McCain blasts Swith Boat Vets ad

[Armstead]

Heard on Air America news, so no link right now.

John McCain has come out strongly against the Swift Boat Morons Against Kerry smear campaign. According to Air America, he said the ads were deceptive and McCain called on the White House to condemn them.

Good for McCain.

[truthspeaker]

1. I just sent this email to McCain

probably hopeless but I urge other DUers to follow suit.

Dear Senator McCain:

I am writing to your for two reasons. The first is to thank and commend you for speaking out against the campaign ads that slander John Kerry's military service. Your refusal to play along with this kind of dirty politics and your defense of another veteran is admirable and all too rare in this day and age. My admiration for your words in this matter stands regardless of your response to what I say next.

I urge you to reconsider your support of George W. Bush for reelection in November. I am not asking you to cease being a Republican, but I am asking you to put the good of the country ahead of party politics. The fanatics currently in control of your party hate you anyway so in my opinion you have nothing to lose. You have heard their gay-bashing and misogynist rhetoric. You have witnessed their incompetence in waging the war in Iraq and the war on Al Qaeda, and their dishonesty in claiming the two wars are one and the same. You have seen the shameful way they have treated our reserve and National Guard troops and wounded veterans. You have experienced first-hand their dirty campaign tricks. You know that Senator Kerry is a man of intelligence and integrity, even though you have honest disagreements with many of his policy positions. If "Democrats" like Zell Miller can endorse Bush, why can't a Republican endorse John Kerry?

I am neither one of your constituents nor a Republican, but I am, like you, a patriotic American. Please consider this serious issue.

[LittleApple81]

2. LBN link: (DU is always faster than lightning!)

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=102x730024

[SoFlaJet]

3. is there a

web site? a link? names of the hired hands?
Hey I'm all for a guy trying to make a buck(I'm SURE they're being paid for this)and all but NOT on the back and reputation of another man-especially a Vietnam veteran

[displacedtexan]

14. It's a truly Nixonian bunch!

I posted a ton of info on them, their funding, and O'Neill's bio
on my blog: http://ascrivenerslament.blogspot.com/

[Octafish]

4. Thanks, blm!

You the Democrat!

[blm]

9. Thanks, but I think he would have done it anyway. The stack of messages on

his desk this morning (and the emails in his box) just may have helped him come out sooner.

[BJ]

5. Spurious accusations by a spurious group

"The leader of the group(Swift Boat Veterans for Truth{added for clearity by poster}), retired Adm. Roy Hoffmann, said none of the 13 veterans in the commercial served on Kerry's boat but rather were in other swiftboats within 50 yards of Kerry's."
AP on YahooNews.com

These "eyewitnesses" were probably hinding their eyes behind their hands when the action in question took place!

LIARS

[RobertSeattle]

6. Cool

I've been trying to come up with a nice simple analogy for these Swift boat guys. These Swift boat guys are like a bunch of 4th graders criticising another 4th grader, but one in a completely different 4th grade class. They sound legitimate since they are all 4th graders, but they actually have no first person experience with the person they are criticizing.

[calimary]

15. Maybe it's THEY who had lousy commanders on their boats, so

they automatically assume Kerry must not have been worth much, either.

I'm glad McCain is saying something about this. That's the cheneying LEAST he can do for a fellow combat brother. The LEAST. I like truthspeaker's letter in post #1 - that invites him not necessarily to abandon his precious party but just simply to do the correct thing here. At LEAST he's come forward this far.

I'm not among those who worship John McCain. If I were his wife, I'd be rubbing his nose in Joseph Wilson every hour on the hour. Joseph Wilson is a man (and how!) who sticks up for his wife when she's under attack by these vicious thugs in the White House. He's been out defending her honor for over a year now, ever since Novak outed her and ruined her career and ruined all her hard, careful work and network building over more than 2 decades, and very likely put her - and everybody she worked with - in mortal danger. He's out there fighting for her. And what did McCain do when HIS wife, AND their marriage, AND THEIR COMPLETELY INNOCENT ADOPTED DAUGHTER (with the South-Asian swarthy skin) came under the worst kind of deceitful, character-assassinating attacks by bush's band of ruthless rogues?

(crickets chirping)

I would think ANY woman who was married, ANY woman who, with her husband, had adopted a child from another culture, would be disgusted with the republi-CONS for that. And I'd think ANY woman in that position would find it nearly unforgivable that her husband didn't fight back for her and their child.

(PSSSST! would you be willing to vote for candidate so-n-so if you knew he'd fathered a black child out of wedlock? JUST asking... pass it on)

I swear, I am NOT given to delusions of grandeur. But this is the ONE time in my life wherein I have actually wished, for one instant, that I could play God. And if I got that opportunity, guess which loathesome bunch I'd immediately and perpetually banish to the lowest levels of Hell? I realize, of course, that it's not for me to say, or to judge, and ordinarily, I do not dare to presume so. But MAN-oh-MAN!!! I wish SOMEBODY would.

Meantime, we should CERTAINLY be calling McCain's office or writing or emailing him, to say we heard about this, we recognize an act of truth and honor when we see one, and we appreciate it GREATLY that he's man enough to speak up about this.

GREAT letter - truthspeaker!

[HysteryDiagnosis]

7. For the Freepers who believe....

that Kerry should be castigated for whatever reasons... and that the vets collectively are at odds with him... I suggest the following....

www.veteransforcommonsense.org (Do a search for Kerry in search window)
Kerry's Military Records Show a Highly Praised Officer

>>Kerry's Military Records Show a Highly Praised Officer This site repeatedly posts news articles about how President George W. Bush can't account for nearly one year while in the Texas Air National Guard during the Vietnam War. Now this site will CS post a news article describing Senator John Kerry's Vietnam War service. Kerry, who is a veteran, earned a Silver Star, a Bronze Star, and three Purple Heart medals during combat.<<

>>$1.9 Billion of Iraq's Money Goes to U.S. Contractors (Halliburton)
The article below answers the disturbing question: "Who profits from this war, paid for at the expense of our Nation's youth?" FOX won't report on this or the hundreds of thousands of dollars Halliburtonpays Vice President Richard Cheney while he is in office. And FOX won't dare report on all the campaign contributions by Halliburton executives made to President George W. Bush and Cheney. That's why Veterans for Common Sense highly recommends viewing "OutFOXed." See it soon.<<

[cthrumatrix]

8. don't point out facts to the freepers ...they can't digest them

[HysteryDiagnosis]

10. they can't digest them

They need to put their thinking caps on.... and see that... what is happening now... is unique to history.... and it didn't happen in a vacuum.... and it won't end with total war.... it will end when injustice, hunger and fear are defeated and not until. They need to digest the true facts of history... and see what has directed our foreign policy more than they would like to believe.

http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0471265179/qid=1091719813/sr=8-1/ref=pd_ka_1/104-2482485-8895102?v=glance&s=books&n=507846
All the Shah's Men: An American Coup and the Roots of Middle East Terror
>>With breezy storytelling and diligent research, Kinzer has reconstructed the CIA's 1953 overthrow of the elected leader of Iran, Mohammad Mossadegh, who was wildly popular at home for having nationalized his country's oil industry. The coup ushered in the long and brutal dictatorship of Mohammad Reza Shah, widely seen as a U.S. puppet and himself overthrown by the Islamic revolution of 1979. At its best this work reads like a spy novel, with code names and informants, midnight meetings with the monarch and a last-minute plot twist when the CIA's plan, called Operation Ajax, nearly goes awry. A veteran New York Times foreign correspondent and the author of books on Nicaragua (Blood of Brothers) and Turkey (Crescent and Star), Kinzer has combed memoirs, academic works, government documents and news stories to produce this blow-by-blow account. He shows that until early in 1953, Great Britain and the Anglo-Iranian Oil Company were the imperialist baddies of this tale. Intransigent in the face of Iran's demands for a fairer share of oil profits and better conditions for workers, British Foreign Secretary Herbert Morrison exacerbated tension with his attitude that the challenge from Iran was, in Kinzer's words, "a simple matter of ignorant natives rebelling against the forces of civilization." Before the crisis peaked, a high-ranking employee of Anglo-Iranian wrote to a superior that the company's alliance with the "corrupt ruling classes" and "leech-like bureaucracies" were "disastrous, outdated and impractical." This stands as a textbook lesson in how not to conduct foreign policy.<<

[JohnKleeb]

11. hah thats great, got em in a pickle

I may not agree with McCain on some issues but he's a respectable guy when it comes down to it.

[gauguin57]

12. I think this is a dupe

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=104x2159976

is the earlier link on General Discussion

[eleny]

13. Good for McCain!

He probably also surmises that the WH is behind all this. But still it's a fair challenge that should get some press. Well, at least I hope so. I haven't turned on the tv yet today. Maybe Keith Olberman will talk about it and the left wing of Crossfire should bring it up.

Do you really think McCain will be offered a position in Kerry's administration? His current backing of * makes me think not. And then he wouldn't want to leave the Senate anyhow.

[noonwitch]

16. I think it would depend on the position

I don't know what his specialty is, as far as a cabinet post would go.