Something like a quarter of all voters said the DUI "October Surprise" was a factor in their vote, and reliable sources have stated that if that story had never come out before the election, that Bush would have carried the election without the knock-down drag-out in Florida, and the whole "illegal president" shitpile would never have existed. Pretty heavy for an insignificant talking point.

I have sufficient evidence to convince me that Kerry lied about the Cambodia issue. More important, there is enough evidence to convince me that the Kerry campaign, and a number of media organizations, are damn well aware of it, and just trying to figure out an exit strategy. Unfortunately, so far they haven't been coordinating this, which is why several different versions, all from pro-Kerry sources, not Swift Boat Veterans, disagree with each other.

No one in the "Band of Brothers" is backing Kerry on this. His biographer has gone to ground. The media are pretending the issue doesn't exist. Note that Cambodia is not coming up at all in the latest attacks on the SBV.

It really doesn't matter who wins a football game. Not true of presidential elections. And lying about Cambodia is at least as important an issue as the DUI was. It is significant as part of a pattern of behavior.

What the Kerry campaign is really hoping nobody notices is that the vast majority of Swift Boat Veterans and a large number of other veterans are much angrier about Kerry's documented behavior on his return from Vietnam than they are about Cambodia, medals or other issues. Kerry has nothing to counter this with.

Nor does he have anything to seriously counter a long Senatorial history of anti-military votes, and support for Leftist foreign policies that, if enacted, would have been disastrous.