Not to put too fine a point on it, but would you mind pointing out where exactly these blockbuster affidavits might happen to be? Because personally, I deal with affidavits (and these are not depositions, in which a witness is actually subjected to examination by somebody with a skeptical mind) on a routine basis, and I’d giggle myself to death if some opponent showed up claiming to have oodles of affidavits stating that my client felched goats on the weekends, but wouldn’t actually show me any of these alleged affidavits.
elucidator: That’s a pretty interesting story. I wonder why they didn’t report who actually wrote the document? They said that they expected that Thurlow would have written because he was the most senior, but I seem to recall Kerry saying that he was leading the mission that day. Anyway, I’m guessing that the names are probably redacted in an FOIA request.
I don’t know. One reason why I’m trying to reserve judgement until I read the book. But O’Neill must be a pretty good lawyer, and wouldn’t be absolutely idiotic for him to claim he has affidavits when he really doesn’t?
By God, that’s it! I’ll not stand for this infamy another moment! The scales fall from my eyes, the error of my ways exposed! What kind of perfidious liar would dare to stoop so low! What man is so craven, so base, so devoid of scruple or character as to lie about a lucky hat!
A lucky hat!! Is there no end to the malignant mendacity? If he should prevail, how do we explain to our children that the highest office in the land is clutched in the foul grip of a man who lies about a lucky hat! Would we not deserve, and receive, the universal scorn of decent nations?
I am numb with horror, shocked! shocked and sickened! I only hope I can wipe away the tears sufficiently so that I can see to fill out the Republican voter registration form!
Sadder. bit wiser, Sam, I am deeply in your debt for bringing this whole ghastly matter to my attention! Oh, the haberdashery…
By the same standard of bullshit, doesn’t O’Neill’s refusal to disclose his alleged Affidavits of Mass Destruction kind of prove that they’re not what he claims them to be?
From the same story…
Didn’t mean to interrupt, Sam. You were saying?
Well, that doesn’t get us anywhere, because Elliott claims exactly that: He based his recommendations on the after-action report, which he now believes was not accurate. The question is, who wrote the original report on the incident that Elliott based this on? If it was Thurlow, he’s got some explaining to do.
If it was Kerry, then this whole article is irrelevant and offers nothing new.
They didn’t report it because they don’t know. Thurlow was the Senior Officer so it should have been his responsibilty but the Swifties have countered by saying that “Kerry liked to duke the system,” whatever that means. It looks like Thurlow hasn’t flat out accused Kerry of writing the AAR, but even if Kerry did write the damn thing, everyone else on his boat, then and now, including the guy he saved agrees that they were under fire from the shore.
More importantly, Thurlow himself would have read his own damn citation, would he not? This information comes from his records, didn’t he know what was in them. If he knew at the time that his citation, then why the hell didn’t he say so? Either Thurlow wrote the AAR, which discredit him completely, or Kerry wrote it and Thurlow did not object to either the official record or his own medal citation until 35 years later. I wonder why.
Sam the point of the story is that where SwiftVet allegations can be checked, most often they are tuning out to be false. And not false in some minor detail, but false in a way grossly at variance with the truth. Further the false claims are invariably pejorative of Kerry.
By contrast, the residue of allegations by the SwiftVets tend to be those which rely on recollection and opinion. In essence, the emerging picture is of unabashed haters of Kerry, with a demonstrated warped presentation of the facts, now asking the general public to take their allegations on trust.
No reputable newspaper would touch that with a pole of sufficient length to punt the Mekong. Even Bill O’Reilly has expressed distaste for the S’Vets indecorum, on his blog. I’m sure you know where it is.
Has he refused to disclose them? My understanding is that he’s been showing them to reporters, but I just can’t find them on the web. I’m thinking maybe they are in the appendix to the book? Has anyone got the book yet?
elucidator: The ‘lucky hat’ thing, in my opinion, was a clumsily contrived scheme to puff up his reputation.
Here’s how the Washington Post describes the incident:
Does anyone believe this? Gee, a ‘close associate’ whispers to the media, “Ask him about his secret compartment!” And Kerry is SHOCKED that the media knows about it! Not even his friends know about it! Nonetheless, he’ll put the hat on and pose, and go ‘pow’ with his finger. Kind of creepy, if you ask me.
Oh, come now.
He never read his own citation for the Bronze Star? And then lost it, having not read it, not being aware that the award was predicated upon bravery under fire? Is there some tradition of awarding medals for courageous action under conditions of little or no danger?
And note also: “…he was unwilling to authorize release of his military records because he feared attempts by the Kerry campaign to discredit him…” As well he might, I suppose, if he had any good reason to believe that such documents would reflect poorly upon him. Which, point of fact, they do.
Not true. It would tell us that Thurlow went along at least passively with Kerry’s AAR at the time. Unless you believe that Thurlow never read his own medal citation (and I’ve got to believe that it’s the sort of thing you read more than once- hell, if I had a Bronze Star I’d have my citation memorized and bore people to screaming by talking about) then he must have known 35 years ago that the official record said the entire flotilla was under heavy fire. Thurlow now says that he “never heard a shot.” Why did he make know objection to what is written in his own citation if the citation is incorrect?
This wreck’s Thurlow’s credibility either way. He’s either a liar now or he was a fraud then. Which is it?
And not for nothing but we still have the word of Rassman and Kerry’s other crewmates as well. The one guy who now says they weren’t ubder fire is contradicted by his own medal citation.
Diogenes the Cynic said:
This is a very good question. If he knew the report was wrong, why didn’t he dispute his own medal? Why didn’t he try to correct the record? I’d like to hear him answer that question.
Sevastapol:
You mean like their claim that Kerry was lying about Christmas in Cambodia?
Guys, I concede the issue with Thurlow, at least until more information comes out. It sounds strange. It may simply be that once he had the Bronze Star, he just shut up and kept it because after all, it was a Bronze Star. In which case he would be guilty of the same kind of character flaw he’s accusing Kerry of.
At least he wasn’t lying about a lucky hat. The man has some standards of decency…
Which claim? The lying bit, or the ‘in Cambodia’ bit?
No Sam, seriously, that is precisely what I do mean. The claim rested on opinion and recollection. Hence the ‘lying’ claim cannot be made out. The entire allegation is not a question that could be independently verified.
It is all like that. As evidence that you can independently verify emerges, it is consistenly pushing the S’Vets into a closer retreat. Alll they have to fall back on, are opinion and recollection. You just cannot make headlines out of contradictory or ambiguous recollection.
Oh, by the way, about that Alston thing: I think it actually credits the Swiftboat vets that they shut down that line of inquiry. It wasn’t the Swiftvets who raised that issue - it was a bunch of bloggers who thought they had a scoop and started talking about it on there. The Swiftvets basically said, “You are speculating about the word of a U.S. military veteran without proof. We do not support this line of inquiry.” or something to that effect. I think they are trying to stay focused and disciplined around the set of charges they’ve outlined in their book. They don’t want to be seen as a bunch of wingnuts by being associated with goofball conspiracy theories and wild accusations.
And yes, I know you’re going to guffaw and say that they’re already doing that, but that’s what’s in dispute. Can they back up their charges? I don’t think we know yet. It could go either way. Certainly you can’t believe that sixty men from the same coastal division in Vietnam would all be shills of the Republican party and willing to lie for them? The numbers breakdown for the Swiftvets is something like 17 people who knew Kerry intimately (one crew member, a number of fellow Swiftboat skippers from the same boat group, and several commanding officers), 60 from the same coastal division (mechanics, clerks, corpsmen and doctors, whatever. People who served on the base while he was there and maybe witnessed a few things here and there, but not close associates) and the rest of the 254 are anyone else who served on or with Swiftboats who wanted to join the group and contribute money and other help.
Even if O’Neill was proven to be a lying liar later, as long as the waters get muddled enough now for some inattentive voters to believe his account of events, then he can claim “mission accomplished.”
This whole Swift Bullshitters for Bush bruhaha has never been about revealing the truth; it’s about heaping enough crap on the topic to bury the truth and fool a nontrivial number of undecided voters.
Jebu Crisco, Sam, look at your own numbers!
“… something like 17 people who knew Kerry intimately (one crew member, a number of fellow Swiftboat skippers from the same boat group, and several commanding officers)…”
one crew member, with how many more directly contradicting the testimony of said one crew member. If his testimony equals one unit of credibility, necessarily theirs equals …what, 10 times more?
A number of fellow skippers? What number, Sam? That number must be minus one, because Mr. Thurlow is under a cloud, to say the least. How many are this “number” of fellow skippers? Do they also testify as to questions of Kerry’s service? And commanding officers, whose testimony we have on record praising Lt. Kerry?
And “60 from the same coastal division” who may, or may not, have known Lt. Kerry from Adam. How many men in a coastal division Sam? Is 60 a vast majority? A drop in the bucket?
And we are then left with the remainder, of about 170 men in the Swiftvets who had no personal knowledge of Lt. Kerry whatsoever! Zero! None! Nada!
What motivates these people, Sam? It can’t be thier intimate personal knowledge of Sen Kerry, they have none, by thier own admission. What, then, are we left with but the obvious? That they despise Kerry for reasons having nothing to do with his service, and everything to do with his political stance after his tour of duty!
The admakers have conflated these stances as though they were one! When you hear a guy talking about how Kerry lied about Viet Nam, that’s what he’s talking about! Now that statement may reflect a sincerely held opinion, but an opinion only. The ad makers have artfully sandwhiched that statement in amongst statements questioning Kerry’s “earning” his awards, and the listener is cordially invited to conflate the two! Thus leaving the entirely false impression that some 250 persons with intimate knowledge of the character and actions of Lt. Kerry have evidence to offer in condemnation, when in fact three out of four have no personal knowledge at all, and several of the most important figures in the remainder are at variance with each other and themselves
In comparision to these guys, Mike Moore is a shining paragon of candor!
These guys are not hiding who they are. They are not being coy about their motivation. Seventeen men have come forward with direct charges as personal eyewitnesses. Sixty more knew of Kerry, knew these men perhaps, support them. Then the wider group includes anyone who served on Swifts, and their major beef with Kerry is what he did after he got back from Vietnam. But they also believe that Kerry has never been held accountable for what they see as horrible character assassinations of their branch of the service and their fellow soldiers.
No one is suggesting that all 254 are personal eyewitnesses to any of this. Just the ‘core’ group of 17 officers, and their charges and their version of the events, backed by whatever evidence they offer, is outlined in their book, which none of us have yet read.