BoatBanter.com - Swift Boat Liars

For all you who served in the military, have a look at what the GOP is
unleashing against Kerry.

Thank God there are good folks like John McCain who'll stand up to the
bull****, no matter the source.

jps

http://mediamatters.org/items/200408050007

Submerging the truth about Swift Boat Vets on Hannity & Colmes,
Scarborough Country

FOX News Channel's Hannity & Colmes and MSNBC's Scarborough Country
both gave free airtime on August 4 to a new, misleading ad sponsored
by Swift Boat Veterans for Truth, a recently formed group dedicated to
attacking Senator John Kerry's record during and after his service in
Vietnam.

Both programs devoted segments to the ad, airing it the day before its
scheduled release, but left out key facts that discredit Swift Boat
Veterans for Truth.

In an August 5 interview with the Associated Press, Senator John
McCain (R-AZ), "a former prisoner of war in Vietnam, called the ad
criticizing John Kerry's military service 'dishonest and dishonorable'
and urged the White House on Thursday to condemn it as well."

Swift Boat Veterans for Truth did not serve alongside Kerry

In the new ad, members of Swift Boat Veterans for Truth claim that
they "served with John Kerry."

Hannity & Colmes co-host Sean Hannity echoed the false claim, saying
that the veterans in the ad are "the people that know him best," and
referred to them as "some of his fellow crewmates."

Even Pat Halpin, who was filling in for co-host Alan Colmes, called
them "some of John Kerry's crewmates."

Scarborough echoed Swift Boat Veterans' misleading claim that they
"served with John Kerry in Vietnam."

While the veterans attacking Kerry in the ad are veterans of the
Vietnam War and may have served at the same time as Kerry, as The New
York Times reported on August 5, the Kerry campaign noted that "none
of the men had actually served on the Swift boats that Mr. Kerry
commanded."

Adm. Roy F. Hoffman, one of the veterans in the ad, has even
"acknowledged he had no first-hand knowledge to discredit Kerry's
claims to valor," the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reported on May 7,
"and said that although Kerry was under his command, he really didn't
know Kerry much personally."

In contrast, many of the veterans who have appeared on the campaign
trail with Kerry did serve alongside him.

The Wall Street Journal's Albert R. Hunt noted in his August 5
"Campaign Journal" column, titled "Sham Charges Against a War Hero"

"Indeed, 10 of the 11 men who served on his two swift boats all have
sworn by John Kerry; nine living members were in Boston [for the
Democratic National Convention]."

Swift Boat Veterans for Truth's Republican ties

As Media Matters for America previously noted, on May 4, Salon.com's
Joe Conason detailed Swift Boat Veterans for Truth's ties to the
Republican Party.

In addition to pointing out that the group's founder, John O'Neill,
has long-standing ties to the GOP that can be traced back to the Nixon
administration, Conason also reported that among the people behind
Swift Boat Veterans for Truth is "veteran corporate media consultant
and Texas Republican activist Merrie Spaeth, who is listed as the
group's media contact."

As MMFA has documented, both Hannity & Colmes co-host Alan Colmes (on
May 28) and FOX chief political correspondent Carl Cameron (on May 4)
reported the group's Republican ties on FOX News Channel; on May 4,
Scarborough mentioned criticism of O'Neill's "dirty tricks" for the
Nixon administration.

While Scarborough did mention on August 4 that the group was part of
the "Republican counteroffensive" "prepar[ing] to release blistering
attacks in John Kerry's Vietnam record," Hannity completely ignored
the group's ties to the GOP.

Swift Boat Veterans for Truth doctor did not sign Kerry's medical
record

Neither Hannity nor Scarborough bothered to note that Dr. Louis
Letson, who is featured in the ad claiming to have treated Kerry for
the wound that earned him his first Purple Heart and claiming that it
was undeserved, was not the medical official who signed Kerry's
medical records for the wound.

The Kerry campaign noted this fact in a report in The New York Times
and a report in the Los Angeles Times that surfaced when Letson first
unleashed this attack in May.

In criticizing the ad, McCain told the Associated Press, "'It was the
same kind of deal that was pulled on me'... referring to his
[McCain's] bitter Republican primary fight with President Bush,"
according to the AP.

As Conason reported on May 4, "The 'swift boat' veterans attacking
John Kerry's war record are led by veteran right-wing operatives using
the same vicious techniques they used against John McCain four years
ago."

Conason explained that Spaeth (the group's media contact) participated
during the 2000 Republican primary contest in TV ads that "falsely
attack[ed]" McCain's environmental record in California, New York, and
Ohio.

McCain might have been referring as well to attacks on his military
record by Ted Sampley and Thomas Burch, both Vietnam veterans, during
the 2000 primary season.

As Media Matters for America previously reported, Sampley hounded
McCain as a "Manchurian Candidate" -- suggesting that the decorated
veteran and former prisoner of war was a brainwashed communist agent
-- and was convicted for misdemeanor assault related to an attack on
one of McCain's legislative aides.

Sampley is the leader of a group called Vietnam Veterans Against John
Kerry.

During the 2000 Republican primary in South Carolina, Burch, according
to a February 22 report in the Chicago Tribune, "stood with George W.
Bush at his side and accused Sen. John McCain of Arizona of opposing
health care for Persian Gulf war veterans and blocking efforts to
locate POW-MIAs, saying the former prisoner of war "came home from
Vietnam and forgot us."