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search), chief sponsor of CPAC, which is giving the veterans the "Courage Under F ire" award during the annual Ronald Reagan banquet in Washington, DC, on Friday. "We thought this sort of example of citizens stepping forward under adver se conditions should be recognized," Lessner added.
search), the Democrat credited with g iving one of the most memorable speeches in favor of President Bush at t he Republican National Convention this summer, will present the award to Adm.
The Swift Boat Veterans for Truth, or "Swifties" as they are affectionate ly called in the CPAC press release and by their fans, raised more than $27 million near the end of the presidential campaign and ran television ads denouncing Kerry as dishonest about his service in the Vietnam War and for his testimony before Congress against the war when he returned i n 1971.
The ads, coupled with the media and Internet blitz surrounding the ads, a re largely credited with crippling Kerry's message in the final months o f the campaign. "For a second time, the Swift Boat Veterans stepped up to serve their cou ntry honorably and courageously by telling the truth about John Kerry's tour of duty in Vietnam," said ACU President David Keene. "Despite vilif ication, character assassination and the hostility of the elite media, t hese veterans dared to tell a side of the story that the American people otherwise would not have heard." But not everyone thinks the veterans behaved honorably nor are they surpr ised that this annual conservative confab, which boasts speakers like Vi ce President Dick Cheney, White House Deputy Chief of Staff Karl Rove an d nine Republican senators, is honoring the group. "This is a fairly cynical recognition of the fact that their dirty tactic s helped and worked to elect their candidate," said Joe Conason, investi gative editor for American Prospect magazine and author of "Big Lies: Th e Right-Wing Propaganda Machine and How It Distorts the Truth." Conason was referring to the fact that the Swift Boat Veterans received b ig money donations from Bush contributors. The Bush campaign adamantly d enied it had anything to do with the group.
He later gave $ 250,000 for Bush's inaugural celebrations. Critics have contended all along that the Swift Boat Veterans were workin g hand-in-glove with Republican Party operatives. Kerry's campaign manag er Mary Beth Cahill, in an August letter to her counterpart in the Bush campaign, Ken Mehlman, now chairman of the Republican National Committee , provided a chart with the alleged connections. Featured prominently is Swift Boat Veterans public relations consultant Merrie Spaeth, a long-t ime Texas GOP activist and Republican media strategist.
search), a well-known Republican firm that is now working with Re publican groups to prepare for the fight over future Supreme Court nomin ations. The law firm hired by the Swift Boat Veterans also had connectio ns to Bush.
search) was forced to resign as a consultant to the Bush campaign when it was revealed he had advised the group. "Everybody who was involved in a significant way with the Swift Boat Vete rans were Republican or Republican activists in their communities. The i dea that they weren't is about as true as anything else they've ever sai d, which is nothing," said Conason. com that the group was conceived completely inde pendently from any Republican influence. The folks they worked with subs equent to their founding might have been Republicans, but the veterans' goal was not to elect George W Bush.
search), author of the anti-Kerry book "Unfit for Command." It was at th eir first meeting in Texas that they met Spaeth, he said. "We have Democrats in our organization obviously they are conservative Democrats but we have made a concerted effort to avoid any connection, if only to deny the Democratic Party a direct tie to Republicans in any way." Hoffman said he is "honored" to receive the award from CPAC, and feels co mfortable about it because it is a conservative group, not necessarily a GOP-sponsored one. He said he turned down several invitations to speak at inaugural events.
He was also named "Man of the Year" by the center's FrontPageMagcom. "It's always a good time to do the right thing and it's the right thing t o honor the Swift Boat Vets," said long-time conservative activist Richa rd Viguerie.
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