posted on February 16, 2004 09:59:02 AM new
There is that word again..."unsubstantiated". I already know that you won't respond simply because you can't in most cases. But it's a problem that might be in your interest to consider.
posted on February 16, 2004 10:12:22 AM new
But, Linda, when you post your "views" as being the other side of anything beyond your own rationale, and then fail to back them up as anything more than just what rolls out of your head, it negates whichever point(s) you're trying to make. And I shall go right on saying so every time you pretend that your opinions are facts. That you'll no longer reply to my posts is no deterrent at all...
posted on February 16, 2004 10:27:26 AM new
Bear, that photo of Kerry is such an obvious fake, a child could do a better job...you're really stretching it if you think anyone here other than yourself would believe it, whether they're Democrats or not...
___________________________________
posted on February 16, 2004 10:30:52 AM new
helen and pat
There is a BIG difference between sharing opinions and stating facts. Most of the time here, this is a CHAT board after all, we share our opinions/views of the issues as we individually see them. We do not go around demanding 'proof' about each and every statement everyone makes.
But when challenged I have always presented my proof. I'd say about 80-90% of the time your facts, HELEN, are someone else's op-ed article. But what I refuse to do is to continue to be insulted on a personal level and then be expected to continue to communicate with the one insulting me or to meet their demands.
And on opinions they are opinions....we all have them.
I shall go right on saying so every time you pretend that your opinions are facts. That you'll no longer reply to my posts is no deterrent at all...
I didn't expect you to change your ways....I just answered the questions you posed to me about why I was ignoring you.
carry on anyway you wish.
Re-elect President Bush!!
posted on February 16, 2004 10:44:42 AM new
okay Pat....
This thread is about Bush being a deserter.
Show me your FACTS that he is....rather than speculation and smears to PROVE this president was a deserter. This makes my point. No one can PROVE it. We've all shared our opinions about whether he was or not and since he was given an honorable discharge the 'tilt' of truthfulness goes to his side. Until someone can prove differently....it's just like Kerry's current postion. His affair has not been 'proven'....we don't have the FACTS...so that makes it all rumor UNTIL it is proven.
posted on February 16, 2004 06:53:48 PM new
General Turnipseed Remembers, Sort Of
The "Bush was AWOL!" claim is evolving into an urban legend. If you want to tune in on the "debate," check out Bill Hobbs' fine site; Hobbs has been on this one for a while.
The observation I want to make here is on how urban legends grow. Today the Minneapolis Star Tribune reprinted an article from the Washington Post, with some additional material from the Associated Press, on Bush's National Guard service. Here is a key portion of the Strib's version of the Post's article, which sounds quite damning:
Bush's aides did not release new information to answer lingering questions about a one-year gap in the public record of his service in the Texas Air National Guard during the Vietnam War. Aides have said he reported to an Alabama unit during the period, from May 1972 to May 1973.
Retired Gen. William Turnipseed, a commander at the base Bush was assigned to, has said he never saw Bush appear for duty. Bush says he remembers meeting Turnipseed and performing drills at the base.
But the Strib didn't reprint the whole Post article, which goes on to say: "The officer, retired Brig. Gen. William Turnipseed, hedged from a similar statement he made to the Boston Globe in 2000, saying he could not recall if he had been on base much at that time." Which renders Turnipseed's inability to remember Bush entirely meaningless.
But thousands of readers who rely on the Strib for their news will never know that; nor will the readers of hundreds of liberal web sites who have jumped uncritically onto the "Bush was AWOL!" bandwagon, for whom Turnipseed has become a star witness.
For what it's worth, Bush not only put in more Guard service than was required, he was an excellent pilot:
Retired Col. Maury Udell, who trained Bush to fly the F-102, has no doubt his pupil was willing to go to Vietnam. Udell agreed that Bush was too inexperienced for Palace Alert, but he said the young man did become a good fighter pilot. "George got really good in air-to-air combat," he said.
Udell, now a 270-pound judo expert who describes himself as a "war-type guy," said Bush had an extraordinary memory and ability to process information. Udell said he spent six hours a day for six months training Bush.
"He was really good with folks," he said. But the young pilot did not take insults well: "You can't put him down too easily. He's really tough. He'll fight you."
Bush's commanders were equally pleased with the young officer. The Associated Press reviewed several glowing annual evaluations along with about 200 pages of Bush's military record.
"Lt. Bush is an exceptional fighter interceptor pilot and officer," Maj. William Harris wrote on May 26, 1972, in a typical example.
That evaluation came in the same month that the Democrats now claim Bush "deserted." But those who propagate urban legends are not in the market for truth.
Turnipseed I'm beginning to find out my memory is not any good anymore. I'm 75 years old and getting Alzheimer's."
On Friday, John Calhoun, 69, a Roswell, Ga., businessman and retired officer with the Alabama Air National Guard, confirmed Bush's claims that he served with this Montgomery Guard unit while working on the 1972 U.S. Senate campaign of Winton "Red" Blount Jr.
"The truth is George Bush came to Alabama. He asked for weekend drills with us. He was assigned to me," said Calhoun, who was in Florida on Friday for this weekend's Daytona 500. Calhoun said he saw Bush sign in at the 187th Tactical Reconnaissance Group in Montgomery eight to 10 times for roughly eight hours at a time from May to October 1972.
"He showed up. He sat in my office. He signed in," Calhoun said. "He was very determined to be there. He was in uniform and he did what he was supposed to do."
However, Calhoun recalled Bush in the unit in the summer of 1972 when the documents indicate that he had not yet applied to serve there.
The records, for example, show Bush was not paid for any service during more than five months in 1972, from April 17 to Oct. 27. He was paid for two days in late October 1972, four days in mid-November 1972 and no days in December 1972.
Bush's letter requesting duty at the 187th is dated Sept. 5, 1972.
The 187th's former commander, retired Brig. Gen. William Turnipseed, said he knew Calhoun and he wasn't "the kind of guy who would make up stories."
But his own memory apparently isn't so sound. In 2000, Turnipseed told the Boston Globe that he would have remembered Bush had he reported for duty - and that he didn't recall seeing the young pilot.
On Friday, he said, "I don't even remember if I was there.
"All I was trying to do is tell the truth about it. I'm beginning to find out my memory is not any good anymore. I'm 75 years old and getting Alzheimer's."
posted on February 17, 2004 12:22:22 AM newFrom Guardsman . . .
By Richard Cohen
Tuesday, February 10, 2004
During the Vietnam War, I was what filmmaker Michael Moore would call a "deserter." Along with President Bush and countless other young men, I joined the National Guard, did my six months of active duty (basic training, etc.) and then returned to my home unit, where I eventually dropped from sight. In the end, just like President Bush, I got an honorable discharge. But unlike President Bush, I have just told the truth about my service. He hasn't.
At least I don't think so. Nothing about Bush during that period -- not his drinking, not his partying -- suggests that he was a consistently conscientious member of the Texas or Alabama Air National Guard. As it happens, there are no records to show that Bush reported for duty during the summer and fall of 1972. Nonetheless, Bush insists he was where he was supposed to be -- "Otherwise I wouldn't have been honorably discharged," Bush told Tim Russert. Please, sir, don't make me laugh.
It is sort of amazing that every four or eight years, Vietnam -- that long-ago war -- rears up from seemingly nowhere and comes to figure in the national political debate. In 1988 Dan Quayle had to answer for his National Guard service. In 1992 Bill Clinton had to grapple with the question of how he avoided the Vietnam-era draft. Now George Bush, who faced this question the last time out, has to face it again. The reason is that this time he is likely to compete against a genuine war hero. John Kerry did not duck the war.
But George Bush did. He did so by joining the National Guard. Bush now wants to drape the Vietnam-era Guard with the bloodied flag of today's Iraq-serving Guard -- "I wouldn't denigrate service to the Guard," Bush warned during his interview with Russert -- but the fact remained that back then the Guard was where you went if you did not want to fight. That was the case with me. I opposed the war in Vietnam and had no desire to fight it. Bush, on the other hand, says he supported the war -- as long, it seems, as someone else fought it.
It hardly matters what Bush did or did not do back in 1972. He is not the man now he was then -- that by his own admission. In the same way, it did not matter that Clinton ducked the draft, because, really, just about everyone I knew at the time was doing something similar. All that really matters is how one accounts for what one did. Do you tell the truth (which Clinton did not)? Or do you do what I think Bush has been doing, which is making his National Guard service into something it was not? In his case, it was a rich kid's way around the draft.
In my case, it was something similar -- although (darn!) I was not rich. I was, though, lucky enough to get into a National Guard unit in the nick of time, about a day before I was drafted. I did my basic and advanced training (combat engineer) and returned to my unit. I was supposed to attend weekly drills and summer camp, but I found them inconvenient. I "moved" to California and then "moved" back to New York, establishing a confusing paper trail that led, really, nowhere. For two years or so, I played a perfectly legal form of hooky. To show you what a mess the Guard was at the time, I even got paid for all the meetings I missed.
In the end, I wound up in the Army Reserve. I was assigned to units for which I had no training -- tank repairman, for instance. In some units, we sat around with nothing to do and in one we took turns delivering antiwar lectures. The National Guard and the Reserves were something of a joke. Everyone knew it. Books have been written about it. Maybe things changed dramatically by 1972, two years after I got my discharge, but I kind of doubt it.
I have no shame about my service, but I know it for what it was -- hardly the Charge of the Light Brigade. When Bush attempts to drape the flag of today's Guard over the one he was in so long ago, when he warns his critics to remember that "there are a lot of really fine people who have served in the National Guard and who are serving in the National Guard today in Iraq," then he is doing now what he was doing then: hiding behind the ones who were really doing the fighting. It's about time he grew up.
posted on February 17, 2004 10:13:07 AM new
I do not fault those who chose to join the National Guard, or even the Coast Guard during Vietman. They chose an option, the same option open to those who could enlist in the Army, Marines, Air Force or Navy.
They chose a better course that those who fled to Canada.
President Bush chose a legal option as did Kerry when he dug up an obscure military regulation that allowed an early out for being awarded 3 hearts.
Although on a personal note, I can't imagine taking the 3 heart out for receiving minor wounds. A bond is created with your fellow brotheren, you want to stay because you depend on they & them on you. You know if you get in trouble they are there to help you & vice versa. You feel that if you leave & they get injured or killed, it is your fault because you weren't there to help them. It isn't called a Band of Brothers without cause.
Even after leaving for the world, you continue to wonder about those you left behind. Only when you receive a letter or call from them safely back in the world does your concern stop.
By MICHAEL DUFFY/WASHINGTON
Monday, February 16, 2004 Posted: 2:38 PM EST (1938 GMT)
George W. Bush has long had a habit of giving people nicknames—and perhaps that's because he picked up a few along the way himself.
Like the one he earned in 1972, when he left his home in Houston to work on the long-shot Senate campaign of Winton M. (Red) Blount in Alabama.
C. Murphy Archibald, a nephew of Blount's who worked on the campaign that fall, told TIME that Bush "was good at schmoozing the county chairs, but there wasn't a lot of follow-up."
Archibald, now a trial attorney in North Carolina, remembers that a group of older Alabama socialites, who were volunteering their time, gave Bush a nickname because they thought he "looked good on the outside but was full of hot air." They called him the Texas Soufflé.
.......So Did Bush Report for Duty in Alabama or Not?
Depends on whom you believe. During his Meet the Press appearance, Bush twice told Russert that he reported for duty in Alabama.
But for most of last week (and for much of the past four years), it has been difficult to find anyone who recalls seeing Bush at Dannelly Field. (At one point in 2000, 10 Vietnam veterans offered a $1,000 reward to anyone who could prove he saw Bush on duty during 1972.) Even Bush had trouble explaining his job at Dannelly, saying he did "administrative work." John B. Calhoun, an Atlanta resident who served for 28 years in the Air Force and the Alabama Guard, told TIME he clearly remembers Bush reporting for duty on weekends starting in the summer of 1972, apparently before Bush officially requested reassignment there.
Calhoun explained that Bush signed into his office and mainly read training manuals and safety magazines, signing out at the end of each drilling day. Bush kept a low profile, Calhoun said, and sometimes ate lunch with Calhoun in the snack bar.
But there are some discrepancies in Calhoun's account: he claimed Bush turned up more often than was indicated in Bush's official pay records for the period. And many other veterans of the 187th do not recall seeing Bush on base.
Paul Bishop, a retired Air Force colonel who says he never missed a weekend drill in 27 years with the 187th, told TIME the physical layout of the unit's hangar made it "virtually impossible" for Bush to have met with Calhoun and for none of the unit's 800 other reservists to have seen him.
"Fighter pilots, and that's what we are," says Bishop, "have situational awareness. They know everything about their environment, whether it's an enemy plane creeping up or a stranger in their hangar."
This much is known: for the first three years while he was in Texas, Bush had no trouble racking up hundreds of points each year, far in excess of what was required. He logged more than 600 hours of flying time and received glowing evaluations from his superiors.
But in 1972, when he moved to Alabama, his points plunged. He earned only 41 points but was awarded the standard 15 "gratuitous" points from Texas Air Guard Major Rufus Martin for being a member in good standing—just enough to meet his obligation.
Why Did He Miss The Physical?
No question so unsettles some former Guardsmen as much as this: If Bush did report, as he contends, why did he let his medical certification lapse around the same time—a full two years before his Guard commitment was up?
Four years ago, the Bush campaign said Bush didn't undergo the physical because his family doctor was back in Texas. That explanation doesn't wash; only flight surgeons can perform Air Force exams, and there were plenty of those in Alabama.
The official explanation has changed: the White House now says Bush didn't need to take the medical exam because he was no longer flying. But even if Bush wasn't planning a career in aviation, that explanation is difficult for other pilots to accept. Pilots routinely sacrifice everything to keep their "medical cert" current; the military is rife with stories of cheating by pilots to pass their physicals.
And the government, which spent hundreds of thousands of dollars to train and keep its pilots flying, has never looked kindly on highly trained personnel, particularly pilots, standing down on their own. "There are certain things I expect from my pilots," said Major General Paul Weaver, who retired as head of the Air National Guard in 2002. "He should have kept current with his physicals."
Some Guard veterans have speculated that Bush may have been dodging random drug tests, which were instituted in some military units as early as 1971. But there is no evidence to support that; in fact, the dentist who worked on Bush's teeth and who later became the commander of the base medical unit, told TIME that the Alabama Guard did not conduct random drug tests until the 1980s.
******
Censorship, like charity, should begin at home; but unlike charity, it should end there --Clare Booth Luce
posted on February 17, 2004 01:19:05 PM new
"Calhoun explained that Bush signed into his office and mainly read training manuals and safety magazines, signing out at the end of each drilling day."
Well, that explains why Bush was treated for hemorrhoids during his 'service'...
posted on February 17, 2004 02:16:59 PM new
bear, that was an excellent post on the National Guard and how you felt about those who chose that route. And I agree...about fleeing to Canada. They never should have been able to return, imo.
posted on February 17, 2004 02:22:01 PM new
Minor wounds can sometimes affect someone in a major way. For example a minor knee injury or a minor foot wound could make walking difficult. Since we don't know the nature of the minor wounds, we can't make any judgements on that score, can we?
posted on February 17, 2004 02:30:48 PM new
"bear, that was an excellent post on the National Guard and how you felt about those who chose that route."
Oh, come off it! If the shoe were on the other foot, and Bush had three Purple Hearts and Kerry had been the draft-dodger who'd weaseled into the Nat'l Guard to avoid active duty, you and every other RepCon would be howling about it from every rooftop in the country. What a hypocrite you are, Linda. And you, too, Bear...
