The Overseas View of the US presidential race . . .
John Heelan from the UK and Christopher Jones from France have both sent messages titled "The overseas view of the US presidential race. John writes: "Observing the dirty politics emerging from both Bush and Kerry campaign camps is as unedifying as watching two women trying to scratch each others' eyes out in the street. It disgusts the onlookers and does neither of the participants any credit. Rather than each claiming to be a bigger hero in a colonialist war 30 years ago, perhaps both presidential candidates should be distancing themselves from a war that has left an even bigger indelible stain on US' reputation that the Suez debacle has on the UK's reputation. Further, what hope is there for world peace when the more accomplished liar gains the most powerful job in the world boasting about his long-forgotten actual/nebulous war record?"
Christopher writes: "I have attached an article which appeared in The Observer (8/22/04) which recounts the antics surrounding the Swift Boat Veteran's assault on John Kerry. It also goes on to mention MoveOn and other pressure groups. I cannot understand this collective obsession to "rehabilitate" the Vietnam War. It is crazy and scares allot of people outside the US. Do Americans think that the war was justified? Is this obsession with war records not a silly comment on machismo? Here is an excerpt from "Why America is still fighting the battles of Mekong Delta. The controversy over John Kerry's Vietnam service masks a deeper argument over political advertising on US television", by Paul Harris:
John Kerry's tour of duty in Vietnam has defined his bid for the White House. He is the warrior candidate who heroically led men into battle but who came home to almost as bravely question the very war for which his comrades gave so much blood. But now Kerry's time in Vietnam, during which he was wounded three times, has become the backdrop of the most bitter row of the electioneering during one of America's dirtiest presidential campaigns. His war record is under fire like never before and, instead of defining his campaign, his time as captain of a Swift Boat is now threatening to derail his bid for the presidency. How this turnaround has come about is a tale as murky and muddied as the brown waters of the Mekong on which Kerry used to guide his craft. It is a tale of low politics, indirect funding and negative campaigning with a 'nod and a wink'.
A political row that has erupted across the election and is already headed for the courts. But, perhaps more than that, it is also a stark portrayal of how the terrible conflict in Vietnam still divides America 29 years after the war ended.
Kerry's tour of duty in Vietnam lasted a little over five months. During that time he captained two Swift Boats, which plied the waters of the Mekong Delta. It was dangerous work and the firefights were common.
After being wounded three times, Kerry was discharged early. He left as a changed man. Gone was the bright, highly-educated youth of his college days. In its place was the serious man who immediately joined the anti-war movement and flung him self into politics.
But now, as that career reaches its zenith, the American media have cast a new focus on Kerry's Vietnam experiences.
Pushing the issue is a shadowy group called Swift Boat Veterans for Truth which is running a highly negative and personal campaign attacking Kerry's experience in Vietnam.
They have single-handedly turned Kerry's strongest card into a devastating political row.
Instead of praising his bravery, the group is questioning his motivations. It is questioning the details of his service and saying he has told lies.
Doubts have been cast on his war record and about whether Kerry really deserved his medals. His anti-war activities have been called a betrayal.
The issue cuts to the quick of Kerry's life experience. His campaign is so outraged that it has launched a legal suit against the SBVFT group claiming it has illegal ties to the Republican campaign to re-elect President George Bush. It is a claim the Bush team has vigorously denied.
Suddenly the language of the campaign has turned vicious. 'John Kerry is a fighter and does not tolerate lies,' said Stephanie Cutter, Kerry's tough-as-nails press spokeswoman.
But the Bush campaign has not backed off. 'I do think that Senator Kerry losing his cool should not be an excuse for him to lash out at the President with false and baseless attacks,' Bush's spokesman, Scott McClellan, told reporters outside Bush's ranch in Crawford, Texas.
The truth behind Swift Boat Veterans for Truth is not simple. It appears to be a classic case of a 'surrogate' attack of the kind that has long been used by both sides.
It is essen tially using another group to raise the issues that the Bush campaign dare not address directly. In CIA-speak, this gives the campaign itself 'plausible deniability' for saying it has nothing to do with the issue while ensuring plenty of headlines.
On the face of it, SBVFT is a collection of Vietnam veterans with a grudge against Kerry, especially over his anti-war activities when he threw away his battle ribbons.
They complain that Kerry let down Vietnam veterans after the war by criticising the conflict and detailing atrocities that took place in Vietnam.
They have launched a sustained personal attack on Kerry through adverts, a book and countless interviews on cable news and radio.
Kerry has been accused of lying about being wounded, fabricating stories of crossing into Cambodia and making up details of firefights. The accusations have been fiercely denied.
None of the members of SWVFT served on Kerry's boats and many of Kerry's own boat comrades have angrily refuted the claims.
But the group's charges have stuck. Criticism of Kerry's record is now the talk of America. Polls show that Kerry's support among veterans has started to decline.
Yet the story behind SBVFT is a story of secretive Republican support and, as such, at odds with the official denials of any link.
The group received much of its initial funding from Bob Perry, a longtime Texan Republican donor who is a close friend of Karl Rove, Bush's political guru and master of dirty tricks in election campaigning.
Perry was well enough known to Bush to earn an invitation to visit the then Texas governor in 1997. 'I hope all goes well with you,' Bush wrote in a 15 April 1997 letter. 'Should you ever come to Austin, please come by and say hello.'
Another initial funder for SBVFT was Harlan Crow, a Texan Republican donor who is also a trustee of Bush's father's presidential library.
The group has further help from Merrie Spaeth, a public relations executive who has helped to co-ordinate its media strategy.
In 2000 Spaeth worked for a group that ran television adverts in support of Bush as he fought a bitter campaign against Senator John McCain for the Republican presidential nomination. The ads were vital in attacking McCain and lauding Bush's record.
The group has also employed the advertising firm, Stevens Reed Curcio & Potholm, which ran devastating ads against Democratic candidate Michael Dukakis in 1988 that helped destroy his presidential bid.
The veterans behind the group are Rear Admiral Roy Hoffmann, Kerry's old commander, who was outraged by a critical treatment of his tactics in Kerry's official biography, and John O'Neill, a Swift Boat commander who has been a critic of Kerry ever since the early 1970s.
O'Neill was recruited in 1971 by the Richard Nixon administration to debate Kerry in the media as Kerry's anti-war fame grew.
A close examination of the group's claims has revealed serious holes. Its book, Unfit For Command, which contains many allegations that Kerry lied about his record, was written by O'Neill and Jerome Corsi.
Corsi was recently revealed as having posted anti-Islamic and anti-Catholic rants on a right-wing website. He has since apologised.
The group also produced a medical doctor, Louis Letson, who features in an advert saying Kerry lied about one wound he got a Purple Heart for and claims it was self-inflicted. But Letson's name does not appear on the army medical records that detail Kerry's injury.
But, many experts agree, it is not the details that matter. The group has successfully targeted the central plank of Kerry's appeal - his Vietnam heroism - and put it at the centre of national debate.
On Friday the group launched a fresh attack advert which will air across vital battleground states next week. It looks at Kerry's claims in the early 1970s of atrocities committed by American troops in Vietnam. The group is clearly not going to go away.
Democrats say that the real motivation for the group's emergence lies not with the events of three decades ago in a long-ago war but in the here and now of a bitter election fight that has seen Republicans stunned by the success of Democrats in erasing the Republican advantage in raising cash.
Part of that Democrat success comes from several extremely wealthy organisations, such as MoveOn.org, America Coming Together and the Media Fund, which have campaigned against Bush on behalf of the Democrats.
They run adverts far more negative than the Kerry campaign itself. As with Bush and SBVFT, Kerry's campaign has also vigorously denied any official links to the groups which would be illegal under new campaign finance laws.
Yesterday Bush campaign spokesman Steve Schmidt explicitly linked the Vietnam row to the emergence of these powerful groups. 'Real coordination is what John Kerry's campaign has been engaged in with the Media Fund, America Coming Together, and MoveOn.org,' he said. '(It) is a flagrant disregard of the spirit and letter of the campaign finance reform law.'
In May, the Republicans launched a lawsuit that named 28 different groups as illegally co-ordinating with the Kerry campaign in breach of finance laws.
From a Republican point of view, groups like SBVFT are a natural response to the Democrat surrogates. And the group is having an impact.
A recent University of Pennsylvania poll showed that its attack ad questioning whether Kerry deserved his medals had been seen or heard of by half the voters questioned.
It also revealed that 44 per cent of independent voters found the advert at least somewhat believable. Meanwhile a CBS poll showed the number of veterans who supported Kerry had dropped from 46 per cent to 37 per cent.
To some observers the success of the attempt to question Kerry's record seems amazing. Whatever the details of his record, Kerry volunteered for service in the war and repeatedly risked his life.
Meanwhile the Bush family used its connections to secure Bush a coveted Texas-based job in the Air National Guard.
Questions remain over whether Bush completed that service. Vice-President Dick Cheney meanwhile got repeated deferments from the Vietnam draft and is on record as saying he had 'other priorities' than military service.
But Democratic strategists are haunted by the experience of Kerry's close friend and fellow veteran Max Cleland.
Cleland, who appears at many Kerry events, lost three limbs in Vietnam. But in 2002 a Republican campaign successfully unseated him as a senator in Georgia after portraying him as unpatriotic.
In the brutal world of American politics the lesson is clear: being a Vietnam hero is no guarantee. The gloves are off.
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posted by Tom Grey | 8:04 AM
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