The point is, who wrote the citation for that award??? It WASN"T Thurlow. It might have been Kerry or someone else. But, we won't know until kerry signs form 180 to release his military files. Bush has done so, why won't kerry??????
Although Thurlow apparently deserved a medal for jumping aboard boat #3, giving medical aid to the crew, and saving the ship (no one disputes any of that), if the medal was for heroic actions in the face of "withering enemy fire", then he does not deserve it and he should give it back. I believe he has offered to do so.