Frame Up

I like this. Kerry’s campaign is going after Regnery, saying that they should withdraw the book because it is a hoax.

The Kerry campaign has told Salon that the publisher of “Unfit for Command,” the book that is at the center of the attack on Kerry’s military record by the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth, is retailing a hoax and should consider withdrawing it from bookstores. “No publisher should want to be selling a book with proven falsehoods in them, especially falsehoods that are meant to smear the military service of an American veteran,” said Kerry campaign spokesman Chad Clanton. “If I were them, I’d be ducking under my desk wondering what to do. This is a serious problem.”

Now, Regnery will do no such thing, of course. But, the frame is obvious.

Bush supporters insisted that James Hatfield’s book Fortunate Son, be pulled because of what they claimed were false assertions of George W. Bush’s alleged cocaine use. The editor in chief of St. Martin’s Press, Robert B. Wallace, resigned over the controversy. Surely, this swift boat book, based upon one proven lie after another, should be dealt with the same way.

Some on the other side will point out that Hatfield’s book was eventually withdrawn not because of its allegations that George W. Bush had used cocaine but because the author had been convicted of hiring a hit man on his boss. But if the character of the author is the prevailing question, then it cannot be ignored that one of the authors of Unfit For Duty has recently admitted to writing a long litany of noxious swill including references to the pope and little boys, Islam as a satanic religion and Katie Couric as “Little Katie Communist of the NBC Today Show” Indeed, it seems that this author believes that many in the media are communists. Is that the kind of author a publisher should stand behind when the facts in the book are called into question?

St. Martin’s Press withdrew their controversial book when the character of its author was revealed to be suspect and the charges of George W. Bush’s cocaine use in 1972 were refuted by a man in Texas. Now, we have a similar situation in which the character of the author of Unfit For Duty has been called into question and numerous facts contained within the book have been fully exposed as false, most recently in an article today in the Washington Post. Regnery Publishing, despite its Republican ties, should do the right thing and withdraw this book.

(And while they’re at it they should condemn William Regnery’s new all white dating service. (Thanks Oliver.)