You can't make this stuff up either.

My dad served in Vietnam and proudly wears his Vietnam Veteran cap. He never really talks about it, but he was there when I was 2 and my brother was 8. He and my mom recently went to a renaissance festival and my mother told me how countless people came up to my dad to thank him. It was heartwarming, especially after all these years. He's been wearing this hat for years and has never seen this like he is seeing it now.

... and then you read stuff like this..


In a profile of Kerry in The Boston Globe, October 6, 1996, reporter Charles M. Sennott wrote:

'That Kerry took the trouble to film his war experience strikes many veterans, including some of his closest friends, as extraordinary -- even strange.'

'Kerry says he shot his war footage on a Super 8 camera he bought at the PX in Cam Ranh Bay. Asked how he filmed in the heat of battle, he demonstrated, gripping an imaginary ship's helm and thrusting his camera hand out to the side. "I'd steer, or direct, or fire my gun, and hold onto it when I could," Kerry says.'

"Indeed, after Kerry's swift boat was attacked on February 28, 1969 - an event in which Kerry's action led to his being awarded the Silver Star - Kerry returned to the scene of the incident the next day with his movie camera to re-enact exactly what had transpired - for the record."

"Sennott described the footage of Kerry as a "young man so unconscious of risk in the heat of battle, yet so focused on his future ambitions that he would reenact the moment for film. It is as if he had cast himself in the sequel to the experience of his hero, John F. Kennedy, on the PT-109."

"Sennott captured one other moment worth mentioning. Hours after his victory over William Weld in November, 1996, Kerry gathered a bunch of his fellow swift boat veterans together at his home where they watched his movies and reminisced fondly about Vietnam well into the morning. Sennott wrote:

'[Fellow Vietnam veteran Thomas] Vallely teased Kerry about the films, which some have felt revealed that even as a young lieutenant, Kerry was so intent on his future political ambitions that he made sure he had his heroics captured on film. Kerry looked at Vallely over his bifocals and smirked."