The circle closes...

[Kurt_and_Hunter]

A few days ago Billy Shaheen did a Clinton campaign hit on Obama.

We then learned from an Obama devotee on DU just how vicious a character Billy Shaheen is. In 2000 Bob Kerrey was a Bradley supporter, and Shaheen was a Gore supporter. When medal-of-honor winner Bob Kerrey, who lost a lower leg in Vietnam, tried to enter a hall for a Bradley event, he had to run a gauntlet of Gore supporters led by Billy Shaheen, who (or so the story goes...) led the Gore mob in a chant of calling Bob Kerrey a "cripple." (On account of the leg he left in Vietnam.)

It's one of those stories that is kind of obviously not true the longer you think about it... did a Gore campaign chair really lead a mob in chanting "cripple" at Senator Bob Kerrey? Damn... if only the Gore campaign had actually been anywhere near that tough!

So today we are informed that Bob Kerry is a Clinton campaign operative--not just that he endorsed her, but that he is part of a plan to smear Barack Obama, a plan that he must have been involved in for most of this year, because he made exactly the same comments more than once ages before he endorsed Clinton. In fact, it was said he was flirting with endorsing Obama when he made these exact comments before.

The irony is deliscious... Bob Kerrey must be an awfully forgiving man to sign up with Hillary to do her bidding in smearing Barack Obama, who Kerrey likes a lot, for a campaign that was run in New Hampshire by the guy who lead a "cripple" chant against Bob Kerrey!

But, of course, a few day ago when it was convenient, Bob Kerrey was a big hero! It was an OUTRAGE what evil Billy Shaheen had done to this good man! The thing is, nobody knew a few days ago that Bob Kerrey was going to have to be painted as a ruthless Hilbot so soon.

What a tangled web, etc..

[madeline_con]

1. More about his Viet Nam days...

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=132&topic_id=3855155&mesg_id=3855271

[NYCGirl]

2. Yeah, and you'd think McCain would have nothing to do with Bush after the

smears in the 2000 primaries. But you'd be wrong. Politics makes very strange bedfellows.

[SaveElmer]

3. On a board where George McGovern...yes that George McGovern is called senile...

For his support of Hillary...no amount of character assassination is surprising...

[JeffR]

4. Not a very substantive rebuttal to the OP...

No snark intended. I'm still perplexed why our so-called "top-tier" candidates are anything but also-rans in this campaign - all of them. But odds are one of them will be nominated. If I'm going to end up voting for Senator Clinton, against my better judgment, an honest, detailed response to these allegations is something I think pretty important.

[SaveElmer]

5. Wasn't attempting a rebuttal...

The observations made by the OP are accurate as far as I can see...

It is simply another example of one days hero being the next days goat based on their support of Hillary...

[JeffR]

7. You're not wrong about fickleness here

but I'm left wondering why anything about either Obama or Clinton is compelling. I know this is retail politics and they'll say what they say. I just don't get why these people are the inner circle of the candidates, other than money, which buys a lot of megaphones.

[Kurt_and_Hunter]

6. Every hing is open to interpretation, but when this issue arose, I visited the Google and

found, mixed in with the stories from today, several instances where Kerrey said exactly the same things about Obama, going back to May, in contexts where no fair-minded person would think he was trying to harm Obama.

But the second Kerrey endorsed Clinton it was like the past no longer existed! I've been following Bob Kerrey for a long time, and, as Ben Smith noted today, the guy is not famous for being deceptive or sleazy, and is nobody's idea of a Clinton water-carrier. (I was surprised he endorsed here, because there's a lot of bad blood there... maybe not with Hillary, but definitely with Bill Clinton and with Al Gore.)

(Observations that he was a baby-killer in Vietnam, or that he is pro-war today are side-ways issues. Interesting, by hardly probative of the issue at hand)

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=132&topic_id=3854233&mesg_id=3854233

[JeffR]

8. Good points

There's a lot of pre-primary bullshit being spread. I'm just grateful that I have what I believe is a better option than Obama or Clinton, at least until the GE.