To: Sully- who wrote (77730 ) 10/15/2004 7:35:19 AM From: LindyBill Read Replies (4) | Respond to of 793838 Koppel ignored Kerry's direct quote that there was only one enemy soldier there that day. I loved to watch Koppel's obvious irritation. He just would not answer O'Neil and kept trying to make O'Neil answer him. It was laughable. 50% of the Swift Vets effectiveness has been due to O'Neil's ability to handle everybody he has come up against in that type of debate. That was the first time I have seen O'Neil obviously mad at the questioner. Josh Marshall, et al, are trying to claim a victory. Josh is one of the more rational of the lefty bloggers. So this shows you just how upset he is with the Swifties. He would not be this vituperative if he didn't know it was killing Kerry.Kevin Drum has the details: as slimy and cynical as you might have imagined the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth to be, they end up being even more shameless than you might have thought. Exposed again as hacks, liars, puppets. But then who escapes Rove with his soul in his own hands? O'Niel said this report of a Swift Boat guy being there was a lie. [Kevin Drum] - SWIFT BOAT LIES....Like most bloggers, I have my beefs with the mainstream media. But you know what? They produce an awful lot of damn fine original reporting. Case in point. In August the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth charged that John Kerry had lied about the events that led to his Silver Star. In order to figure out if the SBVT account was true, Nightline sent a crew to Vietnam, where they visited the hamlets of Tran Thoi and Nha Vi and interviewed the local villagers to get their recollections of what really happened 35 years ago. You can read the resulting story yourself, but it's summarized pretty easily: Kerry was right and SBVT honcho John O'Neill wasn't. But there was also this: Back in Tran Thoi, villager Nguyen Van Khoai said that about six months ago he was visited by an American who described himself as a Swift boat veteran and told him another American from the Swift boats was running for president of the United States. Nguyen said the man was accompanied by a cameraman. "They say he didn't do anything to deserve the medal," Nguyen said. "The other day, they came and asked me the questions and I said that the recognition for the medal is up to the U.S.A." He said that, after they met, the Swift Boat veteran and the cameraman turned around and went back down the river. Nightline has not been able to identify the men. Unbelievable. The SBVT folks, hoping to dig up dirt on Kerry, interviewed these villagers six months ago and have known the truth all along. It wasn't just a case of differing recollections in the heat of the battle. They knew the truth. But they went ahead and told their lies anyway. What a revolting bunch of men. What a disgusting, repellent, sleazy operation. And now Sinclair Broadcasting is about to air their movie. Even worse, we still have three weeks to go. I wonder how much lower the Bush team and their surrogates can sink in that time? And I wonder what decent Republicans are going to do about it after Bush drags them down to defeat in November?washingtonmonthly.com