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Billman
Lt.Jg.
Joined: 14 Aug 2004
Posts: 126
Location: Seattle, WA
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 Posted: Fri Oct 01, 2004 8:34 pm Post subject: |
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Let's stay precise with the facts. Per the debate transcript, Kerry said:
| Quote: | | KERRY: I understand what the president is talking about, because I know what it means to lose people in combat. And the question, is it worth the cost, reminds me of my own thinking when I came back from fighting in that war. |
Certainly, that can be claimed a technically accurate statement, if a bit misleading.
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-- Bill in Seattle |
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Tom Poole
Vice Admiral
Joined: 07 Aug 2004
Posts: 914
Location: America
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| Posted: Fri Oct 01, 2004 8:36 pm Post subject: |
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It fits his profile to twist and manipulate even those things sacred.
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'58 Airedale HMR(L)-261 VMO-2 |
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Lance_Flatchew
Ensign
Joined: 21 Sep 2004
Posts: 53
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| Posted: Fri Oct 01, 2004 8:54 pm Post subject: died - not of physical injuries |
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I am 55 and never served in the military, but I lost friends who died over there and one who came back and died - not of physical injuries.
Kerry is not unique...
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http://www.tangate.com
Yes, you can lie about your war record. You can lie about spending Christmas in Cambodia. You can lie about ... atrocities of your fellow soldiers. But we are going to nail you on tangate 04. |
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Denis
Seaman Recruit
Joined: 24 Aug 2004
Posts: 48
Location: North Carolina
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| Posted: Fri Oct 01, 2004 10:03 pm Post subject: |
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| Billman wrote: | Let's stay precise with the facts. Per the debate transcript, Kerry said:
| Quote: | | KERRY: I understand what the president is talking about, because I know what it means to lose people in combat. And the question, is it worth the cost, reminds me of my own thinking when I came back from fighting in that war. |
Certainly, that can be claimed a technically accurate statement, if a bit misleading. |
I agree that someone could find fudge room in that, but also that such would be purely dishonest. He spoke to what Bush was 'talking about', and what Bush was talking about was being the commander who ordered men into harm's way, not someone who knows people who so died, or had friends who so died, or whose comrades so died.
It was and is dishonest. Having said that, no, it is not a big deal, a thundering mistake that will sink the Good Ship Kerrypop. However, as with the Cambodia story, it is purely another example of where Kerry will be something like genetically predisposed to puff himself up with distorted claims about his truncated Vietnam service. 'The President bears a burden for sending warriors into harm's way, and some die, well, I, John Kerry went through the same in my four months....'
It is another indication of the man's character, and how he views things about himself in a self deluded way., and again, uses Vietnam as his personal enhanced resume.
In 2003, speaking at a memorial in Virginia for Martin Luther King, Kerry went once again to - of course - Vietnam, with this:
| Quote: | | "I remember well April 1968, I was serving in Vietnam, a place of violence..." |
Point is, at that time he was on the USS Gridley, which had not come under any kind of attack and may not even have been to Vietnam yet. Here there is wiggle room also, as Kerry does not claim to have seen, participated in or been in danger of this violence! So what is the point, other than again and as always making of himself the glorious warrior suffering the pain of Vietnam as all these tragedies occur!
Later he told the NYTimes that he was aboard the Gridley and 'headed' for Vietnam when King was killed.
Source
My point is, the man is a complex mix of self-delusion and self-serving distortions, and he intentionally plants those distortions. Like a shrink determining that someone is, how shall we say, someone who needs serious professional help over the long term, the analysis is generally built up over time and the observance of many small incidents that make the conclusion, rather than simply calling oneself Napoleon Bonaparte!
If we were to be 'precise, as you say, he claimed he understood the feelings of a commander who had ordered men to that which resulted in their deaths, when he had never done any such thing. Being precise is the antidote to fudge factors.
Denis |
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Bean Counter
Seaman Recruit
Joined: 23 Sep 2004
Posts: 6
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| Posted: Sat Oct 02, 2004 7:26 am Post subject: Lose men in combat |
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We seem to be certain that no man under Kerry's direct command lost his life. And grieving for his school friend could have happened if the guy died in a car crash, considering Kerry's remoteness from action on the Gridley.
It has been said that the Swifties of different crews bunked and ate together at the base. So the only way I could see giving Kerry a pass on this is if they lost people in his unit (squadron?) when he was there.
My father in law was a bombadier on B-17F's. I was with him at the 94th Bomb Group reunion near where I lived then. Bill was a pretty tall guy, and probably not easy to forget. A very small man came up to him and said "I think I remember you." Bill wasn't sure and the guy repeated "I'm sure I remember you." Bill thought a bit more and it came to him. He said in the softest voice I'd ever heard from him, "I remember now, you were the orphan" For whatever reason, that man didn't fly that day with the rest of his crew - and they didn't come back. He came to Bill's hut and asked to bunk with them because he couldn't stand all those empty beds. |
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sevry
Commander
Joined: 13 Aug 2004
Posts: 326
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| Posted: Sat Oct 02, 2004 11:48 am Post subject: |
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| Bob Chamberlain wrote: | | Yeah, Denis, you're right - especially when the two sentences are put up right next to each other, as they were in the debate. But I still think his phrasing is vague enough to allow him to wiggle out |
Sure, if there were no 'new media'. But he's not talking about knowing of people who were killed, even those with whom he supposedly was friendly in a warzone. Everyone knows people killed in combat - loved ones, relatives. And most aren't even in the military who know of people killed or wounded in combat. He's saying that he lost men in combat, or there's no point in his saying it, that way. He knows more than all these others, in other words, because it happened to those in his command. He has to live with that. There's no 'wiggle-room'.
Now, he may have misspoke - to be unreasonably charitable. He may have MEANT to say that he knew the pain and suffering of knowing that people had been killed in combat, just like everyone else. But that's not what he said. |
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Hammer2
PO2
Joined: 30 Aug 2004
Posts: 387
Location: Texas
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| Posted: Sat Oct 02, 2004 7:04 pm Post subject: |
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This is what Bush was talking about:
To Mrs. Lydia Bixby
Executive Mansion,
Washington, Nov. 21, 1864.
Dear Madam, - I have been shown in the files of the War Department a statement of the Adjutant-General of Massachusetts that you are the mother of five sons who have died gloriously on the field of battle.
I feel how weak and fruitless must be any words of mine which should attempt to beguile you from the grief of a loss so overwhelming. But I cannot refrain from tendering to you the consolation that may be found in the thanks of the Republic they died to save.
I pray that our heavenly Father may assuage the anguish of your bereavement, and leave you only the cherished memory of the loved and lost, and the solemn pride that must be yours to have laid so costly a sacrifice upon the altar of freedom.
Yours, very sincerely and respectfully, Mrs. Bixby,
A. Lincoln.
John Kerry has NEVER had to write a letter like this one, his comments were a cheap attempt to equate himself as a commander equal to Bush.
He makes me want to vomit!
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"The price of freedom is eternal vigilence" - Thomas Jefferson
"An armed society is a polite society" - Thomas Jefferson
"The beauty of the Second Amendment is that it won't be needed until someone tries to take it away." -- Thomas Jefferson |
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TXBear
Seaman Recruit
Joined: 10 Aug 2004
Posts: 36
Location: New Waverly, TX
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| Posted: Sun Oct 03, 2004 3:29 am Post subject: |
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| Quote: | | I have spent considerable effort reading after action reports and such. Kerry never lost a man. He never even had anyone seriously hurt. |
With kerry's actions as common as the "No Man Left behind" incident, where he ran at the first "thought" of enemy fire, it's no wonder kerry never lost a crewman. |
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