SwiftVets.com

[ArrMatey]

I have an idea from the grassroots, for what it's worth. If the editors of this board were to issue responses to the attacks like the Washington Post articles, some of us would be happy to distribute them on our own websites.

I operate a political website with its own message board, and network with several people who also operate message boards, and while the audience at each individual board may amount to several hundred, things tend to get spread out into blogs and boards pretty quickly.

Therefore, if there were any press releases or responses crafted by the editors, I'd do what I could to post and distribute them immediately and frequently.

[integritycounts]

Rapid response is over rated. People think that just because they are following the intra-day news cycle that everything needs to happen with in it.

That is just wrong.

The truth and integrity are what counts. Not the speed of what would be perceived as a bickering match.

O'Neill has not made a single mistake yet, may I suggest to you he knows how to navigate his boat.

Relax, Kerry is exposed, his website includes more contradiction to the prior stories.

You want to be the Hare the Jack Rabbit.....But the Tortoise will win.....just watch....O'Neill has not made a mistake yet..... he does not need to flinch now.

Don't Flinch to Kerry's latest puffery

[Scott]

[Polaris]

Integrity,

Rapidresponse is vital. I am satisfied with the response that the Swiftvets have given. It is solid, hard, and very damaging to Kerry...and now Kerry has just shifted the whole ball game in our favor.

But...and this is important especially in the day of the internet and satillite communications.....we were almost too slow. I note that the Bush/Cheney people had a response out that was thought out within the hour after Kerry attacked them. IMHO we need to be a bit better prepared in the future because it just gets nastier from here.
_________________
-Polaris

Truth is Beauty

[Beldar]

Thanks for the link, Scott. (Everything I write is long; you're right to warn folks.)

IMHO, if O'Neill and the SwiftVets were to file a defamation lawsuit against Kerry at this point, the almost certain result would be a motion by Kerry to dismiss on the basis of the pleadings, with a motion to stay all pretrial discovery until the motion to dismiss had been ruled upon. I think the odds are very high that both motions would be granted. A lawsuit just isn't the way to go.

On the other hand, if Kerry were to file a defamation lawsuit, he'd have a much harder time blocking discovery. Which is one reason he won't, threats from the lawyers for KE2004 and the DNC notwithstanding.

Given the incredibly high standards that a "public-figure" plaintiff has to meet to keep a defamation lawsuit in court -- much less to eventually win it -- neither side has a decent defamation case against the other. This is a battle that should be, and almost certainly will be, played out in the court of public opinion and the voting booth, not in a courtroom.

On the (third) hand, there's a chance that the new Judicial Watch complaint filed with the DoD might be able to shake loose some documents and evidence that a defamation lawsuit couldn't. I don't have a lot of hope for that, but it's a new wild card that's been thrown on the table. (I've blogged about it at http://www.beldar.org/beldarblog/2004/08/judicial_watch_.html ).

[Beatrice1000]