A Death Blow To Kerry's Campaign

Once again, kerry making his Vietnam service one of the pillars of his campaign comes back to bite him in the ass. - Sailor

A Death Blow To Kerry's Campaign
Posted September 22, 2004
By Adam Yoshida
insightmag.com

I think that many people who have seen the sixth ad being put out by the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth will agree with me when say that the ad, entitled "Friends" had the potential to do as much damage to the Kerry campaign as the entire Rathergate/Danron fiasco. Don't believe me? Watch the ad yourself. And, in case you can't see it, here's a transcript.

The beauty of this ad is that it is simple, verifiably true, and
utterly devastating. We know that John Kerry met with the Vietnamese Communists because he admitted it to us. We know that, as American boys fought and died in the muck of Vietnam, John Kerry sat with their perfumed diplomats in Europe and conspired to hand victory in the war to the Communists. We know this to be true. We know it because John Kerry told it to us.

Let me quote him exactly, because it's important to get this right. Kerry said, "I have been to Paris. I have talked with both delegations at the peace talks, that is to say the Democratic Republic of Vietnam and the Provisional Revolutionary Government." His words, ladies and gentlemen. While the United States was at war, John Kerry went to Paris and spoke with the enemies of the Republic.

People say that what happened thirty-plus years ago doesn't matter, shouldn't matter in this campaign. Perhaps, in most cases, that should be true. But in this case it certainly does matter. Does any sane person really believe that whether or not George W. Bush showed up for a week's worth of drills in Alabama thirty-three years ago is somehow more consequential than the admitted fact that Senator Kerry, as a nearly thirty year-old politician, travelled to a foreign nation to meet with the enemies of this country while the nation was at war and then returned in order to advocate that the United States accept peace on the terms of the communist Vietnamese (or, in other words, surrender)?

If this gets out (and since the Swift Vets are reportedly set to spend $2 million running this ad, it will) how does the Kerry campaign respond to it in a credible fashion? In essence, they're left with a handful of options, all of them bad.

They can ignore the accusations altogether, but I don't think they'll try that one again, seeing as it worked so well with the first Swift Vet assault.

Attempting to deflect attention by attacking Bush on his National
Guard service is out now since, thanks to CBS (and probably the DNC too), pretty much anything to do with Bush's guard service is going to be radioactive for the rest of the campaign.

Perhaps they can trot Senator Kerry out to, in the mother of all flip-flops, apologize for some of his anti-war activism.

Alternately, they can act outraged that anyone would, "question
Senator Kerry's patriotism." This, in all probability, is the course that they'll take in the coming days.

And they'll be right: it is an attack on Senator Kerry's patriotism. But, much more importantly than that, it is an accurate attack on his patriotism. Worse still (for Kerry's dwindling legions) is that it feeds into perceptions of how Senator Kerry would behave as President.

The most obvious point that must be taken from his claims as to
Vietnamese intentions at the time is that either Kerry is a liar or he is an extremely gullible man (or perhaps both). Also in his Senate testimony in 1971, John Kerry told the American people that, at the most, the lives of perhaps two thousand to three thousand South Vietnamese would be at risk if the United States withdrew from Vietnam. As we would later see, the numbers would be substantially higher.

This, of course, was not a surprise to anyone with a lick of common sense. He entire world had already seen the crimes of communism in Russia, in Eastern Europe, in China and, indeed, in North Vietnam. Only a very easily deceived person could have believed that the pattern would not repeat the moment the Vietnamese Communists gripped the South within their claws.

Even worse, this wasn't the only time that Senator Kerry allowed
himself to be deceived by foreign enemies of the United States, nor was it the only time that Kerry was used to deliver the demands of an enemy of the United States to the American government and people.

In 1985, the newly-elected Senator Kerry took a trip to Nicaragua,
where he met with the communist dictator of that country. When he
returned to the United States from that trip, the Senator had brought something with him: the Sandinistas' offer for peace with the United States. Once more John Forbes Kerry voluntarily conveyed the demands of a hostile foreign power to his own government. Yet again John Kerry called upon the President of the United States to accept, in whole, the terms offered by an enemy of the Republic.

Once the American people know this history, once they've taken it all in, they'll be left with the same frightful question that I've carried with me for nine months: what happens if the person receiving that
offer is no longer Lieutenant Kerry or Senator Kerry, but President Kerry? What happens if there's no one higher on up for Kerry to call upon to accept the enemy's terms: what if Kerry himself is in a position to accept the enemy's terms?

This is significant because the John Kerry of 2004 shows every sign of being every bit as gullible as the John Kerry of 1985 and the John Kerry of 1971. He's claimed that foreign leaders are eager to see him become President. I'll bet they are.

All of this takes on even greater importance since Kerry proposes to, as President, base his entire foreign policy upon seeking negotiated solutions to the world's problems and since Senator Kerry apparently believes that "negotiating" means "accepting uncritically whatever those sophisticated foreigners tell me" this means that a President Kerry would almost certainly have a foreign policy revolving around the calculated sale of America's national interest.

Kerry pretends to talk tough on North Korea, but then he says things like, "We must be prepared to negotiate a comprehensive agreement that addresses the full range ofÇF? North Korea's concerns about security and economic development." It doesn't take a genius to figure out what Senator Kerry really means. When he accuses the Bush Administration of "not paying enough attention" to North Korea he really means, "Being insufficiently slavish in appeasing Kim Jong Il."

The same is true on Iran. Senator Kerry talks about getting tough, and yet his core proposal for dealing with Iran's nuclear ambitions involves giving nuclear fuel to the Ayatollahs. No, I didn't make that up. Here's Senator Kerry himself, "We should call their bluff, and organize a group of states that will offer the nuclear fuel they need for peaceful purposes and take back the spent fuel so they can't divert it to build a weapon." He's so trusting (or stupid) that he's almost cute.

But, in truth, there's nothing cute about the fact that virtually
every time that Senator Kerry has dealt with an enemy of the United States (or offered a proposal for dealing with an enemy) in the field of diplomacy, his response has been to become an advocate of proposals favourable to that enemy.

In 1971, John Kerry wanted the US to unilaterally begin withdrawing from Vietnam and trust the North Vietnamese Communists to return US POW's of their own volition.

In 2004, John Kerry wants to give "nuclear fuel" to Iran and trust that they won't do anything bad with it, won't divert any portion of it, and will give it all back just as they're supposed to.

John Kerry may trust the enemies of America but the American people just can't trust John Kerry.