Posted on 08/11/2024 8:38:26 PM PDT by bitt
Shortly after Vice President Kamala Harris chose Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz as her running mate, the Trump-Vance campaign called into question claims he previously made about his military service, opening a broadside against the U.S. Navy veteran that some Republicans now liken to “sort of a Swift Boat 2.0 attack.”
It is a reference to the highly contentious playbook the GOP used against Sen. John Kerry when the Massachusetts Democrat ran for the White House in 2004, in large part on his record as a junior naval officer in Vietnam. Those character attacks, widely panned at the time, called into question whether Kerry really deserved his combat medals, notably the three Purple Hearts he was awarded while commanding Swift Boats in the Mekong Delta. For better or worse, this line of criticism has now been rebooted for Walz in the 2024 election.
Walz likely remembers the history well. His first foray into politics was as a volunteer for the Kerry campaign in Minnesota, and later, as the district coordinator of an organization called “Vets for Kerry.” So does Chris LaCivita, a senior advisor to the Trump campaign, who worked as the chief strategist for the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth, a veteran’s group that worked to scuttle the 2004 Kerry campaign.
LaCivita made the comparison explicit in an interview with RealClearPolitics. “Birds of a feather,” he said of Walz and Kerry, “will be tarred together.”
The battle to define the vice-presidential candidate was joined the moment Harris brought him on stage in Philadelphia Tuesday evening. Her running mate was “more than a governor,” she told an at-capacity crowd in Philadelphia Tuesday. To his constituents, he was “Congressman.” To his high school football players, “Coach.” And, she added, “to his fellow veterans, he is Sergeant Major Walz.”
Walz retired from the Minnesota National Guard in 2005, ending a 24-year career shortly before his unit, the National Guard’s 1st Battalion, 125th Field Artillery, deployed to Iraq.
“When Tim Walz was asked by his country to go to Iraq, do you know what he did? He dropped out of the Army and allowed his unit to go without him – a fact that he’s been criticized for aggressively by a lot of the people that he served with,” said Trump running mate Ohio Sen. J.D. Vance. A Marine Corps veteran who served in Iraq, Vance added, “I think it’s shameful to prepare your unit to go to Iraq, to make a promise that you’re going to follow through, and then to drop out right before you actually have to go.”....
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Waltzing Matilda, Waltzing Matilda,
You’ll come Swiftboating Matilda to me...
The great thing about ‘swift boating’... It worked and America avoided having John Kerry as the President... A man who would’ve been a terrible leader. 3 purple hearts in 3 months... Seriously?
Then he came home, joined the antiwar movement and started telling lies and half truths about America’s involvement in Vietnam, and he said he was ashamed of his service... He didn’t deserve to be the commander in chief.
Vance will pummel Walz over this issue in the debate. However it is more important for voters to be informed why and what was Walz doing when he made over 30 trips to China as a Congressman. Bagman? Courier?
John Kerry flip-flopping ads:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oThH-MNCsYw
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pbdzMLk9wHQ&t=3s
The “swift boat” folks got viciously attacked in the mass media—which just made average folks curious about what all the noise was about....
and many then learned the “Swift Boat” guys were telling the truth and the mass media was lying.
The thing is not a single person in the Minnesota National guard is defending Walz. He has no one other then the Vindmans and Grindr Kinzingers coming to his defense. This kinda stuff doesn’t have a way of going away either.
Yup—so this should play out the same way.
The mass media will bleat about “lies attacking Walz’s military service” and then curious folks will try to find out what the “lies” are....
and then find out the “lies” are mostly true and the mass media lied yet again....
Walz will go the way of Eagleton before the DNC begins.
Timmy Tugboat
If Dems and Americans have any character and decency. So, a slim chance.
Walz is studying how a beloved heroic military veteran took responsibility as the DNC nominee....
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y0BtqtTVNHg
Thank you for a reminder that I’d Rather forget.
No /s
I am pretty sure when Kamala introduced him as her V. P. choice she introduced him as Command Sergeant Major. He was demoted back to Sergeant Major because he did not finish the course or serve the time he had agreed to in order to keep that rank.
cripes, the swiftvets are peacefully sleeping...and now they want to poke that sleeping bear with a stick ?
nothing recent...I’m still active
latest posts
http://www.swiftvets.com/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?p=180854#180854
That’s…disturbing.
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