Second FUNNIST joke ever. Kennedy supports Kerry 08!!!!!!!!!!!!

[busybody..]

By Glen Johnson, Associated Press Writer | October 12, 2005

BOSTON --Sen. Edward Kennedy said Wednesday he would back fellow Massachusetts Sen. John Kerry for the Democratic presidential nomination in 2008 -- even if Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton also pursues a White House bid.



While Kennedy has frequently entertained the New York senator and her husband, former President Clinton, he said his loyalty is to Kerry. Early polling shows Clinton and Kerry among the favorites for their party's nomination in 2008, but neither has said for sure whether they'll run.

Kennedy called Kerry, the 2004 nominee, an "able, gifted and talented political leader."

He criticized President Bush's leadership and said of the American people: "Every day, I think they regret that John wasn't elected."

"We haven't had accountability and we haven't had real leadership in dealing with these issues and problems," he said, "and that's what I hear more than anything else."

The White House had no immediate comment.

There was friction between Kennedy and Kerry in 2000, when Kennedy appeared to favor then-Sen. John Edwards as Al Gore's running mate, even though Kerry was also under consideration. Yet Kennedy campaigned vigorously for Kerry last year, especially before the candidate staged a come-from-behind victory in the Iowa caucuses

 

[busybody..]

hahahahaha

the bastard Kerry deserves this

hope he ends up in jail


Suing Kerry


By Jamie Glazov
For more information visit frontpagemag.com
In a Frontpage Exclusive, Mary Jane McManus, wife of Vietnam POW Kevin McManus, discusses the lawsuit Vietnam veterans are bringing against John Kerry.
http://frontpagemag.com/Articles/ReadArticle.asp?ID=19792

Suing Kerry
By Jamie Glazov
FrontPageMagazine.com | October 13, 2005


Frontpage Interview’s guest today is Mary Jane McManus, wife of former Vietnam POW, Kevin McManus, who is part of a lawsuit against John Kerry for conspiracy and defamation.



February 22, 1973 -- Homecoming 2005

at Andrews AF Base, Maryland



FP: Mary Jane McManus, welcome to Frontpage Interview.



McManus: Thanks so much for this opportunity. I'm a Frontpage fan.



FP: The Vietnam Veterans Legacy Foundation (VVLF), led by a group of former Vietnam combat veterans, including several POWs, is suing Sen. John Kerry and a top DNC campaign official for conspiracy and defamation. You are also involved. Before I ask you about these developments, could you kindly tell us a bit about yourself and your background?



McManus: Thanks Jamie. I'm the wife of a former POW, Kevin McManus, held by the North Vietnamese for 5 years, 8 months. We became engaged right before he left for Danang as an Air Force F-4 pilot in October 1966. We planned on an August 1967 wedding. The plan changed. We decided to marry on his R&R.



On March 14 while Danang was being mortared, he called to say that he'd be (if luck held out) in Honolulu on the 15th. Somehow he found me at the Oahu airport. We shopped for rings but weren't able to pick them up until after the ceremony.



Fr. Hill at Hickham AFB performed the ceremony with a loose-leaf binder ring (which he couldn't let us keep because he needed it). Another Air Force pilot, a classmate of Kevin's at the Air Force Academy, and his wife served as witnesses.
A McManus marrying a McCahill deserved a St. Patrick's Day wedding, but we couldn't wait the extra day and tied the knot on the March 16. He returned to Danang on the 19th and I to New York. The wedding reception would be at home in New York in late June when he was scheduled to return.



On June 14, however, his plane was shot down not far from Hanoi, and the usual men in blue showed up at my parents' home in Brightwaters, NY, and at his parents' home in nearby Babylon, to tell us that Kevin was missing in action.
Four months later, thanks to many prayers from many people (my mother called it "storming heaven"), I was notified by the Air Force that Kevin was very likely a POW.



Of course there were no official lists (as prescribed by the Geneva Conventions) of POWs, so no one on this side of the world knew for certain who was and was not captured alive. But that wasn't the only convention the communists flouted: there were no Red Cross inspections, no Red Cross package-deliveries, almost no communication between POWs and family members (the first letter I got from Kevin arrived almost three years after he was shot down);



POWs were tortured routinely while one of the most brutal regimes in the world at the time claimed they were war criminals--a claim repeated by Jane Fonda and other members of Vietnam Veterans against the War, including a Navy Lt (jg) John Kerry.



In 1970 the policy that had kept most POW/MIA relatives quiet for the sake of the POWs changed.



Relatives formed the National League of Families of American Prisoners and Missing in Southeast Asia in April. The Reserve Officers Assn. and later the American Legion gave us office space.



I worked in that office with the heroic wives of some very heroic men: Sybil Stockdale, Joan Vinson, Dorie Day, Jane Denton, Shirley Johnson, and many others who brought the plight of our relatives to national and international attention.



Kevin came home in February 1973.


We had seven children, the youngest of whom, a son, died of cancer at 16 in 1999. As parents we shared all the usual pleasures and duties of school, church, and athletic organizations, and great pride in our children.


FP: I am very sorry about your son.



Can you kindly tell us about this lawsuit?



McMaus: The Vietnam Veterans Legacy Foundation, a nonprofit, charitable, 501(c)(3) organization, was founded early this year to combat the myths that persist--in Hollywood, major news outlets, and most of academia at every level--about Vietnam and the Americans who fought there.



To some the continuation of those myths must be very important indeed because our organization has been sued twice (with another another suit pending), and the producer of Stolen Honor (another myth-shattering vehicle) has been sued three times--twice just three weeks before the 2004 presidential election.



All those who have brought suit against us were members of Vietnam Veterans against the War, an organization to which John Kerry also belonged and for which he was leading spokesman.



As spokesman for this organization, John Kerry testified in April 1971 before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee that American soldiers were committing atrocities and war crimes "on a day to day basis," that this was U. S. policy, condoned "at every level of command."

He accused the U. S. of committing 200,000 murders a year and of being "more guilty than any other body" of violating the Geneva Conventions.



FP: So expand a bit on the specifics of your suit against Sen. Kerry and Anthony Podesta? I recognize that all of its ingredients are available on the VVLF website: www.vvlf.org or www.VietnamLegacy.org. But could you kindly give us the general essence of it?



McManus: Well, let’s begin with the issue of freedom of speech. Does it mean you can lie and defame people and government policies, say just any old thing you want including outrageous lies?



I can’t help but wonder: who sued Michael Moore for Fahrenheit 9/11?
George Butler for "Going Up River,"
Jane Fonda for just about anything, or
John Kerry for his 1971 senate testimony?



Regardless of the content of their statements--truth, fiction, hyperbole--their right to proclaim it is protected. Our rights apparently are not protected.



Rights aside, however, what we're saying is true, not because we're saying it's true, but because at least part of what we're combating is high hyperbole, outrageous generalizations, and utterly illogical statements.



Does anyone honestly believe that American soldiers committed 200,000 "murders a year" in Vietnam?



Or that official policy ("at every level of command") allowed any GI to "rape, cut off ears, cut off heads, tape wires from portable telephones to human genitals and turn up the power, cut off limbs, blow up bodies, randomly shoot at civilians, raze villages in a fashion reminiscent of Ghenghis Khan"?



John Kerry got away with that statement (his verbs were in the past tense), was elected to Congress & the Senate, and ran for President. No one questioned his free speech rights.


Nor do we. But we do question the accuracy of his and others' statements.



We believe our members earned the right to contest that testimony by taking bullets and taking torture. Unfortunately they weren't here to combat Kerry's testimony; most of them were in cement cells they wouldn't leave for another nearly two years.



Next, we can cover the issue of facts as distinguished from opinion or falsehoods:



The January 1971 "Winter Soldier" investigation in Detroit, financed by Jane Fonda brought some 120 Vietnam Veterans against the War, including a then-Lt. (jg) Kerry, to report (and film) recollections of the atrocities and war crimes they had themselves witnessed or committed.



Part of that film was shown in Stolen Honor. (And the whole film, "Winter Soldier," released in August of this year, is now making the rounds at art theatres throughout the country, accompanied frequently by some of its stars who moderate a discussion afterwards.)



Not one "testimony" has yet been proved; not one "testimony" was under oath. Several testimonies, as well as several "veterans," however, have been proven false.



Their leader, a man claiming to be an Air Force Captain and pilot in Vietnam, turned out to be (as documented on Meet the Press in 1971) not a pilot, not a captain, not an officer, never in Vietnam. And he wasn't alone in such deception.



This is fact, as recognized by all reputable media.



John Kerry not only attended that meeting; he reported on it in detail to the Senate Foreign Relations Committe on April 22, 1971. That testimony is available on the net, in the Congressional Record.



Fact.



John Kerry admitted in that testimony that he had visited the various communist representatives of North Vietnam and the Viet Cong. He repeated and recommended their negotiating points to the Senate.



Fact.



This information has never been a secret. Sen. Kerry staked and launched his political career on his antiwar activism.



These facts, along with some opinions (usually first-amendment covered), were brought out in Stolen Honor.

Its producer was sued for defamation by individual members of Vietnam Veterans against the War who declared that they had been defamed not because the film showed them as antiwar activists who had committed and witnessed war crimes, but because the narration suggested that some of them weren't indeed Vietnam Vets, or hadn't committed or witnessed war crimes.

Rather strange take on "defamation," don't you think?



We, Vietnam Veterans Legacy Foundation (consisting of four POWs, two other combat veterans, and the wife of a POW) were added in August to the list of defendants in one existing suit and became co-defendants in another.



Why? Apparently because we supported Sherwood in his defense. I'm not sure when that became a crime or a tort.



We have recently been accused by a Kerry-aide (as reported on 10-6-05, by AP, Washington Post, Philadelphia Inquirer, et al) of continuing the "same smears and sleaze" that began in the 2004 campaign. We're "serial liars."



We'd be interested to know how these accusations came to be levelled at us. Was what we said in Stolen Honor untrue?



What is the likelihood, I wonder, of men who took torture to avoid lying to their captors for 5, 6, 7 years, to avoid saying exactly the same things Lt. Kerry told all of America via his testimony . . . what is the likelihood of their lying now when there's no pressure whatsoever to lie, when lying then would have saved them excruciating pain?



What possible motive could there be that would induce them to lie now?



Does anyone imagine they like disrupted lives, insulting publicity, legal problems, more notoriety or fame? They wouldn't say this, but I can: honor is the only inducement. The overwhelming majority of American servicemen served honorably, heroically, in Vietnam, and not even their own parents or children know it.



Some of their children are serving honorably in the Middle East. While imbedded reporters told their story, we all knew how honorably. But we're sliding back into the same old anti-soldier rhetoric that masqueraded as give-peace-a-chance in the 60s/70s. We just can't allow the old let-the-wounds-heal philosophy dictate what is and isn't said about Vietnam today. It's too important.



I wonder at the gall of those who dare question the integrity of our members, never mind our chairman, Col. George E. (Bud) Day, USAF (Ret)--a veteran of World War II, Korea, and Vietnam as well as of three services (the Army, the Marines, and the Air Force) not to mention a Medal of Honor recipient and the most highly decorated Air Force veteran living today, one of the most highly decorated combat veterans ever, an attorney who restored the promise of lifetime health care to our WWII and Korean veterans.



We're not suing to silence anyone.



We're also not attacking individuals with personal invectives, slurs, smears, or sleaze.



We're trying to unearth the truth about Vietnam. We have no interest whatsoever in ruining anyone's reputation, including Sen. Kerry's. Our abiding interest is to try to restore the reputations of 58,000 dead U. S. combat soldiers and the generation of soldiers from which they came.



We're not suing them for their view. We believe they're free to express whatever sentiments they may have. We'd just like the opportunity to present our very different view of the service of Americans in Vietnam. But it looks as though we've got to sue to get it.



FP: So why now? Why the lawsuit at this particular moment?



McManus: As some Americans are already aware, the Vietnam Veterans Against the War serve in the front ranks of antiwar veterans and activists today. Carefully adjusted claims of atrocities and war crimes have been devised for this generation of soldiers.



The allegations are typical: the U. S. tortures its POWs as a matter of policy (never mind that terrorists don't qualify as POWs under the Geneva Conventions; and never mind, too, that the VVAW didn't believe Americans were tortured at all in Vietnam and that their definition of "torture" vacillates predictably depending on who's doing the “torturing”), the U. S. puts nuclear waste in the bullets and bombs we're using in Iraq and Afghanistan, etc.



Jane Fonda's been replaced by, or gained an ally in, Cindy Sheehan, but the talking points haven't changed much.



FP: So what you are saying is that the lawsuit is crucial at this very moment not only for the principle of truth in and of itself but also a crucial tool to keep the spirit of our soldiers in Iraq high? In other words, this suit is directly connected to legitimizing our fight for freedom in the terror war?



McManus: I wish I'd said that--exactly that way. Today's anti-U.S propaganda machine is turning out new versions of the communist propaganda of the late 60s and 70s. This isn't an idle charge, nor is it our idle charge.



Communist generals and spies since 1975 have admitted that they won the war in the streets of America, not on the battlefield, and they won it with KGB talking points.



This isn't the best of arguments to use, of course, because one can never be completely sure when a propagandist is telling the truth. We do know, however, that Sen. Kerry and Ms. Fonda are held in high enough regard in that small place that their pictures along with testimonials from the communists hang in Vietnamese military museums.



FP: Can you give us some of your thoughts when you see the Vietnam Veterans Memorial?



McManus: This is my personal opinion, and many don't share it. I know the wall has become one of the most visited, most revered spots in the capital, and it's the only semblance of recognition our generations of veterans ever received.



But . . . Is there any doubt that the myth survived and the facts died when you look at that Memorial? Is there anything more "reflective" of America's apparent opinion of the Vietnam Veteran than that Memorial?



A multi-paneled headstone, black in a city of white and bronze monuments to heroism, below-ground, a "scar on the landscape," listing neither battles nor victories nor medals nor regiments--nothing but the names of the dead and MIA in chronological order of death (no doubt to remind the name-seeker of just how many lives were "wasted'). What a tribute.



But what can Vietnam vets expect--a parade? If they'd wanted a decent memorial, they shouldn't have committed all those war-crimes. Sarcasm over.



Most Americans don't know that not a single Vietnam veteran sat on the selection committee for that monstrosity.



Funny--the WWII vets got a white, above-ground memorial that sits prominently in the sun on the mall--important battles, theatres, victories all part of the memorial for a shorter if more universal war. My father's war, Kevin's father's war, our uncles' war. Could anyone doubt they were culturally acceptable servicemen who fought a culturally acceptable war.



Most of WWII vets' sons weren't drafted into their service in Vietnam; they volunteered. Most of the 58,000 who gave their lives there were volunteers--not reluctant draftees who could find no way out of serving in what became an "unpopular" war. And most reluctant draftees served just as honorably.



Someone recently suggested that something was seriously wrong when the hallucinogenic vision of a few vets was allowed to co-opt every facet of the history of America's longest war.



How did it happen? How has this view lasted so long?

How has its influence permeated the culture?



Just look at what our children and grandchildren are exposed to:



Movies/documentaries/TV series about Vietnam or Vietnam vets--how many can you name that show U. S. servicemen as heroes?



How many can you name that show the U.S. serviceman as a bully, a war-criminal, a drug-addict, insane, riddled with guilt, unstable, or at the very best a misfit (Rambo)? We're working on that now.



Of the over 100 film-titles we've looked at, a handful of movies portray GIs as heroes. Most of those films are about POWs. Those POWs, I think it's logical to assume, came from squadrons, battalions, fleets, companies of other heroic men who weren't captured, who came home to America and oblivion (if they were lucky).



FP: What are your personal feelings about an individual like Jane Fonda?



McManus: I'd like to believe that her opinions on Vietnam stemmed from the same feelings of insecurity she describes in her book (yes, I read it, but I didn't pay for it). The price for her free speech, I think, came rather high--not to her, perhaps, but to America.



Her money and connections played no small part in the image of the Vietnam vet created and perpetuated in Hollywood, an image somehow accepted by the "major" media and the army of disposable-scholarship producers the draft excused during the war. As an actress, she was accustomed to reading others' lines. All were fiction.



FP: What do you think of the likes of Michael Moore, Tom Hayden, Cindy Sheehan and others today who are cheering on the Islamist terrorists in this terror war? What do you think motivates them? What is in their hearts?



McManus: St. Paul tells us, in effect, that we can't know the content of others' hearts; but we certainly know the content of their speech on the subject of our military.
When the role of conscientious objector or isolationist or peace-advocate slid, apparently without objection, into soldier-basher I don't think I could pinpoint; but there's little question that the practice gained important adherents in the late 60s and that the practice was encouraged, if not initiated, in the PR departments of our Cold War enemies, along with notions that attempted communist takeovers were actually popular civil uprisings on a par with the American Revolution, and that communist leaders weren't tyrants but freedom-fighters like George Washington.



Not all the old propaganda finds outlet in the war against the War on Terror, but much is recognizable. Re-cycling it even after communism itself has begun to crumble has proved useful to America's enemies at home and abroad. It's hard to improve on the old model.



Perhaps when we see a Brittany Spears or a Julia Roberts sitting in on a beheading session we'll realize just how effective the old model (sorry, Ms. Fonda) was and why its de riguer for today's antiwar activists.
Cindy Sheehan, I have to hope, is an exception; who knows what grief can cause? And who, indeed, could crawl so low as to exploit that grief?



FP: What are your hopes concerning this lawsuit? Are you optimistic?



McManus: I'd have to be optimistic, wouldn't I? Part of that optimism is based on two elections: Nixon's in '72 and Bush's in 2004. Results in both rejected the same antiwar rhetoric, the first by a landslide, the second by enough.



And Reagan's, not directly related, rejected pessimism about our role in the world and our ability to prevail in the Cold War. The other part is common sense. No matter what political views Americans have, I don't believe they're ready to accept passively the slandering of their fathers, sons, brothers, neighbors, or classmates, in any war. My hopes, therefore, are high and many; but I'm not going to tempt fate here by listing them.



FP: Mary Jane McManus, it was an honor to speak with you today. Your husband is a great hero and so are you. And the people you represent are our heroes and we admire you greatly and thank you for your priceless service to this nation. We wish you the best.



McManus: They were and are heroes, but they weren't alone in that regard. Thank you for helping us to honor the rest of their warrior-generation.

 

[busybody..]

For you know who

 

[Cap’n AMatrixca]

How dare you bag on a highly decorated hero in Nixon's secret war against Cambodia!

Shame, shame, shame..

 

[Cap’n AMatrixca]

McManus: I'd have to be optimistic, wouldn't I? Part of that optimism is based on two elections: Nixon's in '72 and Bush's in 2004. Results in both rejected the same antiwar rhetoric, the first by a landslide, the second by enough.


Don't forget Dukakas' "Pretty in Tank" election!

 

[eagleyez]

I guess that makes the first funniest Joke of the day that well crafted Photo Slop by GWB yesterday.

Talk about busted for being a phony moron.

Ah well, we all knew that already, so its old hat.

Have a good weekend Cap, toss a nice load of Water Oak in the woodstoove and enjoy.

 

[busybody..]

I guess that makes the first funniest Joke of the day that well crafted Photo Slop by GWB yesterday.

Talk about busted for being a phony moron.

Ah well, we all knew that already, so its old hat.

Have a good weekend Cap, toss a nice load of Water Oak in the woodstoove and enjoy.

THIS

is THE funniest JOKE ever




--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

They See Al Gore by a Nose in 2008



Is Al Gore coming back? If allies we talked to have their way, the former veep will be the next president. "It's Gore Time," says a political strategist and fundraiser who is opening a bid to get Gore into the race. Gore friends see his recent political and business moves as proof he's preparing to run. Allies say that in speeches, Gore has found his voice to address domestic and world issues. And in raising money for his Current TV network, which targets the critical youth market, Big Al has built an issue base and donor network that's competitive with Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton 's. Our source--a top aide in the previous Bush administration--is planning meetings with Gore's team to push an early entry while Clinton runs for re-election in New York. It doesn't end there: The Gorebots want him to pick Sen. Barack Obama, the youthful Illinois African-American, as his No. 2.

 

[Cap’n AMatrixca]

Why now, after eight years of Clinton, does the press suddenly realize that Presidents stage things?

 

[Cap’n AMatrixca]

PS E

A little men in black lingo...

It's INJUN SUMMER!

80's today.

 

[busybody..]

I dont think it was staged

if it was, why do it in front of reporters so they can embarrass you?

What it was

was MANAGED so that the order was assured

whats the big deal?

 

[Cap’n AMatrixca]

He's a dumbass nazi mutha fucka, that's the big deal...

 

[busybody..]

Thursday, October 13, 2005
You could just feel it...
You could just feel how badly the media wanted to believe the President's videoconference with 10 U.S. soldiers was "staged." And dammit, if the media wanted it to be staged, then staged it will be.


WASHINGTON - It was billed as a conversation with U.S. troops, but the questions President Bush asked on a teleconference call Thursday were choreographed to match his goals for the war in Iraq and Saturday's vote on a new Iraqi constitution.


Of course. And I have an agenda, distributed in advance, listing what I want to talk about when I hold a company level training meeting. These guys understand that. I understand that. The AP, apparently, doesn't. I guess none of their reporters ever interviewed a source and told them what they were interested in discussing.

And just one question: "hailed" by whom?


Barber said the president was interested in three topics: the overall security situation in Iraq, security preparations for the weekend vote and efforts to train Iraqi troops.




A brief rehearsal ensued.

"OK, so let's just walk through this," Barber said. "Captain Kennedy, you answer the first question and you hand the mike to whom?"

"Captain Smith," Kennedy said.

"Captain. Smith? You take the mike and you hand it to whom?" she asked.

"Captain Kennedy," the soldier replied.

And so it went.

"If the question comes up about partnering — how often do we train with the Iraqi military — who does he go to?" Barber asked.

"That's going to go to Captain Pratt," one of the soldiers said.

"And then if we're going to talk a little bit about the folks in Tikrit — the hometown — and how they're handling the political process, who are we going to give that to?" she asked.


Well, think about it, for a second. The President wanted to talk to people who were knowledgeable on these three specific subjects. Wouldn't a prudent advance person want to get the mic to the right person smoothly in case the subject comes up?

Of course she would.

Does that mean that the soldiers' comments were insincere? No. There is no reason to believe anyone was up there lying. But that is what the AP would like to imply.


The president told them twice that the American people were behind them.

"You've got tremendous support here at home," Bush said.

Less than 40 percent in an AP-Ipsos poll taken in October said they approved of the way Bush was handling Iraq. Just over half of the public now say the Iraq war was a mistake.


Ok, but what percentage of the American people favor an immediate pullout, you dolts? Isn't that the most relevant stat here? What percentage of the people oppose the troops? (In reality, the answer is more than anyone on the left wants to admit, though still a small minority of the population.) The AP, however, is Hell-bent on undercutting the president, here (and basically giving the troops a snide and subtle "fuck you" in the process), but what they are really giving is poll numbers that reflect support for the President. Not support for the troops.

Most editors I wrote for as a Time Inc. wretch would have caught that, and never let me get away with it. Not so at the AP I guess.

Oh, and here's the scuzziest bit of all:


Paul Rieckhoff, director of the New York-based Operation Truth, an advocacy group for U.S. veterans of Iraq and Afghanistan, denounced the event as a "carefully scripted publicity stunt." Five of the 10 U.S. troops involved were officers, he said.


If Operation Truth is simply "an advocacy group for U.S. veterans of Iraq and Afghanistan," then I'm the Queen of Sheba. Their website says they're "nonpartisan." But look who's doing the fundraising: Randi Rhodes, Jenine Garofolo, Al Franken, Air America, and Tim Robbins.

This reporter is remarkably uncurious about the sources she seeks for comment.




"If he wants the real opinions of the troops, he can't do it in a nationally televised teleconference," Rieckhoff said. "He needs to be talking to the boots on the ground and that's not a bunch of captains."


Yeah. I guess we're all idiots. None of us know what's going on about anything. Actually, there could not have been more than 4 captains, since only five of the ten were officers, and one was a lieutenant. The remainder were NCOs. Yeah, I guess NCOs never talk to troops either.

Some advocate.

Splash, out

Jason

UPDATE: Check out the morons in the discussion board! Some of them are calling for the officers and NCOs who participated in the conference call to be reprimanded and discharged.

Yep. That's support for the troops alright, leftie style.

 

[busybody..]

If one has BSD then one doesnt see reality

here is another way of looking at the matter



AP Response to Bush Teleconference Staged!
Media Madness
Hatched by Dafydd
UPDATE 18:23: See below.

Now the AP has taken to attacking the president for supposedly "staging" a teleconference with soldiers... because they rehearsed in advance which soldier would answer which question.

Bush Teleconference With Soldiers Staged
Oct 13, 2005
by Deb Riechmann

WASHINGTON (AP) - It was billed as a conversation with U.S. troops, but the questions President Bush asked on a teleconference call Thursday were choreographed to match his goals for the war in Iraq and Saturday's vote on a new Iraqi constitution.


When I first read that paragraph, my Skept-O-Meter™ went off like the Queen Mary's foghorn. What did Ms. Riechmann mean, the questions were "choreographed?" Aren't the questions always choreographed?

During an interview, for example, the interviewer always knows in advance the major questions he will ask, the order he will ask them, and to whom they will be directed (if multiple subjects are being grilled simultaneously). Often the subject also knows, to allow him to do whatever research is necessary to come up with a more detailed answer. Typically, major questions spawn follow-up questions; we have no clue from the AP story whether this happened this time, even though that would reveal much about the charge of being "staged."

So what the heck does Ms. Riechmann mean? How is this different from any other interview situation? Remember, the president is the interviewer, not the subject; he's playing Brit Hume, for a change of pace.

"I'm going to ask somebody to grab those two water bottles against the wall and move them out of the camera shot for me," [Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense Allison] Barber said.

A brief rehearsal ensued.

"OK, so let's just walk through this," Barber said. "Captain Kennedy, you answer the first question and you hand the mike to whom?"

"Captain Smith," Kennedy said.

"Captain. Smith? You take the mike and you hand it to whom?" she asked.

"Captain Kennedy," the soldier replied.

And so it went.


Yes... it went, rather than crashed, because the soldiers actually knew in advance the order in which they would speak! They didn't talk over each other or tussle for the microphone. Will Bush's perfidy never stop?

"If the question comes up about partnering - how often do we train with the Iraqi military - who does he go to?" Barber asked.

"That's going to go to Captain Pratt," one of the soldiers said.

"And then if we're going to talk a little bit about the folks in Tikrit - the hometown - and how they're handling the political process, who are we going to give that to?" she asked.


And here at last we have the substance of the charge of "choreographing" the questions: that the soldiers knew in advance which of them was the expert in a particular area -- hence who would actually answer the questions pertaining to that area.

This is what the Associated Press is trying to pass off as another "scandal" in the Bush administration. This barely even counts as a college try; Ms. Riechmann may as well have just used the pre-existing template titled Bush the Lying Liar Version 23.

Does even the Left doubt any longer the bias of the press against this president and against Republicans in general? Or do they just go through the motions occasionally, tossing a bit of tainted, gray meat to their base, more or less as a hobby?

Of course, they had to close with an eyebite from somebody hostile to Bush:

Paul Rieckhoff, director of the New York-based Operation Truth, an advocacy group for U.S. veterans of Iraq and Afghanistan, denounced the event as a "carefully scripted publicity stunt." Five of the 10 U.S. troops involved were officers, he said.

"If he wants the real opinions of the troops, he can't do it in a nationally televised teleconference," Rieckhoff said. "He needs to be talking to the boots on the ground and that's not a bunch of captains."


I don't know what branch of the service Mr. Rieckhoff served in (if any), but it's evidently one where junior officers stay at the Pentagon and only privates and non-coms actually venture into the field.

I wonder whether he applies that same scorn to a certain fellow who was a Navy lieutenant in Vietnam, the exact equivalent rank to "captain" in the Army or Marines: Lt. John F. Kerry.

UPDATE: I have now listened to the 4:26 audio that National Public Radio made available (hat tip to Octavius), and contrary to some of the commenters to this post and some lefty blogs, such as This Divided State, there is not one, single instance of anybody "coaching [the soldiers] along the way" (as Bryan at TDS claims).

Allison Barber asks one question and listens to Captain Kennedy's answer; she does not tell him to change anything or give him any feedback whatsoever. She runs through a couple of other questions but doesn't wait for the soldiers to answer.

Let me repeat something I said above, because it may not have sunk in. When you are evaluating verbal acuity or mental quickness, you don't want to reveal the questions in advance; you prefer to watch the subject squirm. But when you want to gather solid information, you do give him the questions in advance, so he will be prepared with complete and accurate answers.

President Bush was not giving these soldiers a pop quiz, for heaven's sake. He wanted to hear what they had to say when they'd had a chance to think about it. And even if every one of them had been given an opportunity to rehearse speaking his answer -- on national TV and before the Commander In Chief -- it is neither "staged" nor "choreographed," except in the most technical meaning of those words, and there is no example at all of "coaching."

These are the real opinions of real soldiers who know what the hell they're talking about. Even if half of them are captains.

Hatched by Dafydd on this day, October 13, 2005, at the time of 05:02 PM

 

[Cap’n AMatrixca]

He should have stuck to crosses in the sand and dirty dancin' on the beach...

And speaking of presentation, anyone know of any instance that Hillary Clinton has not had every question staged and orchestrated?

 

[busybody..]

and if you dont know what BSD is

its

Bush Derangement Syndrome

Sorta like Helen Thomas has





Scott McClellan Says Helen Thomas Opposes 'War on Terrorism'

By E&P Staff

Published: October 13, 2005 3:50 PM ET

NEW YORK Questions today from longtime White House reporter Helen Thomas caused White House Press Secretary Scott McClellan to declare that she opposes the war on terrorism. His response caused one of Thomas's colleagues, Terry Moran, to leap to her defense.

Here is the exchange from the official transcript:

THOMAS What does the President mean by "total victory" -- that we will never leave Iraq until we have "total victory"? What does that mean?

McCLELLAN: Free and democratic Iraq in the heart of the Middle East, because a free and democratic Iraq in the heart of the Middle East will be a major blow to the ambitions --

THOMAS If they ask us to leave, then we'll leave?

MR. McCLELLAN: I'm trying to respond. A free and democratic Iraq in the heart of the broader Middle East will be a major blow to the ambitions of al Qaeda and their terrorist associates. They want to establish or impose their rule over the broader Middle East -- we saw that in the Zawahiri letter that was released earlier this week by the intelligence community.

THOMAS They also know we invaded Iraq.

McCLELLAN: Well, Helen, the President recognizes that we are engaged in a global war on terrorism. And when you're engaged in a war, it's not always pleasant, and it's certainly a last resort. But when you engage in a war, you take the fight to the enemy, you go on the offense. And that's exactly what we are doing. We are fighting them there so that we don't have to fight them here. September 11th taught us --

THOMAS It has nothing to do with -- Iraq had nothing to do with 9/11.

McCLELLAN: Well, you have a very different view of the war on terrorism, and I'm sure you're opposed to the broader war on terrorism. The President recognizes this requires a comprehensive strategy, and that this is a broad war, that it is not a law enforcement matter.

Terry.

TERRY MORAN On what basis do you say Helen is opposed to the broader war on terrorism?

McCLELLAN: Well, she certainly expressed her concerns about Afghanistan and Iraq and going into those two countries. I think I can go back and pull up her comments over the course of the past couple of years.

MORAN And speak for her, which is odd.

McCLELLAN: No, I said she may be, because certainly if you look at her comments over the course of the past couple of years, she's expressed her concerns --

THOMAS I'm opposed to preemptive war, unprovoked preemptive war.

MR. McCLELLAN: -- she's expressed her concerns.



--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
E&P Staff (letters@editorandpublisher.com)

 

[busybody..]

He should have stuck to crosses in the sand and dirty dancin' on the beach...

And speaking of presentation, anyone know of any instance that Hillary Clinton has not had every question staged and orchestrated?

that is called MANAGEMENT

what Bush does is MANIPULATION

dontya know

 

[Cap’n AMatrixca]

Ich kenne das...

 

[Cap’n AMatrixca]

I just reminded myself of something.

Hillary DID go off script once!

She claimed to have been named after an unknown bee-keeper in New Zealand...

 

[cjh]

bush may be the biggest joke ever

For the first time, more people say George W. Bush's presidency will be judged as unsuccessful than say it will be seen as a success, a poll finds.

Forty-one percent of respondents said Bush's presidency will be seen as unsuccessful in the long run, while 26 percent said the opposite. Thirty-five percent said it was too early to tell, according to the Pew Research Center for the People & the Press.

In January, 36 percent said successful and 27 percent said unsuccessful.

The increasing pessimism about Bush's long-term prospects comes at a time when many polls have found the public increasingly is negative about Bush's performance and the direction of the country.

Seven in 10 said they want the next president to offer policies and programs that are different from the Bush administration's.

http://www.billingsgazette.com/inde.../2005/10/13/build/nation/28-bush-approval.inc

 

[Cap’n AMatrixca]

Well duh! The conservatives want a conservative and the Democrats hate Bush even though he spends and acts just like them so no one's happy.

What's new?

 

[busybody..]

About "Staged" Video Stunts

Shortly before airing a segment designed to embarrass the President over yesterday’s “staged” teleconference, the Today Show was caught staging a video stunt of its own.

In the Bush/Iraq segment, Today screened footage indicating that prior to engaging in a video conversation with President Bush, soldiers on the ground in Iraq were given tips by a Department of Defense official.

But the only advice that the official was shown as giving was a suggestion to one solider to “take a little breath” before speaking to the president so he would actually be speaking to him. It was also stated that some of the soldiers practiced their comments so as to appear as articulate as possible. But there was no indication, or even allegation, that the soldiers were coached as to the substance of their comments or in any way instructed what to say. (Video available: Real Media or Windows Media Player)

Today’s timing couldn’t have been worse. A preceding segment focused on the incessant rains and ensuing flooding in the northeast. For days now, beautiful, blonde - and one senses highly ambitious - young reporter Michelle Kosinski has been on the scene for Today in New Jersey, working the story. In an apparent effort to draw attention to herself, in yesterday’s segment she turned up in hip waders, standing thigh-deep in the flood waters.

Taking her act one step further, this morning she appeared on a suburban street . . . paddling a canoe. There was one small problem. Just as the segment came on the air, two men waded in front of Kosinki . . . and the water barely covered their shoe tops! That’s right, Kosinski’s canoe was in no more than four to six inches of water!

 

[busybody..]

Bush Holds Teleconference for Iraq Troops

President Bush held a video conference with troops in Iraq today, and the MSM spin, closely matched by lefty blogs, is that it was a staged event: Bush holds video rally for troops in Iraq.

It’s another non-issue, of course; if any “staging” took place, it happened right in front of the reporters who were covering the event. No one hid anything. The main beef seems to be that the producers of the event took questions and comments only from soldiers who supported the Iraq effort. So what? It’s not as if people who want a dose of defeatism have nowhere to turn—they can always read the New York Times or Atrios.

 

[busybody..]

remmber when Rumsfeld was asked by a soldier about having to look thru junkyards for armor for the Humvees?

it was a STORY for weeks!!!!!!!!!

it turned out that

1) A reporter told the soldier to ask that question, which made the press conference staged

and

2) It wasnt even TRUE. Over 98% of that units Humvess were armored and those that were not were not used in combat

There was a STAGED question, and the MSM did care that it was nor that FALSE info was being disseminated

 

[busybody..]

'Unfit for Command' coauthor eyes Senate run against Kerry
By Scott Helman, Globe Staff | October 14, 2005

An architect of the swift boat campaign that contributed to the derailment of John F. Kerry's presidential bid has created an exploratory committee for a run for the senator's seat in 2008.

The move, by Jerome R. Corsi, a 59-year-old author from Denville, N.J., who co-wrote the antiKerry book ''Unfit for Command," was his first formal step toward challenging the four-term junior senator from Massachusetts.

In an interview yesterday, Corsi said Kerry was not fit to be senator. He said he was ''testing the waters to see if there's enough interest to support me to make the run feasible."

Corsi has not yet registered with the Federal Election Commission, but his committee has received an employer identification number from the Internal Revenue Service, an early step that candidates for any office must take.

He said he sold an interest in US Financial Marketing Group, an insurance brokerage firm in which he was a managing partner.

Corsi said that he will consider running regardless of whether Kerry seeks reelection but that he would relocate to Massachusetts only if it were clear he could attract the financial support to mount a serious campaign.

''If I have no backing, it may not work," he said.

If Corsi does run, it would revive for Kerry perhaps the most painful episode of his failed 2004 presidential bid.

A group of Vietnam veterans called Swift Boat Veterans for Truth launched an extensive, well-funded campaign questioning Kerry's combat service and antiwar activities. Corsi is not a veteran, but he wrote ''Unfit for Command" with John O'Neill, a Navy veteran and ally of the Nixon White House incensed by Kerry's role in the antiwar movement.

The Kerry campaign did not immediately respond to the attacks in hopes that the issue would wither, but the swift boat message took hold and has been seen as a factor in Kerry's defeat.

Asked about a prospective Kerry-Corsi race, Kerry spokesman David Wade wrote in an e-mail yesterday, ''Although I could say plenty about Jerry Corsi, John Kerry is focused on his work for the people of Massachusetts."

Kerry has set up a Senate reelection committee, but Wade said it is too early to say whether the senator would seek a fifth term or make another White House run.

Corsi, who also writes columns for the conservative Internet news site WorldNetDaily, has drawn heat for his online screeds against Islam (which he called a ''worthless, dangerous, Satanic religion"), the pope, and leading Democrats, among others.

He apologized last year for some of the comments, and said he was just trying to be provocative during the race.

The Massachusetts Democratic Party chairman, Philip W. Johnston, said in a statement yesterday, ''Massachusetts will not welcome a candidate whose calling card is slandering Catholics, the pope, Jews, and Vietnam veterans."

Corsi said he would soon turn his attention to fund-raising.

For now, he said, he's concentrating on a new book he has co-written about the US dependence on foreign oil, ''Black Gold Stranglehold," due out this month.

Corsi has some ties to Massachusetts. He said he spent summers in Framingham, and he lived in Boston from 1968 to 1972 while earning a doctorate from Harvard.

Scott Helman can be reached at shelman@globe.com.