That hissing noise you are are hearing is the air rapidly coming out of and deflating the Kerry candidacy for president. It's still very early but if I was a betting man I would be putting a big number on President Bush. By the time November roles around I don't think it will even be close.
You can tell that concern is spreading rapidly through the Democratic Party ranks by reading the party organs. Todays piece in the New York Times by Maureen Dowd was an example of the party line which seemed to be a coordinated theme across the print and television media. Everything the Swiftvets are saying are lies, cleverly orchestrated by Lee Atwater protege, Karl Rove to smear the record of a legitimate war hero. She uses the Times own story of last week to prove they are lies! She uses examples of the Bush family smear modus operandi by citing the slime attacks on such party favorites as Michael Dukakis, Ann Richards and Max Cleland. No where is it mentioned that neither party has a monopoly on these tactics against the other or for that matter the use of these tactics in intra party squabbles. After all, if memory serves me correctly, it was Al Gore who used the Willie Horton smear on Mike Dukakis first. Of course there is no mention of the Lanny Davis, James Carville, John Podesta troika of Democratic smear meisters in Ms. Dowd's screed.
Listen to her charachterizations of the Swiftvets, "stomach turning Swifts", "Swift Boat Sleazoids" and finally "vile Swiftboaters". Not a word of thoughtful opinion regarding the accusations or a word of refutation. Of course there is also not a word of what has already been proven to be true about their charges. Just the same approach as Maureen's little sister newspaper, the Boston Globe in Sunday's edition.
Adding to Kerry's troubles today was a comment from Rear Admiral William L. Schachte (Chicago Sun Times) who spoke out for the first time. Schachte who is not listed as a member of the Swiftvets in the membership list has had no public comments on the issue. He was motivated to speak out after seeing Davis on CNN's Crossfire. The Admiral's comments essentially back up the books account of events relating to Kerry's first purple heart. Schachte said he was in the boat, they were not under any fire and that Kerry got a superficial wound as a result of firing a grenade launcher to close to his own boat.
So far the Swiftvets book keeps rising in popularity and Kerry's poll numbers seem to keep eroding particularly in the battleground states. This despite the fact that almost all the main stream references to the Swiftvets begins with something like "unsubstantiated charges". Given a choice between Maureen Dowd and the "vile Swiftvet sleazoids", apparently Ms. Dowd's opinion comes out on the short end.
