The American Spectator

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Going to Kerry City

3.25.04 @ 12:01AM

MISSING THE ACTION
Re: Paul Beston's Kansas City Kerry:

Thank you for "Kansas City Kerry," Mr. Paul Beston. The best part was the fact that both sides have agreed to keep silent. 'Course most minds won't be changed anyway. They would rather die than admit they were wrong. And turning their backs on their favorite news anchor would be a sin. Vietnam has never been settled, and never will. Brainwashing is very effective, unless you daily look for it, and deny it any roots. Americans have sat on their behinds and soaked in CBS, NBC, ABC, and the Jane Fonda Hollywood swill for years. Swim in a septic tank long enough, and you can't get the stink off.

But Vietnam is still being fought on the Internet. Thankyoualgore. Some of us refuse to be silent. We refuse to say Vietnam was a mistake. We refuse to agree to disagree.

So there you have it. Republicans, Democrats and Nam Vets. As for me personally: I go with Bush. Period.
-- Martin N. Tirrell
Lisbon, New Hampshire

If Republicans were the same as Democrats, we would just let this story die down, then on Friday afternoon before the election, media sources would be awash with an alarming allegation made by another Vietnam Veterans Against the War meeting attendee that "Kerry attended the meeting, and they proposed the assassination of a senator that may have been a powerful Democrat!".

The problem, of course, is that the story wouldn't be reported until the media fully investigated the impact on Kerry's electability, or if reported, denounced as a scheme to harm a candidate in the last moments before an election with an "unproven allegation" with no time for the candidate to effectively respond.

Nowadays, although, you could bank on the media fully covering a 30 year-old Kerry DUI immediately...right?

Play no favorites! Let the chips fall where they may!
-- John Carrigg
Downers Grove, Illinois

The Republicans ought to make an issue of Kerry's involvement with the VVAW and his antiwar activities which are reported to have been viewed favorably by North Viet Namese commanders. What he did amounted to giving aid and comfort to the enemy and may have cost some Americans their lives. At the time Kerry was under FBI surveillance for his war protest efforts he was a 27-28 year old former Navy Officer. He can't lay claim to the youthful exuberance of a college student. What he did reveals a lot about his character and how he would function as a Commander in Chief.
-- Dick Melville
Ozone Park, New York

You write in today's column that Kerry's Kansas City meeting will probably go nowhere as a political issue. I agree. But what about this claim? True or false, it's damning and more checkable:

"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." -- from Kerry's 1971 Senate Testimony, page 186.

Trouble is, I can't find any reference to Kerry's actual presence at the peace talks. So many questions.

1. Was Kerry making this one up too, pushing back the fossil record
30 years on his pattern of weird self-inflationary lying about meetings with "foreign leaders"?

2. Was Kerry telling the truth? If so, was he breaking U.S. law about unauthorized negotiations with same foreign leaders? Later in the testimony, he allows that he may have stepped over the line, but pleads lamely that Sen. Joe McCarthy did it too and didn't get caught. Oh? And what peace conference did McCarthy attend?

3. Finally, why hasn't anyone ever asked for Kerry's recollections of this fascinating brush with history? I'd love to hear what Le Duc Tho told Kerry. "You know, you gotta win this one" and replace that "lying crook" Nixon, etc.

Letter to the Editor

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