Finagle, I don’t think their beef is with war protest. I think accusations of atrocities sticks much more in their craw, especially since the Winter Soldier “investigation” turned out to be a poorly researched propaganda piece.
One of these guys’ main beefs appears to be that Kerry used the word atrocities in describing U.S. forces’ conduct during the war. But is there really any question that there were some major atrocities committed by American forces in Vietnam? Lt. Calley and the My Lai massacre, anyone?
It seems to me that he is talking about many other issues. When I heard him speak here in Pittsburgh, Viet Nam was hardly his focus, although he did allude to his history of service to the country.
It seems to me that the Viet Nam focus had faded into the background until Karen Hughes went on television and brought it back to the front. Seemed like a stupid thing to do at the time, but at least now the conservatives get to whine about it being discussed, and suggest that Kerry is hypocritical for focusing on it.
According to Fox News, Powell has already linked the prison incident with My Lai.
Interestingly enough,the FBI file on the Veterans Against the War has been released. The Nixon FBI seems to have regarded John Kerry as relatively moderate and reports him as encouraging the political process and as getting out of the outfit before it turned goofie.
As far as officer efficiency reports are concerned, I wrote those things during the same period LT(jg) Kerry was getting them and receiving them too. I’ll tell you that the reports that have been published are spectacular. I’ll also tell you that they are reviewed up the chain of command and it is not unheard of for a report to be bounced back to be toned down. I never had a report as full of praise as LT Kerry’s and I seldom wrote one that good. It is hard to believe that the very commanders who were saying that Kerry could damn near walk on water in 69 and 70 are being at all candid and honest in claiming that he is “unfit” for office now. There was no motive to exaggerate in 69, there sure is a motive to manipulate now – especially since the principal critic seem to be a career Kerry hunter in the service of the Republican National Committee.
Perhaps you should include the context of the reply I posted Kimstu. You’ve made it appear, unless one reads the thread you’ve linked, that my comment came outta the blue and has no relevance to the quote from Drain Bead. In fact, a question was asked in that thread and my response is a direct and evidential answer to that query. Here the question for your review:
My remarks about Gore are in no way a highjack; they are on point and a direct response to what appears to be an honestly posed query. In more than four years of postings, this is the best example you can come up with? Shit.
Snort. A pit thread about a fucking troll. C’mon on. If you people wanna paste a label on me you’re gonna have to do better than you have so far. These examples are laughable.
A) I ain’t no Bush supporter. Check my posting record before making this accusation again. And B) No, I don’t see the difference. Are there not already enough Bush thread’s discussing his service record, that it is necessary to rehash it here. I will give you that some comparisons between his and Kerry’s service record are indeed relevant here. It’s comments such as those made by Aeschines,
Master Wang-Ka, Squink, and iamme99’s first post that I take exception to. None of those are relevant to the topic at hand in the remotest fashion.
I regret the ‘GW supporter’ statement.
However I take back none of the rest. The part of your post I referred to concerned you comparison of Clinton references during the past Presidential campaign with the Bush references here. They are entirely different for the reason I stated and your saying they are equivalent doesn’t wash.
So this letter, signed by scads and scads of verifiable people, which will surely blaze across the media like a California cook-out, this Letter of Mass Destruction…has it been released yet? Some reason been offered as to why it hasn’t? Just askin’, ya know, 'cause that would certainly focus the nature of the question, no?
I suggest Sam as our Special Correspondent for Swift Boat Updates, keep us informed, as we wait with breathless anticipation for the release of that letter, with all those verifiable names, and all. No doubt they are feverishly doing whatever it is that they didn’t have complete when they called thier first press conference.
(anecdotal addendum: no suggestion or implication of evidence…)
I once talked with a guy who was a Captain (First Cav?), asking why it was that experienced officers got sent home so often and so early, was it because they wanted out? No, he replied, it was because so many “lifers” wanted in. Nothing was more important to one’s career aspirations as getting, as he put it, “your ticket punched”, that is to say, having it on one’s record that one had served in direct combat.)
On Preview: Spastic Dehorn, our esteemed correspondent from the Redenbacher Fly-Over, underlines something I noted before. At the time, I had some contact with the VVAW. Many’s the time I heard Kerry derided as not being sufficiently radical, too much soft-pedaling. I thought then, and think now, that he was right, that too much “guerilla theater” alienated the very people we so desperately needed to reach.
As well, anybody Nixon hated must have doing something right!
What the heck are you talking about? The link I posted lays out some verifiable facts about the critics and the way their criticism is being used and coordinated by partisans. I don’t have to claim to be non-partisan to point that out. I made no claim to be above the fray.
Most? Which “most” are you talking about? This group itself only claims to have hundreds of signatories (but who knows even how rigorous the identity checking system they used was: could I sign it? Could my dog?) at most.
And did anyone read the article about Elliot? How his story about Kerry’s war wound turns out to be factually bogus? Why is he trotting out a false story about a rather inane issue? Is it because he feels so deeply that he just cannot help but lie?
As I said: the core issue that legitimately makes Vets mad is Kerry’s testimony on atrocities, which were undeniably occuring in Vietnam, though Kerry’s claims probably went too far and he has acknowledged and apologized for that over and over.
But do you really think that’s going to play badly in a media environment reeling from the news that Tony Blair’s government is now saying that American soliders rode a 70 year old Iraqi woman around like a horse, or interrogated a guy to death and then covered up their involvement, even faking medical proceedures to hide it? Or that these problems were systemic: due to “we’ll give the generals anything they need” gross lack of supplies men training support, plus commanders recommending the standards applied to Gitmo prisoners be used in every foriegn prison the U.S. controls? Is that going to make Kerry look like a bad guy because he ratted out bad behavior by the military in which HE served?
Several points which I think should be considered for context. Firstly, these “LOT” of people, how many of them do you think had real first-hand experience of Kerry during Vietnam? I work for a large company with a large bureaucracy. People two links up the chain may know my name, but that’s about it. I know for a fact that the CIO(Admiral equivelant) wouldn’t have an informed opinion to offer.
Secondly, as Spavined Gelding pointed out, the self-stated reason they believe Kerry is unfit for the office is “Kerry should be denied the White House because of his 1971 allegations that some superiors had committed ''war crimes.”" We’ve gone back and forth about these “allegations” and how concrete they were and who they implicated. No clear picture emerged aside from the general picture that bad things were happening in Vietnam and were being committed by members of the armed forces. In addition to casting doubt on the motives of those raising concerns of Kerry’s fitness for the office of President, this statement would indicate a very dated evaluation standard. Over thirty years out of date to be precise.
Thirdly, the framers of the constitution specifically created the office of Commander in Chief as a civilian post. The CiC hat is not the primary role the President plays, nor should how well it fits a certain candidate be the overriding concern in selecting one. Colin Powell was a high muckey muck in the armed forces and by all accounts a superior commander, but he was never CiC. There’s a reason. The Executive is supposed to be a civilian and represent their views and interests.
I don’t want a Commander In Chief. I want a President.
Enjoy,
Steven
Let’s just remember that this is all smoke and mirrors, a big distraction to lull us away from the fundamentals:
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John Kerry went to Vietnam, got his ass shot at, killed a Viet Cong guerilla attacking him with a rocket launcher, went in under heavy fire to retrieve a fallen comrade, and did what the United States government ordered him to do.
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George W. Bush got his daddy to pull strings and bounce him into the National Guard, specifically requested not to be sent to the front, got transferred into a “champagne unit” for rich kids, and then didn’t bother to show up for anything more demanding than a dental exam.
Anything else is a sideshow.
We killed 2 million vietnamese because we didn’t like their political system. How’s that for an atrocity?
This whole thing reads like a smear campaign. Kerry criticized his commanders in Vietnam, and now they’re gonna get revenge. What exactly did Kerry do? He said atrocities were committed. I’m sorry, but atrocities WERE committed. God forbid we should have a president who tells the truth.
And UncleBeer, unless I’m mistaken, Bush is running in the upcoming election, and Clinton is not. The comparison is not apropos. It’s very, VERY relevant to bring up Bush’s record, because for all practical purposes, we have a 2-party system, and the choice is between Bush and Kerry. It makes no sense to not vote for Kerry based on his war record, but then vote for Bush, whose war record is worse.
To clarify, I realize you said “during the last election cycle”. But Clinton wasn’t in the last election, either. The only time it would have been apropriate to bring up Clinton was either when he was running against Bush Sr. or Dole. Was there even a SDMB then?
It’s history in America. Short, to the point, and wrong.
I see. So, by your logic we should consider credulously indulging Kerry’s critics now and the reason we should consider this is because there’s a really good chance they were all lying the first time around. And, of course, we should all consider military politics as a mitigating factor when evaluating Kerry’s seemingly fine record but, one assumes, ignore the fact that there’s a presidential election underway when evaluating the credibility of the smearing Republican bastards now coming out of the woodwork (this especially applies to a certain party who claimed that Kerry got his first purple heart for a mere scratch on the forarm when the actual medical report shows that he had a piece of shrapnel removed from his upper arm). Wow. I don’t think I’ve ever encountered such an magnificent piece of iron-clad logic.
And, by the way, regarding those “backstabbing assholes” who, according to you, got rewarded and “fine salors” who were not: What you say may possibly be true, but I’d just like to remind you that we’ve already covered the trouble with self-validated reports from the politically impassioned in another thread. It could just be that the “backstabbing assholes” you mention were people who refused to humor you and the so-called “fine sailors” were bascially your friends. Of course, I don’t know that that’s true but I think we should just ignore whatever empirical evidence is available and simply choose our sources on the basis of who tell us what we want to hear. It’s a real time saver and always makes God happy.
You want to prove that “most”?
I’d also like to observe that Kerry’s campaign was saved in Iowa when the men under his command rallied around him at the time of his greatest need.
Does that strike you as how the subordunates of an asshole would behave? I am sincerely perplexed where that magnitude of loyalty would come from were he really the vainglorious jerk some creeps are now making him out to be.
But, no. Let’s ignore all those fine reports. Let’s forget about three purple hearts and a silver and bronze star. Let’s forget about the sailor he pulled out of the water after getting wounded and allow ourselves to be dazzled by a bunch of partisan Republicans and reelect a man who, at the time Kerry was earning his medals, was a coke-sniffing, alcoholic womanizer who used his daddy’s influence to get into the national guard and then went AWOL and who recently did us the great favor of lying his head off to get us into a military disaster in Iraq after a lifetime of being asshole buddies with our true attackers, the Saudis.
Because, you know, if we don’t then the terrorists have already won.
My Lai wasn’t the only atrocity that happened. There were others, many still buried from the light of day. I think Kerry was right when he said that these things were happening. The Toledo Blade newspaper won a Pulitzer price for a series of investigative reports on the atrocities committed by one group called “Tiger Force”. Link to newspaper is HERE.
Here’s one part of the story running at Information Clearing House:
Does this also apply to someone who received a trumped up “Honorable Discharge”? 
I think in Bush’s case, they were happy to rubber stamp all his papers, just to get rid of him.
In all fairness to friends Moto and Stone, we should suspend judgement until the Swift Boat guys actually release thier blockbuster of a letter with all those names attached…all those verifiable names attached. Its just a gosh-darned shame they didn’t have it all ready to release when they called the news media. No doubt they are carefully checking the wording, syntax, probably ran spell check about 50 times. Been what?..three, four days now? Well, can’t be too careful.
This sort of care and caution is commendable, of course, but still, it does tend to incite skepticism.
How typical of a circle-jerking Bush basher! Did it never occur to you that that is precisely why Mr. Bush’s fitness reports are missing?! Because he is, like most Republicans, the very soul of modest self-effacement. Because the reports are so glowing and effussive, they embarass the Shining One! So much praise heaped upon his slender shoulders, he preferred not to have to face the titanic rush of approval that would sweep a grateful nation. And note full well: even if such as this would certainly asssure his election. Re-election. Whatever.