Angry Words from Angry Men

By Rick Horowitz

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" -- very much in the news in recent weeks, and he's here in our studio this morning as a spokesman for the organization. Thanks for joining us."

"Good to be here, Matt."

"You and your colleagues have really been in the middle of a storm lately. A little background first, if we could -- how long has Swift Boat Veterans for Revenge been together?"

"Matt, Swift Boat Veterans for Revenge was formed earlier this year. Some of us knew one another from our time in the service, and others we just met in the past few months as we put the word out about John Kerry and his lies."

"Lies about his time in Vietnam? About his medals?"

"Absolutely. All of it is lies."

"And so you took it on yourselves to try to set the record straight -- at least from your perspective."

"It's not a matter of perspective, Matt. It's a matter of fact. John Kerry is -- "

"Well, I want to get into some of that with you in just a minute, but as you know, your charges against Sen. Kerry don't exist in a vacuum. We're in the middle of a very hotly contested presidential race, and according to the polls, you've already caused some damage to Mr. Kerry's standing with veterans."

"That's fine with us. But I'll tell you, we'd have said the same things about him if he'd been a Democrat or a Republican or an Independent."

"Maybe so, but you wouldn't have been heard without plenty of startup money from some wealthy Texans with close ties to the Republican Party, and to Karl Rove, President Bush's chief political strategist, and even to the Bush family itself. Aren't we right to be just a little suspicious?"

"You need to be suspicious of John Kerry -- that's who you need to be suspicious about!"

"Well -- "

"We've got dozens of people who served with John Kerry in Vietnam, who don't appreciate what he did there, how he tried to turn himself into some kind of hero."

"Well, let's talk about that for a minute. The action that got Kerry his Bronze Star, for instance, rescuing a fellow crew member while under enemy fire -- you say it wasn't anything like he described it."

"Absolutely not."

"You realize that the official Navy records support Sen. Kerry's version, don't you? As does his medal citation -- and for that matter, the citation from that same incident for a member of your own group."

"Kerry's the one who put all that stuff in there in the first place. He wrote the after-action report."

"And your evidence for that?"

"His initials are on the bottom of the report, right here."

"But these initials are 'KJW.' Kerry's initials are 'JFK.'"

"See how sneaky he is?"

"Wait a minute! So you're saying -- "

"We've got eyewitnesses, people that were close enough to see everything that happened that day, and they say there weren't any bullets flying around."

"And the men who were on Kerry's boat, who swear there were?"

"They were too close."

"And the bullet holes in at least one of the boats?"

"Rust."

"What about -- what about all the other vets who've stepped forward in the past few days to dispute your accounts of Sen. Kerry's service, and to praise him for his courage and his leadership? Are all of them mistaken?"

"Maybe they were brainwashed."

"Brainwashed?!"

"I know what they can do to people -- I saw 'The Manchurian Candidate.' Did you know that Kerry is half-Manchurian on his father's side?"

"Look, I have to ask you: Isn't this really all about Sen. Kerry's efforts against the war after he returned from Vietnam? Isn't it payback for what he said about how the war was being fought?"

"I certainly didn't appreciate being accused of committing atrocities, I'll tell you that. I took it very personally. We all did. And we swore someday he'd pay for it."

"But did he actually accuse any of you -- specifically, I mean -- of doing anything wrong?"

"He didn't have to -- I knew he was talking about me."

"Even though you -- "

"And he's still doing it. If you take the first letter of each paragraph of his convention speech, and you add the number '1969,' and then you -- "

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Posted 8/24/04. For award-winning commentary, just click to "Rick's"!

Rick Horowitz is a syndicated columnist, TV commentator, writing coach and public speaker.

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