Kagen Camp Parrots Discredited Body Armor Attack

From the Kagen Campaign Update email I received yesterday:

John Gard is proving that he will say and do anything to get elected. Not only does he distort Dr. KagenÂ’s positions, he also has difficulties telling the truth about his own failed record.

- Gard says he supports our troops. The truth: he opposed a bill (SB 609) to provide body armor to Wisconsin National Guard troops.

Dr. Kagen should be ashamed – this line of attack has been thoroughly and publicly discredited.

The Democratic Party of Wisconsin launched the attack with a press release, dated March 10 2006:

Republican Assembly Speaker John Gard and the GOP leadership turned their backs on Wisconsin troops this week by killing a bipartisan bill that would have provided adequate, up-to-date body armor to Wisconsin National Guard and Reserve troops called to active duty in Iraq and Afghanistan. By refusing to bring the bill up for a vote before the end of the legislative session this week, Gard is following the lead of the Bush Administration and Republicans in Washington who have failed to protect our troops, said Joe Wineke, Chair of the Democratic Party of Wisconsin.

The Sheboygan Press reported at the time:

Wisconsin Democratic Party Chairman Joe Wineke said state Republican leaders “turned their backs on Wisconsin soldiers” by refusing to approve SB-609.

But Wineke recanted March 16 after Albert Wilkening, the adjutant general of the Wisconsin National Guard, said Wineke’s claims were “simply untrue” and “careless misrepresentations of the facts.”

The Wisconsin National Guard them put out a release showing the Dems’ attack to be bunk:

Earlier this week, a statewide political party organization issued a series of news releases implying that Wisconsin National Guard troops deployed to Iraq and Afghanistan do not have adequate body armor.
This is simply untrue. Although the misleading news releases have now been withdrawn, I want you to know the facts about body armor for Wisconsin’s sons and daughters in uniform….
The entire Wisconsin National Guard leadership team is disappointed in the careless misrepresentation of the facts about body armor provided to Wisconsin service members. These misrepresentations created unnecessary alarm for the families of our troops at the same time they unfairly criticized several elected public officials.[emphasis added]

The Democratic Party then issued this weak retraction. Senate Democratic candidate Jamie Aulik, running against Republican incumbent Joe Leibham, made the same charges in robo-calls to veterans in his district.

Once the press got wind, letters to the editor flowed in, like this one, from Gerald Harrison of Oostburg:

I’m currently deployed for Operation Iraqi Freedom and am a member of the Wisconsin Army National Guard. While reading The Sheboygan Press online, I came across some recent letters to the editor supporting Jamie Aulik for state Senate and a response by incumbent Sen. Joe Leibham explaining the truth behind his support of the Wisconsin Army National Guard. …
Mr. Aulik claims that Sen. Leibham voted against providing the latest in body armor for us. The fact is we received the latest body armor and other equipment prior to arriving in theater and it had nothing to do with any bill in the state Senate. The adjutant general of Wisconsin has verified this fact, and yet Mr. Aulik stands by his accusations. I say it’s time to review your seven Army values, admit you were wrong and apologize publicly to Sen. Leibham.[emphasis added]

The Sheboygan Press then published an editorial on the matter as Aulik continued his accusations:

[W]e are troubled that Aulik has ignored the explanation of the armor issue from the Wisconsin National Guard and chose instead to repeat the mistake made by the Democratic Party. In March, the Democrats issued a blistering news release claiming Republicans didn’t support Wisconsin soldiers because of the failure of Senate Bill 609 to pass. But the party quickly backtracked after the National Guard said Wisconsin soldiers already had the best in body armor.

From looking at the history of Senate Bill 609, it appears that there was some political maneuvering in how it made its way through the Senate and how it eventually became a non-issue. Aulik is wrong to continue to play politics with it. … Aulik has done a disservice to the voters to come out of the gate with with false accusations[emphasis added]

I am deeply troubled and disappointed that the Kagen for Congress campaign would chose to repeat these charges after that have been so thoroughly and publicly discredited. The Green Bay media should call Kagen out for making such a flawed accusation after it has already been so publicly repudiated, and Kagen should apologize.

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