John Kerry to strike back at "infidelity"-coverage, will appear on Imus-Show [LIVE THREAD]

ShortNews ^ | Friday the 13th 2004

[vox humana]

I did not have sex with that woman!

[leadpenny]

There are so many things that you bring up that call to me. Not you - the items want to suck me in. I don't want to fight the war anymore. Most of what I would say would be in terms of War Stories, and I've heard all my War Stories. But I'll take just one area and try to stay focused.

If we bombed them, they would have withdrawn as the General points out . . .

We did bomb them - endlessly. They were in "Total War." We were in a limited war. That is not the fault of the anti-war crowd - that's the fault of leadership. You can't lead the country where it does not want to go. I was just an Army Huey driver. On my first tour (67) I was in Pleiku. At the end of 67 my unit, the 119th Assault Helicopter Co., worked what was called FOB2 out of Kontum for a month. We put all kinds of people well across the border into Laos. Their purpose was to gather intell and/or disrupt the flow of men and material on the Ho Chi Minh Superhighway. Ours missions were just part of the effort. Many times our missions had to be squeezed in between Tac Air and B-52 sorties also lined up to interdict day and night.

Did it stop the flow? Hardly! After a year and a half at Mother Rucker imparting my vast knowledge of helicopter intrument flying to students I was back in Nam. Only this time I was in the tri-border region to the North (South Vietnam-North Vietnam-Laos) (West of Pleiku was, of course, Cambodia-Laos-South Vietnam). For a few months in early 70 my job was to fly the Army's 24th Corp Arty CG around the AO. He loved to fly and his big guns (175s and 155) at firebases south of the DMZ were trained on those fingers of the Trail coming into South Vietnam from Laos. Of course the best way to see the results of the daily poundings by Arty and airstrikes was from the open door of a UH-1. Day and night they would be hit. And day after day we would be in the area south of Khe Sanh to see how they had hacked out another click of road. No sign of trucks and men and whatever, but they were down there, probably in holes.

As Paul Harvey would say, "Now you know . . . "

Was it General Giap? Whoever? He short-changes his own troops. They had the will and desire. We did not. LBJ can rot in hell.

I don't want Kerry (or any other democrat) to be president but not because he may have or may not have thrown medals over the WH fence. Listen to some of the LBJ tapes when he is discussing the conduct of the war with McNamara or other lackies. He was tormented from the beginning and never had a plan for winning. I will never forgive him for that.

[Neets]

;-)

[AmericanInTokyo]

Welcome to Free Republic. You joined today.

[cyncooper]

I was spit on in SF as I was preparing to leave for my 2nd tour in Nov69. I blame one man - LBJ!

Kerry is a lot of things but he was not responsible for what happened. He was not a corrupt CinC with a corrupt Defense Department.

The first person I heard articulate clearly the idea that Kerry was in large part responsible for others who served in Vietnam returning to the U.S. only to be reviled and spat upon was Mark Steyn. He appears on Hugh Hewitt's radio program on Wednesday's, and after he said this (called Kerry despicable and a contemptible man), and I read about Kerry's Congressional testimony. I am persuaded that Steyn and others are correct. Kerry at least had a hand in fomenting anti-vet sentiment. But of course, for himself he reserves the title of "hero".

He really is despicable and contemptible. Apparently in almost every way imaginable.

[cyncooper]

An ambitious, manipulative John F Kerry is responsible -as is Fonda- for leading impressionable young people to march in the streets jeopardizing the lives of the troops still in harms way.

He is responsible for his testimony before Congress to further his malevolent ambitions.He indicted the troops - the real band of brothers - without any proof and for that he must be held accountable in the public arena.

Repeating to buttress my post.

[cyncooper]

I'm glad you have the Vietnam War all figured out. I'm not there yet. Please don't attempt to put your conclusions up as if they counter my non-existant support of Kerry. I don't have all the answers like you do. Kerry is no more responsible for what we call Vietnam than you or I. LBJ is. And, LBJ is responsible for Kerry.

Best tell Kerry. Even though Kerry went to Vietnam while LBJ was president, he goes around calling it "Nixon's War" and omits that little factoid.

[WOSG]

"I don't want to fight the war anymore. "

I can understand that. I'll let the debate rest, but just say that what you describe - our futility of fighting ant trails without attacking the ant-hill mound in Hanoi - does align with what the Vietnamese General was saying.

Thanks for your service to our country.

[AmericanInTokyo]

Paging the following FREEPERS IN KENYA.

Common Tator; father_elijah; Harmless Teddy Bear; and propertius

How about helping us track down "Alex", the alleged girlfriend, said to be or to have recently been in Kenya. That probably means Nairobi, and certainly it would be easy to track and see if anything is in the local papers about her, if she hangs in 'expat circles, or what-not.

[leadpenny]

Do you reserve any of that contempt for the leadership?

[WOSG]

Welcome to FR.

Bush wont lose this election. Kerry's only close in the polls because only 37% of Americans know he's an extremist Liberal Senator with a Kennedy track record.

They'll find out.

[cyncooper]

Yes I'm waiting for the DNC to start pointing fingers at the RNC for fabricating this story. Or have they done it already??

MSNBC regular programming started hinting about the story by talking about "frontrunner" Kerry about to come under assault. Of course the insinuation is from the republicans, though they don't say exactly. And their "Question of the Day" is "Do you think this will be the dirtiest campaign season ever" or similar phrasing. Curious question all of a sudden. I don't think they are referring to the slanderous and baseless "Bush was AWOL" stories that they've shamelessly led with for days on end that were instigatted by McAuliffe and Clark and Kerry himself.

What a disgusting lot.

[leadpenny]

I'd fight him on that. Remember a few months ago when the little old Toledo Blade did there "Gotcha" piece? They did the same thing. I ended up talking to one of the editors about blaming LBJ v. Nixon. He saw my side.

[cyncooper]

I don't know what that means but I know what freedom of speech is.

I submit that freedom of speech is not going before Congress and lying in your testimony.

[leadpenny]

Thank you for your comments.

- our futility of fighting ant trails without attacking the ant-hill mound in Hanoi -

Of course that goes back to where I started.

[cyncooper]

I'm talking about Kerry, not the whole of the Vietnam story.

[leadpenny]

I know but I just can't get excited about it anymore. We need to (and will) move on before the Fall. Kerry would be an awful president and he would bring all the democrat baggage with him.

We (the country) needs to get off of two things: Kerry's Vietnam War history and W's Guard service.

[cyncooper]

Here's the thing, leadpenny: Kerry constantly harks to his Vietnam experience ("When I returned from Vietnam", or "When I was over in Vietnam"), and one is hardpressed to find an article about him that doesn't preface his name with "decorated war hero" and he goes about with his "Band of Brothers".

I'm willing to set it aside, but I wouldn't equate the two stories. President Bush does not bring up his service, it was being twisted and lied about.

All of it disgraceful. I would be content to talk about Kerry's voting record in the Senate and so forth, but if he's going to hark to his experience and denigrate Bush's service (which he did on Sunday, in a politically subtle and round about way of course) I'll not remain silent.