Swift Boat Book "Sleazy" and "Filled with Lies"
Reported by Marie Therese - August 13, 2004 -
Capital Report. CNBC. August 12, 2004.
Host: Alan Murray - Partial transcript of interview with guests Lawrence O'Donnell, MSNBC Senior Political Analyst and Byron York, White House Correspondent for the National Review
CLIP OF CNBC's Eamon Javers reporting that "Historian Douglas Brinkley told CNBC today that O'Neill's account is 'a sleazy book filled with lies'. Brinkley says Kerry did, in fact, go into Cambodia numerous times in 1969, although he was not there on Chrismas Eve 1968. The political fight over what happened one night over more than 35 years ago shows how raw the wounds still are for the generation that fought the war in Vietnam, and just how bitter this year's Presidential election will be."
Host Alan Murray asks if any of this matters.
O'DONNELL: "Well, it's hard to see what sense it makes in the current political campaign. You know the game going on now with John O'Neill's book is: 'Can we find one thing that Sen. Kerry has said that is untrue?,' because they're not doing so well when they get into the argument about 'Was he heroic in rescuing Jim Rassmann in the water?' because Rassmann will tell you that they were firing live rounds from all over the place. John O'Neill's people will say they weren't and there just isn't a way to pick the truthteller in this."
Murray comments that Kerry has used the Cambodia anecdote to call Nixon a liar about Cambodia, then notes "of course, the President WAS lying about Cambodia, but if Kerry was lying as well that certainly muddies the whole point."
YORK: "...He [Kerry] has offered rather detailed explanations of his being in Cambodia over the years. For example, he has said that he was on a special mission with the CIA. The campaign now says that wasn't Christmas 1968, it was at some other time. But still he's offered very detailed accounts of his time in Cambodia. That means we really need to know a little more about it."
O'DONNELL: "...We're never ever going to be able to prove in any objective fashion exactly where John Kerry was on Christmas eve 1968. Let's just remember. We have a President of the United States who can't prove whether or not he was in Alabama during his National Guard service, because military records are terrible and military records, we know, in Vietnam on matters like body count and exact placement of troops were falsified. We're not gonna have a historical proof here."
MURRAY: "Is it wise for Republicans to be allowing this line of argument to proceed when they're dealing with a candidate who didn't serve at all and served in the National Guard instead?"
YORK: "Well, I don't think Republicans can actually control all this....Yes, John Kerry's argument could be 'Maybe I wasn't in Cambodia Christmas of 1968, but I'll tell you where I was. I was in the Navy, I was on active duty, I was serving my country in Vietnam' and that's a very good argument, and, I think, it'll stop things right there for a number of people. On the other hand, Kerry is essentially saying that his service in Vietnam is, perhaps, the centerpiece of his campaign for the Presidency, the most important qualification he has to be Commander-in-Chief and, by the way, "You can't ask me any questions about it'."
Comment:
First, I would like to say that it was a delight to watch a political show where the participants actually listened to each other and responded in a normal tone of voice. After watching so much of FOX IT'S ALWAYS THIS LOUD AND THIS EXPLOSIVE, what a treat to listen to three intelligent men with something to say and the self-confidence to respect the other person's opinion. Thank you, CNBC!
Richard Nixon announced in a speech on April 30, 1970 that he would authorize the invasion of Cambodia. However, Nixon knew when he gave this speech that, prior to this date, he had already begun illegal, clandestine incursions into Cambodia.
I frankly don't care whether Kerry was in Cambodia in late 1968 or in 1969. As someone who lived through the Vietnam insanity, the issue for me was (and is) not a matter of one night or another, but the fact that, prior to April 30, 1970, ALL incursions into Cambodia were ILLEGAL and our government asked men like John Kerry to break the law and that was wrong.
I suggest John O'Neill and his cohorts take the beams out of their own eyes before they worry about the splinter in John Kerry's.
