108 Comments

1. themarkman:

Those of us in the Gen X area (I’m 36) are not particularly worried about “healing” the wounds of Viet Nam. I DO remember the fall of Saigon, being 7 years old for the better part of 1975. I also remember my extremely silly hippie older brother and sisters (I am the seventh of eight children) and their friends. Now that I am older, and had to put up with my siblings intellectual dementia, the only wound to the country I want to see healed is that of the Baby Boomer generation itself. No generation has done more to polarize this country than the boomers, and I will not miss them. I fully realize that the overwhelming majority of boomers have done some great things for this country, but the act of ceding the pulpit to the moron communist sympathizers galls me. Everywhere you look, the media, academe, celebrity, the boomer generation brought respectability to a self-indulgence that is sickening. The majority of boomers who allowed this to happen is as culpable as the so-called “moderate” muslims who will not speak up over the atrocities commited in their name. The liberal me generation has caused millions to die by handcuffing our national purpose, and will not be missed by those who follow.

Aug 23, 2004 - 12:02 pm 2. Michael Parker:

I desire to associate myself with that expression of disrespect.

Aug 23, 2004 - 12:14 pm 3. jonkendall:

vietnam? for you – painful. but some of us are too young to remember or to have understood the gory details. and what we do know, is wholly negative. is it accurate? i’m beginning to think it isn’t. with the decidedly two-view of the Iraq war, i’m getting a different view of Vietnam, and i think the war has been unfairly cast. national intent, characterization of soldiers, atrocities, drug use – was it really an uncharacteristic American war? or was it the beginning of an anti-war media barrage that is just now peaking? -k.

Aug 23, 2004 - 12:14 pm 4. Sun-Tzu:

jonkendall:

I would suggest that examining how the “Tet Offensive” of 1968 was written up at the time, in the first wave of histories, and now will show you how much distortion occurred.

Tet in 1968 was described as an enemy victory.

Tet, in the first wave of post-war histories, was described as something of a failed offensive, but which showed that the American leadership was lying.

Tet, now, is recognized as a North Vietnamese/VC defeat—but one which turned the political tide in the United States against the war.

The Left, however, now flips cause and effect: It wasn’t that coverage of Tet turned people against the war, it’s that Tet showed that the government was lying—although by that light, one would suspect that Eisenhower and FDR would have been turned out for “lying” about the Germans at the time of the Battle of the Bulge.

Perhaps, as the Vietnamese archives open up a bit more, we’ll see more evidence that, in fact, it was the North Vietnamese who were defeated in 1968—and our own elites who failed to understand/recognize that.

Aug 23, 2004 - 12:34 pm 5. Lapsed Randian:

Roger: you said it better than I thought it could be said.

Aug 23, 2004 - 12:38 pm 6. jedrury:

After movies like Apocalyse Now, Platoon,

and Tom Cruise’s movie [Born in the USA ?],

the songs from Peter Paul and Mary, Bob Dylan, the pervasive aura/culture of the anti war of the Woodstock generation and the anti war activities of Jane Fonda and John Kerry, it has been hard for any American to accurately evaluate, assess, approve or disapprove the Vietnam War as a historical issue.

It is a cultural history written by screen writers [yes, Roger !] and artists and polemicists and accepted and not questioned by the mainstream media as fact. Look at the politicians since the war [as good an apparent barometer as any - to the extent that political chatter defines a time in the history of a country] and identify who defends the war now. Better yet, who on the political landscape has the courage to define and the perspective to educate us. Not many.

Aug 23, 2004 - 12:39 pm 7. Rocketeer:

markman,

We seem to be in the same cohort, and I couldn’t agree more. Those of us in the generations to follow have paid, and will continue to pay, an unbelievably high cost for their nihilistic solipsism.

Aug 23, 2004 - 12:45 pm 8. IcePilot:

Roger,

Excellent, as always. 2 points:

1. The Vietnam war was “lost” because the generals had to fight it with one (sometimes two) hands tied behind their backs. NEVER half-fight a war. MacNamara should have gone to jail.

2. Check out adeimantus.blogspot.com/2004/08/let-it-alone.html. Superb article. Absolutely NAILS Kerry.

Aug 23, 2004 - 12:46 pm 9. Pat Curley:

The irony is that if Kerry had just finessed a little bit on his anti-war record back in May or so, he’d probably be out of trouble. I remember Russert asking him about the war crimes testimony back then, and Kerry could easily have said something along the lines of, “Well, you know, Tim, I was going from things that had been reported at the Winter Soldier investigation, and I didn’t realize at the time that some of the people who testified there weren’t really Vietnam Veterans and that some of them had exaggerated their participation in supposed war crimes. Knowing what I know now, I’d have to say that true war crimes, while they did occur were fairly rare, and were not committed with the knowledge of officers at all levels of command, and I apologize for not knowing that at the time.”

But for once in his life, Kerry refused to flip-flop, and it may be the one thing that costs him the election.

Aug 23, 2004 - 12:56 pm 10. D Anghelone:

MacNamara should have gone to jail.

Harry Truman: “The buck stops at the desk of the Secretary of Defense!”

This “McNamara’s War” bit really has to go. The President and Congress were the decision makers. McNamara was initially targeted because JFK was not to be touched.

Aug 23, 2004 - 1:03 pm 11. bdog57:

Sometimes I go for car-rides with my son to visit the nutritionist: a 50-minute drive one way. Being 8 years old, he loves war stories. Why we did what we did, battles fought, everything. Given my limited knowledge of history, I try and lay things out there in an easy-to-understand -let’s face it: an 8-year-old audience is probably the most I’m qualified for.

At any rate, on one of these treks I began discussing the Vietnam war. I started on a negative tangent…and then it hit me. The war itself wasn’t bad. It was people’s perception and the propagandizing of the war which led to our defeat. Was protecting the South from Communism the right thing to do? Absolutely. Could we have won if the media had been on our side? You bet.

It’s amazing what you can allow to become ingrained in your consciousness through years of primary and secondary education.

Aug 23, 2004 - 1:09 pm 12. Rick Ballard:

Pat, if he had done that then he’d have lost the wink and nod boys and girls prior to the convention. The ones who look at each other knowingly when they see Michael Moore sitting next to Rosalyn, the ones who use the word “nuance” to describe lying through your teeth, the ones who recognized his silly-assed “salute” as he “reported for duty” at the Dem convention as the slap to all servicemen who honor their duty that it was, the ones who snickered and sniggered as he wrapped himself in the flag at the end of his acceptance speech, sure in the knowledge that his famous “nuance” would allow him to burn the flag as soon as he took it off. He can’t win without the America haters and he’s prepared to kiss their butts right through election day. That’s just the kind of guy that John is.

Aug 23, 2004 - 1:14 pm 13. Roberts:

Pat, the possibility exists that you’ve found the core of John Kerry by identifying what he hasn’t flip-flopped on – his support of communist regimes like North Vietnam and the Sandinistas.

Aug 23, 2004 - 1:16 pm 14. so it begins:

I tend to look at this thing not from a political sense, but from a very personal sense for the Vietnam vets. Roger is right – this is not going to put Vietnam to rest. But it does not have to and it is not the reason the SBVT is doing what they are doing. It is a personal matter that started 33 years ago and that needs reckoning. It just so happens the SBVT were patient enough to wait for the biggest stage in the World.

Here is an analogy:

You are the suriving family memeber of a murdered individual. The thug who did it is taken in front of a jurry and given his day in court. He is convicted and there is a sense of justice… but there will never be complete closure.

This is the same thing. I think all along these Vets just want to see this go to court – that is their ULTIMATE goal. However, if they just make sure Kerry is not President they’ll be satisfied as well. It is kind of like hoping that murderer gets the death penalty, but ends up with life in prison. You’re not completely satisfied, but you CAN move on. These guys have been waiting 33 years for justice – now they’ve taken it into their own hands. I don’t believe in “luck” or “coincidences”. This whole 527 fiasco happened for a reason… maybe just so these guys could have their day in the court of public opinion.

I for one, support their efforts.

Aug 23, 2004 - 1:17 pm 15. John Moore ( Useful Fools ):

Any way it comes out, this election is going to increase a gap of some sort. After all, a whole lot of people never accepted the 2000 results, and that has already created a gap and a lot of hatred.

If Kerry wins, I think Vietnam Vets will go back to our lives, a bit more bitter. It will authenticate his charges made in 1971 – we must be baby killers – the President said so many times! Hopefully not too many will finally give up on the system and just stop participating.

It Kerry loses, the hatred on the left will continue, and I think result in some internal terrorism – like we had in the ’70s from the left. I would expect the hard left to join with the Islamofascists (there are already examples of this).

Aug 23, 2004 - 1:33 pm 16. Clio:

Growing up, as many others here did, in the shadow of the 60s I can honestly say that I never wanted to hear “Vietnam” spoken again after the age of 12.

I think there are a couple of important points to make here: Gen Y kids don’t even have THAT much context to go on. They must be going nuts (those who are paying attention, that is). For a guy who supposedly wants to appeal to youth voters, this is a bizarre tactic. Ditto for “swing voters” like me (cranky 30 and 40ish professionals).

And I think Kerry’s critics always need to keep his big picture in mind. Why does Vietnam matter? Well, because Kerry wants to have it both ways, when as Roger notes an entire generation chose sides and lived and died there. How can anyone not question the guy’s motives? Did he game the system? I think so, and so does my husband who, until this story sunk in, was pretty sure he would vote for the guy. Less sure now. Funny.

I mentioned it in an earlier post, but I think the attempt by Kerry to piggyback on McCain’s more credible claim to heroism and leadership will eventually turn sour for one or both of them. Next to McCain, Kerry and Bush both look pathetic. Right now Kerry is able to bask in McCain’s reflected glow (does it matter much? several relatives raise the names and experiences in one breath–to my eternal disgust). If McCain pulls a Dole, whither goes Kerry?

Aug 23, 2004 - 1:34 pm 17. Bostonian:

Roger’s right in that we won’t see any national consensus on whether the Vietnam War was a good idea, was fought properly, etc. Historians will be arguing about that for decades or longer. There’s lots of larger context to consider.

I can, however, see a useful national debate on the war crimes that Kerry & his gang invented for us. Either they happened, or they didn’t. And people are still alive to give testimony.

The Winter Soldier claims did an incredible amount of damage to our nation’s psyche, and I think it affects how people view our military even today. This needs to be aired out.

Aug 23, 2004 - 1:45 pm 18. John Moore ( Useful Fools ):

There is a good reason for Vietnam to continue to be part of the political dialog. The social movements associated with Vietnam accreted a number of other issus (abortion, government social welfare programs, etc). The time was one of ferment, the results of which affect politics every day in the United States. Vietnam wasn’t the genesis of this – there were various varieties of harad left groups floating around, but Vietnam, especially because of the draft, drove ordinary people into contact with the hard left, and the result was all sorts of changes, not just related to the war or foreign policy.

Without Vietnam, I suspect few college students would have paid attention to the hard left rabble rousers – they just werren’t interesting off quibbling about their various doctrines. But in a few years we had major activity in the civil rights movement (some of which ha hard left root, but almost everyone except many in the south supported), the birth control bill leading towards changes in sexual attitudes that affected gay rights and abortion a few years down the road, the draft for Vietnam, which created a whole lot of energy, largely among potential draftees, in some cases their parents, and not many other people, and which drove many who didn’t want to go into graduate school, resulting in the extreme leftist takeover of the humanities, the arrogance of the generation (the motto was “don’t trust anyone over thirty”) which changed views of the value of tradition and acquired wisdom, and the drug revolution, which simultaneousy turned many tens of millions onto criminals for using harmless drugs (pot) or not so harmless ones (e.g. LSD – I’ve seeen a few bad trips as Barracks Master At Arms).

This is a lot of change for one generation to assimilate, and given the democraphics of the generation, it was a hurricane of ideas, odd behavior, rebellion, distrust of government, and lots of other things.

As an example of the typical weirdness of the times, a friend decided to take a hitch-hiking trip around the country, including a visit to my home town (Lawrence, KS, a university town – KU – and still full of hippies). When his ride dropped him off not to far from town, some locals drove up, saw this hippie (and his friend who was a long), and opened first with a shotgun. Said hippies dived into the ditch and were harrassed by gunfire for a while. Then these guys left. Since most folks around Lawrence can shoot, they obviously missed on purpose. Deciding the town was maybe not so “cool,” the hitched into Nebraska. They were picked up there by a standard Ken Kesey like hippie bus (flowers painted all over it, etc). It was full of raw marijuana (the Army planted hemp in the midwest, including around Lawrence, in WW-I). These guys were floating down the raod wheels a few feed up when they spotted a marijuana field, at which point everyone bailed and picked. My friend got back in the bus and they were going down the road preparing the pop, throwing stems, etc out the window. A cop stopped them. 30 days in the country jail.

That sort of story was not atypical of the time.

So Vietnam by itself is a thing – there are many conflicts about it – could it have been won, who betrayed us how (Kerry’s high on my list, behind LBJ), is Agent Orange a real problem, etc, etc, etc.

All of this stuff is part of American history that is significant because of the major impact on current culture.

And, of course, we all grew up in the “duck and cover” generation. Today, we are still in as much danger of global thermonuclear war, we just prefer to ignore the fact.

Aug 23, 2004 - 1:57 pm 19. John Moore ( Useful Fools ):

preview, john!

Aug 23, 2004 - 2:03 pm 20. David C:

Like Markman and Rocketeer, I’m in that same Gen X age cohort (35 now), and the sooner the Boomers are out of power, the better, as far as I’m concerned. (I’m not necessarily that crazy about my own generation either, incidentally – I think the rising “Generation Y” and younger, might end up the ones to really set things right. And if you’re familiar with Strauss and Howe’s “Generations” theories, this fits.)

But I digress. More to the point is that the operative idea of the Kerry campaign has always seemed to be “Why would Kerry’s antiwar activism cause him problems? Everybody knows he was right, and the war and its supporters were all evil and Nixon.” And they just take it as a given that all sentient people feel the same way – such a given that it’s not deemed worthy of defense or discussion, even.

But to those of us not afflicted with the manias of those times, it’s not nearly so cut and dried. It’s actually very difficult to really learn much about the history of the war in Vietnam, since virtually all of it is filtered (one way or the other) through the vicious tribal warfare of the day. I think the definitive history of those days will only come (*can* only come) when some great historian of a generation that didn’t experience it firsthand takes a crack at it.

Aug 23, 2004 - 2:05 pm 21. marek:

IcePilot,

Indeed, an outstanding essay. Thanks.

adeimantus.blogspot.com/2004/08/let-it-alone.html

Aug 23, 2004 - 2:08 pm 22. Terrye:

I agree with Roger here. Only when we boomers are dead will this ountry come to any consensus on Viet Nam. Dragging this into the national spotlight now is only going to make things worse. Thanks John.

It was much the same after the Civil War and then like now men were waving the bloody shirt. Then like now a lot of people did not know how to put the tragedy of war behind them.

But Kerry is just so oppurtunistic that it strikes me no good can come from a victory for him. I have no idea how this election will come out but to vote against Bush because he is polarizing and for Kerry is just wishful thinking if it is national unity you really want. The truth is guys like Kerry really don’t want unity. They honestly want to stick it to people like the swifties. Today I heard one of the legion of Democratic strategists call the swifties a pack of liars. Yep, it is just like the good old days. Might as well call them baby killers and be done with it.

Aug 23, 2004 - 2:17 pm 23. Tom Holsinger:

Themarkman,

Consider redefining your categorization of Boomers. Is President Bush, as a boomer, as responsible as John Kerry, et al., for the things you don’t like? Does this make generalizations about X’ers true too?

I’ll certainly give you Democratic activists now who are Baby Boomers. I was a Democratic activist then too, but of the Scoop Jackson variety. Now I’m a Republican. Where I was and how I got to where I am show how useless simple categories are.

1) Classic boomer origin – my parents met on VE Day. My father was a replacement infantry lieutenant waiting to be shipped to the Pacific. It doesn’t get any more Boomer than that.

2) Democratic activist family. Both parents. And my godfather was Phil Burton – he taught me to “count”.

3) Twisted youth. If having Philip K. Dick as a role model at the impressionable age of 12-14 doesn’t make you weird, nothing will. I met him through his step-daughter (a classmate) when we were all living in the Point Reyes area of Marin County after my parents’ divorce. As the area’s only subscriber to Analog, I had the joy of reading Dick its review of his Man In The High Castle, which ended with “Buy this book!” Dick won a Hugo for it.

4) Still more twisted youth. My political consciousness began then in the Inverness library where I discovered James Burnham. The first book I bought with my paper route money was Milovan Djilas’ Conversations With Stalin. The second was his New Class.

So due to Dick I have never been in danger of conventional thinking, while Burnham & Djilas innoculated me early against Marxism.

5) Vehement opposition to the Vietnam War. I was in the first big anti-war march in San Francisco, and admired the longshoremen providing security with their cargo hooks. This was either in the fall of 1966 or the spring of 1967. I opposed the war because I thought we couldn’t win due to mistakes going in (based on my high school research as a wargamer and incipient historian) and from what my politician father was telling me from his Johnson administration sources. I didn’t think the War was wrong, just that we had screwed it up so badly ab initio that victory would have too high a price.

6) Successful anti-war activist. The first political campaign I managed was the 1968 Santa Cruz County, California, presidential primary for Senator Eugene McCarthy. I was an 18 year-old freshman at UC Santa Cruz. We delivered the second biggest majority in the state for McCarthy – only tiny Butte County beat us. Our victory margin was based on re-registering moderate Republicans as Democrats to vote against the Vietnam War, as only Governor Reagan appeared on the GOP primary ballot as a favorite son.

7) But no political illusions. The final take-home exam for my spring 1968 core course – Stability And Change In The Soviet Union – offered a choice of the then Prague Spring as a subject. I selected that and predicted that the USSR would invade Czechoslovakia ten days before the 1968 Democratic Convention in Chicago.

Becoming a Republican. The last straw for me was the 1984 Democratic presidential primary campaign when Senator John Glenn endorsed the “nuclear freeze” idiocy. At that point it was clear that there was no room in the Democratic Party for anti-Communists like me. I changed parties after Jeanne Kirkpatrick did so publically.

So even Democratic Boomers during the Vietnam War were not all like you depict.

Aug 23, 2004 - 2:18 pm 24. Jamie Irons:

My G_d! I disagree with Roger!

While I think he is correct to say that the Vietnam issue cannot be “settled” as an argument, I disagree that it is a waste of time to have this argument.

I think that “Vietnam” has become a surrogate for how to wage the war on Islamic fascism: the notion that the Vietnam conflict was entirely evil is matched by the idea that the Iraq war was the result of a deception carried out by the evil Bush administration.

I think I am somewhat qualified to speak to this issue (a little bit anyway) since I was one of those who protested the Vietnam war and now fervently supports the war against the Islamists. I think many others on this board are like me in that respect, as is our esteemed host.

And finally, I am a little tired of hearing how “self-indulgent” the “Boomers” were/are. As a group we are neither more nor less self-indulgent than any other generation.

We were, though, I think, blessed in many ways, to grow up in a great nation and during a prosperous era.

I think we need to have this hopeless, unresolvable debate about “Vietnam,” and that Mr. Kerry has provoked it may be the best thing he has ever done.

Jamie Irons

Posted by at August 23, 2004

Aug 23, 2004 - 2:26 pm 25. Jamie Irons:

Let me just add, apropos of nothing, that this TypeCast (or whatever-the-in-the-name-of-all-that-is-holy) program for logging in irritates the hell out of me.

It tells you you are signed in and can now comment. You compose your thoughtful, if somwhat long-winded and perhaps not overly brilliant remarks, and you find that in the interim you are no longer signed in!

Jamie Irons

Aug 23, 2004 - 2:32 pm 26. Jamie Irons:

somewhat long-winded…is what I meant to write.

As Rick Ballard reminds us, “Preveiw is our fiend.”

Jamie Irons

Aug 23, 2004 - 2:35 pm 27. Rick Ballard:

Jamie,

Hear, hear!

When Tom mentioned the dock workers providing “security” at the SF protests I wonder how many of the younger readers caught the reference to Harry Bridges. If he were alive today he would be a leader in ANSWER. Just as the real impetus for the anti-war movement in the Vietnam era came from the hard left, so today a different group with the same antecedents cynically uses kids in pursuit of the sole goal of tearing this country down.

Aug 23, 2004 - 2:45 pm 28. Demosophist:

Sorry but the anti-historical generational chauvinism of posters like themarkman, including the rather nihilistic ethics of wishing the whole group were dead as soon as possible, strikes me as far more immature and potentially divisive than anything going on in this rather tame P-campaign (by historical standards). It’s also completely illegitimate, because George W. Bush and nearly all of his cabinet are “boomers,” as is Roger L. Simon, Viktor Davis Hanson, Michael Ledeen, and Bill Kristol. Take a pill, guys.

I agree that too much nostalgia about one’s “coming of age” experience is probably a bad thing, but that applies as much to gen-Xers as boomers. Of all the ways that one might tar individuals by what group they belong to, the generational tarbrush is about the stupidest. It’s even dumber than race.

(Note: I didn’t actually call any specifc person dumb or immature. I’m talking about the behavior.)

Aug 23, 2004 - 2:48 pm 29. Tom Holsinger:

I second Jaime’s complaints about the Typekey timer.

Aug 23, 2004 - 2:53 pm 30. penwil:

Jamie Irons: “I think that “Vietnam” has become a surrogate for how to wage the war on Islamic fascism: the notion that the Vietnam conflict was entirely evil is matched by the idea that the Iraq war was the result of a deception carried out by the evil Bush administration.”

I agree with this wholeheartedly. And I think on a subconscious level the electorate knows this,and that’s why the story exploded into the mainstream, in spite of the fact of it being ignored by media. Sure it was helped along by alternative media like talk radio and blogs, but lots of subjects are discussed in these venues and never make it out into the mainstream. (Oil for Food scandal, anyone?) The swiftboat vet story broke because it’s a conversation the pubic wants to have.

But the conversation is really about Iraq and the greater war on Islamofacism. And this is where I think it ultimately is going to help Bush, because he was vulnerable on Iraq when the national dialogue was over WMDs and Fallujah and Abu Graihb. But he stands a better chance when the issue gets distilled down into a question of fighting the bastards who brought down the WWT and all those countries that support Islamic terrorism, or embracing the make love not war and American soldiers are all baby killers crowd as embrodied by Kerry in his Winter Soldier personna.

The fatal mistake Kerry made was not so much wrapping himself in the flag and his heroism today, as it was in forgetting about that little matter of his betrayal back in 1971.

Aug 23, 2004 - 3:02 pm 31. VN Vet 67-68:

I served in VN for a year and I doubt that the various issues surrounding that conflict will ever be put to rest. But, that’s true of any war you can name. People still write books about wars fought centuries ago.

My own views have gone around a couple of times and probably will oscillate another time or two before I’m dead.

The one thing that amazes me has to do with people who are dead certain their view is correct and who make no more than a pretense of examining what is known about any particular question, whether that be the Iraq war, the Vietnam war, abortion or any other divisive topic.

I examine my own motives and consider new information daily. Sometimes my views on things change. That process of change has taken me from a pro-abortion Liberal of the early 70s through all sorts of contortions down to this present, where I find myself bereft of labels.

As for the boomers making a mess of things, well, each generation gets mulitiple chances to screw things up. We did right and we did wrong. I’m sorry to break this to you Gen-X and Y types, but your generations will do the same.

Your challenges will be different. Lessons from history are of limited use. Inevitably, you’ll find yourselves having to invent a path.

Good luck!

Jim

Aug 23, 2004 - 3:07 pm 32. Pat Curley:

Rick Ballard, I don’t think that is the issue; after all, Kerry has stated that he would still have voted for the Iraq war even knowing what he knows now, which is a whole lot bigger issue to the left than Vietnam these days, on the assumption that the’d back him as ABB anyway. So why would they not have forgiven him for sliding away from his testimony about war crimes 33 years ago?

More than anything else, Kerry stuck to his guns on this issue because he failed to think ahead. For years his antiwar status has been a badge of honor among liberals and in Massachusetts. But he failed to heed Nixon’s dictum of running to the center and now it’s too late.

Aug 23, 2004 - 3:08 pm 33. Jamie Irons:

penwil

And this is where I think it ultimately is going to help Bush, because he was vulnerable on Iraq when the national dialogue was over WMDs and Fallujah and Abu Graihb. But he stands a better chance when the issue gets distilled down into a question of fighting the bastards who brought down the WWT and all those countries that support Islamic terrorism, or embracing the make love not war and American soldiers are all baby killers crowd as embrodied by Kerry in his Winter Soldier personna.

I think your analysis here (and this is the first time I’ve seen it put this way) is exactly right. The only questionable point is whether the discussion can be continued along these lines long enough, before the restless national attention (who knew an entire nation could suffer from ADHD?) drifts to some other subject.

Jamie Irons

Aug 23, 2004 - 3:09 pm 34. Tom Holsinger:

Rick,

The hard-core lefties did not provide the “real” impetus for the anti-war movement in California. ]My politician father was one its major leaders here, and its real impetus here came from the California Democratic Council. He formed an alliance with then Assembly Speaker Jesse Unruh after Bobby Kennedy’s assassination, and became Jesse’s chief political “enforcer”, i.e., anti-war activism in this state was controlled by the Democratic Party apparatus after the 1968 primary.

California anti-war activism sprang up among the public at large in 1966. It was expressed among many groups. The CDC leaders who had driven the Communists from the Democratic Party in their days as Young Democrats used the imminent 1968 presidential primary as a organizational vehicle in 1967 to secure control of the “movement”.

California lefties departed for the marginal Peace & Freedom party in January 1968 after the CDC recruited McCarthy as its primary candidate. The CDC directed public anti-war energy into conventional electoral politics in the spring of 1968, and used the ensuing power as a vehicle to make an alliance with the Democratic bosses who survived the 1968 primaries.

My father in particular used the then presidential convention delegate selection process – county caucauses to choose slates of delegates who then ran in congressional district elections pledged as delegates for the presidential primary – to bring as many new people and groups into the Democratic party as possible. I.e., he used widespread public opposition to the War as a vehicle to expand the Party’s base and secure control of the Party for his faction.

California lefties were entirely frozen out of this, and were gone for a decade. They came back in and secured control with the “nuclear freeze” movement of the early 1980’s.

Aug 23, 2004 - 3:13 pm 35. penwil:

Also, look how similar Kerry’s 1971 behavior is to Michael Moore’s today–the granstanding, and the propagating of lies and slander. And there was Michael Moore prominently sitting next to Rosalyn Carter (another peace at any price president–and look how well that turned out) at the Dems convention. These kind of connections do get made in the voters’ minds, if only on a subconcious level.

Michael Moore may end up influencing this election after all. Only not quite in the manner he’s expecting.

Same with all the moonbats who are so gleefully intending to descend on NY to disrupt Bush’s convention. Yeah, lets all go back and revisit Chicago 1968 and meanwhile, Iraq’s soccer team is going for the gold and Pakistan just foiled a big al Queda terrorist plot.

Aug 23, 2004 - 3:13 pm 36. Sandy P:

Ice Pilot, wow. I encourage everyone to read it.

Aug 23, 2004 - 3:15 pm 37. Jamie Irons:

Tom Holsinger

That’s fascinating history; even though I lived through that era as a University of California medical student, I had forgotten much of what you recount. (Of course I was quite busy then!)

Jamie Irons

Aug 23, 2004 - 3:17 pm 38. holdfast:

I’m with the markman – as a tail-end gen Xer I have no Vietnam memory – but I remember how it colored all the commentary throughout the 1980s. Falklands, Lebannon, Grenada – it always came down to Vietnam for the talking heads.

And Demosophist -we don’t wan’t you all dead (I’m rather fond of my parents, esp my mom who’s made a pretty hard move to the right in the last few years). It’s just that there’s so damned many of you. There are plenty of good boomers – I happen to like GWB, though I recognize some of the mistakes he’s made. So much of the culture is about boomer experiences – Vietnam, the 60s, bell-bottoms – it’s all about your stuff – and the relentless campaign to convince yourselves and the rest of us that you’re still young, cool and trend-setting. It’s like when I was 17 at a rock concert and some guy who looked like my Dad offered me a doob. That is simply not cool. I’m sure he enjoyed his grass, but smoking up does not make a 48 white-collar guy cool.

Unfortunately, Gen X isn’t all that much to yell about – Ben Stiller and Jeneane Garafolo – sheesh.

But – hope is on the horizon – the next bunch, my little brother’s crew, really does have the right stuff. These are the kids fighting in Najaf and Fallujah. These are the warriors who are losing feet and legs and BEGGING to be allowed back into combat because they don’t want to abandon their buddies. I was on a plane recently with a US Army orthapedic surgeon, recently returned from Iraq, and he could not talk about the guts and stoicism of the yong troops without get moist-eyed. John Kerry could not in a million years imagine having a “band of brothers” like that.

Aug 23, 2004 - 3:19 pm 39. ambisinistral:

Eh, Generations alway admire the Gradnparents days, but not their parents. The Gen Xers will find this out soon enough.

On topic, I too agree that the Vietnam debate is relevent, although in and odd proxy sort of way, in that the Country is entering yet another conflict with a for using non-traditional tasctics. What started out as a spat over a Purple Heart might yet morph into a serious discussion of the commitment needed to fight the WoT.

Aug 23, 2004 - 3:38 pm 40. ambisinistral:

Preview? Bah, I claim to suffer from Dyslexic Typing Disorder. Hmmmm… perhaps I could talk some moonbat foundation into funding my research into DTD?

Aug 23, 2004 - 3:42 pm 41. hollywood:

Got to give the devils their due. Rove/Bush, after getting maximum mileage out of the Swift boat stuff, leaving Kerry’s camp to play catch up, now request that Kerry join them in banning all 527s. Notice he doesn’t mention PACs. Just a down low way of appearing to take the high road. http://www.nytimes.com/2004/08/23/politics/campaign/23CND-BUSH.html?hp

Aug 23, 2004 - 4:13 pm 42. John Moore ( Useful Fools ):

I don’t see the relevance of the Vietnam issue, at least so far, other than how it casts light or shadows on the character of John Kerry (we did this with Bush months go).

The situation is a lot different today. The “anti-war” candidate is pro-war. The war is microscopic compared to Vietnam, as are the casualty figures. We have a disagreement as to whether the war was needed, one I don’t remember from the mid ’60s when anti-Communism was a given.

As to the boomer generation, of which I am a member… we are special in the sense that we represent a demographic bulge. In addition, a whole lot of social changes (see previous post) just happen to be associated with our generation.

But the characterizations of the generation are too rough. Certainly hedonism got a big boost by the generation (which translates too many times to selfishness), but were the volunteers in Vietnam (2/3 of the soldiers at the height) hedonists? The generation is not monolithic, just big, aging, and with memories of some historic events and movements.

Aug 23, 2004 - 4:23 pm 43. RogerA:

I am probably one of those to whom Roger referred as exorcising a ghost–I did so in an earlier thread–I think, however, the issue re Kerry’s candidacy is pretty straight forward–Here is a man with a public record of 30 years–He chose to drag up is VN experience of 4 months–I understand he is narcissisitic but most politicians are; I can understand embellishing war stories and I know the difference between fairy tales and war stories. Clearly the Cambodian thing is a lie; I will attribute to the fog of war the discrepancies surrounding the valor awards. What blows it for me is the purple hearts–from my experience no one gets three purple hearts and doesnt spend any time getting medevaced. Bob Dole summarized that quite nicely.

So my problem with Kerry is not viet nam and its assorted ghosts–actually I cant say I ever lost a nites sleep about my service there. It comes down to the utter disregard for any principled behavior and a willingness to manipulate a system and people therein for purely opportunisitic motives–and that in and of itself disqualifies him to be making decisions for the country.

I wish we could talk about social security and health care and the war on terror and Iraq–Kerry chose not to talk about that, thus the record he chose to stand on is fair game. And the lessons I have learned from the analyses I have seen posted do not support a vote from Kerry from me.

Aug 23, 2004 - 4:28 pm 44. lindenen:

Given Kerry’s past remarks, voting behavior in the Senate, etc I cannot see his administration having a very positive or close relationship with the Pentagon. This does not bode well with a war on.

Aug 23, 2004 - 4:40 pm 45. Terrye:

hollywood:

Oh for Chrisake grow up and accept the fact that those men have a right to an opinion whether you like to hear it or not.

I don’t think Rove is responsible for any of this in fact the Dems are dragging McCain into this when his campaign manager from 2000 is one of the pows in the second ad.

I always thought the Democrats believed in freedom of speech. Guess I was wrong.

If they have a problem with this Kerry can do what Bush did and release his records. He can also sue these men if they really did lie, but it seems to me that Kerry had no problem defaming the men he served with years ago and so it should not surprise him if they return the favor.

Aug 23, 2004 - 4:46 pm 46. Fresh Air:

Don’t know if this could be considered OT, but…

Here is a thorough debunking of the Bronze Star “under enemy fire” claim, posted a military intelligence officer over at the Swift Boat Veterans’ site.

It is essential, as it definitively fingers Kerry as the author of the report.

Aug 23, 2004 - 5:23 pm 47. John Moore ( Useful Fools ):

RogerA,

What we are learning about Kerry’s character is IMHO more important than his “policies.” First of all, most policies can simply be predicted. He’s a Democrat, therefore…..

He’s a Democrat, so unless he surprises us, he’ll bring in a cabinet whose idea of waging war is scolding people.

I said this a lot in 1992, as did many conservatives: character counts, a lot. You are voting for a person, not a bundle of policies, which you know were created just in time by focus groups, people from the appropriate think tanks, and polling results. Clinton’s character came through – he was narcissistic as all get-out, a woman abuser, and when he lost his majority, a flexible compromiser (i.e. principles? don’t let them get in the way) which was not a bad deal for the country.

Everyone says they want to talk about policies. I don’t. I don’t think they mean squat in a presidential campaign except when they are significantly unusual, important and hard to get away from once the presidency is won.

It wasn’t George Bush’s pre-election policies that caused his reactions to 9-11 – it was his character and his cabinet, but mostly his character.

This is true of any president in a crisis, and let’s face it, it is during a crisis that the president is both most important and most powerful. You don’t have a long congressional debate when someone blows up something important.

Furthermore, why does Kerry’s campaign harp on Vietnam? The reason is character – to convince us his character is one of courage and valor. Otherwise, we wouldn’t have heard a thing.

Why do people care so much about the medals controversy? Same reason, If the guy faked a purple heart, he is a shirker. If he works the system to get a medal he isn’t entitled to, his valor seems false. In any case, there’s the question of how he can inspire loyalty when the only people who stick by him, out of his entire military unit, are enlisted men who were given transfers to safe assignments when Kerry went back to the world. In the Navy world, enlisted and officers might as well be different species. Officers are godlike creatures to enlisted men. So Kerry’s supports are very far from being his peers.

So once again, we just don’t need to know about policy. In Kerry’s case, he’s so dishonest that it matters not what he says – in power he’ll do whataever he wants.

In Bush’s case, we have four years of history to look at. We know how he operates, whether we like it or not. We know he would prefer to be doing “compassionate conservatism” (which drives small government conservatives nuts), but he has a war to fight, and we know he takes it damned seriously.

So it may be heretical, but under the circumstances, issues don’t count.

Aug 23, 2004 - 5:36 pm 48. ambisinistral:

Mark Steyn’s opinion piece on this is a hoot as usual.

“If Vietnam vets loathe him, World War Two vets seem to think he’s a buffoon. Short of reversing over the last 128-year-old Spanish-American War veteran in the retirement home parking lot, it’s hard to see how Kerry could more comprehensively diminish his military support.”

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/opinion/main.jhtml?xml=/opinion/2004/08/24/do2402.xml&sSheet=/portal/2004/08/24/ixportal.html

Aug 23, 2004 - 5:44 pm 49. John Lynch:

I just watched O’Reilly and Chris Wallace.

I got so worked up that I sent an email.

Your question or poll of the evening: “Are you tired of the Swift Boat Controversy?”

I am tired of the press and partisan denouement of the Swift Boat controversy. I have waited, and waited, . . . for some meaningful investigation of these issues. Your interview recapping Mike Wallace is the closest I have seen, but does not satisfy.

Did Kerry put in for the medals himself? Was it suggested he leave the theater because the other officers did not trust him? The Cambodia event “seared” into his memory was a seminal political event, is it dismissed as a tricky memory?

These questions go to character. This is one the most important issues about choosing a leader. He brought it up, he invited the look at his character. He used the war experiences as his example. Fellow veterans, from the period, from the theater, from the unit, and from the same events — have something to say.

They have the right to say these things, the public has a right to hear them, and the press has a duty to investigate to the same extent that Bush’s AWOL allegations were investigated.

You can call it character assassination of you wish. I believe, similar to libel, that the best defense is the truth, not the avoidance — or lack of coverage — of the truth. Are there unreleased records?

This has nothing to do with Bush, Bush’s campaign, Kerry’s campaign, or John McCain. This has to do with veterans who have contrary points of view, evidence — including first person testimony, and yes — an ax to grind.

My opinion: Kerry – if you can’t take the heat — don’t make enemies that we think well of (veterans,) and get out of the kitchen.

I am sure it wont’t do any good, but I feel better (momentarily.)

Aug 23, 2004 - 5:58 pm 50. Catherine:

****Some people, including a few commenters on here, have welcomed the Kerry/Swiftie controversy as an opportunity to finally exorcise the demon of Vietnam. Good luck to them – that’s not going to happen

I’d put money on it that 60% of the American people would agree with H.R. McMaster’s conclusions in Dereliction of Duty : Johnson, McNamara, the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and the Lies That Led to Vietnam by H. R. McMaster

Pace Rick Ballard, all you need for a ÔøΩconsensusÔøΩ is 50% of the public; you need 60% for an ÔøΩoverwhelming consensus.ÔøΩ

Given how violent the disagreements are on Vietnam, I’m guessing we need 60% of the American public to agree on Vietnam: ÔøΩagreeÔøΩ meaning hold the same shared narrative explaining what happened in Vietnam and why.

I think that’s all it would take.

Having read every word of McMaster’s book over my one-week vacation, I think all or most centrists would be convinced by his narrative, as would all or most of those on the center-left and all or most of those on the center right.

You would still have your ÔøΩfunky 13%,ÔøΩ the 13% of the American people who will believe anything, rejecting the book outright; in practice I imagine that would mean 13% on the far right and another 13% on the far left.

You would also have professional historians continuing to research, write, analyze and debate. McMaster’s thesis is radical for a historian, and probably not one that will prevail in its ÔøΩstrongÔøΩ form.

And that would be fine. With 60% of the American public sharing McMaster’s narrative you would have the kind of overwhelming consensus that finally lays an issue to rest, and you would have another 20% to 30% of Americans holding the different and differing points of view that keep the mind alive.

To give you an idea of why I believe McMaster’s book could provide the American consensus position on Vietnam, here is my own experience reading the book.

I am one of the baby boomers Markman would like to see dead (& as to that: Right back at you, friend). But I was in high school when all hell broke loose, and I never really understood what the whole thing was about.

So for a number of years now I’ve been having jonkendallÔøΩs experience:

but some of us are too young to remember or to have understood the gory details. and what we do know, is wholly negative. is it accurate? i’m beginning to think it isn’t. with the decidedly two-view of the Iraq war, i’m getting a different view of Vietnam, and i think the war has been unfairly cast.

Now that I’ve read McMasterÔøΩs book my mind is almost certainly made up, although I will continue to read other histories of Vietnam, and am now reading Peter Braestrup’s classic on press reporting of the Tet offensive, The Big Story. A terrific book; I recommend it.

Here is where I now stand on Vietnam, thanks to McMaster, a genuine war hero in the Gulf War who went on to earn a Ph.D. in history from UNC:

I am against the Vietnam War, retroactively. If all of America had to line up along two walls right this minute, Vietnam protesters on one side & Vietnam supporters on the other, I would be with the protesters.

OTOH, McMasterÔøΩs book did not cause me to reject either the Cold War policy of containing Communism, or Ronald Reagan’s policy of winning the Cold War. I am as strongly anti-Communist as I ever was.

Nor did the book make me reconsider my vote for George Bush, given that John Kerry is the candidate, although it did give me pause. Anthony Zinni says another Dereliction of Duty will one day be written about the Iraq War. I hope he’s wrong about that.

I also believe that the Vietnam War was winnable; provisionally I believe those who say that in fact we were winning when we gave up the war for lost. (McMaster does not address the latter proposition, and implies that the former is true).

I do not have an opinion as to whether the Vietnam War would have been worth fighting if we had had good political and military leadership. I don’t know, but more importantly I don’t feel I need to know to be ÔøΩsettled,ÔøΩ in my own mind, about what went wrong.

McMaster’s history works as a consensus narrative because it neither condemns nor endorses either party’s vision of Vietnam. You could believe every word of the book and come out voting for Bush, as I did, or you could believe every word of the book and come out voting for Kerry.

If I had my druthers the entire country would take a week off and read McMasterÔøΩs book, but since that won’t happen, IÔøΩll give a thumbnail of McMaster’s discoveries. (The book is a diplomatic history, and McMaster was able to use thousands of newly released archives in his research.)

What happened, McMaster found, was that our soldiers never had a chance. They were sent off by LBJ, Robert McNamara & the Joint Chiefs not to win, not to establish South Vietnam as a free and independent state, but to achieve “stalemate,” to ÔøΩ”communicate”ÔøΩ with the enemy, and to show the world that we could ÔøΩ”bleed.” LBJ & his civilian advisors believed American credibility would be strengthened if the world watched us fight a bloody war we could not win.

These were the stated goals of Lyndon Johnson and Robert McNamara, stated not to the military nor to the public, but to themselves alone. Stalemate, communication and blood. 58,000 Americans gave their lives so that we could communicate with the Communists.

I’m sure there are people who would argue that stalemate, communication, and blood are valid reasons to fight a war. There may even be people who could make that argument in a way that would make sense to me.

But I don’t see myself signing on for a bloody war of communication. As Jack Warner once said, ÔøΩ”If I want to send a message IÔøΩll use Western Union.”

I’d put money on it 60% of the American public sees things the same way.

For Eliot Cohen’s review of McMasterÔøΩs book in The National Interest, see http://www.findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m2751/is_n51/ai_20633208

Aug 23, 2004 - 6:09 pm 51. Terrye:

John:

I think it was very good and it does make a person feel better to respond. The press needs to hear this stuff.

One of the things that is really pissing me off is the desire to shut these men down. If Kerry does not like what they say then he can either respond or do what Bush usually does when someone attacks him and ignore it.

Aug 23, 2004 - 6:17 pm 52. Catherine:

Jamie Irons

I think we need to have this hopeless, unresolvable debate about “Vietnam,” and that Mr. Kerry has provoked it may be the best thing he has ever done.

Yes.

You compose your thoughtful, if somwhat long-winded and perhaps not overly brilliant remarks, and you find that in the interim you are no longer signed in!

Not only that, but after you are signed out & you sign back in, suddenly all your commas and quotation marks are heiroglyphics.

Aug 23, 2004 - 6:19 pm 53. John Lynch:

Catherine, Rick, Roger

I am 50 (ish) and was drawn number 9 in the year the draft was halted.

I guess that puts me in what some here are calling the ‘boomers.’

I’ve read McNamera, Moore (Harold,) and others on the war. I’ve friends who came home, and did not.

For me, the current debate is not about reliving the war.

For me the current debate is a question of character about one who would be our leader.

I am willing to use any reasonable means to judge that character. The means playing out in front of me is his suggestion that we use his war period, and a group of veterans who are willing to provide testimony about that period and about him.

Seems fair to me.

I do not need to replay my feelings about the war and the period following. I have come to my own peace with those experiences and those years.

I do however take them as a meaningful backdrop for the decisions on an individual’s charactor.

Aug 23, 2004 - 6:21 pm 54. Roger:

Sorry about the log in problems, but I have no control over them. They are TypeKey problems and I would appreciate people sending them email. They “say” they intend to correct them. Still, trolling is way down while the site visitor numbers are way up. I am grateful for that.

Aug 23, 2004 - 6:24 pm 55. Catherine:

Demosophist

Sorry but the anti-historical generational chauvinism of posters like themarkman, including the rather nihilistic ethics of wishing the whole group were dead as soon as possible, strikes me as far more immature and potentially divisive than anything going on in this rather tame P-campaign (by historical standards). It’s also completely illegitimate, because George W. Bush and nearly all of his cabinet are “boomers,” as is Roger L. Simon, Viktor Davis Hanson, Michael Ledeen, and Bill Kristol. Take a pill, guys.

Yeah, well, I was hoping someone would say that.

On a personal note, I learned last weekend that my high school sweetheart has died.

He was 52.

He left behind two children, ages 10 and 12, and a wife, and he was a good guy. The world is not a better place without him.

But today I log on to rogerlsimon to discover that his death is just another notch on the bedpost for Markman. Congrats.

I’m reading this thread tonight, and participating.

But in the future I won’t be involved in any threads in which commenters wish death on whole categories of human beings.

Aug 23, 2004 - 6:27 pm 56. jdwill:

IcePolit and Marek already linked this (The single best piece on the reason Kerry did it to himself)…

Let it Alone, by Adeimantus

But I had not seen this point brought out in any of the MSM pieces or other posts I have seen:

Yes, it’s true that under the strict terms of our long-standing domestic truce, John Kerry was not required to apologize for the things he said thirty years ago, even though he himself had more recently tested that truce with his attacks on George Bush’s National Guard service. But then in January of this year, to burnish his credentials as a war president, Kerry’s authorized biography reported a story implying that his Swift Boat comrades had fled the scene of an enemy attack while he alone returned to rescue the wounded. Honor being such an insignificant thing to John Kerry, he probably had no idea that–with his biography reviving war crimes accusations and, more specifically, implying cowardice on the part of his fellow swiftees–he had broken the domestic truce.

Aug 23, 2004 - 6:29 pm 57. Rick Ballard:

Roger,

Don’t worry, Typekey teaches patience, perserverance and caution. Not bad things at all. It also helps in the development of creative swearing. There is a bright side to everything, no?

I just wish that damn privew button would work correctly. It doesn’t seem to fix very many of my mistaeks.

Aug 23, 2004 - 6:34 pm 58. John Lynch:

I find it useful to write my post in Word, then sign in, then cut and paste into the post window, then change the quotes and double quotes into apostrophes and equivalent, then preview, then post.

Somewhat laborious, but spell checker is my friend, and I have the text in the case of a time-out.

Aug 23, 2004 - 6:40 pm 59. Clio:

The greatest achievements of the Boomer generation are but the reverse side of their besetting, unexpunged sins. On the plus side, individual liberation for those who had none or little before (gays, women, racial minorities, hedonists, addicts, what have you). On the minus, a pie-eyed, quasi-totalitarian insistence on utopian principles.

If you cannot have war without rape, war crimes, bloody mistakes, paranoia, crushed dreams and shattered lives, if your motives as a country or an administration are not utterly pure–then you have no business going to war. This appears to be what John Kerry came home “knowing.” It is what my generation (gen x–who are NOT the children of Boomers, by the way, just to clear up that one) were force-fed at school, college, grad school. In my case I only stopped regurgitating this pap on Sept. 12, 01.

That John Kerry has not renounced his role in undermining the military, the intelligence services, etc. through his post-war career–this tells me that he lies when he says (of all things!) he would have gone to war in Iraq. I say of all things because this statement has gotten him into serious trouble with the anti-war left. Why say it? To appeal to “Security moms”? We aren’t buying what he’s selling.

As a historian (though not predominantly of the military variety) I can offer just this small insight. What the US did in Vietnam appears not to have been any worse than what any other country has done throughout the modern era–it’s not even in the top ten for brutality. What made the difference? TV cameras. What makes the difference in Iraq? Arabs holding the tv cameras. All the rest is hot air. War is always ugly. I don’t trust that Kerry knows that. He honestly seems to believe that HIS war was worse than what came before. That’s why I can’t stand the guy (and, by the way, that’s why so many young people resent Boomers–not all the time, just when the “everything was so REAL then” lightshow begins).

Now that everyone has a camera and a laptop, everyone creates his/her own war. The audience gets to follow whatever camera it wants to, believes it is the only “reality” and goes from there. Think “Tampopo” without a director to choose which path we walk down. Is unity of purpose or mutual understanding possible in this brave new era?

Aug 23, 2004 - 6:52 pm 60. Catherine:

penwil

The fatal mistake Kerry made was not so much wrapping himself in the flag and his heroism today, as it was in forgetting about that little matter of his betrayal back in 1971.

Ditto.

Though I quibble with the perception that the Vietnam debate is “really” a debate about Iraq.

It certainly is a debate about Iraq, but it is also a debate about Vietnam, which, as various commenters have pointed out, affected the country in more ways than any of us even knows at this point.

Pat Curley

I’ve been thinking pretty much exactly what I believe you’re saying.

I think Kerry’s only hope of heading this off would have been to do what Bill Clinton did during his first campaign. Kerry needed to go on 60 Minutes (no–Diane Sawyer, I think) back when the Swifties held their press conference nobody covered and apologize to the nation for Winter Soldier and his subsequent statement to the Senate.

He should have said, “I was young, I was upset, the times were crazy, and I was wrong.”

I think he could have kept his anti-war base, because he could have said what McMaster said: We were sent to Vietnam to die, not to win. Then he could have finessed the Should-we-have-been-there-at-all issue: easy to do in the context of a Diane Sawyer interview. I think that would have flown, if only because the hard left thinks he’s a war criminal anyway. (Rick B–your thoughts?)

Even if it wouldn’t have flown with his anti-war base, I think he had to take the chance. He needed to head the Swifties off then, not now. This battle is getting bigger and bloodier by the day–now we’ve even got Bob Dole in play. Astounding.

Behind the scenes Kerry and his people needed to be doing daily outreach to all of the Swifties, the same way Rove did with McCain & his people. Kerry’s camp needed to be “picking off” every single Swiftie they could get with personal contact and lots and lots and lots of attention and TLC.

This would have been a radical approach–reacting to trouble before you’ve got it–but a smart political operative could have known that this is Vietnam we’re talking about, not an intern.

Vietnam has ripped this country apart for 40 years now; there was no way John Kerry was simply going to step over it while simultaneously running as a War Hero. You can’t be a War Hero and a War Anti-hero at the same time; it was never going to work.

I realize not many people saw what a huge issue this would be, and that as recently as two weeks ago many of the commenters here felt the Swift Boat story would never reach the MSM.

But we aren’t political operatives.

A person whose job is politics could have foreseen this. From the first moment I heard about the Swifties (actually from the first moment I read John Moore’s web site) I thought Kerry was going to get killed on this stuff–either killed, or suffer a near-death experience. And I’m not a politician.

I should probably add that I don’t have any special insight into the culture other people don’t have.

What I have is a zillion years of being almost bizarrely mainstream in my reactions and emotions. Whenever I have a strong reaction to something, five seconds later I find out that everyone else and his brother is having the same strong reaction. I could be a Focus Group unto myself.

So when I reacted the way I did to the vets on John Moore’s web site, I knew I wasn’t going to be alone.

Aug 23, 2004 - 6:52 pm 61. Ben:

What I most dislike about the Boomer generation is its self-obsession (this may simply be a function of its size). As a Gen-Xer, it drives me nuts to this day to hear aging Boomer hippies decry the “materialism and lack of idealism” of my generation. IMHO, people whose first concern is their own community accomplish a lot more good than the dreamy-eyed screwballs who want to “visualize world peace.” My suggestion to them is that they stop visualizing world peace and volunteer some time at the local food bank.

The Vietnam war protests were driven primarily by the draft: when the draft ended, so did the protests, for the most part. So much for idealism – fear would be a much better motive. Boomers voices are amplified by their numbers, but I still think of this as a confused generation. Some of the wackiest ideas I have heard come out of the Boomer generation (although the point about Affleck and Geraffalo (sp? I don’t want to waste time looking up thread again) is well-taken).

I like plenty of Boomers (including GWB), but I wish the ones suffering permanent angst would inflict their opinions on their own kind instead of on me. In keeping with my prior statement, perhaps the Boomers could visit a nursing home and spend their time talking to the patients. Some of the patients would have no idea what is being said to them and the rest would be glad for the company. That way, Boomers with Angst can get it off their chests, the lonely old people will have someone to talk to, AND I’LL HAVE SOME PEACE AND QUIET!

Aug 23, 2004 - 6:53 pm 62. Syl:

John Moore

“The war is microscopic compared to Vietnam, as are the casualty figures.”

That’s a mere ‘fact’ which doesn’t phase the anti-war types. Besides to them, the issue is whether we’re in a war at all. If one doesn’t believe we’re in a war, then Iraq is meaningless and a travesty, large or small.

Where Vietnam and Iraq compare is that both wars were/are winding down through Vietnamization/Iraqification. Kerry and the Protesters were instrumental to our Cut-and-Run before the Vietnamese could fully handle it themselves. And from which the deaths of hundreds of thousands ensued. Kerry says he’ll bring our troops home from Iraq in six months whether ‘allies’ come through or not. Will the Iraqi’s be able to handle it themselves after only another six months?

That parallel is truly frightening.

Back in 1971 in the debate on the Dick Cavett show, O’Neill suggested if we cut-and-run now there was a danger of genocide. Kerry scoffed at that and said there would be no genocide.

Kerry was wrong then. Is there any reason Kerry has given us to believe he is right now?

Aug 23, 2004 - 7:02 pm 63. Catherine:

Ben & everyone

perhaps the Boomers could visit a nursing home and spend their time talking to the patients. Some of the patients would have no idea what is being said to them and the rest would be glad for the company. That way, Boomers with Angst can get it off their chests, the lonely old people will have someone to talk to, AND I’LL HAVE SOME PEACE AND QUIET!

These “old folks” you mention are our parents.

I’m out of here. Enjoy your peace and quiet.

Aug 23, 2004 - 7:07 pm 64. ambisinistral:

Geez Gen-Xers, can you ever stop whinning?

Us Boomers were driven crazy by stories about the Great Depression and how little character we had because we missed it. Apparently we are driving you crazy with the 60’s and how little character you have because you missed them. Be patient, you too someday will be able to drive a generation crazy with your life experiences and how little character they have because they missed whatever.

Aug 23, 2004 - 7:11 pm 65. richard mcenroe:

Simple Fact: The Vietnam war will never be out of our psyche. The Weekly Standard a while back had a feature about people protesting the construction of a statue of Lincoln in Richmand… 140 years after the end of the war.

Aug 23, 2004 - 7:16 pm 66. Rick Ballard:

Catherine,

If you’re asking whether I believe that Kerry can pull off a Flowers/Bubba/Bubbetta skit on 60 Minutes, the answer is no. Bubba was the most skilled liar of his generation (vide Bob Kerrey for confirmation). The ability to fake sincerity in a manner skillful enough to convince a “consensus” among viewers as to the underlying “truth” of his words is not in Kerry’s skill set. People with a deep belief in their own superiority don’t do humble very well. And then again, do you think Teresa would allow him to try?

I don’t think Kerry is a good politician in any respect. He hasn’t done the logrolling base work necessary for legislative achievement. He hasn’t done the necessary fund raising and personal appearances on behalf of other party pols to incur meaningful debts with them. Hell, he hasn’t even shown up for the minimum number of “sit there and look important” appearances on important committees. His attendance at intelligence committee meetings is pathetic – and the Bush campaign is going to hit that one like a jackhammer. He’s been a decent waterboy for Teddy Kennedy for twenty years and Teddy has rewarded him with the use of the Kennedy machine in MA.

That is the sum total of John Kerry.

Aug 23, 2004 - 7:18 pm 67. John Lynch:

Ben, Clio

I believe you are conflating generational issues with left/right issues.

I do not believe the ‘boomers’ are any more left or right than later generations.

I see as many young clueless about the issues of economy and security, transfer programs, multi-nationalism, and world government as those of older generations.

I see the decrying of materialism from the young and those older.

I believe certain audiences have some higher concentrations of these well-meaning but clueless people. Academics, Journalists, and trial lawyers come to my mind when thinking about gross categorization. I do not usually think of youth verses boomers as delineation on this type of thinking.

I am sure that some amount of this crap came from the 60s, but I see the take-up rate of the ideas just as great today as it was then. Therefore, it is the ideas, not the generation that are wrong.

Aug 23, 2004 - 7:22 pm 68. themarkman:

Tom Holsinger,

If you notice, I make no distinction of political party. I don’t care what party anyone was in the ’60’s. What I don’t care for with the boomer generation as a whole is the victim mentality that they have been forcing upon us, along with all of this PC bullshit. It is almost time for this generation to retire, and cracks in their facade are beginning to appear. Look at the rise in conservatism discourse over the last decade, and see the panic set in among the established boomers in America. The State Department could sure use a lot less of the generational groupthink. Same with the academy, and the media.

Catherine, sorry for your loss, but you are wrong, and I resent it. I am referring to their impending retirement, and loss of power, not their deaths. I married an older woman (50) who is a boomer. I have nothing against the individual, but the damages wrought during the Sixties will take us two-three generations to fix.

Aug 23, 2004 - 7:24 pm 69. Roberts:

Notice above that Hollywood gives us the Bush/Rove Conspiracy Swift Boats theory without a shred of evidence. Ah, I love the smell of hypocrisy … it tastes like victory.

Aug 23, 2004 - 7:25 pm 70. Terrye:

Catherine:

There is a difference in how I feel about the war in Viet Nam and how I feel about how we left Viet Nam. We should not have done that. The impact on the lives of millions of innocent people was disastrous.

As for the war people can argue after the fact that we were meant to bleed not win, but one would think that Korea proved American could bleed. It could also be argued that had we told the French to bugger off in 1945 and tried to use more diplomatic means dealing with the Viet Namese early on the war could have been avoided. We somple can not know that now. I do think the press played a part then, just as they do now. The litany of horror wears people down. It leaves them feeling hopeless.

So in reptrospect I don’t support abandoning the people of south east Asia, but neither do I support fighting that war the way it was fought.

As for Zinni and all the other after the fact arm chair and real generals out there if many of them had been half as wise and insightful and intuitive when they were in active service as they are after they retire and write books for a living maybe Saddam would never have become the menace he became and we would not be where we are today.

Sorry, but all day everyday it is a nonstop parade of experts saying do this do that do this do that….

Aug 23, 2004 - 7:26 pm 71. themarkman:

Having re-read all the comments, I see many instances where people are assuming I want the Boomers dead. I make no such claim. I want them out of power, that’s all, and I apologize to any who felt I meant otherwise.

Aug 23, 2004 - 7:30 pm 72. Rick Ballard:

Catherine & Richard,

I like to think about the tax hikes the whiners are going to pay while I’m cashing my social security checks. It’ll only last ’til they’re 65 but that’s long enough for me.

“We must think of the children. The ungrateful bastards.”

I’m going to send each of my grandkids a one pound bag of M&M’s with a note that they can only eat them on Sunday morning.

Aug 23, 2004 - 7:31 pm 73. Syl:

I do know the difference between ‘phase’ and ‘faze’. Sigh.

re Generations. I think this discussion is stupid. It’s not an entire generation, it’s half a generation that has also sucked in half the succeeding generation and half the generation after that.

It’s an outlook, not an age, thing.

Aug 23, 2004 - 7:55 pm 74. Ben:

Catherine -

Sorry if I offended – I was attempting (perhaps improvidently) introduce some levity into the conversation while making a serious point (that people who are really concerned about doing “good” for the underprivileged will accomplish more by taking concrete steps to help an individual than by protesting).

Aug 23, 2004 - 8:04 pm 75. MeTooThen:

All,

Me too, then.

Wow.

Really.

Perhaps everyone could just for a moment, consider the marvel, the absolute miracle that is the Internet and the democratization of information and how completely amazing it is for us to be communicating in this way.

I learn so much from reading your posts.

Gratitude.

…

OK, back on-topic.

I am on the cusp of the Boomers and Gen-X, my older siblings had plenty of friends who got shot up in Vietnam, some died, others crippled, others didn’t fight but got hooked on drugs, or found other in-vogue ways to ruin their lives following the “Summer of Love”.

The intergenerational tension has heretofore for me, not been witnessed or appreciated.

I believe that John Forbes Kerry is a dreadful choice for President (as I have written here and elsewhere often).

But for me, neither his unapologetic lying when it came to his service in Vietnam, his repudiation of his fellow servicemen, or the cynical use of those lies for power, are what I find the most repellent about him.

Rather, it is that he will, like Clinton, evade, obstruct, distort, destroy, anyone and anything that stands in his way of his own ascendency, even if he himself is the one at fault or guilty, and in doing so he puts the American people in peril.

We can argue the merits or failings of the US policy in SEA forever, but I cannot abide John Forbes Kerry as Commander in Chief at a time when radical Islam has openly declared its intention to maim, murder, and annihilate all of us.

Ultimately, I find myself in both camps of this debate. The prolonged adolescent rebelion and angst that was the 60’s, must end. But sadly, it is being replaced by the narcissistic rage of the X’ers.

Aug 23, 2004 - 8:11 pm 76. lindenen:

“It is what my generation (gen x–who are NOT the children of Boomers, by the way, just to clear up that one) were force-fed at school, college, grad school.”

Clio, if Gen X is not the children of Boomers, then who are our parents? Honestly, I’m confused. I’m also on the borderline between Gen X and Y.

Aug 23, 2004 - 8:14 pm 77. Rick Ballard:

Ben,

There are plenty of boomers that are currently paying at least a portion of their folks assisted living costs (if they are not taking care of them at home) while still funding their n’erdowell Xer’s latest error filled foray into reality. If you’re carrying your own weight, more power to you – just give a thought about all those in your age bracket who aren’t. I would note that stereotypes work until they don’t.

Aug 23, 2004 - 8:22 pm 78. The Fop:

It was obvious to me that after 9/11 the biggest concern of liberals was that the terrorist attacks would lead to a wave of old fashioned WWII style patriotism that would undermine all the pacifistic, anti-military, anti-flag waving sentiment that had been spoon fed to the American people for the past 30 years by Hollywood, the media, rock stars and academia.

I remember when we were massing troops in preparation for the invasion of Afghanistan, the anti-war protests were starting and there was this attitude amongst all the lefties of “hey, we gotta bring back the spirit of the Vietnam era”. So to have all these Vietnam vets emerging from the smoke 30 years later to denounce Kerry and inspire people to re-examine the grandaddy of all anti-war movements would seem like the last thing that the Democrats should want to see happen.

No doubt that those of us who support the War On Terror who are under the age of 65 have already gone through the process of re-examining the Vietnam era over the past 3 years and have come to some pretty definite conclusions. Having Kerry as a presidential nominee, with all the emphasis he’s put on his time in Vietnam coupled with the Swift Boat Vets, will force everyone to decide how they now feel about the whole “Vietnam thing”.

This is not what the Dems want people to be thinking about in a post 9/11 world. And they’ve got nobody to blame but the idiots who voted in the primaries who picked this guy.

Aug 23, 2004 - 8:29 pm 79. Terrye:

Rick:

I will say one thing for my g..g…g…generation.

We left home. We could not get out soon enough.

First place I lived in had no heat, the bathroom was dangerous as was the kitchen and I would swear it was haunted but my mother was not there and it was mine and that was all I cared about.

Now I know ‘mature’ women who cut the grass while some big lug of a son lays on the couch and watches cable.

My folks would have kicked them out. I mean that literally, kicked as in foot to ass.

Aug 23, 2004 - 8:32 pm 80. Terrye:

The Fop:

If nothing else they can remember the boat people and what happened when we cut and run.

Aug 23, 2004 - 8:36 pm 81. John Moore ( Useful Fools ):

I have not read the book. What is the evidence that we were meant to bleed, not win? Winning would have been cheaper and produced the appropriate result.

Although I think Johnson and MacNamara were very, very wrong, I’m surprised at that assertion.

Aug 23, 2004 - 8:38 pm 82. David C:

“Clio, if Gen X is not the children of Boomers, then who are our parents? Honestly, I’m confused. I’m also on the borderline between Gen X and Y.”

Strauss and Howe’s definitions of the generations:

http://www.lifecourse.com/generations.html

The G.I. Generation (Hero, born 1901-24)

The Silent Generation (Artist, born 1925-42)

The Boom Generation (Prophet, born 1943-60)

“Generation X” (Nomad, born 1961-81)

The Millennial Generation (Hero?, born 1982-___)

So quite a few members of Generation X are indeed children of Boomers, but not all (I’m a child of “Silent Generation” parents, for instance.)

Fascinating stuff there, by the way. I’ve read a couple of their books, and they make a strong case for certain recurring generational trends.

Aug 23, 2004 - 8:39 pm 83. Charlie (Colorado):

McNamara was initially targeted because JFK was not to be touched.

Um, sorry, you’ve got your chronology a little confused. Kennedy died about Thanksgiving 1963; the long drawn-out escalation was McNamara and Johnson, not McNamara and Kennedy.

Aug 23, 2004 - 9:40 pm 84. Charlie (Colorado):

Stalemate, communication and blood. 58,000 Americans gave their lives so that we could communicate with the Communists.

Catherine, the thing that galls me about this is that a fifteen year old ROTC student with a thing for military history (and a military family, so I had lots of sources) could figure that out in 1968. That’s what got Richard Nixon elected: “peace with honor” and “a secret plan to end the Viet Nam war”.

Aug 23, 2004 - 9:53 pm 85. Charlie (Colorado):

What is the evidence that we were meant to bleed, not win? Winning would have been cheaper and produced the appropriate result.

John, I haven’t read the book either (just ordered it, though) but, as I said, it seemed pretty obvious to me even then. Consider:

- we never took the steps needed to establish dominant force on the ground

- we never really acted against the VC/NVA logistics in an effective way (although mining Haiphong and bombing Hanoi were at least a little bit of an attempt, as late as it was)

- we set up an army with the lowest fighters to support staff ratio ever (up to that time, the Germans and Belgians have us beat now)

- we never attempted to strike against the enemy’s C3I until Nixon, nor did we attempt to make geographical progress against the enemy into their own territory

All in all, it was a “containment” war, not a “win it” war. Whether it was consciously “proving that we were willing to shed our blood”, the effect was certainly to make it clear we were willing — for a long long time — to absorb endless casualties without acting to win and end the war.

I mean, hell, can you explain it any other way?

Aug 23, 2004 - 10:10 pm 86. blogaddict:

I’m wading in here where I should probably fear to tread. Although I’m one of those awful boomers, I can’t claim any expertise on the way the Vietnam war was waged. By I’m intrigued by Catherine’s description of the book which says the policy was to show Americans can bleed.

Is this book (whether its main thesis is correct or incorrect) describing the LBJ policy only? Didn’t Nixon change the policy to increase “Vietnamization?” Of course, there’s the usual tremendous amount of disagreement on whether the Vietnamization policy was working or could have worked before Congress pulled the plug by cutting off its funding, and I really have no way of knowing which side is correct about that. But I’m just curious whether this book you describe ventures an opinion on the Nixon policy in the war, and how it differed from the Johnson policy, and whether it could have been successful if the tide of public opinion had not already turned irrevocably against the war by that time.

Aug 24, 2004 - 12:55 am 87. M. Simon:

Did any of you mopes consider that your host here is a boomer?

–==–

What is the War Hero Afraid of?

Form 180. Release ALL the records.

Video link

Aug 24, 2004 - 1:45 am 88. M. Simon:

Charlie,

It was a containment policy. Openly acknowledged at the time. No one wanted a Russian nuke going off in the back yard. That was the fear.

This is not news.

–==–

What is the War Hero Afraid of?

Form 180. Release ALL the records.

Video link

Aug 24, 2004 - 1:56 am 89. M. Simon:

MeeTooThen,

I don’t know how kids are doing today but we had a hell of a lot of fun. A hell of a lot.

And we learned a few things. Like authority (tthen it was only government authorities) needs to be fact check.

We brought you the internet – and if I can be like Kerry and toot my own horn – I have a small piece in a museum in Boston (horrors) with my name on it that is a part of the worlds first BBS.

I saw then (after Randy and Ward wized me) that getting people communicating with computers was a very good idea. I had no idea it would get this big.

Well any way us boomers have given you a tool to set it all right.

Quit yer bitchin.

–==–

What is the War Hero Afraid of?

Form 180. Release ALL the records.

Video link

Aug 24, 2004 - 2:10 am 90. M. Simon:

BTW the Powell doctrine “fight to win” was a result of Vietnam.

Why this all sounds so strange is that in Korea the policy was effective. So why not try for half a loaf in Vietnam too? Made sense. Not only that – historically it has been a very good policy for America and South Korea.

We have different policies now.

If Iran gets nukes it is back to containment. I’d rather not see that happen.

Containment was based on the relative strength of the competing powers.

–==–

What is the War Hero Afraid of?

Form 180. Release ALL the records.

Video link

Aug 24, 2004 - 2:20 am 91. M. Simon:

What ever the boomers screwed up they gave us the tools to fix.

Quit yer bitchin and get to work.

And be thankful that unlike the anti-communists of 1918 you will not have to wait 70+ years for the mass production of personal computers and fax machines.

Believe it or not with all of America talking it will take less than 30 years to straighten things out. The change is already well underway. Thanks to the boomers who built this new America and some of us (our kind host) who changed our mind about politics (not sex, drug, and rock ‘n roll) since the 60s.

The transfer of intergenerational wisdom is astounding. In all directions.

=================

BTW the Powell doctrine “fight to win” was a result of Vietnam.

Why this all sounds so strange is that in Korea the policy was effective. So why not try for half a loaf in Vietnam too? Made sense. Not only that – historically it has been a very good policy for America and South Korea.

We have different policies now.

If Iran gets nukes it is back to containment. I’d rather not see that happen.

Containment was based on the relative strength of the competing powers.

–==–

What is the War Hero Afraid of?

Form 180. Release ALL the records.

Video link

Aug 24, 2004 - 2:40 am 92. D Anghelone:

Charlie (Colorado): Um, sorry, you’ve got your chronology a little confused.

Possibly, but I don’t think so. I believe they’d zeroed in on the “technocrat” when Camelot was in full ball gown.

Aug 24, 2004 - 4:28 am 93. hollywood:

“Notice above that Hollywood gives us the Bush/Rove Conspiracy Swift Boats theory without a shred of evidence. Ah, I love the smell of hypocrisy … it tastes like victory.”

Let’s see: Bush the Elder–Willie Horton.

Bush the Younger–McCain slam ad.

Hmmm. If it looks like a duck, walks like a duck, quacks like a duck, it’s a duck!

Aug 24, 2004 - 7:03 am 94. Charlie (Colorado):

Charlie,

It was a containment policy. Openly acknowledged at the time. No one wanted a Russian nuke going off in the back yard. That was the fear.

This is not news.

Sure. Now ask the next question: what’s a containment policy? What does it mean to, as a matter of policy, be willing to escalate to show national determination, but not be willing to estabish logistical or geographical dominance?

Aug 24, 2004 - 7:04 am 95. Clio:

Lindenen and David C (and everyone),

David posts a source that lists the Boom generation starting (somewhat bizarrely) a full two years before the end of WWII, to say nothing of the delays in demobilization of large numbers of GIs which should, to my mind, date the start of the “Boomers” at 1946 at the earliest (hey, nine-month gestation and all).

Most Gen Xers (though by no means all) are thus either children of people born just before or during the war (both my grandfathers were given deferments for professional or family reasons). Boomer parents of Xers were married with kids at or before the beginning of the real cultural revolution in the late 60s–these Boomers tended to be culturally indistingishable from the previous generation and look with shock and some horror at the antics of younger siblings more in line with the 60s stereotypes.

And in passing, while I hate to suggest that Boomers are living in the past (moi?) might I remind Rick and Catherine and everyone else who falls in that category that Xers are no longer in their 20s and very few of us live with our mommies and daddies. Those would be the 20-something Gen Y kids (and I’m not knocking them–you can save a lot of dough living in M and D’s basement while you build an internet startup co.) whose parents are (ahem) BOOMERS.

This raises interesting questions about the child-rearing philosophies and educational practices of Boomer parents, don’t you think? Well, maybe we don’t want to go there…

Aug 24, 2004 - 7:06 am 96. Charlie (Colorado):

Charlie (Colorado): Um, sorry, you’ve got your chronology a little confused.

DA: Possibly, but I don’t think so. I believe they’d zeroed in on the “technocrat” when Camelot was in full ball gown.

No, Kennedy was long dead already by the time the Viet Nam was was anything but a little low-level conflict. Remember the Gulf of Tonkin resolution was 7 AUG 1964 — ten months after Kennedy was assassinated.

Aug 24, 2004 - 7:29 am 97. Roberts:

Wow, now Hollywood is an expert in waterfowl.

Aug 24, 2004 - 8:34 am 98. hollywood:

“Wow, now Hollywood is an expert in waterfowl.”

Yeah, Roberts, your goose (Bush boy) is just about cooked.

Aug 24, 2004 - 9:05 am 99. D Anghelone:

No, Kennedy was long dead already by the time the Viet Nam was was anything but a little low-level conflict. Remember the Gulf of Tonkin resolution was 7 AUG 1964 — ten months after Kennedy was assassinated.

And you please remember that all was not Vietnam. There was the Bay of Pigs. There was the Cuban Missile Crisis – far more ominous than Vietnam. There was the Berlin Crisis – 148,000 Guardsman and Reservists called up – the wives of some pushing baby carriages in front of the White House.

Aug 24, 2004 - 10:25 am 100. Roberts:

That was pretty pathetic too, Hollywood. Its John Kerry who is feeling the lies he has built up over decades falling apart around him.

Aug 24, 2004 - 1:38 pm 101. MeTooThen:

M.Simon,

“Quit yer bitchin.

Um, OK.

About what though, I am not sure.

Maybe you could clarify it for me?

Aug 24, 2004 - 1:55 pm 102. hollywood:

Roberts,

Yet another shred:

It was further disclosed late Tuesday that the Bush campaign’s chief outside counsel, Ben Ginsberg, has also been giving legal advice to the Swift Boat group.

Aug 25, 2004 - 8:41 am 103. Mark Poling:

Hollywood

Perhaps you could explain what “outside counsel” means to the class. You being a lawyer and all.

From the NYTimes story:

The campaign of Senator John Kerry shares a lawyer, Robert Bauer, with America Coming Together, a liberal group that is organizing a huge multimillion-dollar get-out-the-vote drive that is far more ambitious than the Swift boat group’s activities. Mr. Ginsberg said his role was no different from Mr. Bauer’s….

Pot, meet kettle.

Aug 25, 2004 - 10:11 am 104. Charlie (Colorado):

Yeha, Mark, and the DNC’s lawyer also lawyers for Move On.

Look, the point here is that you’ve got to pick one: either the minimal contact between the Bush campaign (a lawyer in common and an unpaid volunteer) really does constitute “collaboration”, in which case most of the movers and shakers in the Democratic Party are going to jail under McCain-Feingold, or the massive connections (shared campaign managers, announcements of “partnerships”, regular public meetings, and so on) between the Democratic party and the Kerry campaign aren’t actionable, in which case the minor contacts between the Swifties 527 and the Bush campaign are trivial and even less actionable in comparison.

Aug 25, 2004 - 11:50 am 105. Roberts:

It sure is funny that every attempt Hollywood makes at establishing coordination between the Bush campaign and the Swift Boats Vets is literally dwarfed by more extensive parallel contacts between Kerry’s campaign and the Democrat 527’s.

Most intelligent folk would see the pattern by now.

Aug 25, 2004 - 12:02 pm 106. hollywood:

Roberts & Charlie,

Another contact between Bush and the Swiftees is Chris LaCivita of DCI Group who advises the Boatheads and whose firm has worked with Bush in the past. Charlie, you apparently missed my prior recitation (in response to Roberts’ search for shreds)of other common contacts.

Mark,

I suspect you know what outside counsel is. If not, it’s the opposite of in-house counsel (Mr. Gonzales, IIRC). It’s an independent contractor as opposed to a direct employee.

Aug 25, 2004 - 2:23 pm 107. Charlie (Colorado):

Oh, Hollywood, come on. You don’t want to push this. Ben Ginsberg was lawyering for the RNC and SwiftVets. Neill Reiff is deputy general counsel for the DNC and lawyering for MoveOn.org. Robert bauer works for the Kerry campaign and America Coming Together. Joe Sandler works for the DNC and MoveOn.org, and said there wasn’t anything wrong with doing so.

Some Texas Republican (eeek!) contributed $200,000 to SBVFT; George Soros, a Democrat contributor, contributed tens of millions to MoveOn.org.

The DNC brags that:

The Democratic Party is partnering with MoveOn.org, People for the American Way, Campaign for America’s Future, and dozens of other groups ….

Then there’s:

Media Fund (expenditures-$27,208,905):

Harold Ickes, president and founder (deputy White House chief of staff under President Clinton)

America coming Together (expenditures-$24,196,532):

Minyon Moore (former Chief of Operations, Democratic National Committee)

MoveOn.org (expenditures-$17,435,782):

Zach Exley, director of special projects (former Dean campaign aide, soon-to-be [now, I think] Kerry director of online communications and organization)

New Democrat Network (expenditures-$6,970,070):

Simon Rosenberg, president and founder (former Clinton campaign aide)

America Votes (expenditures-$1,176,590):

Cecile Richards, president (former aide to Rep. Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., and daughter of former Texas Democratic Gov. Ann Richards)

Grassroots Democrats (expenditures-$1,137,544):

Joe Carmichael, co-chairman (former vice-chair, Democratic National Committee)

(stolen from here.)

Aug 27, 2004 - 3:58 am 108. Charlie (Colorado):

Sorry, should have caught this:

I suspect you know what outside counsel is. If not, it’s the opposite of in-house counsel (Mr. Gonzales, IIRC). It’s an independent contractor as opposed to a direct employee.

Right. Ben Ginsberg is outside counsel — he a partner in a DC firm.

Aug 27, 2004 - 4:07 am

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