Posted on 09/19/2009 6:26:42 AM PDT by Travis McGee
To Set The Record Straight, first pubished in 2008, is much more than a history of the 2004 presidential race, and the effects the Swiftboat veterans had on that campaign. TSTRS uses the Swiftboat veterans' story to focus upon the role the mainstream media has played in shaping American public opinion over the past forty years, from the Vietnam War until the recent past. When Senator Kerry decided to make his military record a central part of his campaign, the Swiftboat veterans who knew him the best were angered and sickened. They had had enough, and they decided literally “to set the record straight.” Presidential candidate John Kerry unwittingly helped to pull the curtain back on the left-wing media machine, when he was directly confronted by scores of his old military associates.
In the words of Navy SEAL captain and Vietnam veteran Larry Bailey, “More than any other person, John Kerry is responsible for the false image of Vietnam veterans as dysfunctional misfits and crazed killers, and we intend to change that image.”
During 1970 and 1971, while the Vietnam was still raging, John Kerry began his first campaign of political self-promotion, as a leader of the hard-left “Vietnam Veterans Against the War” and “The Winter Soldiers.” With the enthusiastic support of that era’s solidly leftist media, Vietnam veterans were smeared as baby killers and maniacal butchers. John Kerry was the public face and the leader of that campaign of slander and libel against American veterans. These campaigns of slander were enthusiastically broadcast into every American home by the three television networks, and they set the image of Vietnam veterans for the next thirty years. With strong old-media support, John Kerry then ran for Congress and the Senate based on the fame he earned as the nation’s worst slanderer of Vietnam Veterans.
However, by 2004, the leftist media’s monopoly control of opinion information had been breached by a “new media,” consisting of internet forums and blogs, talk radio, and the new Fox television network. John Kerry was to discover to his shock that it was not sufficient that his old allies in the old-media were still solidly in his corner. When the Swiftboat vets began to challenge Kerry’s dubious record of heroism in combat, and attack his treasonous behavior after he left Vietnam, the old-media maintained an airtight news blackout of these new players on the political scene. This time, the old-media blackout wasn’t sufficient to prevent the truth from reaching the voters. The way Americans received their news had changed in the new millennium, and the old-media blackout was no longer an effective bulwark against the truth, as it had been from the 1960s until very recently. Eventually the old-media was forced to respond to the Swiftboat veterans charges, first dismissively and then derisively, but never convincingly. All that the old-media accomplished by their full-throated defense of Kerry the “war hero,” and their attacks on the Swiftboat vets, was to absolutely convince the majority of Americans of the left-slanting nature of their reporting.
The Swiftboat veterans victory against the old-media was not only a decisive event, and a David versus Goliath victory, it was paradigm altering. Gone forever where the days when a Walter Cronkite could pretend to be an objective reporter, and be called, “The most trusted man in America.” In “To Set the Record Straight,” we even see how Cronkite’s successor at CBS news, Dan Rather, put the final nail in the coffin of old-media news control and opinion manipulation. Rather, who was a product of Vietnam-era misreporting and disinformation, tried to counter the effects of the Swiftboat veterans with his own attack on George W. Bush’s Vietnam-era Texas Air National Guard service. CBS anchor Dan Rather breathlessly reported on a series of “newly discovered” purported TANG memos, stating that Bush was a marginal and delinquent pilot officer. As soon as the dubious memos were briefly shown on television, they were immediately dissected and proven to be forgeries by unpaid members of the “new media,” who were “mere” bloggers and members of internet forums, with expertise in the typewriters and printing methods available in the early 1970s. The exposure of Dan Rather as a fraud and a hack over his “memogate” behavior led to his dismissal in disgrace.
“To Set The Record Straight” is much more than an outstanding account of the 2004 presidential race, and the role of the Swiftboat Veterans. It’s the first history of the role the leftist old-media played so successfully in manipulating the opinions of Americans during and after the Vietnam War. The book brilliantly analyzes and describes how the old-media ultimately became a dinosaur, brought crashing down through the efforts of a handful of Swiftboat vets, using the new-media channels of the internet, talk radio and FOX news.
To Set The Record Straight was written by Scott Swett, and freeper Tim Ziegler. Swett created the SwiftVets.com and WinterSolder.com websites during the 2004 campaign, and was central to the Swiftboat veterans' success.
Thanks for the excellent review and ping.
“In the words of Navy SEAL captain and Vietnam veteran Larry Bailey, “More than any other person, John Kerry is responsible for the false image of Vietnam veterans as dysfunctional misfits and crazed killers, and we intend to change that image.”
“During 1970 and 1971, while the Vietnam was still raging, John Kerry began his first campaign of political self-promotion, as a leader of the hard-left “Vietnam Veterans Against the War” and “The Winter Soldiers.” With the enthusiastic support of that era’s solidly leftist media, Vietnam veterans were smeared as baby killers and maniacal butchers. John Kerry was the public face and the leader of that campaign of slander and libel against American veterans. These campaigns of slander were enthusiastically broadcast into every American home by the three television networks, and they set the image of Vietnam veterans for the next thirty years. With strong old-media support, John Kerry then ran for Congress and the Senate based on the fame he earned as the nation’s worst slanderer of Vietnam Veterans.”
Hopefully, Kerry’s treason and treachery will be recognized by enough good Americans to remove him from office and make him a “leper” in America before he passes on to hell.
I think they put some kind of chemical lobotomizer into the water in the People’s Republic of Taxachusetts. How else to explain the success of two traitors like Teddy and John?
Good job! We conservatives must learn to use the new media to our advantage in the next presidential election. Obama had a veritable internet army working for him, and he captured the youth vote with it. We all know that those voters aged 18-25 are vulnerable to the “popular culture” which is decidedly left wing. We must counter this with showing them that their jobs and indeed their very future is with conservative values. A tough sell, but not impossible.
And it has been interesting having a ringside seat here at FR, watching it all happen.
Good review.
"Under questioning from the Committee, Kerry referred to the democratically elected government of South Vietnam -- our allies -- as a "dictatorial regime, the Thieu-Ky-Khiem regime," while respectfully calling the North Vietnamese communist regime we were fighting by its oxymoronic official name, the Democratic Republic of Vietnam, and the murderous Viet Cong's political arm by their preferred "Provisional Revolutionary Government.":
http://www.jewishworldreview.com/cols/chavez042804.asp
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June, 1970 -- Kerry joins Vietnam Veterans Against the War (VVAW), a national veterans group that is part of the Peoples Coalition for Peace and Justice. The PCPJ is a broad coalition of local and national organizations, including the Communist Party, USA, "committed to conducting demonstrations aimed at ending the war in Indochina, and poverty, racism and injustice at home." The VVAW, CCI and PCPJ all have headquarters at 156 Fifth Avenue in New York City. VVAW Executive Secretary Al Hubbard, a former Black Panther, is also on the coordinating committee of the PCPJ. Hubbard soon appoints Kerry to the VVAW's Executive Committee, bypassing the normal election process.
http://www.wintersoldier.com/index.php?topic=Timeline
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Fact: The Black Panthers were revolutionary communists...
From the Maoist Internationist Movement:
[1960s/original] Black Panther Party [BPP] Archives
From the article: REVOLUTIONARY HEROS
"On May 1st, May Day [1969], the day of the gigantic Free Huey rally, two of Alioto's top executioners vamped on the brothers from the Brown Community who were attending to their own affairs. These brothers, who are endowed with the revolutionary spirit of the Black Panther Party defended themselves from the racist pig gestapo.
Pig Joseph Brodnik received his just reward with a big hole in the chest. Pig Paul McGoran got his in the mouth which was not quite enough to off him.
The revolutionary brothers escaped the huge swarm of pigs with dogs, mace, tanks and helicopters, proving once again that "the spirit of the people is greater than the man's technology."
To these brothers the revolutionary people of racist America want to say, by your revolutionary deed you are heroes, and that you are always welcome to our camp."
Source: Maoist Internationist Movement
Article: REVOLUTIONARY HEROS (May 11, 1969):
http://web.archive.org/web/20060717050055/http://www.etext.org/Politics/MIM/bpp/index.html
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November 22, 1970 -- During a fund-raising tour for GI deserters, Vietnam Veterans Against the War and the Black Panthers, Jane Fonda is quoted in the Detroit Free Press as telling a University of Michigan audience:
"I would think that if you understood what communism was, you would hope, you would pray on your knees that we would someday become communist," and "The peace proposal of the Viet Cong is the only honorable, just, possible way to achieve peace in Vietnam."
http://www.wintersoldier.com/index.php?topic=Timeline
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John Kerry and the VVAW--Hanoi's American Puppets?
"Two recently discovered documents captured from the Vietnamese communists during the Vietnam War strongly support the contention that a close link existed between the Hanoi regime and the Vietnam Veterans Against the War (VVAW) while John Kerry served as the group's leading national spokesman."
http://www.wintersoldier.com/staticpages/index.php?page=puppets
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Vietnam Veterans Against the War (VVAW) Complete FBI files:
http://www.wintersoldier.com/index.php?topic=VVAWFBI
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RE: Ramsey Clark
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Ramsey Clark, former U.S. attorney general under democrat LBJ with convicted terrorist enabler/commie lawyer, Lynne Stewart, at an "anti-war" rally in Harlem NY on March 19, 2005, the 2nd anniversary of the start of the Iraq War. The event was organized by the Workers World Party and "Troops Out Now". TON is an "anti-war" (pro-communist) Workers World Party front group.
Yes, that is the current chairman of the House Ways and Means committee, DEMOCRAT Charlie Rangel, speaking at the podium at this Workers World Party event in 2005.
http://www.workers.org/march19/index2.html
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Workers World
55 W. 17 St., NY, NY 10011
Email: ww@workers.org
Subscribe wwnews-subscribe@workersworld.net
Support independent news
http://www.workers.org/orders/donate.php
Troops Out Now Coalition
55 W. 17th St. #5C
NY NY 10011
www.TroopsOutNow.org
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Also from the website of the Workers World Party:
"Dear Comrade Kim Jong Il...
With his leadership [Kim Il Sung], the Korean people defeated the Japanese colonial occupation and soon after brought about the first defeat of the U.S. imperialist military machine. ...
Workers World Party values our close, comradely relations with the Workers Party of Korea very highly. We are proud to have known Kim Il Sung as a great leader and a comrade in the international communist movement. ..."
With comradely solidarity, Sam Marcy Chairperson, Workers World Party" (1994):
http://www.workers.org/marcy/cd/sam94/1994html/s940721.htm
I understand there's still copies available. Why not contact either one by freepmail and see how to get your copy.
Prepare to be fascinated by inside stuff!
Leni
I put up a piece called “Thr Left Has Lost Its Groove” today on the same point. It is truly amazing that neither the old media or the libs are really fighting back. They flail about, etc. but have not accepted that the field of battle has changed and adjusted.
My thought is that, having enjoyed a monopoly for so long (similar to IBM until the 80’s) they became fat and convinced of their wonderfulness. Insofar as they never had to defend a position, they forgot how.
By the time they get rid of the dead weight and the lunes, the battle, and perhaps the war, will be over...
No matter what the media and some of our own said about the Swift Boat Vets, the veterans KNEW. Their families and friends KNEW and they also KNEW the msm was lying about them.
“I think they put some kind of chemical lobotomizer into the water in the People’s Republic of Taxachusetts. How else to explain the success of two traitors like Teddy and John?”
Two reasons why Massachusetts votes these cretins into power:
1) Most of the long time politicians in Mass. are of Irish ancestry. The Irish were the “niggers” of Boston since the clipper ships brought them there to avoid the famine in Ireland. The Kennedy clan was the first real power broker Irish family in Massachusetts. Their legend and power has faded little in 75 years.
2) There are 80 colleges within a 20 mile radius of Boston Proper. In the late 60’s,and early 70’s, these colleges became decidedly left wing, and stayed that way(like almost every college in the U.S. has).
in Massachusetts history.
The old media, is it even relevant anymore? DinoTV of the former big three caters to the elderly, the newspapers cater to a demographic that worries more about the fashionable appearance of its views than their truths.
“I think they put some kind of chemical lobotomizer into the water in the People’s Republic of Taxachusetts. How else to explain the success of two traitors like Teddy and John?”
sjb does a good job explaining the cultural makeup of the Boston Area which also keeps electing Blarnie Frank.
We have a friend, and she grew up in the Boston Area. Her dad was an Irish Catholic Democrat, who was born and raised in Boston. He was a WWII vet and loves FDR, all of the Kennedy’s, and John Kerry.
We will not go our friend’s house if her Dad is visiting or any of her sisters. Our friend takes after her mother, who was a conservative from down south. Her mother was a nurse and met the Dad in a hospital when he was recovering from some war wounds. They got married and had a brood of democrats with the exception of our friend and only son, who moved to Australia about a decade ago to get away from his liberal family.
The Obama election and his actions since his election have basically separated this woman from her family. Her husband is a conservative Republican and tried to warn her family what 0b0z0 would do to this country. He is a very forceful and stand up guy, and he refuses to tolerate their liberal stances and attacks on conservatives like him.
Since the election and 0b0z0’ actions, our friend doesn’t communicate with her Boston family as they have stopped all communications from their end.
Her family, most of the sisters, father and in laws like to come to this area and visit. They came this July and didn’t even call our friend. She found out about their visit from a local friend who knew her dad and her sisters and saw the family in a restaurant. Our friend got a call from her friend, and called the hotel where her family usually stayed. Sure enough they were all there and had been for 3 days. She left a simple message, “Go to Hell!”
Nice writeup.
I’d like to see a followup book that addresses those of us who have simply abandoned the MSM entirely. The numbers cannot be small, influence growth of alternative news outlets, and are forming a whole ‘nother branch of news culture (if not culture outright).
I say let's dump an extra mag into the brain pan just to be sure.
We’re starting to win a few skirmishes...
Up.the NEW-Media is blocking it too... i just googled "Hannah Giles" for images and found virtually NONE!
same with yahoo, same with wikipedia
you get thousands of hits, but none of them are of her
try it and see if you get the same results
Trav, thanks for the ping and the excellent review. Thank God for the arrival of the internet in time to give a vehicle for resistance just as the communists have been approaching the peak of their strength in the USA.
Free Republic and similar sources will be in the vanguard for the counter-coup.
The American People rejected Kerry because of the ability of the Swift Boat group to get the truth out independently of the mainstream media - Kerry was quickly recognized to be ultra-liberal and a communist sympathizer. How in the world Obama was not snared I will never understand - he is many degrees worse than Kerry politically, apparently born outside of the country, a collaborator of violent anti-Americans, with a murky astro-turfed past. The forces controlling the Hopey Changey doofus are implimenting the policies of preemptive surrender and disarmament abroad, while communizing our society and economy and destroying our freedoms at home. This will not stand. American will revolt so long as they know the truth.
I used to believe the MSM was the instrument of the democrat party, but now I understand it to be the other way around.
Matt, thanks very much for the perceptive review.
As others on the thread have noted, we have a long way to go before the old media wing of the DNC is completely marginalized. Such paradigm shifts are rarely smooth and continuous...
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