Folllowing up on the Pentagon investigating Kerry’s service record, Slapnose has more details, as well as some links questionaing what this news actually means. It may be that the conservative attack group that requested the investigation is merely overplaying some procedural step, like the Pentagon acknowledging receipt of their request.

The Pentagon is investigating Kerry’s war record. That the investigation is happening now, in the midst of a presidential campaign in which Kerry is the Democratic challenger, rather than at any other time in the past 30 years is a pretty good indication that this is an abuse of power that would have made Nixon blush.

Meanwhile, we can’t very well investigate Bush’s war record, because he doesn’t have one, at least not prior to doing an bungling job as commander in chief durring the “war on terror.” We can’t investigate his military record either, because so much of it has conveniently gone missing, with key documents missing or “accidentally” destroyed.

(9/6 added a link)

So, the Swiftboat Veterans for Truth (more acurately “liars who will trample over anything resembling the truth get their man elected”) have struck again.

Appearantly they’ve been circulating a letter questioning Kerry’s service supposedly signed by about 300 swift boat veterans. The problem is, more than one of the veterans named didn’t give consent for their names to be used, they weren’t even asked. Even if they were asked, they wouldn’t have consented.

One vet saw the letter and contacted some of the other vets listed. Of the dozen he contacted 3 hadn’t given permission. Hmm, wonder how many of the other names on the letter have been appropriated.

I went to look at their website which contains quotes like:

We think that he[Kerry] knew he was lying when he made the charges, and we think that they’re unsupportable. We intend to bring the truth about that to the American people.

We believe, based on our experience with him, that he is totally unfit to be the Commander-in-Chief.”

— John O’Neill, spokesman, Swift Boat Veterans for Truth

and

“I do not believe John Kerry is fit to be Commander-in-Chief of the armed forces of the United States. This is not a political issue. It is a matter of his judgment, truthfulness, reliability, loyalty and trust — all absolute tenets of command.

— Rear Admiral Roy Hoffmann, USN (retired), chairman, Swift Boat Veterans for Truth

Now, what am I to make of such righteousness from such complete and utter frauds?

I have a great idea. Find out the names and addresses of some of your local Republican Party functionaries. It’s easy to do. Just google for the website of your state Republican party and then look for local members of the state commitee. Washington state residents can get a head start here.

Next step is to take some time to pay them a friendly visit. Introduce yourself. Establish common ground around shared values like the importance of friends and family Let them know how concerned you are about this next presidential election. How important its outcome is to the country. How bad things could get for all of us if there were any questions about the way the polling was collected anywhere in the country. Engage them in a creative discussion about how we work togeather to be sure the results of polling are valid, no matter what the juristiction.

We are all in this together after all. We all have so much to loose. We can’t let a few people risk it all for their own gain.

I think of myself as pretty moderate, and not particularly partisan, though its hard to be anything but a bit disgusted during campaign season. The Democrats have been turning my stomach, and now the Republican Convention is boiling my blood a little.

Listening to and reading the foreign policy rationale spewed during the convention really makes me uneasy. I think having a military, and using it when necessary, is an important part of defending our country from a very real threat.

The thing is, I think its important to use it wisely. Using it wisely would mean making sure there were enough troops on the ground in Afghanistan to keep it from disintegrating back into terrorist playground. Using it wisely would mean not invading Iraq under false or dubious pretenses. Whether or not one was invading under false pretenses, using it wisely would mean not invading without sufficient troop strength and post-war planning in place to insure the country doesn’t disintegrate into another terrorist playground. Using it wisely would mean holding the secretary of defense accountable for such mistakes, and the others, like the torture of prisoners (including children) that occurred during his watch. Using it wisely would mean being aware that doing a sloppy job is just going to make a difficult job even harder.

The Republican standard bearers demonstrate no wisdom in this regard. They seem inclined to sweep all these bungles and mistakes under the rug, happy to sacrifice our safety and security in order to secure another term for a Republican president. They paint anyone critical of this bungling as cowards, or even traitors. They surely can’t see how this bungling could come back and bite us on the ass in the form of 20 years of terrorist attacks on American soil and 20 years of national insecurity as we constantly fear for our oil supply.

I’ve been relying on Webalizer, as provided by my webhost, to give me a view into the traffic to this blog. I’d really like a more flexible but equally inexpensive tool that would give me finer grained views on things.

I’d like to be able to easily answer which referrers are pointing to which pages, and when.

Any tips?