During an interview with Megyn Kelly of The Kelly File Wednesday night, Rep. Duncan D. Hunter (R-CA) managed a nice little two-fer while discussing Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl — he flip-flopped from his previous opinion of the soldier and he ‘swift boated’ him. Bergdahl has become latest cause celebre for Republicans, as they feel they can agitate and energize their rapidly shrinking base of angry old white men by accusing the POW of being a deserter and traitor which the President traded five of the hardest hard-core Taliban leaders for to bring back home.
Kelly asked Hunter at the beginning of their interview if there is any validity to statements made by White House aides that Sgt. Bergdahl is suffering the same fate that John Kerry did during his 2004 Presidential campaign, when he was famously attacked by fellow Vietnam veterans over his service record, in an action that has been tagged ‘swift boating.’ Anyway, Hunter, a Marine veteran, disagreed that Bergdahl was being swift boated, and then proceeded to swift boat the former POW.
Below is video of the interview, courtesy of Fox News.
As John Kerry threw his medals over the White House fence and turned his back on all of his Vietnam brothers and sisters, that’s what Bergdahl did. Bergdahl walked away from his men, and he left them in a bad spot. People lost their lives and got hurt trying to find him. But the one real commitment that you have as a military person, especially when you’re fighting and it’s dirty and you’re tired and you’re hungry, it’s not always to your flag, it’s not always for your country, it’s for the man or the woman standing next to you. And he betrayed that and that is the most sacred trust that you have in the military, whether it’s the Marine Corps, the Army, the Navy or the Air Force. It’s that trust that you have with the person next to you. That’s what he betrayed.
You have to hand it to Hunter. He was able to knock both John Kerry’s actions during the Vietnam War while at the same time claiming that Bergdahl is a deserter and betrayed his fellow soldiers. If Hunter gets defeated in November by Democrat James Kimber, a veteran himself, he will likely have a seat at the table over at Fox News. He is a pro at throwing out the red meat for the conservative viewers to gnaw on.
I did say point out that Hunter also flip-flopped on his opinion of Bergdahl as a deserter. Well, as Tom Kludt over at Talking Points Memo pointed out on Thursday, it appears that Hunter co-signed a letter to Fox News back in 2009, along with 22 other members of Congress, complaining about analyst Ralph Peters’ assertion that Bergdahl was a deserter and deserved to be detained by the Taliban. The letter urged Peters to apologize to Bergdahl’s family and the troops stationed in Afghanistan. The writers of the letter also requested that Fox News chief Roger Ailes publicly apologize for Peters’ implication that Bergdahl should be killed by the Taliban. The entire letter can be read here.
It is one thing to play along with your party’s latest talking point; it is another thing entirely to just be a raging hypocrite. Hunter went out of his way to defend Bergdahl all the way back in 2009 when a Fox News analyst called him a deserter then. He, like other Republicans, called for action to be taken to bring Bergdahl back home. Now, because Republicans somehow sense a scandal here that can hurt the President, Hunter is playing along and denigrating Bergdahl because that’s just how the Republican Party rolls these days.
Regarding Bergdahl, in the end, does it even matter whether or not the man’s service record wasn’t impeccable? Seriously, what kind of person takes joy in slandering and criticizing a person who just spent five years in captivity as a prisoner of war? This man was an American soldier that volunteered for service and went overseas to fight in a war. This nation has made a promise to its soldiers that, if they should be captured by an enemy, extraordinary measures will be made to bring them back home. That is what occurred with Bergdahl. Case closed.
Justin Baragona is the Managing Editor at Politicus Sports as well as Senior Editor at PoliticusUSA. He was a political writer for 411Mania.com before joining PoliticusUSA. Politically, Justin considers himself a liberal but also a realist and pragmatist. Currently, Justin lives in St. Louis, MO and is married. Besides writing, he also runs his own business after spending a number of years in the corporate world. You can follow Justin on Twitter either with his personal handle (@justinbaragona) or the Sports site’s (@PoliticusSports).
I am begining to believe that the ignorance of the republican party has crossed over to an airborne pathogen. Perhaps someone should call the CDC to round them up and test them.
Where are those FEMA camps when we need them?
All of these people are responding to a central whistle. It would be most enlightening to uncover the whistler.
You cant make this shit up
McCain: Those Accusing Me Of Bergdahl Flip-Flop Are ‘Lying’
http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/mccain-bergdahl-flip-flop-lying
This POS has gone senile. You are on tape, the internet that says you are a lIAR
@djchefron, this is plain hilarity. I have been tweeting him asking why he is a liar and if he can sleep at night.
McCain is a trout on the river bank flip-floppin’ along. Also, wasn’t he released from a POW camp in a prisoner exchange. Hypocrite as well as a flip flopper!
by the time all the dust and feathers settle, there are a great many pundits who are going to scramble for the ERASE-ERASE button. We’ve seen REALLY OLD Senator John “Songbird” McCain flipping his flop…trying to back peddle as fast as he can. But…tough…Jonny-boy….you’re hung by the testicles of the past. This toilet bowl floater needs to be hung out to dry when the dust finally settles…
Wait till they find out the guy frequently left base and walked outside. Wait till they cant get back on the train quick enough
The three stooges (a.k.a) whistle blowers are McCain, Ayotte, and Graham.
I’ve come to the conclusion that these people hate Obama more than they love their country, the military or even their children.Please VOTE in November and send a clear message that division,racism and hatred can not be tolerated.
What is wrong with these people?
They’ve all lost their damn minds I think.
Shiva – my feelings exactly, no one has said that when he left the base he was not on his own time, and with regard to some of those that the rethugs have rounded up to dish dirt on him, could they be party to the crimes of running down a child and hunting villagers, I think there might be some stories there, remember when some of these were recruited Bush was getting recruiters to overlook criminal records to get bodies in the military.
PS we know that one of those who were recruited to speak against Bergdahl got a less than honorable discharge.
Just a observation. Say that you have 3 friends and they were ask to describe you. Don’t you think there would be 3 different narratives while the soldiers they interviewed said basically the same thing. A rethuglican mind trick. Any hot button issue when they come on here say the same thing just as they were told. Don’t believe the hype
Information seems to be trickling out about his escape twice from his captors, when the whole story is known, I wonder if the republican lynch mob will feel any shame – I think sadly the answer is no.
And you would be right about feeling shame. This just in:Fox News Is Now Claiming That Bergdahl Is A Jihadist http://thinkprogress.org/media/2014/06/06/3445711/you-wont-believe-what-fox-news-is-now-saying-about-bowe-bergdahl/ This is from some super top secret report that someone saw and who would that someone be?Duane R. (“Dewey”) Clarridge, a former senior operations officer for the Central Intelligence Agency in the 1980s best known for having been indicted for lying to Congress about his role in the tangled set of events that became known as the Iran-Contra scandal. He was pardoned by the first President Bush in December 1992 while on trial.
http://imageshack.com/a/img577/7529/f3ns.jpg
His name is Josh Korder, a former Army sergeant from Minnesota who served with Bowe Bergdahl. He also admits he may be in violation of that by speaking out.
http://minnesota.cbslocal.com/2014/06/02/mn-solider-speaks-out-against-freed-pow-bowe-bergdahl/
Congressman Hunter doesn’t know any of the facts, nobody does at this time. All anybody knows is what the opinion manipulators are telling us, and they don’t know any of the facts either.
Let us all withhold judgement until the military goes through a debrief and an investigation.
I maintain he was recruited by the CIA to be an”undercover” prisoner, to find out the names of the real
Taliban leaders and where they hideout.
But I don’t know, and you don’t know: nobody knows. And anybody who challenges my scenario doesn’t know either.
In the past I have read (either in the Hastings story or another I read) that he said he pretended to be a friend of his captors so that he could win their trust and get greater freedom whereby he could escape. I think that would be a good plan on his part if true. We know he tried escaping a couple of times. One question, when he went for his walk away from the base -was it on his free time or was he on guard?
Another small but interesting item – per the daily beast, bergdahl senior addressed the conservative fundraiser -attended by Michael Steele where he informed them of his sons plight and asked for them to support them, whereupon Steele made a remark that the ‘other party had no feelings for these boys’
Talk about hypocrisy!
If OBama had done nothing the republicans would be howling about that.The best thing I think we can do is to vote.The republicans have no moral compass,have O.D on hypocrisy and to boot seem to be suffering from oxygen depravation.Since we can’t stop their howling,it may behoove us to let them howl,but with no body paying any attention to them.Deprive them of an audience is a fitting ending to what has been” our congress”
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