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This is the archive for Daily Updates for the period from August 1 through 10, 2004, appearing below in reverse chronological order.

 

 

Aug. 10, 2004 #01:  No update today.  Editor on special assignment.

 

Aug. 9, 2004 #01:  No update today.  Editor on special assignment.

 

Aug. 8, 2004 #01:  No update today.  Editor on special assignment.

Aug. 7, 2004 #01:  No update today.  Editor on special assignment.

 

 

Aug. 6, 2004  #01Political Satire/Commentary where satire is always commentary but commentary isn't always satire 
(but we're confident you'll know the difference)  Search PoliSat.Com Home  Tell a friend about PoliSat.Com    Subscribe 
Permanent Link to this installment in PoliSat.Com's Archives    Google-News list of recent updates    About author, Jim Wrenn.

Swift-Boat Veterans Unwittingly Expose Swift-Boat Journalism and Asymmetrical Media Warfare by Dominant Media Regarding Allegations against John Kerry and George W. Bush.

    I found the explanation by the soldier whom Kerry pulled from the water to be compelling and persuasive proof that Kerry exhibited courage in doing so.  Likewise, I also found George Bush's having become a National Guard fighter pilot (which requires more than a year of active-duty training in contrast to the six-months basic training applicable for most National Guard service) to fly what John McCain has described as one of the most dangerous fighter planes then in our inventory to be persuasive proof of Bush's courage.  The death-by-aviation-accident rate for this plane posed a greater statistical risk to its pilots than the risk of death faced by those serving in Vietnam in non-combat branches such as Al Gore, who served there as a military "journalist" (here).

    That Bush's Air National Guard service required intrinsically dangerous duties obviously requiring more courage than most active-duty assignments in non-combat-branches in Vietnam did not deter the investigative "journalism" instincts of the media to trumpet claims by some that Bush was "AWOL"-- i.e., claims that he failed to attend all drills during the final year of his multi-years service obligation.  None of those claims undermined the indisputable courage of his service during the years before the final year, yet the media found the "AWOL" allegations worthy of investigation.  Are not allegations of being "AWOL" the equivalent of challenges to one's patriotism?  Are not excused absences from duty or early releases in accordance with established policies the opposite of being "unpatriotic"?  Did the media not fan a firestorm of demands that Bush furnish decades-old records to "answer" the "AWOL" allegations?

    In contrast, did not the dominant media treat the persuasive evidence of Kerry's courage in pulling the soldier from the water as being sufficient to extinguish any journalistic obligation to "investigate" the claims of the Swift-Boat Veterans first made public many months ago?  Did not "60 Minutes" and other "investigative" journalists in the dominant media ignore those claims rather than trumpeting them the way they trumpeted the "AWOL" allegations against Bush?  Why?

    Just as claims that Bush may have obtained early release from duty during the final year of his Air National Guard obligation did not in any way negate his courage in flying dangerous fighter planes throughout most years of his service, the Swift-Boat Veterans' assertions do not negate the fact that Kerry pulled the soldier from the water.  The question is why the dominant media did not consider the "AWOL" allegations against Bush as being out of bounds but do appear to consider the Swift-Boat Veterans' allegations against Kerry to be out of bounds.  

    One of the Swift-Boat Veterans who was on the same mission (but commanding a different boat) when Kerry pulled the soldier from the water said that his boat stayed beside Kerry's boat the entire time and that there was no gunfire when Kerry pulled the soldier from the water following an incident involving explosion of a mine.  He also says a member of his crew (or said crew member of another boat) pulled two men from the water and did not receive (or expect) a medal for doing so.  He denies the implication (not corrected by Kerry) that only Kerry's boat was involved in such rescues.  He says the assertion to the contrary by the soldier Kerry rescued is the product of that soldier's perspective from his position in the water prevented him from knowing how long more than one boat had been in the vicinity at the time of, rather than merely immediately after, Kerry's pulling him from the water.  Fog of war.  

    There is no reason to doubt such soldier's sincerity in his recollection of Kerry pulling him from the water or in his recommendation that Kerry receive a medal for doing so.  There's no reason to doubt his sincerity in not recalling the presence of another swift boat while, rather than merely after, his being pulled from the water.  Fog of war.  Regardless of which version is correct, there is no doubt that Kerry was serving his country in a combat zone at great risk to his personal safety.  To my mind, that was indisputably courageous.  Likewise, to my mind, flying what is known to be a highly dangerous fighter plane even in the Air National Guard is also courageous.

    Do all who display courage seek to minimize its scope or do some seek to maximize it?  Most genuine heroes (Bob Dole, for example) try to minimize the scope of their courage rather than wearing their heroism on their sleeves.  Do some who've served in combat refuse to decline heroic credit for non-heroic acts because they perceive themselves as having performed other heroic acts without receiving recognition?  Would that be evil or just human nature?  The latter, of course.  In a campaign in which a candidate so aggressively touts his heroism, is it relevant that some who served with him and observed the incident in question first-hand perceive claims of heroism as being greatly exaggerated?  Of course it's relevant.  It would be irrelevant, of course, if Kerry, like most recognized for heroism, were to have aggressively sought to minimize rather than maximize its scope.

    If Bush were to have been the Vietnam veteran decorated for pulling the soldier to safety, would the dominant media not have hungered for fog-of-war assertions by other Swift-Boat Commanders on the same mission minimizing, rather than maximizing, his courage in doing so?  Does a wild bear fertilize the woods?

    I find the undisputed evidence of Kerry's post-Vietnam-service defamation of our military by speciously asserting (not merely implying) that commission of atrocities comprised military policy from the top down rather than having constituted isolated incidents that occur in every war to be far more disturbing than the allegations by the Swift-Boat Veterans, which could be construed as different recollections from the fog of war.  Likewise, I find the dominant media's asymmetrical interests in the "AWOL" and "Swift-Boat" allegations more disturbing than either set of allegations.  

    Regarding Kerry and his supporters now demanding that Bush demand that the Swift-Boat Veterans "shut up," has he, or any of those supporters (other than Joe Lieberman) demanded that Ted Kennedy "shut up" his hateful, mean-spirited allegations (here, here and here) against Bush?  Of course not.  Have they demanded that Howard Dean retract his attacks on Bush's patriotism?  Of course not.  Have they treated Michael Moore as pariah (rather than as a political celebrity)?  Of course not.  Did they denounce (rather than merely tepidly declining to endorse) Al Gore's Elmer-Gantry-like speech accusing Bush of "betraying" his country (here) and equating Abu Ghraib abuses by a few of our soldiers with Saddam Hussein systematic system of torture and murder (here)?  Of course not.

Swift-Boat "Journalism."

As dominant media tracking
the claims of the spokespeople flacking
against or in favor
of viewpoints we savor,
we're balanced reporting such flacking.

We're equally quick to disfavor
attackers of viewpoints we favor
as when we condemn
the ones who defend
attacks from the viewpoints we favor.

So therefore, we cannot perceive
the reason so many believe
we're biased not fair
in print or on air
on viewpoints in which we believe.

We're sure 'twas our duty to push
the claims charging "AWOL" by Bush
and equally sure
critiques from the tours
of Swift Boats we needn't have pushed.

In choosing the news to be pandered,
we're Media "Swift Boat" Commanders
obliged to suppress
the views we detest
and pacify those of our camber.

    The dominant media have demonstrated greater credulity in propagandistic allegations by Michael Moore than first-person assertions by Swift-Boat Veterans who served on missions with, although not under, Kerry in Vietnam.  The dominant media do not view the Democrats' treatment of Michael Moore as an honored guest (seated with Jimmy Carter) at their convention in Boston as being mean-spirited, yet they are prepared to view as mean-spirited the inability of Bush to silence the Swift-Boat Veterans.  Furthermore, if Kerry's service to his country in Vietnam entitles him to be heard about his service there and to defame the service of others as he has done, the Swift-Boat Veterans' service to their country entitles them to be heard regarding their first-person observations of his service as well as what they deem to have been his post-Vietnam defamation of virtually all who served in Vietnam. 

--Jim Wrenn, Editor at PoliSat.Com.

 

August 5, 2004 (Thursday)-- No Update today.  Time consuming medical appointments.

 

 

Aug. 4, 2004  #01Political Satire/Commentary where satire is always commentary but commentary isn't always satire 
(but we're confident you'll know the difference)  Search PoliSat.Com Home  Tell a friend about PoliSat.Com    Subscribe 
Permanent Link to this installment in PoliSat.Com's Archives    Google-News list of recent updates    About author, Jim Wrenn.
Faster-loading, permanent link to this is at http://PoliSat.Com/DamselInDistress.htm.  See also Kerry versus Kerry versus Kerry.

John Kerry's "secret plan" to "win" Operation Iraqi Freedom is exposed by PoliSat.Com revealing the details of the plan, code-named "Damsel in Distress."·

    Everyone knows John Kerry's portrayal of himself as a war hero benefited from the cinematic expertise of a colleague of Steven Spielberg in the form of a movie adapting Kerry's 8mm movies re-staging his heroic events in Vietnam.  However, few people know that another colleague of Spielberg, whose name must, of course, remain anonymous, applied cinematic/computer-programming skills to test Kerry's hypothesis that the way he would fight terror would be "smarter and better" than George Bush's way.

    PoliSat.Com's highly unreliable source within the Kerry campaign has obtained a copy of this highly experimental computer-modeled test of Kerry's theories.  Of course, Kerry's campaign (including PoliSat.Com's highly unreliable source) will vehemently deny the existence of the test, code-named "Damsel in Distress" (high-resolution version is here; faster-loading, lower-resolution version is here).

    Kerry's strategic advisers arranged the highly secret project to test Kerry's theories for weaving the handling of Iraq into his strategy against terrorism.  Kerry's statements on the campaign trail asserting that he knows how to accomplish this but cannot make the details public have led some in the media to liken his claim to Nixon's "secret plan" to "win" the war in Vietnam.  When reporters asked a high-level, former Kerry advisor (Sandy Burglar*, who spoke on condition of anonymity), whether Kerry's "secret plan" is the equivalent of Nixon's-- i.e., "Iraqification"-- Burglar scheduled a press conference at which he anonymously denied "Iraqification" is Kerry's secret plan.  Then, speaking even further off the record than merely anonymously, he told the press the real name for Kerry's plan is "Chiracification."  

    This prompted a flood of additional questions from reporters.  What is meant by "Chiracification"?  Burglar told the reporters that unlike George Bush's "simple minded" approach, "Chiracification" would involve applying a highly intellectually nuanced strategy to reduce the threats of terrorism by secretly paying the terrorists in the hope they'll turn their attention to China rather than the United States.  When questioned about the sanity of such strategy, Burglar replied, "Well, it worked for Chirac, didn't it?"  

    Speaking to PoliSat.Com's Washington Bureau Drawer Chief on deep background, Burglar acknowledged that the expected unpopularity of a strategy named for its foremost practitioner (Jacques Chirac) made it necessary for the strategy to be named "Damsel in Distress."  As proof of the success of Chiracification when practiced by Jacques Chirac during the period preceding Operation Iraqi Freedom, Burglar directed the press to three prominent sources:  Source 1: main-source herephotograph here; soundtrack here; Source 2:  video here; Source 3:  video here.

    Despite Kerry's secret adoption of "Chiracification," Burglar vehemently denounced Rush Limbaugh's theory that John Kerry is the "Frenchurian Candidate."  Burglar also denied that a coded command in a telephone call to him from Dominique de Villepin prompted him (Burglar) to stuff classified documents into his socks and underwear while in the National Security section of the National Archives.

    When one of Kerry's top foreign-policy advisors learned PoliSat.Com was preparing to expose the secret computer-model testing of the "Chiracification" strategy (code-named "Damsel in Distress"), he contacted PoliSat.Com's Washington Bureau Drawer Chief.  Unable to dissuade PoliSat.Com from exposing the project, he insisted that PoliSat.Com be "fair and balanced" by presenting both sides of such a complex set of strategic issues.  Therefore, to show the contrast between Kerry's intellectually nuanced·º¹·º²· but linear policy of assuring the terrorists that if they strike us, a President Kerry would "swiftly strike back," PoliSat.Com provides the following links:  Un-Boxed Dots and Strategery.

    Finally, Burglar denied that since Scoop Jackson, the donkey kicking ass has changed to an ass just kicking.  As an example that the donkey "still can kick ass," Burglar cited Kerry's occasional willingness to criticize the Dean of Mean and Doctor of Spleen, by expressing his lack of complete agreement with the various conspiracy theories touted by Dean in his futile effort to make Michael Moore seem lucid by comparison.      

--Jim Wrenn, Editor at PoliSat.Com.

*I can't remember who originally dubbed Sander Berger "Sandy Burglar"; I only wish it were I.

 

 

Aug. 3, 2004 #01:   No update today (Monday)-- Editor still recovering from being away for in-laws' anniversary.

 

Aug. 2, 2004 #01:   No update today (Monday)-- Editor away for in-laws' anniversary.

 

 

August 1, 2004 #01:  No update today (Sunday).  Editor away for in-laws anniversary.

 

Installment immediately preceding the one above, go here.

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