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Jacob Heilbrunn

Jacob Heilbrunn

Posted: June 30, 2008 04:40 PM

McCain Camp: Obama Aided Enemy in Vietnam

What's Your Reaction:

Vietnam, which figured prominently in the 2004 presidential campaign, has surfaced again as a volatile issue as the McCain and Obama camps square off. Ret. Gen. Wesley Clark's recent remarks about Sen. John McCain's service not necessarily qualifying him to become president have enraged the McCain camp, inside sources report. Apparently, a McCain "Truth Squad" is now contemplating countering by alleging that Obama's true vulnerability isn't that he didn't see action in Vietnam, but that he did -- on the side of America's enemies.

The gist of the accusation seems to be that as a lad in Indonesia, Obama did not, in fact, attend a madrassa, as some have alleged, but instead was a lousy student who refused to hit the books and played hooky. The contention is that, eager for adventure and excitement, he hot-footed it to the war zone sometime in 1971 as a ten-year-old and wound up in North Vietnam, where he became enamored of anti-war singers such as Joan Baez and Hollywood stars like Jane Fonda. He is also said to have been influenced by the writer Mary McCarthy, who traveled to Vietnam several times. Obama's critics now trace his elitism and later association with radicals such as William Ayers to these formative experiences, which are said to have imbued him with a deep and abiding mistrust of American values and patriotism.

Indeed, grainy photographs from the early 1970s showing a small child supposedly resembling a young Obama handing Viet Cong soldiers soft drinks and other snack foods have begun to circulate on the internet. One caption says that Obama's childhood name "Barry" really referred to his readiness to supply soldiers with berries from the countryside. McCain aides refused to comment, but groups close to the campaign are said to be scouring the archives for possible pictures of Obama working on farms in Cuba as well, figuring that they might help put Florida in play again. One GOP consultant who insisted on anonymity declared, "look, he may sound appealing enough, but he's always just been a bad apple." Though Obama himself dismissed the photos today as the kind of politics his campaign seeks to transcend and as "rotten to the core," the controversy has indubitably enlivened what is turning out to be a bruising campaign by further pitting the two camps against each other.

 
 
 
Vietnam, which figured prominently in the 2004 presidential campaign, has surfaced again as a volatile issue as the McCain and Obama camps square off. Ret. Gen. Wesley Clark's recent remarks about Sen...
Vietnam, which figured prominently in the 2004 presidential campaign, has surfaced again as a volatile issue as the McCain and Obama camps square off. Ret. Gen. Wesley Clark's recent remarks about Sen...
 
 
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09:36 PM on 07/04/2008
OMG, this is just laughable. They can't really be trying to push these stories??? Are they just trying to bait Obama into responding on his rumor website to something this stupid?
05:50 PM on 07/01/2008
ROFLOL
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HUFFPOST SUPER USER
BassMent
Left of Ted Kennedy, right of Che Guevara
01:47 PM on 07/01/2008
Very clever post! Although I gotta say, the string of apple-related puns at the end there really had me groaning.

Well done!
12:28 AM on 07/01/2008
Maybe I missed it but, if they haven't done so already, watch for the headline from the tabloids stating that David Ploufe and David Axelrod are really aliens from outer space.
12:28 AM on 07/01/2008
LOL! Great Satire. Unfortunately I wouldn't put it past the Repukes to actually try this.
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XME
Life is hard. After all, it kills you.
11:51 PM on 06/30/2008
It's really sad when one has to pause to ask if this is a joke, or for real!
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HUFFPOST COMMUNITY MODERATOR
indypete
04:37 PM on 07/01/2008
I paused, and I'm usually fairly sharp on the uptake with satire. My first thought was, if this is satire, it's pretty good, if it's not, they're just as bad as even my cynical mind assumed. As Dave01 put it a couple of posts above, I wouldn't put it past them.
11:09 PM on 06/30/2008
Unlike the intelligence photos of the produce trucks parked behind the Baghdad Save Mart that passed for carrying WMD, The Truth Squad is pretty certain they can link a 10-year-old Obama directly to Saloth Sar.

Paul Wolfowitz, Douglas Feith, Richard Perle and Dick Cheney claim there is ‘conclusive evidence’ that it was a young Obama who convinced his pal Pol Pot to greatly increase the requirements for membership in the Khmer Rouge in 1971. Both being the lousy students they were, they also claim Barrack and Pot got on like a house on fire now rejecting students, intellectuals and so-called middle peasants from joining.

With Barrack now the sophisticated intellect honed in the jungles of Cambodia with the Communist Party of Kampuchea, The McCain campaign now hopes to capitalize on this 37-year-old Obama ‘flip-flop’.

One can only fight this comical notion with humor . . . and McCain started it. Publicly uttering the phrase ‘truth squad’ with a straight face.

Funny stuff.
11:51 AM on 07/01/2008
I have been reading the posts and articles here for awhile now and this has just got to be the funniest (in a bad way) thing I have ever read.

I was born in Serey Sophorn, Cambodia in 1976, and am a land refugee. My family and I left Cambodia due to the Khmer Rouge. I have been in the US for about 20 years now and I have never felt the desire to become a citizen until I heard about Barack Obama; he inspired me. I filed for citizenship earlier this year and because I was frustrated that I couldn't vote for him I became one of his small donation donors.

After reading this article, I now will make another donation to Barack Obama.
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HUFFPOST COMMUNITY MODERATOR
judyc
One love, one heart...
10:04 PM on 06/30/2008
You've got to be kidding me!!!!! Desperation at it's best.
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HUFFPOST SUPER USER
Forsetti
08:25 PM on 06/30/2008
What is next, photos of Obama as the "second shooter on the grassy knoll"?
05:10 PM on 06/30/2008
Earlier today, John McCain described his time in VietNam. According to his statements, as a 5 star General in the U.S. Army, he single handedly led 200,000 men in an invasion of North VietNam and captured the country which has been a stable democracy ever since. Joe Lieberman has called John McCain 'The Hero Of The Successful Win Over VietNam'. When a reporter from a Bolivian newpaper stated that he thought the U.S. had abandonded VietNam in 1974, and that he thought John McCain had been a POW and not a General, he was pounced upon by the rest of the media crew and beaten to death. His dead body was then dragged through the streets of DC to show what happens to people who argue with John McCain.
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HUFFPOST SUPER USER
bibb
08:23 PM on 06/30/2008
Yeah, it's getting hard to stomach how McCain's military history has become the "Holy Grail" that nobody is supposed to look at carefully and we're all supposed to just take it on faith.

In the meantime, the nonsense that is coming out on Obama is past ridiculous. If people are stupid enough to believe this crap, then they deserve what they get. The clue should be that none of the really crazy stuff has appeared on the major news.
09:26 AM on 07/01/2008
That's right. John McCain's military record should not be looked at too carefully. 17 out of the more than 300 pages reveal he lost 5 planes, was assigned to a plum job after graduating 4th from the bottom of his Naval Academy class (but, gee, his daddy and granddaddy were admirals, weren't they?) and generally didin't shine.

I admire his willingness to serve and his loyalty as a POW. Those are powerful things. BUt a great military leader? I don't think so. Most guys aren't, and that doesn't mean they can't be heros and courageous. My son is in Iraq and I can say unequivocally that he is not a great leader, but, man! I admire him for doing what he's doing.