Without them, CNN might go about publishing entirely incorrect stories about American heroes. But unlike us bloggers with our simple Google research capabilities, CNN is a mega-million dollar operation with true professionals on the job.

One of the members of John McCain’s new Truth Squad — which his campaign says was launched to respond to unfair attacks on his record of military service –- was a member of the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth, and appeared in an attack ad for the group in 2004.

The group was created to attack 2004 Democratic nominee John Kerry’s military service record.

“How can you expect our sons and daughters to follow you when you condemned their fathers and grandfathers?” asked former Air Force Col. Bud Day, who was a prisoner of war with McCain in Vietnam, in a 2004 Swift Boat Vets spot.

Funny thing is, Bud Day was apparently never a member of the Swift Bot Veterans for Truth, which was created to set Kerry’s stories straight and have yet to be proven wrong by the Massachusetts senator. The image they use was him appearing in the group’s joint ad of veterans, but he apparently wasn’t a member:

The CNN description of Col. Bud Day was simply wrong. Col. Day was never a member of the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth.

The Swifties criticized John Kerry’s Vietnam service, his medals, and the details of his discharge. After Kerry’s salute and his “reporting for duty” comment at the convention, another group sprang up around documentary producer Carlton Sherwood whose goal was to make Kerry accountable for the 1971 testimony before Fulbright’s committee, testimony in which he talked of war crimes, atrocities, etc. Col. Day was part of the second group and not the Swifites. In fact, he disagreed with the central thrust of the Swifties, that of questioning Kerry’s medals.

There was not just a philosophical but a legal difference in the Swifties and in the group which coalesced around Carlton Sherwood. The Swifties were organized as a Section 527 and thus “political,” while Sherwood’s group was a for-profit S corporation organized in Pennsylvania and, at least in theory, “non-political.”

This whole issue becomes more complex when in September of that year the Swifties had lost all momentum and were dead in the water but were sitting on millions of dollars while Sherwood’s group had no traction and was broke.

About the time Sinclair announced it was running “Stolen Honor” and the resulting flap and publicity, the Swifties decided they need to regain their momentum. They asked the POWs who had appeared in Sherwood’s documentary to join them in taping a series of television ads. The ads had enormous impact, the most powerful of which was one of Col. Day, Medal of Honor around his neck, staring into the camera and asking of John Kerry, “How can you expect our sons and daughters to follow you when you condemned their fathers and grandfathers?”

Taping the series of ads was the only place where the two groups came together. That does not make Bud Day a Swifty. CNN was wrong.

How I wish I had CNN’s layers of payed fact-checkers so I never looked like an idiot.