Swift reaction

The AP is now running a story that states that the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth are having an impact on John Kerry's campaign. After weeks of ignoring or dismissing the story, the mainstream media has finally caught up with the Bloggers and have begun to cover this story.

However, the Washington Times reports that the angle of the coverage is somewhat one-sided:

According to the Media Research Center, the major TV networks -- ABC, CBS and NBC -- have collectively aired just nine stories about the "swiftees" charges as of this writing, and nearly all covered ad hominem attacks to discredit the accusers. Conversely, the same networks devoted 75 stories questioning President Bush's National Guard service. As the media center calculates, that's an eight-to-one disparity.

In print, the "major" outlets haven't performed any better. The Washington Post finally covered the story on Thursday, though the report was a blatant attempt to discredit one of the "swiftees." The New York Times gave huge space to SBVT on its front page on Friday -- but only to "reveal" all the connections linking the veterans to the Republican party. Not too long ago, the same papers, along with dozens of other major dailies, devoted thousands of inches of print space to Mr. Bush's National Guard service.

Meanwhile, the Kerry campaign has gone into full attack mode by saying that (gasp!) some of the vets might have actually donated to the GOP!!!

The Horror!

Out on the blogsphere, Tom Maguire has rightfully pointed out that Kerry's campaign has inadvertently endorsed the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth when they said:

"When somebody's attacking your military record, you reach a boiling point, and he reached a boiling point last night," Ms. Cutter explained. "When you go and fight in a war, when you spill blood for your country, your instinct is to fight back and defend your record.

Which is exactly what the swift boat vets are doing...