The Vets' Case

A detailed analysis of the Swift Boat affair

Jesse Walker | August 25, 2004

I know you clicked through to this story expecting an analysis of the Swift Boat controversy. I'm sorry we had to deceive you.

This is an intervention. My name is Dr. Wilson. Your friends, family, and coworkers asked me to be here; they're concerned about how your obsession with the election is affecting your life.

READER: What the hell? Hey—dammit—how come the "back" button isn't working?

YOUR BOSS: We had it disabled.

READER: That's enough of this. I'm turning on MSNBC.

DR. WILSON: We cut off the cable, too. So you don't have anywhere to go. Please stay and listen to us.

YOUR FATHER: We love you. We really care about you. This is for your own sake.

READER: Look, I don't think you people understand. Bush hasn't specifically condemned the content of the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth ads yet. He's the worst president ever. I have some important blogging to do.

YOUR SON, LITTLE NED: Daddy, you were gonna come see me play Mr. Rabbit in th' school play but you didin' come 'cause you were home blogging. I ask you why and you said you had to stop John Kerry before he turned Washington into Ho Chi Minh City. Daddy, I'm scared!

READER: OK, what was that all about? I don't even have a kid, and I'm for Kerry.

DR. WILSON: I'm sorry, we're still working out the kinks in this process. We're trying to conduct hundreds of personalized interventions in cyberspace, but it's a young technology. That was a little boy whose father is convinced that Kerry was "in insurgency" against the U.S. government during his antiwar years, and thus is not eligible for the presidency.

READER: You see? You see the kind of crap those Freepers are spreading? That's why we have to stop Bush now!

YOUR MOTHER: (quietly starts to weep)

YOUR FATHER: Stop it! You're killing your mother!

READER: I'm not—