It felt like a bad flashback to the 2004 campaign when the words "Swift Boat Veterans for Truth" and "John Kerry" once again graced the front page of the New York Times on Sunday. The piece about how Sen. Kerry's still fighting back against the smear campaign does offer more evidence that counters the Swift Boaters' specious allegations about Kerry.
For instance, the SBVT maintained that "the enemy who Kerry shot and killed in the incident for which he won the Silver Star was actually a wounded and fleeing teenager 'in a loincloth.'" To counter that, Kerry produces a photo of a younger version of himself standing next to a clothed corpse. "Mr. Kerry says his photographs show the body of a man fully dressed and lying face up, suggesting, he says, that the man was shot while approaching," the photo caption reads.
We're as frustrated as anyone that Kerry didn't put these rumors down decisively during his ill-fated campaign, and do not relish the chance to pick over the whole mess again. Yet, it's not obvious these pictures would have helped Kerry's cause had they surfaced back in 2004. No matter the point that a graphic photo proves, a picture of the would-be president posing next to a corpse might not have done much good for his image.
We'll never know.
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