Kerry: No Bloodbath in Vietnam

RUSH: John Kerry was on Washington Journal, C-SPAN today with Susan Swain. Caller from Lubbock, Texas, says, ‘I remember the horrible killings after Vietnam with the boat people coming over here, and I really hate to go off and leave our allies over in Iraq, and I am concerned about that.’

KERRY: Let me just say to the first part of your question with respect to boat people and killing, everybody predicted a massive bloodbath in Vietnam. There was not a massive bloodbath in Vietnam. There were reeducation camps, and they weren’t pretty and, you know, nobody, you know, likes that kind of outcome. But on the other hand, I’ve met lot of people today who were in those education camps, who are thriving in the Vietnam of today.

RUSH: Ho, ho, ho. There was no bloodbath in Vietnam. Reeducation camps. ‘Yeah, they’re not fun, but I’ve met a lot of people who have come out of those.’ A reeducation camp, does he know what he’s saying? Bloodbath, reeducation camp, denying that the bloodbath that did happen happened, and now coming out and talking about these reeducation camps as though they were some sort of ultimate great thing. I tell you, this guy came close to being president. He came close to being president. His view, if he could have gotten 110,000 more votes in Ohio, he could have — and that’s pretty close.

BREAK TRANSCRIPT

RUSH: John Kerry got a caller, by the way, from Plymouth, Minnesota, on the Republican line this morning on C-SPAN. This is what the caller said to Senator Kerry.

C-SPAN CALLER: I did not vote for you, Senator Kerry. And the reason is, is you’re an old hat at undermining our troops. Do you remember meeting with the Vietcong in Paris during the Vietnam War? And I don’t know how anybody gets three Purple Hearts, self-inflicted. And also you never answered why you didn’t release all of your military records. What you Democrats are doing is providing aid and comfort to Al-Qaeda. You’re undermining their effort while they’re fighting. You should be ashamed of yourself.

RUSH: All right, this is a montage. We’ve got Kerry’s answer. This is a montage of his reply to that caller.

KERRY: The Navy itself has said that every single one of the medals that I was awarded I deserved and they were appropriately awarded to me, and I’m proud of what I accomplished there personally as a warrior on behalf of my country. And it is a shameful tactic that Republicans see fit to attack the personal record of those who serve our country. Moreover, none of those wounds were self-inflicted, and I resent and will forever resent the implication by anybody that that was, uh, er, uh the fact. There were soldiers on my body, sailors on my boat. Every one of my crew has certified that what happened, happened, uh, and it was thoroughly vetted. So enough of this Republican smear tactic. With respect to, uh, uh, the visits, uh, to the Vietcong, uh, please, ma’am, I fought against the, uh, uh, communists in Vietnam — and when I came back, after having seen the lies that our government told, uh, I stood up and told the truth about that war.

RUSH: (Laughing.) And lied through his teeth about it. You know what this guy’s got? What’s the word? He has so much resentment over the fact that this carefully laid image and plan got blown up in his 2004 presidential runs. He worked on that, obviously like Clinton is working on his, and it just got blown up with the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth, and of course the national attention you’re going to get when you want to be president.