First let's dispense with this swift boat stuff. Throw out all the Kerry detractors who weren't on the boat and you are left with a handful who actually served with him. Their support of Kerry speaks for itself. End of controversy.
Then there's the issue of Kerry's anti-war record after returning from Viet Nam. A lot of GI's came home with horror stories of their own and quietly tried to put the pieces of their lives back together. Others spoke out against what they had seen, and despite good war records, chose to actively voice opposition. Anyone who lived during that time (and actually understood the national mood) knows how incredibly polarizing Viet Nam was. I don't find it incongruous at all for Kerry to have both a good war record and subsequently voice vehement opposition to the war.
If you believe, as some conservative writers would have you believe, that any opposition to the Iraq war is tantamount to treason, then they've done a good job of convincing you by extension that protesting against the Viet Nam war was also unpatriotic. it's easy to see how the Republicans have used revisionist history to demonize Kerry's post-war record, especially since if elected, he'll inherit a tangled knot called Iraq.
No longer Donald Segretti-like campaign tricksters, Republican strategists have evolved into clever, calculating and effective information managers.
Shortly after Kerry started to respond to attacks that the 527 airing the swift boat ads was involved with the Bush re-election campaign and that Bush should publicly denounce the attacks, White house press secretary Scott McClellan first floated the idea that the President was against soft money on all fronts. In an August 5th briefing McCClellan stated, "The President deplores all the unregulated soft-money activity. We have been very clear in stating that, you know, we will not -- and we have not and we will not question Senator Kerry's service in Vietnam."
As the heat grew on Bush to denounce the specific activity of the 527, he did so this week, nearly a week after the ads stopped running. But Bush, from what I can tell, didn't actually denounce the ads themselves, instead preferring to condemn the use of "soft money." "I think they're (527's) bad for the system," Bush said.
So now it's an issue of 527's and "soft money" and apparently has nothing to do with Kerry's war record. Damage done and the trap is sprung. Expect Bush to push this point and keep the Kerry camp on the defensive. A quick look at the top 527's and their political affiliation (and their fund-raising activities) shows where all this has been going. It's no secret that Democrat-leaning 527's are very active and well-funded. In fact, in the top 50, it's hard to find a Republican-based 527.
While the Swift boat controversy plays itself out as a minor issue in a slow news month, it has conveniently given the Republicans the opening they needed to attack 527's - and bait Kerry into doing the same. Should they be successful, the Republicans will have robbed Kerry of millions of anti-Bush money.
Republican campaign strategists should get a well-deserved pat on the back from RNC leaders. They've managed to cast doubt on Kerry's war record, portray him as a waffling anti-war traitor and are in the process of denying funding to the one advantage the Democrats have - 527's.
This ought to be interesting. I wonder how many references to abolishing 527's we hear at the Republican convention.
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