Facts are a fragile thing. Especially in the hands of a master storyteller such as yourself. I lived through the 1960s, and surprising, I was both there and remember it.
I was on the Mall in Washington, D.C. on October 15, 1969 with my friend Bob, the son of the owner of the Baltimore Bullets (now Washington Senators), and a CIA analyst father of another friend, among the crowd of 500,000 protesting Nixon's expansion of the war into Cambodia. In the subsequent two years I was tear gassed about a dozen times, and had menacing black helicopters flying surveillance over us with 500K footcandle searchlights and 50 calibre machine guns aimed at us as we hurled the gas canisters back at the pigs.
So when you relate the history of John Kerry, I can tell you I speak from some experience.
John Kerry was not a founding member of Viet Nam Veterans Against the War. He joined after the nucleus of the group was formed, and he did a great service to the cause by using his aristocratic connections to wheedle himself in front of a Congressional committee that would never in a million years consider empaneling someone like me who had a much better political grasp of the situation, albeit I did not have Kerry's erstwhile hero credential and pedigree.
So, Kerry didn't help to found the group. Why does this matter? Because as an executive, this experience offers no evidence of Kerry's leadership. Only that he was a clever and well-connected young man who could take advantage of the situation for some self-promotion. And perhaps some effort for the anti-war cause.
As far as Kerry leaving the group, I would say that I differ greatly in your representation of the decisions being made within SDS, the Yippies ad hoc groups and other ad hoc committees on campuses across America. I was there. I was witnessing the angst being suffered by the most intelligent young people of that age trying to come to grips with a society that had gone feral and was becoming the most wicked force on the planet.
Not to my credit, I opted out and joined the counter-culture, dropping out of the struggle and avoided confrontation. Not to his credit, John Kerry did much the same, walking away from VVAW. Those who had the courage of their convictions were the people who saw the necessity to escalate the struggle against the evil of the U.S. government. I admire them. They were the only true American heroes of that era.
Which naturally meant that they were and are hounded, hunted down, incarcerated and destroyed by the U.S. Government which to this day remains the most evil terrorist conspiracy the world has ever faced.
Kerry's vote, in October, 2002, for Bush to lead us into naked aggression was an act of pure cynicism. Shame on him.
God Bless America. A Land Where Fairy Tales Come True. (Or at least are sold as the truth.) |
