LONG STORY SHORT | Military Record « Urban Molecule

LONG STORY SHORT | Military Record

27Aug08

Plastic Purple Hearts and Swiftboating: Political Torture Gets a Facelift
by Josh Livingston

Being confined in a tiny, squalid cage for years doesn’t mean you should be Commander-in-Chief. It only means you’re veal. And as Maureen Dowd explains, there are only so many times McCain’s handlers can use his POW record as a get-out-of-jail-free card before it starts to lose all meaning.

McCain shouldn’t have to know how many houses he owns, couldn’t possibly have overheard the questions at Saddleback or even be responsible for keeping up with current pop music because, as his campaign has made incontrovertibly clear, he stayed at the Hanoi Hilton.

Never mind that none of these points are likely to shift a single vote, but his campaign urgently needs to remind you that, by god, John McCain was a POW! But before you get too upset over my lack of reverence for McCain’s decorated service, let’s examine why that reverence is no longer automatically granted in today’s political climate: the swiftboating of John Kerry.

If you want the playbook for how to thoroughly shit all over someone’s military career, review the 2004 tapes to see how Republican operatives responded to Kerry’s. Any credit for volunteering to fight an unpopular war despite a wealthy, connected family? None whatsoever! Medals for valor in combat? Earned by forged documents and lies! Taking a principled stand against the war – a view held by many, many Americans – after his tour of duty? Unmitigated treason!

They are two significant differences between Kerry’s and McCain’s military histories. First, Kerry didn’t get caught (a devil’s advocate might suggest that not getting captured by the enemy shows competence, luck and good judgment – all terrific qualities for a president). Kerry has also moved on. McCain is still stuck fighting the same war, demanding just a few more years, to reach some ever elusive turning point toward an undefined “victory.” What is victory in Iraq? (That’s not rhetorical – I’d really love to know what exactly would constitute a tally mark in the United States’ “win” column.)

When delegates at the 2004 convention sported Purple Heart band-aids to mock Kerry’s medal, the collateral damage was every other Purple Heart awarded. Just ask a veterans group. And during a radio interview Friday, Republican Rep. Terry Everett excoriated decorated Vietnam vet John Murtha, D-Pa. as,

a cut-and-run idiot [who is] certainly no friend of the military… And don’t talk to me about him being an ex-Marine. Lord, that was 40 years ago. A lot of stuff can happen in 40 years. Thank you for your service… but that doesn’t mean you’re (not) an idiot, and he is.

Swiftboating John Kerry may have won the 2004 election, but it eroded the worth of everyone else’s service in the process.

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