I wasn't born yet. John Kerry was in Vietnam. Or he wasn't. Well? He says he was there but that's all playing politics with his own military record. If it sounds good and makes him look good he was there.
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I wonder where he was when MLK was shot? Kerry may not even know.
Then there's this tall tale from Kerry. He was in Cambodia on Christmas
Even Kerry doesn't contend that this is true anymore. His own journal entries show that he is ... not forth coming with the truth.
The point being that Kerry uses his Vietnam experience very liberally. He invents whatever he needs to please the politics of the situation. One moments he's angry vet' with "seared" memories and tossed away medals no ribbons. The next he's proud war hero.
But talking about this is dragging a war hero though the mud, right?
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Quote:
Another Seared--Seared--Memory
From a John Kerry speech commemorating Martin Luther King Day, Jan._20, 2003:
I remember well April 1968--I was serving in Vietnam--a place of violence--when the news reports brought home to me and my crewmates the violence back home--and the tragic news that one of the bullets flying that terrible spring took the life of that unabashedly maladjusted citizen.
In fact, Kerry did not go to Vietnam until November 1968.
From a John Kerry speech commemorating Martin Luther King Day, Jan._20, 2003:
I remember well April 1968--I was serving in Vietnam--a place of violence--when the news reports brought home to me and my crewmates the violence back home--and the tragic news that one of the bullets flying that terrible spring took the life of that unabashedly maladjusted citizen.
In fact, Kerry did not go to Vietnam until November 1968.
I wonder where he was when MLK was shot? Kerry may not even know.
Then there's this tall tale from Kerry. He was in Cambodia on Christmas
Quote:
This is how he described it to the Boston Herald in 1979: "I remember spending Christmas Eve of 1968 five miles across the Cambodian border being shot at by our South Vietnamese allies. _._._. The absurdity of almost being killed by our own allies in a country in which President Nixon claimed there were no American troops was very real."
In 1986 Mr. Kerry argued on the Senate floor against U.S. support for the Nicaraguan contras, again citing the 1968 Christmas in Cambodia and "the president of the United States telling the American people I was not there; the troops were not in Cambodia. I have that memory which is seared--seared--in me." In a 1992 interview with the Associated Press the story came back: "By Christmas 1968, part of Kerry's patrol extended across the border of South Vietnam into Cambodia."
Trouble is, the person who appears to have been wrong here about Mr. Kerry's location was not the president--who was Lyndon Johnson, not Nixon, by the way--but Mr. Kerry himself. His commanding officers all testify to this fact, as do men who were on his boat at the time. And so now, reluctantly, does the Kerry campaign.
Last Wednesday Kerry spokesman Michael Meehan sent me a statement saying that "During John Kerry's service in Vietnam, many times he was on or near the Cambodian border and on one occasion crossed into Cambodia. ._._. On December 24, 1968 Lieutenant John Kerry and his crew were on patrol in the watery borders between Vietnam and Cambodia deep in enemy territory." I asked for clarification as to whether the "one occasion" was Christmas Eve 1968. "No," was the reply.
"Watery borders" is something of an evasion, intended to imply that Mr. Kerry's "seared" memory might have been easily confused. But according to both the maps and the testimony of swift vets, the Mekong doesn't run along the Cambodian border but bisects it, such that the coincidence between the two is obvious. In any case, Mr. Kerry's own journal, as cited in Douglas Brinkley's biography, records him being 50-some miles from the border at Sa Dec on that day contemplating visions of "sugar plums."
In 1986 Mr. Kerry argued on the Senate floor against U.S. support for the Nicaraguan contras, again citing the 1968 Christmas in Cambodia and "the president of the United States telling the American people I was not there; the troops were not in Cambodia. I have that memory which is seared--seared--in me." In a 1992 interview with the Associated Press the story came back: "By Christmas 1968, part of Kerry's patrol extended across the border of South Vietnam into Cambodia."
Trouble is, the person who appears to have been wrong here about Mr. Kerry's location was not the president--who was Lyndon Johnson, not Nixon, by the way--but Mr. Kerry himself. His commanding officers all testify to this fact, as do men who were on his boat at the time. And so now, reluctantly, does the Kerry campaign.
Last Wednesday Kerry spokesman Michael Meehan sent me a statement saying that "During John Kerry's service in Vietnam, many times he was on or near the Cambodian border and on one occasion crossed into Cambodia. ._._. On December 24, 1968 Lieutenant John Kerry and his crew were on patrol in the watery borders between Vietnam and Cambodia deep in enemy territory." I asked for clarification as to whether the "one occasion" was Christmas Eve 1968. "No," was the reply.
"Watery borders" is something of an evasion, intended to imply that Mr. Kerry's "seared" memory might have been easily confused. But according to both the maps and the testimony of swift vets, the Mekong doesn't run along the Cambodian border but bisects it, such that the coincidence between the two is obvious. In any case, Mr. Kerry's own journal, as cited in Douglas Brinkley's biography, records him being 50-some miles from the border at Sa Dec on that day contemplating visions of "sugar plums."
Even Kerry doesn't contend that this is true anymore. His own journal entries show that he is ... not forth coming with the truth.
The point being that Kerry uses his Vietnam experience very liberally. He invents whatever he needs to please the politics of the situation. One moments he's angry vet' with "seared" memories and tossed away medals no ribbons. The next he's proud war hero.
But talking about this is dragging a war hero though the mud, right?







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