A primary claim against Mr. Kerry is that Mr. Kerry's first Purple Heart — awarded for action on Dec. 2, 1968 — did not involve the enemy and that Mr. Kerry's wounds that day were unintentionally self-inflicted.

Mr. Kerry has claimed that he faced his "first intense combat" that day, returned fire, and received his "first combat related injury."

HOWEVER
A journal entry Mr. Kerry wrote Dec. 11, raises questions about what really happened nine days earlier. "A cocky feeling of invincibility accompanied us up the Long Tau shipping channel because we hadn't been shot at yet, and Americans at war who haven't been shot at are allowed to be cocky," wrote Mr. Kerry, according the book "Tour of Duty" by friendly biographer Douglas Brinkley.

If enemy fire was not involved in that or any other incident, according to the Military Order of the Purple Heart, no medal should be awarded.

Even Cleland did not get a purple heart for his injuries! And if even only one of Kerry's purple hearts is discredited, then you know he would've had to stay in Vietnam longer. How many vets had just as many wounds as Kerry, but didn't finagle their way home?

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Order without liberty and liberty without order are equally destructive. - Theodore Roosevelt