Unquestioning and unthinking support of John Kerry is the message of bloggers who repeatedly flog Ed O’Reilly for telling The Boston Globe that Kerry ought to go ahead and clear up questions about his military credentials after Kerry himself announced he was prepared to do that very thing.

Here’s the story timeline: Kerry’s military record is attacked by the so-called Swift Boaters for Truth, a Republican shill group in the 2004 election. Kerry fails to respond clearly and forcefully. Questions remain. Kerry is interviewed by the Plymouth, MA, newspaper in November 2007, and says he is contemplating another run for the presidency in 2012 and has compiled a dossier to refute the Swift Boat attacks. Boone Pickens, financier of the Republican attackers, picks up the challenge, calls Kerry’s bluff, and offers a $1million prize. Kerry is on the hook. The Boston Globe calls Ed O’Reilly and asks his opinion. O’Reilly says Kerry ought to clear up the remaining questions and put this festering controversy behind him. Immediately O’Reilly is criticized in DailyKos and Blue Mass Group as being a “Republican sympathizer,” adopting “Republican talking points.”

Very strange: When O’Reilly says that Kerry ought to go ahead and clear up the questions, O’Reilly is attacked for acknowledging that there are questions, despite the fact that Kerry himself says he has answers to the questions that the bloggers say don’t exist. The Berkshire Eagle presented the contradiction in its most obvious form, saying that John Kerry should “clear up the questions” about his military service while criticizing Ed O’Reilly for saying exactly the same thing. What kind of illogic is that? Kerry should “clear up the questions,” but O’Reilly should not say so?

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Note: The Berkshire Eagle has taken down the link to it’s editorial on this. The link — http://www.berkshireeagle.com/editorials/ci_7546587 — now goes to a page titled “Sink Swift Boat Issue,” with the statement “the article … is no longer available.”

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One more thing, in case you have any doubt: The elevation of military experience (or pretend military experience, as in the case of George Bush) as a political qualification deserves to be questioned in its own right. Politicians who claim military experience are twice-burdened: once to explain why war is a sign of leadership in a democratic society, and twice to explain their own experience. In this context, Bush’s ‘military record’ is far more outrageously questionable than Kerry’s. But the fact that Bush is a fraud does not relieve Kerry of these burdens.