What's on John Kerry's mind? (part one of a series)

a) Well, the veterans aren't buying the "I was a war hero" thing - screw them, I'm running for President of Vietnam! Teresa, how would you feel about a 58th variety - Heinz Nuoc Mam?

b) Angela Davis stole my bong. Again.

c) Hi, troubled street people of Detroit - I'm John Kerry! And do I have a deal for you! For every false allegation of war crimes you make, we at the Winter Soldier Investigation Committee will give you a gram of hash and a handsome Viet Cong flag - just like the one behind me!

But wait, there's more! You get a quart of Mad Dog 20/20 for every pathetic fellow piece of human flotsam you refer! Come on, we have a Senate Foreign Relations Committee to hoodwink and an entire subcontinent to hand over to Communist mass murderers - so let's get started NOW!

d) (after an amazing flash of prescience) In just thirty years, the Twentieth-Century Fox movie studios will create a television network, hire reporters to make my life a living hell, and mock me mercilessly with a sitcom called "That 70s Show" - where a young man blessed with my craggy eyebrows and big hair gets to climb all over a tall, stacked, stunningly nubile redhead, while I have to settle for rich widows... can I just die now?

e) Next time, I'm going to lobby for the Red Chinese, like Al Gore and Johnny Huang. They actually got paid... what's that, Teresa? Oh, just working on the new book. Can't trust Brinkley not to put actual facts in it, can I? I know, I know, you said we should have used Bob Woodward....

Top ten stories not covered by the national news media of Thursday, August 19th:
Topic: Unintentional truths
unreported story #10)

Alleged historian and confirmed Kerry PR flack Douglas Brinkley is in grave trouble with his boss.

Dr. Brinkley inadvertently alluded to the truth in his puff-piece Kerry war memoir Tour of Duty, by quoting an excerpt from Kerry's secret Navy diaries stating that his crew had seen no combat, dated AFTER Senator Kerry said he'd been injured in combat - an injury for which he had applied for and been awarded a Purple Heart.

Department of Defense regulations require that injuries be sustained during combat in order to qualify for award of the Purple Heart. This disputed injury also counted toward the three Purple Hearts required for Kerry's early return from Vietnam - after four months instead of the usual year-long tour. And now Dr. Brinkley let the cat out of the bag... there wasn't any combat for Kerry to have gotten pinked for that first Purple Heart.

Props to Cybercast News Service for this catch:

"Brinkley Excerpt Confirms Swift Vets' Eyewitness Claims"

I wonder if "Zippo John" Kerry's lawyers are looking into Brinkley's failure to adequately distort the facts as a cause of action against him....


unreported story #9)

Dan Rather took the day off from the CBS Evening News, possibly to locate the two bits of personal anatomy he might need in order to buck his political masters, and report on huge stories such as the two apparently self-inflicted Purple Heart wounds in Kerry's military past, instead of covering and re-covering, and re-covering even more George W. Bush's Air National Guard record since before the 2000 election.

Maybe what Rather, Brokaw, Jennings, Clift, Williams, Liaison and company are saying by omisssion is that it's just not news that Kerry lied on the supporting documentation for two of his Purple Hearts, since he's stretched the long bow on so many other things having to do with his military service record. That would make sense.

Or maybe they're trying to help John Kerry win a Presidential election by slanting the coverage of the election and insulating Kerry from his own past. That, too, fits with what we've seen so far.

And why haven't Lt.(j.g.) John Kerry's naval diaries and other records been released? We the taxpayers paid for Zippo John to play Captain Courageous in the first place, we've been bored stiff with the bowdlerized, "Kerry for Saint" official version of his service, so why aren't we seeing the documents which would affirm - or deny - his entitlement to those medals?

One word, guys - FOIA.


unreported story #8)

The role that millionaire trial lawyers such as Kerry's running mate John Edwards have played in pushing medical insurance premiums through the roof.

Their million-dollar fortunes, tower office suites, luxury cars, trophy wives and Senate seats are paid for right out of those shocking premium increases.

I just heard Mr. Smarmy Voice (I don't know his name, but I recognize his voice-overs on the Democrats' political attack ads that run around the evening news - as opposed to the free political attack programming that runs DURING the evening news) purr indignantly about how George W. Bush doesn't seem to know that medical insurance premiums have increased four times as fast as wages.

But the attack ad neglected to mention how John Edwards and his fellow fat-cat millionaire tort profiteers have not rebated a single penny of their million-dollar tort lawsuit fortunes to help us poor folks pay the medical premiums which Senator Edwards and friends did so much to help make unaffordable.

That would be "constructive," and thus alien to the Kerry/Edwards mindset.

George W. Bush HAS tried, and tried hard, to do something about the medical insurance affordability crisis by pushing medical tort reform - which has been opposed by the very same Democratic Party that bought that lying attack ad with all their hearts. It's possible that the huge donations the Democrats have received from the trial lawyers of the United States of America paid for the air time required to place that ad on the evening news here in Denver.

When we were in junior high, this tactic of the Democrats' was called the "Who farted?" ploy - the idea being to shout "Who farted?" just after losing containment of some gas, implying that whoever was responsible for that awful smell, you weren't. Apparently one of my old classmates now works for the national Democratic Party - a real stinker from the looks of it....


unreported story #7)

Dan Rather and pals are still AWOL on the "Did Kerry fudge his Purple Heart documentation and commit official fraud while in Vietnam, not to mention lie to the American people" story beat.

Is the lack of journalistic ethics, intellectual honesty, impartiality and guts an institutional thing with CBS, NBC, ABC, CNN, and the tax-supported precincts of Public Broadcasting in general?

I mean, if it even appeared that "W" might have falsified documentation for any medal - much less the Purple Heart - much less TWO of them - while in the Air National Guard, we'd have had to sit through fifty network news documentaries (half of them tax-supported episodes of "Frontline" and tax-exempt episodes of "NOW with Bill Moyers") and a Michael Moore movie/libel-fest on the subject by now. The networks would be demanding that our college kids all be given iPods with twenty gigs of Mara Liaison and Cokie Roberts droning on about the whole sordid affair before being allowed to register to vote.

But it's Kerry who might have fudged the books, so there's this massive vacuum of anything resembling investigative journalism on the matter - H. Ross Perot's "huge sucking sound" reverberates all over New York and Washington DC as the elite journalists of the country continue to... suck.

I predict that this vacuum will last until the first week of November 2004, not unlike the coverage of the Clinton sex scandals prior to November 1992 and November 1996. I don't EVER want to hear the practitioners of the national "news" racket pat themselves on the back about their integrity and ethics... ever... again.

I'd say that Dan Rather, Tom Brokaw, Peter Jennings, Juan Williams, Mara Liaison, Eleanor Clift, Juan Williams and their political co-religionists have prostituted themselves and their calling in order to help throw an election, but actual prostitutes sometimes actually do what they're paid for, unlike the employees of the national news media on the Kerry beat. The play-for-pay ladies appear to have at least sporadic professional ethics - most journalists covering John Kerry for the national news organizations don't seem to know what the term means lately.

You have to give Rather this - maybe he just had the decency not to show his face in public tonight after participating in the massive put-up job being conducted on Kerry's behalf by CBS's Election Manipulation division. Can Dan Rather still blush after thirty-plus years pretending to a journalistic objectivity he appears to have lost in Vietnam?



unreported story #6)

In another great catch by Cybercast News Service, "Kerry's False Report Led to Media Assault, Swift Boat Vet Claims", the Washington Post appears to have tried to discredit one of John Kerry's former Swift Boat commanding officers, using military records that their victim Larry Thurlow maintains were routinely falsified by Kerry to exaggerate then-Lt.(jg) Kerry's heroism and the intensity of the actions his command was involved in as primary source material.

Imagine the Washington Post's Ben Bradlee sending Woodward and Bernstein down to help the Nixon White House smear John Dean's reputation by citing John Haldeman's press releases - and you now grasp is exactly what is happening to Larry Thurlow.

In high school journalism class, we learned about these things called "primary sources of information," and how they shouldn't be generated by the subject of an investigative report or any other person whose objectivity might be called into question in the course of an unbiased investigation.

Oops.

Best of luck to Larry Thurlow and his attorneys. If he doesn't have legal representation, he should really look into getting some, on the off chance that the Post's malpractice coverage is up to date. Maybe John Edwards can recommend a good firm in the DC area.

unreported story #5)

Larry Thurlow originally got into trouble with the Washington Post for stating that Kerry falsified the documentation supporting his Bronze Star.

Since Thurlow's own Bronze Star depended on Kerry's account of the same incident, an unbiased news organization might have relied on something beside that account and an abiding faith in John Kerry before discrediting Thurlow. Unfortunately, for Mr. Thurlow, it was the Washington Post on deck and not an unbiased news organization.

Let's walk through the process for a second:

a) A guy exposes himself to ridicule and oppobrium, not to mention the loss of a decoration for valor during combat, in order to set the record straight on what really happened to get him and his former subordinate that medal;

b) "Setting the record straight" means in this case Larry Thurlow saying that Lt. Kerry exaggerated the particulars of a combat action so that Kerry and Thurlow came away with Bronze Stars with Valor devices - medals which are generally awarded to men who go above and beyond the call of duty in combat;

c) The reaction of the Washington Post isn't to investigate whether Kerry's account of the action in question was accurate, but to cite the account WITHOUT QUESTIONING IT in order to discredit Thurlow - the Post making the assumption that OF COURSE Thurlow was put up to outing Kerry as a self-promoting liar.

I covered the "primary source" problem in the last item, so I'll cut straight to the logical problem in what the Post did - someone claims the report of a combat action was faked, so what does the Post do?

They say "this man couldn't have been telling the truth, because we have this report of a combat action that directly contradicts his story!" - and they're talking about one of the very accounts which the man they're discrediting says Kerry faked.

At this point, I can't help remembering the National Lampoon's MAD Magazine cover parody showing Alfred E. Neumann dressed in Lt. William Calley's uniform, asking "What, My Lai?"

Maybe the Lampoon could dress old Alfred up in Kerry's Navy khakis this year. They could use the graphic over an issue consisting of verbatim quotes of the coverage of John Kerry by the national news media - as a satire on how journalism is supposed to work.


unreported story #4)

Presidential candidate John Kerry seems to be having a meltdown.

Again, quoting from the CNS article about the Washington Post's reliance on John Kerry's after-action reports to discredit allegations that Kerry lied on his after-action reports:

"A spokeswoman for the Kerry campaign didn't immediately return CNSNews.com's request for comment. But Kerry denounced the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth, of which Thurlow is a member, during a speech Thursday.

"They're a front for the Bush campaign," Kerry said. "And the fact that the president won't denounce what they're up to tells you everything that you need to know - he wants them to do his dirty work."

Okaaay... The President of the United States of America doesn't take time out from his schedule to denounce people (a) who served with his opponent during Vietnam and (b) say his opponent lied and exaggerated about military actions to get medals he wasn't entitled to, and (c) this is proof that... what, "dirty work" is happening and it's the President's dirty work, and that he wants these people to do it for him?

An equally plausible explanation is (d) Kerry lied and/or exaggerated his ass off on Navy letterhead to get himself some undeserved medals and out of Vietnam after four months instead of the year other officers had to put in.

Maybe that's not true, and that would be good to hear, but you couldn't say that the national news media has tried to investigate the matter - aside from saying that the people making the allegations are Republicans and failing to pursue the matter any further.

That means as much or as little as saying that if the Swift Boat Veterans for Justice had been Democrats, they'd have backed Kerry's version of the story - or that if the people covering the story now hadn't been Democrats, they'd have worked a little harder to see whether there was anything to the allegations.

If these guys are lying, hey, make them AND Bush look bad by PROVING it - do some of that old-school Woodward and Bernstein stuff, people!

Circling wagons around John Kerry and NOT investigating what would be a killer story no matter who's right just proves that the national news media are afraid of what a thorough investigation might show about the man whose professed political stance most closely matches their poorly-concealed biases.

Having successfully painted the President as a Vietnam-era garritrooper, Democrats in and outside the national press must be cringing at the idea of that particular chicken coming home to roost in the Kerry/Edwards coop. If there's anything at all to what Larry Thurlow has to say, a lot of the bronze could flake off of his and John Kerry's stars, leaving a single uncontroverted Purple Heart and a lot of supporting paperwork which John Kerry and his supporters do not want to see the light of day - at least not before November.

Suppressing such a story benefits John Kerry much more than it would George Bush. Apparently John Kerry knows how the "Who farted?" ploy works, too - accuse the other guy of "dirty work" loudly so no one looks too closely at your own dirty work and that of your supporters in the press and electronic media.

Mrs. Heinz-Kerry, please make sure your hubby doesn't miss his afternoon naps.

John forgets to spin coherently when he's grouchy. It's embarrassing.


unreported story #3)

John Kerry qualifies for a free trip to the Hague, according to his testimony before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. If he were any less popular in Europe, maybe he'd get to bunk with Slobodan Milosevic.


unreported story #2)

All the charges John Kerry should have had to face from his Vietnam years:

I like to call this story "The Court Martial of John Forbes Kerry" (in homage to "The Court Martial of George Armstrong Custer")

While as a serving member of Congress, Senator Kerry's person is immune from arrest while Congress is in session, his recall to active duty to stand before an Article 32 hearing to determine whether a court-martial on the following specifications should be convened is probably unlikely.

Unlike the cast of JAG, I don't even play a military lawyer on TV (though I did listen to someone from Air Force JAG talk to my AFROTC class for an hour in 1976), so I can't speak authoritatively, but I understand that Senator Kerry would have to be impeached or lose his Senate seat in some other way (such as a drastic increase in the average IQ of Massachusetts voters come his next election) before anything judicial or court-martial-like happened to him.

However, it's interesting to ponder just how many ways Kerry and those who served with him say that he screwed the pooch, and what sort of trouble he'd be in if he did what he and others said he did, and was found guilty of it all.

The provisions of the Uniform Code of Military Justice pertinent to the conduct in which Lt.(jg) John Forbes Kerry, USN has been accused of committing (my notes explaining why I think Kerry ought to be investigated for violating each provision of the UCMJ are given in italics):

SUBCHAPTER X. PUNITIVE ARTICLES

Section 910. ART 110. IMPROPER HAZARDING OF VESSEL

(a) Any person subject to this chapter who willfully and wrongfully hazards or suffers to be hazarded any vessel of the armed forces shall suffer death or such punishment as a court-martial may direct.

(b) Any person subject to this chapter who negligently hazards or suffers to be hazarded any vessel of the armed forces shall be punished as a court-martial may direct.

(John Kerry has admitted on several occasions, and this has been confirmed by no less an authority than former Chief of Naval Operations Adm. Elmo Zumwalt, to beaching his Swift Boat against enemy-held positions, needlessly exposing his men and innocent civilians - some of whom died as a result - to enemy fire.

Kerry's demeanor on these occasions, according to witnesses, appears to have reflected intent on repeated occasions to "willfully hazard or suffer to be hazarded" his vessel - and innocent people died because of his depraved indifference to their welfare.

Admiral Zumwalt might have saved us all a lot of trouble at this point - instead of pinning a Silver Star on Kerry, he could have jumped on the chance to convene a summary court, find him guilty of Improper Hazarding and execute him right then and there.

But in fairness to the Admiral, who knew that Lt.(jg) Kerry was going to grow up to imperil the freedom of millions, first as a lobbyist for Southeast Asian Communism, then as a political hack, a supporter of two-bit dictators like Daniel Ortega, and a dedicated, tireless foe of American military preparedness?)

Section 926. ART. 126. ARSON

(a) Any person subject to this chapter who willfully and maliciously burns or sets on fire an inhabited dwelling, or any other structure, movable or immovable, wherein to the knowledge of the offender there is at the time a human being, is guilty of aggravated arson and shall be punished as a court-martial may direct.

(b) Any person subject to this chapter who willfully and maliciously burns or sets fire to the property of another, except as provided in subsection (a), is guilty of simple arson and shall be punished as a court-martial may direct.

(John Kerry testified to having committed acts of arson while serving as an officer in the United States Navy before the United States Senate Committee on Foreign Relations.)

Section 907. ART. 107. FALSE STATEMENTS

Any person subject to this chapter who, with intent to deceive, signs any false record, return, regulation, order, or other official document, knowing it to be false, or makes any other false official statement knowing it to be false, shall be punished as a court-martial may direct.

(Several witnesses have alleged that John Kerry made false statements regarding combat or other action, including statements representing non-combat and self-inflicted injuries as injuries received in combat, or misrepresenting noncombat actions as combat actions in order to receive decorations for valor)

Section 928. ART. 128. ASSAULT

(a) Any person subject to this chapter who attempts or offers with unlawful force or violence to do bodily harm to another person, whether or not the attempt or offer is consummated, is guilty of assault and shall be punished as a court-martial may direct.

(b) Any person subject to this chapter who--

(1)commits an assault with a dangerous weapon or other means or force likely to produce death or grievous bodily harm; or

(2) commits an assault and intentionally inflicts grievous bodily harm with or without a weapon; is guilty of aggravated assault and shall be punished as a court-martial may direct.

(John Kerry testified to having committed acts of assault while serving as an officer in the United States Navy before the United States Senate Committee on Foreign Relations.)

Section 918. ART. 118. MURDER

Any person subject to this chapter whom without justification or excuse, unlawfully kills a human being, when he--

(1) has a premeditated design to kill;

(2) intends to kill or inflict great bodily harm;

(3) is engaged in an act which is inherently dangerous to others and evinces a wanton disregard of human life; or

(4) is engaged in the perpetration or attempted perpetration of burglary, sodomy, rape, robbery, or aggravated arson; is guilty of murder, and shall suffer such punishment as a court-martial may direct, except that if found guilty under clause (1) or (4), he shall suffer death or imprisonment for life as a court-martial may direct.

Section 919. ART. 119. MANSLAUGHTER

(a) Any person subject to this chapter who, with an intent to kill or inflict great bodily harm, unlawfully kills a human being in the heat of sudden passion caused by adequate provocation is guilty of voluntary manslaughter and shall be punished as a court-martial may direct.

(b) Any person subject to this chapter who, without an intent to kill or inflict great bodily harm, unlawfully kills a human being--

(1) by culpable negligence; or

(2) while perpetrating or attempting to perpetrate an offense, other than those named in clause (4) of section 918 of this title (article 118), directly affecting the person; is guilty of involuntary manslaughter and shall be punished as a court-martial may direct.

(John Kerry testified to having killed noncombatant persons protected by the Geneva Convention while serving as an officer in the United States Navy before the United States Senate Committee on Foreign Relations.

Whether, if he were found guilty of the acts he claims to have committed, the act or acts he admitted to would constitute murder or manslaughter, and which degreee of manslaughter (if applicable) is properly a matter for the court-martial panel to determine.

The deaths resulting from Kerry's Improper Hazarding of the vessel under his command might also be actionable as manslaughter.)

Section 878. ART. 78. ACCESSORY AFTER THE FACT

Any person subject to this chapter who, knowing that an offense punishable by this chapter has been committed, receives, comforts, or assists the offender in order to hinder or prevent his apprehension, trial, or punishment shall be punished as a court-martial may direct.

(John Kerry testified to possessing knowledge regarding other servicemen's violations of the Uniform Code of Military Justice, including acts of assault, murder, rape and arson directed at noncombatant persons protected under the Geneva Conventions, while serving as an officer in the United States Navy before the United States Senate Committee on Foreign Relations.

Kerry's failure to report such acts to competent military authority in a timely manner could be construed as assisting or attempting to assist them to avoid being arrested, tried or punished for such violations.)

Section 915. ART 115. MALINGERING

Any person subject to this chapter who for the purpose of avoiding work, duty, or service--

(1) feigns illness, physical disablement, mental lapse or derangement; or
(2) intentionally inflects self-injury; shall be punished as a court-martial may direct.

(the manner in which John Kerry sustained two injuries could reasonably be considered self-inflicted if the testimony of other officers, including Kerry's commander during his training period, is correct.

Kerry is alleged to have attempted to misrepresent the first such injury to his training base commander as a combat wound, despite other crewmen's denial that combat occurred when Kerry was injured, and despite the evidence that the only weapon fired which could have caused the wound to which Kerry referred was the one fired at a river bank by Kerry himself.

After Kerry's commander refused to endorse his application for a Purple Heart for the wound in question, Kerry appears to have obtained the medal by means unknown to his commanding officer at the time the wound was sustained.

The second wound considered under this specification consisted of a bruise to Kerry's buttocks and lodging of rice grains in Kerry's skin after he (according to others who were present) threw a hand grenade in a cache of rice.

Again, according to others who were present, this was not done in combat. It is open to conjecture whether Kerry knowingly inflicted this injury on himself, but he claimed that it occurred in combat and was successfully awarded the Purple Heart on that basis.

The two injuries in question are alleged by other officers not to have occurred in combat, resulted from Kerry's use of antipersonnel grenades outside of combat and not according to doctrine for employment of these devices, and were alleged to have been fraudulently reported as combat injories - with the ultimate result that Kerry's tour of duty in Vietnam was shortened from the usual twelve months to four months.

Again, if the evidence supports these statements, at least one charge of malingering could be brought against Kerry)

Section 880. ART. 80. ATTEMPTS

(a) An act, done with specific intent to commit an offense under this chapter, amounting to more than mere preparation and tending, even though failing, to effect its commission, is an attempt to commit that offense.

(b) Any person subject to this chapter who attempts to commit any offense punishable by this chapter shall be punished as a court-martial may direct, unless otherwise specifically prescribed.

(c) Any person subject to this chapter may be convicted of an attempt to commit an offense although it appears on the trial that the offense was consummated.

(for trying to violate the provisions of the Uniform Code of Military Justice which were mentioned in the allegations made against Kerry and to which he testified having committed while serving as an officer in the United States Navy before the United States Senate Committee on Foreign Relations; this article applies even though the attempt was successful and resulted in guilt of another offense under the UCMJ.)

Section 933. ART. 133. CONDUCT UNBECOMING AN OFFICER AND A GENTLEMAN

Any commissioned officer, cadet, or midshipman who is convicted of conduct unbecoming an officer and a gentleman shall be punished as a court-martial may direct.

(self-explanatory)

Section 934. ART. 134. GENERAL ARTICLE

Though not specifically mentioned in this chapter, all disorders and neglects to the prejudice of good order and discipline in the armed forces, all conduct of a nature to bring discredit upon the armed forces, and crimes and offenses not capital, of which persons subject to this chapter may be guilty, shall be taken cognizance of by a general, special or summary court-martial, according to the nature and degree of the offense, and shall be punished at the discretion of that court.

(self-explanatory)


unreported story #1)

The elite media personalities of America are - with only a few blessed exceptions such as the staff of the Weekly Standard, most conservative talk radio hosts, and Fox News' Brit Hume - in complete cognitive dissonance.

In English, that means that the likes of Eleanor Clift, Dan Rather, Tom Brokaw, and Peter Jennings are capable of holding several mutually contradictory ideas in their heads at the same time, and voicing these ideas without any sign of embarrasment or discomfort at all.

Case in point: John Kerry.

These people believe

(a) "Killing people is bad and unforgivable unless

(b) you're John Kerry and you mostly killed friendly civilians and were really traumatized by it, and you wore a really bad haircut and a ratty field jacket for years and hung out with smelly Sterno drinkers in Detroit to atone for it, then resolved to further atone by helping world Communism take over Southeast Asia at a cost of 1.5 million lives -

(c) but that's all right because John said in his Senate testimony that those Cambodian guys chose to live under the Khmer Rouge and have their heads lopped off with garden hoes for owning books and wearing glasses, and...

(d) Wouldn't Teresa make a wonderful First Lady? None of this boring "cause" crap for her, it'll be boozerama and strapless evening wear at the Residence every night - CAMELOT, came-a-lot, whatEVER, we'll have another JFK in the White House, hot and cold running abortions on demand, and that's worth a LOT of broken journalistic ethics! It's time for a return to the Pierre Salinger School of Political Journalism!"

You don't want to read more examples of how elite media journalists think any more than I want to write them, but there's just one more thing I want to leave you with -

This is the guy the liberal elite think is a TRUE American patriot:

Note John Kerry's flag of true allegiance in the background - the banner of the Viet Cong.

At least George W. Bush has ALWAYS known which flag to salute - the American flag. I'm unwilling to take the chance that Kerry might decide to imitate Al Gore at some future date and start saluting the Red banner of the Communist Chinese.

John Kerry. Walter Cronkite, Peter Arnett - 'Heroes' in the "War Back Home"
Topic: Kerry's Lies and Spin
I screwed up on an earlier post ("John Kerry in Dire Straits") here, referring to liberals rooting for Vietnam-era war criminals as though it were remarkable. That's just not true, and apologies are offered where appropriate.

General Vo Ngyuen Giap and his boss Ho Chi Minh were effusive in their gratitude to John Kerry, Peter Arnett (of "they had to destroy the city to save it" fame), Walter Cronkite (whose solemn on-camera assessment of the 1968 Tet Offensive as a Communist "win" was just short of a baldfaced lie, unsupported by anything but leftist hyperbole mislabeled as reporting such as Arnett's), and their friends for "winning the war in America" for them.

Without such work above and beyond the call of duty as Kerry's recitation of the leftist horse crap generated by the "Winter Soldier Investigation" before the Senate, and the Democratic Congressional leadership's illegal and immoral repudiation of our treaty obligations to the people of the Republic of Vietnam, the sacrifices of the fifty thousand Americans who died in the Vietnamese Theater of Operations might have been validated by a free South Vietnam today.

Kerry's successful lobbying to sabotage "Vietnamization" of the war - which in easy-to-understand terms was getting the Army of the Republic of Vietnam trained, equipped and supplied to the point where the South Vietnamese would successfully repulse attacks from the North without American troops fighting beside them - was decisive in winning that war for Horth Vietnam. Thus John Kerry's most meaningful act in the entire Vietnam war was as a lobbyist for the enemy with Congress - undoing the work of all the other Americans who fought and died there.

After they won their war, the leaders of North Vietnam wasted no time in extending their Stalinist dictatorship southward, causing one of the worst human disasters in history as thousands fled South Vietnam in flimsy boats to be robbed, raped and killed. Those who didn't leave the conquered South were in many cases imprisoned in "re-education camps" for lengthy periods - or murdered outright - John Kerry's most significant human legacy, and one for which he has not accepted responsibility.

This explains Kerry's winning the Democratic Party's nomination so handily - finally the Democrats have an admitted murderer of the innocent and an admirer of Ho Chi Minh's work that they can put into office here in the US, instead of living their dream ("one man, one vote, one time" as evidenced by their record of electoral cheating in this country) vicariously through their proteges Fidel Castro, Kim Jong-Il, Robert Mugabe and company.

We Must Destroy Dan Rather and the Democratic Party for the Good of the Nation
Mood:  irritated
Topic: Taking back our Culture
I recently read Hugh Hewitt's If It's Not Close, They Can't Cheat, a book I recommend you all read, because in it Hewitt says with great clarity what most of us have thought from time to time - that Big Journalism is a crooked dealer in the Casino of Ideas, and that the Democratic Party does not intend to not cheat when cheating can put them in power or keep them in power.

I think that maybe the reason we don't demand that Dan Rather and company pull their noses out from between John Kerry's nether cheeks and actually report impartially - instead of what they're doing now - is that we've all become blase about prominent journalists using their position to play with the public's heads. They brag to each other about their ability to make our minds up for us. This has to stop - NOW.

The continued ability of liars and naked political partisans to earn big livings in Big Journalism is a personal failure accountable to each and every one of us who can write, post Email and create blogs.

Twenty or thirty million men and women screaming lustily for the blood of Dan Rather every day in the print and electronic media - including what Hugh Hewitt calls the "blogosphere," in which you now are - would make the advertisers without which CBS News, and CBS itself, would be out of business do a bit of unpleasant math in their heads and pull their lucrative prime-time commercials, perhaps redirecting them to a safer harbor such as Fox News.

Those of us who care about the country we live in and are handing down to our kids and grandkids have to take charge of the ratings wars, because only by supplying our vital feedback to the process by which money is disbursed to and within Big Journalism can we hope to change the quality of its product.

Only by holding Big Journalism responsible every day for telling the truth and nothing but the truth, and by contradicting them publicly when they lie or cover up the truth can we change the minds of our fellow citizens about the most important question in every election - Will we be represented in Congress and the White House by men of integrity or by self-serving, pathological liars like Al Gore and John Kerry?

While I myself am a registered Libertarian, I plan to vote a straight Republican ticket for as long as it takes to doom the Democratic Party to utter political irrelevance. My political differences with the Republican Party are tiny compared with my disgust with the lies, distortions and dirty tricks which the Democratic Party has resorted to increasingly because they are less and less able to win elections fairly.

The Democratic Party has degenerated from an annoying feature of daily life to an actual threat to democracy as we know it - and it must be destroyed to ensure both national security and our ability to hold free and fair elections in this country.

The mad power-lust of the Clintons, Al Gore, the Johns (Kerry and Edwards) and Democratic Party Chairman Terry McAuliffe causes the Democratic Party to lie, cheat and steal whenever possible - to the point that they collectively are the societal equivalent of a rabid animal loose in the backyard, requiring dispatch (politically speaking) for the safety of everyone else. Only when these unprincipled opportunists are irrelevant to American government can we safely stop fighting them.

I'd like to thank Hugh Hewitt for convincing me (by means of his book) that I needed to contribute what I could by starting my own blog - and by exposing as many people as I could to the truth, and encouraging them to pass it on.

John Kerry on the relative value of democracy and dictatorship
Mood:  incredulous
Topic: Unintentional truths
"I think that politically, historically, the one thing that people try to do, that society is structured on as a whole, is an attempt to satify their felt needs, and you can satisfy those felt needs with any kind of political structure, giving it one name or another. In this name it is democratic; in others it is communism; in others it is benevolent dictatorship. As long as those needs are satisfied, that structure will exist."

"Statement of Mr. John Kerry," Legislative Proposals Relating to the War in Southeast Asia, Hearings before the Committee on Foreign Relations, United States Senate, Ninety-Second Congress, First Session (April-May 1971), Washington: Government Printing Office, 1971., April 22, 1971, page 195.

John Kerry's always spoken up for dictators and Communists in general as a Senator, so this is probably a rare peek at something Kerry actually believes - that people don't need to govern themselves, and that having someone like John Kerry just sort of, well, rule over them as a dictator would be okay, too.

If this IS what John Kerry really thinks (and he held up his hand and swore it was the truth before the Senate), why would anyone want this moron in office??

This is yet another scary parallel with The Manchurian Candidate... Apparently John Kerry doesn't care whether or not we get to vote after November, as long as his felt need to be President is satisfied NOW. One more reason Senator Kerry feels so much empathy for the Fidel Castros and Daniel Ortegas of the world?

The Rorschach Tacky War Criminal Lapel Pin Test
Topic: Kerry's Lies and Spin

Now, what does this graphic make you think?

a) The Jolly Roger is much more appropriate to something with the name of a self-confessed murderer engraved on it;

b) Patriotism is (among other things) the last refuge of a scoundrel;

c) The "Kerry for President" Email spam campaign must have bombed big-time;

d) the survivors of John Kerry's self-confessed orgy of murder and hut arson deserve some of the proceeds from the sale of this item;

e) Ads by Google will take money from anybody.

"The Kerry conundrum: Hypocrisy on parade" - accolades from the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review
Topic: Kerry's Lies and Spin
There actually IS a reason why big city newspaper editors get the big bucks - sometimes they say what needs to be said better than us ordinary folk:

"The Kerry conundrum: Hypocrisy on parade" (editorial), Pittsburgh Tribune-Review, Tuesday, August 17, 2004.

I think that the editorial's title says it all, but just in case you disagree, this is the meat of the op-ed piece:

"Why is Sen. Kerry proud of serving in Vietnam? Vietnam was, in his words, an indefensible horror where men were "given the chance to die for the biggest nothing in history ... ."

We have that on the record. Also from his Senate testimony of April 22, 1971:

Referring to stories told by veterans of unspeakable American atrocities, he said: "They relived the absolute horror of what this country, in a sense, made them do."

Would there be recrimination against South Vietnamese after an American withdrawal? "(Y)es ... but far, far less than the 200,000 a year who are murdered by the United States of America ... ."

"This war was really just as wrong, immoral and unrelated to our national interests five years ago as it is today ... ."
That is, Kerry sought and accepted from his corrupt government combat medals for fighting in a war that, in his view, was an atrocity.

Kerry has claimed in one interview that his awakening to the nature of Vietnam came incrementally, after he enlisted in the Navy. Yes, that's the famed Kerry nuance.

But unabashed pride today about participation in a war that Kerry in 1971 called mass murder erupts without nuance, and without internal consistency.

It is damnable hypocrisy."

Amen.

John Kerry's Million Dollar Pain in the Ass
Mood:  incredulous
Topic: Kerry's Lies and Spin
Just when you think you've gotten to the bottom of John Kerry's self-promotion and flat-out lying in order to create a heroic background for himself, the ooze gives way and you find an even lower level -

Read this op-ed piece for even more insight into Senator John Kerry:

"Grandstanding draws spotlight on Kerry's military record," Phil Valentine, Williamson County Review Appeal, Friday, August 13th, 2004

Some interesting quotes from Mr. Valentine's article:

"By now, you've certainly heard of the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth. This is a group of Vietnam vets who served with Kerry during his four months in Vietnam and they don't have too many kind words for their former comrade-in-arms.

Before you discount these veterans as partisan hacks, as the Democratic spin-control machine would have you believe, understand that 16 of the 23 surviving officers who served with Kerry in swift boats in Vietnam have joined this group."

In other words, 2 out of 3 surviving swift boat officers who were in Vietnam with Kerry (including two of his former commanding officers) feel strongly enough about John Kerry's bullshit about his service there that they got together to protest it publicly.

Valentine's article goes on to state what I mentioned in an earlier entry - quoting Kerry's former CO Cmdr. Grant Hibbard about Kerry's attempt to brazenly get a Purple Heart for an accidentally (and incompetently) self-inflicted shrapnel scratch which happened outside of combat; and his eventual going around his CO to get that medal fradulently despite Cmdr. Hibbard's refusal to sign off on it.

Here's the new stuff -

"The third Purple Heart in question, the one that was Kerry's ticket home after just over four months in combat, occurred on March 13, 1969. The wounds sustained included a small bruise on his right arm and a minor injury to his buttocks. Again, Kerry insists he was wounded by enemy fire, but those who were there tell a different story. Kerry says he was wounded by an underwater mine. The Swift Boat Veterans for Truth say Kerry was wounded as a result of his not-so-bright decision to toss a grenade into a nearby rice cache. The "shrapnel" actually plucked from Kerry's fanny was rice pellets."

So not only WAS Kerry a pain in the ass (according to two of his commanding officers in Vietnam) but he apparently got a Purple Heart for GIVING HIMSELF ONE, too - for two self-inflicted wounds (through incompetence and extremely poor judgment about when and where to use antipersonnel grenades, not to mention using them outside of actual combat or even confirmed contact with the enemy of any other sort), incurred outside of combat as required for the award of a Purple Heart or points toward early rotation out of theater, Lt.(j.g.) John Kerry was sent home from Vietnam after only four months in theater, not the year he would have ordinarily served.

So John Kerry appears:
a) to have lied to get TWO of his Purple Hearts
b) thus to have lied on two occasions in order to be sent home from Vietnam after four months, instead of the usual year-long tour;
c) to have not corrected or clarified either item (a) or item (b) when folding them into his new patriot-hero persona;
d) by all of the above to have an abiding disrespect for true heroism as evidenced by not seeking combat wound decorations for non-combat wounds; and finally
e) to have shown willingness over a period of over thirty years to swear to the truth of lies when they are convenient to his goals.

Some of you would like to know why I call John Kerry "Zippo John," and Mr. Valentine's article throws light on that, as well:

"Interestingly enough, Kerry characterized himself as a war criminal in 1971, saying that he had taken part in the torching of villages and the killing of innocent civilians in violation of the Geneva Conventions."

The activity Kerry admitted to before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee is what was known as a "Zippo raid," after the brand of cigarette lighter allegedly used by rogue American troops to burn the thatch huts of Vietnamese villagers down.

Taking Senator Kerry at his word, I started calling him "Zippo John" to commemorate his self-admitted acts of arson against civilians while allegedly serving his country.

I still want to know why John Kerry didn't do jail time - either for perjury before the Senate or for war crimes. One way or another, he either lied under oath or told the truth about having done worse things.

P.J. O'Rourke's two cents on the matter....
Topic: Kerry's Lies and Spin

Another Kerry CO speaks out - was one of those million-dollar wounds FAKE?
Mood:  incredulous
Topic: Kerry's Lies and Spin
Commander Grant Hibbard, USN (ret.) was Lt.(jg). John Kerry's commanding officer when Kerry was training to serve on Swift Boats, and when Kerry supposedly got one of the three combat wounds (thus Purple Hearts) that allowed him to return to duty outside Vietnam after only four-months.

Cmdr. Hibbard's version:

"While in Cam Rahn Bay, he trained on several 24-hour indoctrination missions, and one special skimmer operation with my most senior and trusted Lieutenant.

The briefing from some members of that crew the morning after revealed that they had not received any enemy fire, and yet Lt.(jg) Kerry informed me of a wound -- he showed me a scratch on his arm and a piece of shrapnel in his hand that appeared to be from one of our own M-79s. It was later reported to me that Lt.(jg) Kerry had fired an M-79, and it had exploded off the adjacent shoreline. I do not recall being advised of any medical treatment, and probably said something like 'Forget it.'

He later received a Purple Heart for that scratch, and I have no information as to how or whom.

Lt.(jg) Kerry was allowed to return to the good old USA after 4 months and a few days in-country, and then he proceeded to betray his former shipmates, calling them criminals who were committing atrocities.

Today we are here to tell you that just the opposite is true. Our rules of engagement were quite strict, and the officers and men of Swift often did not even return fire when they were under fire if there was a possibility that innocent people -- fishermen, in a lot of cases -- might be hurt or injured. The rules and the good intentions of the men increased the possibility that we might take friendly casualties." -- Commander Grant Hibbard, USN (retired)