1) It's nitpicky. Its attempt to prove Kerry's a liar relies ENTIRELY on the viewer being able to discern a difference between medals and ribbons. Sorry, but anyone who understands that difference is already voting for Bush. And who cares if he threw five or six or seven over the fence and changes his story on the number. It's so nitpicky that a neutral viewer will scrunch up their face watching it and go "Bleah." This ad is purely red meat for the true believers.
2) Secondly, there's no gravitas. To go from this silly nitpicky humorous rapid cutting of video clips to the conclusion: "John Kerry--can you trust anything he says?" It just doesn't fit. The evidence in the first half of the ad doesn't lead me to the extremely grave conclusion that I can't trust anything John Kerry says.
There's so much better serious material to use to make the point that you can't trust anything John Kerry says. The medals vs. ribbons flap may be important to the SBV, but it's totally irrelevant to the swing voter. We're talking about who's going to save thousands of lives in Iraq, not about who can remember what they threw over a fence thirty years ago.
You're missing it!
The previous ad, #4 - MEDALS,
http://swift3.he.net/~swift3/medals.wmv
was a perfect setup for the new one!
#4 had established that the symbols of a country, its flag, military, medals, etc. represent the values we hold dear.
Introducing the new video, #5 - DAZED AND CONFUSED,
http://swift3.he.net/~swift3/dazed.wmv
where Al-Qaery in his own words is both denying/admitting he threw away medals in an adroit editing job of classic flipping and flopping. But even then, Al-Qaery admits that regardless he was renouncing the symbols of his country, and that he's proud of it!
"gravitas" ? That over-worked description went out with Al Gore.
I disagree. It highlights Kerry's recent attempt to draw a torturous distinction between medals and ribbons and sympbols. It makes it clear that the nitpicking was being done by Monsieur Kerry and the average person will ask "why".
It is plain as day that the Kerry of recent days was trying to distance himself from his actions from years ago and this ad serves up the issue to viewers so they can see that for themselves. It's quite stark and effective.
The first ad, as has been pointed out, laid the groundwork for the meaning of these awards and Kerry's frame of mind back then, far from the picture he's been painting of himself as super soldier/super patriot.
If you can't see the deliberate "lie" in this ad, time to find a german shepherd to lead you around.
Wrong! Instead of important current issues, thanks to Kerry and the "objective" media we are talking about what happened thirty years ago.
I couldn't disagree with you more. He is indignant today in saying I didn't have the medals with me, I just through away the ribbons, and how precise he has answered the question. But the clip from the past shows him being quite precise in saying it was the "medals themselves" and he numbers them, thinking out loud that it was anywhere from 6 to 9. Further, the ad doesn't nitpick about the number. The number simply shows that he was being precise back then, making it so amazing that he would stand before people today and defend his contradiction so indignantly. You can't pass that away as being a faulty memory. He was caught in a lie and on the video from today was trying to fudge. This ad symolizes what he does on everything. I believe it is simple to understand and should resonate with most anyone except the hardened lib.
It is clear you do not understand why the Swift Vets for Truth are producing and disseminating these ads. What you call picking nits is what they call revealing the truth about someone who stole their honor.
Give the entire ad campaign time to play out and judge it as a whole. These men are bringing down John F. Kerry in a way nothing George W. Bush, the GOP, all the conservatives in America, could have.
When the (Seattle) King County Library System ordered its initial batch of _Unfit for Command_, they ordered 26 copies. Then, based on demand, they upped it to 38, then to 50-something. Now they have 76 copies. This is in an extremely liberal area -- Seattle. There are over 300 people waiting to read it. The book, the ads, the TV interviews, the radio interviews, the newspaper reports, etc., are knocking down the straw man.
I'd say they are doing one hell of a job.
Actually, we're talking about both. This is very much about the type of person who can't remember what he threw over a fence 30 years ago. It's about whetyher this man can be trusted to protect your back.
We are those Kerry heartlessly twisted the knife into years ago. Our sons and daughters are in Iraq and Afghanistan now, fighting the war on terror. Kerry wants the war on terror to be another Vietnam. Kerry helped the VNC win the Vietnam war.
Will Kerry save the lives of thousands of our soldiers in Iraq today, though he helped cause the deaths of thousands of soldiers during Vietnam, and the suffering of millions? AND the deaths of millions of Vietnamese adn Campbodians after he helped the enemy "win" that war?
This is what I think the ad does. It shows him as an utter fool who can't stick to a story even over the minutest detail. When I see him going back and forth over "Ribbons and Medals", I start thinking Clinton and the meaning of is. Why does he expend so much breath trying to say he tossed ribbons over the fence instead of Medals?