Swift Kick and Punt Return

Posted on August 15, 2004 in Campaign 2004 Journalists & Pundits Lies Morals & Ethics

Pursuant to my post about the Swift Boat lies, I received an email from a purported “reader” who pointed me to a disheartening survey about the effectiveness of the ads. A quick check showed this email to originate with a political marketing firm. I think what we have here is disinformation being spread by the Republican Party. I was numbered as someone who might give them lip service.

For the record, I oppose John Kerry’s support for the War on Terrorism. But when it comes to the environment, worker’s rights, treatment of veterans, and general compassion for the American people, John Kerry beats George W. Bush by thousand miles and more. He is not all the way there, but I believe that his experience in Vietnam made him a better person who understands that war is hell and that the aftermath of war is hell, too. George W. Bush lived a spoiled and sheltered life: he does not get these basic human survival issues.

The moral question this triggers in me is this: should a blogger pay any attention to unsolicited queries? I think the tragedy of the American press in this day and age is that reporters and their editors have become lazy; they allow these organizations with capital enough to afford business suits and fancy stationary to conduct their polls, to “check” their “facts”, and direct their interest. The media supposedly serves as the Fourth Estate of the People, the one which singlehandedly balances the other three branches of Government. But when it allows itself to become susceptible to lobbying by marketing agencies such as the one which approached me, it fails in the role it claims for itself.

Because blogging has become popular and has drawn off a small sliver of the public who might otherwise mindlessly read the country’s major newspapers or watch its television media, we are now targetted by the same people who have been maneuvering big media to toe the Republican line. I will be my own fact-checker and my own opinion-maker, thank you. I will not be duped by any pretenses to “objectivity” by organizations founded upon profit or by unknown colleges.

And it is my firm conviction — based on my own access logs, Mr. Xavier Botero, that you are not a regular reader of my blog. It will not surprise me if I never hear from you again. I know how your kind operates and I suspect this to be yet another attempt to grab the limelight away from John Kerry, a man who embodies the word “hero” to many Americans, a contrast to the usurper in the White House who stayed as far from Vietnam as he could and shamelessly sends the sons of others into battle to be killed as he allows his supporters to lambast and defend veterans and conscientious objectors who, in their own way, served this country at risk of their lives and personal freedom.

You got your publicity. As for bloggers, keep pointing to the lies and the dubious record of Mr. Bush when it comes to national service. Compare him to John Kerry and dare to call anyone who impugns what John Kerry suffered and endured as a soldier and a peace activist as anti-patriotic and a coward.

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If you’ve been approached by a marketing firm with alledged statistics about the Swift Boat ad, blog about it. Let’s see how far this thing is spreading: it’s a sign of their desperation. They need to be outed.

Comments are disabled so that they cannot be used by political marketing firms. I will print email commentary which is not self-promotional for these types of services. You want advertising here, you pay for it.