The retired army Major General who works with me, just showed me the latest issue of Time magazine, 5/7/01 and I quote from the feature article "Ghosts of Viet Nam" (www.time.com):

"During Kerrey's brief, lamentable run for the presidency in 1992, he confounded his handlers with his ambivalence about exploiting what should have been his strongest political asset: his war heroism. Everywhere he went, people thanked him for it. But always, there was an awkwardness in the way he addressed it. In the end, under pressure from his consultants, he mentioned it plenty, but he always seemed to talk around it. Kerrey never mentioned his Bronze Star for Thanh Phong, but he could not escape the glory of his other decoration. He was awarded the Congressional Medal of Honor, the nation's highest military prize, for his actions in another raid less than a month after Thanh Phong.

That one too went very wrong — information from defectors led Kerrey's squad into a trap. Chastened by the killings in Thanh Phong, Kerrey had decided to take these targets as prisoners. As a result, he told TIME last week, "I think I almost got some of my men killed that night." Instead, in a 90-sec. fire fight, seven V.C. were gunned down — but not before a grenade landed on Kerrey's foot, shattering his leg and wounding his groin, chest and face. Declining morphine for the pain, Kerrey refused to relinquish his command until he had got his men to safety.

The disastrous mission that one SEAL called a "bumbling overf___" was deemed a success by the brass. Ambrose put Kerrey in for a Silver Star, but as the request moved up, senior officers embellished the description and elevated the recommendation. The next year, Kerrey was awarded the Medal of Honor for conspicuous gallantry.

They all knew it was ridiculous, Ambrose told Karen Tumulty, then with the Los Angeles Times, in 1992. "Bob wanted to turn the medal down ... It was just another night out," he said. "We just got hit." Kerrey and the others believed the "honor" was politically motivated: Nixon's unpopular war needed a few more heroes. Kerrey's buddies told him to accept the medal for the sake of all those who had fought and lost more than he had. Kerrey's sister Jessie Rasmussen says he was still struggling with a decision as the family gathered in Washington for the ceremony. But on May 14, 1970, just 10 days after National Guardsmen shot and killed antiwar protesters at Kent State University, Kerrey allowed Nixon to pin the country's highest military honor on his chest. "

I'm sure the Navy brass were VERY good at "embellishing" and "elevating" the award. And the article merely confirms what my keyboard bumbling was trying to say about the misuse of special units.

I have friends whose view of the world is different from mine, and who believe that even if a fake hero was awarded the Medal of Honor, if that person speaks out for peace, then a greater good is achieved. It may be that the young Marine on Mutter's Ridge would never have been the spokesman that the graduate of the University of Nebraska turned out to be. Kerrey certainally won the hearts of the Peace-at-Any-Cost crowd.

But in quieter moments, I think that Marine should have at least had the chance to speak out, no matter how inarticulately, after really winning what Kerry stained. I am, even as a combat vet, in no position to judge Kerrey, but I hope the darkest hole in Hell goes to the hypocrites...