How John O'Neill carried a personal grudge against Kerry and cost him the election

[Taverner]

I was there, and it was just as stupefying then as it is now.

John O'Neil hated Kerry. It was bad blood that went back years.

At the time Kerry was the spokesman for Vietnam Vets Against the War, he did a number of TV shows. One of those was a famous debate between him and O'Neil.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9j4AP2GW7Ac&feature=related

Watch the video, Kerry is thoughtful, he makes his points cleanly and clearly "wins" the debate. The best O'Neil can come up with is that if we don't win in Vietnam, we'll all be communist in five years.

This was the decisive theater of the Vietnam War - - in the country's homes and living rooms. The numbers just didn't add up, and we pulled out.

Many years later, Kerry is the Democratic Nominee. There were some serious problems in his campaign, but Bush had just as many, plus a record of failure. 9/11 did happen on his watch, and he went and attacked the wrong country.

So O'Neil, being the traitorous scum that he was, mounted a vicious attack campaign against Kerry. You remember these guys: The Swift Boat Veterans for Truth. It didn't matter that barely any of them served on swift boats, nor that none of them served alongside Kerry, nor that the claims they made were flat out lies. They wanted blood, and for some reason - and this is my question - Kerry didn't answer to these ads.

Four years later, the RNC tried doing the same to Obama re: the Birth Certificate, but unlike Kerry, Obama fought back, and made the accusers look like the loonies they are.

Why didn't Kerry do this?

[LiberalFighter]

1. Because Kerry was trying to be more cerebral for what was needed.

[Taverner]

11. Agreed. He should have approached the podium, made eye contact with the camera...

And grunt "ME KILL BIN LADEN DEADER THAN BUSH KILL BIN LADEN!!!!"

[LiberalFighter]

12. It doesn't help to say something that takes 30 minutes

when it could be done in 5 minutes or less.

[Taverner]

13. I still like my campaign message better

He could use prostheses to artificially make his knuckles drag on the ground

[Ken Burch]

16. Or just "ME KILL! ME KILL! ME KILL!"

That seemed to be the message people wanted to hear that year.

:puke:

[Octafish]

2. I've asked that question for 7 years.

blm and a whole lotta other DUers, too. O'Neill and Kerry go back to Nixon's day, when the Crook needed a Vietnam officer to counter Kerry's popularity with the American public.

O'Neill is as low as they come. He also did a number on James R Bath's business partner.

"The judge must've gone crazy." Right.

[Taverner]

5. If I were a religious man, I'd say there's a place in hell for fucks like O'Neil

But I am not - so I would love to see him get his in the here and now

[Gabi Hayes]

7. I'd love to see a movie about Bath

quite the man of mystery

quite a batch of interesting connections

''"In 1979, Bush's first business, Arbusto Energy, obtained financing from James Bath, a Houstonian and close family friend. One of many investors, Bath gave Bush $50,000 for a 5 percent stake in Arbusto. At the time, Bath was the sole U.S. business representative for Salem bin Laden, head of the wealthy Saudi Arabian family and a brother (one of 17) to Osama bin Laden. It has long been suspected, but never proven, that the Arbusto money came directly from Salem bin Laden. In a statement issued shortly after the September 11 attacks, the White House vehemently denied the connection, insisting that Bath invested his own money, not Salem bin Laden's, in Arbusto.

"In conflicting statements, Bush at first denied ever knowing Bath, then acknowledged his stake in Arbusto and that he was aware Bath represented Saudi interests. In fact, Bath has extensive ties, both to the bin Laden family and major players in the scandal-ridden Bank of Commerce and Credit International (BCCI) who have gone on to fund Osama bin Laden. BCCI defrauded depositors of $10 billion in the '80s in what has been called the "largest bank fraud in world financial history" by former Manhattan District Attorney Robert Morgenthau. During the '80s, BCCI also acted as a main conduit for laundering money intended for clandestine CIA activities, ranging from financial support to the Afghan mujahedin to paying intermediaries in the Iran-Contra affair.''

I know it's wayne madsen, but Bush is on the record WRT his ties to Bath, and he LIED

[individual rights]

3. I think Kerry lost because he appeared to be aloof and cold.

[ClarkUSA]

4. He wanted to but according to published stories after the election was over...

... his campaign manager Mary Beth Cahill nixed the idea and insisted he stay above the fray as she felt no sane person would believe SBV's lies. By the time she realized what was happening, and gave the green light to start fighting back, it was too little, too late.

BTW, he didn't lose because of this, he lost 2008 because of Ken Blackwell.

[sasha031]

8. Ohio, bit ironic isn't it

[Ken Burch]

15. If it hadn't been for this, Blackwell wouldn't have mattered.

No one who worked for Dukakis in a strategic capacity should EVER be allowed near a Democratic presidential campaign again.

[sasha031]

6. "Colson was Nixon's point man against Kerry, and he found a weapon in another veteran: John O'Neill.

O'neill found the pro war group Veterans for Peace in reaction to Kerry's Vietnam Veterans Against the War.
"Nixon's chief counsel, Charles Colson, didn't just tap John E. O'Neill to attack Kerry, he also formed an entire group around him called Vietnam Veterans for a Just Peace: <2>
John Kerry "was an immediate celebrity. He was also an immediate target of the Nixon Administration. Years later, Chuck Colson--who was Nixon's political enforcer--told me, 'He was a thorn in our flesh. He was very articulate, a credible leader of the opposition. He forced us to create a counterfoil. We found a vet named John O'Neill and formed a group called Vietnam Veterans for a Just Peace. We had O'Neill meet the President, and we did everything we could do to boost his group."
http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Vietnam_Veterans_for_a_Just_Peace

[1monster]

9. Wow! Talk about ad hominem attacks! That is the most hate-filled

speech I've ever heard. And the bitter anger in O'Neil's voice was way over the top. I think I would have had him in for a complete psychiatric evaluation after that. (My guess was that Kerry was too close for O'Neil's comfort.)

As for Kerry's response, it was clear that he was stunned and taken aback. How does one respond to such unexpected viciousness? Kerry was obviously trying comprehend O'Neil's hatred while he kept a civil tongue in his mouth.

[Taverner]

10. That was the RW strategy of the day

A common meme was 'How unpatriotic! They're the blame America first! party!'

[Ken Burch]

14. Kerry made the worst mistake possible...letting Dukakis people run his campaign

Those idiots NEVER learned the main lesson from 1988...that you lose if you leave smears unanswered because the voters take a refusal to answer as an admission of guilt. They still had this archaic idea that responding to smears was somehow unseemly...and that passionately defending your party's core values was anathema.

Bill Clinton, by contrast, DID learn the first of those lessons...and immediately responded to any smear or attack. This is why he won-NOT his conservatism(Clinton's most popular campaign promise was universal healthcare, not his commitment to using welfare "reform" to punish the poor). Clinton, therefore, would have won solidly running as a REAL Democrat, instead of just as a Democrat-for-Nixon.

Mary Beth Cahill and Co. shouldn't have been allowed within twenty miles of Kerry's campaign. All Dukakis supporters knew how to do was lose.

Will any of this EVER get through to our party's supposed leaders?