Posted on 08/13/2004 4:44:35 PM PDT by veronica
PHILADELPHIA - (KRT) - A group of Vietnam veterans that is challenging Sen. John Kerry's claims of heroic war service says it received a flood of donations in recent days after advertising its contentions on television in three states.
The group, Swift Boat Veterans for Truth, said it hoped to use the money to monitor Kerry's campaign travels and run ads in cities where he appears.
"That's our goal," said John E. O'Neill, a Houston attorney who's one of the group's leaders and co-author of "Unfit to Command," a 251-page book being distributed this week by the conservative Regnery Publishing house. The book quotes Navy veterans as saying Kerry distorted his record as a river boat commander in Vietnam's Mekong Delta in 1968 to 1969.
Democrats have said the group is nothing but a Republican hit squad determined to besmirch their candidate.
Swift Boat Veterans for Truth is registered with the Federal Election Commission as a so-called 527 organization, not affiliated with any party. It got off the ground with a $100,000 donation from Texas homebuilder Bob J. Perry, a prominent Republican donor.
Roy F. Hoffman, a retired admiral and chairman of Swift Boat Veterans for Truth, said the first TV ad, which ran for one week in Ohio, Wisconsin and West Virginia at a cost of $550,000, got so much national news attention that it generated an additional $400,000 from 8,000 donors around the country.
"We are putting together the second ad," said Hoffman, 78, of Richmond, Va. As a Navy captain in 1968 and 1969, Hoffman commanded a unit of 1,650 sailors that included Kerry as a lieutenant.
Hoffman said the unit, known as Task Force 115, included about 16 swift boats and their crews, which patrolled the delta for Viet Cong and other enemy fighters.
"I knew Kerry pretty well," he said. "I did not ride his boat, but we operated very close together. ... I can't say I was a personal friend or buddy-buddy, but I sure knew him ... and I never felt he had the qualifications."
Kerry has made his war service the centerpiece of his campaign to become president. His supporters include men who served on his boat, including a former Green Beret who said Kerry rescued him from the water while under fire.
Swift Boat Veterans for Truth first gained public attention in May when its leaders - including men who served on boats near Kerry's - called a news conference at the National Press Club in Washington.
Hoffman denied that the group is connected to the Republican Party. He said he hasn't been politically involved since leaving the Navy in 1978. Yes, he said, the group had taken cash donations from Republicans. But that became necessary, he said, because the news conference received little attention on network television and in national newspapers.
The group concluded that it needed to buy its own TV ad, he said. And that required money.
He said of Perry: "We had our hand out, and he put money in it. ... As far as I'm concerned, he's a wealthy construction person. If he owns the money legally, I'm all for it."
The group reported $158,000 in donations as of June 30, its latest filing with the election commission.
Donors as of that date included O'Neill and Texas real estate developer Harlan Crow, also a Republican contributor. Each of them gave $25,000, according to the Center for Responsive Politics, a Washington nonprofit that tracks political donations.
The group has received strategic help from Merrie Spaeth, a GOP strategist in Dallas. Spaeth was involved in a 2000 ad campaign against Republican Sen. John McCain of Arizona, then running for president against George W. Bush.
Current advisers include Creative Response Concepts, a public relations firm in Arlington, Va., that Mike Russell, a spokesman, said has done work for the Republican Party and "conservative-oriented causes."
O'Neill's co-writer on the book is Jerome R. Corsi, an author of other books on the Vietnam-era anti-war movement and political violence.
Now 58, O'Neill was a Swift boat commander who took over Kerry's boat after Kerry returned home with three Purple Hearts in 1969. He didn't know Kerry until later. They met in the national debate over the merits of the war and a claim by war opponents, including Kerry, that American troops commonly committed atrocities.
After O'Neill confronted Kerry on a Washington TV station, he said, he got a call from the White House. He then met with President Richard Nixon and his counselor Charles Colson.
O'Neill said he had "read in the papers" that the White House later asked him to speak in Philadelphia at a meeting of the National Conference of Mayors. He said he made a speech but doesn't remember who asked him to attend.
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good.
I hope the next ad explains why they're doing this - kerry insulted their honor and service for political gain when it was convenient - and now they're setting the record straight.
bump for the swifties
I gave them my $50 bucks.
"Swift Boat Veterans for Truth is registered...as a so-called 527 organization"
No bias here-I mean, it either is or it isn't.
So-called George Soros could not be reached for comment.
"Democrats have said the group is nothing but a Republican hit squad determined to besmirch their candidate. "
Hey, if Soros gets a 527, why can't these guys?
Kerry can disprove the Swiftboad Vets pretty easily by RELEASING HIS RECORDS!
Oops, forgot. These guys were financed by a Republican donor. That's different! (being sarcastic here, of course!)
I feel good that I'm doing my small part for the cause.
Bush/Cheney '04!
Make that $400,025 from 8,001.
Ping.
Well that is pretty funny because John O'Neil voted for Algore and Perot twice, and has stated so.
He just did an interview on Hugh Hewett and there is a thread on FR.
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1191143/posts
I gave em $50. I have NEVER, EVER, given to a non-party organization except the NRA, but these guys got under Kerry's skin so badly they must be doing something right. Please donate to them: they have done more in one month than that National Republican Senatorial Committee has done in two years.
https://coral.he.net/~swiftvet/swift/ccdonation.php?op=donate&site=SwiftVets
Contributions can also be sent to:
Swift Boat Veterans for Truth
c/o Weymouth Symmes, Treasurer
PO Box 26184
Alexandria, VA 22313
When contributing by check, please include your occupation and employer.
bump
Check out another ad by the same firm (Stevens, Reed, Curcio and Potholm) that produced the Swift Boat ad at CrushKerry.com , listed as "Only Thinner". Hilarious but with a message. Chris Matthews is the rudest host on the tube, and John O'Neill showed tremendous class.
I sent them money and can't wait to buy the book. I hope they use some of the book proceeds to finance their effort. Soros has a billion, but these guys have the truth, and Kerry did them the favor of tying his own noose at his own convention.
Per Ann Coulter, O'Neill also told Nixon back in 1971 that he was from a long family of Democrats, was Democrat himself and had voted for Hubert Humphrey.
It's harder convincing folks of facts tucked inside just an opinion column so I'm trying to find some other verification of that... no luck yet.
A "so-called" Bump! ;)
I donated $50 last night. I don't like CFR and the resulting 527s, but if it's good for the goose, it's good for the gander.
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