In his case, it went against a solid official record from the Navy. Kerry responded very quickly when they first came out (without a book) in spring 2004 and then put his entire Navy record online.
That SHOULD have been enough to counter the later book. There were fitness reports that spanned his entire nearly 4 years in the Navy - all glowing. Many were written by people who later became SBVT. That alone should have discredited them - after all, which is more believable - a very positive report written in 1966 - 1969 about a young officer reporting to them - or an account written in 2003/2004 against a Presidential nominee running against the President they supported?
Not to mention, the fitness reports described more than just a good officer, in the written comments there are several things repeated by different officers years apart. He was regularly cited as having a very unusually loyal group of people reporting to him, he was often referred to as serious, mature and hard working. He was described as creative and a good problem solver. To me, it was (and still is) shocking that though some in the media did mention the documents being online and did point out that many of the SBVT told a different story then, there was NO media article on the positive things said in those fitness reports. (Even though the same traits in a mature man, with decades of experience in the Senate are exactly what the times called for in a President -- and they can also be seen in how he has worked as Secretary of State.)
I followed that campaign intently- mostly on CSPAN and reading the blog - because the mainstream media coverage was more limited than any major party campaign I can remember. I have to admit that I went to read the records after they were mentioned on the blog -- to answer what color Kerry's eyes were (something that I had little interest in), when the person giving that as the official source of eye color mentioned that everyone should read the fitness reports.
Nor was much made of the fact that very few of the same people when asked about the swiftboats and Kerry in 2002 (I think) when Doug Brinkley was writing his book had any problem with Kerry. One who did was a man whose position Kerry took over after he returned home after he was injured - in one paragraph he repeated the RW meme that JK was aloof - in the other he spoke of not being an officer who learned of his subordinates' families (something JK did) in explaining why few of his subordinates sought him out at a reunion held in the 2000s.
While I am glad that there is a concerted effort to counter these stories now, I wish that some of the same people out in force now, had bothered to defend JK as aggressively -- against charges that were EASIER to disprove. The JK team itself sent a long report detailing many easily proven lies in the book the day after it was out. One person who deserves special blame is his VP nominee, who promised to get out and defend JK and didn't -- more concerned with his own future (and actually betting on losing in 2004). I suspect that many left leaning people in the media were actually more comfortable defending Bill Clinton's actions in avoiding the war (including an unnecessarily nasty letter written to someone who helped him get a deferred spot in the Arkansas National Guard) , then Kerry's heroic service.
Kerry himself was the first person out defending Obama when Corsi attacked him -- and the Obama team was able to quickly define Corsi from all the things the Kerry team found in 2004.
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