I agree with your point Brian, the hero card is overplayed -- especially with sports figures. I'll admit for me that anyone who has served our country in war is someone that I have appreciation for and I always thank them for the sacrifice they made.

McCain is very fortunate that the economy is tanking and oil is doing the Beverly Hillbillies "Black Gold". If this election was about the Iraq War, he would get destroyed. Clark has always been a guy with an opinion, he said nothing wrong, and linking McCain to Bush is solid politics.

This latest dust up is also an example of why I'm not an Obama fan. He seems to be more concerned about spin than taking on tough issues. He would have gotten more respect from me if he supported Clark and went on to address the real issues with Iraq.

LAMBERT: Well, there are probably a dozen topics worthy of leading a national debate, my annoyance with the over-played "hero" card isn't one that needs Obama's attention. I understand completely why he kept Clark's remarks at a distance. It's that telecom immunity thing that drives me nuts. As for your thinking that a bad economy helps McCain ... mmm ... I don't think so.

Right on.

Good on you Brian. There was absolutely nothing wrong with Clark's comments - but I'm really starting to doubt Obama. First he criticizes the SC for striking down the death penalty for anything but murder, then he praises the same court for striking down DC's gun ban, then he disses Clark, and today he's claiming he will keep Bush's religious patronage system, the Faith-based initiative. His speech on Patriotism was droll, boring, and unnecessary.

LAMBERT: I gather his "patriotism tour", or whatever he's calling it is designed for Hillary's Appalachian crowd. But you do roll your eyes, don't you?

2 things -

Obama is a proven liar. Hillary is a proven liar. To say Day is a proven liar isn't really saying much. You keep forgetting, politics aint beanbag.

Clark isnt wrong to say those things. He isnt smart to say them though though, theres no valuable insight there.

Hillary's a hero I suppose, what with her penchant for dropping into the most dangerous places in the world under fire.

LAMBERT: 108, what did you take five shots of Sean Hannity with your coffee this morning. A "proven liar"? Obama? How so? But you're right about Day, and that politics "ain't bean bag". But unlike Hillary's sniper fire bit, the Swift Boaters were intent ... on destroying someone else with bald-faced lies. The fact the press was more interested in the response tactics of the Kerry campaign that the flagrant "untruths" of the Swift Boaters is another discussion.

Let's start with ..." I could no sooner leave that church than throw my own granny under a bus".

Wesley (The Weasel) Clark, as I recall, ran for President based almost exclusively on his own military record.

Which makes his remarks regarding McCain all the more reprehensibel.

Look, until SOMEONE can point out any VALID reason why Obama is in ANY WAY qualified to be Commander In Chief, let alone mangae a Payless shoe store, McCain is obviously the next president.

The recent Supreme Court "decisions" (child rapists deserve to live, 2nd amendment validated by ONE vote) only solidify the need for adult leadership.

LAMBERT: Clark of course actually commanded troops in combat. By conservative standards I'm guessing that DIS qualifies him from any credibility on the subject.

Please, let Obama finish his waffle, then let him manage the restaurant.

He's qualified for THAT.

Let me get this straight: You believe the utter BS of Ketchup Kerry and his "Gengis Khan" blather, but not the unanimity of the real Swift Boaters?

What's wrong with you?

LAMBERT: Even you couldn't make you up.

Are you talking about this man: "George Everett "Bud" Day (born February 24, 1925) is a former U.S. Air Force pilot who served during the Vietnam War. He is often cited as being the most decorated U.S. service member since General Douglas MacArthur, having received some seventy decorations, a majority for actions in combat. Day is a recipient of the Medal of Honor."

By thw way and FWIW Senator Kerry served 4 months and 12 days in Viet Nam. He left early on a navy policy that permitted those with three separate Purple Hearts to leave combat. To be noted, is he had three scratches. One of them was treated at Cam Rahn Bay 6th Convalescent Center. I had a large mental health unit there and there was no surgical hospital. We did triage or treat wounds.

What Kerry did was have a corpsman remove a small metal splinter. He then must have filed for his own Purple Heart. We don't know if he did, since in spite of his claims to the contrary, he never released all his records.

Among things claimed by Senator Kerry is he was in Cambodia and listened to President Nixon claim we had no troops in Cambodia. Nice story, but Nixon became President after Kerry left Viet Nam and his crew denied they were ever in Cambodia.

That was just for starters. Before a Senate Committee he established his liberal credentials and warmed the heart of Senator Kennedy. He did so by claiming a series of atrocities based on his contact with Viet Nam Veterans. All the atrocities were bogus, many of the witnesses had never been to Viet Nam and so on and so on.

I know you liberals want to make "Swift Boat" equivalent to lies and smears; however, at the time they put out the data, Senator Kerry only gave blanket denials and was careful to avoid discussing particulars as he has to this day.

By the way, if you are sure the Swift Boaters were liars dial up T. Boone Pickens. He has offered a million dollars to anyone who can prove them wrong.

Regards. A tough subjec soon to be moot due to father time.

LAMBERT: Why do I think his public display of "liberal credentials" is at the heart of the fervor to believe the unbelievable?

The Swift Boat veterans were intent on making sure a lying jerk like Kerry didn't get away with his outrageous lies and become President.

He's about as relevant today as Gore, btw.

LAMBERT: Just so I'm clear on how you're seeing this. The guy who went and served is the coward and the liar, and those who cooked the ... wholly discredited ... story are the heroes and guardians of truth. So what, just for giggles, is Richard Speck?

Like a refreshing high colonic, Brian. My arse is so weary of all this half-assed lionizing of anyone who ever "wore the uniform" when it suits their political ends. McCain is a survivor of getting shot down by SAMs and a horrific confinement. Good on him.

But it does not in any meaningful way inform the skill set he'll need to be president. Rather, his apparent inability to sort out his experience of the Viet Nam War seems to have left him inconsistent and erratic in his judgments about war and the role of American military force in world events.

I would argue that those lingering issues were a hampering influence on then Secretary of State Colin Powell when he sat before the U.N. and misled the world on Bush phonied up casis belli for invading Iraq.

I'll add another actual hero to your example: Hugh Thompson Jr., a former U.S. Army helicopter pilot honored for rescuing Vietnamese civilians from his fellow GIs during the My Lai massacre. He died in January, 2006 at the age of 62.

Early in the morning of March 16, 1968, Thompson, door-gunner Lawrence Colburn and crew chief Glenn Andreotta came upon U.S. ground troops killing Vietnamese civilians in and around the village of My Lai.

They landed the helicopter in the line of fire between American troops and fleeing Vietnamese civilians and pointed their own guns at the U.S. soldiers to prevent more killings.

Colburn and Andreotta had provided cover for Thompson as he went forward to confront the leader of the U.S. forces. Thompson later coaxed civilians out of a bunker so they could be evacuated, and then landed his helicopter again to pick up a wounded child they transported to a hospital. Their efforts led to the cease-fire order at My Lai.

Chief My Lai prosecutor William Eckhardt described how Thompson responded to what he found when he put his helicopter down: "[Thompson] put his guns on Americans, said he would shoot them if they shot another Vietnamese, had his people wade in the ditch in gore to their knees, to their hips, took out children, took them to the hospital...flew back [to headquarters], standing in front of people, tears rolling down his cheeks, pounding on the table saying, 'Notice, notice, notice'...then had the courage to testify time after time after time."

It wouldn't be until three decades later in 1998 that the Army would honor the three men with the prestigious and long overdue Soldier's Medal, the highest award for bravery not involving conflict with an enemy. It was a posthumous award for Andreotta, who had been killed in battle three weeks after My Lai.

"It was the ability to do the right thing even at the risk of their personal safety that guided these soldiers to do what they did," Army Maj. Gen. Michael Ackerman said at the 1998 ceremony. The three "set the standard for all soldiers to follow."

Lt. William L. Calley, a platoon leader, was convicted and sentenced to life imprisonment for his role in the killings, but served just three years under house arrest when then-President Nixon reduced his sentence.

You can read Thompson's account of that day here:

http://www.law.umkc.edu/faculty/projects/ftrials/mylai/Myl_hero.html

LAMBERT: Clearly a coward and a liar ...

Brian - I'm not a Hannity listener. I dont listen to the radio during the day generally. When I do, I listen to Kerri, Gary or Rush, and Souch.

My Obama criticims are tempered by the fact that I think he's compelling. But all his past past posotions / promises come with a shelf life. Now hes an ardent supporter of the 2nd amendment, having previously been an ardent gun banner.

LAMBERT: That's it? Thats Obama's position on the recent Supreme Court vote? Now he's in favor of what he wasn't before?

I'd call it heroism by association. Yes, some cops and firefighters were heroes during the World Trade Tower collapse but how did they suddenly all become heroes? The media has confused the word "heroism" with "celebrity" and the word "celebrity" with the word "news". Just because a lot of people are interested in a subject doesn't make it news. We sure going to miss George Carlin's careful examination of this language issue.

LAMBERT: There was plenty of heroic action on the part of the first responders on 9/11. But it jumped the shark for me when weeping people lined the streets cheering the clean-up workers as "heroes".

I am suprised that the same people who were offended by questions raised on John Kerry's military service and actions he took after, now have no problem opening up the door to question weather the actions performed by John McCain were really all that heroic. The difference between McCain and Kerry, is that McCain has broadened his campaign to include his leadership in Congress. John Kerry based his entire campaign in 2004 on four months in Vietnam - to his own peril.
Let's just say Clark's comments were fair. (I don't, but for the sake of argument) If McCain's military service does not equate Executive qualaties, then what in Obama's background has? It would probably not be wise for Obama surrogates to start pointing out inadequacies in the McCain camp. Has not Obama had enough trouble distancing himself from some of his closest advisors this year (spiritual and political)?

LAMBERT: Obama seems content with arguing the merits of judgment. Clark's point is that simply serving and getting shot down is no criteria at all for an executive position. On the matter of judgment -- and this is what inspires all the irrational vitriol -- Kerry had the good judgment to recognize the fundamental flaw in our Vietnam policy and speak out against it once he got home. In the Old Soldier Ethic you buy the bullshit from day one until you go boots up. That isn't the kind of intellectual firepower or judgment I want running the country.

Can one of the brave conservative posters who cower behind blogonyms kindly direct me to where Bush's National Guard records are available for review?

Jim, I hate to admit this, but you are a liberal that I actually can get along with.

There are two camps of conservatives out here. One that continues to blindly follow Bush around, following the religion of their favorite radio talking head. There is another group of us out here that lean more libertarian and actually try to think.

Bush has been a complete failure on Iraq. So whether he served or not no longer means much to me. Clark's point is a good one, leading is a different animal than serving.

The key to any chief is who advises them. The better question for both candidates is who they will appoint to advise them on Iraq.

And Brian, my other favorite liberal, my point on McCain and the economy is this. Obama has a losing position on gas prices right now, polls are crushing him in his stance on no more drilling. The economy and oil give McCain a chance to avoid Iraq and his policies similar to Bush. Outside of the 30% or so that are celebrating high gas prices as our ticket to better future energy policy, everyone else is getting hurt right now and wallets will vote. Whoever has the better answer to that will win and Iraq will have little to do with it.

LAMBERT: Once the "general public" -- i.e. "not too well informed" -- understand that "drilling" might take 8-10 years before knocking maybe 15 cents off a gallon of gas, they might be more open to arguments for conservation, and tax incentives to switch out furnaces, cars, etc.

Straw man jimmy. I've never claimed W should be a hero to anyone.

LAMBERT: But those in his service - bankrolled by fellow Texan Bob Perry -- denigrated the service of Kerry while blissfully ignoring the callow cowardice (is there a better word?) of their candidate during Vietnam.

In response to your query "What was the choice there? Suicide?" Actually, the choice McCain had was whether to accept the North Vietnamese offer to be released ahead of prisoners who had served longer. His captors sought the propaganda value of releasing an admiral's son, which would have required him to violate the military's own directive to its personnel that POWs must not accept an offer of release in front of other POWs who'd been held longer. Maybe this doesn't warrant the full-fleged hero treatment, but it sure counts for something that a guy who suffered serious injuries in the crash and then was comprehensively tortured for an extended period of time didn't take the easier route home.

LAMBERT: I believe we're all saying that McCain showed pretty tough stuff in the prison camp. That's good. But is that a major factor in arguing for executive leadership?

Will those on the left be outraged if a 520 (i.e. Moveon.org)group attacks John McCain on his military service?

LAMBERT: I would, yes. But Clark -- contrary to the eye-glazing idiocy of the FoxNews crowd -- is not "attacking McCain's military service". He's offering an OPINION that getting shot down is not necessarily a qualification for the Oval Office. The Swift Boatetrs by stark contrast, were flat-out asserting that Kerry's military service was a fraud and that he wasm in Bud Day's words, "the Benedict Arnold of Vietnam". Do we see a distinct difference? If some liberal 527 starts accusing McCain of being a fraud and a coward they'll get run off the blogosphere. I wish the right wing policed its own as well.

Sorry, I meant to say 527 group.

LAMBERT: I know.

My best friend's brother was killed on a swift boat in Vietnam. Just getting on that boat was insane. I read his letters home. Imagine running up and down the Mississippi in a runabout as men with machine guns on each bank taking pot shots at you as you passed --and they knew you would have to come back the same way. Go get bigger guns. They weren't heroes, just doing their job. But denigrating the job they were doing is like calling firemen lazy because they sit around the firehouse all day.

108: Snap out of your solipsism. YOU are hardly the issue.

The point here is, as Lambert as already alluded, is that President Bush and his handlers have done everything humanly possible to keep us and our surrogates in the media from the knowing to what extent he fulfilled his NG duty in lieu of actually submitting to the selective service, as so many less well-connected young men of his era had to, and in what ways he fell short of fulfilling his lesser commitment as someone trained to fly an obsolete jet.

All this blatant and unapologetic covering up while in full cry calling into question the loyalty and patriotism of anyone who dared pose a line of inquiry that fell short of blind fealty to their phony case for war.

Worse, this war-mongering president, without any precedent with which I am familiar, dressed up in a fighter pilot's outfit like he was going to a Halloween party and capered around the deck of USS Abraham Lincoln (who warned that you can fool some of the people some of the time and all of the people some of the time but not all of the people all of the time) dressed like some tin pot Latin American dictator, the the civilian commander-in-chief of this nation.

You didn't see Eisenhower in anything other than a suit or a golf shirt as president. But this National Guardsman of dubious record actually had his staff go to the contrived trouble to procure him a flight suit and a helmet for this shameful, self-serving charade aboard that only becomes more egregious and offensive with each passing day of our open-ended, bloody, incompetent, wasteful and presence in Iraq and with each fresh indictment of the prosecution of this unprecedented disaster, this sine qua non of all FUBARs, this cynical, gratuitous and fradulent invasion of a soveriegn nation that presented no credible threat to this nation or its allies.

LAMBERT: Cathartic, huh, Jimmy?

I was not comparing General Clark to the Swift Boats, yet I do not think that Clark's comments were all that courageous, neccesary, or even politically gainful for him or Obama. My point was that when the Swift Boats entered the conversation - one of the Swifters being on the John McCain team, I do not think that the Obama camp or the left would be wise to start making issue with who is supporting who. McCain unlike Hillary held restraint during the Rev. Wright media nightmare. He also has been relativley silent on the Clark comments.
To respond to another comment when has the left self policed their fringe groups? I do not recall John Kerry speaking out against web advertisements comparing our President to Hitler.

LAMBERT: Obviously Obama doesn't believe Clark's were gainful, either. It just isn't a broadly relevant issue. But in this modern era Obama's supporters will take great issue with McCain's connection of "war hero" to presidential credibility.

I'm not a solipsist jimmy. In my youth I guess I could acknowledge having been somewhat a trollupsist.

Anyway, you almost have me convinced - but I think I'd really be swayed if you could include another Schlageter anecdote, or a quote from the Network screenplay. I'm sure those aren't far from your fingertips, maybe in a word doc you cut and paste from when the time is right.

The serious dissection of this argument should go like this:

Clark is of course right - being a fighter pilot, getting shot down doesnt qualify anyone to be President. But close to 3 decades congressional and sentate experience does. So its an inane thing to say, and a stupid can of worms for a Friend of Obama to open. You end up comparing Obamas experience as a 'community organizer' and 'state rep' to McCain's 5 decades of big league public service. It makes Obama look small. Way to go Wes Clark.

LAMBERT: 108, the connection is shot down fighter pilot to presidential qualifications. That's all Clark was arguing. He as much said that McCain's years in the Senate, world travels, etc. were valid enough qualifications. Again though, as the full Clark interview reveals, the ground Obama wants to debate on is judgment. I doubt Obama will re-open Vietnam, but I will. The decision to fight in Vietnam was not based in sound judgment, a pattern that continues with McCain's support of Bush's folly in Iraq.

Thats a fair line of reasoning.

I agree. Damn those Republicans for starting Vietnam! Oh wait...

LAMBERT: If you want to stay on that track you might even be able to blame the French for Vietnam. How sweet would that be?

Just one quick thing, being a gal from Arizona, I am quite familiar with McCain. I do like his Campaign Finance reform policies and had you asked me 3.5 years ago, I would have maybe voted for him. However, this whole "experience" card is just getting old. I hate to bring it up, but W had "experience" running 3 companies into the ground and yet, he was elected (once or twice depending on who you ask). How well did his "experience" help him?

We have had plenty of presidents with "experience"--some okay, some fairly good, and some stinkers. But seriously, what "experience" qualifies you to be president? Might it be nice to actually see how someone with not a lot of experience does? The word "refreshing" comes to mind. He can't possibly do any worse then what has been going on for the past 7.5 years.

LAMBERT: Personally, I think 25 years in the Senate is worth something. McCain has been a player. He's put energy into some commendable legislation. If that had anything to do with getting shot down in Vietnam ... I doubt it. But the W precedent (who had no real experience governing, considering Texas' allotment of authority) makes the righties' blindered declaration that experience is the be all and end all more than just silly. But then, I don't think even they believe it. It's just something to say.

The funny thing is, amongst all the woman-ly niggering over McCain's service as a "qualifier" for President (and anyone who can't call someone who survived four years in North Vietnamese capture a hero is an asshat, pure and simple), is that Lib-felder and the other jihadists can and have not come up with ONE line regarding what in the wide wide world of sports suggests that the Obamasiah is qualified!

Not ONE!

LAMBERT: I believe the word "judgment" has been used repeatedly. As in "good" judgment. As in the opposite of what your boys have been deploying the last seven years. Easy on the CAPS keys, pal.

"Personally, I think 25 years in the Senate is worth something."

JFC.

WTF.

Are you f'in' kidding me?

And Bush's resume (and HERITAGE) is far, FAR superior (military, business, education) to stapling fliers on phone poles on the south side of Chicago....while attending a black separatist church and conspiring with a criminal like Rezcko.

Can you fools simply admit that The Obamassiah is simply a cipher, an empty vessel, into which braying liberals can pour all of your guilt, self loathing and hate of America?

LAMBERT: Check the screws on your hinges.

The conversation has moved from the validity of John McCain's heroism to his judgement. True, McCain volunteered to enter the armed forces during Vietnam, much like the 2004 Presidential nominee John Kerry (who based his early campaign on his four months in Vietnam).
McCain supported the war in Iraq in 2002, much like John Kerry (2004 Presidential nominee), Hillary Clinton (2008 early front runner), Harry Reid (Democratic Senate Majority leader), and John Edwards (VP and Presidential candiadate, and to his credit the only one who really has publicly regretted his vote).
Right now we have a Democratic controlled congress that continues to fund the war, a war which I think it is important to mention was passed with a Democratic majority Senate. Give Bush his due for what he did, but do we hold members of congress judgement to the same standard?

LAMBERT: I believe the voters held Hillary Clinton accountable for her vote. Had she voted against, or even expressed regret, as Edwards did, she might have won.

Hey, Bertram, Jr., your roiling bigotry's showing again. The word you were struggling to recall from your last year's word-a-day calendar is "niggling," not "niggerly," which I have no trouble believing comes much more readily to your alleged mind and is more pleasingly resonant to your tin ear.

Wow. Must be a slow news week if everyone's blowing their gaskets on this issue, because it strikes me as much ado about nothing. The unfortunate reality is that there is no empirical relationship between one's experience (whether in a prison camp, running a baseball team, the U.S. Senate or the streets of Chicago)and success as President. It's always a crap shoot because the Presidency is partly one's vision and ability to move meaningful legislation through Congress and partly reacting to world crises. I think both of these guys have sufficient experience to be President, different as their paths may have been.

Let's get on to more substantive issues, or a wrestling match between their wives.

LAMBERT: Finally, a high-minded alternative.

My money's on Cindy. And by the way, Cindy's CV makes Michelle O. look like some sort of washlady.

BTW, go stuff it Libfelder!:

http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=niggerly

LAMBERT: Bad as that is, it isn't the word you used.

Eat your hearts out, "Air America"!

http://www.drudgereport.com/flashrl.htm

When asked by the National Journal in 2003, "Do you think that military service inherently makes somebody better equipped to be commander-in-chief?" this politician answered, "Absolutely not. History shows that some of our greatest leaders have had little or no military experience. ... I have advised [a presidential candidate] that I'd be very careful about how much you talk about that, because you don't want it to sound self-serving." Who, do you suppose, was this politician giving out this advice, and to whom?

LAMBERT: Dick Cheney of George W.?

That was John McCain's, he who works his time as a POW into every possible opening in conversation, advice to John Kerry last time around.

OMG. Bertram, Jr., you truly are parody proof. Your desperate and circular reference describes, of course, only your very attempt to justify your spasm of racist diction with the "urban dictionary" link.

Tuh, look at your pimply white ass gettin' all "niggerly" trying to cover for your festering bigotry. "Niggerly," as defined in the very reference you cower behind, in no way describes what you were mewling about in the posts re: McCain.

But please, by all means, next time you screw up the courage to come into the city, be sure and get all "niggerly" and toss around some of your newly cribbed urban dictionary verbiage around black folks.

You are a constant reminder of the challenge Stephen Colbert takes on each night trying to parody your sort of sensibility.

So that's your explanation of why Obama is your guy?

Is English your first language?

Lib-felder, doesn't it get somewhat tiresome at your age, to be carrying that superior PC load in your pants around?

Spasm of racist diction indeed:

"to act ridiculous/stupid"

What part of that don't you understand?

LAMBERT: Maybe the part where you used a different word than the one you're quoting out of your spurious "Urban Dictionary". As Leinfelder says, I'd be interested the reaction your uh, vernacular, gets in certain parts of town.

My goodness, but you also have apparently joined the Uber-PC-we-know-where-"they"-live"-scolders society".

Are you suggesting that there are parts of this town where "certain" words, as determined by you, should not be used?

Isn't that somewhat, er, "racist"?

Would that not imply that someone should not use the word "honk" in, say, Wayzata?

Please clarify.

LAMBERT: Bertram my man, even you have to know there's a vast gulf between "honky" and what you're trying to pass of as some kind of common terminology.

Look, Bertram, Jr., since you apparently don't even read your own stuff, here is the word you used in context: "The funny thing is, amongst all the woman-ly niggering over McCain's service as a "qualifier" for President..." and (below) the "urban dictionary" definition for it.

Here's hoping you try out your street argot real soon on the north side, even though anyone familiar with your work under your multiple blogonyms knows it was just more of the real you oozing out:

1. niggering 13 up, 12 down
(1) To make racist jokes in front of persons of color, or any other majority or minority group, or in a public place.
(2) Use of the word "nigger" in front of persons of color, whether they are American or non-American, or in a public place.
(3) To work really, strenuously hard; typically for little pay. To be a slave.
(4) To abuse another person because of something out of their control, such as skin color, race, or a disability.
(1 and 2)
- "Why did that guy beat me up?"
- "Ah, because you went niggering out on the patio"

(3) "Ma, I won't be home until midnight because I was niggering all day. Please bring me some cookies."

(4) "It's not cool to go niggering at someone just because they're 4'11."

Bud Day is not a Swift Boat Veterans for Truth Guy, as it turns out. Thats the risk you take when your write4 a blog post based on a CNN report though. Liberal media strikes again.

LAMBERT: 108 ... your "liberal media" in this situation is the Moonie-funded Washington Times and the Conservative Political Action Committee:

"On Thursday, the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) begins its annual conference. The Washington Times writes, “One of the more timely titles of CPAC’s slate of panel discussions: ‘The Left’s Repeated Campaign Against the American Soldier.’” The panel will reunite operatives from the Swift Boat Veterans For Truth, a group that dedicated itself in 2004 to attacking Senator John Kerry’s record during and after his service in Vietnam.

CPAC’s website indicates that the panel participants will be: Ret. Col. George E. “Bud” Day, Mary Jane McManus, Carlton Sherwood, and Rep. Sam Johnson (R-TX). Johnson was on the House floor last week attacking Iraq war critics relentlessly for “cutting funding of the troops,” while conveniently forgetting that he “wholeheartedly supported withholding funds” to end the U.S. involvement in Bosnia in 1995. Some background on the other panelists:

George “Bud” Day: He appeared in national advertisements for the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth campaign. Day said of John Kerry, “My view is he basically will go down in history sometime as the Benedict Arnold of 1971.” Following the 2004 election, Day signed on as President of the newly formed Vietnam Veterans Legacy Foundation, which absorbed virtually all the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth members and officers. Day claimed that “left-wing propagandists in the press” have told a “false history of Vietnam” that has been used to “demoralize our troops.”