I'm not editing anything. Nor am I sanitizing Kerry's record. Kerry did save lives, receive wounds, and personally kill the enemy. He also volunteered to go to Viet Nam, and then volunteered for more dangerous duty, once he arrived. Those are facts. A lot of what's been said against Kerry's service has been disputed, refuted, or left up in the air. But the facts I mentioned are not edited, sanitized, or glorified in any way. They are simply what happened.
I believe that my viewpoint, perspective, needs, desires, and mobility will constantly be changing, but I was refering to things other than circumstances... the way someone's brain works and the way that they live: Almost everyone I know has the same basic personality traits, character traits, character flaws, and moral compass that they have always had. They may be married with kids, working overtime, divorced, unemployed, highly paid, or whatever, but their core personality and character have not changed. I can think of couple exceptions, but this applies to the vast majority of friends that I have. I really don't believe that people change that way without some MAJOR trauma to reshape them. Therefore I think this is a valid point of discussion. I agree that current political issues are extremely important and are always lacking in public discourse, but like I mentioned before.... this thread was started to discuss something else. There are plenty of other threads for those other valid discussions. There could actually be a good discussion on this particular issue. I think my point above is completely valid for discussion's sake. It doesn't need to be tit-for-tat - swift boat captains said, draft dodging lefties said....
I don't want to hijack this thread any worse.... but Kerry/Bush service are joined at the hip, and you can't seem to talk about one without the other. This is from a Boston Globe article that elaborates on the fact that John Kerry was having "growing misgivings" about the war when he voluteered for the "relatively safe" swift boat duty. The swift boat duty turned out to be very dangerous, but that isn't what Kerry volunteered for.
