Kerry Campaign Ad Exploited Both 9/11 and Vietnam

While the media devoted blanket coverage last week to complaints that a campaign ad for President Bush exploited the 9/11 attacks, reporters have given Sen. John Kerry a pass for a spot he ran on the second anniversary of 9/11 that exploited both that tragedy and the Vietnam War.

The ad, which was aired in Iowa beginning on Sept. 9 last year, featured a narrator who described Kerry as "the Swift boat commander who won three purple hearts and the silver star for bravery, then came home and helped rally the nation against that war.

"Ever since," the voiceover continues, "he's been on the front lines of the fights that matter. [He] led the Senate in defending a woman's right to choose [and] sounded the alarm on terrorism years before 9/11."

The ad begins with audio from Kerry's 1971 Senate testimony, where the returning Vietnam vet posited, "How do you ask a man to be the last man to die in Vietnam? How do you ask a man to be the last man to die for a mistake?" (The ad makes no mention of Kerry's comments later on in the same speech, where he trashed his fellow GIs as war criminals.)

Referring to the part of Kerry's testimony omitted from the ad, Bush-Cheney campaign spokesman Scott Stanzel told WABC Radio's Steve Malzberg: "If he's going to use that testimony, we have to look at it in its entirety. There were some very, very offensive things that were said in that testimony."

"I'd like to know if he still stands by those comments," Stanzel added.

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