"It's not my fault!"

John Kerry, Charlie Gibson, Karen Hughes political cartoon.

Apr. 27, 2004...

Sen. John Kerry’s medals story continued to play for the third day. The Kerry website has changed the message on it to reflect the fact that Kerry only threw away his ribbons and not his medals.

Kerry reconciles his conflicting claims that he threw away his war ribbons and/or medals because, he said, "I think to this day that there is no distinction between the two."

Part of Kerry’s problem is his continued conflicting stories. "I never ever implied that I did" throw away the medals, he told the Los Angeles Times just last week. But, this is not true. Kerry himself said that he threw away more than his Bronze Star, Silver Star and three Purple Hearts in a frequently aired videotape of a 1971 TV show, "Viewpoints."

Former Bush White House communications director Karen Hughes criticized Kerry for leading anti-war protests after he returned from the battlefield on Sunday’s talk show.

Following that Kerry said "If George Bush wants to ask me questions about that through his surrogates, he owes America an explanation about whether or not he showed up for duty in the National Guard. Prove it. That's what we ought to have," Kerry told NBC News in an interview, Monday. "I'm not going to stand around and let them play games."

"He only pretended to throw his," Hughes said in a CNN interview. "Now, I can understand if, out of conscience, you take a principled stand, and you would decide that you were so opposed to this that you would actually throw your medals. But to pretend to do so — I think that's very revealing."

Also revealing is Kerry’s inability to have any control over his message or campaign. The Kerry campaign continues to argue that his service in Vietnam is the only credential necessary to prove that Kerry will make a good Commander in Chief.