SwiftVets.com

[Jette]

St. Paul Pioneer Press ^ | August 14, 2004 | PATRICK SWEENEY

Former Air Force pilot Scott O'Grady, a high-profile volunteer in President George W. Bush's campaign, accused Sen. John Kerry on Friday of committing "treason" in opposing the Vietnam War in the late 1960s and early '70s.

Speaking at a St. Paul news conference to announce a pro-Bush veterans group in Minnesota, O'Grady criticized Kerry for meeting with a Viet Cong emissary in Paris in the waning days of the Vietnam War and testifying before Congress about atrocities committed by U.S. troops.

A leader of a pro-Kerry veterans group denounced O'Grady's accusation and said it was outside the bounds of proper campaign dialogue.
"This is a despicable and obscene comment to call John Kerry a traitor and accuse him of treason," said Tom Kayser, a St. Paul lawyer and retired lieutenant colonel in the Air Force Reserve who is supporting Kerry.

"John Kerry was in Vietnam," Kayser said. "He saw what was happening, and he made his comments based on what he saw."

Steve Schmidt, a national spokesman for the Bush campaign, said the comments by O'Grady, a retired Air Force captain from Dallas, were personal.

"Clearly what Captain O'Grady said today was not consistent with the campaign's position," Schmidt said.

Schmidt did not say if the Bush campaign would continue to invite O'Grady to speak at Bush-Cheney events. But he repeatedly said the campaign was pleased to have O'Grady as a volunteer.

O'Grady appeared on the cover of Time magazine after he parachuted to safety when his plane was shot down in Bosnia in 1995.
He has campaigned across the country on behalf of Bush, and Friday's news conference was not the first time he has accused Kerry of treason publicly.

The news conference was evidence of the high-stakes competition between Bush and Kerry for the votes of America's military veterans. And O'Grady's comments reflected the raw nerve that Kerry's anti-war activities still represent for many veterans. O'Grady leveled the charge at a news conference called by the Bush campaign to announce the formation of a Minnesota Veterans for Bush group. About 60 people, many of them veterans, attended the news conference.

When questioned about his charge, O'Grady said it was a personal opinion. Other participants in the Republican news conference Friday accused Kerry of flip-flopping between supporting and opposing the current war in Iraq. But their strongest criticism concerned Kerry's post-Vietnam years when he returned to the U.S. as a decorated combat veteran and took part in Vietnam Veterans Against the War activities.
Dan Weiberg, of St. Paul, a retired Internal Revenue Service agent who served in the Army in Vietnam at the same time Kerry did, said he agreed with O'Grady's characterization of Kerry's post-war actions as treasonous.
"John Kerry is the New England traitor, not the New England patriot," Weiberg said.

[ccr]

My concern about Grady's comment is that the word "traitor" is a very powerful and emotional one. It is also a charge that is very difficult to defend.

It is the kind of charge that undermines his credibility and the credibility of the entire effort.

On the other hand, if he had said, "John Kerry's activities after he returned were disloyal and dishonest", his statement would be far more defensible and would have much more positive impact.

Ames and Walker are traitors. Kerry is a dishonest, opportunistic politician. There is a difference. Hammer the guy, just don't oversell the charge.
_________________
Whose side is John Kerry really on? Take this quiz and decide for yourself.

http://www.learnthat.com/quiz/

[Indianbaboon]

kerry is a traitor, it's harsh, some would say melodramatic, but between that thread FDL posted about hte source of vietnam vets' PTSD and kerry's picture in the NVA heroes thing, there's no doubt about it.

[4moreyears]

Don't mince words...call kerry a traitor, that's what he was as evidenced by his actions.

kerry did not mince words when he called vets "baby killers, rapists..." etc.

No sanctuary for traitors because they are worse than the enemy. At least you expect the enemy to stab you in the back.
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kerry returned to the United States on July 22, 1971, held a press conference publicly calling on President Nixon... for the surrender of the United States to North Vietnam.

[ASPB]

When you do the crime you do the time! Except in America for politicians...especially in 1970 and 1971.

Paris in 1970 with Madam Binh? Treason! Nothing less imho.
_________________
On Sale! Order in lots of 100 now at velero@rcn.com Free for the cost of shipping All profits (if any, especially now) go to Swiftvets. The author of "Sink Kerry Swiftly" ---ASPB

[Navy_Navy_Navy]

O'Grady did say that he was expressing his own personal opinion.


"Traitor" is a hard word, but what could be more appropriate for someone who:

1. Worked actively to undermine support for the war at home?

2. Met with the enemy while still a commissioned Naval Officer?

3. Helped to propagate anti-war sentiment that was scripted by the KGB? (as admitted by a former KGB officer)

4. Helped to foster and encourage a view of our soldiers as war-crazed marauders, little better than snarling animals?

5. Marched repeatedly under the flag of the North Vietnamese at a time when we were still engaged in combat operations against that country?

"Traitor" is a hard word - an inflammatory word. There is a visceral reaction to it.

Multiply it 8 million times - once for every veteran of that war.

Having "traitor" applied to him a few million times won't even begin to pay back what Kerry owes his generation of soldiers for the pain and betrayal he dealt them.

Or, to be more current, multiply it $87 billion times - because he's still betraying our troops, trying to undermine support for the war, and encouraging the enemy. (When I am President, I'll have the troops home in six months or a year)

It's a hard word.

It's just too bad that it's taken so long to see it so widely and appropriately applied.
_________________
~ Echo Juliet ~
Altering course to starboard - On Fire, Keep Clear
Navy woman, Navy wife, Navy mother

[ccr]

Please understand what I am saying:

Such a charge is not persuasive to those we need to persuade and undermines credibility.

Why? Because the statement, "John Kerry is a traitor" is simply not believable. It doesn't matter if it is true or not.

Lay out the facts of what actually happened:

While still a commissioned officer (a member of the IRR) and while fellow Americans were still under fire, John Kerry met with the enemy and aided them in many ways. He also made provably false statements to Congress and the American public that showed he was not keeping good faith and trust with his fellow American fighting men.

Is this spin? Sure. My point is don't sell something that the people we need to convince will never buy.
_________________
Whose side is John Kerry really on? Take this quiz and decide for yourself.

http://www.learnthat.com/quiz/

[forgivenjojo]

CCR

I am sick to the point of vomiting. I refuse to try and live and speak according to a politically correct view. Don't put whip cream on a dog turd and tell me its dessert. I dont live my life like its one big grey area. There are absolutes, very black and white absolutes.

Every knee will bow to Jesus Christ.

And John Kerry is a traitor.

any questions.

[Navy_Navy_Navy]

Okay, let's "stand down" a tad.

Everyone is going to have their own take on this.

I can see both points of view. To me, it's very clear-cut and black and white. To others, it is not.

Especially to others who are not familiar with his history. If we're talking to people who are Kerry-supporters, they're going to react viscerally to the word and not hear what we're saying, and it doesn't matter how many facts we have about Kerry's history to back up our use of the word.
_________________
~ Echo Juliet ~
Altering course to starboard - On Fire, Keep Clear
Navy woman, Navy wife, Navy mother

[ccr]

Thanks for asking everyone to mellow, Navy.

I do understand and appreciate the impact and history of exactly what Kerry did when he returned and EXACTLY what that means (in other words, I've drawn the same black and white conclusion that others have).

SBVT has had a tremendous impact. I'd just hate to see that lost by a poor choice of words (when the opportunity exists to make the same point in an even more persuasive, effective and powerful way -- no, I'm not trying to find a more sensitive way to fight this war ).

There isn't anything politically correct about what I am saying here (I wouldn't know how to be PC if I wanted to be, Jojo). Politically persuasive is different. We aren't preaching to the converted.
_________________
Whose side is John Kerry really on? Take this quiz and decide for yourself.

http://www.learnthat.com/quiz/

[Jette]

Scott O'Grady has been well well known in the mainstream media. He'll have to explain what he meant, and by saying what he said, it may get some attention.

[Beatrice1000]

[d19thdoc]

From my artcile on WinterSoldier.com - "Special Features."
Note: This feature piece was written as a letter to the editor of the Boston Globe, in response to the article "Kerry spoke of meeting negotiators on Vietnam." It was never published. The original Globe article: http://www.boston.com/news/nation/articles/2004/03/25/kerry_spoke_of_meeting_negotiators_on_vietnam/[/url]
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Mr. Healy and Mr. Kranish,

I am an historian of the Vietnam War era, and have read your article in the Boston Globe concerning John F. Kerry's trips to Paris, dated today.

I think you may have been spun away from a salient point of real interest, and may have missed the real story.

The Kerry spokesman would have you focus on the question of whether or not Kerry engaged in "negotiations," which would have been unlawful - or at the very least of questionable legality. He went so far as to assert that Kerry did not attend any of the negotiating sessions, an absurdity on its face, and an obvious diversion. By denying an issue not at issue, he deflected you from the real, and much more serious issue.

Your own reading of Kerry's advice to the Senate Foreign Relations Committee will show that what Kerry suggested to them, and proposed to the American public, was the political position and essentially the military objective of the enemy with which we were then engaged in war. Attached is the proposal of the Provisional Revolutionary Government from somewhat later in the year 1971 (Kerry testified in April and this version of the "points" dates from June), at which time the "Eight Points" Kerry refers to had been expanded to nine, but are essentially the same program.

The Madame Binh whom Kerry references and whose "Points" he recommends was not "a leader" of "a communist group in South Vietnam." Madame Nguyen Thi Binh was the Foreign Minister of the PRG, which was the political wing of the only communist movement in South Vietnam, whose military apparatus was called, by the U.S., the Viet Cong. In both its political and military manifestations, this group was merely another operational aspect of the North Vietnamese communist regime and army.

And when the Kerry spokesman refers to Kerry's meeting with "both sides" attending the peace talks, any reading of Kerry's own words in the testimony will reveal that "both sides" means something other than what is implied. The implication is that he also consulted with his own countryman's representatives. But Kerry says, "I have talked to both delegations at the peace talks, that is to say the Democratic Republic of Vietnam and the Provisional Revolutionary Government." The DRV was, and is, the Hanoi communist regime. They were four-party talks in Paris. He did not bother talking to the Americans or to our allies, the South Vietnamese. To him "both sides" apparently meant only the two communist entities we were then fighting on the battlefield.

Kerry's problem is not that he may have violated an esoteric prohibition against negotiating with foreign powers (18 U.S.C. 953). What he did was collaborate with enemy combatants during the war, "adhering to them and giving them aid." The evidence for this is in his own words. That is covered by another law, The Constitution of the United States, Article III, Section 3.

Most of the words Kerry used in this appearance and applied to the American soldiers who served in Vietnam were far more vitriolic than anything as minor as mere "murder." Having read the full text, need I enumerate them for you? Kerry's entire performance was designed to identify American soldiers as crazed, drug addicted rapists and criminals, and veterans of the war as ticking time bombs addicted to violence as well as drugs. The character of the soldiers who served, and their alleged actions, were the entire stated pretext for his opposition to the war. That was his case. His entire strategy was to confuse the warriors with the war, and he did it by lying about the warriors... but that is another story entirely, about Kerry's and the VVAW's "Winter Soldier Investigation."

A final attachment is a comparison of Kerry's actions in 1971 with a more recent case. You should find it illuminating.

I thank you for being the first in the mainstream media to pick up on the trips (plural) to Paris. Stay with it.

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ATTACHMENTS:

Democratic Republic of Vietnam Peace Proposal, June 26, 1971 (Nine Point Peace Plan) http://ice.he.net/~freepnet/kerry/staticpages/index.php?page=20040401193603653

Peace Proposal of the Provisional Revolutionary Government of the Republic of South Viet Nam, July 1, 1971 (Seven Point Peace Plan)
http://ice.he.net/~freepnet/kerry/staticpages/index.php?page=20040401194200505

U.S. soldier charged in al-Qaida probe
National Guardsman accused
The Associated Press
Updated: 11:10 p.m. ET Feb. 18, 2004

Spc. Ryan G. Anderson was formally charged Feb. 12 with three counts... The charges could lead to a death sentence.

The charges do not allege that Anderson ever actually passed information to real al-Qaida members.

Anderson is also alleged to have communicated by “oral, written and electronic communication” to the supposed “terrorists” that “I wish to meet with you, I share your cause, I wish to continue contact through conversations and personal meetings.” [emphasis added]

The Uniform Military Code says attempts to aid the enemy can be punished by death.

© 2004 The Associated Press.

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AND... at a time when our POWs were being tortured in North Vietnamese prison camps to make propaganda statements defaming American troops and accusing them of war crimes and in support of a U.S. unilateral ending of the war... torture which most of them were able to resist, and under which some died in silence...

From the Congressional Record,
Thursday April 22, 1971,
The United States Senate,
Committee on Foreign Relations,
Washington, D.C.
Page 186

The CHAIRMAN. (Senator Fulbright)... Are you familiar with some of the proposals before this committee?

Mr. KERRY. Yes, I am. Senator.

The CHAIRMAN. Do you support or do you have any particular views about any one of them you wish to give the committee.

"Mr. KERRY. My feeling, Senator, is undoubtedly this Congress, and I don't mean to sound pessimistic, but I do hot believe that this congress will, in fact, end the war as we would like to, which is immediately and unilaterally and, therefore, if I were to speak I would say we would set a date and the date obviously would be the earliest possible date. But I would like to say, in answering that, that I do not believe it is necessary to stall any longer. I have been to Paris. I have talked with both delegations at the peace talks, that is to say the Democratic Republic of Vietnam [Hanoi Communists, ed.] and the Provisional Revolutionary Government [Viet Cong, ed.] and of all eight of Madam Binh's points [Madame Nguyen Thi Binh, the Viet Cong Foreign Minister, ed.] it has been stated time and time again,... if the United States were to set a date for withdrawal the prisoners of war would be returned.

"I think this negates very clearly the argument of the President that we have to maintain a presence in Vietnam, to use as a negotiating block for the return of those prisoners. The setting of a date will accomplish that."
_________________
For The Honor of the Fifty-Eight Thousand.
"He Can Lose, But He Can Not Hide"

[hanna]

Wow. That takes ones breath away.

I wrote a letter to the Kerry campaign long before I was even aware of the Swifties, telling Kerry that the things he was saying and doing were encouraging the enemy and that if I had a child in Iraq and that child were killed, I would hold him personally responsible.

It was interesting. He must have gotten lots of similar comments because after that his tone changed markedly. The wind was blowing again:) At any rate...I don't find treason to be excessive at all nor do I think the thousands that died over his words would either.

[4moreyears]