Last night I watched the Chris Matthews Hardball interview of John Hurley, one of John Kerry's supporters, and John O'Neal, coauthor of the anti-Kerry book Unfit for Command. Toward the latter part of the interview John O'Neal complained that Matthews was asking him questions without giving him an opportunity to answer completely or explain why he believed that starting from the position that all of Kerry's Vietnam medals are valid, and that Kerry never misrepresented his service, was wrong. At that point Matthews got quite angry saying (from memory): "All you guys come on here and after talking for 20 minutes you complain I haven't given you any time. I'm willing to clock the time I'm giving you, John, and put this to the test. This is a common tactic of you conservatives."
(Several times during the interview Matthews refered to O'Neal as a "Republican" or a "conservative," even though O'Neal explained rather patiently that he was an independent who frequently supports Democrats, and had voted for Gore in 2000. He also asked why his partisanship should even be relevant to a discussion about the facts of Kerry's service. Why indeed.)
So I decided to get out my two timepieces, that I use to clock my workouts, and actually put Matthews to the test.
I timed the overall time of the interview, excluding commercial breaks, and I also clocked the amount of time O'Neal was allowed to defend his position.
I did not clock Hurley's time separately, because by and large Matthews was more than willing to adopt and aggressively defend Hurley's position, and I didn't have three stopwatches, or three hands. And bear in mind that O'Neal is being treated as a "hostile witness" even though he was frequently smiling patiently and employed absolutely no aggressive mannerisms or voice modulation, as both Hurley and Matthews frequently did.
Out of a total of 21 minutes John O'Neal talked about 7.5 minutes, or about 36% of the time. During much of that period he was aggressively interrupted, and on a number of occasions Matthews aggressively changed the subject without allowing O'Neal to complete his thought or a defense of a claim. He was just simply cut off and ignored.
I heard no substancial claims from Hurley that refuted anything O'Neal said. He frequently referred to statements made by the Swiftvets and other detractors of Kerry's Vietnam record as "lies," without responding substantively. At one point O'Neal reminded Hurley that at least one of those "liars" served as second in command of the Judge Advocate Corps.
At any rate I leave it to the reader to decide whether 36% of the time alloted for discussion is fair. It wasn't terrible. I felt that O'Neal was pretty effective, and used the time he was given about as well as one could expect. But on the other hand if you're going to denigrate what someone says, you have to at least allow him to say something. A better measure might have been the number of times Matthews interrupted or cut O'Neal off, or even seemed to simply ignore or slight him.
Anyway, I don't think the Kerry people have really dealt with or answered any of this stuff. They've basically just been complaining that it's unfair to even question Kerry's record, which was also the approach that Matthews adopted.
Update 1: A reader, Hurshel Ervin, makes the following profound comment about the consequences of Kerry's acknowledgement of "war crimes" by troops in Vietnam, including himself:
If our Vietnam prisoners of war thought it was difficult having a low ranking officer declare he and our military were war criminals, just wait until our President and Commander in chief is an admitted war criminal and is on record declaring our military to be war criminals.... Our enemy will use this to justify treating our prisoners of war as war criminals.
Of course they will.
Update 2: Another reader, James Williams, took the initiative to do a textual analysis of the Hardball program in which O'Neill appeared. I've been too distracted to post it until now, so apologize to James.
He found, rather unsurprisingly, that Matthews dominated the conversation, with 42% of the words uttered, and 49% of the "at bat" sequences. The combination of Hurley and Matthews accounted for 68% of the words uttered and 62% of the "at bat" sequences, leaving O'Neill with 32% of the words and 38% of the "at bats" to get his point across. During the course of the interview O'Neill was interrupted 16 times, mostly by Matthews, while O'Neill interrupted others only 7 times. Clearly it was a rather one-sided exchange, but with all of that O'Neill was able to make most of his points, and scored several major "hits."
By comparison, during an interview with Wolfe Blitzer and another of the Kerry Swifties (Crowe), O'Neill uttered 42% of the words, had 37% of the "at bats," and was interrupted only twice (by Crowe).
Thanks again, James, for the stats. The smaller percentage of words vs. time, for O'Neill is probably due to the fact that Matthews is a "speed talker."
Posted by Demosophist at August 13, 2004 05:43 AM | TrackBackI watched the beginning of the interview with O'Neill and Hurley, but stopped watching out of disgust. Did you notice that Matthews was interested in the political motivations and connections of only O'Neill and Kerry's other accusers? He couldn't have cared less about Hurley's political motivations and connections, nor those of Kerry's other defenders. He grilled O'Neill on his voting patterns, but not Hurley. The Swiftees must have the Democrats scared silly.
Posted by: ELC at August 13, 2004 08:36 PMI felt Matthews made the statements about conservative tricks with a bit of false wounded pride, like O'Neill was being an ingrate for not appreciating the time Matthews gave him. Immediately after Matthews' complaint, he went on to interrupt O'Neill in his rat-a-tat-tat fashion so O'Neill still could not complete a sentence. Matthews was wrong so frequently on basic facts, and so poorly prepared, I now have to doubt what he says on other topics.
I am eager to read the book so I can read what Mr. O'Neill has to say (and the 200 plus others) without Matthews constantly interrupting.
Of course, Carville and Lannie Davis shouted O'Neill down on CNN yesterday as well. So the Dems response to the Swift Boat Vets is to lawyer up and try to gag the TV stations, and then exercise the heckler's veto when they get on the air. Methinks the Dems protest too much.
Posted by: J Murphy at August 13, 2004 10:48 PMApparently Matthews was sufficiently embarassed about the "you conservatives" comment to O'Neal that it was expunged from the official transcript of the show. Meanwhile the SF Examiner, of all papers, is the first to open the floodgates in the press on the "Christmas in Cambodia" incident.
BTW, I notice that everyone seems to spell his name "O'Neill," but I think Hardball spelled in "O'Neal." Well, you know who I mean, anyway.
Posted by: Demosophist (to J. Murphy) at August 14, 2004 09:51 AM
Alan Colmes has been using the screaming protest technique for month... he will slowly ramp up on Kerry's volunteering for service (twice) his lifetime of service and with in 3 minutes, be literally screaming into the microphone about the pathetic nature of any individual who would question the validity of Kerry's medals.
The first time I heard him do it, it was pretty effective, as I didnt serve and could not really sit in judgement of a man who had sacrificed so much. But hearing him go thru his schtick over a dozen times, after hearing Kerry's fellow soldiers characterize his actions from thier perspective, after reading how Kerry threw medals over the fence in a refutation of the US Government in a time of war, after hearing Kerry admit and at the same time accuse his fellow soldiers that they commited atrocities on a daily basis, after hearing how Kerry utterly rejected Vietnam as a valid war, worked enthusiastically and effectively to demonize the soldiers who fought it, all to his political benefit, returned to his Vietnam era lies when convenient to support his political position in other foriegn policy debates during the intervening years, after hearing all this, Alan Colmes selfrighteous screaming just seems a convenient way to avoid addressing inconvenient facts that reflect poorly on his chosen candidate.
Posted by: J Mackey at August 14, 2004 10:11 AMAs far as I can tell, Kerry enlisted in the Navy to forestall getting drafted into the Army, and wanted to get onto Swift boats because, when he volunteered for that duty, it was pretty safe, their mission being changed shortly thereafter.
Posted by: ELC at August 14, 2004 06:22 PMThat video is gold: Matthews turned into Joe McCarthy. Some blogger with video bandwidth needs to merge them!
Posted by: Clyde at August 14, 2004 11:52 PMI just watch an old clip (1971) of O’Neal and Kerry on Dick Cavet. O’Neal was confrontational and evident to all has a personal vendetta. Too bad it is still on going.
Posted by: Lou Guzman at August 15, 2004 07:13 PMWhat's the "vendetta" about? That word implies there's some pesonal act or conflict that's the basis for the attitude, but I've never heard anyone delineate such a thing. I can understand why a lot of vets feel great animosity toward Kerry, for most of the reasons J. Mackey delinieates, but it's not a "vendetta." Seems to me it's pretty justifiable anger, but not based on any personal event between two men. Ted Peck apparently despised Kerry from the get, and has described Kerry's takeover of his boat after he was injured as "salt in my wounds." There could be a vendetta there, except that Peck really says very little beyond pointing out that Kerry is taking credit for his (Peck's) combat record.
But what does this have to do with the substance of the accusations? Without getting into the conflict over the medals themselves Kerry has almost certainly lied about both the "Christmas in Cambodia" (and probably having been in Cambodia at all) and the fact that Dave Alston was a member of his crew (which helped him in the SC primary). Not that lying isn't a common, or sometimes even useful, quality for a politician... by lying about personal stuff to embellish a resume has usually backfired.
Posted by: Scott (to Lou) at August 16, 2004 11:07 AMJohn O'neal is doing an excellent job of defending his position. I do believe,however, there are a few issues he raises which might be augmented to help his position. As a Radm retired aviator with a silver star and a former airwing awards board president(a board that processed over 1100 awards between April 1972 and november 1972 on board the (Kitty Hawk)I feel I have some perspective on the subject.
First: The fact that Zumwalt came out to help morale shows that Kerry's silver star was not processed correctly. Zumwalt was trying to help morale. He was looking for some one to give the award to and he found John Kerry. Zumwalt had the authority as CNO to give a Silver Star so he did. In our Airwing CVW11 a silver star recommendation had to be sent by message signed by the CO of the ship to CINCPACFLT where it went thru their awards board and on to CNO. It took about a month to process and went thru three boards. Of our 1100 awards during intense conflict all over North vietnam. We as an airwing of some 200 aviators were only awarded 7 silver stars. The silver star is awarded for "Gallantry in Action" Just like it says on the back of the award.Showing heroism is not enough.
Second: The reason some of his band of brothers support him is that they want appointments to political positions if he is elected. I know one of the band well, and because of John Kerry's influence was appointed as Navy deputy undersecratary for reserve affairs I would suspect he would like an upgraded position should Kerry win.
Third you might check and see who actually served more active duty Bush or Kerry. Bush must have spent at least a year on active duty during flight training. If he did much active duty at all after training, he might have more active duty time then Kerry who got an early out and obviously didn't spend any time in the reserves
Fourth: anyone who knows anything about medals knows that throwing away ribbons doesn't mean much because you can always buy more at any axchange, but to get replacement medals you have to go back to the Navy, and I doubt that the Navy would be very sympathic to replacing John Kerry's medals when they found how he lost them.
For John O'Neal should he read this, I would love to talk to you about all the idiosyncrasies Of the awards system during thr Vietnam war.
Pete Pettigrew RADM USNR (ret)
uh, guys, O'Neill is a republican. whether or not you want to believe who he says he voted for in 2000. Historically he's PROVEN to have given 15,000 dollars to the Republican party. None for Democrats.
O'Neill wasnt in Vietnam till after Kerry left. He's in no position to judge Kerry's record and was laughed off stage in debates with Kerry in the 70s on television, after being hand picked by Nixon to support the war effort.
Find the Dick Cavett tapes on the Internet yourself, you can find them I'm sure. This man is just after revenge.
Posted by: Colette at August 18, 2004 04:22 AMNicole:
Again, the crux of what you're saying is that he's biased. And you're, ironically, saying it in a biased way by not providing anything substantive other than the fact that he has contributed to Republican candidates. Is he registered as an Independent or a Republican? Has he endoresed on spoken in favor of Democrats?
More importantly, however, since you've only raised the issue of bias you're guilty of the same "protest too much" tactics as the Kerry Campaign. Why not deal with the substantive charges, and most importantly why not release Kerry's records. He's running for President of the US. Are you proposing that we simply take everything he says on blind faith, because he says it? He's said a lot of thangs, much of which has proven not to be true.
And I am a Democrat, and have raised far more money, and done far more volunteer work, for Democratic candidates than you ever have. I think I have good reason not to trust the guy. He should sign the 180, and release the records.
Posted by: Demosophist at August 18, 2004 10:29 AM"He's running for President of the U.S. Are you proposing that we simply take everything he says on blind faith, because he says it?"
I hope you hold the current person in the White House to the same standards
Posted by: Ryan at August 18, 2004 02:58 PM"He's running for President of the U.S. Are you proposing that we simply take everything he says on blind faith, because he says it?"
I hope you hold the current person in the White House to the same standards
Posted by: Ryan at August 18, 2004 02:59 PMI hope you hold the current person in the White House to the same standards
This is a tu quoque argument, or a logical fallacy. What difference does it make to the argument about Kerry if George W. Bush is a practiced liar or not? There's a domain in which it's simply impossible to tell whether an individual is lying or not... and the best option one has in such situations is to demonstrate good judgment and acknowledge that you don't, and can't, really know. Kerry gets the benefit of this doubt vis David Alston, because there's an interpretive ambiguity in his statements. Did he intend to deceive? He probably did, but I don't know, and there's no real way to tell.
But reverse the coin, and the same is true of Bush vis WMD. Did he know the case was weak and chose to present it as a slam dunk? Well, Bob Woodward says no... that when Bush expressed skepticism he was assured otherwise. But that could have been a show for Woodward, and without the ability to reveal intent there's simply no way to know whether Bush was lying or not.
But the critical point is that this isn't the way the Marxisant left plays it. The, unaccountably, express certainty where no certainty is warranted. Not knowing is simply not good enough for them. So what must one conclude about such judgment? Does it warrant a season at the helm of the state?
Regardless of what you happen to believe about who is lying or isn't lying the answer to that question must emphatically be no. If they don't know what a lie is, or what it takes to prove one, then they won't have a clue when it comes to fathoming the far deeper mysteries of power and war. They (you) flunked the test. Simple as that.
Posted by: Demosophist at August 19, 2004 02:00 AMSo, what medals did John O'Neill earn? I've never heard that mentioned anywhere.
And, since John O'Neill admits to having served in a free-fire zone, and free-fire zones are against the Geneva Conventions, doesn't that make John O'Neill a ware criminal?
Posted by: Geoff at August 21, 2004 12:28 PMSo, what medals did John O'Neill earn? I've never heard that mentioned anywhere.
I don't know. Is it a contest? Why? Does an eyewitness need to be a decorated police officer for their testimony to be valid? And I imagine there are lots of folks in the group that backs up O'Neill who have a lot more medals than Kerry. The point isn't really about the medals. That's a side issue. The point is about betrayal.
Posted by: Demosophist at August 21, 2004 03:16 PMits not betrayal if its the truth.
Tommy Franks even says he's sure everything Kerry said really happened.
Kerry wasnt betraying anyone. If anything, he was protecting other soldiers from having to go through the hell of Vietnam and ruin their lives by taking part in these same activities.
Posted by: Colette at August 21, 2004 05:58 PMIf our Vietnam prisoners of war thought it was difficult having a low ranking officer declare he and our military were war criminals, just wait until our President and Commander in chief is an admitted war criminal and is on record declaring our military to be war criminals.
I especially would not want to be a prisoner of war during the time John Kerry, a self admitted war criminal, is President and Commander in Chief. Our enemy will use this to justify treating our prisoners of war as war criminals.
Hurshel Ervin
August 24, 2004
Your comments got me to analyze Matthews v. various swifties. Looking at the shows with O'Neill as well as Thurlow, you end up like so:
Thurlow 56.5% 43.5%
O'Neill 66.57% 33.43%
If you factor in Hurley for the O'Neill piece
O'Neill: 26.2%
Hurley: 21.64%
Matthews: 52.16%
Now, compare how different things are when Max Cleland is on, blasting Bush:
Cleland: 71.38%
Matthews: 28.62%
But, that is Hardball. I am sure an analysis of some Fox shows would show the opposite.
Posted by: Greg Beamer at August 26, 2004 02:28 PMThis "War" of Vietnam Veterans against Kerry "Isn't" a Bush thing. It is Us against Kerry.
The question of: "Why Is It Coming Up Now?" That is Easy. There wasn't any reason to go after Kerry's War record until now. Prior to the race for the white house, this Liar couldn't hurt anything much. But now, it is a problem.
Vietnam War Veterans, and I am one of them, know facts about the NVA and VC and know what the chances are that Kerry could have lived through what he says happened. It just doesn't happen the way Kerry says it did.
The boat crew standing up and also telling untruths, are doing so for a reason. That reason is this. If Kerry becomes President, those guys well get "White House Job favors" from Kerry. They have nothing to lose by standing behind Kerry.
Kerry doesn't have the War experience that we do. I served 23 Months "Plus" in Vietnam. I believe I have more in that area than Kerry.
Also, I am "NOT" a Baby Killer, Not a Vietnamese civilian Killer, Not a Burner of their homes, Not an Ear Cutter, and not a Head Cutter."
Kerry's mouth has changed me into a Republican.
Christopher Sager // US War Veteran, Vietnam, 1968-1969 & 1970-1971. Ret. KCMOPD
This "War" of Vietnam Veterans against Kerry "Isn't" a Bush thing. It is Us against Kerry.
The question of: "Why Is It Coming Up Now?" That is Easy. There wasn't any reason to go after Kerry's War record until now. Prior to the race for the white house, this Liar couldn't hurt anything much. But now, it is a problem.
Vietnam War Veterans, and I am one of them, know facts about the NVA and VC and know what the chances are that Kerry could have lived through what he says happened. It just doesn't happen the way Kerry says it did.
The boat crew standing up and also telling untruths, are doing so for a reason. That reason is this. If Kerry becomes President, those guys well get "White House Job favors" from Kerry. They have nothing to lose by standing behind Kerry.
Kerry doesn't have the War experience that we do. I served 23 Months "Plus" in Vietnam. I believe I have more in that area than Kerry.
Also, I am "NOT" a Baby Killer, Not a Vietnamese civilian Killer, Not a Burner of their homes, Not an Ear Cutter, and not a Head Cutter."
Kerry's mouth has changed me into a Republican.
Christopher Sager // US War Veteran, Vietnam, 1968-1969 & 1970-1971. Ret. KCMOPD
Why don't you people get as upset about the two months of missing duty by Bush during the Vietnam War as you are with a person who was over there.Kerry's anti war comments were par for the course at that time in history. If you are upset about those than you are equally upset of the views of Cheney who did not want to fight. Norm Coleman Senator of MInnesota who also protested the war.
Posted by: Hennington at September 3, 2004 05:15 PMWhy don't you people get as upset about the two months of missing duty by Bush during the Vietnam War as you are with a person who was over there.
So many things wrong with this. Where to begin. For one thing Bush/Cheney haven't made their military service the centerpiece of their campaign. For another, whatever Bush did in that era had little impact on the nation's overall war effort and the genocidal consequences for Southeast Asia in the wake of US pullout. The same cannot be said for Kerry. Want more? How about the whole "Christmas in Cambodia" spiel that he used as leverage to alter US policy in Central and South America? How about the sheer inconsistency of running for years as an anti-war anti-military candidate, and then claiming that because of four dubious months spent in Vietnam, which he later repudiated, he's fit to be Commander in Chief? How about the fact that he criticizes Bush for having no plan in the wake of the US victory, but voices no plan himself? How about the fact that he ranks the President for "negative campaigning" against Kerry's Vietnam record, when Bush has never had anything but praise for Kerry's record... and yet Kerry manages to sleazily use this imaginary justification to mount his own negative campaign against Bush's service in the National Guard?
For starters...
Posted by: Demosophist at September 3, 2004 05:42 PMTO : Pete Petigrew ADMR et al
I read your posting and I concure about the "morale awards". in my reserve duty as an MA2 (92-99) I had been in a group of awardees presented to us by CNO Admiral Boorda at charlestown navy yard boston 05 dec95 charlston,boston navy yard. All the awards had been administratively awarded by the Sailor's command and the CNO's presentation was for morale purposes.
During the presentations one saliors award was upgraded from a LOC to a NCM by Admiral Boorda on the spot once the award citation was read and the Admiral was impressed. Advice was given to the Sailor to step asside and the Admirals assistant would ensure it was properly filed. When I refer to my NAM for preventing a suicide I am careful to make the distinction that the CNO presented an award to me from my CO. It seems in Kerry's case that "spin" altered full disclosure of medals received may not have been a full disclosure.
I find it difficult to see the difference between medals and ribbons that to me represent the same message of reward on behalf of this nations national defense. In my experience no individual performance award is really achieved due to ones singular effort. It is allways an unrecognized team members that contribute to the awardable action carried out. For Kerry to throw either ribbon or medal is equally agregious and insulting to his shipmates as well as the navy as a whole.
I can't speak with knowledge of military combat as it was in kerry's brief incountry service, but I can say I have worked as a cop and been shot at, which has given me a small glipse of the combat mentality. We all keep the faith in eachother and whatch eachothers back. I would NEVER dishonor my brothers in blue by publicly disgracing the military or Cops. What Kerry did showed his true colors.
Bob Gorman MA2 USNR 92-99
Posted by: bob gorman MA2 USNR (HD) at December 29, 2004 10:55 PM