Mickey Kaus has long noted that Senator Kerry does much better when he doesn’t campaign. The less people see of him, the better he does in the polls. So this story, that he’s taking the next three weeks off, isn’t necessarily that surprising. However, I wonder if it’s also a way to continue to avoid press questions about his Vietnam record, and hoping that it will somehow blow over by then? Clearly, his people still don’t have a substantive response to the Swift Vets’ charges, instead deflecting them with a non-sequitur:

Along the trail, the campaign also had to deal with a variety of distractions.

A group of Vietnam veterans, angry at Kerry’s anti-war activities when he returned from Southeast Asia, accused Kerry of misrepresenting his combat record, and the extent of his wounds.

Kerry aides called the charges ludicrous, contrasting their candidates’ three Purple Hearts with the lack of war experience from Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney.

Bush and Cheney’s war records, or lack thereof, aren’t the issue, of course, since they’ve never made them one. Neither of them has claimed their respective behavior in the late sixties as uniquely qualifying them for the job, as Kerry has. Try as the Kerry campaign might, such comparisons are spurious. The issue is not Kerry’s record versus theirs, but his claimed record, on which he’s staked his candidacy, versus the reality.

If Kerry doesn’t fear the truth, he should be demanding that journalists investigate the claims of his former band of brothers, and validate him, instead of engaging in ad hominem attacks on them. But apparently that’s a very big “if.” Easier to go on vacation and attempt to change the subject.

[Late afternoon update]

Here’s another Vietnam vet (he claims to be a former SEAL) who finds Kerry’s Cambodia stories more than a little fishy.

[Another update, a few minutes later]

Brit Hume is not going to let this story go away. After getting into a heated discussion with Juan Williams over this yesterday on Fox News Sunday, he devoted half the panel to it today on his show. And Juan continues to be an obfuscating moron, claiming that the Washington Post and New York Times have already investigated the claims. Both Fred Barnes and Mort Kondracke set him straight, but I’m sure that he still doesn’t get it. Fred calls the mainstream media’s failure to report this the biggest dereliction of journalistic duty that he’s ever seen in his career.

McGreevey has suckered the gay community into supporting him.

This is pathetic. Don’t they realize how much damage he’s doing to their cause? Do they really want to embrace a “gay” governor who (ignoring the other rampant corruption in Jersey Democrat politics in general) hired his gay lover in a highly-paid position in national and state security for which he was utterly unqualified, in the middle of a war? If they had any sense, they’d be backing away and disavowing him as rapidly and vociferously as possible. But apparently sexual orientation conquers all. Even when it’s possibly fake.

[Update on Monday morning]

Reader Scott Ferguson complains in comments that Barney Frank and the other people cited in the NY Post article aren’t representative of the gay community.

Fair enough. Please provide me with someone who is. I’d be happy to link to criticisms of McGreevey from other prominent gay activists (or even some polling data), if someone can provide some.

Boy, what a time for Andrew Sullivan to be on vacation…

McGreevey has suckered the gay community into supporting him.

This is pathetic. Don’t they realize how much damage he’s doing to their cause? Do they really want to embrace a “gay” governor who (ignoring the other rampant corruption in Jersey Democrat politics in general) hired his gay lover in a highly-paid position in national and state security for which he was utterly unqualified, in the middle of a war? If they had any sense, they’d be backing away and disavowing him as rapidly and vociferously as possible. But apparently sexual orientation conquers all. Even when it’s possibly fake.

[Update on Monday morning]

Reader Scott Ferguson complains in comments that Barney Frank and the other people cited in the NY Post article aren’t representative of the gay community.

Fair enough. Please provide me with someone who is. I’d be happy to link to criticisms of McGreevey from other prominent gay activists (or even some polling data), if someone can provide some.

Boy, what a time for Andrew Sullivan to be on vacation…

McGreevey has suckered the gay community into supporting him.

This is pathetic. Don’t they realize how much damage he’s doing to their cause? Do they really want to embrace a “gay” governor who (ignoring the other rampant corruption in Jersey Democrat politics in general) hired his gay lover in a highly-paid position in national and state security for which he was utterly unqualified, in the middle of a war? If they had any sense, they’d be backing away and disavowing him as rapidly and vociferously as possible. But apparently sexual orientation conquers all. Even when it’s possibly fake.

[Update on Monday morning]

Reader Scott Ferguson complains in comments that Barney Frank and the other people cited in the NY Post article aren’t representative of the gay community.

Fair enough. Please provide me with someone who is. I’d be happy to link to criticisms of McGreevey from other prominent gay activists (or even some polling data), if someone can provide some.

Boy, what a time for Andrew Sullivan to be on vacation…

I’ve always been singularly unimpressed by Douglas Brinkley–he’s always seemed like a Democrat shill to me, but this affair has to really damage his credibility as a professional historian. It will be interesting to see how he manages to clarify, and validate, the current Kerry Cambodia claims. Hugh Hewitt points out, rightly, that there’s absolutely no evidence that Kerry was ever in Cambodia. Errrr…except that he says he was…

I wonder how long Kerry’s going to continue to avoid the press? I don’t know what he’s so worried about–they seem to be quite uninterested in the subject, so far.

He’s not gay. He’s bi.

True (male) homosexuals don’t create children, except through artificial insemination. He can clearly get it up for a woman, even if he may prefer men.

I don’t have a “preference” myself. The word preference implies that one can go either way, just that one is better than the other. Given a choice between a man and Rosie Palms, I’ll take the latter every single time.

I haven’t said much about the McGreevey situation (anything, come to think of it), but it’s clear that it was a clever PR ploy to come out of the closet, allowing him to play victim in our PC culture, and misdirect us from the real issues of his corruption. To really understand the situation, and put it in its proper perpective: what if Bill Clinton had made Monica Lewinski his National Security Advisor? Actually, now that I think of it, he did come close to this, in naming Craig Livingstone as Chief of White House Security. Though I’m pretty sure he wasn’t shtupping him.

Anyway, that’s the equivalent of what McGreevey is attempting to distract us from.

Ed Morrissey says that one of the vets who claims to have “served” with him, “on his boat,” didn’t:

He and Alston conspired to deceive people about Alston’s service under Kerry. That conspiracy was intended to give John Kerry cover against exactly the kind of campaign he faces from the other Swiftvets….

…This isn’t just a guy embellishing his war record — this is a deliberate and longstanding attempt to mislead and defraud people by creating his own witnesses after the fact. That he could have done such a clumsy job should disqualify him for higher office on that basis alone.

That point aside, if true, this knocks the legs out from under the dumb argument that one had to be on Kerry’s boat in order to have “served” with him. Alston would have no more (and no less) credibility than any of the other, less complimentary, Swift Boat Vets. I wonder if the Reverend Alston would sign an affidavit?

[Update at 11 AM PDT]

Kathleen Parker describes what the real issue is with this (at least for me):

Like many Americans, I’m reluctant to second-guess anyone’s wartime performance. None of us knows how we’d perform under the unique stress of battle. Whether Kerry was indecisive or heroic so long ago doesn’t much interest me. Stories get told about war; details get lost or distorted by time and memory.

There’s something near tragic about this latest political turn of events–brother warring against brother–but also revelatory on a level that even Kerry critics might not have anticipated. What is revealed isn’t so much Kerry’s lack of consistency in reporting personal history as his studious pursuit of power and an insatiable need for attention.

[Monday morning update]

Byron York says that Alston did serve under Kerry, though perhaps for as little as a week, and that many of the stories about their service together seem to be embellished or exaggerated. Ed Morrissey concedes the point. The Swift Boat Vets were right to tell people to cool it on this particular issue.

Ed Morrissey says that one of the vets who claims to have “served” with him, “on his boat,” didn’t:

He and Alston conspired to deceive people about Alston’s service under Kerry. That conspiracy was intended to give John Kerry cover against exactly the kind of campaign he faces from the other Swiftvets….

…This isn’t just a guy embellishing his war record — this is a deliberate and longstanding attempt to mislead and defraud people by creating his own witnesses after the fact. That he could have done such a clumsy job should disqualify him for higher office on that basis alone.

That point aside, if true, this knocks the legs out from under the dumb argument that one had to be on Kerry’s boat in order to have “served” with him. Alston would have no more (and no less) credibility than any of the other, less complimentary, Swift Boat Vets. I wonder if the Reverend Alston would sign an affidavit?

[Update at 11 AM PDT]

Kathleen Parker describes what the real issue is with this (at least for me):

Like many Americans, I’m reluctant to second-guess anyone’s wartime performance. None of us knows how we’d perform under the unique stress of battle. Whether Kerry was indecisive or heroic so long ago doesn’t much interest me. Stories get told about war; details get lost or distorted by time and memory.

There’s something near tragic about this latest political turn of events–brother warring against brother–but also revelatory on a level that even Kerry critics might not have anticipated. What is revealed isn’t so much Kerry’s lack of consistency in reporting personal history as his studious pursuit of power and an insatiable need for attention.

[Monday morning update]

Byron York says that Alston did serve under Kerry, though perhaps for as little as a week, and that many of the stories about their service together seem to be embellished or exaggerated. Ed Morrissey concedes the point. The Swift Boat Vets were right to tell people to cool it on this particular issue.

Ed Morrissey says that one of the vets who claims to have “served” with him, “on his boat,” didn’t:

He and Alston conspired to deceive people about Alston’s service under Kerry. That conspiracy was intended to give John Kerry cover against exactly the kind of campaign he faces from the other Swiftvets….

…This isn’t just a guy embellishing his war record — this is a deliberate and longstanding attempt to mislead and defraud people by creating his own witnesses after the fact. That he could have done such a clumsy job should disqualify him for higher office on that basis alone.

That point aside, if true, this knocks the legs out from under the dumb argument that one had to be on Kerry’s boat in order to have “served” with him. Alston would have no more (and no less) credibility than any of the other, less complimentary, Swift Boat Vets. I wonder if the Reverend Alston would sign an affidavit?

[Update at 11 AM PDT]

Kathleen Parker describes what the real issue is with this (at least for me):

Like many Americans, I’m reluctant to second-guess anyone’s wartime performance. None of us knows how we’d perform under the unique stress of battle. Whether Kerry was indecisive or heroic so long ago doesn’t much interest me. Stories get told about war; details get lost or distorted by time and memory.

There’s something near tragic about this latest political turn of events–brother warring against brother–but also revelatory on a level that even Kerry critics might not have anticipated. What is revealed isn’t so much Kerry’s lack of consistency in reporting personal history as his studious pursuit of power and an insatiable need for attention.

[Monday morning update]

Byron York says that Alston did serve under Kerry, though perhaps for as little as a week, and that many of the stories about their service together seem to be embellished or exaggerated. Ed Morrissey concedes the point. The Swift Boat Vets were right to tell people to cool it on this particular issue.