Swift-boating.

So damaging was the smear campaign against Democratic Sen. John Kerry - and his poor handling of it - in the 2004 presidential campaign that it has been permanently ingrained in the modern political lexicon.

Asked recently about his failed Swift-boat response strategy, Kerry said that he lost the presidential election not because he didn’t respond with the truth about what happened - “We did,” he said. “But we just didn’t do it right.”

The question is whether Sen. Barack Obama can avoid a similar fate. If he feels the best reaction is to simply keep answering back, he may end up like his predecessor, back in the Senate and wondering where he went wrong.

Ultimately, Kerry did respond to his swift-boat accusers. But his real mistake was making Vietnam a key part of his campaign in the first place.

He even took the stage at the Democratic National Convention in Boston with the introduction, “I’m John Kerry, and I’m reporting for duty.”

His Vietnam record thus became fair game - resulting in the intense scrutiny of personal events 30 years ago, which resulted in conflicting accounts, half-truths accepted as fact, faulty memories and lost electoral votes.

Sens. John Kerry and Barack Obama are the Democrats’ most recent nominees for president. Can the latter avoid suffering the former’s swift-boated fate.

The lessons for Obama - ones he has failed to learn so far in two pseudo-scandals that flared up during the Democratic race - are twofold:

1. Avoid categorical denials about the past. During the Rev. Jeremiah Wright controversy, Obama said his pastor’s most offensive comments were “not statements I personally heard him preach while I sat in the pews.” True? Possibly. But it doesn’t matter if people - whatever their motivations might be - come out of the woodwork with different versions.
2. Simply apologizing can be great for closing the book on a topic. If done right — admitting fault , showing regret, but raising the level of debate - it can turn a scandal on its head. Obama failed to do so amid backlash from “bitter-gate,” responding indignantly to critics (if at all).

Without a doubt, the biggest flaw in Barack Obama’s campaign strategy so far is the insistence on portraying the candidate as the second coming when he is - believe it or not, at least sometimes - fallible and human.

Obama’s responses to criticism thus far have left the door ajar and invited even greater criticism of his past, keeping what should be absurd non-issues very much alive, and hurting his credibility in the process.

John Kerry let himself be swift-boated out of the presidency. If Barack Obama doesn’t learn from the past, he may be doomed to repeat it.