U.S.: Kerry on C-SPAN

Marvin Kalb is recounting how the media bought Kerry's story hook, line, and sinker. Sounds like the Senate did, too. What one can never forget is that Kerry presented false testimony to support his contention that Viet Nam was an unjust war. What decides whether Viet Nam was unjust? In my books, the hundreds of thousands of deaths at communist hands, the thousands of boat people who fled for fear of their lives, the darkness that fell upon Viet Nam after the American withdrawal declared that Viet Nam was an entirely just war. Democracy is something worth fighting for. Freedom is worth dying for.

Note: I'd planned to do a more in depth assessment of Kerry's speech. However, my sister needed help setting up an iMac, so I grabbed what bits I could.

Ah, here we go, the hearing begins with the racist mentor of Bill Clinton, J. William Fulbright, as the Chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee. Why do politicians like the sound of their voice so much? Kerry's asked to give his bio.

Kerry's in uniform and wearing medals. His sitting before the Senate is symbolic, he says; he's a representative of a group of veterans whom he thinks would testify as he will. He's saying he's been up all night preparing. From what I understand, somebody else wrote the speech for him. Spokemas for Vietnam Veterans Against the War. Jane Fonda was linked to the group.

Kerry's recounting atrocities that U.S. soldiers allegedly committed. Thing is, if Kerry and the men he knew witnessed these atrocities, as officers, they had an obligation to do something about what they saw/heard. The Winter Soldier investigation, called so as a pun on Thomas Paine's words. America had no threat from Viet Nam therefore no need to be there. The Vietnamese were clueless, didn't know communism from democracy and only wanted to be left in piece. They waffled between VC and the U.S. and sided with whomever was there at the time.

America accepted My Lai. The war was basically racist, Kerry says. More blacks died fighting it, and the means of warfare were not the same as would have been employed in Europe or against whites.

Crowd applause. The media takes the bait. The war is framed as Nixon's war. It was actually Kerry's hero, John F. Kennedy, who got the U.S. into Viet Nam; it was Lyndon B. Johnson who ramped up U.S. participation.

Communism can't be fought all over the world, Kerry says. The Viet Namese are not free under the U.S. right now cuz people are dying. Kerry hasn't changed over the years. If freedom is not worth fighting for, then what is? He's indicated here that freedom is not a value he cherishes and the U.S. is not an agent for political change and freedom.

Focus on how black soldiers were impacted by Nam. No moral indignation in the U.S. The U.S. in the midst of a disaster because folks are dying in Nam, Americans and Vietnamese. Kerry is advocating that America leave and forget about communism which he doesn't seem to regard as a threat. Out of Nam now. He thinks the VC would've laid down their arms.

Problem of the war is not about diplomacy; it's about racism, use of weapons, U.S. is guiltier than anyone of violating Geneva Conventions. U.S. bad, evil, racist, killers, immoral.

Kerry trusts the North Vietnamese more than his own government, this I get from his answer to the questioning by George Aiken. The U.S. is bad, even how it trains soldiers to kill, from answers to Pell's questions.

A Nam soldier calling in says Kerry toed the Commie line. Another guy says he's a soldier, says he supports Kerry. He doesn't sound like a Nam vet cuz none of the Nam place names are part of his speech. So, IMO, he's suspect. Most of the callers are pro-Kerry. I think it's possible that the Kerry-ites are love-bombing C-SPAN, cuz that's not unusual.

In a nutshell, what do I think about what I heard? Kerry hasn't changed. He still thinks the U.S. is bad; he still thinks that freedom is not a value worth fighting and dying for; he still thinks opponents of the U.S. are better than the U.S.

I hope Kerry is not elected. No man should lead a country he despises. If he does, he'll run that country into the ground.