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Failed presidential candidate John Kerry blasted President Bush on Thursday as a "criminal" who has been "looting the country." The Massachusetts Democrat offered the incendiary comments during an off the record meeting with liberal bloggers after a speech in Los Angeles to the Pacific Council on International Policy. According to the Web site L.A. Observed, Kerry asked the bloggers to keep his comments confidential; a request they apparently dismissed out of hand without telling him. Blogger "Hollywood Liberal" reports that Kerry "agreed completely with someone's assessment that everything that Bush does is solely for the purpose of looting the country....

Kate Zernike's story on the front page of the Memorial Day Sunday New York Times, "Kerry Pressing Swift Boat Case Long After Loss," is an unfortunate reminder of the Times's embarrassingly poor coverage of Kerry in the face of the Swift Boat Veterans' for Truth charges in the 2004 election. Now as then, the Times acts as if the issues involved were between Kerry's latest representations of his record and the "unsubstantiated" charges of the Swift Boat group. The Times used the term "unsubstantiated" more than twenty times during its election coverage and continues to make no discernable effort to...

The puff piece starts out: “John Kerry starts by showing the entry in a log he kept from 1969: “Feb 12: 0800 run to Cambodia.” Right off the bat, this is the first piece where the Swift Boat Vets were 100% correct. At the time, John Kerry stated that his trip took place on Christmas Eve in 1968. The SBV were right at the time, he was NOT iN Cambodia on Christmas Eve of 1968. Kerry had said that this moment was “seared” into him. After the Vets came out, Kerry had his personal biographer come out and it changed...

John Kerry starts by showing the entry in a log he kept from 1969: "Feb 12: 0800 run to Cambodia." Graphic: Kerry's New Evidence He moves on to the photographs: his boat leaving the base at Ha Tien, Vietnam; the harbor; the mountains fading frame by frame as the boat heads north; the special operations team the boat was ferrying across the border; the men reading maps and setting off flares. "They gave me a hat," Mr. Kerry says. "I have the hat to this day," he declares, rising to pull it from his briefcase. "I have the hat." Three...

Kerry Pressing Swiftboat Case, Long After Loss By KATE ZERNIKE John Kerry starts by showing the entry in a log he kept from 1969: "Feb 12: 0800 run to Cambodia." He moves on to the photographs: his boat leaving the base at Ha Tien, Vietnam; the harbor; the mountains fading frame by frame as the boat heads north; the special operations team the boat was ferrying across the border; the men reading maps and setting off flares. "They gave me a hat," Mr. Kerry says. "I have the hat to this day," he declares, rising to pull it from his...

WASHINGTON -- As Senator John F. Kerry prepared to make a return to presidential-style politics with a classic day of New Hampshire campaigning, he said that the 2004 run left him tougher and more eager to fight. ''When you get knocked on your ass and lose a race, you've got to stop and reflect on what you're doing, why you're doing it, what matters, and what's important. And I did," Kerry said in an interview in his Senate office on Thursday. ''There's a very different John Kerry now who is absolutely crystal clear about how I communicate what I need...

I've just learned that Anne O'Neill, John O'Neill's wife has died in Houston from an infection contracted during chemotherapy. Anne was a woman of courage and grace, and I consider it a privilege to have known her. I ask your prayers for John and for the O'Neill family.

Last week, John Walker Lindh  petitioned the president to commute his 20-year sentence for fighting with the Taliban, imposed in 2002.  It’s a shame that this pampered child of Marin County is sitting in a cell for something as trivial as treason. Under a plea bargain, Walker Lindh (AKA: Abdul Hamid, AKA: Sulayman Al-Lindh) pleaded guilty to supplying services to the Taliban regime and carrying explosives for  Afghanistan’s former rulers.Which is like to saying that Benedict Arnold supplied services to George III. Johnny Jihad trained in an al-Qaeda camp – where he learned to fire an AK-47 and rubbed elbows...

The author of Unfit for Command was a law clerk for the late Chief Justice and remembers him fondly.The busts of the Chief Justices of the United States stand facing each other two-by-two across the Great Hall of the Supreme Court Building. Hughes and Taft, Vinson and Warren the fifteen statues march slowly to the courtroom doors, marking silently the progression of our nation's history. There is an empty niche immediately outside the doors of the Great Courtroom. Soon that niche will be filled with a marble depiction of Chief Justice William H. Rehnquist—the last World War II veteran to...

L.Brent Bozell III's Media Research Center was confounding liberal media types well before any bloggers hooked up their modems. Nailing ideologues left and far left is the Center's specialty, especially at its annual Media DisHonors Awards gala, which took place Thursday at the J.W. Marriott. Good thing some journalists still haven't gotten the memo about liberal bias. Conservative talk titans Sean Hannity, Neal Boortz and recent Time cover girl Ann Coulter were all there to stick it to scribes who can't help letting their guard down-- and biases show. CBS' Dan Rather, who left his anchor chair last month after...

Note: the parody CD discussed below is the brainchild of a couple of "FReepers." The owner of the website FreeRepublic.com has no financial interest or any other interest in the company Right Wing Parodies LLC or in the album. ==================================================================== 3-24-05 It is a CD that will certainly cause some controversy. Oh, those mean right wingers. Look what they are doing now. Right Wing Parodies LLC has announced the release of its parody CD - YOU'VE BEEN FREEPED, Vol. 1. The CD skewers Democratic politicians and other disgusting folk without mercy. To be "FReeped" is a term used on the...

What a thrill. John O'Neill, the man who led the group that kept John Kerry out of the White House, left me a great message today. Yesterday, I left a message on his machine asking where I could send him a copy of YOU'VE BEEN FREEPED, Vol. 1, which contains the song that honors the Swift Vets --- ONE FINE SOLDIER. John said that he loved the song and was "tremendously honored." His son burned a CD and added it to his favorite songs. He also said he would never forget and and all the guys (I presume his Swiftee...

Confrontation with John Kerry A confrontation with Senator John Kerry and a very negative response for our Washington Bureau Chief. Things haven't changed in the five months since Kerry lost the presidential race. This time someone wants to make sure he loses his next run for the senate. Washingon Bureau Chief Don Hammond tracked Kerry down.

from the web: Kerry was droning about his opposition to ANWR at his OWN news conference. Hammond jumped up: HAMMOND: Senator Kerry, I'm Don Hammond from News Central. Can I ask you one question? KERRY: Excuse me? HAMMOND: Thank you very much. A great measure of a democracy also is letting people ask questions in forums such as this. KERRY: Everybody's going to ask their questions, you know, and you clearly have a loud voice and will be able to get your voice -- [laughter] HAMMOND: Thank you so much. And I know you shifted a little bit from ANWR...

WASHINGTON -- When compiling a list of genuine reformers in the United States Senate, a name that does not spring automatically to mind is that of Trent Lott of Mississippi. But the Republican former majority leader has seized the role and is driving hard to end the worst abuses of the last presidential campaign. Those abuses stemmed from the expansion of so-called 527 groups, nominally independent political organizations that collected $400 million in essentially unregulated funds and poured them into TV ad campaigns, often of the nastiest variety. Democrats were the main abusers, with billionaire George Soros and friends financing...

Sen. Ted Kennedy has already announced his pick for the 2008 presidential race, and it's the same candidate he backed in 2004. Asked if he'd be climbing aboard the Hillary Clinton bandwagon, Kennedy told ABC's "This Week": "I'm from Massachusetts. And we have a candidate, I think, probably up there as well." Asked specifically if Sen. John Kerry had his support for 2008, Kennedy said, "Oh, yes . . My Man's John Kerry." And what about Mrs. Clinton? "I have enormous respect for Sen. Clinton," Kennedy said. "I admire her, I respect her. She's qualified for whatever job she achieves."

Maureen Dowd's column on Sunday was full of the usual hyperbole and ridiculousness, but one phrase in particular stood out: "This White House seems to prefer softball questions from a self-advertised male escort with a fake name to hardball questions from journalists with real names..." I'm confused. Every day Scott McLellan steps into a room filled with big-name journalists - some, like the now-retired Helen Thomas, with political leanings every bit as far to the left as Gannon's were to the right - who ask their "hardball questions." It may be a bit of an overstatement to say the White...

It's like a Washington sequel to "Reservoir Dogs." Finally rested up from their cynical assault last year on John Kerry's patriotism, the most ruthless smear squad in American politics is back together again. And they're revving up for another nasty job. Their latest ugly enterprise? Sliming the AARP, which had the nerve to come out against President Bush's plan to privatize Social Security. This is the same gang of rhetorical hatchet men behind the deceptively named Swift Boat Veterans for Truth. During last year's presidential campaign, they were telling vicious lies about Kerry's combat record in Vietnam. Now, they're turning...

Zell Miller to speak..

Euphoric after a big election victory, the organizers of this year's Conservative Political Action Conference say it's only fitting to pay tribute to the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth for helping to stop Sen. John Kerry's presidential bid. Former Georgia Sen. Zell Miller, the Democrat credited with giving one of the most memorable speeches in favor of President Bush at the Republican National Convention this summer, will present the award to Adm. Roy Hoffman (Ret.), founder and chairman of the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth. "For a second time, the Swift Boat Veterans stepped up to serve their country honorably...