If anyone thought the mud won’t be flinging fast and hard this election season, there’s a photograph of John Kerry in the background at an anti-war rally in 1970 featuring Jane Fonda. And of course there’s the requisite comments from conservatives about how he’s really a cowardly two-faced anti-veteran liberal scumbag.
What I find doubtful is the notion that this will have much traction with anyone except the diehard Newsmax.com readership (where the photo first surfaced) this early in the campaign. A photograph like this is best saved for a time like September or so, when the visual impact could linger the longest but before the questions about it come up. Questions like, hey this was taken two years before she went to Hanoi, why should we care?
Frankly, this gives Kerry plenty of time to define his stance on the Vietnam War, and I don’t think this will hurt him. Thoughts?
My guess this is gonna be like the “Gore said he invented the internet” bullshit. It will get trotted out, debunked, trotted out, debunked, pretty much forever.
To steal a line from Beloit’s college mindset list, the only revolution Jane Fonda is associated with anymore is those Fitness Revolution tapes up in the attic. Oh, and I think there’s a reference to her in the Simpsons somewhere along the lines of “Millions of women and I had to marry Jane Fonda.”
On the other hand it isn’t likely to cost him any swing votes either. The “I Hate Hanoi Jane” crowd is solidly in the Bush column anyway; actually, they’re more in the Buchanan column, but they will grudgingly have to settle for a moderate like Bush.
I can’t see that this would be a big deal. The fact that he protested the Vietnam War after his return is well-known. Whether he did it with or without Jane Fonda would make little difference, I think. If people don’t like those who protested the Vietnam War, they won’t like him either way.
I’m not a big Kerry fan but I can’t imagine anybody in their right mind giving this much credence. Even as a Republican I’m still thinking “So what, this is nothing.” The only thing even vaguely interesting to me about the photo was whether or not he was wearing sunglasses (I think he is). Other than that, big deal.
This has already been addressed in the Pit—however, as I understand the photo shows a young John Kerry sitting in the same audience as a young Jane Fonda. Both were speakers at an anti-war rally at Valley Forge, PA. The photo hardly shows them together except in the sense that I might be said to be with any number of some hundred of people who are attending the same movie. There are two questions to ask and answer. They are
Q; When was the photo taken? A: In 1970.
Q: When did Jane Fonda go to Hanoi? A; In 1972.
That ought to answer all insinuations attempting to put Senator Kerry and Miss Fonda in the same bed. The implications of the photo and its presentation at this juncture are dishonest. The *Washington Times * piece that buried the critical information deep in the text was merely disingenuous.
An appropriate response to all this would be to publish and publish and publish the photo of Secretary Rumsfeld shaking hands with Saddam.
I don’t see anything remotely interesting in finding two people, both of whom were on record as opposing a war, at an anti-war rally. I don’t see how anyone cares; surely every voter has some issue more important than a 1970 rally on their personal agenda.
On the other hand, I did see interesting speculation that the bearded fellow sitting behind Fonda is a time-traveling Brad Pitt.
So, I guess other than this one unfortunate lapse, Kerry would have swept up the support of the entire right wing of the Republican party?
Damn! So close, and yet . . .
These are the same people who couldn’t think of anything at all about the entire Clinton adminstration to criticize except Hillary and Monica. You know, the intelligencia of the Republican Party. The thinking segement.
