Gavin in Va Beach Posted August 26, 2004 Posted August 26, 2004 By Craige McMillan, a commentator for WorldNetDaily. Lately I've been wondering how stories we read in "Big Media" would be different if 90-plus percent of reporters and editors were Republicans – not Democrats. Here's how I think the swiftboat-vets story might read. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- A "band of brothers" nearly 300 strong asserted today in a new TV advertisement that John Kerry lied about his service in Vietnam, then "shot his fellow sailors in the back" following his 4-month "service," when he assumed leadership of the Vietnam Vets Against the War and offered false testimony before Congress about nonexistent atrocities committed by American servicemen. Swiftboat Veterans for Truth, a nonpartisan group formed under last year's campaign finance reforms allowing independent groups to comment on presidential elections, launched the advertisement with less than half-a-million dollars in the bank. Contrast that with the $100-plus million already spent by MoveOn.org and America Coming Together, groups attacking President Bush and funded by big-bucks liberal contributors with billions in the bank. The Kerry camp immediately fired back at the veterans, stressing that none of them had actually served under John Kerry's command or on his boat. But further investigation by this newspaper has revealed that swiftboats frequently traveled in groups, and other sailors on other boats often had a better view of the action and clearer grasp of what was happening than the boat "in the thick of it." "Unfit for Command," a new book still backordered at the nation's bookstores, elaborates on what these vets point out are Mr. Kerry's lies and distortions about his "service" in Vietnam. Only about a dozen swiftboat veterans support John Kerry's recollection of events in Vietnam, while hundreds say he's lying. As readers are no doubt aware, the controversy began when Mr. Kerry used a 1969 photo of himself and fellow swiftboat commanders published in Newsweek Magazine on March 8 of this year, to promote his campaign for the presidency. These vets tried to avoid a public conflict and requested the Kerry campaign stop using the photo and implying they supported him for president. Here is an excerpt from their June 1, 2004 letter, signed by their attorney Alvin A. Horne: Below are listed the names of eleven swiftboat officers of a total of 20 depicted in the referenced photograph with your client, Sen. John Kerry. They are: George Bates, Thomas Heritage, Terrance Costello, Robert "Rocky" Hildreath, Robert Elder, William Houle, George Elliott, William Schumadine, Al French, Larry Thurlow, Jim Galvin. These officers demand that Sen. Kerry's campaign cease and desist from all uses of that photograph, taken on Jan. 22, 1969. To my knowledge, of the remaining eight individuals, Mr. Gilbert and Mr. Crosby are deceased and Messrs. Baker, Bernique, Imbrie and MaCann have not indicated a willingness to presently take any position regarding Mr. Kerry. Only when this letter failed did the vets go public in an effort to save the nation from what they had experienced firsthand. Mr. Kerry has made his medals and Vietnam service the centerpiece of his campaign, but its interesting that even his own diary calls into question whether his first Purple Heart was earned – or the result of fabrications ("Diary refutes Kerry claim," Washington Times, Aug. 25, 2004). Mr. Kerry has repeatedly refused to release his diary, his complete service record, or to authorize the reprinting of his 1971 book, titled "The New Soldier," in which he "details" atrocities by American soldiers in Vietnam that most veterans say never happened. Many Vietnam veterans say the lies Mr. Kerry propagated upon his return hurt them even worse than their battle wounds. Former POW Paul Gallanti is one of them. He says in a new Swiftvets.com advertisement that, "John Kerry gave the enemy for free what I and many of my comrades in North Vietnam, in the prison camps, took torture to avoid saying. It demoralized us." The question of Mr. Kerry's medals and service could be easily settled, but the candidate has been less than forthcoming by releasing only selective portions of his military records. Instead, Mr. Kerry's campaign manager directed attorneys to threaten TV station managers with a lawsuit should they run the Swiftvets.com advertisements. This attitude concerns many First Amendment experts, who worry what a Kerry presidency might mean for the freedom of the press. Meanwhile, MoveOn.org launched a series of personal attack ads against the veterans who have challenged Mr. Kerry's Vietnam "service." MoveOn.org is financed and run by numerous Clinton-era Democratic donors, and staffers and election watchers are worried the group may be violating campaign finance law by illegally coordinating their actions with the Kerry campaign. MoveOn.org did not immediately return calls for comment. Republicans in a parallel universe
BRH Posted August 26, 2004 Posted August 26, 2004 I think this guy ripped that story right off of Fox News.
Gavin in Va Beach Posted August 26, 2004 Author Posted August 26, 2004 I think this guy ripped that story right off of Fox News. 7959[/snapback] It sure as fark wasn't The New York Times or The Washington Post...
ExiledInIllinois Posted August 26, 2004 Posted August 26, 2004 Want a little chesse to go with this whine? You'd probably dig the "Fromunda"? Bahwahaaa...
Alaska Darin Posted August 26, 2004 Posted August 26, 2004 I think this guy ripped that story right off of Fox News. 7959[/snapback] Have you ever had an original thought? FoxNews has 2% of the entire news audience in the country, yet ye libertards continue to rail against it as if it were leading to Armageddon. Like there aren't enough crappy liberal sources of bull stevestojan out there?
Gavin in Va Beach Posted August 26, 2004 Author Posted August 26, 2004 Want a little chesse to go with this whine? You'd probably dig the "Fromunda"? Bahwahaaa... 7963[/snapback] Damn, when I clicked on the thread to see who replied I thought it might be someone intelligent...
KRC Posted August 26, 2004 Posted August 26, 2004 Have you ever had an original thought? FoxNews has 2% of the entire news audience in the country, yet ye libertards continue to rail against it as if it were leading to Armageddon. Like there aren't enough crappy liberal sources of bull stevestojan out there? 7969[/snapback] They seem to have a little trouble with opposing viewpoints being presented to the public. All the Foxnews/Rush/Hannity stuff is just their way to try to prevent the public from hearing the other side of the coin. Sad, really.
DC Tom Posted August 26, 2004 Posted August 26, 2004 They seem to have a little trouble with opposing viewpoints being presented to the public. All the Foxnews/Rush/Hannity stuff is just their way to try to prevent the public from hearing the other side of the coin. Sad, really. 7976[/snapback] Of course, if the coin is worthless to begin with, neither side matters much...
Gavin in Va Beach Posted August 26, 2004 Author Posted August 26, 2004 They seem to have a little trouble with opposing viewpoints being presented to the public. All the Foxnews/Rush/Hannity stuff is just their way to try to prevent the public from hearing the other side of the coin. Sad, really. 7976[/snapback] But...but...liberals love to say how open-minded they are...
Alaska Darin Posted August 26, 2004 Posted August 26, 2004 Of course, if the coin is worthless to begin with, neither side matters much... 7983[/snapback] There is that.
ExiledInIllinois Posted August 26, 2004 Posted August 26, 2004 Damn, when I clicked on the thread to see who replied I thought it might be someone intelligent... 7971[/snapback] That's all you got? Hay garbage in is garbage out. How's the scraping going?
KD in CA Posted August 26, 2004 Posted August 26, 2004 By Craige McMillan, a commentator for WorldNetDaily. Lately I've been wondering how stories we read in "Big Media" would be different if 90-plus percent of reporters and editors were Republicans – not Democrats. Here's how I think the swiftboat-vets story might read. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- If that were the case, maybe we'd be focusing in on other stories entirely, like how we were sold out by our allies in the UN Oil for Food scandal that has been all but ignored and why the former national security advisor stole documents from the National Archieves. (Can you even begin to imagine the level of coverage in the NY Times had Brent Scowcroft been the one stealing docs? They would have needed an extra section of the paper! It would have been kinda like the Global Crossing/Enron comparisson)
Mickey Posted August 26, 2004 Posted August 26, 2004 Of course, if the coin is worthless to begin with, neither side matters much... 7983[/snapback] Dude, lighten up. Your nihilism is really bumming me out man. Take my advice and watch some women's beach volleyball for awhile. It'll improve your world view I promise.
DC Tom Posted August 26, 2004 Posted August 26, 2004 Dude, lighten up. Your nihilism is really bumming me out man. Take my advice and watch some women's beach volleyball for awhile. It'll improve your world view I promise. 8140[/snapback] Friggin' beach volleyball. As much an Olymipc sport as is reading a Playboy. And honestly...how can one not be nihilistic about this election. Look at the clowns the parties foist on us as "leadership". May as well cast our votes for a jar of peanut butter for all the good either of these two cretins will do...
Guest RabidBillsFanVT Posted August 27, 2004 Posted August 27, 2004 It already IS biased... Fox News, Boston Herald, Washington Times, Weekly Standard, etc... You watch your slanted news programs, and I'll watch mine. There is no such thing as objective journalism in the U.S. anymore. It's all ratings/circulation.
Alaska Darin Posted August 27, 2004 Posted August 27, 2004 It already IS biased... Fox News, Boston Herald, Washington Times, Weekly Standard, etc... You watch your slanted news programs, and I'll watch mine. There is no such thing as objective journalism in the U.S. anymore. It's all ratings/circulation. 8592[/snapback] There hasn't been objective journalism from the conglomerates during my lifetime. The only difference between my youth and today is conservatives actually now have a choice instead of being beaten over the head by idiots like Dan Rather every night. And for some reason the lefties hate it...
ExiledInIllinois Posted August 27, 2004 Posted August 27, 2004 Who says there has to be (objective journalism)? If there wasn't objective journalism from the conglomerates during your lifetime, I take there wasn't any ever in this country. Objective journalism is realtively a new concept in the last 90 years or so. We are just getting back to our roots... Who really cares? Who needs to care? So what, let the media outlets polarize... Whipty do! This is getting easier than shooting fish in a barrel. I must of woke up on the wrong side of the bed?
ExiledInIllinois Posted August 27, 2004 Posted August 27, 2004 Oh... I forgot to add. I am really not a "What if" person. I just can't think that way. I "hit the ball that is in front of me"... Am I patronizing or what?
Guest RabidBillsFanVT Posted August 27, 2004 Posted August 27, 2004 There hasn't been objective journalism from the conglomerates during my lifetime. The only difference between my youth and today is conservatives actually now have a choice instead of being beaten over the head by idiots like Dan Rather every night. And for some reason the lefties hate it... 8594[/snapback] Ohhh, there were choices all right, just in PRINT. The only choices of my youth were CBS, ABC, or NBC. A whopping THREE media outlets. Walter Cronkite was a man I could totally respect... a very intelligent man who actually went out of his way to make news very respectable. Dan Rather is crap. Total, non-objective, 'inject my opinion in my newscast' CRAP. You could have gone to a NUMBER on conservative print medias and found them just as easy back then. My point is that cable/sat TV is a recent phenomena, and so you get SO MUCH MORE of a choice, and unfortunately, so much more extremist, ratings-grabbing news programs; not like it used to be. Do you think with these mergers, that the news will get any better on TV? NO... in fact, when the companies own a slew of various outlets, look for censorship and wild, FOX-like stories to be more prevalent.
Cheeseburger_in_paradise Posted August 27, 2004 Posted August 27, 2004 Dude, lighten up. Your nihilism is really bumming me out man. Take my advice and watch some women's beach volleyball for awhile. It'll improve your world view I promise. 8140[/snapback] Women's Beach Vollyball, a uniter not a divider.
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