Is John Kerry a Girlie Man? - Comments on the NYTimes Article by Frank Rich

See How Kerry Became a Girlie Man

The article by Rich was a fabulous piece. As the election moves forward, the Republican strategy is clear and it seems that they have been watching too much COURT TV. Their objective is to muddy the waters on any point of attack against them, then hammer home their own points of attack. The case of the Bush National Guard papers is a clear case in-point. Faced with such a challenge they respond that the documents are a forgery and their minions in the press, in particular their legion of Op-Ed columnists such as Safire or Brooks, run the refrain that the documents are forgeries. These ideas are then echoed in the mainstream press. (Nightline's Friday edition essentially concluded that the documents are likely forged) The result, is general public confusion about what has or has not been established by the story. Worse still, this muddies the overall charges of derliction of duty on the part of Lt. Bush. The point of the Swift Boat attacks was similar. It does not matter whether you prove the point about Kerry's service. All that matters is that there is general confusion in the public's eye about the facts, thus neutralizing any advantage Kerry has in the area of wartime experience. For the Bush campaign, however, there can be and is no confusion about whether Kerry voted against funding for Post War Iraq, whether his explanation of the vote is mockable, whether he said that the war on terror needed to be sensitive. the truth of these matters is irrelevant. Like a good prosecutor they hammer these arguments home again and again until they become accepted as fact and slowly blend into the overall dialogue about the campign, echoed by journalists and pundits alike.