NOW, O'Reilly has them on...after judging them harshly and dismissing the ad!!! That burns me up that he did that without even knowing any facts whatsoever!
DAVID BROCK GOES AFTER KERRY BOOK AUTHOR [08/09 08:43 AM]
NRO readers may or may not be familiar with David Brock's new outfit, Media Matters, which describes itself, "a Web-based, not-for-profit progressive research and information center dedicated to comprehensively monitoring, analyzing, and correcting conservative misinformation in the U.S. media." Basically, they complain that conservatives are expressing conservative opinion, all over the airwaves.
Anyway, they've used the DNC's Brown Book material on Jerome Corsi, co-author of the new book slamming Kerry's Vietnam record with John O'Neill. Brace yourself, it turns out Corsi has strong, four-letter-word-strewn opinions about Islam, the pedophilia scandals in the Catholic Church, Hillary Clinton, referred to Janet Reno as "Janet Rhino" and called Katie Couric "Little Katie Communist." There are worse examples, like when he called Chelsea Clinton names, or hoped for a plane to hit the set of the West Wing.
But basically Media Matters "uncovers" that Corsi's got strong opinions and has called people names in the past.
And I'm sure these comments will essentially designate him a "nut" in most of the nation's newsrooms. Of course, are these comments any worse than comparing terrorist Abu Zarqawi to America's founding fathers, as Michael Moore did? Some nutty views are greeted by the press with a shake of the head and a lament, "oh, that wacky Michael!" And then there are those that get you ignored.
USA TODAY TIDBITS [08/09 08:28 AM]
USA Today writes about Swift Boat Veterans for truth, and uncovers these nuggets:
Retired Army general Tommy Franks, who commanded U.S. forces in Afghanistan and Iraq, told ABC's This Week on Sunday that Kerry is "absolutely" qualified to be commander in chief...
The group's chairman and founder, retired rear admiral Roy Hoffmann, says the veterans were angered after reading historian Douglas Brinkley's book about Kerry's service, Tour of Duty: John Kerry and the Vietnam War. Hoffman says the biography is "replete with gross exaggerations, distortions of fact and outright lies."
As for waiting until a news conference this May to come forward, Hoffmann says, "When (Kerry) was in Massachusetts, that was Massachusetts' problem." Things changed, he says, "when he announced his candidacy to be the commander in chief."
Brinkley accuses the group of "a smear campaign." He interviewed at least seven of the men, some of whom he portrays harshly. Hoffmann, the Navy's top swift boat commander in Vietnam, is described in the book as "blood-thirsty" and "egomaniacal."
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Lt. Jim Rassmann, the man who Kerry pulled out of the river, is the first to use the magic words, attributing the ad to "the Republican slime machine." And USA Today provides less context than the Kerry Spot in their assessment of the medical report:
Louis Letson, a doctor who says he treated Kerry. He says Kerry didn't deserve his first Purple Heart because he "inadvertently wounded himself" and "there was no hostile fire." Medical records, however, note that Kerry was treated for shrapnel by J.C. Carreon, not Letson. Bill Zaladonis, who was on Kerry's boat at the time, says the men believed they were shooting at Viet Cong.
FactCheck.org, a non-partisan group that monitors political ads, says Letson's story is "based on hearsay, and disputed hearsay at that." It concludes, "There is reason to doubt" the Swift Boat Veterans' ad because of its funding and because of the discrepancies in memory between Kerry's defenders and attackers.
They don't even mention Letson's claim that Carreon was his hospitalman at the time.
DNC HITTING BACK AGAINST SWIFT BOAT VETS [08/09 08:21 AM]
CrushKerry.com reports that the "Democrat National Committee has prepared a full-scale assault against the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth to draw their character and veracity into question, according to one anonymous source inside the DNC... “We have prepared what we call ‘Brown Books’ that contain damaging military records, personal credit histories, medical histories, psychiatric histories, divorce records, you name it,” our source told us. "We've got the goods on the Veterans who oppose Kerry."
On the one hand, this is predictable. On the other hand... all 250 of these guys have bad credit reports or divorce records that suggest they're liars?
UPDATE: Instapundit concludes, "if people start dishing dirt about these guys instead of offering factual refutations, it will pretty much serve as an admission that the charges are true."
Good to see Fox isn't following the lamestram lead in ignoring this story. If this was about Buah, it would lead every nightly news broadcast for the next month.
9:00 pm: John O'Neill will appear on the Hannity & Colmes (Fox News cable TV, national).
Excellent, will be watching.
I think this was the guy who was ON the boat with Kerry over Christmas.
Monday, August 9, 2004
8:00 pm: Steve Gardner will appear on the Bill O'Reilly Show (Fox News cable TV, national).
9:00 pm: John O'Neill will appear on the Hannity & Colmes (Fox News cable TV, national).
One of them, not sure of the name, will be on Pat Robertson's 700 Club tomorrow, Tuesday, August 10.
I heard Gardner on with Michael Savage on Friday and he was great!
Will be on the 700 club tomorrow.
NIGHTLINE: Truth is the First Casualty
Nightline Daily E-Mail
August 9, 2004
TONIGHT'S FOCUS: Service in the Vietnam War, or lack of service, has become an issue in this election. John Kerry is running on his service record, the President is still dogged by questions about his service in the National Guard. Now there are veterans for Kerry, and veterans against him.
I am amazed at how angry people are these days. There is a group out there called Swift Boat Veterans for Truth. They have launched an ad attacking John Kerry's service in Vietnam. They have paid to run the ad in only three states, figuring, quite correctly, that they would get lots of free coverage on news shows. Now there are some interesting things about this group. There are connections to the Republican Party, one of the veterans who had written a glowing assessment of Kerry back in Vietnam signed an affidavit attacking him, then sort of retracted that in a newspaper interview, and then apparently retracted the retraction.
Now I say people are angry because we have gotten a number of e-mails, starting the day the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth began their campaign, accusing us of all sorts of bias and worse for not investigating their claims. Whatever happened to patience? We wanted to investigate, but that takes a little time, but these days, unless there is some sort of instant response, it's clearly evidence of a conspiracy, or bias, or worse. Not sure what the "worse" is, but it seemed like a good way to end the sentence. I am increasingly convinced that we have lost something important in this country, and that's the capacity for honest disagreement. These days it's not enough that you have to prove the other person is wrong, you have to attack them and prove that they are a bad person for being wrong.
In any case, we're going to take a look at all this tonight. Correspondent Jake Tapper will take a look at the dispute, the dueling groups of swift boat veterans, and the political connections on both sides. He'll also try to sort out the accuracy of the claims on both sides, although, as I said above, I don't expect that to satisfy anyone. And I don't say that with any happiness. Correspondent Mike Cerre, himself a veteran of Vietnam, will look at the split within the Vietnam veteran community as a whole. And does this dispute matter to other voters?
Michel Martin will anchor tonight. Will we answer people's questions about this? That's certainly our intention. Will we bring back civility to this debate, or any other? I'm not that naïve.
Leroy Sievers and the Nightline Staff
Nightline Offices
ABC News Washington Bureau
Swift Vets on Oreilly and Hannity tonight
Monday, August 9, 2004
8:00 pm: Steve Gardner will appear on the Bill O'Reilly Show (Fox News cable TV, national).
9:00 pm: John O'Neill will appear on the Hannity & Colmes (Fox News cable TV, national).
http://www.geocities.com/~swiftydavep/reunion00.html
I have a friend who attended the reunion. kerry was there for one thing - photo ops. No one cheered, apparently the room became quite still and as the web page will attest, was not the camera favorite.