Mr. Kerry, You Asked for This

What goes around comes around

by Vincent Fiore
08/16/04

Vietnam veteran John O’Neil, spokesman of the organization calling itself "Swift Boat Veterans for Truth,” released a devastating ad condemning Democratic Presidential nominee John Kerry as being unable to “lead,” and further calling him dishonest, a betrayer to his shipmates, and most devastating of all, a “liar” regarding the commission of at least one of the Purple Hearts he received. The outrage that quivered off the lips of the Kerry campaign was, understandably, filled with anger and disbelief.

Calling a special press conference in May at the National Press Club in Washington, O’Neil and 25 other veterans who served with Kerry, put his campaign on notice with the released this statement:

We resent very deeply the false war crimes charges he made coming back from Vietnam in 1971 and repeated in the book ‘Tour of Duty.’ We think those cast an aspersion on all those living and dead, from our unit and other units in Vietnam. We think that he knew he was lying when he made the charges, and we think that they're unsupportable. We intend to bring the truth about that to the American people.

We believe, based on our experience with him, that he is totally unfit to be the Commander-in-Chief.

These are real tough words from tough, real, men. With the majority of vets throughout the country supporting Bush over Kerry, 58% to 35%, in this year’s Presidential showdown, it may look to some as if John O’Neil’s group is essentially preaching to the choir with this ad. But more on that in a moment.

It is, one of the most controversial, no-holds-barred campaign commercials the history of elections. Or is it?

In 2000, the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) funded one of the most vicious and noxious thirty-second spots in political history:

I’m Renee Mullins, James Byrd’s daughter. On June 7, 1998 in Texas my father was killed. He was beaten, chained, and then dragged 3 miles to his death, all because he was black. So when Governor George W. Bush refused to support hate-crime legislation, it was like my father was killed all over again. Call Governor George W. Bush and tell him to support hate-crime legislation. We won’t be dragged away from our future.

Or how about this gem of an ad run by Democrats in Missouri in 1998:

When you don't vote, you let another church explode. When you don't vote, you allow another cross to burn. When you don't vote, you let another assault wound a brother or sister . . . Vote smart. Vote Democratic for Congress and the U.S. Senate.

So callousness, or smearing to some, is not new to political speech in ads. It is just “new” for Democrats to have it used against them. This “patently false” ad, as the Kerry campaign describes it in a 36-page rebuttal, has the same ring of truth to it as does Kerry’s “band of brothers,” heroic claims of him. When you get right down to it, it is between these two groups of honorable men who are totally opposite when viewing John Kerry. The choir they preach to is not each other, but the American electorate.

I think, though, that I am more offended by the surprised and indignant outrage of the Kerry campaign, and its liberal supporters in the media. So to those among the Democratic Party as a whole, and the media elite that look at political hardball as a one-way street, I ask you:

Did you think that Republicans and groups in favor of Bush were going to consistently wilt under your demagogic twaddle, and not fire back one day?

Did you believe that you could continuously produce such raw fiction as “9/11 Fahrenheit,” and not look in the rear view mirror?

Did you expect to push countless books written by accomplished fabricators as Al Franken, Joe Wilson, and Richard Clarke, and not foresee a response headed your way?

Did you think that Democratic “527” surrogate groups like MoveOn.org and America Coming Together (ACT), would always be able to run ads that have about as much “truth” in them as a state penitentiary, and not expect payback?

Did you really think Bush supporters would just sit back and watch George Soros try to buy the election? Guess again.

John Kerry, you asked for this. You have boisterously, and ceaselessly, sought to have the American electorate judge you on your four-month stint in Vietnam in regard to your running for the highest office in the land. You have nearly omitted your last thirty years of your life in politics—as a prosecutor, a lieutenant governor for Michael Dukakis, and as the Senate’s most liberal member. It is a strategy of camouflage, and a deceptive one at that.

So before anyone among the Democratic Party condemns these other war heroes who have banded together to tell a different story than the one the other “band of brothers” have been telling for months now, pause a moment in your judgment. John O’Neil and his band of brothers have as much validity, and for certain as much right, to say what they want. The only thing you have to do is listen, and draw your own conclusions.

The problem here is not one of content, but possibly context. For when one looks at John Kerry’s career since Vietnam, and just how he has run his campaign, it has almost been one of self-stealth. There are vast areas of his professional life that Kerry is loath to openly discuss--who he really is and just what he has done in his years in politics. When viewed in this context, you see that the charges that John O’Neil and his Swift Boaters are laying at the voter’s feet are really not so outrageous at all.

Well, the people will know whom to believe. They always do.