Tuesday, October 12, 2004

More on "Promptergate" Was Bush wired during the first debate? The experts think there is good reason to be suspicious: Now a technical expert who designs and makes such devices for the U.S. military and private industry tells Salon that he believes the bulge is indeed a transceiver designed to receive electronic signals and transmit them to a hidden earpiece lodged in Bush's ear canal. "There's no question about it. It's a pretty obvious one -- larger than most because it probably has descrambling capability," said Alex Darbut, technical and business development vice president for Resistance Technology in Arden Hills, Minn. Darbut examined photographs of the president's back taken from the Fox News video feed at the first presidential debate in Coral Gables, Fla., as well as 2002 photos of the president driving and working in a T-shirt on his Crawford ranch, which were posted on the White House Web site. Darbut speculates that the device the president wears is provided by the Secret Service, noting, "They're not going to have him driving around the countryside on his ranch without being in instant contact with him." [snip] On Tuesday, the New York Daily News produced a master tailor named Frank Shattuck who, after viewing photos from both debates, confirmed, "There's definitely something there, in between the shoulder blades. I can't say what it is, but it's not hidden very well. They should have come to me. I can hide a pistol under the breast." Of course, we have no idea whether Bush was wired, and I don't think the first expert knows either. However, these days the most sensible question to ask -- the question that places everything in proper perspective -- is, of course, "What would Dick think?" And the answer invariably is whatever the most absurd, the most extreme, the most paranoid possibility happens to be. 11:30:48 PM    comment [] Gen. Tommy Franks plays politics Gen. Tommy Franks (ret.) is on a four-state campaign swing for President Bush. Last Sunday at a campaign stop in Reno, NV, he denounced Kerry's anti-Vietnam-war testimony, saying: The men I served with in Vietnam weren't war criminals and I'm proud I served with them. However, back on August 3, 2004, Sean Hannity asked Gen. Franks about Kerry's claim that soldiers committed atrocities in Vietnam. Here is what was said (courtesy of the Daily Howler): HANNITY (8/3/04): I want to play a tape of John Kerry, and I want to get your reaction to this tape. KERRY (videotape, Dick Cavett Show, 1971): I personally didn't see personal atrocities in the sense that I saw somebody cut a head off or something like that. However, I did take part in free fire zones. I did take part in harassment interdiction fire. I did take part in search and destroy missions in which the houses of noncombatants were burned to the ground. And all of these, I find out later on[~]these acts are contrary to The Hague and Geneva conventions and to the laws of warfare. So, in that sense, anybody who took part in those, if you carry out the application of the Nuremberg principles, is in fact guilty. HANNITY: What does that mean to you? FRANKS (continuing directly): I think we had a lot of problems in Vietnam. One was the lack of leadership of young people like in[~]in John Kerry's position. He was a young officer over there, and I'm not sure that, that activities like that didn't take place. In fact, quite the contrary. I'm sure that they did. HANNITY: I want to play you another tape of his, where he talks about what other soldiers did when he was there. FRANKS: Right. HANNITY: And then, I'll get your reaction to this. Roll this tape. KERRY (videotape, Senate Foreign Relations Committee, 1971): I relived the absolute horror of what this country, in a sense, made them do. They told the stories of times that they had personally raped, cut off the ears, cut off heads, taped wires from portable telephones to human genitals and turned up the power, cut off limbs, blown up bodies, randomly shot at civilians, razed villages in the fashion of Genghis Khan. HANNITY: I mean, raped, murdered, all these things. But he never told names. Does that anger you? I mean, this is the guy now that is the leading candidate for the Democrats. FRANKS (continuing directly): I don't know. I think Vietnam was -- I think Vietnam was a bad time. I think that what I've learned in my life, Sean, is that it's a heck of a lot easier to protest than it is to step up and take responsibility for the actions of a unit or for -- or for your own actions. And so, I don't -- I don't like what I saw. But at the same time, I wouldn't say that -- the things that Senator Kerry said are undeniable about activities in Vietnam. I think that things didn't go right in, in Vietnam. I suppose now that Gen. Franks has chosen which candidate to support, he's free to adjust his public views accordingly. How depressing to see yet another cherished American institution fall to today's political climate. Now the supposed honor of our military leaders caves. 10:38:13 PM    comment []

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