Letters On Lying Swift Boat Liars

August 20, 2004

Medals, Service and Political Ads (4 Letters)

To the Editor:

Re "Politics as Usual" (editorial, Aug. 19):

The so-called Swift Boat Veterans for Truth are open to criticism on more than one level.

By making accusations of fraud in the matter of John Kerry's medals for valor, particularly during the presidential campaign, not to mention so many decades after the Vietnam conflict, the former military officers making up this organization have opened their motivations to question.

This charge calls into question every medal for valor awarded in Vietnam, perhaps every medal awarded for valor from the Revolutionary War to the present.

By making such ill-timed and specious charges against Senator Kerry, these former Navy officers have sullied George W. Bush's presidency as well. Many will mistakenly believe that President Bush is somehow making this awful slur against Senator Kerry's character by proxy.

Mike Berry
Spring Branch, Tex., Aug. 19, 2004

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To the Editor:

Not mentioned in your Aug. 19 editorial is the fact that John Kerry has denounced the MoveOn advertisement about President Bush's military record (news article, Aug. 18).

President Bush, as you did point out, has failed to do likewise with respect to the ad by the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth.

Brian Rice
Ann Arbor, Mich., Aug. 19, 2004

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To the Editor:

It's both sad and infuriating that you equate the group MoveOn with the disreputable smear tactics of the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth.

It's time that we stop pretending that both sides are "equally responsible" for the degraded state of our politics.

The Republicans have been engaging in personal destruction for years, which included an attempted coup of Bill Clinton's presidency. The reason groups like MoveOn exist at all is for defense against such tactics.

Rick Reil
New York, Aug. 19, 2004

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To the Editor:

When all is said and done, John Kerry was in Vietnam and George W. Bush was not.

Irving Fishman
West Milford, N.J., Aug. 19, 2004