Posted on 09/15/2006 6:44:05 AM PDT by PJ-Comix
Do you want to know the name of the person most responsible for Bush's victory in the last election? Surprise! It wasn't Karl Rove. The person who enabled the Bush victory is virtually unknown outside of South Florida---Brian Craig, co-host of the Steve Kane Show on WNN radio in Broward County. And I was present at the creation of the Bush victory. It happened early one summer morning in 2004 when I flicked on the radio at 6:00 AM to listen to the Steve Kane Show. The show's opening featured the voice of John Edwards saying, "If you have any question of what John Kerry is made of, just spend three minutes with the men who served with him..." This was followed by the voices of the Swift Boat vets talking about John Kerry not being honest and lying. This, now familiar clip, was put together by Brian Craig. Here is some of the BACKGROUND about how that clip ultimately came to be the most effective CAMPAIGN COMMERCIAL in political history as related by Nat Trayger who occasionally appears on WNN radio:
Before this election, I was channel surfing and I came upon a rebroadcast of a debate on C-Span. The debate had been originally aired in 1971 on the Dick Cavett Show. The opponents were two swift boat veterans, John Kerry and John O’Neill. The subject they debated, largely without interference from Mr. Cavett, was John Kerry’s public accusations concerning the alleged large number of war crimes committed by American soldiers. I watched and was fascinated by the obvious distaste and vitriol these men had for each other and I knew that there was political gold in them thar hills.
I sit in as a once a week guest on a radio show hosted by Steve Kane. The show broadcasts to Broward and Palm Beach County in Florida, the scene of electoral confusion and conflict during the 2000 election. On the show we discuss politics and social issues and we definitely lean conservative. I contacted the producer of the show, Brian Craig and he had also seen the debate and sensed what he had to do: Find John O’Neill.
...I informed Brian that John O’Neill was a lawyer in Texas and gave him the most up to date E mail address that I could find. Brian had also been tracking down John O’Neill and one of the first talk shows in the country to have John O’Neill and other swift boat veterans who opposed John Kerry was the Steve Kane Show. To our surprise they had many negative things to say not only about John Kerry’s anti war protests but his service also. These allegations became the focus of a national debate. Other local and national radio and television shows also began to interview the anti Kerry swift boat veterans.
...Senator John Edwards came to Fort Lauderdale and echoed the dominant theme of the Kerry campaign by stating “If you want to know about John Kerry, just spend three minutes with the men who served with him thirty years ago.” Brian Craig took Edwards statement as a challenge and played this statement followed by some of the negative comments that had been made on the Steve Kane Show by some of the swift boat veterans. Brian contacted the swift boat veterans who by now had organized and informed them of Edwards’ statement and his response to it. This suggestion was turned into the television ad that received so much national attention. Many analysts believe that the swift boat ads slowed Senator Kerry’s building of momentum.
So now, boys and girls, you know the TRUE story about the birth of the Swift Boat Vets For Truth commercials. The first of those commercials was almost identical to the one that Brian Craig produced which I heard on WNN. And ever since then the Left has been completely paranoid about the Swift Boat Vets for Truth. They have even come up with a term for their criticisms, "swiftboating" which has entered the Leftwing lexicon. See, when a conservative criticizes a liberal that is now called swiftboating but when a liberal hurls the wildest of charges against a conservative, that is known to the Left as "speaking truth to power."
Now that you know the background of the Swift Boat commercials, and the resulting Leftwing paranoia about them, one can understand the rage exhibited by the Huffington Post HUffies over this STORY, "'Swift Boat' Backer Funds New Project To Target Democratic Candidates..." So let us now join the HUffies, paranoid about being "swiftboated" in Bolshevik Red, while the commentary of your humble correspondent, wondering if Brian Craig will still call him an "agenda caller" the next time he phones in to the Steve Kane Show, is in the [brackets]:
"Swift Boat" Backer Funds New Project To Target Democratic Candidates...
[Run for the hills! We're being swiftboated!!!]
So my friend Robert J. Perry, the original swift-boating money man, has just plunked down the $5 million seed money to start up yet another front group entitled the Economic Freedom Fund. The Republican donor who helped bankroll the Swift Boat attacks on Democratic Sen. John Kerry's war record has given $5 million to a new group targeting Democratic candidates.
[John Kerry will show them...just as soon as he gets around to sending in his Form 180.]
Let the bastard waste his money. People that I have known for years, that have been apathetic about politics, are fired up this year. They are sick of the lies, the incompetence, the cronyism, the creeping fascism, and the hubris that the Republicans embody. Since "Swiftboating" has entered the lexicon as a sleaze tactic, it is immediately associated with the GOP.
[Since "Freudenschade" has entered the lexicon as premature gloating over a victory that hasn't happened, it is immediately associated with the Democrats.]
The GOP is going down this November but we all have to contribute time and money to help insure that it happens. Vote 06, Impeach 07 & Reinvent America 08!!!
[Freudenschade, baby! Oh, and what happened to all that Democrat jabber about impeachment not being on the table?]
Ya got one problem with your complaints against the "Swiftboat" veterans: Kerry was never able to refute what they said. They cited dates, times, places, witnesses. Kerry simply said, "How dare you challenge me, a decorated war veteran?" It was easy. Tell the truth, and they sunk Kerry's lying little swiftboat tale.
[LOUSY FREEPER TROLL!!!]
Pure pigs. Simple pigs. They are pigs, pure and simple.
[Speaking truth to power by conveniently avoiding FACTS?]
Obviously anyone and everyone who opposes such a moral and intellectual superior such as the President and all members of the Republican party can and must be "swiftboated". They must be slandered, libeled, labeled, criticized, and if necessary - jailed. If they still refuse to obey, it is well within the power of the Presidency to publicly execute anyone he sees fit. This of course will be done in the name of Freedom. If this is done in the name of Freedom, the public will not only encourage this, they will gang up on those who do not obey to help the President's cause. Think of what a wonderful country this would be if angry mobs roamed the streets, dragging out all those who have been swiftboated and publicly beating them to death as a message to all others who would dare disobey. We would then and only then be the best country ever!
[So how many showings of V For Vendetta did you sit through?]
The Swift Boat backers are no different than any conservative group. The Taliban, el-Qaeda, and Republicans all hate America and freedom. They will not rest until our democracy is destroyed. What would you have done to a nazi brown shirt in 1938? Conservatives today deserve no better.
[Are you speaking truth to power or are you one of those 9/11 Truthers?]
Let 'em lie, swipe and do G-d knows what about our great Democratic candidates. The American people are fed up and will vote out all Republicans in Novemaber. then we impeach! I cannot wait to see W squirm. I want to see hims shit in his pants. I want to see him pee in his pants. And then yell for pappy and mammy his disgusting mother who should have been lynched by an angry mob during Katrina for the horrendous things she said about the poor in this country. Shame and a pox on the Bush house forever!
[Good news! An overdose of litium WILL cure your severe case of BDS.]
C'mon Arianna. You're big with the Hollywood crowd. Five million dollars is a drop in the bucket to some of them. Get them to pony up.
[Please lean on Sean Penn to blow a few million on the Democrats!]
People that I have known for years, that have been apathetic about politics, are fired up this year. They are sick of the lies, the incompetence, the cronyism, the creeping fascism, and the hubris that the Republicans embody.
[Didn't you also post this in 2002 or was it 2004?]
We need Tony Soprano to whack these guys. They can do all the swiftboating they want from a 55-gal. drum in Jersey.
[To do that, Tony Soprano will have to go through the GOPranos.]
On more than one occasion, I like Martin Sheen in "Apocalypse Now," took my patrol boat into Cambodia. In fact, I remember spending Christmas Eve of 1968 five miles across the Cambodia border being shot at by our South Vietnamese allies who were drunk and celebrating Christmas. The absurdity of almost being killed by our own allies in a country in which President Nixon claimed there were no American troops was very real.
[That event was seared, SEARED into my memory!]
They told the stories at times they had personally raped, cut off ears, cut off heads, taped wires from portable telephones to human genitals and turned up the power, cut off limbs, blown up bodies, randomly shot at civilians, razed villages in fashion reminiscent of Genghis Khan, shot cattle and dogs for fun, poisoned food stocks, and generally ravaged the countryside of South Vietnam in addition to the normal ravage of war, and the normal and very particular ravaging which is done by the applied bombing power of this country.
[Is that you, John Kerry! Wait! It IS you!!!]
This project will work like a charm. Negative advertising is highly effective - look what happened in Rhode Island yesterday. For the first day in months, Tradebetx.com has Repubs. favored to retain control of the house. Bush's poll numbers are soaring and it is looking like 2 more years-at least - of GOP control. Year after year, people underestimate the evil brilliance of Karl Rove and co.While the Dems are making plans to hand out comittee chairmanships, Rove is engineering the most effective GOP "Get out the Vote" effort in history. When you compare their marketing people with ours, it's truly men against boys.
[Is the Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi yet? Nope. It's just Dennis Hastert wearing a Guy Fawkes mask.]
LAST TIME I checked the RNC had about $60 million and the DNC had about $7 million.
LOOK FOR THE GOP TO SPEND ALL OF IT AND LOOK FOR KARL ROVE TO TRY HIS BULLSHIT!
YOU DEMS HAD BETTER BE READY!
[YEEEEEEEAAAAUUUGGGHHHHH!!!! Thank Howard Dean for your sorry financial condition.]
Let me know if you want on the DUmmie FUnnies PING List.
first! :D
PING!
top 10?
Top 10?
top 10!
WooHoo!
top 10?
He brilliantly had the May 12 indictment against him quashed and suppressed.
Top 10. Keep up the good work PJ
All the Democrats are truly convinced that they have the November elections sewn up.
Victory shall be sweet indeed.
The "Swiftboat" shall set you free!
Wooo Hooo, top 167.
You already know about this story but you might like to read Nat Trayger's account of how the Swift Boat Vets for Truth got started.
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This was the most effective political commercial in history and yet FEW know how it got started. And now you do.
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