Swift Vets and POWs for "Truth" v. The Truth
[Formerly Swift Boat Veterans for "Truth" v. The Truth]

Acknowledgements

UPDATE - 9/13/04

I will not be publishing updates on this site for a couple of weeks (unless something major comes up) because I'm working on another (key) project in my sister site [Bush flip-flops at] Compassiongate. Please bear with me if you have not heard back from me (in response to your emails).

NEWS - 9/10/04 

2. [via JohnKerry.com]: SBV backer Merrie Spaeth claimed she did not visit the White House since 2002 (when Ken Starr gave her a tour!), only to backtrack on that claim later. Added to the Other Lies or B.S. page.

1. [Billings Gazette, via reader VM]: SBV's anti-Kerry letter includes around 300 names as signatories. However, several vets whose names appear on the letter have stepped forward to state that they never approved the use of their name in that letter and that they do not support SBV. One of them suggests up to 25% of the names on SBV's letter may have been fictitiously included. How unsurprising. Added to the Other Lies or B.S. page.

NEWS - 9/9/04 
7. [Joe Conason, Salon]: The latest SBV "celebrity" on Cable TV William Schacte claimed that he did not know that he knew anyone in Bush's campaign, despite being associated with a slew of such people. It's quite a list and you should read Joe Conason's excellent piece. Added to the Other Lies or B.S. page.

6. [via Media Matters]: Kansas Republican Senator Sam Brownback (speaking for Bush-Cheney 04) lies brazenly on CNN that we don't know who is funding 527 groups even though the law he voted for in 2000 (and passed) created a specific requirement that 527 groups reveal their donors. Added to the Bush Campaign and SBV page.

5. [via Media Matters]: Three days after Media Matters pointed out that SBV's website contradicted the account of their star "witness" William Schacte that he was in the boat with Kerry at the time Kerry won his first Purple Heart, SBV coolly revised their website. How convenient! Swift Boat Veterans for "Truth", my foot. Added to the Kerry Purple Heart 1 page.

4. [via Operation Respect]: At the Republican National Convention (RNC), the GOP allowed people to make a mockery of Kerry's Vietnam service by wearing "purple heart band-aids". Added to the Bush Campaign and SBV page.

3. [via Americablog and Media Matters]: The Bush campaign criticizes Kerry for attacking Bush over Vietnam and claims to have nothing to do with SBV, while their own spokesmen (including Poppy and Karl Rove) and web site issue criticisms of Kerry's anti-war testimony relating to Vietnam, just like SBV does. Not to mention comments from Laura Bush that the SBV ads are not "unfair" and Karl Rove's false claims about Kerry's testimony. Added to the Bush Campaign and SBV page.

2. [via various sources]: SBV's ad makes it appear as if Kerry's testimony was used against them (when they were POWs). There is no evidence that Kerry's testimony was used by Vietnamese captors against POWs. Indeed, SBV member Ken Cordier who appears in that very ad said later that his captors did not use Kerry's testimony! Other Swift Boat officers, one of whom was a POW, refuted SBV's claims about Kerry's testimony having been used against them as POWs. Senator John McCain has said the same thing. Added to the Kerry-Other War Related page.

1. [The Bakersfield Californian, via reader PF]: SBV member Roy "Latch" Hoffman's criticism of Kerry's anti-war-crime speech is belied by the fact that other Vietnam veterans independent of the Kerry campaign have come forward to point out a known fact - that Hoffman himself did not hesitate to order that a war crime be committed (shooting of unarmed fishermen). Added to the Kerry-Other War Related page.

NEWS - 9/1/04 

3. SBV v. SBV: Reader PT suggests "How Many Swift Boat Vets does it take to tell a lie?" Well, one to claim he was not in Cambodia, one to claim he was not within 50 miles or so of Cambodia, one to claim that he was within 100 yards of Cambodia, one to claim he was in Cambodia, one to claim there is no "watery border" between Vietnam and Cambodia, one to claim that there is, one to claim that no Swift Boats could have entered Cambodia, one to claim that they did. And all of this just from one Swift Boat Veteran from Texas. SBV members can't keep their own stories straight with their myriad self-contradictions showing them to be a bunch of liars. See SBV v. SBV page.

2. [via Hesiod and Daily Howler]: SBV member Hoffmann claimed that he is doing what he is doing now with SBV to set the record straight about alleged lies and distortions (especially about him) in Kerry's biography by Brinkley. It turns out he turned down an offer from Kerry to actually set the record straight. Not to mention even some of his fellow SBV members were highly critical of Hoffmann in the book! Added to the Other Lies or B.S. page. 

1. SBV member Roy Hoffmann falsely claims Kerry served just 4 months and 12 days. Added to Other Lies or B.S. page.

ARCHIVES

INTRODUCTION to Swiftvets.eRiposte.Com 
(email: feedback-at-eriposte-dot-com)

Welcome! This website (a sub-domain to eRiposte.com) is dedicated to revealing the real truth behind the so-called "Swift Boat Veterans for Truth" (SBV for short), more appropriately referred to as Swift Boat Veterans Who Have a Major Problem With The Truth. (On the blogosphere you will find other, equally appropriate names for SBV - such as Swift Boat Veteran Flip-Floppers for Bush or Smear Boat Veterans for Bush or Swift Boat Liars for Bush). Pick the name you like. I'll stick with SBV.

Many media outlets (see below) have been providing a relatively easy opening for SBV (at least until 8/19/04) - sometimes parading these folks before viewers (or readers), often without critically examining the full breadth and depth of their egregiously false charges against Senator John Kerry (some media, "journalists", and serial liars are far worse than others on this). SBV has also permeated their misleading and false attacks through a book titled "Unfit for Command: Swift Boat Veterans Speak Out Against John Kerry". In an attempt to correct the lack of balance in the media's treatment of this group and to refute the false allegations that form the basis of the book, this website explores SBV's charges in detail and shows you the truth behind the so-called "truth". 

What will become clear when you review the material here is that SBV has major ultra-right-wing, partisan, Bush supporters and Kerry haters and GOP slime operators who are merely kicking off Part II of "The Hunting of the President" - while creating the appearance of being an "independent" group.

What is even more remarkable is that SBV's hate-filled mendacity is nothing other than a direct attack on the integrity of the American Armed Forces - something that Republicans like them claim to hold dear. 

As Digby has eloquently noted:

It has struck me lately what a terrible indictment of the military these charges are and how once again the Republicans have absolutely no limits in terms of how fully they are willing to trash the American institutions they allegedly love in order to win. What these people are saying is that the US Navy awarded some of its highest medals for bravery to a coward. The many officers who signed those glowing fitness reports and awarded those citations are either liars or they are incompetent. The word of his shipmates, even the man whose life he saved, are worth nothing. You can't believe military documentary evidence. It was all bullshit, every last piece of it.
And because of this it can now be said that all medals awarded for bravery are suspect. A superior military record is no longer a recommendation. Who can ever believe the government on this issue, now?
...
The conservative attack on the military is, on the other hand, so small minded, so parochial. For puny, partisan reasons they are accusing the military of widespread corruption --- merely to excuse the behavior of their less than stellar candidate.
...
Too bad for the men and women who are risking their necks as we speak for Junior's Big Adventure. Any act of bravery on which the military might bestow a medal is now subject to interpretation. Nothing is sacred to these people.

Some veterans agree:

As was shamefully done previously against decorated veterans like John McCain and Max Cleland, extreme right-wing groups such as the so-called 'Swift-Boat Veterans for Truth' are again spreading lies meant to discredit a decorated veteran. A veteran who volunteered for combat, who was brave enough not only to withstand the rigors of battle but then the equally difficult struggle to speak the truth about war's inevitable dark side: savagery, stupidity, recklessness, maiming, and death. These are the truths of every war -- those necessary and those avoidable; those just and those unjust.

"The slander about John Kerry's Purple Hearts and courage in command is fallacious at best and spuriously shameful. More, the attacks against Kerry's post-discharge protest of Vietnam represent a concerted attempt to prevent others from speaking the necessary truth of their experience by those too cowardly to admit their own share in our flawed humanity...
...
If they succeed, hundreds of thousands of young soldiers and Marines will find it that much more difficult to tell their difficult stories -- whether heroic, tragic, barbaric, or all three -- when they return from Iraq and Afghanistan. So that another generation of veterans will not be rent by the difficult choice between living with a lie and feeling shamed for telling the truth, we ask you: do not listen to those who would distort a brave man's struggle.

Please select one of the menu options at the top of this page to see the facts.