Free Republic

Reading "Masters and Commanders," Andrew Roberts's magnificent account of British and American leaders in World War II, I was struck by how many of them, working prodigious hours and under great strain, were struck down by heart attacks while in their 60s. This doesn't happen anymore, I thought, with the blood pressure and cholesterol medicines many of us routinely take. But it does, as we were reminded by the sudden death at age 69 this week of Richard Holbrooke, who was working prodigiously as Barack Obama's special representative for AfPak, i.e., Afghanistan and Pakistan. Holbrooke was known in cynical Washington...

An American Traitor: Guilty As Charged By Henry Mark Holzer and Erika HolzerFrontPageMagazine.com | June 10, 2005For three decades Jane Fonda obfuscated, distorted and lied about virtually everything connected with her wartime trip to North Vietnam: her motive, her acts, her intent, and her contribution to the Communists’ war effort.  With the aid of clever handlers, she so successfully suppressed and spun her conduct in Hanoi that many Americans didn’t know what she had done there, and, more important, the legal significance. Three years ago, our book, “Aid and Comfort”: Jane Fonda in North Vietnam (McFarland & Co.), laid bare...

If you wanted to see the perfect example of the ethical and moral collapse of the Mainstream Media, you could not do better than a long article in the New Yorker of May 23, 2005. The article is entitled, "The Spy Who Loved Us." Written by a teacher at the University of Albany, named Thomas Bass, it's about a man named Pham Xuan An. Now very old, An was -- among many other things -- a correspondent in Saigon during the Vietnam War for Time magazine. He was apparently considered a particularly brilliant and well-informed correspondent and very well liked...

<p>Sit down to a steaming bowl of pho on a bustling Hanoi boulevard. Kick back on a languorous boat ride down the Mekong Delta. Swim at a secluded highlands waterfall. Welcome to Vietnam.</p> <p>This is from a travel brochure from 2005. It's certainly not from an Army recruiting poster from 1965.</p>

THE Vietnam War is universally regarded as a disaster for what it did to the American and Vietnamese people. However, 30 years after the war's end, the reasons for its outcome remain a matter of dispute. The most popular explanation among historians and journalists is that the defeat was a result of American policy makers' cold-war-driven misunderstanding of North Vietnam's leaders as dangerous Communists. In truth, they argue, we were fighting a nationalist movement with great popular support. In this view, "our side," South Vietnam, was a creation of foreigners and led by a corrupt urban elite with no popular...

He displayed the same bright smile and wore a sharply tailored suit. And when he took the microphone, the crowd erupted into cheers of "Kerry! Kerry!" But it wasn't exactly clear last night whether Democratic Sen. John Kerry of Massachusetts was yesterday's news or tomorrow's candidate. In town for a Democratic fund-raiser to help pay some of the roughly $2 million in costs the party has incurred in its legal fight over Christine Gregoire's election as governor, Kerry joked about his loss last fall, which came when Ohio's electoral votes swung to President Bush.

JANE FONDA REGRETS THE "BETRAYAL" HER PHOTO ON A NORTH VIETNAMESE ANTI-AIRCRAFT GUN SYMBOLIZED - "60 MINUTES" SUNDAY

Kerry Lost Security Clearance! Just spoke with reporter friend in DC. She is talking with former USN ONI types who worked on DOD/USN investigation that resulted in total loss of Kerry’s Navy security clearance. Kerry had been granted a Top Secret by the Navy on October 11, 1967 based on a routine background investigation by Office of Naval Intelligence. A top secret clearance was required for his work at that time. Obtaining and holding a security clearance of any level, especially TS or above, requires certain terms, obligations, commitments and conditions from the holder. One of the most important is...

<p>An official Navy document on Senator Kerry's campaign Web site listed as Mr. Kerry's "Honorable Discharge from the Reserves" opens a door on a well kept secret about his military service.</p> <p>The document is a form cover letter in the name of the Carter administration's secretary of the Navy, W. Graham Claytor. It describes Mr. Kerry's discharge as being subsequent to the review of "a board of officers." This in it self is unusual. There is nothing about an ordinary honorable discharge action in the Navy that requires a review by a board of officers.</p>