Discussing former President Clinton’s charge that Democratic opponents were "swift boating" Senator Hillary Clinton, co-host Joy Behar made this false statement about the "Swift Boat" ads.
"But with John Kerry, and when they swift boated, here’s a man who was a hero in the Vietnam War. And they turned it around to make it that he was a coward and that he wasn’t- and the people who swift boated him, namely the Bush administration, and their cronies, are never even went into the war. They all got out of the war."
Not only did the Bush administration not put out those ads, the Bush campaign never did. In fact President Bush condemned those ads on the record and honored Senator Kerry’s service. The creators of those advertisements were an independent group, Swift Vets and POWs for Truth, composed of actual Vietnam veterans.
This political action committee is composed of such distinguished veterans as William Franke, a Vietnam Purple Heart recipient, and swift boat veteran John O’Neill, who debated John Kerry in 1971 about Kerry’s accusations of atrocities.
Veteran journalist Barbara Walters was present and did not correct Behar’s factually incorrect accusations.
