The American Spectator

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Goodbye to All That

8.30.04 @ 12:01AM

(Page 2 of 5)

Lawrence Henry replies: Let me correct Mr. Fleutte's impression as gently as I can. I am of course familiar with Raymond Chandler's The Long Goodbye, indeed, with every book in his oeuvre, all of which I have already read and re-read. Chandler and Dashiell Hammett are justifiably credited with bringing the mystery novel up to the stature of literature, and with setting the standard for all writers to follow. They are indeed so widely credited that Chandler's title, The Long Goodbye, has entered the English language on its own, as a ready image, and is widely used without credit, simply because everybody knows it. See also any number of phrases from Shakespeare, such as "the dogs of war."

CHRISTMAS IN AUGUST
Re: Patrick Hynes's Self-Inflicted:

"BUT DEZENHALL WARNS REPUBLICANS not to plan their family vacations to the national capital around a second Bush inaugural just yet. "Don't forget that August is always scandal season. John Kennedy once said that no president survives his first August. By engaging this issue right now, there's a good chance it will be out of the way before the real campaign starts," he said."

That's right; and then we finally get to explore Kerry's abysmal Senate record! Then we have the debates! I feel like a kid opening presents on Christmas morning!
-- Bill Kearney
Knoxville, Tennessee

As we'd say down South, John Kerry and his crew stepped in something that's a lot messier and offensive smelling than a rotten onion. They're now up to their knees in it and sinking fast, too.

Given it took three or so weeks for Kerry to admit -- of course, the mainstream media missed it -- that the Swiftees correctly criticized his first Purple Heart, it'll be about July 4th of next year, if that soon, when he finishes addressing all criticisms.

As to his response to the Swiftees, the expert who said it's been mismanaged and the other one who said the Swiftees could've been marginalized both missed the mark. Kerry and his campaign appear inept, ineffectual and weak not just because they are these things, but also this: They're trying to defend lies. They can't.

I laughed reading that the anonymous Democrat complained that Kerry's "signature" issue, which they'd spent months portraying as "war hero, war hero," has been compromised. Get serious. They didn't do their homework. They're getting served just desserts for promoting a candidate whose war experiences are fictional or semi-fictional and whose political baggage includes a 20-year lackluster Congressional career and no vision for America's future.

There's divine payback in this. The Dems were against Vietnam at its end. If memory serves, they advanced a candidate in 1992 that not only dodged the draft, but criticized America while on foreign soil. And their current candidate said Vietnam shouldn't be part of that presidential campaign.

Compared to them, the Keystone Cops look sophisticated, focused and expert.
-- C. Kenna Amos Jr.
Princeton, West Virginia

I confess to personal delight at seeing John Kerry implode, unravel, wind down, and whatever else he is doing to himself. I think that it all boils down to two things: 1. As is now painfully no secret, Kerry has wrapped himself in the straitjacket of his Vietnam experiences -- the real and the unreal -- and, 2. He and his campaign / party have bought into their own propaganda that Bush and his people are all village idiots. In a word, they have completely misunderestimated their foe. They should have learned from their own failed attempt at a coup in Florida that they were not dealing with fools. The Democrat snobs can go on and on all they want about Bush's lack of gravitas and nuance, but he is far from the stupid, feckless man they try to make of him. Kerry, on the other hand, has nuanced himself right into a corner. It would be painful to watch if I were not enjoying it so much.

Incidentally, average people don't appreciate candidates or pitch men using words they have to look up in the dictionary. And really, nuance sounds an awful lot like nuisance -- and I'm beginning to feel that the Kerry campaign has become a public nuisance.
-- Steve Hayes
Utah
average person

Mr. Hynes' article on Kerry's response to the Swift Boat Veterans' advertisements was interesting and informative. My personal (nonpolitical) opinion is that Mr. Kerry could have minimized the increasingly large problem that this group poses by ignoring it (a point made by experts in the article).

However, I also believe that Kerry very likely couldn't have ignored the Swift Boat Vets. I mean that he was psychologically unable to do so.

If, as is charged, he went to Vietnam for "political" reasons, and if, as charged, he "gamed" the system to acquire his medals, (not to mention the very real possibility that he married -- twice -- for something other than love), then we know that, on a deep psychological level, Kerry is a phony with a very insubstantial personality. I don't mean that he's insane, or even neurotic; only that the public attributes of his personality are built on half- (or un-) truths. Thus, he has numerous reasons to feel insecure about his life, and particularly, his putative heroism.

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