“Still, you refuse to engage”
respectfully, your contentions are constructed on what i feel are a false premise (on each count), and i’ll explain why.
in the case of the swift boat veterans, these guys have made claims about another person’s honor, veracity, comportment in a time of war, about his courage or lack thereof, and his current level of honesty as well. it is apparent to me, and i think to most people, that this group would not have come forward absent the political environment, and their protestations notwithstanding i’ll leave it to each person to question whether there were political motives behind their allegations.
you’re asking me to produce concrete evidence that they are lying. i believe there are others who’re laying the groundwork to produce just that evidence, and since you’ve waited two years i think it’s not too much to ask that we both wait a little longer and allow them to do a much better job than i could do myself.
suffice it to say that kerry says they’re lying.
there is a reason why those who accuse others of felonious acts, or of embarrassing acts, or actions that would cause a person or company harm in the marketplace, do so at their own peril. it’s because the burden of proof is not on john kerry, or on me, or on the harmed entity. it’s on the person or group who makes claims that damage an entity’s reputation or treasure.
the question you ought to be asking, absent any political agenda, is do the swifties have incontrovertable proof of their claims? if you think they do, then they will have nothing to worry about when kerry’s counterattack commences (sometime soon, from what i read).
i also pointed out earlier that were their claims incontrovertable, there would be consequences. i remember when i lived in san diego the tale of the burial of the founder of our county’s most famous hotel: hotel del coronado. larry lawrence was an ambassador to switzerland at the time of his death (during the clinton administration). he was buried at arlington cemetery, such honor bestowed because of his wounds received during 1945 while a merchant mariner.
there was just this one problem: his claim of injury in a time of war may very well have been false.
as i recall, it was a republican-aligned faction that brought all this to light, much as with the current case with kerry. in the case of lawrence, his body was exhumed from arlington (at the request of his widow, prior to the army having to make the tough call itself). this was a pretty extraordinary step, it seems to me, and such exhumation was the price one paid, even in death, for (perhaps) fabricating a story. this, though his subsequent high state department service mitigated such alleged fabrication.
likewise, i seriously doubt that kerry would escape scrutiny from the dept of defense, esp such a high profile case, esp with republicans controlling every conceivable branch of government. the lawrence case proves that lying about wounds suffered in wartime is not a thing glossed over by the military.
again, the burden is not on kerry. it’s not on me. it’s on those making the claims. and so much more so when it’s a person living who’s affected, as well as the fortunes of a people about to engage in an election.
more later on the NSA thing, i happen to have run out of time for the moment.