Swift Boat Odyssey Topic for Critical Thinking
Part of the reason John Kerry lost the 2004 election was because his Vietnam War record was attacked by groups with names like "Swift Boat Veterans for Truth." Charges made by these groups were estensively reported, heavily blogged, and widely believed. But were they true?
Your mission is to go to at least one of the SBVT-type websites, (or Wikipedia), and collect, as best you can, their argument supporting one major charge against Kerry. (You don't have to spend a lot of time on this. Just get a couple of reasons. Keep it as simple as you can while still having something significant to write about.) Then go to one of the anti-SBVT sites and collect some of their information on that exact same charge. (Don't worry about other stuff. Just find one or two things that address the specific charge you're looking at.) Finally, you should determine whether or not the limited evidence you've collected supports that particular charge. (Remember the rules for evaluating authority arguments!)
When you have figured out whether or not the charge is supported by the evidence you've collected, write a paper stating your opinion about whether your evidence supports the charge or not.
I've included way more sites than you need simply because some of these links may have gone bad by the time you read this. If one link is bad, just use the others.
Overview:
Wikipedia: Swift_Boat_Veterans_for_Truth
This excellent Wikipedia article contains many, many great links. You could do the whole thing from this site!
SBVT-type sites (You can get your one anti-Kerry argument from one of these sites.)
SwiftVets.com | The Real Story on John Kerry's Military Service and http://www.swiftvets.com/article.php?story=20040706115027678
http://members.aol.com/viperash50/resume/nam.html
http://www.mudvillegazette.com/archives/001146.html
http://ice.he.net/~freepnet/kerry/
http://michnews.com/artman/publish/article_4638.shtml
http://www.intellectualconservative.com/article3706.html
http://www.prnewswire.com/cgi-bin/stories.pl?ACCT=109&STORY=/www/story/05-17-2004/0002176071&EDATE=
http://www.conservativemonitor.com/opinion04/103.shtml
http://www.spectator.org/dsp_article.asp?art_id=6975
Anti-"SBVT" sites (You might have to check out more than one of these sites for info on your one argument. Email me if you can't find anything!)
http://swiftvets.eriposte.com/
Kerry's Purple Heart
http://swiftvets.eriposte.com/kerrypurpleheart1.htm
Dr. Letson
http://www.factcheck.org/article.aspx?docID=231
More anti-SBVT stuff
http://www.johnkerry.com/rapidresponse/080504_truth.html
http://www.disinfopedia.org/wiki.phtml?title=Swift_Boat_Veterans_for_Truth
http://www.salon.com/opinion/conason/2004/05/04/swift/index_np.html
http://www.interventionmag.com/cms/modules.php?op=modload&name=News&file=article&sid=841
http://peat.blogs.com/peat/2004/08/swift_boat_vete.html
http://boingboing.net/2004/09/03/swift_boat_veterans_.html
http://www.washingtondispatch.com/opinion/article_9754.shtml
http://www.snopes.com/politics/kerry/swift.asp
http://www.lit.org/view/16610
http://www.gwu.edu/~action/2004/interestg/swift050404c.html
Independent Articles (These may or may not be helpful.)
http://www.nytimes.com/imagepages/2004/08/19/politics/campaign/20040820_SWIFT_GRAPH.html
http://www.nypost.com/news/nationalnews/29670.htm
http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/politics/july-dec04/vietnam_8-19.html
http://schema-root.org/people/political/activist/anti-kerry/swift_boat_veterans_for_truth/
http://www.disinfopedia.org/wiki.phtml?title=Swift_Boat_Veterans_for_Truth%2FArticles
Purple Heart information.
www.purpleheart.org
Funding information. (If you need it.)
http://www.opensecrets.org/527s/527events.asp?orgid=61
http://quote.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=71000001&refer=top_world_news&sid=auqvaZNTmsBE
Blogs (If you're interested.)
http://www.captainsquartersblog.com/mt/archives/cat_swift_boat_veterans_for_truth.php
http://www.blogsofwar.com/archives/2004/07/26/swift-boat-veterans-for-truth
http://www.lincolnvscadillac.com/showthread.php?t=1769
http://snuggharbor.blogspot.com/2004/08/swift-boat-veterans-for-truth.html
http://www.cdharris.net/archives/2004_05.html
http://www.ricker.us/showarticle.php?id=299
http://www.acrosstheatlantic.com/WordPress/index.php/2004/07/30/swift-boat-veterans-for-truth
http://www.washingtondispatch.com/spectrum/archives/000470.html
http://www.theroughwoodsman.com/archives/001240.html
http://www.i-boards.com/bnp/pob/messages.asp?MsgID=419021&ThreadID=41065&IsResponse=True
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