Constitutional Rights in Jeopardy

[Cablemender]

I'm just curious where the outrage is over the latest threat to Constitutional rights, specifically freedom of speech. When the Patriot Act went into law, people were screaming about someone looking at their library card records. Now we have 250+ Viet Nam veterans who have their opinion, and at their expense published them. Because they are critical of Kerry though, they have to be silenced.

There is a story in this morning's Boston Globe saying he 1) accuses all those vets of being liars, 2) they are working in direct concert with the Bush campaign (even though the core group of them has been around since the early 70's, with video proof of an appearance on the Dick Cavett show), and 3) Bush should (in violation of federal campaign law) contact them and tell them to stop.

Kerry's latest appeal is to the publishers and the book retailers to withdraw the book from publication/bookshelves because HE claims it is full of lies. Now, if this guy who chose to make his service record the focal point of his campaign, instead of the issues or his Senate record, is for shutting up any opposing voice, what does that say about his willingness to support freedom of speech, especially if that freedom might be critical of his secret policies he plans to unfold after voters trust him with the office?

Where was his condemnation of Michael Moore's movie or the books that were all timed to hammer Bush once they were proven to be actual lies? Seems like if he's so concerned about the 527 groups, he ought to jump all over MoveOn.org and groups like that and violate the federal laws himself and tell THEM to stop as well. No, apparently it's only an affront if it is pro-Bush.

I think he should come clean and answer these charges just as he demanded of Bush with regard to his ANG service. Bush released all but his medical records, and then ordered the release of pay records that he didn't even know existed when the DoD reported finding them. Where is Kerry's open-door policy on HIS records? Seems like he could very easily prove his claims true or false by putting what he knows on the table and letting the citizens judge for themselves.

There is just something wrong with a guy who tells his own story, then when confronted with accounts of other guys who were there and saw something different, simply dismisses them as lies. Then when his Christmas under Nixon in Cambodia is blown out of the water, he changes his story. He then revised his "unintentional oversight" of another account of being "under fire" when everyone else in a position to know denied it, and one of them produced Kerry's after-action report that reported "uneventful."

So who's doing the dancing here? And who's supporting the ideals of freedom of speech for all Americans?

[Grug - American Neanderthal]

Kerry is having a real problem develope with these guys, he can't refute them, and they won't just go away, and when he claims they are Bush lackeys the hisorty of them being around long before there was any Bush in the whitehouse negates that claim.

These guys come up with specific charges against him and he has done his best politcal side step instead of confronting them, his solution so far is to deny generally as hire lawyers to try and stop them.

[Cablemender]

Just saw on Drudge that his campaign filed formal charges based on, of all things, a NY TIMES story that shows a link between the Swifties organization and some Republican fat-cats up to and including Carl Rove.

Others have drowned when they used the NY TIMES as their life ring. Bet a donut this turns out the same way. The good side is we'll see how Kerry does when his "intel" isn't so good either.

Of course, I'll bet he was against filing the charges with the FEC right before he filed them

[stetto]

Tom, do you suppose that the DNC outcry over the swiftboaters might be because the swiftboaters' allegations are true? Does "Thou doth protest too much" ring a bell? This might have been a strategy all along...

In order to make their side of the story "true", perhaps they feel the public will be convinced by a loud, ear-piercing scream of outrage. I've seen kids do it a lot. The DNC's (and their candidates') refusal to give the same consideration for the work of Moore and others only amplifies the insincerity...

I'd really rather lock into issues this election year, but Kerry keeps finding ways to distract us from them. Perhaps he knew full well, considering the controversial nature of his service in the first place, that if he made his medal shopping excursion to VietNam the centerpiece of his campaign nobody would ever notice the vast expanse of nothing he offers the U.S. citizenry on legitimate issues.

[Galvin]

I believe that the Navy has a Board of Corrections whose function is specifically to review the circumstances under which any decorations were awarded. It exists to remove any awarded in error and to right any that were not awarded. The forms to be used are the DD149 and the DD256 if I remember correctly. For the price of a 37 cent stamp one can fill these out and send them in to get the ball rolling on an investigation such as the one the "Swift Boat Veterans for Bush" seem to imply should be done.

The admiral who started the organization should certainly be aware of such a process and the fact that no such filing appears to have been done either at present nor at any time during Senator Kerry's political career in the 30 or so years since he came back from Vietnam is puzzling if indeed his medals were awarded in error or under false pretenses.

Much has been made of the claim that Kerry and the man he pulled out of the river were not under fire at the time of one of the awards in question but it has also come to light that in the citation of one of the people awarded a Bronze star during the same action and who is loudly disputing that Kerry and the man he rescued were under fire it says that the boats were all taking small arms fire. Not only that but at least two of those now aligned against Kerry are on record as praising his service in Vietnam, one less than a year ago.

Also, after flatly denying in public (I myself have heard two of these denials from O'Niell and another of the veterans being interviewed on the radio) that any funding has come from anyone connected with the GOP and claiming that the SBVFB are anything but an non-partisan ad hoc committee formed to right an egregious wrong it has come to light that their biggest soft money contributor and the only reason they were able to afford the absolutely appalling attack ads presently running is due to an infusion of some two hundred thousand dollars from a real estate developer freind of the Bush family. So who to believe?

Kerry has previously asked his supporters (whether directly associated with the DNC or not) to refrain from attacking GWB based on his military service. GWB does not seem inclined to give Kerry the same courtesy and seems content to let shadow organizations continue the innuendo and accusations. For an administration with the reputation for micromanaging anything in their control, the claim of the lack of control over the attack ads is disingenuous at best and dishonest at worst. I don't blame Kerry for finally getting fed up with it. He has been the target of Paul O'Neill in particular ever since the Dick Cavett interviews.

Both were extremely wealthy when they decided to enter the service. Both had the political clout and connections to avoid service if they so desired. One volunteered to go to Vietnam and did get shot at and is being accused of inflating his resume in the process while the other managed to get in the Air Guard to fly a fighter that had already been withdrawn from service in Vietnam as unsuitable for combat there and is being accused of doing little more than defending Texas from Oklahoma while taking the last couple of years off from his commitment.

Their military careers aside, exactly what does their military service or the lack of it have to do with their ability to tackle the immense problems we now face in this country? I find the present campaign of accusation and innuendo a giant turn off and one of the more shameful displays of partisan politics in my memory.

I am going to vote based on the demonstrated ability and history of both candidates to respond to problems that are relevant to the welfare of this country and its people, not based on a bunch of penny-ante issues designed by some campaign strategist to get the mind of the electorate off on some sidetrack while things go to hell just about everywhere else.

Only one of them has a track record in the White House and the devil I don't know is far more likely to be better than the one I already do in my humble opinion.

[MrRepublican]

Based on Kerry's track record, I am glad to see that you are going to vote for Bush.

[Grug - American Neanderthal]

Well it seems someone knows how the system works, the complaint against Kerry has been filed.

judicialwatch.org/3794.shtml
"Basing its requests on a recently published book, Unfit for Command, by former Navy officer John E. O’Neill and Jerome R. Corsi, Ph.D..."

So I guess it will come out in the wash now one way or the other.

While the freedom of choice is all yours to use, I don't pay much attention to the sniping and ads and the flying accusations, because in this particular election we do have records to look back on. I have some experience thinking better the evil you don't know couldn't be any worse. At least I gained the wisdom to know better in the future.

I do find it less than amusing how one party decries it unfair when the other uses the same tactics they do. Shades of another election where the courts were used to intervene. A whole lot of things are going to be contested through the courts this time around again, from pre to post election and its sickening.

[Cablemender]

I find it amusing when the dems had absolutely no problem whatsoever allowing people like Richard Clarke, Michael Moore, and former ambassador Wilson to openly and demonstrably lie about Bush, and they never gave a word of condemnation in their direction, in fact they ran all over the talking head shows to lament how Bush should have known better, done things different, etc. If Kerry was so upset by this stuff, then who handed Moore the keys to the Dem convention floor? The answer is they loved Moore's movie, and they loved that it was an attack on Bush. Now when the shoe is on the other foot, they whine like babies. In fact, I remember predicting they'd do just that when an anti-Dem movie came out.

Now some guys put forth their own version of events, a story the press is STILL not even covering in terms of actual accusations, and now the correct thing for them to do is shut up, or their publisher should pull the book from the shelves, or, failing that, Wal Mart and Amazon and Barnes and Noble should keep anyone from reading it.

So when did it suddenly become the right thing to keep anyone from reading someone else's opinions? I heard on the radio yesterday that Moore's movie is now headed for DVD, and guess who's mailing copies all over creation in hopes people buy his proven lies? The 527 groups (Soros and the boys) backing Kerry.

This is so absolutely Clintonesque! If YOU do it, you're wrong. If I do it, who the hell are you to criticize me? That's the pedestal Kerry is standing on right now. You can argue all you want about Kerry asking others not to go after Bush's ANG service, but the fact remains they went after him with a vengence. They only stopped because they couldn't find anything.. kind of like all the Florida disenfranchised voters who they couldn't seem to actually step forward and say, "Yeah, I was prevented from voting."

It's pretty lame to think one candidate is going to portray himself with a special-effects enhanced video as Rambo, then expect no one who might see it differently is going to challenge him. Kerry could make his record, if he had one, the center of his platform, but he chose his shaky, twice revised Viet Nam biographical instead.
He could also run on his new ideas, but he's the one who decided to keep them a dark secret until he's elected. Now he expects because the only thing is IS saying relates to his service, no one should be able to challenge his assertions, even when those challenges flushed out two distortions already.

Does anyone else see the ironic comedy of a newspaper like the NY TIMES, so full of writing scandal it rattles, can rail against the govenrment's methods to gather information on terrorists by continuing to exaggerate the Patriot Act's provision while screaming about lack of due process, yet here they are publishing authoritative "links" to the Bush campaign from the Swifties. So now if you know someone, and that someone knows someone in the RNC or the Bush campaign, it must automatically follow that they put you up to something because it is causing Kerry to nosedive in the polls.

Oh yeah, this is a party of fairness, inclusiveness, tolerance and equality all right. Just ask them.

[MrRepublican]

It is always very funny to see a candidate who himself questioned the president's military record cry foul when his own is called to question by those with whom he actually served. To me, that is not only amusing, it is the antithesis of being presidential to begin with. And I give the swift boat guys a lot of credit for standing up for themselves after Kerry falsly accused them of committing war crimes. We all know full well John Kerry's war-protester past upon which he built a political career over the besmerched reputations of his fellow sailors. And now he proudly proclaims himself a distinguished veteran? Me thinkst Kerry doth protest too much now.

[Galvin]

It is always very funny to see a candidate who himself questioned the president's military record cry foul when his own is called to question by those with whom he actually served.

I believe John Kerry has specifically made statements that called for people to stop questioning the president's military record, the statement being indirectly aimed at move on.org. To date, GWB has not yet made a similar statement regarding the 527 attack ads on Kerry. The statement he made, without mentioning the attacks being made on Kerry, was that he "wished they would stop".

As far as the "truth" being peddled by the "Swift Boat Veterans For Bush", none of the participants arrayed against Kerry served under him on his boat while in action. Today William Rood, the only other surviving officer of the three boats present at the incident in which Kerry is accused of running away (all other men present were enlisted) and who now works as an editor for the Chicago Tribune, stated that Kerry certainly deserved his medal and that the aforementioned "truth" squad is perpetrating a series of lies in order to advance a political cause.


No one of those aligned against and accusing Kerry seems to have served directly under him or on his boat but some who have actually supported him in the past are now lending their names to the truth squad, one has filed two conflicting affidavits, and several have now been recorded lying about the major source of their funding. They of course deny and any possible connection it might have with the Bush campaign.

"Those with whom he actually served" were those on his boat and all of those people are very supportive of him. I have served as a pilot in an airline, rubbing shoulders with several hundred other pilots, some of whom were accquainted with me and I with them to varying degrees. I can tell you a little about those I actually flew with but I can tell you even less or nothing about those with whom I never got to fly nor what went on in the other airplanes I wasn't flying in at the time.

Of course I heard stories and knew some by reputation. But that was hardly a basis for making judgements on their abilities or character, unlike the members of the truth squad who seem to be able to recount an awful lot about people they never worked directly with and details of what was going on in boats other than their own at times when most peoples' attention would be focused on their part of the mission or simply staying alive.

These facts, combined with the thirty year stiffie O'Neill and some others have had for Kerry as a result of his testimony before congress leads one to believe that a score is being settled and that the "truth" is only what these people say it is and as long as it serves their purposes, which include that of getting George the second re-annointed as president. At the end of the day it is nothing less than a sad and shameful display of partisan politics and does nothing to advance any enlightenment of the public as to how the crushing problems we are now facing will be solved.

That war crimes were committed in Viet Nam is a given, as in other wars, and there has been plenty of documentation that there were many who participated.

My friend old Mark W. was a Marine veteran of Vietnam from the mid sixties and was himself recommended for a silver star as a result of he and his best friend charging into a group of Vietnamese Regulars and wiping them out. He used to tell me about the posed photos they would take with their arms around VC and NVA dead after putting cigarettes in their mouths. The one picture he actually showed me had him with a big grin on his face and an arm around a propped up and very dead VC in whose mouth he had put a lit cigarette. I say very dead because half his face was missing. Burning down hooches was SOP in any case where the inhabitants were even suspected of collaborating with the VC or NVA or was sometimes done by our guys just because they could.

He also related very matter of factly that several of his fellow Marines had ear collections and some collected gold teeth. My own father had a similar story of a Marine collecting gold teeth at night from the dead on Okinawa.

It was the existence of these kinds of behavior that Kerry was testifying about before congress thirty years ago. Saying that Kerry was specifically accusing his fellow Swifties and all the troops ever sent there is a gross oversimplification of what was actually said and done. But that is now what is being reported, primarily by the right wing radio and TV outlets.

What he was doing at the time was giving testimony that such behavior was going on and in doing so he was using reams of data given him by other veterans for whom he acted as spokesman. Those who have been there and will talk about it honestly will confirm that he was essentially right in his facts if not in his emphasis, afact that he has subsequently admitrted and says he regrets.

His big sin in, the eyes of many who served in Viet Nam, including the present "truth" squad, and a hell of a lot who didn't, was breaking the implied wall of silence and actually telling congress and the rest of the country about it. The charge has been made that he was undermining morale and the war effort. I guess they felt he should have just kept his mouth shut until the war was over. So when is it appropriate for such acts to come to light? An atrocity is not made any less an atrocity by sweeping it under a rug until the shooting stops. Some say his actions were motivated by personal ambition but maybe it was just that he was young and idealistic when he volunteered to go to the sound of the guns. After being disillusioned about the reality he had witnessed he had the guts to bring such an unpopular subject up for public scrutiny. What a crime it was to state out loud what many did not want to see the light of day.

[MrRepublican]

Galvin said:

It is always very funny to see a candidate who himself questioned the president's military record cry foul when his own is called to question by those with whom he actually served.

I believe John Kerry has specifically made statements that called for people to stop questioning the president's military record, the statement being indirectly aimed at move on.org.

During the primaries, John Kerry himself called GW Bush a deserter based on his misconstrued military record, marching in lockstep with chairman of the dnc, Terry McAuliff. This started the bell ringing. Now Kerry marches forward with 10 guys trying to celebrate an apparently questionable military record of his own (as a centrpiece to his own campaign) and hundreds come forward (from the unit in which he served) to dispute it and clear their own records (besmerched by Kerry along the way), and Kerry cries foul? This is the height of hypocrisy on Kerry's part. Once you ring a bell yourself, you cannot unring it.

[MrRepublican]

Oh and Dave, for the record, I saw this coming months ago (during the primaries). It was not the Bush campaign but Kerry himself who ripped the scab off this wound by trying to capitalize on his own self-hype. It has finally caught up with him by a group of people that he wronged at the time. Otherwise he would not object to the release of his own records right now.

[MadWags]

Well I know one thing is for sure, Scum always rises to the top of the pond and the old Skeeter Pond is starting to get that familiar film on it.

[stetto]

And they said the Iraq situation was a quagmire...

[Galvin]

"Well I know one thing is for sure, Scum always rises to the top of the pond and the old Skeeter Pond is starting to get that familiar film on it.'

That remark was beneath contempt, Wagensomer. The only scum rising is exemplified by the type and tone of the comment you have just posted. If you wish to use the brains you have previously proved you actually have to bring up a fact or facts and refute what I have to say, do so. So far all you have proved lately is that you are the resident troll. If you think this forum is getting scummy then do something to raise the level of discussion rather than lowering it.

[MadWags]

"That remark was beneath contempt, Wagensomer. The only scum rising is exemplified by the type and tone of the comment you have just posted. If you wish to use the brains you have previously proved you actually have to bring up a fact or facts and refute what I have to say, do so. So far all you have proved lately is that you are the resident troll. If you think this forum is getting scummy then do something to raise the level of discussion rather than lowering it."

Hey Galvin,
Take a chill pill.
I did not direct that comment at any person on this forum. I was refering to the topic. If you took it personally maybe you should clean your mirror with some mildew remover or something. jeeeesh. LOL!
I did not direct that comment at you or Mark or anyone else for that matter.
Yet somehow you imply I personaly attacked YOU!

Furthermore I have not posted here in a while so I am surely not the resident you imply.
But I certainly appreciate the lecture.
Thanks.

[stetto]

Galvin said:

.
He also related very matter of factly that several of his fellow Marines had ear collections and some collected gold teeth. My own father had a similar story of a Marine collecting gold teeth at night from the dead on Okinawa.

It was the existence of these kinds of behavior that Kerry was testifying about before congress thirty years ago.

This is NOT the kind of thing I heard John Kerry testifying to. He was "recalling" the killing of innocents, the mutilations of innocents, the unjustified burning of villages...NOT the collection of spoils of war and the understandable retribution on ENEMY SOLDIERS. Kerry mentioned women and children, NOT soldiers.

This was a WAR. It is what people do to each other in a WAR. Name a WAR, any WAR, and you'll find the exact same behavior. You, John Kerry, NOBODY is ever going to eliminate WAR, so you're not going to eliminate the human factor from WAR. Just what good is John Kerry's fairy tales concerning atrocities in Viet Nam going to do? I'll tell you---Get him attention, to further his political ambitions (and it worked), and get an awful lot of patriotic, heroic citizens of this country spat on when they came home. For the sake of his political future...

[stetto]

As an amendment to my prior "response", I'd like to add that I really wish Kerry would have just left his military past just that--in the past. With all the current issues to be addressed this is either a huge mistake on his part to have made it a centerpiece of his campaign, or he's trying to distract voters from seeing his empty ledger of "solutions" to our country's problems.

Does he plan to make the controversy over his service the focal point of any and all upcoming debates? I've been waiting for him to offer specific and viable plans with which to initiate fixes to economic, immigration, social, etc. issues, but I'm now convinced by his refusal to express any that he has none. I believe that if he answers a moderator's question on the economy with an argument that GW had Swiftboaters in his pocket, his whole world will cave in shortly afterward.

I don't remember election campaigns run like this, and it smacks of underhandedness--likely by someone in Kerry's own corner, just chomping at the bit to ride in on a white stallion and "save" the party...in '08 perhaps?

[MrRepublican]

That remark was beneath contempt, Wagensomer. The only scum rising is exemplified by the type and tone of the comment you have just posted. If you wish to use the brains you have previously proved you actually have to bring up a fact or facts and refute what I have to say, do so. So far all you have proved lately is that you are the resident troll. If you think this forum is getting scummy then do something to raise the level of discussion rather than lowering it.

Gee, since MadWags' post followed mine, I thought he might be talking about my comment. Thanks for taking the blame, Galvin. And MadWags, I was not in the least bit bent out of shape. So far, my prostate is working just fine. ;D

And Galvin, I don't have to refute what you say. You are entitled to your opinion, just as I am entitled to mine. But thanks for the lecture just the same.

[Cablemender]

To say John Kerry was only reporting factual incidents in his senate testimony, and that he never implied or distorted what he and his fellow Swifties did is just plain innacurrate. If you bother to read the book it, which I've only glanced over (it sold out in one day here), it is full of examples backed by personal testimony, records, action reports, maintenence records, and more that show Kerry said 'A', and every other scrap of data says 'B'.

Kerry's boat crew associates did not operate in an environment where one plane flew to Tampa, and one to Cleveland. They all ate, slept, worked, and patrolled together, sometimes deck-swapping when the need arose. These men didn't have to be ON his boat any more than two guys working feet apart on an assembly line would have to do each other's task to know if they distort the truth when telling of it later.

The Washington Post did an article today that says both sides didn't include all the data, and both sides are therefore "wrong." However their centerpiece of expose is an issue over who did or did not hear or see automatic weapons fire on one particular part of one mission. The way they lay the story out clearly favors Kerry's account, which is that he was under fire on that one occasion.

Okay, so he was under fire, what does that prove? Does it prove that his buddies working close in with him cut themselves a string of ears? Where is Kerry's proof of his own atrocities? By claiming he did them, Kerry DOES damn his whole squadron given the way they operated in close concert. Reading a bit of the stories of the other members in that squadron, it's very difficult to believe these guys were venturing off their boats wandering the countryside in the dark looking for huts to burn and ears to cut off. They clearly had their hands full being on a noisy 50-ft target gliding up and down waterways in the dark.

The Post article also confirms that Kerry's "shrapnel he still carries in his leg" did in fact come from him and Rassmuss trying to blow up a rice bin.. they both tossed grenades into a hole in the rice they'd dug, and ran. Kerry didn't get far enough, and got shrapnel and pieces of flying rice in the butt. A self-inflicted wound which is what the Seifties have always claimed. Why did it take Rasmuss so long to square this with the public? What does all this say, really?

I give Kerry credit for serving, and I don't doubt the loyalty of that service. If he earned or didn't earn medals, but got them anyway, good for him. I've seen hundreds that didn't deserve them get one, and many that should have who didn't. His medals don't impress me.

I am disturbed by a guy who serves honorably, then comes home and swaps sides. Now if it was truly his conscience talking, he truly was moved by what he saw and that led him to protest, fine. But people who do that from conscience don't then use it as a springboard into national office. Generally, people who have turned against war don't then, when it is politically expedient, portray themselves as participants in war, enhanced with Spielberg bullets to make it look better. So I question his motives. He has used his service on some occasions to sell himself, then swaps roles and uses his protest to sell himself to a different group. Where, then, lies the real John Kerry? He can't be both.

The Swifties, on the other hand, aren't trying to do anything but clear their name Kerry has spent his life smearing. Many of them aren't even going to vote. They have only signed on because Kerry won't come clean and tell the truth about them. This tells me that the person who brought this all on is NOT Bush, NOT Carl Rove, NOT some rich dude in Texas who funds ads, but Kerry.

This is a good example of how he will act as President when responsibility falls his way.