Truth Squad, Assemble!!!

Today Senator McCain has put together what he calls his “truth squad.” His squad is made up of allies who will counter-attack anyone who challenges McCain’s military record. As mentioned below, a member of his squad is Colonel Bud Day, professional slanderer who was one of the “Swift Boat Veterans for Truth.” Bud Day’s defense of McCain was politicized and sharp:

“Things were very difficult for [McCain],he was horribly wounded in his extremities, and it was questionable if he would survive his experience. He set a high standard for himself because the Vietnamese tried to release him and he showed courage by refusing that to come about. We had an opportunity to watch a president in office, a Democrat who was extremely ineffective during those years. [McCain] learned an awful lot from that… General Clark spent a month in Vietnam, got badly wounded and was evacuated, that was his experience. I say let’s hold the two of them up and compare them.”

However, one should remember that this is the same man who slandered John Kerry by saying among other things that:

“My view is he basically will go down in history sometime as the Benedict Arnold of 1971.”

When confronted about the fact that he served as a partisan propogandist in the 2004 election, Day said:

The Swift Boat attacks were simply a revelation of the truth, the similarity does not exist here. What the Swift Boat campaign was about was to lay out John Kerry’s record. John Kerry has never produced any evidence to deny that. We are producing the evidence of these attacks right now to show that those remarks were completely inaccurate.”

Of course, someone who didn’t think “The Swift Boat attacks were simply a revelation of the truth” was John McCain as Senator Kerry points out:

“Colonel Day’s comments today only further highlight the McCain campaign’s disregard for a new kind of politics, John McCain condemned these kinds of attacks in 2004 when he called the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth ‘dishonest and dishonorable.’ Senator McCain should condemn these remarks and cut ties with the Colonel and anyone else connected to SBVT. Day’s comments only serve to disparage all those who served on swift boats in Vietnam.”

Another man who doesn’t think they were telling the truth is Steve Hayes, an early member of the group and good friend of the group’s founder. In an interview with the New York Times, Mr. Hayes said:

“The mantra was just ‘We want to set the record straight, it became clear to me that it was morphing from an organization to set the record straight into a highly political vendetta. They knew it was not the truth.”

The photo used was uploaded to Flickr by jim.greenhill who licensed it under a Creative Commons Attribution License and my use of the photo in no way indicates an endorsement of the article from jim.greenhill .

Clark Questions McCain’s Readyness

Yesterday on Face the Nation with Bob Schieffer, General Wesley Clark attacked the idea that Senator McCain’s time in Vietnam would make him a better president:

“In the matters of national security policy making, it’s a matter of understanding risk, it’s a matter of gauging your opponents, and it’s a matter of being held accountable. John McCain’s never done any of that in his official positions. I certainly honor his service as a prisoner of war. He was a hero to me and to hundreds of thousands and millions of others in the armed forces, as a prisoner of war. He has been a voice on the Senate Armed Services Committee and he has traveled all over the world, but he hasn’t held executive responsibility, that large squadron in the Navy that he commanded – that wasn’t a wartime squadron.”

Bob Schieffer then pointed out that Obama hasn’t had any of those experiences, which prompted General Clark to say:

“Well, I don’t think riding in a fighter plane and getting shot down is a qualification to be president,”

General Clark has said things to that effect before, but this time his statement attracted attention. Many Republican Senators reacted with outrage such as John Warner:

“I was utterly shocked, that he would in such a disrespectful way attack one of his fellow career military officers.”

and Bob Dole:

“Beyond comprehension … further erosion of our nation’s political discourse,”

Their outrage was shared by Airforce Colonel Bud Day who said that it was “A very indecent thing,” Of course, Colonel Day knows a lot about indecent things as he took part in the “Swift Boat” ads which slandered John Kerry in the 2004 election.

The candidates both took a higher road on the matter with Senator Obama saying at about the same time as Clark made his statements that Senator McCain:

“endured physical torment in service to our country … no one should ever devalue that service, especially for the sake of a political campaign, and that goes for supporters on both sides.”

Earlier today, Obama’s spokesman Bill Burton said:

“Sen. Obama honors and respects Sen. McCain’s service, and of course he rejects yesterday’s statement by Sen. Clark.”

Senator McCain attempted to link Obama to the statement he had denounced by saying:

“If that’s the kind of campaign Sen. Obama and his surrogates and supporters want to engage in, I understand that. But it doesn’t reduce the price of gas by one penny. It doesn’t achieve our energy independence or make it come any closer. Doesn’t make any American stay in their home who’s at risk of losing it today. And it certainly doesn’t do anything to address the challenges Americans have in keeping their jobs, homes and supporting their families.”

What no one seems to want to point out is that Wesley Clark’s ultimate point is right. McCain’s time as a POW certainly shouldn’t be belittled, but saying that it doesn’t make him qualified doesn’t belittle it in the slightest. It simply makes the point that living through the horrors of torture doesn’t mean he’s going be a great President.

The question about whether or not it should be a part of the political discourse I can certainly see but, the only serious argument I can see against Clark’s point is that being a POW has given McCain greater judgment. However, the McCain campaign is choosing not to address it but rather disregard it.