Sound of Crickets Chirping

[billroper]

This column by Larry Simoneaux (who I know nothing about other than what I just read in the linked-to column) does a fine job of encapsulating my feelings about the utter silence from the mainstream press in trying to determine what's the truth of the situation with John Kerry and the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth.

I've watched stories on the Internet for the past week since I first heard about Senator Kerry's "Christmas in Cambodia" on Fox News Channel. That's the only place I can get any information, because none of the mainstream press that should be interested in getting to the truth has reported on it at all that I can find. Just to pick on my hometown papers, the Chicago Tribune hasn't mentioned it at all in their news pages. The Chicago Sun-Times has referenced it twice on the editorial page, here and here. But I'm not really interested in editorializing on the subject. What I want are facts.

I can find blogs like Captain's Quarters which have assembled an impressive recitation of what they say are the facts. But are they telling the truth?

I don't know that. But I'd like to believe that the mainstream press would pursue this story with the same kind of dogged persistence that they've chased after President Bush's National Guard Service Records.

Because I'd like to know the truth.

I really would.

Comments

[shsilver.livejournal.com]

It may be that the non right wing news organizations feel that there isn't a story, just as they felt there wasn't a story when rape charges were filed against George Bush on December 4, 2002. (Margie Schoedinger, the accuser, was eventually found dead from a gunshot wound to the head in November 2003).

Anyway, the Columbus Dispatch has this to say about the Cambodia story:

"According to Senate testimony in the Congressional Record, during a 1986 debate about whether to support the Contras in Nicaragua, Kerry said he was in Cambodia when the government insisted no troops were there.
"'I have that memory which is seared — seared — in me,' Kerry said.
"[Steve] Gardner says he was on the boat with Kerry that Christmas in 1968 but they were 50 miles from Cambodia — and that there was no way anyone on the boat would consider going to Cambodia because of the risks.
"[Jim] Wasser said it was nearly impossible to tell exactly where the boat was on the river but that if it wasn’t in Cambodia that day, it was "very close."
FactCheck.org, a nonpartisan group that monitors the accuracy of campaign ads, points to the crew members who support Kerry and notes initial funding for the opposition campaign came mainly from a Republican booster in Houston."

Note: Jim Wasser served for six weeks with Kerry on a Navy swift boat in Vietnam in late 1968 and early 1969. Steve Gardner is the only Kerry crew mate who is a member of Swift Boat Veterans for Truth.

However, despite the received wisdom of of Attorney General Edwin Meese III, where there is smoke, there isn't necessarily fire.

[billroper]

I've looked at the FactCheck.org article (at least twice now). It has no discussion of the Cambodia story. Nada. (Unless there's an article other than the one linked in the response below.)

I did find on some web page somewhere -- and I'm sorry I don't remember which one -- a note that said that we'd just managed to get Prince Sihanouk to give back some U.S. troops who had strayed into Cambodia on Dec. 23rd after some lengthy negotiations, so the chances that someone would say "Let's send that hot shot Kerry to Cambodia" the next day were pretty low. :)

Steven, when you point out that the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth were funded by a Republican booster, are you suggesting that we should disregard everything that MoveOn.org has to say because of the funding that it's received from George Soros? I don't expect the Democratic Party to fund the SBVFT, do you? They're funding the people who are telling the version of the story that they want to promulgate.

What I'd like to know is what version of the story is true.

[shsilver.livejournal.com]

Actually, I didn't say that. The quoted article did. I just dropped off the initial " by mistake (probably when putting in the link).

I do look at the attacks on veterans such as John McCain, Max Cleland, and John Kerry and see a theme emerging, however.