This, apparently, is going to get uglier before it gets better.

Uglier, for Jacques, I mean:

The Democratic Party launched a costly round of ads Friday to buttress John Kerry's credentials to be commander in chief as the White House accused the Massachusetts senator of "losing his cool" over attacks on his war record.

"John Kerry is a fighter and he doesn't tolerate lies from others," shot back spokeswoman Stephanie Cutter.

The unusual late-August maneuvering highlighted the closeness of the race for the White House and came as polls offered the first hint that the questioning of Kerry's medal-winning service in the Vietnam War � allegations that he strongly condemned this week as lies � were taking a political toll.

One poll found that more than half the voters questioned had seen or heard of an ad by Swift Boat Veterans For Truth that accuses Kerry of lying about events that earned him five medals in Vietnam a generation ago. The University of Pennsylvania's National Annenberg Election Survey also found that 44 percent of self-described independent voters found the ad very or somewhat believable.

Separately, a CBS poll found a sharp drop in Kerry's support among both veterans and a smaller erosion among independents since the end of the Democratic Convention.

Because the 'V' is authorized for only the ten awards cited above, but not for the Silver Star, Kerry's Silver Star citation (the 'explanation' of why the award was made) does not even mention the 'V' for valor (see www.johnkerry.com).

The presence of the combat 'V' with Kerry's Silver Star on his DD 214 raises two extremely disquieting questions. How did the unauthorized 'V' get there, and why has Kerry allowed it to remain?

The first question should not be taken lightly because we are talking about possible federal crimes. We are talking about the possibility of a forged official document. We are talking, as well, about Title 18, United States Code, Section 1001, which states: '[W]hoever, in any manner within the jurisdiction of the executive, legislative, or judicial branch of the United States, knowingly and willfully . . . makes or uses any false writing or document knowing the same to contain any materially false, fictitious, or fraudulent statement or entry, shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than 5 years or both.'

Was the combat 'V' added by a sloppy clerk or a yeoman's typo thirty years ago? Was someone pressured or persuaded to add it? If Kerry had nothing to do with the gratuitously added combat 'V,' why didn't he have his DD 214 corrected when he was separated from the Navy?

Which gives rise to the second disturbing question: If Kerry was not a party to the unauthorized 'V,' why, for all these years, has he allowed his DD 214 to remain uncorrected and to repose on his website?

In light of the recent Swift Boat revelations and the cloud they have cast over Kerry's awards, one plausible answer is that this is yet another example of Kerry's multiple, and increasingly transparent, lies about his alleged heroics in Vietnam.

But it was what appeared on Ferris's television that really pained him. John F. Kerry, a decorated fellow Swift boat driver, was testifying before Congress about atrocities in Vietnam, throwing his medals away, speaking at antiwar rallies. Ferris, who was trying to rehabilitate himself back to active duty, felt betrayed.

"I was livid," Ferris, 57, of Long Island, N.Y., said yesterday, recalling how his dislike for the presidential candidate began in the early 1970s. "I said to myself at the time, this is someone who is using his experience for his own purposes, and this was long before he ever ran for office. I thought he was using, actually manipulating, what he had done in Vietnam. Just like he's doing now."

Ferris is one of 250 Swift boat veterans who in May signed an open letter to the Massachusetts senator asking for full disclosure of his military records, specifically focusing on events during a four-month tour in Vietnam for which Kerry was awarded medals for bravery in combat. The veterans group -- Swift Boat Veterans for Truth -- has criticized Kerry for using his military experience as a centerpiece of his presidential campaign, arguing that the Democrat has exaggerated his experiences at war for political gain.

Vietnam.

If John Kerry could have done one thing differently, I'm betting it would have been to characterize himself as a fighter in the Senate for various liberal causes. It would have been an honest argument, and heaven knows it would have been a clean and defensible argument. He could have argued about principled positions he has taken over the past 20 years, and he could have energized the base without pissing any of them off.

The course he has taken has introduced an element of moral conflict that was totally unnecessary, and that he falls on the wrong side of in so many ways. Vietnam was not a positive experience for the people who Kerry wants to carry him into office. There's an abstruce, semi-blind, jigged-by-emotion aspect to the very notion of conjuring Vietnam service as one's primary credential for a Democratic candidate for public office. He should have let the winter soldier stuff sit there in the background, and he should have highlighted his public service since then.

This sets up a particularly interesting election. On the one hand you have a sitting President who is painted as Anti-Christ. [Also see here, here, and here].

On the other hand is a challenger who has got to have even his most ardent followers smacking their foreheads in despair.

And we once again return to Kerry. He'll do less damage than Bush, especially when it comes to appointing judges, but he's really nothing more than "someone else," rather than a solid alternative. And now that Kerry has said he believes life begins at conception? Well, he's different from Bush in that he doesn't allow his personal, private opinions to determine policy, but the men really look at the world from the same place. What, for example, would happen to the presidential candidate who said he was pro-abortion and didn't give a hoot in hell when life began?

The truth is, John Kerry is all over the place in terms of policy and on the national security front this could be devastating if properly spelled out by the Bush team. If he wasn't running against the anti-Christ, I'd have to say Kerry was toast.