122 Comments

1. CERDIP:

If this issue gains enough attention, it could stop Kerry dead in the water.

Aug 9, 2004 - 9:05 am 2. Charlie (Colorado):

Roger, I belong to a Republican men’s club that has, among others, half a dozen previous Colorado state party chairmen and a couple of previous gubenatorial candidates as members.

Now, most of the time this is a chance to tell dirty jokes to old men and get a nice dinner, but in our most recent meeting (last Tuesday) we actually talked politics.

I mention all this because you say:I support Bush for reelection because of the War on Terror. I oppose him on gay marriage (I’m considerably to the “left” of Kerry on that issue; he recently even backed the Missouri amendment!)

You may be interested, and possibly even surprised, to discover that of this group, something like 80 percent agrees with you.

Aug 9, 2004 - 9:08 am 3. spongeworthy:

He’s going to stick with his story no matter what–it’s his word against others and the media isn’t going to press him.

And while the impeachment of Clinton was a charade, it appears to be the only option the Constitution allows. He was not removed, as is appropriate, but he was punished. I find the entire exercise to have some value, even if just to go through the motions as warning for the benefit of future creeps.

And it’s hard for me to look at it as overturning an election when it’s not like Dole would take his place–it’s the VP’s job to take his place and Gore was definitely on the ticket.

Aug 9, 2004 - 9:26 am 4. Eric Deamer:

You may be interested, and possibly even surprised, to discover that of this group, something like 80 percent agrees with you.

I, for one, would be extremely happy and extremely surprised to know that this was the case. But, unfortunately from my perspective, social and religious conservatives are extremely prevalent in the blogosphere. (Perhaps they’re overrepresented), so much so that I no longer call myself a Republican, even though I’ve voted that way for probably 90% of votes I’ve cast. The impression I get is that the social conservatives are taking over, but again maybe that has something to do with reading too many blogs.

Aug 9, 2004 - 9:34 am 5. hollywood:

Roger,

I think spongeworthy’s right about this not getting to be a big deal with the media. Your source quote reads, “Mr. President, I remember Christmas of 1968 sitting on a gunboat in Cambodia. I remember what it was like to be shot at by Vietnamese and Khmer Rouge and Cambodians, and have the President of the United States telling the American people that I was not there; the troops were not in Cambodia.”

So, it sounds like he was allegedly in Cambodian waters (however that would be defined) and he caught fire from some Cambodians (however that would be ascertained). He can always say that because the Cambodians engaged his boat, he was fighting with Cambodians and they were treating the waters as if they were theirs. It’s a fudge (assuming he was not truthful) but I think he skates on it.

Aug 9, 2004 - 9:36 am 6. JK Ribera:

“He’s going to stick with his story no matter what–it’s his word against others and the media isn’t going to press him.”

Possibly. But it may not be so easy. There are too many contradictions already in print and it is too easy to track down.

Aug 9, 2004 - 9:36 am 7. jerry:

Roger:

I assume you are engaging in hyperbole. A President can be impeached only for “high crimes or misdemeanors” committed while in office. Anything he did before election to the office is not grounds for impeachment.

I think your [perhaps former] friends can rest assured that you remain solidly committed to left. You defense of Clinton should assure you re-admittance to the tribe after the election when you can hopefully start campaigning for Hillary in 2008. Perjury is a high crime or misdemeanor. It doesn’t matter whether its in a law suit about sex, [Geraldo lost 10 grand over that one) or not. Clinton’s perjury in the Jones case was material to the case. Remember, Jones claimed she could prove her complaint because of Clinton’s “distinguishing characteristic”. If he admitted to his relationship to Lewinski then she could testify to the veracity of Jones’ claim. Therefore, his “lie about sex” was not innocent. It was a deliberate attempt to tell a falsehood with purpose of obstructing justice and the 5th Circuit court so ruled. That’s why he eventually settled the case out of court and that is why he has been disbarred by both the US and Arkansas Supreme Courts.

Aug 9, 2004 - 9:37 am 8. Eric Deamer:

And hollywood arrives with the Clintonian word games in advance.

Aug 9, 2004 - 9:39 am 9. hollywood:

“Perjury is a high crime or misdemeanor.”

Actually, jerry, I’m not sure what is or isn’t a high crime and/or misdemeanor was ever resolved in this context. As I recall, it’s not defined in the Constitution. Some would argue it relates to treason or treasonable offenses.

Aug 9, 2004 - 9:46 am 10. Eric Deamer:

And to further confuse everyone about where I’m “coming from” (as if anyone should really care), I agree completely with jerry’s excellent summation of the vapidity of the “only lied about a private matter” defense of Clinton. He lied in a civil sexual harassmnent lawsuit, thereby obstructing justice and infringing upon Paula Corbin Jones’s civil rights. The lies were “about sex” because the case was about sex. So what exactly? I never understood this defense.

Aug 9, 2004 - 9:49 am 11. HA:

Jerry,

A President can be impeached only for “high crimes or misdemeanors” committed while in office.

Here is how Kerry’s lies before taking office will become high crimes should he win the election. This dispute between Kerry and the Swift Vets will end up in court one way or another during his hypothetical administration. If this occurs, there is no way that Kerry is going to get away with refusing to testify. And if he testifies under oath, he will either have to contradict one of his myriad of public lies or commit perjury. He’s damned either way.

Aug 9, 2004 - 9:52 am 12. Rick Ballard:

Could we please, please, please leave Bubba out of this?

Kerry’s words on the Senate floor were spoken in opposition to further funding for the contras. He was actually telling lies in support of Danny Ortega (Castro’s mini-me). His lies in this instance constitute a portion of the web of deceit that he began weaving upon his return from Vietnam. Tugging on this loose thread is going to pull the web apart until the central lies of his life in politics are laid bare for the American public to examine.

Impeachment has a separate meaning from that which is commonly understood. I would hope to pursue that secondary understanding without getting involved in a replay of the ’90’s. Sen. Kerry has impeached his own character by telling obvious falsehoods on the floor of the Senate in order to affect the policy of the United States.

I believe that the question that Roger poses, “Will you lie to us about such things in the future?”, should be preceded by “Have you ever stopped telling lies about Vietnam?”

Aug 9, 2004 - 9:55 am 13. Dave Schuler:

A President can be impeached only for “high crimes or misdemeanors” committed while in office. Anything he did before election to the office is not grounds for impeachment.

Actually, jerry, not quite. Here’s what the Constitution says:

Section 4. The President, Vice President and all civil officers of the United States, shall be removed from office on impeachment for, and conviction of, treason, bribery, or other high crimes and misdemeanors.

Nothing about “while in ofice” there. Presidents may be immune from suit for prior offenses while in office but not immune from impeachment and conviction by the Congress for prior offenses. So what are “high crimes and misdemeanors”? Pretty much anything the Congress want them to be. It’s an area over which the Congress has complete discretion. So does perjury before the Senate thirty years ago fit the bill? Frankly, I doubt it. But war crimes would. There’s no statute of limitation on those.

Aug 9, 2004 - 9:58 am 14. Dave Schuler:

And, of coures, if lying during a political campaign were a high crime or misdemeanor no president would ever serve out his term.

Aug 9, 2004 - 10:01 am 15. Knucklehead:

Hmmm…

Just for the heck of it, here is some info re: High Crimes and Misdemeanors and Impeachment.

http://www.claremont.org/projects/constitution/981215bessette.html

http://www.c-span.org/questions/week119.htm

http://www.infoplease.com/ipa/A0764613.html

Aug 9, 2004 - 10:03 am 16. jerry:

Dave:

The Constitution forbids the application of any laws ex post to a crime. The impeachment clause can only be applied to crimes committed after taking the oath of office. Therefore nothing that a individuals does before assuming the office can be held legally against him under the Constitution. His fitness for office will be decided by the voters.

Aug 9, 2004 - 10:10 am 17. hollywood:

jerry,

Apparently Clinton agreed to a 5 year suspension of his Arkansas law license. I don’t know if that means he automatically gets it back after 5 years, or if he has to apply for reinstatement or what. Sorta moot in that he’s unlikely to be practicing law anyway. http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn?pagename=article&contentId=A21107-2001Jan19&notFound=true

Aug 9, 2004 - 10:12 am 18. Occam's Beard:

Jerry,

I believe the prohibition against ex post facto prosecution refers to making a deed a crime after the deed was committed. It would seem the Constitution is silent on whether an offense has to be committed in office to render its perpetrator impeachable.

Aug 9, 2004 - 10:17 am 19. Knucklehead:

Just some unscientific observation…

There is definitely strong ABB sentiment out there among the electorate. Part of the ABB crowd seems to think of itself as “independent”, perhaps rightfully so. They claim that they don’t support Kerry, they just think Bush is Bad.

The early returns on how the Swiftvets stuff is playing with this “don’t love Kerry, just hate Bush” crowd is that they really wish this Swiftvets stuff would just go away and do NOT want to see it pressed and will get downrighted agitated about it.

My suspicion for why they feel that was is that it might generate a corresponding ABK sentiment among some people. This is difficult for them to come to terms with because 1) “anybody” in ABK is Bush, and they hate him, and 2) it calls into question the whole issue of taking an “ABB” stance because, well, the “anybody” in ABB might be somebody worse than Bush.

Just been listening around, that’s all.

Aug 9, 2004 - 10:18 am 20. jerry:

holly:

Are you saying that makes it no big deal? I think I can see where you are coming from. Respect for the law is a Republican thing so we can hold them responsible for their actions. On the other hand, Democrats are above the law and therefore it is ok for them to commit perjury to win a law suit.

Aug 9, 2004 - 10:18 am 21. jerry:

Occam:

As far as I know, lying on the Senate floor with the intent to support the communist government in Manaqua is not a crime.

Aug 9, 2004 - 10:21 am 22. Rick Ballard:

Knucklehead,

The logic of your ABB vs ABK argument leads to “a pox on both their houses” solution by the person who was originally an ABB’er. That’s not the worst thing that could happen.

Aug 9, 2004 - 10:26 am 23. Knucklehead:

Jerry,

I haven’t read books on the topic of “High Crimes and Misdemeanors” or “Impeachment”. It seems, without deep reflection on my part, that we would want to avoid making impeachment of federal office holders a standard operating procedure. But, then again, why shouldn’t getting rid of office holders who behave badly through impeachment or whatever means available be a bad thing? (Just a rhetorical question, not really seeking an answer.)

The Claremont Institute article I linked to above argues that impeachment history suggests that high crimes and misdemeanors is not limited to abuse of official powers while in office (assuming I read it correctly).

On the matter of Clinton, supporters cannot allow the argument to advance beyond “all about sex” or “just a lie about a personal matter”. I made the case many times that there is no shortage of people who lost their jobs and/or their shirts for engaging in the sort of activity Clinton did (abuse of disparate power, perjury, obstruction of justice, etc.) This argument apparently carries no weight among Clinton supporters and it matters not one little bit if they are fully supportive of the sorts of laws which lead us to “disparate power” and perjury and obstruction of justice prosecutions. It really is purely a matter of “those things were wrong in THIS case”. I never followed it, but it was there.

Aug 9, 2004 - 10:30 am 24. ambisinistral:

Knuckle,

Well, as you may have noticed I’m not exactly a champion of Bush so’s I guess I’m one of those rare ABK voters.

On topic, another hair-brained impeachment fiasco by the Republicans would not sit well with public. At some point you have to accept that voters decide elections in a Democracy.

If Kerry were to win I would go pound my head against the wall for about fifteen minutes, then I would sit back and pray he did a better job running the country than being a Senator.

Aug 9, 2004 - 10:35 am 25. Gerry:

Mr. Simon,

Just to quibble on a minor tangent, if Clinton had been removed it would not have overthrown the election. It would have made Gore President, not Dole (and probably would have meant Gore beating Bush in 2000).

But that’s a minor side issue, and I wanted to say thank you for an excellent post. On my blog I had been studiously avoiding the whole Swift Boat vets thing, until the details of the Cambodia story were coming out. It was only then that I became interested, and for the same reason as you.

If he was just bragging, that would be reason for mockery and scorn, but what he appears to have done (namely, lied to influence policy) is inexcusable.

And it does not escape my attention that once again, his actions were to the benefit of a communist regime, just as when he went to Europe to negotiate with the Vietcong after his discharge from the Navy, just as when he testified in the Senate about the war crimes he and others committed.

Aug 9, 2004 - 10:36 am 26. Knucklehead:

Rick Ballard:

The “pox on both their houses” case would, I suppose, be fine if it led sufficient numbers of voters to stay home on Nov. 2 I’ve long wished that those who can’t find a reason to pick between one of two candidates, or one of two parties, would do the rest of us a favor and not vote.

The thing I was trying to point out, however, is that there seems a visceral level of animosity regarding this – they do not want ABB to collapse under the weight of John Kerry’s faults, at least not before the election. They are so strongly ABB that they’ll find some way to blame Bush for Kerry’s faults.

Aug 9, 2004 - 10:38 am 27. Fresh Air:

Ms. Wood–

Back to the topic. Although I appreciate your Clintonian defense of Kerry a priori, it really won’t work here. According to the Boston Globe, Kerry spent Christmas at Sa Dec, which is some 60 miles from Cambodia. Insofar as the U.S. had a blockade on the Mekong River at the Cambodian border, it is impossible for Kerry to have engaged in hostile combat with “Cambodians.”

Aug 9, 2004 - 10:39 am 28. Fresh Air:

Okay, “hostile combat” is redundant. I type fast sometimes.

Aug 9, 2004 - 10:40 am 29. Katherine:

Jerry,

I hope that Rogerís friends will not cast him out merely because he supports Bushís war on terror. But, judging from multiple experiences of people who found themselves in his position, I fear the worst. I was verbally assaulted by my friends for merely stating that Bush is not necessarily a moron and that tax cuts – such as his ñ are good for the economy (this was before 9/11). I was prudent enough not to say that I actually voted for the guy, because I probably would leave the place with grilled salmon flung on my head. I am still torn whether it is worth it to keep up with people who would cast me out for having different political opinion.

Rogerís situation is so much more difficult because of this blog, which provides incontrovertible evidence of his support for the Prez ñ even if this support is conditional. In my experience such support is nothing less than apostasy for people calling themselves liberals. Even working for Hillary 08 may not be enough to earn their forgiveness. Roger may have to join the Underground Republican Cell, which is supposed to be active in Hollywood, to have any social life at all

BTW Roger, you may find that there are more Republicans that share your views on number of social issues than you would suspect (see Charlieís evidence) , and that you would not be considered a lesser human simply because you do not support entire platform of Republican Party.

Aug 9, 2004 - 10:41 am 30. Knucklehead:

Fresh Air:

“Hostile Combat” isn’t redundant – it is nuanced. For example, Mr. Kerry probably never allowed himself to feel hostility toward the people he engaged in combat.

Aug 9, 2004 - 10:48 am 31. Katherine:

There is one issue that continues to baffle me. Here we have Kerry supporting communists over and over again. One can forgive a youthful folly, but as a senator didnít he have access to enough information detailing absolute evil and inhumanity of those regimes? Just what is it with the super-rich people supporting communistís dictatorships? Every time I hear about some mogul or billionaire visit Castro and praise the wonders of socialist or communist order I do wonder whether we share the same universe. Are they really that stupid? Can somebody provide logical explanation

Aug 9, 2004 - 11:03 am 32. blogaddict:

I doubt Kerry’s statements in 1986 on the Senate are impeachable. What they are is despicable and contemptible. (And, by the way, IMO, Clinton’s crimes were not “high,” and in fact, technically, his lies under oath didn’t quite meet the legal definition of perjury. But I digress–)

I’m a Democrat. Never voted for a Republican in my life, but plan to vote for Bush in 2004. That makes me commonplace on the blogs, but a rara avis in life. My friends think I’ve gone mad, likewise my relatives. It doesn’t matter what facts I have at my fingertips, or how much reading I do, or how well-argued my logic. They are ABB through and through.

Yesterday I was talking to my elderly mother about the swift vets, etc. Her answer? They’re all Republicans out to get Kerry. ‘Nuff said. And Bush? He’s stupid. That’s it. Now let’s change the subject–

These issues have no traction at all with whatever percentage of the electorate is ABB. They literally mean it: ANYBODY but Bush. And “anybody” means just that–anybody. Even Kerry. Doesn’t matter what he’s done, in Vietnam, in the Senate, in the campaign. He’s their ticket out of Bushworld.

I posted this on LGF about Kerry, with some interesting links. Thought you folks here might be interested, too:

Here is some information on how the “three wounds and you’re out” rule actually worked (Navy rule 1300.36): http://www.thegunzone.com/rkba/rkba-25.html. Also, Purple Hearts can only be awarded for wounds received from enemy fire, so the issue of whether Kerry’s wounds were self-inflicted is germane. (The records of Kerry’s first Purple Heart are missing, though http://www.insightmag.com/news/2004/04/27/Politics/Purple.Hearts.Three.And.Out-656749.shtml )

.

This is Kerry’s military timeline: enlisted 2/66 for a six-year tour of duty, which means he should have gotten out 2/72. His Vietnam swift boat service began 11/17/68. The first Purple Heart was received 12/2/68–that’s about 2 weeks after he started. His second one was received on 2/20/69, two months later. The Silver Star came on 2/28/69, in the firefight with the disputed issue of whether he shot the Vietcong in the back (that’s a week after Purple Heart #2). Third purple heart was received on 3/13/69, about 2 weeks later, at which time he also received the Bronze Star for rescuing the injured crew member (the latter, as far as I can see, was an act of bona fide heroism). Four days later, on 3/17/69, he put in his request to be transferred out. He was transferred in 4/69.

An interesting fact, mentioned in (of all things!) a 6/16/2003 Boston Globe article by Kranish, is that when Kerry was transferred out of Vietnam, he also requested (and received!) safer reassignments for all of his crew http://www.boston.com/globe/nation/packages/kerry/061603_p.shtml Maybe that’s part of the reason so many of the men who actually served under him on his swift boat (as opposed to his fellow officers) are supporting him now–he may have saved their lives by getting them out of harm’s way!

In 1/3/70, two years before his Navy tour should have been up, he requested an early discharge from active duty in order to run for Congress. He received the discharge, but stayed in the reserves. In 2/70, just a short time later, he withdrew from the race. In 6/70 he began his antiwar activities. He was officially in the reserves till 1978.

Strangely enough, a lot of this Kerry timeline information appeared in Mother Jones: http://www.motherjones.com/news/update/2004/02/02_400.html .

Aug 9, 2004 - 11:06 am 33. hollywood:

jerry,

What I’m saying is that this seems hard to prove. More importantly, as we saw the last time around, impeachment “trials” are a cumbersome drain on the system and generally an inefficient way to throw the government off track. Better to just vote for the other guy if that’s how you feel. But, if you are really dead set on going that way as Plan B, I think HA laid out how it might (expensively) be approached. I doubt it would succeed, but it could be done.

Aug 9, 2004 - 11:06 am 34. jerry:

Katherine:

The usual answer is guilt. But I think it is something else…elitism. The entire premise of communist ideology is that a vangaurd elite will lead the sheep-like masses to a “better” world. Of course its only a better world for the Vanguard as the masses are relegated to material whose sole purpose is to make the elite comfortable. Kerry sees himself as an old European aristocrat. He believes his own superiority entitles him to the adulation of the masses. He knows what is best for them. This attitude is perfectly congruent to that of Lenin, Kim Jong Il, Castro or Danny Ortega. Folks like Kerry focus on what communism is for the communist class not what is like for the other 98%.

Aug 9, 2004 - 11:11 am 35. Steven Smith:

The reason why the Swiftboat story went nowhere outside the tinfoil hat crowd on the wingnut right has more to do with the charges being so extreme that they ended up injuring the Bush campaign (reportedly, he was furious that these allegations were aired, since it only reminded voters that Kerry served, and he didn’t). The book was published by Regnery Press, which usually is more obsessed with proving that Bill Clinton was a drug-dealing rapist. That Matt Drudge and Mark Steyn, who plugged the phony allegations that Kerry had an intern mistress a few months back, are on the story is testament enough that the story is dead.

Aug 9, 2004 - 11:18 am 36. jerry:

blogaddict:

I don’t wish to belabor bubba because I just used him as example of when the crime must be committed for it be impeachable. But, since you offered your opinion I will restate that lying in civil trial in order to obstruct justice is perjury under the law. The 5th US Circuit Court ruled it such when they heard the appeal. Neither of our opinions count for much. However the 5th Circuit’s does stand as a matter of law since Clinton did not appeal it. Perjury: Guilty as Charged.

Aug 9, 2004 - 11:18 am 37. jerry:

Mr Smith:

You statement that Bush did serve shows that you don’t know what you are talking about. Bush served in the Texas National Gurard as a Fighter Pilot. Whether he saw combat is irrelevant to his service. If service equals combat then a vast majority of US Servicemen in WWII did not serve. Now I suppose you meant Vietnam but if you did then you should be more careful in your choice of words.

Aug 9, 2004 - 11:22 am 38. jerry:

oops “did serve” shold have read “did not serve”

Aug 9, 2004 - 11:23 am 39. Keith_Indy:

BTW Roger, you may find that there are more Republicans that share your views on number of social issues than you would suspect (see Charlieís evidence) , and that you would not be considered a lesser human simply because you do not support entire platform of Republican Party.

**************

Katherine – Here, here… I second the sentiment.

Ever notice how the “jack booted fascist sheep” of the Republican Party always seem to disagree with each other about policy issues, and the “independent minded” Democrats always seem to march in lockstep.

Count me in as one of the liberal on social issues Republicans. Why?? Because I don’t believe the Federal government, or any level of government should be telling consenting adults what they can or can’t do in the privacy of their own homes. At least not in a society that values liberty as we do.

Aug 9, 2004 - 11:25 am 40. leni:

I am just curious does Kerry need to be elected as President? Can’t Kerry be impeached as a Senator?

Aug 9, 2004 - 11:31 am 41. blogaddict:

jerry–I don’t want to belabor it either, but I just want to point out that there is a very strong argument (convincing to me, as a law school graduate) that Clinton’s evasions under oath did not rise to the level of perjury in the technical sense. See this for the full argument: http://www.huppi.com/kangaroo/L-clintonperjury.html

Aug 9, 2004 - 11:39 am 42. TmjUtah:

Previewing your Comment

Roger -

I respect your opinions, and applaud your personal commitment to our shared interest in keeping our country and families safe from Islamofascist murderers.

The fact that it took 3000 dead bodies in a smoking hole in the world’s greatest city to motivate you is neither here nor there. I just wish that you could further focus your formidable intelligence and vast experience dealing with the powerful, driven, and public animal in order to understand why foreign policy is far, far short of the ethical, moral, and structural failings of your (quasi)former political tribe.

Bill Clinton didn’t get hounded for a pecadillo. He consciously used the prestige and power of his office to thwart a citizen seeking redress through the courts. His actions with Lewinsky were criminal under a law he signed. The hours of a day a president can do anything about anything are numbered 24. Under his ethos, and that of his political community, he elected to prioritize his personal desires over the public obligation he pledged to bear as president.

Would you knowingly sign a contract with the implicit understanding that your interest, and your ability to protect the same, were implicitly and without reserve discounted at the whim of the other party?

Would you? I don’t think so – especially after reading more than just a bit about your relation with the Screen Writer’s Guild. Business is business, and debts must be paid.

Democracy is such a scary thing. Our representative republic represents the most radical departure from the execution of state power in history. By linking the political process as closely as humanly possible to the ambitions, hopes, and dreams of the governed AND expressly reserving a body of fundamental individual rights for sovereign individual citizens, we rejected outright the possibility the existence of master and serf classes.

What mighty machine makes this happen? Just a few thousand words penned over the course of a year and change. Words that represent the distilled reading, experience, and judgement of men who honestly intended to design a system that worked first for the citizen and not the government.

That document is a contract. The power of the words is nonexistent without the faith and willing participation of the parties. Postmod folks have gaily charged into a world they at best take for granted or at worst define to their own taste. They empowered themselves to craft solutions for problems without reference to or appreciation of human nature or even simple historical precedent. They ignore old fashioned conventions like right/wrong or good/evil at the drop of a hat if the conventions impede their activist path.

All the awareness in the world cannot change the fact that shit flows downhill. The PARTY that stands behind John Kerry is the author of generational welfare, impotent foreign policy, and the politics of class warfare aimed at garnering individual political power. The PARTY that stands behind John Kerry embraces a subset of unreconstructed communists. The PARTY that stands behind John Kerry defended a sitting president because he was theirs – not because he was remotely innocent of the charges made against him.

A political philosophy based on a sense of entitlement vice a sense of duty is the most dangerous school of thought that can exist in a democratic system. You know why tens of thousands of activists are going to screw up NYC during the convention, and there were only a handful of Republican sign carriers in Boston?

It’s because the right still believes that elections are the important part of participation.

Lowering standards never improves an organization. Below a certain level of excellence we will cease to exist as a free nation and retract into despotism. We have law and elections as the instrument to correct deficiencies. The last administration critically damaged faith in the law. All indications are that the Democrats are prepared to build on the precedent of Florida not to seek justice or relief but to further damage the credibility of elections themselves.

I don’t know if I’ve made the point I set out to communicate. You, Michael J. Totten, and to a lesser extent Mickey Kaus constantly kick my “They miss the POINT!” button. Bill Clinton is an example, not an aberration, of the thought process that permeates progressive political strategy.

OT but a great read here: href=”http://www.nationalreview.com/interrogatory/kessler200408090855.asp”On character in leadership.

Aug 9, 2004 - 11:43 am 43. Fresh Air:

I see the trolls are coming out. Anybody got any stale bread?

Aug 9, 2004 - 11:44 am 44. PeterArgus:

Steven Smith:

Perhaps you would be willing to share with us your source that Bush is “furious that these allegations were aired” because he is afraid “it only reminded voters that Kerry served, and he didn’t”?

All:

Please no impeachment talk. The concept of attempting to impeach a newly elected President (in the middle of a WOT nonetheless!) is beyond the pale. If the Swiftees want to take him to court fine. But let’s not do the impeachment thing again. Just defeat the SOB and move on.

Aug 9, 2004 - 11:47 am 45. foreign devil:

Kerry’s own words both from a Senate hearing in 1971 and in print said that he was five miles inside Cambodia on Christmas Eve in December 1968 listening to the President of the United States say he wasn’t there and he has the event ’seared’ into his memory. Now, presumably what he meant by that was the President (whoever it was at that time since Nixon didn’t take office until January 1969 so it must have been Johnson), said that “there were no US troops in Cambodia”. But that’s not what Kerry says in his testimony. He uses an odd phraseology: that the President of the United States “was saying I wasn’t there”.

Well, right there is where I think he begins to lie. First off the phrasing of the statement leads me to think he’s distancing himself from the lie even as he’s telling it. On checking, because I was curious as to which President could have made a speech on Christmas Eve 1968, I found that neither Johnson nor the incoming President Nixon made ANY speech in December 1968, or indeed in the whole of 1968. Johnson had no need to make speeches–he knew he wasn’t running again. And Nixon had just won the race for the White House in the November elections, so in December, everybody was dossing down for a quiet Christmas. THERE WAS NO PRESIDENT MAKING ANY SPEECH ON DECEMBER 24th, 1968! Now if Kerry can explain which President it was that was seared into his memory out there in the dark of a Mekong night, I’ll be happy to re-examine his claims, but so far I think he’s lying, first about what this President supposedly said and second that any such speech was ever given.

Aug 9, 2004 - 11:48 am 46. TmjUtah:

Well, I certainly hacked that last effort up…

One more time for the link.

I saw “rightwingnut” up there.

I go to great lengths to avoid labels. I disagree with progressive politics and politicians because what they propose does not work. Their opinions and agendas are theirs, and more power to them. I just decline to support them because the historial record is that they DON’T WORK.

That makes me a wingnut. Bigot. Homophobe. And that seems to be the basis of most of their arguments. I freely admit that I cannot make the connection between their wins as good and any other outcome being a failure of the system. I guess on top of everything else, I’m unnuanced as well.

Aug 9, 2004 - 11:56 am 47. EdGraham:

Kerry has legislative immunity and probably cannot be punished for any statements, even lies, made on the Senate floor:

“[F]or any speech or debate in either house [the members] shall not be questioned in any other place.”

United States Constitution, Article I, Section 6.

Aug 9, 2004 - 12:04 pm 48. TmjUtah:

EdGraham -

Certainly not in the commonwealth of Massachussetts, for sure.

Aug 9, 2004 - 12:10 pm 49. hollywood:

foreign devil,

The material I’ve seen is fragmented, but it appears that Kerry was referring to comments made by LBJ at various times in 1965, not necessarily on Christmas.

Aug 9, 2004 - 12:14 pm 50. Sandy P:

–For me that is not enough to overthrow an election–

Replacing a democrat w/a democrat would not “overthrow” the election.

It would have made Prince Al king.

The President of the US willfully violated a citizen’s rights and lied about it. If he had told the truth, it would have all blown over and Bubba could have been the great president the left knew he woulda’ coulda’ shoulda’ been.

A CEO would have been gone – Packwood was gone for less -

And while we might not be around in about 45 years when the Senate files are opened – he was scum. And when those files are opened, if you were younger or do live to see it, you will change your mind. I’ve instructed my younger friends to come and yell (hopefully up) you were right, he/they was/were scum!

Bubba was the embodiment of the 60s generation, you got what you voted for.

Aug 9, 2004 - 12:14 pm 51. Knucklehead:

Mr. Smith:

Since I don’t know you at all I can’t say whether you are among the ABB crowd, a actual Kerry supporter, simply a partisan, or some combination of those. But no matter, let’s have a look at your claims:

The reason why the Swiftboat story went nowhere outside the tinfoil hat crowd on the wingnut right has more to do with the charges being so extreme that they ended up injuring the Bush campaign (reportedly, he was furious that these allegations were aired, since it only reminded voters that Kerry served, and he didn’t).

So the story is already dead and hasn’t gone anywhere and was only interesting to the “wingnut right”. Might you be engaging in a bit of wishful thinking here, Mr. Smith? The Kerry campaign seems to have written this “story” off months ago, yet not only hasn’t it died but it has reared its ugly head again. Hmmm…

- Kerry used an apparently little known “3 PH’s and you’re out of here” rule to get out of Vietnam. Many others probably would have appreciated knowing about that rule. Kerry, however, may have falsified, or at least stretched to the limit, how he went about receiving the PHs he got. Making much of 3 PHs and leaving Vietnam might be extreme, but if so then surely Kerry is guilty of as much extremism here as anyone. He never shuts up about it. He went to the extreme of making this a central part of his campaign.

- While still an officer in the USN, Kerry became not just a war protester but a very active one. He joined an veteran’s antiwar group and was part of some extremely (oh, there’s that word again!) questionable testimony in congress) and wrote a book where he apparently accused no only himself, but others, of engaging in atrocities and war crimes. Making much of this might, indeed, seem extreme to some but the nasty little gotcha here is that Kerry is going to the extreme step of asking us to vote for him against an incumbent president. You don’t suppose it might be pertinent to matters at hand for Kerry to explain to voters how he would deal with people and organization which used untruths to undermine a war effort he, as president, was leading the nation in, do you? Or is that merely and extremist question?

- Since becoming an elected representative Kerry seems to have taken some extreme liberties with his, umm… what’s the word… narrative, that’s it. Kerry would apparently have us believe that he has had some extremely insightful and useful personal experiences that, it seems, he is not likely to have had. Literary license? Since he’s running for POTUS rather than the keeper of our national fiction, perhaps we are entitled to an explanation.

No point dwelling on any of this wingnut right extemism any further for this purpose. Let’s return to your comments, shall we.

The book was published by Regnery Press, which usually is more obsessed with proving that Bill Clinton was a drug-dealing rapist.

Ah, yes, the useful tactic of telling us that it the entire publishing house is something akin to wingnut right extremists. Well, Regnery seems to be quite proud of their publishing efforts and quite open that they are a “conservative” publishing house. I’m no sure what you claim they are obsessed with in this case. A single book on this topic hardly seems “obsessive”. I find Mr. Kranich’s three books on the subject of John Kerry something closer to an obsession, but that’s just me and I am, after all, a self-confessed member of the VRWC.

Lest anyone care to try and determine for themselves how “obsessed” Regnery is with “proving that Bill Clinton was a drug-dealing rapist” you can find their active catalog at this http://www.regnery.com/catalog/catalog.html

That Matt Drudge and Mark Steyn, who plugged the phony allegations that Kerry had an intern mistress a few months back, are on the story is testament enough that the story is dead.

One of the regular contributors here is an expert on the ad hominem fallacy and has posted much on the topic here. Perhaps you’d care to search previous threads. In the meantime what say we give this thing another week or six before we declare the “story” dead, shall we.

Aug 9, 2004 - 12:14 pm 52. hollywood:

foreign devil,

It ain’t clear but the stuff I’ve seen seems to suggest that Kerry was referring to comments made by LBJ at various points in 1965, not necessarily on Christmas (probably not).

Aug 9, 2004 - 12:16 pm 53. Lapsed Randian 2:

“Impeachable offense in advance.”

Roger: I think you have officially gone over the top. First, I don’t think there is such a thing. Second, if we are going to impeach everybody who stretches the truth on the Senate floor, based upon the “importance” of the stretchmarks being left, we better get out William F. Buckley’s famous phonebook, because we’re going to have some openings that need to be filled.

Isn’t the more practical course in all of this to ask for the man’s medical records? I realize that has nothing to do with the Cambodia issue, but it likely has a great deal to do with Kerry’s purple hearts, and would address his veracity on that point, at least. Everybody is fixated on Kerry’s veracity, and rightly so. But Kerry has truly put his medical condition at issue in this campaign, not unlike a medical malpractice plaintiff puts his medical condition at issue in a lawsuit. His medical records would clear up a fair amount of the Swiftee accusations currently flying around the blogosphere.

Given what we know about Kerry’s mindset and willing to exploit his months in Viet Nam, what can reasonably be concluded about his failure to make those records public? Just wondering.

Aug 9, 2004 - 12:18 pm 54. bdog57:

Can’t say how all of these things will be read by the 3% of the electorate who haven’t made up their minds about November. History is on Bush’s side, though, as noted by Polipundit. I have yet to run into a serious analysis that puts Kerry as winning this election but maybe I’ll have a Kael moment come November 3rd.

Agree or disagree with Bush on SSM, Missouri’s amendment can only be read as favorable for Bush. This will most certainly be a factor as there are a number of battleground states voting on a constitutional ban.

I disagree with Eric that the blogosphere is filled with social conservatives -at least, this has not been my experience. Nevertheless, the blogosphere and real life are, apparently, two different things. With our perfectly divided electorate, Missouri’s 70% is absolutely astonishing. 70%. Last I checked, Missouri isn’t 70% Republican. I would venture that the pews in Missouri don’t contain 70% of the Missouri electorate on Sunday, either. Furthermore, Oregon’s amendment will be coming from a ballot initiative that gained more signatures than any other OR initiative. Ever.

Not here to argue the validity of this particular issue, just saying that there’s another side to this which seems to go generally ignored (or poorly argued…though I’ve seen a few good NR pieces). Day-prior polls in Missouri indicated 60% support for the amendment with 10% undecided…apparently all the undecideds broke for the amendment. Neither Roger nor Instapundit even commented on this one (as I recall, though I’d like to be proven wrong).

How does this relate to current events? Well, the overwhelming majority of Kerry’s Vietnam colleagues don’t think too highly of him. He has taken the unusual (for a “hero”) tack of highlighting his own heroism to further his career and thus opened himself up for this kind of thing (should such a groundswell of disapproval exist – which it does). The counterattack to claims by the SBVFT is that this is a Republican deal. Clearly, though, the probability that all of these 200+ individuals that served with Kerry are GOP is highly unlikely. Somebody computed the odds on another thread. I would hypothesize that the probability that they are all GOP is probably about the same as the 70% in Missouri being all GOP (in a Dem primary, no less). Just a thought for the “foreign policy conservative/social liberal” contingent here.

Aug 9, 2004 - 12:26 pm 55. Mark Poling:

TmjUtah, thanks for the link. My favorite paragraph:

Voters tend to forget that presidents are, first and foremost, people. If they are unbalanced, nasty, and hypocritical, that will be reflected in their judgment and job performance. If a friend, an electrician, a plumber, or a job applicant had a track record of acting unethically, being habitually late, or displaying the kind of unbalanced personality of a Johnson or a Nixon, few would want to deal with him. Yet in the case of presidents and other politicians, voters overlook the signs of poor character and focus instead on their acting ability on TV.

Most people outside the press get this, I think. The only question is whether the filter that is the press will let enough of Kerry’s character shine through so that people not paying much attention get to see it for themselves.

Aug 9, 2004 - 12:27 pm 56. Knucklehead:

Lapsed Randian 2:

I believe all we need is for Kerry to give DoD permission to release all his military records. Why won’t he do that? What is hiding? (Is turnabout really fair play? Comments on that from the ethicists among us welcome.)

Aug 9, 2004 - 12:29 pm 57. vnjagvet:

For those interested in the merits of the issues discussed here, check out CPT Ed (who intially dismissed the story out of hand) at: http://www.captainsquartersblog.com/mt/archives/002202.php#comments. There are later posts as well.

Stephen may be a bit premature in his conclusions. We’ll see.

Roger:

I think you are right.

Aug 9, 2004 - 12:38 pm 58. Fresh Air:

Knuckle–

Stevie Pooh really puts on a clinic of how not to argue a point. In his short post he engages in ad hominem, circumstantial ad hominem, appeal to mockery, guilt by association and “poisoning the well” fallacies.

Sadly, he is right at Tim Russert’s level, maybe just slightly above it.

Aug 9, 2004 - 12:49 pm 59. Catherine:

I didn’t mean this post to devolve into impeachment legalisms.

You’re in luck!

I personally don’t know One Single Thing about impeachment legalisms, this in spite of the fact that I fervently supported the impeachment of Bill Clinton. (And I voted for the guy, too. Twice.)

I took Juanita Broaddrick personally.

Not to mention, “It depends on what the meaning of the word ‘is’ is”:

If the–if he–if ‘is’ means is and never has been, that is not–that is one thing. If it means there is none, that was a completely true statement….Now, if someone had asked me on that day, are you having any kind of sexual relations with Ms. Lewinsky, that is, asked me a question in the present tense, I would have said no. And it would have been completely true.”

Tell me that’s not an impeachable offense . . .

Aug 9, 2004 - 12:53 pm 60. PeterUK:

It is incredible that the remedy for the whole debacle is in Kerry’s own hands and he seems incapable of acting in a proper manner.He can open the records and make a statement giving his version of events instead of letting it fester.

Now there is either a highly subtle political intelligence at work here or the habit of smoke and mirrors is too deeply ingrained,or there is a chancre at the heart of the candidate that will eventually get lanced.

For the good of your nation and the good of the free world John Kerry should do the right thing and put the people before personal ambition.Set the record straight, and do it now.

Aug 9, 2004 - 12:58 pm 61. Steven Smith:

Catherine:

That’s not an impeachable offense.

Aug 9, 2004 - 1:06 pm 62. Goof®:

Finding it easy to stay content-free now that someone brought up Article I, Section 6.

85 days to go.

Aug 9, 2004 - 1:11 pm 63. Pat Curley:

Couple of points:

1. Kerry may already be disqualified for office due to his meetings with the North Vietnamese in Paris in 1971. Read the 14th Amendment, which disqualifies any officer who gives aid and comfort to the enemy. Kerry, of course, was an officer in the Navy at the time he collaborated with the enemy.

2. Impeachment proceedings certainly can be instituted for actions prior to ones’ election to high office. Spiro Agnew would have been impeached had he not resigned, and Evan Mecham was impeached as governor of Arizona for actions he took before the election.

3. All that aside, there will be no impeachment, because Kerry’s not getting elected.

Aug 9, 2004 - 1:14 pm 64. jerry:

Mr. Smith:

One more time…The reason Clinton lied was to prevent Ms. Lewinsky from becoming a material Witness in the Case of Jones versus Clinton. Her quality of her “interactions” with the “Big He” would allow her to confirm Jones assertion of that Mr. Clinton had a particular deformity. That constitutes a lie for the purpose of obstructing justice, i.e., the legal definition of perjury.

Aug 9, 2004 - 1:17 pm 65. Roberts:

Catherine, an easy guide to who knows what they are talking about: Anyone who claims something is explicitly not an impeachable offense doesn’t have a clue about the subject.

Aug 9, 2004 - 1:19 pm 66. jerry:

Pat:

Agnew pleaded guilty while in office. That made him a felon. His status as a felon whould have been grounds for impeachment. However he could not be tried for tax fraud and bribery by the Senate.

Aug 9, 2004 - 1:21 pm 67. Knucklehead:

Steven Smith:

Make a quick visit to http://dictionary.reference.com/search?q=humor and pay particular attention to items one through three. You might also consider starting to save your pennies in hopes of a future purchase.

Aug 9, 2004 - 1:21 pm 68. Rick Ballard:

Peter,

Kerry is a creature of the Kennedy machine. There is no evidence extant (at least since 1968)that the Kennedy machine is capable of putting the good of the people, nation or free world above personal political ambition. Kerry is a Kennedy Democrat (Teddy – not John or Bobby) and nothing matters except personal advancement. They’ve buried truth and paid people off for thirty years with impunity. They think that they can do it again and they know damn well that the spineless NYT, WaPo, Globe bootlickers will be behind them 1000%.

So, how’s Tony doing these days?

Aug 9, 2004 - 1:22 pm 69. Catherine:

Steve Smith

That’s not an impeachable offense.

LOL.

This always reminds me of that great remake of the O’Henry story, “Ransom of Red Chief.” Remember? The one where Danny DiVito refuses to pay ransom for his kidnapped wife, Bette Midler?

There’s a scene where they’ve got police snipers on all the rooftops and one of the kidnappers (Judge Reinhold?) comes out in the middle of the intersection below and stands there acting like a complete & total dolt.

The sniper is going nuts; he keeps saying, “Man! That guy is stupid!” and “Oh, Jesus, he’s an idiot!” Things like that.

Finally he says, “He’s so stupid, I say we shoot him.”

Unfortunately, that is one of my favorite movie lines ever.

And I try to be a tolerant person.

Hmm. Probably it’s not clear how Clinton talking about the meaning of “is” relates to The Ransom of Red Chief.

I feel like that cop, only my problem with Clinton wasn’t that he was stupid (he wasn’t); the problem, to steal a line from Mary McCarthy, was that practically every word he ever said was a lie including “and” and “the.”

At some point I felt like, “I say we impeach him.”

Aug 9, 2004 - 1:27 pm 70. hollywood:

“All that aside, there will be no impeachment, because Kerry’s not getting elected.”

Don’t hatchet your counts before they chicken.

Aug 9, 2004 - 1:34 pm 71. insatty:

I am so sick and tired of hearing from Steven Smith’s ilk that GWB “ducked service” in the Air National Guard, or used his “family connections” to avoid Vietnam. The talking heads in the liberal media constantly repeat these scurrilous charges as fact despite no evidence supporting them. Al Hunt commonly derides Bush with these charges on Capital Gang and in his Thursday WSJ pieces. In truth, GWB wanted to fly like his dad, but the USAF had no room for him when he tried to apply. He opted for the Texas ANG when it accepted him for flight training. Is it such wishful thinking to expect the elite media to offer proof of partisan invective before repeating urban legends as fact?

Aug 9, 2004 - 1:49 pm 72. Charlie (Colorado):

Re Hollywood: Are you saying that makes it no big deal? I think I can see where you are coming from.

I know I’m coming in a little late here, but let’s be fair to Hollywood on this: he didn’t say anything pro or anti on whether this would be a Good Thing, just that this kind of amphiboly and equivocation would serve Kerry well as a defense.

I suspect he’s right, like it or not.

Aug 9, 2004 - 1:50 pm 73. PeterUK:

Rick,

Tony is Clinton lite,all of the perfidy and none of the pulchritude.I know America seems to hold him in high esteem,but the war on terror is the only thing he has got right.Great one for innitiatives is our Tone,I don’t know if he’s a socialist but the rest of his government are unreconstructed Ruritanian marxists.If we had an opposition he’d be gone.

Aug 9, 2004 - 1:51 pm 74. Rick Ballard:

insatty,

Nice points but totally irrelevant to the discussion at hand.

As are all comments pertaining to what constitutes an impeachable offense.

All,

Please take a look at Roger’s update.

And lastly,

BUBBA WAS IMPEACHED

and he’s still married to Hillary. Which fate is worse depends on your point of view.

Aug 9, 2004 - 1:55 pm 75. mwalls:

Having just glanced at the bill of particulars for the attempted impeachment of Andrew Johnson, I’d have to say you impeach a president for anything the House & Senate can make stick.

Aug 9, 2004 - 1:55 pm 76. Charlie (Colorado):

Catharine: Tell me that’s not an impeachable offense . . .

Steve Smith: That’s not an impeachable offense.

Well, he’s nothing if not agreeable.

Aug 9, 2004 - 2:01 pm 77. Knucklehead:

PeterUK:

….I don’t know if he’s a socialist but the rest of his government are unreconstructed Ruritanian marxists…

See

http://communistsforkerry.com/

(Don’t miss that part about the Dress Code).

And as long as I’m acknowledging the fun of sheer, unadulterated silliness (this time in the “you can’t make this stuff up” category), see the answer to the question on page 2 at

http://www.humaneusa.org/2004_presidential/question/jkerry_2004.pdf

Aug 9, 2004 - 2:03 pm 78. Charlie (Colorado):

Don’t hatchet your counts before they chicken.

I’d love to know the joke that’s the punchline to.

Aug 9, 2004 - 2:04 pm 79. Charlie (Colorado):

Another news flash: Nightline will be covering the Swift Boats stuff.

Aug 9, 2004 - 2:14 pm 80. DennisThePeasant:

Fresh Air-

We should probably be both surprised and impressed by the fact that Stevie-Poo was able to figure out Typekey. At this point, he’s one up on lil joe on that score.

And him showing up to be stupid about the Swift Boaters indicates to me that this story is starting to worry the Lefties. That is the only time he shows up…when something is afoot that could cause real damage.

Goof-

Your ease with content-free posting probably has more to do with the amount of time you spend practicing than anything else. At least that would be the charitable take on it.

Aug 9, 2004 - 2:15 pm 81. Catherine:

blogaddict

Great post—-

I’m finding the whole Swift Boat situation incredibly murky: how is this going to play out?

And what does it mean?

For me this gets back to another thread, from last week maybe, where some of us were trying to figure out the “core” problem with Kerry.

It’s easy to make a list; the man has a lot of “weak points.”

But what’s driving them all?

What ties them all together?

It struck me, reading this thread, that Kerry is not, first and foremost, a liar. He has certainly told lies, a number of them, it seems, but if you could choose only one word to sum up everything that’s worst about Kerry, “liar” wouldn’t be it (or not for me, at any rate).

With Kerry, there’s something about the constant “flip-flopping,” . . . the meeting with Communist dictators, the post-Vietnam meeting in Paris . . . . the entire Senate career spent investigating our government, rather than building a life of accomplishment to call his own (Kerry has been quoted as saying that sometimes whatÔøΩs important isnÔøΩt what you do, but what you keep other people from doing) . . . . the selection of Bob Yost (right? the “walking man”) as his favorite Red Sox player . . . . the harsh reaction to Bill Clinton’s “indispensable nation” speech (ÔøΩ”Why do we have to be so arrogant?”ÔøΩ) . . . .

Has anyone here noticed Kerry’s reaction when his best friend was KIA in Vietnam?

The ABB narrative on Kerry is that he went to Vietnam to serve his country, and then ÔøΩsaw what was going on over thereÔøΩ and ÔøΩbecame disillusioned.ÔøΩ

But thatÔøΩ’s not remotely close to the truth. Apart from the fact that he gave a speech opposing the war (and not just the war, I think, but the broader principle of intervention in foreign lands . . . ) he was already bitter and dark on the way over.

I don’t have a link, or a direct quotation, but he wrote a dark, angry & despairing letter to his parents about his friend’s death. In his letter he says he is depressed and angry (I think those are the words) and calls his friend’s death a “waste.” A ÔøΩ”Goddamned waste,”ÔøΩ if IÔøΩm remembering correctly.

This is a very young man speaking, at a time in life when you would expect him to be naive and idealistic, and he’s bitter and dark. And he hasnÔøΩt been to Vietnam yet; heÔøΩs on a boat.

He sounds nothing like young people then (or now, I think). Young people who protested the war might have been cynical about Lyndon Johnson or Richard Nixon, but they hero-worshiped Bobby Kennedy and thought they were going to change the world. Young people who served in Vietnam were idealistic; young people who protested serving in Vietnam were idealistic—the norm for young people then, and now, was to believe in something.

More than that, itÔøΩ’s probably not normal to think of a friendÔøΩ’s death as an utter waste even if it is. Normal people (I really do want to use the word ÔøΩnormalÔøΩ) are constantly finding meaning in death; thatÔøΩ’s how we comfort ourselves. Normal people have what psychologists call positive illusions.

Not Kerry.

(ThereÔøΩ’s a whole field of wonderful research on positive illusions. My favorite is this: something like 95% of all people believe they drive ÔøΩbetter than average.ÔøΩ Thinking you drive better than average is normal. Actually driving better than average is normal, too, but only 49% of the public can correctly make that claim.)

People complain that Kerry has not ÔøΩlaid out a vision,ÔøΩ or that heÔøΩ’s a ÔøΩflip-flopper,ÔøΩ or that his speech ÔøΩlacked substance. AÔøΩll of these things are variation on a theme.

I’ÔøΩm not sure the man has ÔøΩsubstanceÔøΩ in the sense these writers are getting at. He doesn’t seem to have passion, or passions. The only aspect of life that seems to get his juices flowing is athletic activity, and in that realm Kerry is odd, too. All of his sports are solitary, expensive, and rare. (Snowboarding? Not skiing?)

He did seem, in his convention speech, like a decent human being, a man who could be well-loved by his children.

But he’ÔøΩs a lost soul.

Aug 9, 2004 - 2:18 pm 82. hollywood:

Charlie (Colorado),

“I’d love to know the joke that’s the punchline to.”

Afraid those brain cells are dead. As best I recall, it was just a very long shaggy dog story culminating with the punch.

Aug 9, 2004 - 2:27 pm 83. Steven Smith:

One more time…The reason Clinton lied was to prevent Ms. Lewinsky from becoming a material Witness in the Case of Jones versus Clinton. Her quality of her “interactions” with the “Big He” would allow her to confirm Jones assertion of that Mr. Clinton had a particular deformity. That constitutes a lie for the purpose of obstructing justice, i.e., the legal definition of perjury.

Actually, it had nothing to do with any “particular deformity” (which, as it turns out, Clinton didn’t have), but whether Clinton had made it a habit or practice of propositioning other women in his employ. The judge in that case subsequently quashed any of the allegations that concerned Lewinsky on the grounds that they weren’t material to the Jones case (a point understood by, among others, Lindsay Graham, who voted against impeachment on the charge of perjury during the Jones case), and ultimately, the question of whether Clinton lied in his depostion became irrelevant, when the House rejected that count. To be fair, there was (slightly) more justification to impeach Clinton over that than there would be to “impeach” Kerry over whether or not he knew back in 1984 he had never been inside Cambodia.

Getting back to the issue at hand, I believe the original post by Mr. Simon concerned the fact that the SwiftBoat charges hadn’t gained much traction outside the right wing press and blogosphere. To note the far right background of the individuals and groups involved isn’t to make an ad hominem attack, but to explain why people who don’t believe Joseph Wilson, Sandy Berger and John Kerry are diabolists conspiring with the Freemasons to conquer the world are going to be skeptical of these allegations. I think it would behoove all of us, on both left and right, to take a time-out every now and then and not use the word “liar” as shorthand for “I disagree with you.”

Aug 9, 2004 - 2:27 pm 84. Catherine:

TimJUtah

I stumbled across a wonderful Clinton anecdote in yesterday’s TIMES Book Review (a review of Dennis Ross’s new book) that supports your comment:

There are a few spots where Ross lets his hair down. He clearly views Benjamin Netanyahu, the Likud politician and former prime minister, with contempt, and he says so. And as the Lewinsky and impeachment scandals start to overtake Clinton in late 1998, Ross observes him during a negotiation writing on his yellow legal pad, ”Focus on your job, focus on your job, focus on your job.”

http://www.nytimes.com/2004/08/08/books/review/08BRONNER.html?pagewanted=print&position=

Aug 9, 2004 - 2:33 pm 85. PeterUK:

Knucklehead,

Kerry falls at the first hurdle,machinegunning chickens is not going to sit well with chickenkind.What is the procedure to practice on livestock then work ones way up to teenagers?

Aug 9, 2004 - 2:33 pm 86. Catherine:

TimJUtah

I can’t get your link to work—whose the author?

Maybe I can find the article by going to NRO.

Aug 9, 2004 - 2:41 pm 87. Charlie (Colorado):

To note the far right background of the individuals and groups involved isn’t to make an ad hominem attack,….

Steve, you’re mistaken: that’s very specifically the ad hominem circumstantial. The background of the people making the statements (which, by the way, you haven’t even correctly stated; O’Neill is a moderate Democrat and the Swift Boat Veterans are all over) doesn’t speak to the truth or falsity of their points.

Aug 9, 2004 - 2:50 pm 88. Knucklehead:

Catherine:

If Tmj doesn’t return in time, I’m pretty sure the link is

http://www.nationalreview.com/interrogatory/kessler200408090855.asp

It is an interview of Ronald Kessler conducted by Kathryn Jean Lopez – the date it today, 8/9

Aug 9, 2004 - 2:52 pm 89. Knucklehead:

Steve Smith:

To note the far right background of the individuals and groups involved isn’t to make an ad hominem attack, but to explain why people who don’t believe Joseph Wilson, Sandy Berger and John Kerry are diabolists conspiring with the Freemasons to conquer the world are going to be skeptical of these allegations.

If you wish to explain why people “…don’t believe Joseph Wilson, Sandy Berger and John Kerry…” you simply need to restate what Wilson, Berger, and Kerry say and then demonstrate that what they said is untrue. People do it here all the time. Why are you struggling with it since you picked such easy targets as Wilson, Berger, and Kerry?

Aug 9, 2004 - 2:57 pm 90. TmjUtah:

Steve Smith -

I’ll note your remark…

“Getting back to the issue at hand, I believe the original post by Mr. Simon concerned the fact that the SwiftBoat charges hadn’t gained much traction outside the right wing press and blogosphere.”

…and see what the story is three weeks from now, as far as the Swifties are concerned. George Bush was hounded for six weeks (this time around)by the entire weight of media at the behest of Terry MacAullife’s imputation he was AWOL from serice thirty years ago. I don’t remember Terry ever relating his personal knowledge of the events he based the charge on. Now we’ve got hundreds of men intimately familiar with crucial events that Mr. Kerry has called into play as evidence of his fitness for office and they disagree with his version of the history.

Where’s the split? What makes the Swifties automatically marginal? They are by a far stretch the most profoundly apolitical a group of men I have ever seen involved in a public political statement. The Swiftie (O’Neill?) that debated Kerry on Cavett way back in the mists of time was there to defend his and his fellow veterans’ conduct from the slander being visited on them by Kerry. For that he got labelled a member of the Nixon Attack Squad? Why?

The ‘why’ is simple to arrive at when viewed over the last three decades of press/media chicanery but comes up in stone when viewed over the coverage of the last democratic administration: to disagree with the left means to be less than honorable at an ad hominem level. Never mind the argument. The issue is always secondary to the parties and partisanship.

This way of doing business leads to paralysis. It has worked for the Democrats so-so; their thiry-year descent to powerlessness has lasted ten years longer than it should have, for one thing.

Cherry picking ONE damning personal fault of character discredits the debate out of hand. It used to be that media had to look for addictions, criminal, financial, or sexual shenanigans but now the unspoken rule is right = WRONG…especially since the last administration made calling the “old book” faults pretty diffucult to do with a straight face.

Impeachment is not a mechanism of justice. It is a political act. It was designed as yet another check and balance but was rightfully regarded from the outset as a possible weak link in the chain of oversight. The option to impeach demands a majority of legislators determined to do what is best for the office…or country at large. I don’t think the current crop can make the case that they are motivated to those ends. This is the same group (substantially) that brought us campaign finance reform and 526’s. The Republicans passed the buck and the Democrats sought capital, expecting the president to veto it. Bush screwed up because he thought the Supreme’s would do their job even if he didn’t. Now he knows better.

“Unfit for Command”. Nobody has read the entire book yet, to my knowledge. I’ll wait for my chance to judge the evidence until after I’ve got something to judge, thanks. To my knowledge, no MSM outlets have yet to weigh in with their ‘brown book’ talking points yet. According to Hugh Hewitt (site down…hacking?) the program to discredit the Swifties has been in the can for literally years. Attack the messenger…not the charge.

The other shoe hasn’t dropped in this story, of course. We’re all fixated on Vietnam because that’s all Kerry has run on. He was in the senate for a few years after the war, right?

Aug 9, 2004 - 3:10 pm 91. Knucklehead:

Does anyone suppose a story like this

http://www.editorandpublisher.com/eandp/news/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1000602993

gets any traction outside the “right wing press”? What “liberal media”?

Aug 9, 2004 - 3:19 pm 92. Kevin P:

Katherine:

I know the thread has taken off in a different direction but I would like to respond to your question about the democrats reaction to Communist regimes. I think that it is there inability to believe in any absolutes,so that to just come out and say that Communist regimes are evil and agressive is not nuanced enough for them. From the 30’s to the 90’s to simply state that communism was evil was considered to be the sign of an idiot. It is very similar to the “terrorism is a tactic” crowd. Yes terrorism is a tactic, employed by evil regimes. The elimination of the Jews by Hitler was a tactic too. Kerry bought the con job that Daniel Ortega was a different kind of communist, that he was a good communist. They appeal of the communist lie of a perfect and equal world is very attractive to the salon revolutionary crowd and that is what Kerry grew up in. When the facts of the terror of Stalin and Mao was proven they just ignored it. When Castro began to institute a carbon copy of the Stalinist system they pretended that somehow Castro was Different and the Denial of the left in the 30’s and the 40’s was transfered to the younger generation.

Aug 9, 2004 - 3:23 pm 93. hollywood:

http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/editorials/la-ed-vote9aug09,1,4712121,print.story?coll=la-news-comment-editorials

Once we look beyond Cambodia, I think it’s safe to say, Kerry would be on the other side of both these issues: stem cell research and assault weapons ban.

Aug 9, 2004 - 3:47 pm 94. John Moore ( Useful Fools ):

Let’s dispose of this “impeachable offense” nonsense.

An impeachable offense is whatever the house can be convinced is impeachable. The Evan Mecham (AZ Gov) case is a good example. The real offense he committed was to embarrass the heck out out of the state’s political and business establishment. I was not happy – it was more intreesting having him in office.

Regarding Swifties. Here are my current theories – informed in some cases by conversations with swifties:

1) The SBVT guys are there to combat Kerry’s previous lies, both about his Vietnam experience and his anti-war experience. In both cases, Kerry’s behavior was far beyond acceptable, enough to

2) Those who support Kerry may have several motives. A powerful one is that Kerry arranged for them to be transfered out of danger when he left.

3) I suspect that Rassman thought he was under fire while in the wire because of suppressive fire from the boats around him. He was hardly in a position to know what was going on, while the people on the boats had lots of visibility. Furthermore, the fact that the boats had no new bullet holes is significant.

Aug 9, 2004 - 3:57 pm 95. Rick Ballard:

Kerry’s Cambodian incursion delusion led Fox this evening, Carl Cameron did a nice set up – even handed without aspersions on the Swifties. The Kerry campaign skokesman that Carl dealt with at first denied Kerry had made the Cambodian incursion statement and then, when confronted with the Congressional Record evidence promised that the campaign would “get back” to Carl “later”. Evidently, “later” means after the broadcast. Brit Hume kept the story on top and it was a discussion panel subject. I expected Fred Barnes to be a bit better informed than he was. He suggested that someone should ask the corpsman (Correon?) about Kerry’s first wound. Problem is, he died in the ’90’s. Fred needs to read blogs.

At any rate – at least the story made Fox and was presented in a reasonable manner. Now the WSJ can weigh in with a “call for explanation” editorial. The fun continues.

Aug 9, 2004 - 4:14 pm 96. Katherine:

Kevin and jerry,

Thank you for your insights regarding exculpation of communist regimes by so called ìprogressivesî. What you write explains their attitudes well.

But I am still left wondering how anybody with any level of integrity and decency can be blind to hard-core evidence of rottenness of practiced communist ideology, such as eyewitness accounts of atrocities and suffering, which were recently confirmed by direct documentation from the opened KGBí archives? And utter economic failures of any nation that attempted to implement Marxist economic principles (two most direct experiments on the subject were provided by East and West Germany, and North and South Korea).

This is what bothers me the most: donít these communist apologists realize that these were real people who suffered (and suffer still) under Dictatorship of Proletariat and System of Social Justice aka communist regimes? Mothers, fathers, children, grandmas and grandpas, all with desires and aspirations, hopes and despairs, as human as any person living in the freedom of liberal democracies. Why these people count so much less than somebody abstract belief?

The casual cruelty of todayís Marxist apologists toward their fellow men forces me to conclude that they have neither hearts nor souls.

And that includes Mr. Kerry.

Aug 9, 2004 - 4:18 pm 97. Rick Ballard:

Roger has a new post on the Fox news report. Might want to comment there instead of here.

Aug 9, 2004 - 4:29 pm 98. Rick Ballard:

Katherine,

I think it would be great to see your last comment changed to a post. You ask questions that have bothered me for twenty years. It’s still going on in Cuba and China and Vietnam. All the lies, all the pain, all the suffering and all for a failed abstraction.

Aug 9, 2004 - 4:34 pm 99. Samuel:

People

I guarantee that Kerry will be less liked the closer we get to November (More on this later). As far as Impeachment…

I’ve talked about impeachment before so I will not go into detail about what Clinton did, but just remind people that the actions against Clinton were in fact very political, but then impeachment always is. It is a political act by an elected body of legislators that answer directly to the people, as such it is always legitimate if the arguments are above board and factual. The fact is the case against Clinton was legitimate because Congress said it was and a President can be impeached for any reason, incompetence alone could be a reason. I disagreed with impeachment though in retrospect feel Clinton deserved every ounce of what he got plus more. Again remember, the Republicans lost 5 seats in 1998 because of this (they should have gained many), at least they put their money where their mouths were and did not lie about any facts, no one can refute that. I always hated the GOP before Bush but in truth they are straighter and much fairer players of the political process than the Dirty Dems, which of course says nothing significant because the Democrats are unscrupulous players indeed.

To Steve Smith, Hollywood and Co. spare me the nuanced arguments, I have argued your side of politics my whole life (until 1 year ago) and am still biting my tongue about much. What is good for the goose should be good for the gander, you should be grateful the Republicans play nice by comparison. Or are you too blinded by partisanship to even notice?

Back to Kerry.

Catherine,

I will tell you that Kerry is a very insecure person for reasons a shrink would have to help him sort out, I won’t go there but I will say only what I have personally observed. From my perspective his insecurity causes him to address things quite pathologically, that is why I call him “Clinton without the charm”. He has been just as contradictory on a personal level as well. It is also why I predicted and still predict his defeat in a landslide (53-57% for Bush). Kerry’s drive appears to come from a desire to validate himself. Whether Vietnam is the main reason I don’t know but it seems to complicate things. I used to view him as selfish or self-centered, but I do believe his issues are deeper than this, In truth I feel sorry for him.

Peggy Noonan’s “Sad Tree” analogy rings truer to me than any. The guy is definitely a downer and wears heavy. My feeling somewhat sorry for him in no way makes me desire to see him as our President, quite contrary. The last thing we need now is a person that is in conflict with himself is such ways. President Bush despite his weakness is the exact opposite, quite comfortable with himself and his beliefs. Agree or disagree one knows were he stands. He changes for reasons of conviction not reasons of nuance and splitting the difference. He is willing to risk losing this election and his political career doing what he thinks is right, something Kerry would not do.

It is for that reason I find solace in this President. I agree with him less then 50% of the time but take comfort in the fact that he isn’t “testing the wind” on every damn issue, especially life and death issues. People who do “wind checking” or are overly nuanced end up turning on their own. Whether inadvertent or not does not matter, that is the end result with such people. They can’t be trusted because they will go with what is best for them and not others. Politically this is something Kerry is very keen at doing. Thank God Bush doesn’t give a rats ass about such things (especially with our interests abroad). I would like to say more but have got to run. Good job Roger!

Aug 9, 2004 - 4:47 pm 100. jerry:

Mr. Smith:

The issue is not whether he does or does not have deformity. The issue was admitting to have relations with Lewinsky makes her a material witness in Jones vs Clinton. He lied to conceal the fact that Lewinsky was material witness. Therefore, his lies constitute obstruction of justice…QED He committed perjury.

Aug 9, 2004 - 4:48 pm 101. Fresh Air:

TMJ–

Robert Novak has read the book and found it credible.

I guess the rest of us will have to wait a couple of days.

Aug 9, 2004 - 5:09 pm 102. TmjUtah:

Fresh Air -

Thankee. I have ordered a copy.

For general consumption:

I never understood why Clinton (the co-presidency actually) wasn’t impeached for the Travel Office scandal. They arrived at the conclusion that they would profit by destroying the reputations, careers, and lives of the existing employees. So they did just that. Using the FBI. Why? Because the chance they might be ACCUSED of cronyism? This wasn’t victimless crime. The act was blatant abuse of executive power at the highest level – the kind of scenario that you can find in any White House palace coup fantasy. Billy Dale faced years in prison and ended up with a not guilty verdict and no job.

Which side of the aisle has problems with Ashcroft and Patriot?

Inappropriate workplace relations, perjury, obstruction, the unrelenting waves of IRS audits affecting almost every name publicly known as a Clinton adversary, and dereliction of duty all came later. Just icing on the cake.

Aug 9, 2004 - 5:36 pm 103. Jamie Irons:

Fresh Air:

Wow. The Bob Novak piece looks to be the entering wedge of the MSM taking the Swifties seriously.

Here’s hoping.

Jamie Irons

Aug 9, 2004 - 5:42 pm 104. Catherine:

Samuel!

You’re back!

Yay!

And in the nick of time, too.

I’ve been struggling with “who is Kerry?” trying to get a handle on the man . . . and I’ve been coming to exactly the impression you’re describing, I think.

The guy is definitely a downer and wears heavy. My feeling somewhat sorry for him in no way makes me desire to see him as our President, quite contrary. The last thing we need now is a person that is in conflict with himself is such ways

That’s how I’m coming to feel about him: he’s not “OK.”

He seems especially “damaged” (is that the word?) given his age. Most of the people I know (maybe all of the people I know) have gotten less sad-mad-and-crazy as they’ve aged. The things you thought were catastrophic when you were 20 or 30 start seeming not so catastrophic after all, and the things that really are catastrophic (in my case, my children’s diagnoses) can come to seem like things that were meant to happen, and are, in their own way, a blessing.

I see none of this in John Kerry.

He is the least “wise” 60 year old I’ve seen in my life.

Aug 9, 2004 - 6:05 pm 105. Katherine:

Rick,

These questions bothered me all my life. When living ìover thereî I thought that it was simply due to lack of informationin the West. Now, I know that there is no such excuse.

There must be something in human nature that I fail to understand. Too bad, because this ìsomethingî seems to be quite common.

Samuel,

If I understand you correctly, Kerry seeks presidency as some sort of a therapy? What this poor nation did to deserve it?

Aug 9, 2004 - 6:31 pm 106. Tom Holsinger:

Mr. Simon’s gut feeling is correct. The applicable statute which makes an impeachable offense of John Kerry’s statements to Congress on his Cambodian experience is 18 USC 1001 (the one Martha Stewart was convicted of). Here is the URL for 18 USC 1001:

http://caselaw.lp.findlaw.com/scripts/ts_search.pl?title=18&sec=1001

Criminal offenses prior to achieving office are impeachable while holding said office. They need not have been committed using the power of the current office – tax evasion or, more commonly, bribery while holding a different office (Spiro Agnew as Governor of Maryland is an example) may constitute impeachable offenses. Clinton’s perjury had nothing to do with his office, but the Senate’s failure to convict him had to do with the gravity of the offense and not with it being wholly unrelated to office.

Kerry’s statements to Congress here:

http://instapundit.com/images/kerrycambfull.jpg

could certainly constitute an impeachable offense if Congress finds them to be willfully false.

Here is the pertinent text of 18 USC 1001:

a) Except as otherwise provided in this section, whoever, in any matter within the jurisdiction of the executive, legislative, or judicial branch of the Government of the United States, knowingly and willfully -

… 2) makes any materially false, fictitious, or fraudulent statement or representation; or

… shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than 5 years, or both.

… (c) With respect to any matter within the jurisdiction of the legislative branch, subsection (a) shall apply only to -

… (2) any investigation or review, conducted pursuant to the authority of any committee, subcommittee, commission or office of the Congress, consistent with applicable rules of the House or Senate.”

I haven’t had such fun giving legal advice in 26 years of practice.

Aug 9, 2004 - 6:38 pm 107. Terrye:

Hollywood:

I will be damned if I know what stem cell research has to do with any of this but the point often missed is that Bush was the first president to spend anything on stem cell research. And as far as assault weapons go just jump right in there. I really don’t think that is going to win this election and besides not everyone who owns a gun is a gun nut.

I think the most annoying thing about the Dems is their double standard and their complete lack of core principles. Which means right and wrong don’t apply to them.

Kerry is a anti war war hero war criminal morph back to war hero isolationist internationalist who promises the whole will love us again if we just make him president. And Bush is bad.

Aug 9, 2004 - 7:04 pm 108. Kat-Missouri/USA:

I wanted to chime int because I think several of you almost hit the nail on the head about Kerry and the real issue with Viet Nam, but didn’t quite take it to conclusion.

First, from what I could gather from the Kerry biography, he did not believe in the Viet Nam action before he went to Viet Nam. He already believed that the US was over stating it’s case before he signed up. He signed up for two reasons: 1) He would be drafted and, even if he defered until after college, it was quite clear that deferment would be up before the war was, so in essence, he was speeding up the process; 2) Avoiding service did not fit well with his ideal persona. The all american boy joined the military and served his country when needed. He says this many times through out his career, in his biography and even today when questioned on it.

These both seem rather calculating, but certainly not criminal. However, his already anti-war leanings were simply re-enforced when he got in country.

Second, his desire to be transferred to a combat billet was hardly the “all american gung-ho” act he is putting forward today. He was serving in a non-combat billet for almost 2 years. During that time, you were certainly not going to be rotated out or have the chance to resign your commission early if you did not have the year “in country”. This is probably more a cynical move, and risky one at that. I am thinking, based on the service record we know, that he was more than aware of the 3 and you’re out rule before he requested combat billet. I am more and more convinced that Kerry was disillusioned early on and was attempting to leave under whatever circumstances he could derive. These weren’t illegal acts, nor were his other endeavors wrong, however, he more than once uses this to make his way through the slog of service that did not live up to his idea.

I think somebody nailed it, but I’ll simplify: he gets in country and combat is no where near the heroic stuff of his boyhood idea/dream and he feels betrayed. This betrayal extends itself to the government because he immediately begins to define the government activity as a “lie”. His interactions with VVAW, his testimony (real or false) in front of the senate is all predicated on his feelings of betrayal. Eventually, he even leaves the VVAW because he discovers that his ideal organization is not so ideal. Advocating communist tenets and the assissination of congressmen did not sit well with his ideas of re-constructing government.

Somebody else nails it some more by pointing out his continued behavior from meeting with the North Viet Namese peace delegates, to his VVAW behavior, his self appointed trip to Nicaraqua and obtained deal with Ortega that goes south, his investigation into the Iran/Contra deal that he is later left off the committe investigating (in the Globe story it even points out that his Democrat counterparts felt he would be so intent on his crusade that he would destroy the republic-US-just to prove his point, alledged CIA involvement in drug smuggling (which he almost does the same to and is another reason why he votes down appropriations), his vote to strip funding away from the CIA and decimate the intelligence corps, his vote against Gulf War I, his votes against military improvements, his “nuanced vote” for Gulf War II and later repudiating it and then finally his embrace of the new Anti-war crowd, including Michael Moore, all tell a story that we should be wary of.

It’s not how he got the medals. It’s not if he threw them away. It’s not his lie about Cambodia.

What you should see from his past behavior is an inate belief that the government is very bad. He believes that the current administration lied and is lying about the reasons for Iraq, and even if he won’t say it publicly, he sees it as another Viet Nam. He thought that Central AMerica would be another Viet Nam.

Essentially, he believes in some idea that the US should not use it’s powers to shape other nations policies, but should be a nearly Wilsonian Isolationist country and allow the world to be as it will be. The US is only to negotiate with these countries and attempt diplomatic solutions. Military action will never be something he will use as a tool, even to threaten with, because he believes that the US should take these governments at face value, idealistically, because we act like we trust them they will return the same favor and be trustworthy. That’s his failure with these Communist governments, not necessarily his communist beliefs. And he still refuses to recognize it. His campaign is talking about dealing with Iran on fissel material “to bring them into the fold”.

If he becomes President, his sense of betrayal by the government and his belief that it is too interfering in the world, will lead him to strip certain agencies down to the minimum, denounce actions, withdraw troops (not even offer them under humanitarian guise) and let the chips fall as they may with the US simply “reacting”. Because he believes in an idea and does not firmly grasp the reality of the US roll. He decries it really as hegemony or imperialism.

This is his danger. He has a history of going to an extreme for his ideas (something his group would hammer Bush about) even to the point of being detrimental to the US, in order to preserve his idea.

That should scare the hell out of everyone.

Aug 9, 2004 - 7:13 pm 109. Samuel:

Catherine

Thanks for the welcome back, my time is limited these days.

Katherine

I wouldn’t say it is for Kerry’s therapy, I imagine he has always been the way he is, whether Vietnam complicates it is up for someone else to decide, but I believe it does. But you know the type, the person that must always exagerate the truth, even when the truth would be adequate. They can’t help it, it is pathological, and I believe he is (I believe Clinton is as well and I voted for him twice… ouch!)

Aug 9, 2004 - 7:21 pm 110. Sandy P:

–He is the least “wise” 60 year old I’ve seen in my life.–

60s or 68-hater boomer, never grew up. And Mama T’s his sugar mama.

First Bubba, now Cabana Boy. Wanting his world view to be proved right.

I read that a couple of sociologists (?) theorized the boomers had to tear down everything their greatest generation parents did was because they hated their fathers, didn’t like their mothers. Knew they couldn’t live up to them. Traditions had to go. Now the millenials are bringing them back.

Maybe I need to read that book Generations. It explains it much better.

Aug 9, 2004 - 7:48 pm 111. Terrye:

Kat:

In many ways Kerry reminds me of Carter. And we all know how that ends.

Aug 9, 2004 - 8:46 pm 112. blogaddict:

I haven’t read any bios of Kerry, but I read a short piece a while back: http://www.uahc.org/rjmag/03fall/kerry.shtml. It described a number of psychologically revealing facts in his background that might have shaped him to be the strange sad sack he is today. There was a cold father (in Kerry’s words: “My dad was sort of painfully remote and shut off, and angry about the loss of his sister [she had died of cancer] and lack of a father.”) Not only did Kerry’s father “lack a father,” in Kerry’s words, but the father (Kerry’s grandfather) had committed suicide in a very public and awful fashion (shooting himself in the Copley Plaza Hotel after some huge financial reversals). Although the suicide had occurred in the year 1921, Kerry only learned of it when his own father was dying of cancer in 2000 and finally told him. Of course, Kerry was in his late 50s at the time he found out–what a shock that must have been. It had been a family secret all that time.

And it was by no means the only family secret. Kerry found out in the late 1980s, when he was in his mid-forties, that his grandmother (father’s mother) had been born a Czech Jew and had converted to Catholicism, a fact kept a secret from Kerry. Then, in 2002, he found out (partly through a search by Kranish, the Boston Globe columnist who is his buddy and biographer) that the grandfather, the one who killed himself, had been born a Czech Jew also, converted to Catholicism, and kept it hush-hush. One can only imagine the effect of all of this.

In addition, Kerry was sent to private schools at a fairly early age, and felt himself to be “different” from the other kids. The whole picture is actually a very sad one, full of deceptions and secrets. Kerry may have sensed something amiss when he was growing up. I believe it probably affected him deeply.

One can feel bad about all of this, as I do, without for a moment excusing a single thing the man has done. I find him a terrible candidate and I fervently hope he does not become President.

Aug 9, 2004 - 9:06 pm 113. Kat-Missouri/USA:

Terry and blogaddict..

I agree, there is something very wrong with this guy. His whole life has been a sense of betrayal yet he continues to look for the “ideal” which always fails and continues to betray him.

That’s how he sees the current government. always failing and betraying.

He is going to suck as a President if he whens. Thank god there will be a republican congress to reign his ass in. (crossed fingers)

Aug 9, 2004 - 9:17 pm 114. hollywood:

“He believes that the current administration lied and is lying about the reasons for Iraq,”

By your standards, even a blind pig can sometimes find an acorn. Here, he has. The administration has lied, is lying and will continue to lie about Iraq. It’s their only un-nuanced course. They can’t avoid it. Time to wake up and smell the coffee.

Aug 10, 2004 - 12:00 am 115. Syl:

Kat

Excellent analysis.

Hollywood

“The administration has lied, is lying and will continue to lie about Iraq…Time to wake up and smell the coffee.”

I, for one, smell the chicory, which the Left passes off as coffee.

Aug 10, 2004 - 1:55 am 116. jerry:

Wood:

There is a Senate committee report, A British Parlimentary Report and the Independent 9-11 commission report that shows that the only person we know to have lied about Iraq is Joe Wilson. You reveal yourself as DU type or an idiot who believes anything that mire extreme elements in the MSM says.

Aug 10, 2004 - 5:20 am 117. hollywood:

jerry,

We just disagree. I’m not a type, just me. No idea what DU means.

syl,

If you’ve never been, you owe it to yourself to try some chicory coffee in New Orleans. Beignets would be a good accompaniment.

Aug 10, 2004 - 8:31 am 118. Roberts:

Hollywood writes: “The administration has lied, is lying and will continue to lie about Iraq. ”

You evidently haven’t been paying attention. Subsequent analysis by multiple commissions, including the 9/11 Commission, and the Senate Select Intel Committee show that in fact it is not the administration that has been “lying” but its critics like Kerry advisor Joe Wilson.

But rather than actually follow the issues, it is evidently so much more convenient for you to just repeat discredited slanders.

Aug 10, 2004 - 10:10 am 119. Michael Levy:

The same people giving Kerry a pass for lying on the senate floor threw a ####-fit when Cheney told Leahy to go do something to himself.

Apparently, only Republicans can do wrong.

Aug 10, 2004 - 11:47 am 120. Keith_Indy:

Micheal – that’s because for the typical leftist/liberal/democrat, lying is OK if it serves their purpose, because their purpose is to better mankind…

And of course, since their purpose is to better mankind, and the Republicans oppose them, then the Republicans purpose is to make mankind worse off…

Funny, how they want everyone to be non-judgmental about every strain of humanity except Republicans…

Aug 10, 2004 - 1:44 pm 121. Kevin P:

Roberts:

Hollywood is just using the “Big Lie ” propaganda tool .If you keep repeating the lie over and over you will get a certain amount of people to believe it. It makes no difference to he/she that the 9-11 commision, the Butler report, and even a large swatch of the MSM has put this rumour to rest. Holly is similar to the right wing crazies that still claim that Clinton killed all those people on the “Clinton Death List.” It makes no difference what proof you show HW he/she will put her hands over her ears and instead of saying LA la,la,la,la he/she will say Lie,Lie,Lie. This technique is why the Protocols of Zion and the crop circle people still sell books and still make the rounds on the internet. Logic and reason will find no purchase in their pointy little heads.

Aug 11, 2004 - 8:37 am 122. M. Simon:

Why wasn’t Kerry reprimanded for throwing chickens against the wall?

Because he didn’t throw the chickens. He used a machine gun.

What is the War Hero Afraid of?

Form 180. Release the records.

Aug 14, 2004 - 8:22 am

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