In the December 2001 edition of the Atlantic, David Brooks wrote an essay titled "One Nation, Slightly Divisible," in which he suggested that America is divided largely into two political cultures, one "red" and one "blue." His idea is based on those electoral maps in 2000 that colored majority-Republican states in red and majority-Democratic states in blue. Brooks' witty essay pictures the red-state voter as trending rural, a salt-of-the-earth type, concerned with individual liberty and family values, whereas the "blue" voter trends urban, more of a book-reader, a Beltway-savvy intellectual, the environmentally conscious soccer mom or dad.

Cliches? Maybe. But Brooks does have his finger on two very strong currents in the American votership. It's not that Pennsylvania is a "blue state" or Alabama is a "red state." It's that our two political cultures don't talk to each other much, or even know much about each other. To bridge that gap, we've brought together two "red" voters - John Franklin and Cynthia Sneed - and two "blue" voters, Terri Falbo and Timothy Horner. Each week, they'll ponder and debate the issues arising in the election campaign. The hope is that they'll model an intelligent discussion, a great big conference room where red and blue sit down together.

Cynthia Sneed, Red Stater  

Question Number Three: John Kerry's Vietnam War record has been called into question. One group, Swift Boat Veterans for Truth, is being backed by several Republican backers of President Bush. It has launched a Web site and aired TV ads calling into question Kerry's medals awarded during Vietnam. A book, Unfit for Command by John O'Neill, suggests Kerry is lying about his war record. What do you make of such tactics? Should they carry much weight with voters?

What John O'Neill, longtime Kerry nemesis and coauthor of Unfit for Command: Swift Boat Veterans Speak Out Against John Kerry, should have done was hire an independent Hollywood producer to make his book into a feature film. The movie would be released at a glitzy film festival with fat cats attending the premier and would be nominated for, and win, an Academy Award.

Meanwhile, the producer would go to the Republican convention as a mega rock star, partying with the movers and shakers in the Republican Party. All of the major media anchors would discuss the "documentary" in a serious tone while newspaper editors across the land would refer to the O'Neill account of Kerry's Vietnam service as "troubling" and "worthy of investigation."

Of course, O'Neill would have to actually find a Hollywood producer to make the movie. Any book/movie about John Kerry while he is running for president would be met with the same derision and suspicion as the absurd "Clinton Chronicles." [The documentary] in which the Clintons were to have killed or been associated with the deaths of no less than 35 people over the entire course of their lives. I hate to say it, but by the time you are 40 years old people around you start dropping like flies, you find yourself reading the obituaries before the comics. If knowing 35 dead people by the time you are 40 makes you a murder suspect, I need a lawyer - quick.

Those actually keeping up with this stuff (the .0001 percent) are likely more amused than swayed. The Republican Party, very concerned about unregulated 527s that violated the spirit, if not the form, of the campaign finance reform laws, tried to halt the stop these groups unleashed by George Soros and Moveon.org to no avail. Now that the FCC has apparently agreed that it is fine to violate the campaign laws with soft money, conservative supporters - always a day late and a dollar short - have funded groups to run their own ads.

So, what we have is the playground brawl between the mega-millionaire bullies (no, not Teresa Kerry and Lynne Cheney): [moveon.org contributor] George Soros and [Swift Boat Veterans contributor] Bob Perry. We have Michael Moore versus John O'Neill, Fahrenheit 9/11 vs. "Unfit for Command," Hollywood megastars versus angry Vietnam vets. Those vets were vilified when they returned home - in large part because of Lt. Kerry's testimony before Congress that claimed that they were guilty of war crimes. (Kerry now "regrets" his choice of words. Duh.)

The number of vets signing the letter does interest me because there were 300 at the Swift Boat reunion and about 250 were willing to say they thought Kerry unfit to command the military. Of all the Swift Boat vets contacted fewer than 10 percent refused to sign the letter.

About 60 eyewitnesses to Kerry's service are cited in the book. The eyewitnesses were all in Kerry's unit, with each boat carrying seven or eight. The swift boats traveled together in groups of five or six meaning there would be 36 to 40 or more soldiers on the river together at one time. Some eyewitnesses were describing Kerry fleeing comrades who were under attack, disregarding orders, putting others in danger, creating phony film footage of his exploits with a home movie camera, and recommending himself for medals and Purple Hearts in reports he wrote himself.

Why so many Vietnam Vets, many of them lifelong Democrats, would lie about John Kerry - a man they served with in close combat - is unclear. I cannot ever remember any politician from either WWII or the Korean War having members of his own unit question his personal accounts of his service record.

If John Kerry gamed the system to earn his medals, then he was successful at the gaming and parlayed the game into a lifetime career as a politician. If John Kerry had some type of precognitive knowledge that one day he would be running for president, and therefore would need film footage of his duty during the four months in country, then good for him for thinking of making the home movies and group photos. (My father-in-law, who served two tours of combat duty in Vietnam, does not have home movies or photos to share or nary a Purple Heart. He did have a dog there for a while.)

I very much doubt that most Americans can tell you anything about John O'Neill and the swift boaters. Most of us do not live in the key "battleground" states never see any national candidate up close and personal. If either candidate comes to our town they charge $1,000 per ice cube for the event, leaving most of us wondering: "Who are these people that can afford to go to these things?" Then we realize it is Whoopie Goldberg and a bunch of fat-cat corporate executives with more money than common sense.

The rest of us, we take the kids to the beach, go fishing and cookout in the backyard. I do not believe that Michael Moore movies and John O'Neill books influence undecided voters because the vast majority of Americans get their political news from Comedy Central and The Tonight Show.

posted at # 10:03 AM