Mr. Auster,

Do you really believe the pure crap in this “Chronwatch” article by Barbara Stock?
Do you really believe John Kerry was awarded a Silver Star in Vietnam for running down a wounded North Vietnamese soldier and finishing him off behind a “hootch”.
I’m not really sure what to say here. Barbara Stock’s piece is the type of character assasination usually found on left wing nut sites. I don’t remember reading anything this crude at VFR before. I hope I never see such nuttiness here again.
For those of us on the right, this kind of crap hurts our cause. It does not help it.

For all I know, Bartelson is right about the medal. I will check that out. (I have looked it up and have only found general information about leading an assault against Viet Cong; if Bartelson has more information, he could share it with us.) What made me decide to link the article was not the Vietnam episode but the quote of Kerry’s charge of atrocities by the U.S. military in Vietnam. I had seen that quote before, including in a famous speech by W.F. Buckley at West Point, and I thought it was worth while to show the rank anti-Americanism that launched Kerry in his political career, and which he still exhibits (in a muted form) today.

In response to Bartelson’s criticisms, I’ve redone the blog entry, so that I’m quoting from the ChronWatch article only the material about his votes on intelligence funding that was of interest to me. The account in that article of his acts in Vietnam does seem so tendentious that it’s very likely incorrect.

Here’s William Buckley revisiting Kerry’s total condemnation of the U.S. over the Vietnam war, and comparing it to Kerry’s position on the Iraq war:

http://www.nationalreview.com/buckley/buckley200401231611.asp

Here is an excellent article by Mackubin Thomas Owens of the Naval War College giving the background on Kerry’s lies to Congress in 1971. Owens’s closing point: Kerry must be forced to account for the atrocity claims he made back then. If he still believes them, then he can’t claim to be a “proud” veteran of the Vietnam war. If he doesn’t believe them, then he was lying back then and slandering his fellow servicemen and the United States. Either way, he is a big liar.

http://www.nationalreview.com/owens/owens200401270825.asp

Owens is using B.G. Burkett’s excellent book, Stolen Valor, for a reference. A book you should read if you haven’t. There was a meeting in Detroit in 1971 called “Winter Soldiers.” At this event, various veterans confessed to horrible atrocities they had either seen or committed in Vietnam. However, a good many of them weren’t even IN Vietnam. A cottage industry has developed were men claim to have knowledge of US atrocities. Often these men were never in the military at all. Some were actual veterans who tell false stories for their own benefit, political or otherwise.

The idea of the US soldier in Vietnam as a wanton killer of noncombatants has long been a staple of the Left. This seems to be a given among Hollywood screenwriters, filmmakers, and film critics in general. Remember all the “crazy vet criminals” on the cop shows in the Seventies? The film, We Were Soldiers, was criticized by many reviewers (David Denby in The New Yorker was one) for not showing US soldiers in a negative way.

Your saying all of Kerrys lies when you probably haven’t even considered the fact that Bush lies just as much as Kerry does. To be president of the United states of America you have to be a good liar! Thats why Gore didnt win. You really should consider looking at Bush’s lies.

Why should we look at Bush’s lies? surely if you were smart you’d know that kerry’s lies add up far more then his…Bush, right or wrong has always be strait up and honest about what he was going to do. however, john kerry has flip flops. his opinions are based apone what group of people he’s around (to get their votes, I assume) anyone who looks at the two should be able to see a big differance…Bush has morals. he’s not stabbing babies in the neck with partial birth abortions (the abortion that kerry wants to make legal again, by the way) he’s also not a flip flop. he says what he means and means what he says. he’s a christian man and has a good heart! his plan is a plan to a better america! and I don’t understand how anyone could see differantly!

In answer to Holly, Bush is certainly better than Kerry in many respects. However, the objections to Bush on this site over the last few years include:

1) His support for open borders and illegal alien amnesty, combined with his support for affirmative action and related leftist multiculturalism/group rights nonsense, will combine to destroy this country over time. Ever growing ethnic groups, each with a Third-world group rights mentality, will use the group rights precedents to extinguish the Anglo-American heritage of individual rights. This would mean that the country called America might exist in 2050 or 2100 A.D., but it will bear little resemblance to the historic American culture. George W. Bush does not merely fail to oppose this; he is one of the instigators and cheerleaders of the process of cultural destruction.

2) George Bush’s liberalism is redefining both conservatism and the GOP in the eyes of the public. This could lead to a country with no real conservative political force at all. For example, increasing dependency on government via the prescription drug welfare program, massive increases in spending, huge deficits, never vetoing a spending bill in four years, supporting homosexual civil unions (did you know that he said this the other day?) while trying to pacify conservatives with lukewarm support of an amendment to ban gay marriage, along with the liberal policies on immigration and affirmative action, all make Bush more liberal than conservative. Yet, because he is more conservative than Kerry, Bush is called the “conservative” in this race. Conservatism is being redefined before our eyes by Bush.

That’s a nice summary by Mr. Coleman of conservative objections to Bush. We can add the abortion issue to an extent also. Bush has failed to push Congress on his judicial nominees. Worse, he intervened on behalf of the excreable Arlen Specter in the PA primary against the conservative Pat Tommey. Specter, leftist snake that he is, explicitly stated that he will block any pro-life Bush judicial nominee in return. Specter is slated to become chairman of the Senate Judiciary committee if Republicans retain control. Either Bush was too dumb to figure this out, or he really cares little for opposing abortion - a position one would expect from a Corporatist Liberal.

George W. Boilerplate - the opiate of the conservatives.

Excellent summary of Bush’s positions by Mr. Coleman. I would add his mindless FreeMarketUberAlles economics theology. Made ironic to be held by a man who is a protypical crony-capitalist.

All jobs this guy has ever had were in public sector, quasi-goverment monopoly (prof sport team) and generating tax losses for daddy’s rich friends by blowing their money on dry holes.

With his job experience, ideology and lack of intellectual depth, GWBush in economics arena is an easy pray for short term oriented multinationals and hostile foreign powers (China, Russia).