On September 1, MSNBC's Scarborough Country host and former U.S. Representative Joe Scarborough (R-FL) presented the hollow argument that cable TV is not responsible for the widespread attention being paid to the anti-Kerry group Swift Boat Veterans for Truth. Scarborough claimed that the Regnery book Unfit for Command: Swift Boat Veterans Speak Out Against John Kerry, co-authored by Swift Boat Vets co-founder John E. O'Neill, was already in the top spot on online bookseller Amazon.com's Top Sellers list before his program aired the group's first ad attacking Senator John Kerry's service in Vietnam.

In the early hours of September 1, during MSNBC's After Hours coverage of the Republican National Convention's second day, Scarborough said:
"[B]efore the [Swift Boat Vets] commercial -- and I think we [Scarborough Country] were the first show that played the commercial -- before we played that commercial, I think the book was number one on Amazon.com. So cable television didn't create this."

In fact, Scarborough Country aired the ad on August 4 -- the day before Unfit for Command gained the top spot on Amazon.com, according to The Boston Globe. And Scarborough Country was actually the second program to show the ad. As Media Matters for America has noted, Hannity & Colmes aired it earlier that evening.

But neither Scarborough Country's nor Hannity & Colmes' airing of the ad marked the first time that the cable news networks covered Swift Boat Vets' smear campaign. As MMFA noted on August 5 -- the day Unfit for Command did reach number one on Amazon.com -- O'Neill and his group had appeared on, been quoted by, or covered by CNN, MSNBC, FOX News Channel, or CNBC at least 22 times beginning in April and ending on August 4, when Scarborough aired their ad.

As the Associated Press reported on August 24, "'Unfit for Command,' which went on sale Aug. 11 with a first printing of 85,000, will have 550,000 copies in print by next week."