By the way, here's a repeat of the last two paragraphs of Rassman's piece... Does this strategy of attacking combat Vietnam veterans sound familiar? In 2000, a similar Republican smear campaign was launched against Sen. McCain. In fact, the very same communications group, Spaeth Communications, that placed ads against John McCain in 2000 is involved in these vicious attacks against John Kerry. Texas Republican donors with close ties to George W. Bush and Karl Rove crafted this "dishonest and dishonorable" ad. Their new charges are false; their stories are fabricated, made up by people who did not serve with Kerry in Vietnam. They insult and defame all of us who served in Vietnam. But when the noise and fog of their distortions and lies have cleared, a man who volunteered to serve his country, a man who showed up for duty when his country called, a man to whom the United States Navy awarded a Silver Star, a Bronze Star and three Purple Hearts, will stand tall and proud. Ultimately, the American people will judge these Swift Boat Veterans for Bush and their accusations. Americans are tired of smear campaigns against those who volunteered to wear the uniform. Swift Boat Veterans for Bush should hang their heads in shame.
Are you referring the Kerry campaign responses as listed in the article that you posted above? That isn't an admission that Kerry was never in Cambodia.
You mean like saying he was on the Varsity Rugby Team when there is no such thing... only Intramurals? "I played for a year, and it was the varsity." Not only saying he played on the Varsity, but also delivering an illegal punch to the face while making illegal contact on a high tackle and leaving his feet, yet another no-no in rugby. I guess cheerleaders always want to play on the varsity... amazing how it comes down to character isn't it?
from ABC's The Note, who, btw say the 2004 race is "Kerry's to Lose" comes this: http://abcnews.go.com/sections/politics/TheNote/TheNote.html Let's face it: there is something squirrelly and unsettling and not quite right about the way Michael Meehan answers the media's Vietnam-era questions — something that makes nearly every member of the Gang of 500 think there is still something there.
i can't find a link, although i saw it on brit hume's show last night. i think this is the quote, copied from a random right-wing blog. -- But today, on Fox News' "Fox and Friends," Kerry Campaign Advisor Jeh Johnson had this to say to the show's co-host Brian Kilmeade: JOHNSON: John Kerry has said on the record that he had a mistaken recollection earlier. He talked about a combat situation on Christmas Eve 1968 which at one point he said occurred in Cambodia. He has since corrected the recorded to say it was some place on a river near Cambodia and he is certain that at some point subsequent to that he was in Cambodia. My understanding is that he is not certain about that date.
That is not this... In fact, this... He has since corrected the recorded to say it was some place on a river near Cambodia and he is certain that at some point subsequent to that he was in Cambodia. is certainly not this... Pathetic smears. Bush is hurling everything possible because he has a one month advantage where he can spend a bunch of money and Kerry can't. Pure bush league stuff here.
with all due respect to the pathetic smearing ability of the bush campaign, the "roll back" characterization is my own. to the best of knowledge, noone in the campaign has mentioned cambodia, or vietnam for that matter. as to the question of whether a roll back has occurred, i leave that up to you. if kerry is still claiming he was in cambodia "at some point" why will noone else on any of the swift boats, including kerry's own, corroborate that claim?
Here's what Drudge says... At least three of the five crewmen on Kerry’s boat, Bill Zaldonis, Steven Hatch, and Steve Gardner, deny that they or their boat were ever in Cambodia. If you take Drudge at his word, three of five deny they were in Cambodia. It says nothing about the other two. Do they say yes? We don't know, so blanket statements like "noone else" are irresponsible.
Furthermore, if you Google Bill Zaldonis, you get nothing but the exact sentence from Drudge. No statement, no verification, no nothing. I tried searching under the other two names, but they are too common to be worth the time. If you have any source beyond Drudge or a copy of Drudge that says what he does with specifics, please post.
since i don't read drudge, i don't know, but if three of five say they weren't there, and one of the remaining two is dead, that really just leaves one other guy to confirm his story, doesn't it? also, it's worth noting that the three who say they weren't in cambodia are logically part of the crew that backed him up onstage at the DNC, no? and btw, you're really cute when you Call me irresponsible - call me unreliable Throw in undependable too Do my foolish alibis bore you Well I’m not too clever - I just adore you
another story from the telegraph, with at least Kerry's biographer, if not kerry meme-uh, changing his story: http://news.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2004/08/13/wus13.xml -- Kerry's confusion over Cambodia By David Rennie in Washington (Filed: 13/08/2004) The biographer of John Kerry, the Democratic presidential candidate, said yesterday there was no basis for one of the senator's favourite Vietnam War anecdotes - that he spent Christmas 1968 in Cambodia, a neutral nation which US leaders vowed was off limits for American forces. "On Christmas Eve he was near Cambodia; he was around 50 miles from the Cambodian border. There's no indictment of Kerry to be made, but he was mistaken about Christmas in Cambodia," said Douglas Brinkley, who has unique access to the candidate's wartime journals. But Mr Brinkley rejected accusations that the senator had never been to Cambodia, insisting he was telling the truth about running undisclosed "black" missions there at the height of the war. He said: "Kerry went into Cambodian waters three or four times in January and February 1969 on clandestine missions. He had a run dropping off US Navy Seals, Green Berets and CIA guys." The missions were not armed attacks on Cambodia, said Mr Brinkley, who did not include the clandestine missions in his wartime biography of Mr Kerry, Tour of Duty. "He was a ferry master, a drop-off guy, but it was dangerous as hell. Kerry carries a hat he was given by one CIA operative. In a part of his journals which I didn't use he writes about discussions with CIA guys he was dropping off." A group of anti-Kerry Vietnam veterans have accused him of lying when he said he was in Cambodia. The group, "Swiftboat Veterans for Truth", is officially independent, but has received much of its financial backing from a wealthy Texan Republican. Group members have contributed to an anti-Kerry book published this week, Unfit for Command, which states: "All the living commanders in Kerry's chain of command . . . indicate that Kerry would have been seriously disciplined or court-martialled had he gone" to Cambodia.
So brinkley now says Kerry was near cambodia, about 50 miles away. in country that's only about 100 miles deep, that sounds much more like "smack dab in the middle of vietnam" than "5 miles inside cambodia", where for 25 years kerry has been claiming he was on christmas eve 1968 (the memory of which was seared -- seared -- into his mind). well, i suppose one easy way to research this would be to just check the after action reports on kerry's website , since he's release all his military records as he promised earlier this year. Oops! January is missing, on;y Gebruary and March are there. You'd think that big media would be all over this sort of contradiction and non-disclosure. almost make you think they want kerry to win or something.
He may have voted but he also kept switching his position on many issues. Somebody has been paying him to vote the way he does.....this guy reeks of special interest groups.
