• Kudos to Republican John McCain for expressing his disgust with the ads set to run in a handful of swing states and paid for by "Swiftboat Veterans for Truth," a group of Vietnam vets who maintain that John Kerry's record as a war hero is a fraud. (Of course none of the members of this group served directly with Kerry; the five surviving colleagues from his swift boat assignment have all endorsed the Massachusetts senator. Moreover, most of the funding for the ads comes not from contemporaries of Kerry's in Vietam but from established GOP activists.) McCain blasted the ads as "dishonest and dishonorable."
• Though the post-convention playbook for the Republicans has been to question Kerry's supposedly less-than-productive record as a U.S. Senator, Dick Cheney passed a grand total of TWO bills into law during his eleven years in Congress (in contrast to Kerry's 57). And even don't get me started on George W. Bush's "accomplishments" before January 2001.
• And finally, in the From The Horse's Mouth Department, our president offered these words earlier today while signing a defense appropriations bill: "Our enemies are innovative and resourceful, and so are we. They never stop thinking about new ways to harm our country and our people, and neither do we."
