Bush Official Uses Nixon Tactics to Smear John Kerry

[cindyw]

From the Kerry blog. You'll love this. How stupid do you have to be to repeat an easily refuted lie.

Bush Official Uses Nixon Tactics to Smear John Kerry

Richard Nixon just won't go away. Just when you think our country has finally exorcised Nixon's baleful memory, his ghost comes back for another round of nastiness. And if you think I'm kidding about Nixon's ghost being a problem, do a Google search on "Nixon" and "ghost"--I got 76,300 hits tonight.

Wherever else Nixon may still be haunting us, there's no doubt that his spirit spends some time roaming the halls of the Republican National Committee.

Consider: In 1971, the Nixon White House tried to discredit John Kerry by telling President Nixon that John Kerry was sleeping in a Georgetown home while other veterans protesting the war slept in tents on the National Mall.

Yesterday, before a conference hosted by a conservative PAC headed by a former Nixon aide, Republican National Committee Chairman Ed Gillespie repeated the same smear, nearly verbatim, in a desperate attempt to discredit John Kerry again, this time as his campaign to remove Gillespie’s boss from the White House is gathering strength.

“Ed Gillespie should put down the dirty tricks play book, pick up his pride and apologize to John Kerry for attempting to smear him with the same unsubstantiated charge the Nixon White House used in 1971,” said David DiMartino, Kerry campaign spokesperson. “Or, he could disclose exactly where President Nixon would have had to look to find George Bush during the time Kerry served in Vietnam or protested the war afterward.”

http://blog.johnkerry.com/blog/archives/001066.html#more

[cindyw]

1. Here is the proof. Man who started rumor admitted lie.

http://blog.johnkerry.com/blog/archives/001066.html#more

"Only Nixon Propaganda says John Kerry didn't sleep on the Mall

April 28, 1971, 4:33 p.m. President Richard M. Nixon takes a call from his counsel, Charles Colson.

"This fellow Kerry that they had on last week," Colson tells the president, referring to a television appearance by John F. Kerry, a leader of Vietnam Veterans Against the War.

"Yeah," Nixon responds.

"He turns out to be really quite a phony," Colson says.

"Well, he is sort of a phony, isn't he?" Nixon says.

Yes, Colson says in a gossiping vein, telling the president that Kerry stayed at the home of a Georgetown socialite while other protesters slept on the mall.

"

Colson later apologized to Kerry for dirty tricks

Some 25 years later, as a born-again Christian, Colson wrote a letter to Kerry asking "forgiveness over any ways in which I hurt you in the past."

[blm]

6. Segretti and Rove have been planting stories about Kerry for over 30 years

Too bad so many on this board end up repeating the smears.

[WhoCountsTheVotes]

9. so, Kerry DID sleep on the Mall with the other veterans?

Is that right?

[QuidditchFan]

2. Kerry is almost daring Gillespie/Rove to go after him...

The gloves have come off.

I really, really, really don't think that the Republicans want to pick a fight with John Kerry about military service. At the same time, I hope that they are stupid enough to walk into this trap. I have waited for what seems like eternity for a Democrat like Kerry, who will be able to go on the offensive against the cabal currently running our country.

I want to see Kerry pummel Bush (and by association Sean Hannity, Bill O'Reilly, Rush Limbaugh, *Tom DeLay*, Bill Frist, and the list goes on).

[cindyw]

3. Can I just say that I love your name. My 2 1/2 year old son,

rides a broom around the house all day long!

[Octafish]

4. Nixon FEARED Kerry.

From the Nixon's Secret White House tapes:

April 28, 1971, 4:33 p.m. President Richard M. Nixon takes a call from his counsel, Charles Colson.

"This fellow Kerry that they had on last week," Colson tells the president, referring to a television appearance by John F. Kerry, a leader of Vietnam Veterans Against the War.

SNIP...

"He was in Vietnam a total of four months," Colson scoffs, without mentioning that Kerry earned three Purple Hearts, a Silver Star, and a Bronze Star, and had also been on an earlier tour. "He's politically ambitious and just looking for an issue."

"Yeah."

"He came back a hawk and became a dove when he saw the political opportunities," Colson says.

"Sure," Nixon responds. "Well, anyway, keep the faith."

The tone was sneering. But the secretly recorded dialogue illustrates just how seriously Kerry was viewed by the Nixon White House. Some of these conversations have not been previously publicized, and Kerry said he had never heard them until they were provided by a reporter.

CONTINUED...

http://www.boston.com/globe/nation/packages/kerry/061703.shtml



John Kerry walks with his hands behind his head on May 31, 1971,
as police escort veterans and supporters from the Lexington Green.

[Michael Harrington]

5. I think you guys are making the cardinal mistake we always make...

You're assuming a plurality of smart people in the electorate. I know Ed Gillespie is a worthless bag of offal as well as everyone here, but he's exactly the kind of twit who can convince voters that Bush was some sort of hero and Kerry wasn't. They've done it time and time again. I would love to think this was a winning issue for John, but I fear it won't be.

[Guaranteed]

7. Especially since Kerry voted for the war.

That's his biggest problem.

[Octafish]

8. Kerry voted to give authority to Bush to protect the US.

Blame Bush if Bush didn't do as he promised -- use war as a last resort.