JustOneMinute

OK, Kranish Doesn't Know Either

Color me frustrated.  We had an earlier post on the Sen. Kerry - Admiral Schachte controversy regarding Kerry's first Purple Heart, and the three men in a boat mystery.  However, a key potential source of illumination has faded, and we are running out of places to look for evidence. 

Therefore, I repeat my earlier suggestion - some reporter ought to look at John Kerry's War Notes, to see what, if anything he recorded at the time about what he described to Tim Russert as "one of the most frightening" nights he spent in Vietnam.  Strangely, Douglas Brinkley's "Tour of Duty" account of that evening is based on a 2003 interview with Kerry.  The WaPo wants to see these notes, and Douglas Brinkley has dropped his objections.

Michael Kranish of the Boston Globe has joined the fray.  Since his original story on this incident is credited by Douglas Brinkley as providing the baseline account, we had high hopes that Mr. Kranish would check his notes, replay some old interview tapes, and shine some light on this.

No luck.  In April 2003, Kranish reported this about Admiral (then Lt.) Schachte:

"It was not a very serious wound at all," recalled William Schachte, who oversaw the mission and went on to become a rear admiral.

"Oversaw the mission" - meaning what - did he oversee it from the main Swift boat, or from the skimmer?

From his latest story, we get a bit more:

The Schachte comment is likely to gain notice both because of the high rank that Schachte ultimately achieved and because Schachte had provided a much less specific account of the Dec. 2, 1968, incident in an interview with the Globe last year. During that interview, Schachte did not challenge Kerry's Purple Heart.

Kerry told the Globe last year that Schachte was on the larger swift boat that dropped off the Boston Whaler, also known as a ''skimmer."

Questions raised by Hibbard about Kerry's first Purple Heart were first reported in ''John F. Kerry: The Complete Biography," written by reporters for the Globe earlier this year. Schachte declined to be interviewed for the book.  But in an April 2003 Globe interview, Schachte described the action as a ''firefight" and said of Kerry: ''He got hit." Schachte described it as ''not a very serious wound at all."

In May 2003, when the Globe asked Kerry about the incident, Kerry said Schachte conceived the mission but stayed behind on the larger swift boat, which had towed the skimmer.

''He wasn't with me on the skimmer," Kerry said. ''I went in on the skimmer, not him."

A potential key witness is Michael Voss, who skippered a swift boat that towed a Boston Whaler to a drop-off point at the time of the incident. But he said yesterday that he didn't remember whether Schachte went on the skimmer.

''I am not certain who was on a skimmer on a certain night 36 years ago," said Voss, a Massachusetts resident .

William Zaladonis and Patrick Runyon, the two enlisted men who have said they were with Kerry that night, said in interviews this week that they stood by their statements that Schachte was not with them. ''The only thing I can come up with is he is confused and went on another skimmer operation," said Runyon.

Bother.  Kranish did not focus on that detail for his April 2003 story (understandably), got some specific details from Kerry in May 2003 (the April story does not say how many men were on the skimmer), did not check back with an evidently unenthusiastic Schachte, and here we are.  Kerry told Brinkley in Jan 2003 as well as Kranish in May 2003 that he was on the skimmer with two enlisted men, so we see some consistency there.

Relatedly, Dana Milbank of the WaPo, in "A Swift Shift in Stories", paints Schachte as a corrupt liar.  Since John McCain is not the only Navy guy who takes his honor seriously, this line of attack might lure Schachte back into the fray:

According to a March 18 legal filing by Schachte's firm, Blank Rome, Schachte was one of the lobbyists working for FastShip on issues such as the effort to win funding for a new marine cargo terminal. On Feb. 2, Philadelphia-based FastShip announced that it would receive $40 million in federal funding for the project.

Here is the FastShip website; here is the Feb 2 press release, touting the involvement of two Pennsylvania Senators, and promising to bring jobs to Philadelphia.

Pardon my idiocy - the contract was awarded in February 2004; the first Swift Veterans press conference was May 2004.  Was this just brilliant planning ahead, or does Schachte routinely jeopardize his future lobbying activities (which I expect will be curtailed by a Kerry Administration and vigilant Democratic Congressional oversight) in exchange for jobs already done, and paychecks already cashed?  And speaking of paychecks, do lobbyists normally receive success fees, or would Schachte's fee have been based on hours worked (a common lawyerly custom).

My guess is that it varies.  However, it is possible that Schachte received a flat fee for work already done - why would he then go on national television and lie to help this client?

More dirt:

In addition, David Norcross, Schachte's colleague in the Washington office of Blank Rome, is chairman of this week's Republican convention in New York.

OK, who want to help the Admiral and find some prominent Dems on the Blank Rome roster?  [Here is a modest start, suggesting a bipartisanship at Blank Rome that we applaud.  In fact, if they are deliberately bipartisan, does that undermine the "corrupt liar" theory?  Or do they lie for both sides...]

Finally:

Records also show that Schachte gave $1,000 to Bush's 2000 and 2004 campaigns.

Yeah, yeah.

It Depends On What The Meaning Of "Win" Is

Geroge Bush makes news, or maybe not, in his Matt Lauer interview, as reported in the NY Times:

Bush Cites Doubt America Can Win War on Terror

...In the interview with Matt Lauer of the NBC News program "Today," conducted on Saturday but shown on the opening day of the Republican National Convention, Mr. Bush was asked if the United States could win the war against terrorism, which he has made the focus of his administration and the central thrust of his re-election campaign.

"I don't think you can win it," Mr. Bush replied. "But I think you can create conditions so that those who use terror as a tool are less acceptable in parts of the world."

As recently as July 14, Mr. Bush had drawn a far sunnier picture. "I have a clear vision and a strategy to win the war on terror," he said.

At a prime-time news conference in the East Room of the White House on April 13, Mr. Bush said: "One of the interesting things people ask me, now that we are asking questions, is, 'Can you ever win the war on terror?' Of course you can."

Hmm. First, I sure wish it was Kerry that had said this, since he would be torn apart. However, Bush has trained the press, and the rest of us, to understand that the words coming out of his mouth need to be interpreted very broadly (my personal fave is Bush's assertion that we went to war with Iraq after Saddam refused to allow the inspectors in; I ought to dig up a cite to aid my faltering memory).

Ms. Bumiller of the Times probes a bit, and gets some spin:

It was unclear if Mr. Bush had meant to make the remark to Mr. Lauer, or if he misspoke. But White House officials said the president was not signaling a change in policy, and they sought to explain his statement by saying he was emphasizing the long-term nature of the struggle.

...Scott McClellan, the White House press secretary, told reporters on Air Force One that Mr. Bush was speaking about winning the war "in the conventional sense" and that his comments underscored the reality that ridding the world of terrorists would take decades.

"I don't think you can expect that there will ever be a formal surrender or a treaty signed like we have in wars past," Mr. McClellan said. "That's what he was talking about. It requires a generational commitment to win this war on terrorism."

Well, fine, if you want to use logic. But I don't think any of us expected a formal surrender, or a dramatic visual like the destruction of the Berlin Wall.

The Kerry campaign used Edwards for their rapid response:

"After months of listening to the Republicans base their campaign on their singular ability to win the war on terror, the president now says we can't win the war on terrorism," Senator John Edwards, Mr. Kerry's running mate, said in a statement. "This is no time to declare defeat. It won't be easy and it won't be quick, but we have a comprehensive longterm plan to make America safer. And that's a difference."

Could someone please get these rapid-response folks a coupon book for a nearby Starbucks? A cup of coffee might help here. Look, if you are going to criticize the President for saying he can't win, you probably ought to include an assertion that your team can win. Both Edwards and Kerry correct this omission in follow-ups:

Mr. Edwards elaborated on his criticism in an interview Monday with the ABC program "Nightline.'' Mr. Edwards said the battle against terrorism was "absolutely winnable" with the right leadership.

...Mr. Kerry, who has limited his campaigning this week, was asked at his vacation home in Nantucket whether the war on terror could be won. He replied, "Absolutely."

Better, at least rhetorically. I want to dig up the Kerry statement where he described the War on Terror as more of a law enforcement exercise, and see how that compares (Kerry with Tim Russert, Meet the Press). In my capacity as Republican Attack Dog, I woud stay away from this February 27, 2004 speech by Kerry, where he says, "George Bush has no comprehensive strategy for victory in the War on Terror – only an ad hoc strategy to keep our enemies at bay. If I am Commander-in-Chief, I would wage that war by putting in place a strategy to win it."

All that said, I doubt the Dems are going to make up a lot of ground trying to convince us that Bush is not committed to aggressively pursuing the war on terror. Whether that means "victory" is another question.

MORE: My clever ad for the Dems? Run a clip from Bush's April press conference, and from the Matt Lauer interview, then have a voice-over by Christopher Lee. It would read like this:

George Bush, April: "Can you ever win the war on terror?' Of course you can."

George Bush, August: "I don't think you can win it".

Ominous Voice Over: Even George Bush has lost confidence in his plan to win the war on terror. Shouldn't we vote for a man with a plan? Kerry's the One.

OK, maybe the Nixon slogan is not a great idea...

UPDATE: Victory is within our grasp!

Is The Kerry Campaign Hearing Echoes, Or Voices?

It is probably coincidence, but we wonder if the Kerry camp is engaging in a bit of pre-emptive news management. The NY Times delivers an interesting Week in Review piece, "Swift Boats and the Lessons of Dukakis".

First, a bit of background - on August 10, Mickey Kaus of Slate had some fun with an excerpt from the Philip Gourevitch New Yorker profile of John Kerry (look for "Gourevitch-Skipper"). Here we go:

"He'll often thrash around in the night," the filmmaker George Butler, who is one of Kerry's oldest friends, told me. "He smashed up a lamp in my house in New Hampshire, in the bedroom where he was staying. Most Vietnam veterans go through this." [Emph. added]

Yikes! And are the flashbacks worse at night or in the day, Senator? ...

OK, I had some fun, too. But recently Glenn linked to an American Thinker article that raised the stakes considerably. Their gist - there is evidence that Kerry suffers, or suffered, from a significant sleep disorder; according to a doctor they quote, "'We treat patients with medication, psychotherapy, CBT, acupuncture or a mixture of them all."

The American Thinkers point out, rather forcefully, that Kerry has not released his medical records, and ask this:

Is Kerry getting medical and or psychological treatment including drugs or counseling for parasomnia or any other sleep disorder? If he is not getting therapy for it now, did he ever get therapy for it in the past - and if so what kind of therapy?

I'm with Mickey on this - Yikes!.

Kerry was asked about this by the WaPo in 2002 and more recently by Tim Russert this April, so the question is certainly in bounds and in play. However, in each case, Kerry managed to deflect the point of the question. Here he is with Russert:

MR. RUSSERT: Your wife said recently--a few years ago--that you had bad nightmares, which were very frightening, about Vietnam. Do you still have nightmares?

SEN. KERRY: No, I don't. I don't, but I did for a period of time. You know, movement or sounds might jostle you into a kind of awareness. I don't know a lot of people who were in combat who haven't had them, but, no, I don't anymore, I'm glad to say. I don't even have nightmares about George Bush and this election, Tim.

Russert moved on, so there was no follow-up about therapy or medication.

But is this question going to fade back into the shadows? Or should we look forward to a calm, non-partisan discussion of sleep disorders sometime in September on Crossfire? Perhaps Lanny Davis and James Carville can explain to us that their candidate acts sedated because he is sedated, but that is a good thing. Yikes, again.

Anyway, a hint as to how Dems might attempt to close off this line of inquiry is revealed in the NY Times piece:

One damaging rumor, that Mr. Dukakis had undergone psychiatric treatment, was pushed onto the front page when President Ronald Reagan was asked about it and joked that he didn't want to pick on "an invalid." Mr. Dukakis's advisers said later that he dropped 8 points in the polls after that report.

The campaign held a news conference with the candidate's doctor and released his medical records, all knocking down the story, but Ms. Estrich recalls, "The problem with rumors is the more you answer them, the more play they get."

Ahh! We can hear the Kerry spokesperson now - "Anyone who asks these questions is simply participating in a Republican dirty trick, just like the one Bush's dad pulled in 1988! We deplore these shameless, baseless attacks, and refuse to release the medical records on principle!"

Hey, it might work. Or, it may not matter. But I suspect we will find out.

MORE: Oh, you want to get nasty, do you? You're thinking that maybe Cambodia was "seared" into Kerry's memory because he is a bit foggy from the downers, is that it? You don't think Kerry is lying about the infamous Kansas City meeting of the Vietnam Veterans Against the War, with his baffling explanation that "[he] must have been in Kansas City for the November meeting" but "he had "no personal recollection" of the contentious debate" - you think he was too spaced out from his meds to remember it.

Well, you are a cog in the lying, crooked Republican attack machine.

UPDATE: And another thing! Glenn provides a great link to this WaPo story from March, which includes this detail:

Kerry now often proudly tells audiences how he survived cancer and how ordinary Americans deserve the type of high-end insurance he, as a senator, benefited from during the operation.

Kerry's Dec 14, 2003 speech would provide an example, if it had not been moved off of his website - the excerpt is here.

And my point - based on Kerry's tax return, he had $9,000 in unreimbursed medical and dental expenses. Just what sort of health coverage is the Senate offering, and what sort of coverage might be enjoyed by folks who are not married to billionaires? If Kerry wants to extend the plan covering him to the rest of us, he ought to show us why he got stuck with $9,000 in bills. Release the records.

THE GQ UPDATE: GQ asks the tall, well dressed chap about Vietnam and nightmares:

GQ: Did you come back from Nam with any psychic damage? JK: I was very lucky, Mike. I think I was able to take that pain and put it out there in my efforts to end the war. And so I very publicly laid out my depth of opposition to what was happening and my feelings about what had happened over there in a way that, you know, a lot of guys didn't have that opportunity, or couldn't or didn't, and they kind of held it in. And I think that's the harder thing; that's the problem for a lot of guys. So I never did have any of those issues. It doesn't slow me down; it motivates me.

GQ: You've never seen a therapist? JK: No. I had some nightmares when I came home, which is not unusual.

When he "came home"? Check with Teresa.

I Question The Timing Of This Leak

Fans of Sandy Berger will join me in bitterly denouncing this shameless attempt by partisans unknown to embarrass Bush by leaking news of an ongoing investigation just before his convention - "Pentagon Official Suspected of Giving U.S. Secrets to Israel".

Bah! My hearts not in it - because this follows the "leak bad news on Friday" rule, and because plenty of Republicans don't like the neo-cons, this could have been leaked by anybody. And the politics are a minefield - spying on the US is bad, but bashing Israel is bad, too. And we know the AIPAC likes Bush!

A detail which half-identifies the subject of the investigation:

The Pentagon analyst who officials said was under suspicion was one of two department officials who traveled to Paris for secret meetings with Iranian dissidents, including Manucher Ghorbanifar, an arms dealer.

More on the not-so-secret meeting; the candidates, please:

The senior administration official identified two of the Defense officials who met with Ghorbanifar as Harold Rhode, Feith's top Middle East specialist, and Larry Franklin, a Defense Intelligence Agency analyst on loan to the undersecretary's office.

This would all be embarrassing if these guys were subject to that emotion.

Are Reporters Allowed Follow-Up Questions?

Thomas Lipscomb of the Chicago Sun-Times does an astonishing job of probing the puzzling reissuance of Kerry's Silver Star citation:

Kerry citation a 'total mystery' to ex-Navy chief

Former Navy Secretary John Lehman has no idea where a Silver Star citation displayed on Democratic presidential nominee John Kerry's campaign Web site came from, he said Friday. The citation appears over Lehman's signature.

"It is a total mystery to me. I never saw it. I never signed it. I never approved it. And the additional language it contains was not written by me," he said.

...Asked how the citation could have been executed over his signature without his knowledge, Lehman said: "I have no idea. I can only imagine they were signed by an autopen." The autopen is a device often used in the routine execution of executive documents in government.

OK, is it expecting too much for Lipscomb to ask Lehman whether this might have been the standard practice in his office? Or did Lehman remember siging every citation awarded under his tenure in the 80's? Roughly how many was that, anyway? Does Lipscomb know, or care?

OK, I am glad a Serious Journalist is looking at this. But my goodness.

And we still don't know why the citation was revised...

Sen. Kerry Versus Admiral Schachte

We are grappling with the questions created by the emergence of Admiral Schachte, who claims (Novak column, Meyers interview) that he was on the three man "skimmer" on Dec. 2, 1968 when Kerry got his controversial first Purple Heart.

Since Kerry's story is that he led a three man crew of himself and two enlisted men, both of whom have come forward to vouch for Kerry, we are puzzled.

My first port of call was Douglas Brinkley's "Tour of Duty" (p. 146-8).  I was somewhat surprised that Brinkley's account of the incident is based on his recent interview with Kerry; Brinkley also credits the 2003 Kranish article, back in the chapter notes.  Here is the relevant Globe excerpt:

Kerry experienced his first intense combat action on Dec. 2, 1968, when he "semi-volunteered for, was semi-drafted" for a risky covert mission in which he essentially was supposed to "flush out" the enemy, using a little Boston Whaler named "Batman." A larger backup craft was called "Robin."

Unfortunately, Robin had engine trouble, and Batman's exit was delayed until the boats could depart in unison. The Batman crew encountered some Viet Cong, engaged in a firefight, and Kerry was slightly wounded on his arm, earning his first Purple Heart on his first day of serious action.

"It was not a very serious wound at all," recalled William Schachte, who oversaw the mission and went on to become a rear admiral.

What is missing from the Brinkley version is any mention of how Kerry described this incident in what we thought were his voluminous War Notes and correspondence.  The WaPo wants to see these journals [It's OK with Doug!] - this Dec. 2 incident would be one more reason to look through them.  Remember, Kerry described this as one of his most harrowing nights in Vietnam, when talking to Tim Russert - surely he wrote down something at the time.

A related question - the Globe story does not specifically say there were three men in the boat (and it does quote Schachte, but does not mention either Runyon or Zaledonis).  So, are there any accounts of Kerry's version prior to the Brinkley book?  For example, people found various versions of the Rassman story over the years - has such a thing happened here?  And when did we all agree that Runyon and Zaledonis were in the boat, and what is the evidence supporting that conclusion - Kerry's memory and journal have not been offered to provide supporting evidence.

Or, if the "three men in a boat" version originated in 2003, let me ask a different question - Kerry was at Cam Ranh, the base that performed the skimmer ops, for about three weeks; each skimmer crew was an ad hoc collection of "volunteers", who didn't necessarily serve with each other before or after.

Zaledonis is credited as one of the three men, and later served on PCF-44 with Kerry, so let's set him aside for a moment.  What was it about this night that made is so memorable for Runyon that he was able to come forward 35 years later, sure that he had gone out with Kerry and Zaledonis, and not some other strange officer on some other skimmer op?  Might he just be confused?  It seems weird, but the idea that Schachte has decided to jeopardize his plush career as a Washington attorney by coming forward with a lie also seems weird.

"Runyon" does not appear in the index to Brinkley's book; "Zaladonis" is a crew member on Kerry's PCF-44, which was transferred from Cam Ranh to An Thoi on Dec 5.  We see from Brinkley's book that Wasser was also on PCF-44 at An Thoi, and was involved with the Dec 2 incident, providing cover from the main Swift Boat.  Presumably he has been grilled about this as well - does Wasser remember Schachte as involved at all?

And we think Schachte ought to be able to manage the release of some records for other skimmer ops, even if, as he says, there was no after-action report for this one.  This would lend support to his "two officers, one enlisted" assertion.

UPDATE:  Put Lisa Meyers in the mix again, with a follow-up interview with Mr. Zaladonis.  Good stuff about whether there was enemy fire (he's not sure), but for my purposes, this is key:

Zaladonis:  ...And Pat and I have shared this story a few times since we've been out of the Navy.  We've been very good friends ever since we've been—when we were in the Navy and out – and this is something that we talked about every now and then.

OK, if Zaledonis went on one skimmer op (I believe him when he says that), and Runyon and he remained friends, its easy to believe that Runyon remembers his one night with his buddy on a skimmer.

MORE:  Good links at Swift Boats e-riposte.  Kerry's site has some of the Band.

If I had an editor, she would say my main points are:

- release Kerry's notes

- Runyon is not mentioned by name in either the Brinkley interview or the Globe interview; Kerry did not remember him when they met face to face at a rally (per Runyon's account).  When was Runyon first publicly identified as the third man, and what is the evidence supporting it?

UPDATE 2:  I see assertions but no evidence here.  But the conspiracy-minded will like this story, where Runyon describes his reunion with Kerry, as excerpted in the continuation below.

UPDATE 3:  Deus Ex Machina.  Or, Eureka!  I will assert with OK confidence that Zaledonis and Runyon were first publicly identified by Michael Kranish of the Boston Globe on April 14, 2004.  I say that because they fall from the sky into his story, but are missing from this well-researched Stephen Crum hit piece on April 12, and from this Douglas Brinkley apologia in Salon on April 17.

Now, what evidence does Mr. Kranish offer to verify their role in this incident - none, other than their say-so.

And we are delighted to find an answer to a question that has vexed us in the Crum piece - one other officer, Jim Galvin, got three Purple Hearts, but he did *not* invoke the "Three and Out" rule.

Crum also presents more background on the odd record-keeping surrounding the first Purple Heart.

UPDATE 4:  Kranish follows up with Schachte and others.  Inconclusive.

Runyon excerpt below:

Indiana John - Why Did It Have To Be Snakes?

"If there was anything that leaves me absolutely dry-mouthed and frightened it is the thought of meeting face to face with any poisonous snake - or even any snake."

John Kerry, from a letter to Julia Thorne; Douglas Brinkley's "Tour of Duty", p. 119

MORE: I wouldn't advise looking for a point to this, but if you find one, let us know.

NOW Bush Is "Mr. Credible"!

The NY Times gleefully reports that "Bush Dismisses Idea That Kerry Lied on Vietnam".

Well, he would say that, wouldn't he, since Bush is not a knucklehead and has the good sense to stay on the high road while leaving the (uncoordinated) dirty work to others.

And let's remember Bush's actual (made-up) quote - we wish his answer had been, "Is Kerry a war hero? It's a slam-dunk!"

Actual answer:

"I think Senator Kerry should be proud of his record,'' Mr. Bush said. "No, I don't think he lied.''

Boring!

"B" Is For "Batman", and Maybe "BS"

[The UPDATE is key - it turns out that Schachte is quite forthcoming when asked]

Beldar links to a Robert Novak column which we come to via Glenn. The gist, from Novak:

Retired Rear Adm. William L. Schachte Jr. said Thursday in his first on-the-record interview about the Swift boat veterans dispute that "I was absolutely in the skimmer" in the early morning on Dec. 2, 1968, when Lt. (j.g.) John Kerry was involved in an incident which led to his first Purple Heart.

"Kerry nicked himself with a M-79 (grenade launcher)," Schachte said in a telephone interview from his home in Charleston, S.C. He said, "Kerry requested a Purple Heart."

Oh, boy - two former sailors claim that there were only three people in the "skimmer" that night, so Admiral Schahte makes four. But why come forward now to lie?

Well, why indeed - what do we make of this, from the Admiral's interview with Mr. Novak:

Schachte said he has never been contacted by or talked to anybody in the Bush-Cheney campaign or any Republican organization. He said he is a political independent who has voted for candidates of both parties.

That may well be true, but it is somewhat incomplete. Admiral Schachte is now an attorney with BlankRome LLP.

According to my FEC Spy, he gave $1,000 to Bush Cheney 2004 on Feb 18, 2004, and another $1,000 to Bush Cheney 2004 on April 18, 2004 [Ooops - make that $1,000 to Bush on April 18, 2000].

On the first contribution the donor is identified as "SCHACHTE, WILLIAM L MR.; CHARLESTON, SC 29401; FOSTER WHEELER ENVIR. CORP./ATTOR"; the second contribution identifies the donor as "SCHACHTE, WILLIAM L. MR.; CHARLESTON, SC 29401; DYER ELLIS & JOSEPH/ATTORNEY".

By checking the roster at BlankRome, we see that Dyer, Joseph, and Ellis are associated with the BlankRome Washington branch, as is Admiral Schachte. Since their specialty, like the Admiral's, is law of the sea, it is a fair bet that we have a match.

This announcement places the Admiral on the payroll of Foster-Wheeler.

I also see contributions for Lindsay Graham (R, SC), and Ernest Hollings (D, SC), John McCain, and Wayne Allard (R, CO).

This doesn't mean the Admiral is lying, of course, about his politics or anything else - for all we know, he told Novak exactly this, and Novak printed what he printed.

However, I wish it was either Novak or the Admiral that was telling us this.

UPDATE: Can't fault the Admiral's disclosure with Lisa Meyers of MSNBC:

Myers: Why speak out now in the heat of a presidential campaign?

Schachte: ...I'm non-partisan. Listen, I have voted Democrat, Republican. I voted for President Clinton the first time he ran. And I know what you're talking about. That has nothing to do-- this is not a partisan issue. This is an issue of people stepping forward to tell their facts as they saw them.

The Next Big Thing

Deborah Norville of MSNBC hosted a rollicking discussion with and about the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth - a transcript should become available here [transcript].

One of her guests was Kate Zernike, a national reporter for the NY Times, who had a byline on "Bush Campaign's Top Outside Lawyer Advised Veterans Group".

Near the conclusion, Ms. Zernike was asked to predict what the next big story would be that would deflect the media from the Swift Boat controversy. Her suggestion - when the US death toll in Iraq reached 1,000, the media would re-focus on that.

Ahh! Presumably, the NY Times is preparing their retrospective right now - how did we get into this mess, is it a quagmire, where did Bush go wrong, and so on.

Since we are now at 966 deaths (which is 966 too many), the Times launch point should be sometime in September. Forewarned is forearmed. Folks looking backward will want copies of Kerry's Senate floor speech from October 2002. The Spinsanity "imminent threat" analysis" will probably be helpful; the Senate Intel report is here; other suggestions are welcomed, natch. (Abu Grahib, "Mission Accomplished"... the capture of Saddam?!?)

But no Iraq retrospective will be complete unless we continue to vex Tall John with the "if you knew then what you know now" question about his vote authorizing war, and the subsequent policy decisions made by Bush - it's been fun so far, and we see that Kerry advisor Jamie Rubin, who briefly got us into the endzone by saying that "in all probability" Kerry would have deposed Saddam, has since recanted. The NY Times, among others, has pummelled Kerry for his puzzling explanations of what he might have done differently.

Or, folks looking forward to see which candidate has the more credible plan for a stable and democratic Iraq will want to dust off these LA Times, AP, and WaPo pieces - all deride Kerry's "plan" for Iraq.

VPW - Judith Miller and a New Suspect

Editor and Publisher moves the Valerie Plame Wilson leak investigation story along a bit. They (and we) wondered about the subpoena received by Judith Miller of the Times, who has never had a bylined story on this case. The E&P explanation:

If Miller had Plame's name and identity, who was her source? If she didn't, why has she become embroiled in the current case?

The answer probably rests in the suspicions attending the staff of the vice president, who have become prime suspects as the source of the Plame leak. The man who seems to be emerging at the center of the probe is John Hannah, an aide with a profile lower than that of Cheney's chief of staff.

Hannah could be the link between Miller and Plame, as they have known each other for a long time -- one of a string of close associations she has with neo-cons in the Bush administration. Along with Miller and Bill Luti in Undersecretary of Defense Doug Feith's office, Hannah and Libby were the recipients of Ahmad Chalabi's bogus intelligence on Iraqi WMD that was "stovepiped" to the top, and not vetted within the intelligence community.

John Hannah is not mentioned as a member of the White House Iraq Group, which is where we thought we would round up the appropriate suspects. However, Mr. Hannah was mentioned as a prime suspect last February, and this USA Today profile of Cheney describes Mr. Hannah as "Cheney's top Middle East adviser", so that fits.

The One by Two by Six theory is that six reporters received leaks - so far, we think we know about Novak, Pincus of the WaPo, Miller of the NY Times, and Cooper of TIME. I happen to think that the White House should have called Nick Kristof, since he had written two egregious but influential columns - he is my pick for a Surprise Subpoena.

Time To Panic?

The WaPo examined the conflicting versions of the March 13 incident that led to Kerry's Bronze Star. Although their specific conclusions were not unfavorable to Kerry, the warning shots fired by the WaPo must have set the Kerry campaign scrambling:

An investigation by The Washington Post into what happened that day suggests that both sides have withheld information from the public record and provided an incomplete, and sometimes inaccurate, picture of what took place.

...The fullest account of Kerry's experience in Vietnam is "Tour of Duty" by prominent presidential historian Douglas Brinkley. It was written with Kerry's cooperation and with exclusive access to his diaries and other writings about the Vietnam War. "Unfit for Command," by John E. O'Neill, who succeeded Kerry as commander of his Swift boat, and Jerome R. Corsi, lays out a detailed attack on Kerry's record.

The Post's research shows that both accounts contain significant flaws and factual errors.

...In "Tour of Duty," these thoughts are attributed to a "diary" kept by Kerry. But the endnotes to Brinkley's book say that Kerry "did not keep diaries in these weeks in February and March 1969 when the fighting was most intense." In the acknowledgments to his book, Brinkley suggests that he took at least some of the passages from an unfinished book proposal Kerry prepared sometime after November 1971, more than two years after he had returned home from Vietnam.

In his book, Brinkley writes that a skipper who remains friendly to Kerry, Skip Barker, took part in the March 13 raid. But there is no documentary evidence of Barker's participation. Barker could not be reached for comment.

Brinkley, who is director of the Eisenhower Center for American Studies at the University of New Orleans, did not reply to messages left with his office, publisher and cell phone. The Kerry campaign has refused to make available Kerry's journals and other writings to The Post, saying the senator remains bound by an exclusivity agreement with Brinkley. A Kerry spokesman, Michael Meehan, said he did not know when Kerry wrote down his reminiscences.

...Much information is available from the Web sites of the Kerry campaign and Swift Boat Veterans for Truth, and the Navy archives. But both the Kerry and anti-Kerry camps continue to deny or ignore requests for other relevant documents, including Kerry's personal reminiscences (shared only with biographer Brinkley), the boat log of PCF-94 compiled by Medeiros (shared only with Brinkley) and the Chenoweth diary.

Although Kerry campaign officials insist that they have published Kerry's full military records on their Web site (with the exception of medical records shown briefly to reporters earlier this year), they have not permitted independent access to his original Navy records. A Freedom of Information Act request by The Post for Kerry's records produced six pages of information. A spokesman for the Navy Personnel Command, Mike McClellan, said he was not authorized to release the full file, which consists of at least a hundred pages.

I sense frustration at the WaPo. Incomplete, inaccurate disclosure, a run-around from Brinkley, a bizarre confidentiality agreement - do they smell cover-up?

And will anyone keep a straight face if Kerry criticizes the secretive Cheney energy task force, when Kerry won't even release his own war notes except to a friendly historian?

I foresee a grim week for the Kerry side, with the Republican convention as their only hope of respite.

The InstaPundit was on this on Saturday.

MORE: OK, what is on your wish list for released records? My Conventional Wisdom pick - we all want to see the paperwork for Kerry's first Purple Heart.

My long-shot pick is the after-action reports for March 18/19, which should be Kerry's last mission (Brinkley says so, although his website does not). Brinkley says Kerry was sailing to Cambodia; other evidence suggests that Swiftee George Bates was with Kerry while Kerry torched a hamlet or two. Who knows?

UPDATE: The NY Times, "Friendly Fire: The Birth of an Anti-Kerry Ad", By KATE ZERNIKE and JIM RUTENBERG:

After weeks of taking fire over veterans' accusations that he had lied about his Vietnam service record to win medals and build a political career, Senator John Kerry shot back yesterday, calling those statements categorically false and branding the people behind them tools of the Bush campaign.

His decision to take on the group directly was a measure of how the group that calls itself Swift Boat Veterans for Truth has catapulted itself to the forefront of the presidential campaign. It has advanced its cause in a book, in a television advertisement and on cable news and talk radio shows, all in an attempt to discredit Mr. Kerry's war record, a pillar of his campaign...

I Attempt A Swift Ad

If the Swiftee's new ad can excerpt Kerry's 1971 testimony, mine can too. And we will juxtapose Kerry's 2004 acceptance speech:

2004: I'm John Kerry, and I'm reporting for duty.

1971: I would like to talk, representing all those veterans, and say that several months ago in Detroit, we had an investigation at which over 150 honorably discharged and many very highly decorated veterans testified to war crimes committed in Southeast Asia, not isolated incidents but crimes committed on a day-to-day basis with the full awareness of officers at all levels of command.

2004: I am accompanied by an extraordinary band of brothers led by that American hero, a patriot called Max Cleland.

Our band of brothers doesn't march together because of who we are as veterans, but because of what we learned as soldiers.

We fought for this nation because we loved it, and we came back with the deep belief that every day is extra. We may be a little older, we may be a little grayer, but we still know how to fight for our country.

1971: …they had personally raped, cut off ears, cut off heads, tape wires from portable telephones to human genitals and turned up the power, cut off limbs, blown up bodies, randomly shot at civilians, razed villages in fashion reminiscent of Genghis Khan, shot cattle and dogs for fun, poisoned food stocks, and generally ravaged the country side of South Vietnam…

2004: I know what kids go through when they're carrying an M-16 in a dangerous place, and they can't tell friend from foe. I know what they go through when they're out on patrol at night and they don't know what's coming around the next bend. I know what it's like to write letters home telling your family that everything's all right, when you're not sure that that's true.

1971: I would like to talk to you a little bit about what the result is of the feelings these men carry with them after coming back from Vietnam. The country doesn't know it yet, but it has created a monster, a monster in the form of millions of men who have been taught to deal and to trade in violence, and who are given the chance to die for the biggest nothing in history; men who have returned with a sense of anger and a sense of betrayal which no one has yet grasped.

2004: I learned a lot about these values on that gunboat patrolling the Mekong Delta with Americans -- you saw them -- who come from places as different as Iowa and Oregon, Arkansas, Florida, California.

No one cared where we went to school. No one cared about our race or our backgrounds. We were literally all in the same boat. We looked out, one for the other, and we still do.

1971: …we are ashamed of and hated what we were called on to do in Southeast Asia.

2004: I defended this country as a young man…

1971: In our opinion, and from our experience, there is nothing in South Vietnam, nothing which could happen that realistically threatens the United States of America.

Kerry Campaign Endorses Swift Boat Veterans for Truth

Kerry campaign spokesperson Stephanie Cutter unwittingly but unmistakably endorsed the motivation, if not the message, of the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth, although she was explaining Kerry's decision to attack the Swiftees:

"When somebody's attacking your military record, you reach a boiling point, and he reached a boiling point last night," Ms. Cutter explained. "When you go and fight in a war, when you spill blood for your country, your instinct is to fight back and defend your record."

As the new ad from the SBVT makes clear, these veterans did not like it when John Kerry described them to the US Senate in 1971 as war criminals and rapists who operated like an army of Genghis Khan. And they still don't like it.

Real Clear Politics explains why this plot twist is not good for Kerry. Kerry air-brushed his anti-war activities out of his biography as presented at the Democratic convention - presumably, "I was a war hero before I was a war protestor" seemed too nuanced a position to appeal to swing voters.

On the other hand, Kerry really did say those things. He tried to open a bit of distance between himself and his past when Tim Russert asked him about this in April, but how can he repudiate his anti-war days without antagonizing a significant portion of his base? This is a straddle-flip-flop that would stymie Paul Hamm.

For their part, the Swiftees have moved the argument to what seems to be their real objection to John Kerry - his medals may gall them, but it is his anti-war testimony that really lights their fire, as this 1971 debate between John Kerry and John O'Neill makes clear. (The debate is worth reading just for the staggering ineptitude of Dick Cavett's segues to breaks).

Before I resume radio silence, I have a personal plea to the Captain, Roger Simon, Hugh Hewitt, and anyone who might be in contact with the Swiftees: as this post explains, it has been widely reported that Kerry was honorably discharged prior to becoming a war protestor. Not So! When Kerry was meeting with the North Vietnamese, accusing his fellow officers of war crimes, and meeting with a group that discussed the assassination of US Senators, he was an officer in the Naval Reserve. This was only acknowledged by the Kerry campaign in May of this year, correcting a phony [strike "phony", insert "misleading"] Harvard Crimson interview from January 1970. Readers of the NY Times, the LA Times, and the Boston Globe are in for a surprise.

MORE: The smell of fear at the NY Times: from Adam Nagourney - "Kerry Might Pay Price for Failing to Strike Back Quickly:

In fairness to Mr. Kerry, his aides were faced with a strategic dilemma that has become distressingly familiar to campaigns in this era when so much unsubstantiated or even false information can reach the public through so many different forums, be it blogs or talk-show radio.

Matt, Glenn, Hugh, and Rush are breaking hearts at the Times - bring back the Responsible Big Media filter!

And from Glen Justice and Jim Rutenberg, "Kerry Is Filing a Complaint Against Swift Boat Group:

...some Democrats said privately they feared that this ad would have even more impact than the last, whose charges have not been substantiated.

"It's not something that can be easily or successfully discredited,'' said one party strategist, who requested anonymity because he did not want to be seen as undermining Mr. Kerry's campaign. "It's guys talking about how they felt and you can't discredit someone's description of his own feelings.''

And this excerpt from the ad is punishing:

The new commercial that the Swift boat group introduced on Friday features veterans who say that Mr. Kerry's antiwar statements in the early 1970's, when they were being held as prisoners of war by the Vietcong, aided their captors.

"John Kerry gave the enemy for free what I and many of my comrades in the North Vietnam prison camps took torture to avoid saying,'' says Paul Galanti, identified on screen as a prisoner of war from January 1966 to February, 1973.

Bring it on.

Don't Impeach Anyone While I'm Gone

I will be in a Limited Bandwidth Modality next week while on vacation.

Do You Want The Truth?

You may think you're entitled. But the Kerry campaign thinks you can't handle the truth, which puzzles the Bear.

My question - isn't this one more story for the NY Times, champions of campaign finance reform, to sweep under the rug?

Democrats Don't Want A "Fair" Election

How much coffee will be sprayed out of how many nostrils when NY Times readers open their Sunday Times magazine and see this:

QUESTIONS FOR RAY C. FAIR
Bush Landslide (in Theory)!
Interview by Deborah Solomon

Orrin Judd has been following this forever, and provides links to Professor Fair's website.

The NY Times Charts A Course To Gay Marriage

Hint - they don't want anyone in our democracy to actually vote on this question.

The New Yorker described the legal terrain here; the bit about the Supreme Court being a follower, rather than a leader, with its anti-miscegenation "Loving v. Virgina" decision, actually matches an earlier argument I posted. And no, I was not a fan of the Bush strategy, either.

My Bold Prediction - No Brinkley/New Yorker Article

My Bold Prediction is that, contra Drudge, there will not be a New Yorker article by Douglas Brinkley describing John Kerry's "January in or near Cambodia", which was previewed to the Telegraph.

Why not?

(1) It will simply call attention to a story that mainstream media is ignoring;

(2) It will make Brinkley look less like an objective historian and more like a Kerry flack;

(3) Serious reporters will squirm at this weird selective disclosure - the January after-action reports are not at Kerry's website, but Brinkley can miraculously rely on after-action reports and Kerry's own War Notes to present Kerry's story? Someone in the press may rebel and ask for both the already-promised after-action reports and access to Kerry's notes (ask for December and March 18/19 after-action reports, while you are at it. And the paperwork for the controversial first Purple Heart).

(4) Brinkley will not have a good explanation for his decison to leave it out of the book in the first place. Possible explanations, none appealing - (a) Running covert operatives to Cambodia makes John Kerry look like a macho man of mystery and danger, and that was not the picture Brinkley wanted to paint; (b) Brinkley didn't want to suggest that Kerry was involved in Nixon's secret war, or that Kerry broke international law by violating Cambodia's border (except when he did); (c) it doesn't square well with Kerry's own account of his March 18 mission near Cambodia, as excerpted in Brinkley's book, where Kerry made it clear that violating the Cambodian border was a Big Deal.

The campaign will conclude that it is safer to let this drift away. Well, that's my guess. I hope I'm wrong.

MORE: OK, this is brutal, but how big is the San Francisco Examiner?

UPDATE: Props to the Captain - evidently, "served under Kerry" is a slippery concept. MORE: Oops! Read the comments! The Captain has good evidence that Alston left, but no real evidence that he did not return. Lots of good research being done by Lori from Texas, however. I'd love to get her to compare the Feb 20 action described at Kerry's website (which seems to blame the helicopters for wanton destruction) with the Feb 20 after-action report. (Actually, that would just be a warm-up...)

UPDATE 2: From the Bear, we see the Seattle Times and Knight Ridder, neither known as right-wing apologists, picking up the "Christmas in Cambodia" story.

Shorter Chris Matthews

Chris Matthews had a segment with John O'Neill of the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth and John Hurley of the (objective and non-partisan) Vietnam Veterans for John Kerry. As a service to my readers, I will save you the trouble of laboring through the transcript. Here we go:

Chris Matthews: I didn't go to Vietnam. George Bush didn't go to Vietnam. John Kerry showed a lot of courage going to Vietnam, and anyone who disagrees is a lying, partisan weasel.

John O'Neil: Well, lots of men, including John Kerry, showed courage by going to Vietnam. However, to win a Silver Star requires an extraordinary display of courage...

John Hurley: You're a partisan, lying weasel funded by Republicans.

Repeat for twenty minutes.

"Squirrelly And Unsettling"

ABC's August 12 NOTE intrigues us with this comment about the subtlest of flaws in the Kerry campaign:

E. . Let's face it: there is something squirrelly and unsettling and not quite right about the way Michael Meehan answers the media's Vietnam-era questions — something that makes nearly every member of the Gang of 500 think there is still something there.

And there is a reason for that - like the rest of us, this campaign is on a voyage of discovery into John Kerry's past. And like the rest of us, they are repeatedly learning that their candidate's memory of his Vietnam era is conveniently unreliable.

Three quick examples - first, we have been following the "Christmas in Cambodia" story; from Matt Drudge, we see that Kerry historian Douglas Brinkley is now scrambling to recast this as "January in Cambodia". Time will tell. Meanwhile, we can check the January after-action reports at John Kerry's website, where he has fully released all the relevant records. But wait! I only see after-action reports for February and March! (and *not* his March 18/19 mission, BTW). Golly, the Big Media will never tolerate this sort of non-disclosure, will they? Squirelly, indeed.

Second example - the Kerry campaign, through both press releases and its website, spent months promoting the odd notion that Kerry was in the military from 1966 to 1970, and then was in the Naval Reserve from 1972 to 1978. Yes, this would have conveniently meant he was not in the service during his anti-war, ribbon-tossing, meet with the North Vietnamese days, but why did he re-join in 1972?

Of course it made no sense, and with the release of his records in April they have corrected their press releases. But imagine their surprise! We also imagine that they hope that the LA Times and NY Times don't notice (or, more likely, don't care - the NY Times is more inclined to correct the misspelling of the name of a Russian ballerina then they are to correct this.)

A third example is found in this NY Times story, with this provocative lede:

When questions were raised last month about whether a 27-year-old John Kerry had attended a Kansas City meeting of Vietnam Veterans Against the War where the assassination of senators was discussed, the Kerry presidential campaign went into action.

Indeed, they did. But patient readers will eventually come to the bit where we learn that Kerry's memories and denials about his attendance at such a meeting are contradicted by FBI files. Oops. We especially admire the subtle distinction Kerry makes about "being there":

...he says he had emotionally checked out of V.V.A.W. after St. Louis and until recently said he had left the organization at that point.

But several news organizations, including The Kansas City Star and The New York Sun, have recently reported that Mr. Kerry also attended the meeting of the group in Kansas City, Mo., in late 1971 where killing opponents of the war was discussed.

Mr. Kerry says he still has no memory of being there but does not dispute the F.B.I. files.

Let's be fair - some participants say the assasination plan was discussed, but never voted upon; some say there was a vote; some say Kerry was there for discussions, but not the vote; all agree that Kerry was opposed. This was covered widely last spring - a link-hunt could start here. (And anyone who wants to drop a relevant link in the comments is surely invited to do so.)

The recurring theme - what Kerry remembers isn't always what is true, but it is self-serving.

UPDATE: A commenter at Orrin Judd's fine blog presents a head-scratcher - Kerry spoke to the Senate in April 1971. By then we all knew about the 1970 incursion/invasion into Cambodia (Tin soldiers and Nixon's coming...).

However, the "secret bombing" of Cambodia was not widely revealed until 1973 (if we can rely on Sy Hersh). And this article suggests that the insertion of covert operators into Cambodia was highly classified (presumably, prior to 1970 - post invasion, what was there to deny?). Here is a quick excerpt about the Al Haig, then an aide to Henry Kissinger at the NSC:

He confided to a few that while serving in Vietnam he had participated in one of a regular series of highly classified ground reconnaissance missions inside Cambodia. The Americans who went on such missions, whose existence did not become publicly known until 1973, wore specially manufactured replicas of North Vietnamese uniforms and carried captured gear and weapons. They went in "sterile," that is, without any identification or markings to indicate that they were Americans-except, of course, their white or black skin, large body size, and fluent knowledge of English.

So, the question - John Kerry was not exactly holding back in his Senate presentation - atrocities, Genghis Khan, and so on. Why didn't he mention that the US was routinely violating the Cambodian border in 1969? Since that news did create headlines later (and became a proposed article of impeachment against Richard Nixon), wouldn't it have been a big deal when Kerry testified? Why so coy?

Just to state the obvious - the previous question is suggestive, not dispositive. A transcript of the Kerry-O'Neill debate on Dick Cavett might shed further light on this.

Now, other points I would ponder, if I were spinning for Kerry - why were the South Vietnamese getting liquored up in celebration of Christmas? It's not a Christian country. Ok, they were celebrating the truce. But when was the Chinese New Year that year (and is that celebrated in South Vietnam?) What, from the Command History, was Kerry doing then? And might that be the incident which is "seared" in his memory?

More here.

UPDATE: OK, the campaign tried to release the January records last April but got all confused. Time to try again?

VPW - Judith Miller Of the NY Times Subpoenaed in Plame Investigation

Judith Miller of the NY Times has been subpoenaed in the investigation into the Valerie Plame leak, the NY Times reports.

The Times reminds us that "The Times has not published any articles saying it received information about Ms. Plame's identity.

We do recall the eerie media silence that fell over this case last summer. If we can believe our timeline, Paul Krugman mentioned the case in a July column; the first story by a Times reporter was on August 8 by Douglas Jehl.

In fact, from this list of stories with Ms. Miller's byline, only this one stands out as vaguely relevant. Our guess - folks remember her as sympathetic to the Administration spin on WMDs - she might have been mentioned as a recipient of a White House leak meant to discredit Ambassador Wilson, even though she never went on to publish a story using the information.

And what does it mean? "One x Two x Six" refers to one source leaking to the WaPo the news that two White House staffers leaked the Plame connection to six reporters. We have puzzled over Pincus, and mulled over Miller, neither of whom have any obvious bylines on this story. Perhaps the special counsel has found The One, and is subpoenaing the six reporters who received leaks. (Hmm, a blogger's dilemma - the sequels were so lame that I hate to go with the Matrix wordplay; can the phone call to the WaPo be the "One Ring-a-ding to nab them all"?)

On a related note, the Times had an editorial whining that this leak investigation, with the aggressive subpoenaing of reporters, might have a chilling effect on investigative reporting.

First of all, no kidding - that endgame was always obvious, which was why I speculated a year ago that the press was deliberately avoiding a walk down this road.

Secondly, what is the Times thinking about with this:

To unmask a confidential source as part of a criminal investigation, the government should have to show two things: that the information is central to the investigation and that it cannot be obtained any other way. In Mr. Cooper's case, the information could more than likely be provided under oath by government officials, including those implicated.

Boy, will their jaws drop when they read the rest of the Bill of Rights (past the bit about press freedom) and get to the Fifth Amendment.

Getting To "Yes" - Ongoing

The NY Times provides the latest on the Kerry campaign agoniste, as they struggle to deal with President Bush's ticking time bomb:

"My opponent hasn't answered the question of whether, knowing what we know now, he would have supported going into Iraq."

Previous follies are recounted here and here; from the latest:

...Mr. Kerry has struggled to convince his audiences that his vote to authorize the president to use military force was a far, far cry from voting for a declaration of war.

So far, his aides and advisers concede, he has failed to get his message across, as Mr. Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney have mocked his efforts as "a new nuance" that amount to more examples of the senator's waffling.

Well, yes, and the Senator is in quite a box. If he admits that his vote was a mistake, he will immediately have thrown at him his famous question from 1971 - "How do [you] ask a man to be the last man to die for a mistake?"

And in trying to answer that, he will risk leaving the strong impression that his commitment to a democratic Iraq is unsteady, and that Kerry is the "cut and run" candidate (which a big part of his base will love him for, BTW).

So, he tries to pretend that his vote was not a mistake. And that it was not simply political positioning. And no one is convinced.

Leaving us where on Kerry and Iraq? No one can keep a straight face when he explains his votes. No one can keep a straight face when he explains his Iraq "plan".

Kerry's The One!

Now I'm Getting Crazy

Matt Drudge alerts us to a marital spat that led John Kerry and Teresa Heinz to spend the night in separate hotel rooms. Marital spat indeed - Teresa just wanted a good night's sleep, away from the nightmares and thrashing (Look for Gourevitch-skipper).

Hey, is this line of speculation over the border, or just near it? I don't know, but Tim Russert raised it in April.

MORE: But seriously, a note to self - re-read Robert Musil's warning about insane over-reach by the Kerry critics. This is what he is warning against.

UPDATE: OK, new explanation - maybe Kerry was sailing into Cambodia to meet with foreign leaders. (ed -- You're backsliding...)

Really Bad Advice For Kerry

Doc K at Titus One Nine provides a helpful diagnosis to Kenneth Baer, writing in TNR.

And oh, my - not only was there a doctor in the house, but a lawyer showed up, too - Beldar the Terrible lays waste to the TNR. Run, you fools!

MORE: Robert Musil waves the yellow "caution" flag, twice.

Matt Welch makes an odd comment (partly rebutted by the InstaPundit here), and provides an interesting link to the JunkYard Blog.

OK, the odd comment from Matt:

What I don't understand is how anyone professes to truly give a flip about what John Kerry and George Bush did 32 or 36 years ago.

...I'm going to vote for the guy who I think will do the best job leading the most powerful country in the world in the war against people who want to blow us up, period. Everything else -- only 32,000 new jobs this month! This one dude acted weird at a Wendy's! -- is an increasingly pointless and unfunny diversion.

Well, yes. I hope to compose a slightly longer repsonse, but the gist would be, we are trying to locate Kerry's heart, and head, on the subject of Iraq (specifically) and the War on Terror generally. Since his constant emphasis of it suggests that Vietnam was a formative experience for Kerry, we need to explore his conduct both during the war, and immediately afterwards.

As a quick example - Kerry probably "hates" Nixon - will Kerry really want to get elected so that he can become Nixon, guiding Iraqi-ization and delivering peace with honor? What, one wonders, does his heart tell him?

"Christmas In Cambodia" Gets Bigger

Although it is not yet News Fit To Print, the two NYC tabloids, the The NY Post and the Daily News, grapple with Kerry's "Christmas in Cambodia" legend. Fox News ran a story, and got a comical reaction-retraction from the Kerry camp. (And yes, we see a Murdoch connection, thanks).

My caveat to the Kerry critics - "Christmas is Cambodia" is a Kerry creation, and he deserves to be hammered on it. However, "St. Patrick's in (or near) Cambodia", especially with SEALs, has got life. Be careful with the undated "hat" story - SEALs and CIA both operate covertly, and that mistake would be easily overlooked. I'm just sayin'.

Of course, as support of this, Kerry would need to release some missing after-action reports for March 18/19. C'mon, John - Keep the promise you made to Tim!

MORE - where I would take this, if I worked for Kerry, is to get the "seared in my memory" quote scaled back to "Sort of lightly browned", and then try to switch over to "Hey, he really was in Cambodia when Operation Menu started." The partisan, racist, hate-mongering, lying, crooked Republican Attack Machine (did I mention they are racist?) needs to stare at the checkerboard (Kerry clearly does not play chess) and get one step ahead of this defense. Hint!

RE: "Lightly browned" - NO, Kerry is not going to say, "I was toasted in my memory". Please. This is a no-smoking blog. No smoking of anything.

Getting to "Yes" - Kerry Hammered From Both Sides

Last week, President Bush goaded Man Who Would Be President with a seemingly simple question:

My opponent hasn't answered the question of whether, knowing what we know now, he would have supported going into Iraq."

After some amusing tap-dancing, Kerry finally stepped up and firmly straddled, restating his long-held position that he would have voted for diplomacy in October 2002. Oh, let him say it:

"I'll answer it directly. Yes, I would have voted for the authority. I believe it is the right authority for a president to have but I would have used that authority effectively."

A position Boldly Taken!

Now the Bush team is chewing on him, and the anti-war Toronto Star is chewing on him. First, let's Blame Canada:

Kerry fails Iraq test

..."I believe it's the right authority for a president to have," Kerry now says. Only he would have used that power more "effectively."

This amounts to a sweeping claim by Kerry that America has carte blanche to make war on even bogus grounds, and in defiance of the United Nations and world opinion, so long as the war is waged effectively.

...Kerry comes off looking like "Bush lite" on Iraq, rather than as a candidate with better values and a sounder program. He seems weak. Muddled.

They are unhappy.

From the other flank, we have the LA Times - Bush Mocks Kerry's 'Nuance' on Iraq

And from somewhere in the middle, USA Today - Kerry's been consistent about his nuances, at least .

The Atrios Smear Catches On

Props to Atrios, whose guilt by association smear of the SwiftVets seems to have caught on with the Kerry campaign and the mainstream press.

Duncan "Not Sirius" Black spent some time with chat board archives, and concluded that John Corsi, co-author of "Unfit for Command", is a "moronic brownshirt moronic f***". Oops, wrong link, my bad! People do say the darndest things on the internet, though, don't they?

Anyway, this particular "rebuttal" made it to the Kerry campaign, and on to the AP. The "guilt by association" bit is here:

"It says something about the smear campaign against John Kerry that it has stooped to enlist a hatemonger," said campaign spokesman Chad Clanton.

I'm not sure what it says - that all the Swiftees are racist hate-mongerers? That they don't research Free Republic chat boards before taking a guy on as a co-author? Help me, Chad!

Strangely missing from the Atrios piece, and the comment from the Kerry spokesperson, and the AP story, is the somewhat ritualistic "we honor his service" tribute to the fact that John Corsi, like John Kerry, got shot at defending his country. OK, folks (including myself) have slacked off putting that disclaimer in every piece about Kerry, but this is the first time Corsi has made the news. Atrios we understand, but is this really the way the AP wants to introduce John Corsi to America? What is the AP thinking about? (Don't answer that!)

And if the press has this much free time, we encourage them to ask Chad and his friends to deliver the military records Kerry promised last April. What does it say about Kerry and his campaign that they have lied about this (Hint: a good guess would be "sometimes they lie").

The AP could even look into these other points, if the afternoon is dragging and time hangs heavy.

Kerry's First Purple Heart

One of the Swiftee allegations is that Kerry did not deserve his first Purple Heart.

The Kerry talking point in defense of this seems to be, the doctor who is doing the complaining isn't even the one who signed the medical form.

This was addressed back in May by the LA Times, and more recently by the good doctor himself, with Jim Geraghty of the NRO, chatting with the NRA (yeah, he's great in front of a friendly crowd...). From the LA Times, as reprinted by the Seattle Times:

Letson said that Carreon, a lower-ranked "hospitalman," was "present at the time and he, in fact, made the entry into Lt. Kerry's medical record."

Mr. Carreon died in 1992.

Props to the commenters at Q and O.

The Purple Heart regs are here. Friendly fire and accidents in combat would qualify, so I am not sure why Kerry's accident wouldn't, strictly speaking, qualify. However, it was just a scratch...

MORE: My stint as a JAG ends - Under 2-8 (b) 6 (b), Kerry wins:

(b) Individuals wounded or killed as a result of "friendly fire" in the "heat of battle" will be awarded the Purple Heart as long as the "friendly" projectile or agent was released with the full intent of inflicting damage or destroying enemy troops or equipment.

Under 2-8 (b) 5 (h), I suppose Kerry could lose:

(5) Examples of injuries or wounds which clearly do not qualify for award of the Purple Heart are as follows:

(h) Self-inflicted wounds, except when in the heat of battle, and not involving gross negligence.

OK, the Kerry people should change their talking points.

And we still haven't seen the after-action reports for December (when this incident, and "Christmas in Cambodia" both occurred). C'mon, John you made a promise to Tim Russert.

We want the March 18/19 after-action, too - c'mon, Brinkley uses five pages of his book to excerpt from your "War Notes" journal discussing your March 18 mission is support of Operation Menu, and you can't release a simple after-action report? Like you said you would? C'mon.

Brinkley On Kerry In Cambodia

Having sat down with a copy of Douglas Brinkley's "Tour of Duty", it is pretty clear that this book does not support Kerry's "Christmas in Cambodia" story. To the contrary.

A strong cite is on p. 324-328 - Kerry's War Notes are excerpted, and he describes his reaction to Nixon's Operation Menu, launched March 18, 1969, to bomb Cambodia. Kerry's role - he and other Swift boat ran SEALs to the Cambodian border (His last mission, BTW, contra his web-site, which says his last mission is on March 13 - release the records!). Here we go, p. 324, Kerry's words:

On occasion we had shot towards the border when provoked by sniper or ambush but without fail this led to a formal reprimand by the Cambodian government and accusations of civilian slaughters and random killings by American "aggressors".

One might infer from Kerry's journal that he believed that the border was taken seriously. We also sense a resentment that others would exaggerate claims of American war crimes. Ain't life ironical.

P. 179, Cambodia off-limits: Oct. 14, 1968 (two months before Christmas) - a fellow officer, Bernique, engages in an action "near the Cambodian border at the northern end of the Gulf of Thailand...unfortunately, because the action had taken so cose to Cambodia, and several of the dead had fallen on the other side of the border - which at the time the US Navy took great pains to observe - the incident was not so easily lauded, or forgotten. A furor erupted over Bernique's violation of the ban... and it appeared that he was facing a court-martial for his actions and "

P. 218: Describing the Christmas incident, Brinkley never describes Kerry as crossing the border. Wasser is quoted: "We were getting close to Cambodia," Wasser explained later. "We were out there all alone in the darkness."

UPDATE: Hey, this is why we have Fox News, which recycles the "Christmas in Cambodia" story, presents the Swift cites (the Boston Herald letter, the 1986 Senate speech), and asks the Kerry campaign for a comment:

The Kerry campaign first asserted that the Massachusetts senator never said that he was in Cambodia, only that he was near the country. But when presented with a copy of the Congressional Record and asked about Kerry's letter in the Boston Herald, the campaign said it would come up with an explanation. After repeated phone calls, there was still no clarification.

The campaign should just tell the truth - Kerry and Valerie Plame were looking for Santa Claus.

Getting To "Yes" - Kerry Nearly There!

On the "if you knew then what you know know" question about Saddam and the missing WMDs, the Good Ship Kerry nearly has sailed into port.

Let's let George Bush ask the question:

"My opponent hasn't answered the question of whether, knowing what we know now, he would have supported going into Iraq."

Since we don't have any videotape of oral surgey to inspect, let's watch Kerry's progression on this question.

Last Thursday, Aug 5: "You bet we might have".

Saturday, Aug 7, through a spokesperson: "Kerry still would have voted to authorize the war and "in all probability" would have launched a military attack to oust Hussein by now if he were president>"

And now, Kerry himself: "I'll answer it directly. Yes, I would have voted for the authority. I believe it is the right authority for a president to have but I would have used that authority effectively."

Ahh, he'll answer it directly by not answering! How, we still wonder, would he have followed up?

The article goes on to explain Kerry's vision for reducing our troops in Iraq by passing the steaming sack of whatever to our allies. Current laugh line - Kerry says that troop reductions are an "appropriate" goal. Well, gee, is that controversial? Our question is, is it achievable? The LA Times, and others, have already pounced.

VPW - Reporters Subpoenaed

Recent news reports suggest that Special Counsel Fitzgerald may be approaching the penultimate lap in the investigation into the Valerie Plame Wilson leak. Matt Drudge is blaring this AP story, but the real news is in the front-page coverage by the Washington Post.

A federal judge has held a Time magazine reporter in contempt of court for refusing to testify in an investigation of the leak of a CIA officer's identity, rejecting requests from two media organizations to quash federal grand jury subpoenas seeking information from the media.

...While NBC fought a subpoena issued May 21 and was included in the opinion, it avoided a contempt citation after Tim Russert, moderator of NBC's "Meet the Press," agreed to an interview over the weekend in which he answered a limited number of questions posed by special prosecutor Patrick J. Fitzgerald, NBC said in a statement.

Now, Russert has said previously that Ms. Plame's name was not disclosed to him. However, this next bit is the key, in terms of the timing of this case:

Lawyers involved in the case said it appears that Fitzgerald is now armed with a strong and unambiguous court ruling to demand the testimony of two journalists -- syndicated columnist Robert D. Novak, who first disclosed the CIA officer's name, and Washington Post reporter Walter Pincus, who has written that a Post reporter received information about her from a Bush administration official.

Pincus was served with a subpoena yesterday after Hogan's order was unsealed.

Ahh, instead of a cooperating defendant roll-up, we are seeing a judicial roll-up. Cool.

The subject of these conversations is Cheney's Chief of Staff, Scooter Libby. Folks who read only the AP story will hyper-ventilate that he is going down (OK, Full Disclosure - I picked him as a prime suspect a long time ago). However, the WaPo is fascinating on this point:

Fitzgerald has shown a continuing interest in Libby, witnesses have said, but it now appears that his reasons may be more complex than was first apparent. Libby has signed a waiver allowing reporters to tell the prosecutor whether he disclosed Plame's name to them. Prosecutors have e-mails and phone records showing his contacts with reporters, and witnesses have said they are interested in a story Cooper wrote last summer in which Libby was interviewed.

We take for granted that this is the Cooper story in question.

Ok, those are the highlights. Here's your soundbite - be cool on Libby - he's still a good choice, but this story doesn't prove it.

As to timing, the court order has an expedited schedule (p. 2) for the TIME appeals - three to four summertime weeks. The the Walter Pincus subpoena fight has just begun, and Novak's subpoena may or may not have been served (would the WaPo know?).

The opinion itself is here; this is the court's website, where we can await future developments.

MORE: CNN coverage of their TIME reporter's situation.

UPDATE: Why Walter Pincus, you ask? Good question. This NY Times story from last February describes (near bottom) the One x Two x Six investigation sparked by a WaPo story.

I sure thought this was the WaPo story in question, but the bylines are Allen and Priest; here is some WaPo follow-up from last October, this time with Pincus and Allen.

So, what news on subpoenas for Allen and Priest? I'm, like, derelict here. Unless Pincus was a source for the Allen/Priest story, or other evidence suggests that Novak and Pincus were original leakees...

UPDATE: Interesting - Walter Pincus had the June 12 story with Wilson as a source - the story the Senate Intel committee mocked. That struck me as deeply significant when I began this sentence...

OK, the fog has cleared - if Pincus had a bum story on June 12, the White House may have called him in July to set the record straight, and leaked the Plame-Wilson connection in the process. Hence, Pincus was a leak recipeint, even though he did not publish.

Props To Matt Yglesias

Matt told us then what the LA Times is telling us now - Europe is not interested in sending troops to Iraq so that we can send our troops home.

Short excerpt:

Did Anyone Else Get This Stock Tip?

Filed under both "I'll Be Darned" and "Is This The Latest Scam?":

We had a "wrong number" message left on our answering machine over the weekend detailing a stock that will surge on Monday. We had no idea who the tipper was, and the name she was leaving the message for (no, not Martha Stewart) was unfamiliar to us as well. The underlying "news" that was meant to spark the stock came out last Wednesday.

Well, the stock did surge. My question - did some scammers leave 10,000 "wrong number" messages just to hype the stock?

And no, I did not buy any. Just doing my civic duty here.

Wasn't This Josh Marshall's Big Scoop?

From last week's Financial Times:

French Probe Led to 'Fake Niger Uranium Papers'
By Mark Huband / Financial Times
August 2, 2004

I didn't see anything about this at his site last week, but that may reflect more on me than on Dr. Marshall.

A Good Comment In Defense Of Kerry's Bronze Star

Well known commenter Bruce Moomaw and I don't often see eye to eye, but he does a good job here.

The subject is the debate over the March 13 incident where Kerry got his third Purple Heart and a Bronze Star for pulling Green Beret Rassmann out of the water. A sense of the dispute is found in the Swift letter at Captain Ed's.

I am reprinting his comment, with no significant editorial oversight:

Regarding the clash between Thurlow and Rassmann over the Bronze Star Incident [here on CNN] -- which, as [Tom] remarks, resembles Rashomon (with both men flat-out calling each other liars before Judy Woodruff, and both of them apparently disagreeing with Brinkley's account), the obvious thing to do is to track down the skippers of the other three Swift Boats and find out what THEY say. According to Brinkley (if he's right), they were Rich Barker, Don Droz and Rich McCann.

Well, a 2-minute stroll through Google reveals that:

(1) Barker is an wildly enthusiastic supporter of Kerry. (See http://www.abclocal.go.com/kgo/news/politics/072804_politics_kerry_vet.html and http://www.al.com/news/mobileregister/index.ssf?/base/news/1090919792168000.xml , to name just two of dozens of entries.)

Kerry Versus The Swiftees - Who's Lying?

[RELATED: A new "Kerry in Cambodia cite - the 1992 AP interview - is here.]

I have been advised that the Swiftees may simply be lying about Kerry's Vietnam record for partisan political purposes. Oh, that would be low! We would all agree that lying about Kerry's Vietnam record for partisan political purposes is a bad thing, wouldn't we? Well?

It turns out that John Kerry, his supporters, and his campaign have been doing exactly that - they have been lying about his record. Let's have a quick review:

(1) John Edwards and Bill Clinton, two of the most prominent speakers at the Democratic Convention in Boston, lied about the circumstances under which Kerry joined the Swift boats, with the effect of over-stating his valor. Brendan Nyhan of Spinsanity caught this, not the Swiftees.

(2) From a 1970 interview with the Harvard Crimson through two recent major biographies, with erroneous reporting in major newspapers along the way, Kerry has left the false impression that he had been honorably discharged from the Navy in 1970, prior to his days as a prominent anti-war activist. John Cole captured the political significance succinctly - "I was completely unaware that Kerry was throwing his anti-war hissy fits and meeting secretly with the North Vietnamese while serving as a LIEUTENANT IN THE RESERVES."

Following the release of his military records, the the Kerry campaign ended this charade. However, the campaign was misleading the public on this point through the entire nominating process, and we have seen no corrections in the same media that ran the mistakes. The Swiftees have not been emphasizing this point (and Naval officers have free speech rights), but others have been since April.

3. In a Senate speech in 1986, in order to score a political point about the perils of a wider war if the US provided aid to the Contras, Kerry recounted his dramatic story of a Christmas spent in Cambodia in 1968. In 1992, in order to demonstrate his empathy and solidarity with the POWs/MIAs who may have been lost in Cambodia, Kerry told the story to John Diamond of the AP.

However, the story does not stand up. Perhaps Kerry would like to release the relevant records to support his contention, but that takes us to number 4.

4. Kerry told Tim Russert in April 2004 that he would make his military records public. We are still waiting for a full disclosure.

For example, the John Kerry website shows after-action reports for February 1969 through March 1969; it also includes the history of CD-11 (Kerry's assignment) from Jan 1, 1969.

However, the "Christmas in Cambodia" incident took place (or didn't) in December of 1968. Where is the after action report for that?

Similarly, when Tim Russert asked about the circumstances under which Kerry received his first Purple Heart, Kerry responded that "if you ask anybody who was with me, the two guys who were with me, [it] was probably the most frightening night that they had that they were in Vietnam...".

Well, we are still waiting for the after-action report from Dec 2, 1968. It is not at his website, and it is quite controversial - the Swiftees claim that, according to the after-action report, there was no enemy fire. From that, it follows that Kerry's minor shrapnel wound may have been a friendly fire incident - his own friendly fire, in fact, since he may have simply fired a grenade launcher and had a grenade explode too close to him. The Swiftees attach a copy of a reg that, they claim, disqualifies a "friendly fire" wound in this context.

Interestingly, some of these Freepers point out that "friendly fire" is not disqualifying (understandably). As to the regs, who knows? My much simpler question is, where are the long-promised records - reporters should be clamoring for the after action reports and the Command History for the units described in this timeline: Coastal Division 14 for Dec 2; Coastal Division 13 for Christmas.

While they are at it, they might ask about after-action reports for March 18-19 of 1969. Kerry missed a couple of days after being wounded on March 13, but was back in full service mode by the 17th, and seems not to have left until the end of the month. The Command History shows his boat went out on March 18 and 19, burning structures and destroying enemy bunkers, but not reporting enemy contact. More details are at the bottom of this post.

Is this a big deal? Kerry told Dick Cavett (from the MTP archive) that "I took part in search-and-destroy missions, in the burning of villages." Maybe this simply documents that point. Maybe Kerry was filing records while waiting for his transfer and his boat was reassigned - release the records!

So, good point - let's not have any partisan lies told about John Kerry. That would be deplorable.

UPDATE: Let's give some oxygen to Douglas Brinkley - he gets Kerry's "honorable discharge" wrong in the text (p. 338), but right in the timeline in the back of the book. My half-bad.

Brinkley also kills the "Kerry in Cambodia" story, repeatedly. In fact, he says several times (and quotes Kerry saying) that the Navy was quite strict about observing the border, and that crossing it meant trouble and an investigation, prior to the Nixon incursion.

And Kerry's last mission was *after* the March 13 Bronze Star adventure, in support of Operation Menu, the Nixon incursion into Cambodia which started March 18. Kerry's role - running SEALs to (but not across) the Cambodian border. The timing matches the CD-11 history - release the records!

Page number to follow, sorry.

Brown Books From The Folks In, Hmm, Earth Tones

John Kerry with Tim Russert on Meet The Press, April, 2004:

MR. RUSSERT: You used the word "war criminals."

SEN. KERRY: Well, let me just finish. Let me must finish. It was, I think, a reflection of the kind of times we found ourselves in and I don't like it when I hear it today. I don't like it, but I want you to notice that at the end, I wasn't talking about the soldiers and the soldiers' blame, and my great regret is, I hope no soldier--I mean, I think some soldiers were angry at me for that, and I understand that and I regret that, because I love them.

And this, from a source about which I know nothing:

“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."

Hard to believe. Of course, there is this smear, from Not Serious at the Krugman-endorsed Media Matters. The left may not like McCarthy, but they are not afraid of the tactics.

A Cite For Swiftee Eyes - A New "Kerry In Cambodia"

An alert reader points me to a "Kerry in Cambodia" cite that, as best I can tell, will be new to the Swiftees, and everyone else. This is an AP story from 1992 interviewing Sen. Kerry about a committee hearing into the fate of missing POWs/MIAs:

06/25

Kerry-MIA

Copyright, 1992. The Associated Press. All rights reserved.

By JOHN DIAMOND
Associated Press Writer

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Navy Lt. John Kerry knew he had no business steering his Mekong River patrol boat across the border into Cambodia, but orders were orders.

A quarter-century later, Sen. John Kerry says newly declassified documents have convinced him fellow servicemen captured on such trips were left behind at war's end.

Kerry, D-Mass., announced this week at hearings of the Senate Select Committee on POW-MIA Affairs he chairs that as many as 133 U.S. servicemen may have been left behind, either as unrecorded fatalities or prisoners of war, when the Vietnam War ended in 1973.

This conclusion that the government failed to account for all its soldiers, sailors and fliers did not come easily for the 48-year-old senator. Through two decades of political activism since he returned from Vietnam, first as an opponent of the war, then as a lawmaker, Kerry has remained studiously neutral
on the POW-MIA question.

Veterans groups and researchers of varying credibility raised allegations and published photographs suggesting that Americans might still be languishing in Southeast Asian stalags. Bereaved family members pleaded with lawmakers to rescue loved ones they were convinced were still alive. Kerry said only that
there was evidence that needed to be explored.

"I've always said there's evidence. But I'm not going to draw any conclusions about this until we do a sound, sensible job," Kerry said in an interview. "This conclusion was drawn from documents which no one saw 10 years ago."

But for Kerry, who spent six violent months commanding a patrol boat on the Mekong River, there's always been a ring of truth to allegations of abandoned Americans. By Christmas 1968, part of Kerry's patrol extended across the border of South Vietnam into Cambodia.

"We were told, `Just go up there and do your patrol. Everybody was over there (in Cambodia). Nobody thought twice about it," Kerry said. One of the missions, which Kerry, at the time, was ordered not to discuss, involved taking CIA operatives into Cambodia to search for enemy enclaves.

"I can remember wondering, `If you're going to go, what happens to you,"' Kerry said.

Excerpts continue below.

Quick reaction - if I were a Kerry defender, I would like the CIA, hush-hush, everyone is lying angle.

And that is it for the defense - what about "Everybody was over there"? The Swiftees are not backing him on this, and three of his shipmates seemed to have spent Christmas elsewhere. Maybe they were channeling Yogi Berra - nobody goes there anymore, it's too crowded.

One wonders - were any US boats going upriver into Cambodia? And did John Kerry specifically do so? This post strongly rebuts the Kerry story as it has been presented so far.

Many sources at the Vietnam Veterans of America.

Captain Ed has "Kerry in Cambodia" cites, and a letter from the Swiftees detailing their allegations.

This PBS show says that in 1967, "Pursuing their enemy, American and South Vietnamese aircraft often attacked across the Cambodian border. Sihanouk criticized Secretary of State Dean Rusk, who was then trying to repair relations." OK, that could result in POWs/MIAs; it does not mention boats, but how surprised would you be to learn that some boats did cross the border? OTOH, the Cambodians couldn't control their airspace; a river would have been more manageable. On the third hand, covert ops to rescue airmen or scout the VC probably were happening. However, Swift boats were 50 feet long, and noisy; smaller, quieter boats were available, and perhaps more suitable. Beats me, but I am distracting myself - Kerry has no after-action reports, no witnesses, a story by Brinkley that puts him too far from the border, and a less-than-full crew supporting him - not good. Unless everyone is lying except John!

UPDATE: Early reaction is not favorable to Kerry - plenty of links to recap the discussion, and some colorful quotes.

ANOTHER UPDATE: US News and World Report put Kerry in Cambodia in a May 2000 article. This time, he is running supplies on clandestine missions - cool! To be serious, it might be his last mission, running SEALs to the border in support of Operation Menu, Nixon's bombing of Cambodia (Brinkley, p 324-328).

I May Have To Vote For Kerry

Bush can deliver occasionally, but for day-in, day-out steadiness and reliabilty, Kerry's The One. He really did deliver both of these insights at the same event while responding to questions:

Senator, what would you have done in that schoolroom on the morning of 9/11?:

"First of all, had I been reading to children, and had my top aide whispered in my ear, 'America is under attack,' I would have told those kids very politely and nicely that the president of the United States had business that he needed to attend to, and I would have attended to it."

Bravo, Johnny Danger! And sir, knowing what we know now, would you have taken out Saddam Hussein?

"You bet we might have, after we exhausted [U.N.-led inspections] and found that [Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein] wasn't complying and so on and so forth".

Hmm, he's not so bold when faced with adults. Courage, Tall One!

Does anyone know if Kerry has had his hearing checked recently? The President asked for a yes or no answer, not yes and no.

So, the big question - can I count on Kerry to provide this sort of silliness for four more years? Will I vote for him? You Bet I Might!

UPDATE: Getting warmer!

Knowing then what he knows today about the lack of weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, Kerry still would have voted to authorize the war and "in all probability" would have launched a military attack to oust Hussein by now if he were president, Kerry national security adviser Jamie Rubin said in an interview Saturday.

The suspense builds inexorably. Will it be war or peace?

Kerry's Advisers Mock His Energy Plan (So I Don't Have To)

On Thursday, Sen. Kerry unveiled his plan for energy independence (apparently a crowd-pleasing concept which we are sure polls well).

On Saturday, the NY Times presented the Kerry rebuttal:

Kerry's Goal of Independence From Middle East Oil Divides Advisers

The idea of a United States independent of Middle East oil is a touchstone of Senator John Kerry's campaign and a huge crowd pleaser, but has divided and exasperated many of his most experienced energy advisers.

Some advisers say they worry that Mr. Kerry's focus on freeing the United States from reliance on oil from the Persian Gulf, the linchpin of the energy plan he released on Thursday, is unrealistic and misleading and that hammering away at it would erode Mr. Kerry's credibility with business, the news media and other countries.

Hmm, that contrasts splendidly with the Washington Post description: His promises to stop the outsourcing of jobs and end dependence on Middle East oil are not grounded in reality.

Well. My (uncharacteristically non-rhetorical) questions:

An Alert Reader Finds Kerry In Cambodia

UPDATE: Another Alert Reader strikes gold - Kerry is back in Cambodia in a 1992 AP Interview. And "Everybody was over there"!

An alert reader has found the Senate floor speech in which Kerry makes the claim that he was in Cambodia in December 1968. That is not good for Kerry (Insert frownie face, and botox it). The Nixon connection is weak, however. This is a disappointment from a comedy and mockery perspective, but hardly central to the main point.

The speech is in an update to "Swimming to Cambodia", below.

Kranish Is Cooked

Michael Kranish rocked us on Friday with a story, headlined "Veteran retracts criticism of Kerry", which told us that:

"a key figure in the anti-Kerry campaign, Kerry's former commanding officer, backed off one of the key contentions. Lieutenant Commander George Elliott said in an interview that he had made a ''terrible mistake" in signing an affidavit that suggests Kerry did not deserve the Silver Star -- one of the main allegations in the book.

Elliott is quoted as saying that Kerry ''lied about what occurred in Vietnam . . . for example, in connection with his Silver Star, I was never informed that he had simply shot a wounded, fleeing Viet Cong in the back."

Get Maureen Dowd on the line - that may have been the most misleading ellipsis ever published, but since the affidavit was not public, who knew?

Subsequently, Capt. Elliot retracted his retraction, prompting some head-scratching.

Now, both the original affidavit and the re-affirmation (the retraction of the retraction) are available here. I will read it again, and you should, too, but my first reaction [Update: and second, and third] is that Kranish wrote a wildly deceptive and misleading story.

Let's restore the missing ellipsis, emboldening the excerpted bit:

3. When Kerry came back to the United States he lied about what ocurred in Vietnam, comparing his commanders to Lt. Calley of My Lai, comparing the American armed forces to the army of Ghengis Khan, and making similar misstatements. Kerry was also not forthright in Vietnam. For example, in connection with his Silver Star, I was never informed that he had simply shot a wounded, fleeing Viet Cong in the back.

Hello, Mr. Reporter! When Capt. Elliot "backed off one of the key contentions", was it the My Lai complaint, or the Ghengis Khan comparison? Or was it one example preceded by "for example"?

Unbelievable. In his re-affirming affidavit, Capt. Elliot cites the same material I did to reach this conclusion - he was not informed of the facts, and "had I known the facts, I would not have recommended Kerry for the Silver Star for simply pursuing and dispatching a single, wounded, fleeing VietCong".

This, from the Globe, now looks wildly ironic:

In the ad, Elliott says, ''John Kerry has not been honest about what happened in Vietnam."

Asked to supply evidence to support that statement, the anti-Kerry group provided a copy of Elliott's affidavit. Elliott said the same affidavit had been used in the production of the book.

It is unclear whether the work contains further justification for the assertion, beyond Elliott's statement.

Oh, it is going to be pretty clear, I bet. They still need to back it up, but there will be more. And based on the Filing Frenchman's description of book co-author John O'Neill, the research will be something other than a house of cards.

Earlier, I had guessed that the Swiftees would disappear under the headline of "Cranks can't get story straight". But if Kranish has been this irresponsible, the Swiftees will sail on as the heroes of a "Liberal media attempts to squash Veteran truth-tellers" drama.

Don't even ask me about Joe Wilson.

MORE: Let's give Kranish a little credit here - Elliot does seem to be on both sides of the "did he shoot him in the back" question. But this early quote in the story - "Elliott said in an interview that he had made a ''terrible mistake" in signing an affidavit that suggests Kerry did not deserve the Silver Star" - seems to be an out of context interpretation of the full quote, which runs later - ''I still don't think he shot the guy in the back," Elliott said. ''It was a terrible mistake probably for me to sign the affidavit with those words. I'm the one in trouble here."

One might plausibly argue, as Elliott now does, that the "terrible mistake" was to cite that somewhat immaterial detail, rather than to focus on the (subjective but irrefutable) war crimes accusations.

UPDATE: The Globe stands by its story, offering a legalistc "the quote is accurate" defense. I assume the quote is accurate; all that is missing is an appropriate context. Print the affidavit - the relevant section (3) is only about three sentences, as demonstrated above.

The NY Times is scarcely better - they can't find space for three sentences either.

And hey, is that Atrios, posting as Duncan B. Black at Mind Over Media Matters? Apparently, co-author Jon Corsi is associated with the Free Republic and delivers the snark when dissing Dems. I bet he wears inappropriate t-shirts, too. Burn his book now!

And a hint to Not Sirius - December comes at the end of the year. Worth noting.

Finally, some commenters seem to think that the Boston Globe article didn't really create the impression that Elliott had retracted his entire affidavit. FactCheck staggered to that erroneous impression, as did most of the commenters found here. (And isn't my faith in tedious things like evidence kind of poignant?)

This Is Going Well

The DNC Religious Coordinator experiences a personal separation of church from state; the Democratic Truth Squad is mocked as liars - bring it on!

A Trove Of Comedy Classics

I was looking for something else, and found this compendium of Kerrymania - think of them as potato chips for the Kerryphobic.

Swimming To Cambodia

[UPDATE: A new cite for Kerry in Cambodia - a 1992 AP interview. "Everybody was over there."]

Christmas in Cambodia with John Kerry? Roger Simon and Hugh Hewitt are very intrigued (look for Aug 6, 12:30 for Hugh).

More detail is available in Chapter 3 of the Swiftees book (Christmas in Cambodia starts on p. 17 of the .pdf). Now, set aside (if you can) any sense of these guys as hatchet men, and focus on the specific sources they cite. For example, they claim that on March 27, 1986, John Kerry gave a speech on the Senate floor recounting his time in Cambodia (and deploring the evil President Nixon who sent him there.)

As Hugh Hewitt points out, this is objectively verifiable - someone needs to get the Congressional Record, and see whether these guys are quoting Kerry correctly, taking his words out of context, or what.

Similarly, the Swiftees guide us to the Kerry book by the Boston Globe team, available in bookstores now, as another source for this story. OK, are they lying? Or were the Globe reporters "misinformed" - it wouldn't be the first time, since Michael Kranish also fluffed Kerry's honorable discharge.

Based on Beldar's professional experience with John O'Neill, co-author of the Swiftees' "Unfit for Command", my guess is that the aspects of this book that can be researched will pass at least casual inspection.

For an excellent discussion that preceded the Swiftee book, check this out - these gents did a fine job of showing that Kerry was not where he said he was when Nixon wasn't saying that Kerry wasn't there.

Now, I can't help you find a bookstore. And I don't think you can find Kerry's 1986 speech online, since the Congressional Record is available online only back to 1994. However, this page helps you find libraries that carry it - I already have mine targetted.

MORE: Let's pre-empt one possible Kerry defense, which would be, hypothetically, "His phrasing may have been awkward, but he knew in 1970 that Nixon was lying because he had been there in 1968". Fine, but he wasn't there! Don't let his defenders rebut the minor point and slide past the big one.

UPDATE: All eyes turn to AntiMedia, who has dug up some Kerry speeches from 1986, but can't find the mystery speech - yet. This is far from over - the Unfit for Command book footnotes the Kerry floor speech cite, but, naturally, the portion of the book with the footnotes is not excerpted. However, as noted by Beldar, John O'Neill has done some research in his time.

UPDATE: We have a Bingo! On the major point, he really did tell the US Senate that he was in Cambodia. Good for the Swiftees, bad for Kerry. On the other hand, the Nixon connection is tenuous; let's score that minor point against the Swiftees.

How Kerry might reconcile his claim with his military records, I don't know. And the Kerry website won't help - it does not show after-action reports for December 1968. Why not?

And the Command History picks up on January 1, 1969. What unexpected bad luck.

Speech excerpted below:

More On Pakistan Versus Al Qaeda

Kamran Khan and Dana Priest score a front-pager on the efforts in Pakistan against Al Qaeda. The timeline of the roll-up of High Value Targets makes a nice counterpoint to the "Waiting for the Balloon Drop" theory that generated so much discussion.

More from the FT: Pakistan has uncovered fresh evidence as to where al-Qaeda leaders may be hiding along its border with Afghanistan, senior Pakistani officials said on Friday.

You Take The High Road...

And I'll be John Kerry, who said:

"I want to address these next words directly to President George W. Bush.

In the weeks ahead, let's be optimists, not just opponents. Let's build unity in the American family, not angry division. Let's honor this nation's diversity. Let's respect one another. And let's never misuse for political purposes the most precious document in American history, the Constitution of the United States.

My friends, the high road may be harder, but it leads to a better place."

before he said:

"First of all, had I been reading to children, and had my top aide whispered in my ear, 'America is under attack,' I would have told those kids very politely and nicely that the president of the United States had business that he needed to attend to, and I would have attended to it."

Tim Blair is suitably savage.

UPDATE: Having been reminded that Sen. Kerry was simply answering a question, I must express my delight that he has ended his boycott of hypothetical questions, at least about the past; now, if only we can get him to focus on the future...

We are also disappointed to learn that Mr. Kleiman considers "Give 'em Hell" to be somehow consistent with taking the high road. Give 'em four more years, I say! And I will echo the Senator in saying, "Let's respect one another".

Finally, George Stephanopolous was fascinating on this subject.

UPDATE: The WaPo lets Teresa slap Kerry silly.

MORE: My Bad! Kerry has answered the question (linked above) of whether he would have taken out Saddam if he knew then what we know now: "You bet we might have".

Oh, you think I'm cheating - a more complete quote is ""You bet we might have, after we exhausted [U.N.-led inspections] and found that [Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein] wasn't complying and so on and so forth". And yada, yada, and a little bit of this, and a little bit of that, and maybe I can talk him to death and then bore his heirs...

He MUST Be A Kerry Guy!

Did Lieutenant Commander George Elliott actually say, "I was for the affidavit before I was against it"?

NO, but we wish he had. Except for a minor hiccup in the commentary, my story below is fine, and covers a lot of the same ground as the Boston Globe story. And, while on the subject, here is a retraction from the Kerry side about his dates of service that no one has noticed.

[UPDATE: And now Elliott retracts the retraction - from Drudge:

The following statement from Swift Boat Veterans for Truth concerns an article appearing in morning edition of the BOSTON GLOBE, written by GLOBE reporter and author of the official Kerry-Edwards campaign book, Mike Kranish.

"Captain George Elliott describes an article appearing in today’s edition of the BOSTON GLOBE by Mike Kranish as extremely inaccurate and highly misstating his actual views. He reaffirms his statement in the current advertisement paid for by the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth, Captain Elliott reaffirms his affidavit in support of that advertisement, and he reaffirms his request that he ad be played.

“Additional documentation will follow...

They then refer to the Boston Globe reports we discuss in this post.

OK! We are going full speed ahead here; later, we will figure out whether we are headed up- or down-river. And since it looks like George "Elastic" Elliott will agree with the last guy to talk to him, we await developments (and we kinda hope someone asks him if he buried Jimmy Hoffa).

That said, since this seems to have degenerated into a weird credibility contest we have our own little quarrel with Mr. Kranish. Both in his Boston Globe profile of John Kerry and in his book, he presented the now-discredited information that John Kerry was honorably discharged in January, 1970. The Kerry people have (ever so quietly) corrected the record - will Mr. Kranish? Email Kranish@globe.com]

Now, in this [initial] retraction [retraction.o1], Elliott seems to be focussed on the question of whether Kerry shot a fleeing Viet Cong in the back. As my earlier post demonstrates, that is hardly the only discrepancy between the Silver Star citation and the other accounts.

[SORRY, another update - here is a link to the retraction affidavit, and the original affidavit. Elliot says the same thing I do - shooting the guy in the back is not central to his argument. At first glance, Kranish is cooked.]

We also note that the Boston Globe reporter uses a selective excerpt - when asked about the possibility that he shot the person in the back, Kerry said more than just ''No, absolutely not". (I don't say a lot more than "who cares", BTW, but evidently people do.)

My longish post also uncovers a possible loose end - are there still some missing records at the Kerry website? There are suggestions that Kerry was on patrols on March 18 and 19, but there are no after-action reports beyond March 13.

One wonders where this story is headed - Michael Moore made a million errors, yet remains a hero to Democrats. However, my guess is that the press will point to this retraction of one part of one allegation, and ignore the Swift Veterans forever.

Final result - Kerry is a noble veteran who served his country and would never make up stories, distort his service record, or exploit his military background for partisan purposes.

However, if other veterans criticize him, they are just lying, uninformed, partisan hacks.

Rassmann, the Green Beret Kerry pulled from the water, does get to the heart of this at the end of the Boston Globe piece:

Those questioning Kerry's medals, Rassmann said, are ''angry about John speaking out against the [Vietnam] war."

Yes, these are simply not pro-life Republicans who decided one day to make up lies about John Kerry.

MORE: Good links from Glenn.

The Swift Vets Versus Kerry

Matt Drudge excerpts some incendiary charges against John Kerry from the new Swift Veterans attack book, "Unfit for Command". Interestingly, the major details seems to be confirmed by Kerry's own story as told to the Boston Globe. More interestingly, Kerry's Silver Star citation (see page 7 of this .pdf file) provides an account of the action which is much closer to the Swift Vets story than to Kerry's story. Since the Globe reporter also quotes the Silver Star citation, we can not explain why he overlooked these details.

Let's start with the Drudge headline - VETS CHARGE: KERRY KILLED FLEEING TEEN; LIED FOR MEDAL /Slaughters Animals, Burns Down Tiny Village.

According to the Silver Star citation, Kerry leaped ashore, pursued the "man" behind a hooch, and killed him. That is not quite the version told either in Drudge, or by Kerry to the Boston Globe - there, another man wounded the "teenager", who fled and was shot by Kerry. Hmm, what is the age of majority in Vietnam?

Drudge, and the Silver Star citation, make clear that Kerry was leading a three boat patrol with thirty Vietnamese soldiers per "unit" (if I am following this, a "unit" seems to be one Swift boat, although I am advised that ten soldiers per boat is more likely), so Kerry was backed by plenty of force. One would not get that from the Globe.

We have more extensive excerpts below, but let me offer a few comments - first, combat is confusing and after-action accounts differ; it is clear from the Globe that even Kerry and his crew remember many things differently. Let's go easy on the word "liar".

Secondly, the Swift Vets may be right on many (or all) of these facts, and wrong in their conclusions - for example, the Naval officers who recommended Kerry for a Silver Star were probably well aware of the circumstances in which he won it; they were also aware of the PR and morale value of recognizing a Yalie like Kerry. [UPDATE: I, on the other hand, was not aware of this affidavit and retraction story. Fortunately, my research is stronger than my commentary, so the rest of this post is not affected.]

Excerpts below.