry\_gear](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dry_gear)\ **Post date:** [August 5, 2004, 6:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/johm-kerry-evil-sez-drudge/258249/85 "2004-08-05T06:30:57Z")
> [@](#): > > Kerry entered an abandoned Vietnamese village and slaughtered the domestic animals owned by the civilians and burned down their homes with his Zippo lighter. Anyone else find this hilarious? It reads like an Something Awful article. “John Kerry took a teddy bear away from a small child and performed satanic rituals! He also was rude to an elderly lady!” ---
**Author:** ![El\_Cid\_Viscoso](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/41988e/32.png) [@El\_Cid\_Viscoso](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/El_Cid_Viscoso)\ **Post date:** [August 5, 2004, 6:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/johm-kerry-evil-sez-drudge/258249/86 "2004-08-05T06:35:05Z")
> [@](#): > > _by RTFirefly_ > > Well, what do you fucking expect?? > > The GOP did its level best to drag Clinton through the mud over his non-service in Vietnam when he was running against WWII vets Bush Sr. and Dole. Clinton won, but the war thing cost him, no question. But you know what? When then-Governor Clinton gave his tremendous speech, that magnificent show of force at the Democratic Convention, I knew he would win. I just knew it. And then as the first wafts of Clinton’s victory drifted around the jamb, I was fetal on the floor, full of whiskey and howling into my new cordless phone, as my fiancée struggled to hear me on the other end of the line. The raw force of Bill Clinton in 1992 was a tempest, a tide of words and personality. When the storm receded, the land had reluctant fecundity, prosperity, crapulence…listlessness. Emptiness. Mr Kerry is a candidate who has evolved to thrive in this cavity, and he stuffs his Promise into the spaces in our minds, into the holes that have been eroded by the horror of what is being committed right now, as we speak, and in every one of our names. > [@](#): > > So this time, our guy went to war, the Republican candidate did his level best to stay away from combat (and seems to have been pretty damned casual about his reserve duty too), and we by God want full credit for that, this time. The men and women who serve our country deserve respect, but they’re not beyond question. I came up next to some real bulletproof rat-bastards. They’d cut out your guts with a bayonet, eat your shit and sneak out at night just to hump back and crap into your cold, dead mouth. Colonels, majors, generals, fathers and husbands. > [@](#): > > But Kerry will already be there, with his comrades-in-arms, waiting for them, holding the high ground. Because that’s the only way the GOP Slime Crew can be beaten, is by being continuously ready. If they disarm, maybe we will too. But we’re damned sure not doing it first. I wanted to be behind him. I have a Colorado farm to support, so I _desperately_ wanted to be behind him, but I can’t. He’s wrong for our nation. ---
**Author:** ![GaWd](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/f08c70/32.png) [@GaWd](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GaWd)\ **Post date:** [August 5, 2004, 1:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/johm-kerry-evil-sez-drudge/258249/87 "2004-08-05T13:58:06Z")
> [@](#): > > I wanted to be behind him. I have a Colorado farm to support, so I desperately wanted to be behind him, but I can’t. He’s wrong for our nation. No, he’s wrong for **YOUR** nation. He’s right for mine. Sam ---
**Author:** ![BobLibDem](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/boblibdem/32/3149_2.png) [@BobLibDem](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BobLibDem)\ **Post date:** [August 5, 2004, 2:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/johm-kerry-evil-sez-drudge/258249/88 "2004-08-05T14:07:34Z")
> [@Sam Stone](#): > > First, Kerry volunteered for the NAVY. Just like the National Guard, the Navy got more than its share of volunteers because volunteering for the Navy generally kept you out of harm’s way, whereas waiting to get drafted meant you could be an infantryman sleeping in the mud while the enemy shoots at you. > > Second, at the time George Bush volunteered for TANG, the very unit he volunteered for was participating in operation “Palace Alert” (or Palace Watch) in Vietnam. > > Third, no one knew at the time what the Guard would wind up doing. In the end, it turned out that the Guard largely stayed out of the war, but it didn’t have to be that way. In fact, there was much debate over the Guard’s role, and Bush could easily have been called up. > > Fourth, after Bush got his wings he volunteered for Vietnam. He was turned down. Whoa. Looks like Kerry failed to stay out of harm’s way even in the Navy. He’s got 3 Purple Hearts to prove it. Also, everything I’ve read about Bush’s service was that he checked “do not volunteer” for oversees duty. What demonstrates that Bush volunteered for Vietnam? Not to belittle the Guard, but at the time those of us of draft age knew that the probability of going to Vietnam in the Guard was significantly less than that of other services. Not that it wasn’t possible, but Guard duty was seen as a way to escape Vietnam. Obviously, it didn’t work for everybody. ---
**Author:** ![Sam\_Stone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecccb3/32.png) [@Sam\_Stone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sam_Stone)\ **Post date:** [August 5, 2004, 2:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/johm-kerry-evil-sez-drudge/258249/89 "2004-08-05T14:19:33Z")
> [@](#): > > Whoa. Looks like Kerry failed to stay out of harm’s way even in the Navy. He’s got 3 Purple Hearts to prove it. Also, everything I’ve read about Bush’s service was that he checked “do not volunteer” for oversees duty. What demonstrates that Bush volunteered for Vietnam? Yes, that’s the way it worked out. But it \*could have worked out that Bush could have been flying in 'nam on Palace Watch while Kerry sailed the Pacific or something. But I did point out that on his second tour Kerry volunteered for Swift Boats, which he certainly didn’t have to do. So I’m not disparaging Kerry. I’m saying that those who claim that Bush joined the Guard because he wanted to stay out of harm’s way, while Kerry joined the Navy because he wanted to see action, are engaging in pure speculation. The Navy WAS used as a way to stay out of Vietnam. Everyone knew that if you were in the Navy you were unlikely to see combat, and that every night you’d go to sleep in your own warm bunk after a hot meal. Draftees that wound up as infantry in Vietnam had it a lot tougher. So both men could have joined their respective services to avoid being “in-country”, or both men could have joined because both wanted to be warriors and they happened to choose those services because they thought they fit them best. We really have nothing to go on other than opinion. ---
**Author:** ![Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e99b99/32.png) [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Diogenes_the_Cynic)\ **Post date:** [August 5, 2004, 2:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/johm-kerry-evil-sez-drudge/258249/90 "2004-08-05T14:33:14Z")
Give it up, **Sam**. Kerry specifically volunteered for combat and Bush specifically pulled strings to avoid it. There was no suspense about whether Shrub’s division would get sent to Nam. His division existed precisely to keep guys like him OUT of Nam. And not to put too fine a point on it, but Bush was never _qualified_ to fly anything in Nam. He trained on an outdated plane specifically to _prevent_ himself from being qualified for Nam. There was nothing wrong with Bush avoiding combat, but quit trying to pretend that there was any real chance that he would go to the shit or that his “volunteerism” in the ANG was inspired by anything but self-preservation. ---
**Author:** ![BobLibDem](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/boblibdem/32/3149_2.png) [@BobLibDem](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BobLibDem)\ **Post date:** [August 5, 2004, 2:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/johm-kerry-evil-sez-drudge/258249/91 "2004-08-05T14:34:24Z")
I’ve always thought that if I had to enlist today I’d be in the Navy. Let’s compare- in the Army and Marines you sweat your butt off and get shot at by the locals. In the Navy you stay in the shade on the ship in your own bunk and don’t contend with the locals. Does anyone have data on which service fills its ranks the easiest? ---
**Author:** ![ElvisL1ves](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/5daacb/32.png) [@ElvisL1ves](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ElvisL1ves)\ **Post date:** [August 5, 2004, 2:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/johm-kerry-evil-sez-drudge/258249/92 "2004-08-05T14:42:08Z")
> [@Ukulele Ike](#): > > Bob Dole? He stood in FRONT of that descending shell, just so he could ship his ass back to Kansas early! Wish I could remember who said it, but anyway: Kerry was worse than a draft dodger. He even joined the Navy and left the country just so he wouldn’t be drafted. The country he went to was _the very country we were at war with_. What does \*that \* tell you about him? ---
**Author:** ![Chefguy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chefguy/32/138_2.png) [@Chefguy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chefguy)\ **Post date:** [August 5, 2004, 2:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/johm-kerry-evil-sez-drudge/258249/93 "2004-08-05T14:50:27Z")
> [@BobLibDem](#): > > I’ve always thought that if I had to enlist today I’d be in the Navy. Let’s compare- in the Army and Marines you sweat your butt off and get shot at by the locals. In the Navy you stay in the shade on the ship in your own bunk and don’t contend with the locals. Does anyone have data on which service fills its ranks the easiest? This ranks up there with one of the more ignorant postings of recent memory. As a U.S. Navy Seabee, I was one of thousands who served on the ground with the grunts, providing support, building their helo pads and runways, their hootches and mess halls, going on patrol with them and defending our perimeters. Four of my friends were medevacked out of Nam with injuries running the course from missing testicles to missing eyes. Get your fucking facts straight, you fucking moron. ---
**Author:** ![ElvisL1ves](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/5daacb/32.png) [@ElvisL1ves](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ElvisL1ves)\ **Post date:** [August 5, 2004, 2:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/johm-kerry-evil-sez-drudge/258249/94 "2004-08-05T14:53:21Z")
> [@elucidator](#): > > So…Mr. Hibbard states that Kerry reported his wound to him, which, it is safe to presume, was standard procedure. Mr. Hibbard states that he did not regard the wound as significant, and did not initiate proceedings to award Mr. Kerry a Purple Heart. Hibbard, however, did not arrive at the unit until 2 weeks after _Kerry had already left_. In interviews, he has been dragged forcibly into admitting he never actually saw the wound, which of course he couldn’t, and that the accounts told by the crewmen were consistent with Kerry’s. Yet \*now \* he says Kerry is lying about how it happened - er, pardon me, not “lying” exactly, not as the Bush supporters claim, but unmistakably insinuated. > [@Sam Stone](#): > > No, he’s wrong for YOUR nation. He’s right for mine. You can come pick him up any time. ---
**Author:** ![DMC](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dmc/32/18049_2.png) [@DMC](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DMC)\ **Post date:** [August 5, 2004, 2:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/johm-kerry-evil-sez-drudge/258249/95 "2004-08-05T14:56:04Z")
Sam, On Bush’s military paperwork, he specifically states that he is not interested in doing time overseas. He’s the one who filled that out. You, on the other hand, can provide a cite that a buddy of his says he wanted to go to Nam, but they wouldn’t let him. There was actual paperwork that was filled out by those interested in doing so, and he never filled it out. Even his buddy can’t seem to remember if he ever took it that far or not. So, we have documented proof that he was not interested, including proof that he specifically asked to not go, along with an absence of documentation that he changed his mind and wanted to after all, versus a buddy saying he said he wanted to go. I’ll go with the former until you have a better cite. If you’d like me to arrange for one of my buddies to say that I made some statement 35 years ago, you let me know what you want me to have said, and it will have been said. Just ask them. ---
**Author:** ![elucidator](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/8edcca/32.png) [@elucidator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elucidator)\ **Post date:** [August 5, 2004, 3:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/johm-kerry-evil-sez-drudge/258249/96 "2004-08-05T15:00:46Z")
Not **Sam**. ---
**Author:** ![PatriotX](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/c4cdca/32.png) [@PatriotX](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/PatriotX)\ **Post date:** [August 5, 2004, 3:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/johm-kerry-evil-sez-drudge/258249/97 "2004-08-05T15:16:39Z")
> [@ElvisL1ves](#): > > You can come pick him up any time. That quote was from **GAVVD** , who is a sam, but not from **Sam Stone**. I was shocked to see **Sam Stone** ’s name associated with Kerry and the phrase “right for my country”. ---
**Author:** ![elucidator](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/8edcca/32.png) [@elucidator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elucidator)\ **Post date:** [August 5, 2004, 3:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/johm-kerry-evil-sez-drudge/258249/98 "2004-08-05T15:21:08Z")
_Drudge_ has an update, with an excerpt from the soon-to-be-published bombshell book. The main emphasis of the excerpt is to challenge the official version of the incident by which Kerry earned his Silver Star. > [@](#): > > …“Kerry earned his Silver Star by killing a lone, fleeing, teenage Viet Cong in a loincloth.”… Which flatly contradicts the testimony of four of Kerry’s crewmates, as given here: [http://abcnews.go.com/sections/Nightline/Politics/kerry\_medal\_040624-2.html](http://abcnews.go.com/sections/Nightline/Politics/kerry_medal_040624-2.html) But note: none of this is proveable, certainly it can’t be grounds for slander or libel, its a matter of _recollection_, not evidence. And this just in: McCain has, indeed, come out and condemned the ad campaign. and called upon the White House to follow suit…(crickets chirping…) [http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/news/archive/2004/08/05/politics1020EDT0544.DTL&type=printable](http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/news/archive/2004/08/05/politics1020EDT0544.DTL&type=printable) And as far as the seemingly endlessly flexible number of men who served with Kerry, another country heard from… > [@](#): > > …Jim Rassmann, an Army veteran who was saved by Kerry, said there were only six crewmates who served with Kerry on his boat. Five support his candidacy and one is deceased… Way to go, Big John! ---
**Author:** ![PatriotX](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/c4cdca/32.png) [@PatriotX](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/PatriotX)\ **Post date:** [August 5, 2004, 3:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/johm-kerry-evil-sez-drudge/258249/99 "2004-08-05T15:24:01Z")
[Highlighted sections](http://www.google.com/search?q=cache:cZ3IyHwR69YJ:www.washingtonmonthly.com/archives/individual/2004_04/003747.php+%22A+TALE+OF+TWO+SOLDIERS....Our+story+so+far:%22&hl=en) of Bush and Kerry’s records. One is a section that is checked, “Do not volunteer for duty overseas.” The other is an excerpt from a letter that reads, “I request duty in Viet Nam.” You’ll have to visit the site to see which was whose. I suspect that I loathe Kerry. ---
**Author:** ![PatriotX](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/c4cdca/32.png) [@PatriotX](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/PatriotX)\ **Post date:** [August 5, 2004, 3:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/johm-kerry-evil-sez-drudge/258249/100 "2004-08-05T15:28:43Z")
Those fucktards at Humanevents got several of my email addresses but haven’t sent me a single free chapter. Asswipes. Anyone wanna email me theirs? [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/johm-kerry-evil-sez-drudge/258249.md?page=4) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/johm-kerry-evil-sez-drudge/258249.md?page=6)