Man Without Qualities

Posted 11:08 PM by Robert

Brother Says Kerry Is Not A Keeper

TIME reports:

PCF-44 Gunner’s Mate Stephen M. Gardner—in a long telephone interview from his home in Clover, South Carolina—has a starkly different memory. “Kerry was chickenshit,” he insists. “Whenever a firefight started he always pulled up stakes and got the hell out of Dodge.” .... Gardner is sickened by the idea of Kerry as president. “Anybody but Kerry,” he says. “I know what a disaster he’d be.” ....

“And you know I served with this guy, and the bottom line to it is; harsh as this may sound or as good as it sounds to any Democrat, out there, John Kerry is another ‘Slick Willy.’ He’s another Bill Clinton and that’s exactly what he is. And I’m telling you right now, that if John Kerry gets to be president of these United States, it’ll be a sorry day in this world for us. We can’t stand another Democrat like that in there again. We’ll get our asses in such a sling this time; we won’t be able to get out of it. And the bottom line to it is, I don’t care how much John Kerry’s changed after he moved off my boat, his initial patterns of behavior when I met him and served under him was somebody who ran from the enemy, rather than engaged it. If I’d had Rush’s 800 number, or known how to reach him, I would have called in.” ....

When describing Kerry he unloads choice adjectives, “opportunist” being his favorite. His most colorful phrase is claiming that all Kerry wanted to do was “save his lily-white ass.” Up until now he has kept his resentment mostly to himself. “I’ve told a few of my friends that he was an asshole,” Gardner says. “But I’m not looking to make news.”

Too bad it's just in TIME. Maybe Mr. Gardner will talk next to a reporter from a real news outlet.

UPDATE: Excellent Kausfiles comments on this one.