ACTION ITEM: Tell The Austin American-Statesman To Correct Austin Bay’s Distortions

Conservatives Wingnuts are very adept at repeating falsehoods over and over so that a bogus meme becomes "fact" (i.e., Gore invented the Internets, Clinton’s $10,000 haircut held up airline traffic at LAX, Bush didn’t blow off his Guard duty). It’s very important that we push back when they engage in this kind of dishonesty because they’re shameless revisionists, and they’ve racked up quite an extensive track record for successfully distorting the historical record.

Witness Austin Bay in today’s Statesman:

John Kerry’s "Christmas in Cambodia" yarn ignited the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth. Whatever your memory of the 2004 presidential campaign, Kerry’s sudden silence about a wartime Christmas "seared" in his memory was a rare example of a citizens group publicly backing down a powerful U.S. senator and a major-party presidential candidate.

Let’s count the factual errors/distortions/lies in this one paragraph. Which do you think is the biggest whopper?

• That the Swift Boat Liars, bankrolled by fat Texas Republican wallets with extensive ties to the Bush campaign, are characterized as a lowly "citizens group" taking on the big, scary Kerry?
• That Bay claims Kerry’s "yarn" about being in Cambodia "ignited" the group (in fact, the Kerry/Cambodia story wasn’t brought up by the Swift Boat Liars until their third ad)?
• That Kerry’s memory of being in Cambodia was largely vindicated?
• That Bay doesn’t mention that the Swift Boat Liars have been exposed as a bunch of frauds (even more here) and were so out of bounds that even John McCain denounced them?

So what? This is 4 years ago, right? Who cares what Bay says? Wrong.

We need to challenge these people aggressively, consistently, every time they make shit up, because the media (in this case, the Statesman) doesn’t. They play right along. And before you know it, Al Gore claimed he invented the Internet and the Swift Boat Liars were a ragtag nonpartisan grassroots organization that came together to tell the truth.

Please politely tell the Statesman to correct the record.

You can use this online form here.

And feel free to write Austin Bay here.

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