May 08, 2003
From the desk of Jane Galt:Interesting. Bill Hobbs says that one of the favorite liberal factoids -- that George W. Bush went AWOL during Viet Nam -- just ain't so.
Bush volunteered to serve in a unit at the very moment it was seeing combat in Vietnam, and only a restructuring of the unit's mission before he completed his flight training made it unlikely he would fly in combat. And he was never AWOL - he completed his required service and even served beyond the minimum.Posted by Jane Galt at May 8, 2003 01:04 PM | TrackBack | Technorati inbound links
Dig the frothing denials here. Synopsis: "Fascist!" "Rightwing nut! "Hah hah this link says he did! So there!" -- and my favorite: "The cartoon didn't say he was AWOL, it only said it on the side of his little toy plane" -- in other words, "it didn't say he was AWOL, it said he was AWOL."
Actually, I don't deny that I think Bush was AWOL. I think he was. By some veteran's definitions he was even a deserter. I think he should produce his service records. What I am pointing out is that Bill Hobbs says I "continue" to make the claim when it appears one time on one cartoon picture. The post where I supposedly "continue" to make the claim simply asks the question, where was he? No mention of the term AWOL at all. The only reason I mention it is because Bill prides himself on his journalistic ability, and is usually careful about being accurate. That's the context that is missing from your remarks.
Posted by: SKBubba on May 8, 2003 02:01 PMIn addition, the term "chickenhawk" shouldn't apply to him. Fro the same blog entry, when Bush volunteered to join the 147th, the 147th was flying missions in Vietnam. By the time he was done with flight school, the missions were done. But Bush had no way of predicting whether or not he would end up in Vietnam.
Posted by: Byna on May 8, 2003 02:23 PMThat's a distinction without a difference. Saying that someone has mysterious, unexplained absences from their post, when it appears not to have been either mysterious, or unexplained, is implying that they were AWOL without saying it outright. That's rather worse than better.
Posted by: Jane Galt on May 8, 2003 02:30 PMGee, who could have guessed that if you shoot your mouth off without researching the facts it might come back to bite you in the ass?
Posted by: Robin Goodfellow on May 8, 2003 02:31 PMOh and the "just raising questions" line is bunk. It's just making accusations without evidence for or against, plain and simple. Aziz Poonawalla tried to fall back on this by claiming that Israel merely may have been working on genocidal biological weapons. See how that works? You just state the accusation without claiming it's true and you don't actually have to back it up. For example, South Knox Bubba may be involved in skinning cats and dogs for their furs, and he may have created the SARS virus in his basement, and nobody can yet explain his whereabouts around the time of the anthrax attacks. See, works pretty well eh?
Posted by: Robin Goodfellow on May 8, 2003 02:53 PMKrugman is also is up to his neck in this, as he usually is pertaining to any dishonest accusations against George W. Bush. What is so odd about Krugman is that there are so many intellectually honest ways in which to rip Bush that for someone of Krugman's intellect to reduce himself to these tactics is really unfortunate. I've had Krugmanites actually bring up Ann Coulter as means of defending their pundit/icon, completely oblivious to the pathetic aspect of someone with a deserved reputation as a brilliant academic, who some mention as a Nobel Prize candidate, being compared to someone (by the academic's defender's!) whose primary qualifications are being a leggy blonde with a toxic mouth.
Posted by: Will Allen on May 8, 2003 03:21 PMso, i looked at hobbesonline. i don't think the evidence he offers in defense of president bush is all that overwhelming. uses of "some," "maybe," etc. doesn't really inspire my assent to the claim in such a confident manner as robin goodfellow feels.
and wouldn't this be all a bit of a non-issue if the president just released his complete military records? then the truth could be seen in its clarity, and the president could be clearly exonerated of any nefarious and spiteful runmours that might be buzzing around right now. what is the matter of principle on that? (that my word should be good enough?--nothing personal, but the president is a politician; executive privilage--where have i heard that one invoked before). please excuse my cynicism.
Posted by: cas on May 8, 2003 04:05 PMCiting that the guard liked him in 2000 as proof? Sheesh.
Posted by: Jason McCullough on May 8, 2003 04:08 PMYou know what I find fascinating?
CAS' suggestion (not such a bad one, actually) could just as easily be applied to Iraq and Hussein. Wouldn't it have been just easier for him to have come clean, shown us the records, and made it clear that he had no WMD at all?
More importantly, of course, there were all sorts of UN Resolutions which required Hussein to do exactly that. And no one, not the most Left commentator, not Hans Blix, says that Saddam cooperated.
Yet, for not revealing, voluntarily, records that he has no obligation to show, some argue that Dubya MUST be hiding something (despite being honorably discharged). For not revealing, by "international law," records that he MUST show, some of these same folks argue that Saddam had NO WMD (which, of course, he had used in prior conflict).
And then they wonder why some of the more conservative among us question their senses---since they evidently consider Saddam to be at least as credible, if not more so, than Dubya.
Posted by: Dean on May 8, 2003 04:27 PMI can think of loads of reasons not to release them, including the fact that lackluster military performance would probably hurt him electorally, as well as hampering his effectiveness as commander in chief. As they say in statistics class, absence of evidence is not evidence of absence.
Posted by: Jane Galt on May 8, 2003 04:47 PMDon't pick on SKBubba too much. He's a good patriotic East Tennessean-American, and a Vols fan. Just happens to be against Bush. I singled his blog out because, well, he had that photoshopped pic of Bush in "AWOL ONE" and it made me laugh, so I felt I had to make amends by looking into the "Bush AWOL" story and blogging on it. Never expected it to become the talk of the blogosphere - hell, I sourced some of it to Andrew Sullivan's blog the day before.
The thing that most stuck out at me in my reading was finding out that the unit Bush enlisted in was flying combat in Vietnam at the same time Bush was enlisting, so the anti-Bush meme that Bush got a cush posting to the TANG to save his butt from combat is, quite frankly, horseshit.
So, when I started writing, I needed to hang the whole post on something. So I picked Bubba's blog because we often go back and forth on stuff we disagree on and blog-hug on things we agree on, like keeping Tennessee taxes low. I respect Bubba so much I might name my next child Bubba, if we were having more, and if it's a boy, and if my wife wouldn't kill me, and if we decide not to use the name "Reagan," and if ... )
Bubba's not my target: the slanderous claim that Bush was AWOL is my target.
Posted by: Bill Hobbs on May 8, 2003 04:49 PMDean, I think that's circular logic.
These are the set of facts you choose to use as analogous:
I believe that Saddam had WMD. I knew that he had used them in the past. I had heard some general rumblings that he had WMD. People asked him to produce them. He refused. We went to war. Many dems were not happy.
You decide to draw a correlation between that and the following:
I believe that GWB went AWOL for a year. I have heard some anicdotal evidence and seen some documentation which leads me to believe this. People have asked him to produce his war record. He refused. All them dems should quit their whining.
I'm sorry? I have still not seen evidence that GWB had a one year excused absence from his base. I mean he was on active duty and yet he was (I think) living in a different state? I have read somewhere that it was excused, but mostly because strings were pulled for him and his direct superiors were told by their direct superiors that they should not report his unexcused absence, as opposed to GWB having asked for it through the proper channels.
As the previous paragraph makes clear, I have not been following this story closely. I don't really care. What I do care about is someone making a series of statements which don't make any sense to me. Please try again Dean.
Posted by: Kate on May 8, 2003 05:11 PMDean:
It has been explained one very plausible reason why Hussein did not submit to inspections:
In the first set of inspections (which withdrew in 1998), he did not cooperate because he believed CIA spies were infiltrating the inspection teams to get information that the US was not entitled to back to the US. Most dictators are not in the habit of letting their enemies' spies into their secret hideaways. We later found out that he was right.
In 2002, inspections resumed. He knew, you knew, France knew, and I knew that Bush only wanted them as a reason to go to war. So Hussein was in a position of either showing off all his hiding places and then going to war, or not showing his hiding places and going to war. Again, dictators are not in the habit of letting their enemies see their secrets.
The new tack of "WMD's don't matter, we liberated the Iraqi people" is either a) a lie or b) proof that Hussein would have faced war either way.
Posted by: Adam on May 8, 2003 05:33 PMAnd for the record, the original Photoshop said "Air Force One" on the side of the toy plane. Someone in comments suggested it should say "AWOL ONE" and I thought that was funny as hell so I obliged. So there. Nobody has a sense of humor any more. Except apparently Bill. Sheesh. But I still say he (Bush, not Bill) was AWOL.
(And thanks Bill, back at you).
Posted by: SK Bubba on May 8, 2003 06:20 PMAdam: "Hussein would have faced war either way."
Hussein agreed to the arms inspections in 1991, then blocked effective inspections FOR 12 YEARS. He only began to cooperate when an American army was once again poised on his borders. So just what is your thinking here? That we could keep more than half of our whole front-line military force sitting out in the desert for several more years to keep Saddam even approximately cooperative? (In that case, I assume you were ready to double your taxes to pay for that extended deployment, help the servicemen's families deal with the problems of having a spouse and parent away for years, and volunteer if we needed more troops to deal with Korea or whatever.) Or that someone who has been misbehaving for 12 years but acts better when guns are pointed at his head will continue to behave when the men with guns have gone back home? (In that case, I guess you're just about ready to smooze with mad-dog dictators at the UN.)
Posted by: markm on May 8, 2003 06:33 PMI wonder if any of the people clamoring for Bush to release his military records were demanding that Bill Clinton release his medical records...
Posted by: Rand Simberg on May 8, 2003 07:25 PM> People have asked him to produce his war record.
What record that he's likely to actually possess would satisfy you? (Why would he keep any records?)
I thought so.
Posted by: Andy Freeman on May 8, 2003 10:07 PMBush was a draft dodger. Write that down and memorize it.
How do I know? I'm about the same age as Bush (and Clinton, who was a draft dodger too). I remember the times, and what people were doing. Let me tell everyone this:
Regardless of political views or attitudes towards the war, almost no one wanted to be drafted and sent to Vietnam. And when faced with that possibility, almost everyone did what they could to avoid it. One of the preferred methods was enlistment in the National Guard. One problem: there weren't enough slots. So who got them? Those with connections. The Dubyas and Dan Quayles of the world, with influential families. Don't like it? Too bad. It's true.
Was Dubya at risk of being sent to Vietnam? Well, maybe, but I'm not ready to accept this at face value. Remember, not even the most slavish Bushies have advanced this before. In any case he was at considerable less risk than some poor unconnected kid who got his greetings one day.
The "chickenhawk" issue is one that contributes to my intense dislike of Bush and his gang. We have a bunch of people who said "Vietnam is a noble cause, so let's draft people to go and fight, while I stay here and attend to my other priorities."
Despicable. This scum pretends to moral leadership?
Remember, Clinton opposed the war. he didn't want to go, but at least he didn't think it was a great idea for others to go either. I don't know if Bush went AWOL. I suspect he did, but it's irrelevant to the larger issue. He took advantage of his privileged birth, and to this day does not understand why anyone might criticize him.
Posted by: Bernard Yomtov on May 8, 2003 10:14 PMHere is what you said, Mr. Bubba:
"Bill, you linked to BOTH of them. And the cartoon doesn't say Bush was AWOL. It just says it on the side of his little toy plane."
Could you tell me what I took "out of context"?
Posted by: Andrea Harris on May 8, 2003 10:26 PMNobody wanted to go fight in Vietnam eh? That certainly explains why 75% of the service men and women who fought "in country" were volunteers. Explains it quite well... Wait, I think one of us here is horribly confused...
Posted by: Robin Goodfellow on May 9, 2003 02:51 AM"no way of predicting whether or not he would end up in Vietnam"
He could have gone, he wanted stateside and he got it.
There is one thing which stands out. I have lived in Alabama and when Viet Nam Vets offer a reward for anyone who can prove George showed up in Alabama to serve as was ordered, and no one comes forward and even TRIES to collect it, you can bet he never showed up! Believe me, Alabama is not a 'blue' state, it is as RED as it gets. The overwhelmingly majority follow and love the 'leader' and they sure aren't gonna pass up the dough.
So, Bush still refuses to release his military records. Kind of like the speech he gave to the theocrats at the CNP when he garnered there nod for president...he doesn't want anyone to know the details. Kind of like all his documents on anything, secrets. What a wonderful way to run a country and a world.
Free money:
http://web.archive.org/web/20001205003400/http://www.al.com/news/birmingham/Oct2000/14-e414023b.html
Why is it so hard for some to see how deceitful this man is. He is cutting money to Vets, while he is setting up his re-election by using the militray as a prop. His strategy, make people think he is the ONLY one who can protect them. Think 1984 folks.
Byrd was spot on.
That "free money" dare is a worthless piece of evidence. They're asking for people to offer "proof" GWB was on the base in Alabama 31 years ago, and then saying the lack of such proof proves he wasn't.
No.
The lack of "proof" means that there is a lack of proof. See Jane's comment above: As they say in statistics class, absence of evidence is not evidence of absence.
The colonel who ran the base says he can't remember GWB being there, but as I conclusively demonstrated on my blog, there was little reason 31 years ago for him to have taken special notice of GWB, and it is unlikely he can recall all the names of all the people who were on that base 31 years ago. All his lack of memory proves is he can't remember.
As I wrote on my blog: There's little reason he should have singled out Bush back then for special notice in his memory file. Bush back then was just a kid whose dad was sort of famous in Texas - not famous in Alabama. Bush's father had not yet been president, vice president or CIA director. In fact, in 1970, the senior Bush, a two-term congressman from Texas, lost a Senate race. He wasn't even that big in Texas!
There's little reason anyone should have singled out GWB for a special place in their memories 31 years ago, and, thus, little reason to expect anyone today would have "proof" he was there. Whaddya want? Videotape? Satellite photos? Or maybe some retail clerk who remembers GWB - out of the thousands of people he had waited on - and can describe exactly what he was wearing on that day when GWB came into his story 31 years go, and perhaps even a crayola sketch he drew of GWB, after GWB left the store, thinking "man, he might be famous someday and I'll need proof he was here!" ?!??!
GWB's service records indicate he fulfilled his service requirements, and, as the New York Times - no friend of Bush's - has reported, his military service records show credit for four days of duty ending Nov. 29 and for eight days ending Dec. 14, 1972 - during which time he was in Alabama.
And as the Bush-loathing Boston Globe reported:
Those who trained and flew with Bush, until he gave up flying in April 1972, said he was among the best pilots in the 111th Fighter-Interceptor Squadron. In the 22-month period between the end of his flight training and his move to Alabama, Bush logged numerous hours of duty, well above the minimum requirements for so-called "weekend warriors."
All the links mentioned above are in my original post here.
The facts remain: GWB volunteered for a unit while it was involved in combat in Vietnam, became a good pilot, more than fulfilled his minimum requirements, and got an honorable discharge. The military screwed up some paperwork - nothing uncommon there. Free money: I'll give $50 to the first person who can prove the military didn't screw up GWB's paperwork! But, I promise, I won't use the fact that no one has claimed the money as "proof" the paperwork was all in order. Heh.
Bernard-
I'll go along with the imbecilic "chickenhawk" argument that anyone who didn't serve in the armed services---and apparently you've expanded that to only counting as service if they were in harm's way---has no right to speak out on defense issues and deployment of troops. IF you'll agree to apply the same standard to every other facet of public policy - only stakeholders get to speak, everyone else gets to shut the hell up.
Don't have a job and don't pay taxes? You don't get a say on federal money. None. And all of those lifetime government employees in Congress who have never held a private sector job in their lives? No vote, no committee seats on finance and appropriations issues, no grumbling.
Never played sports? You don't get a say on Title IX. Never published a copyrighted work or held a patent? (Using ghost writers doesn't count, sorry.) Give back the money from Hollywood, you no longer get to vote on intellectual property issues. And you'd better make sure that the very next law coming out of Congress specifically and forevermore binds them to be covered by the laws they write for the rest of us. No exemptions, no excuses.
Think that will happen? Me, either. So put the chickenhawk argument where it belongs, on the groaning shelf holding all of the other steaming piles of self-serving arguments made by the left explaining why no-one who disagrees with you has a right to an opinion.
Posted by: Thomas Stewart on May 9, 2003 08:01 AMJane writes:
As they say in statistics class, absence of evidence is not evidence of absence.
This is a curious principle, to say the least. It's surely true that an absence of evidence is not irrefutable evidence of absence, because it's theoretically possible that some new positive evidence will present itself. But "absence of evidence" can be very good evidence of absence, particularly if we are looking in a place where we would very much expect to find such evidence if it existed.
Accordingly, cas's comment is very much to the point:
and wouldn't this be all a bit of a non-issue if the president just released his complete military records? then the truth could be seen in its clarity, and the president could be clearly exonerated of any nefarious and spiteful runmours that might be buzzing around right now.
I would further note that if Bush had been present for his service obligation during the time in question, he could have made an unequivocal statement to that effect without fear of contradiction. Did Bush or his campaign ever make such a statement in response to the Globe article, or thereafter? If not, isn't that a significant "absence of evidence"?
To put it another way:
"Is there any point to which you would wish to draw my attention?"
"To the curious incident of the dog in the nighttime."
"The dog did nothing in the nighttime."
"That was the curious incident," remarked Sherlock Holmes.
-- "The Adventure Of Silver Blaze"
Posted by: alkali on May 9, 2003 09:17 AMI'm not sure why nobody has mentioned pure politics except Jane, and then only tangentially.
Will not releasing his military record cost him votes among his current supporters? Probably very few, if any.
Will releasing his military record win over new votes? Almost certainly not. How many of the anti-Bush crowd around here would suddenly be on his side if his record showed complete and proper service?
Will releasing it, and showing lackluster performance, hurt him electorally? You bet.
Would releasing it, and showing exceptionally good performance, help him electorally? Probably not much, as it would just spark another round of "if he was so good why didn't he go on active duty?"
Big downside, small upside. Why bother?
Posted by: Devilbunny on May 9, 2003 09:43 AMsaying "bush" is like ringing a bell at the mgm grand...
fight fight fight fight fight!
anyways.. what's funny is that krugman goes nuts, when the nyt wrote an article that at least somewhat refutes his claims, years before he wrote the article... idiot
jeb in 08, gpb in 16, jenna in 24 and barb in 32!!!!
bush dynasty (well not reallly.. but might as well stir the pot)
Thomas,
Learn to read. I made none of the arguments you criticize.
I am not contending that Bush, or Cheney, or DeLay, or anyone else who wasn't in combat has no right to comment on defense issues, so your extensions of this "principle" don't apply.
What I am commenting on is the character of these people. They make a great deal of noise about honor and morality and so on. They thought the war was a good thing, worth forcing people to risk their lives for. Yet, despite being of military age they found ways around it.
I once discussed Vietnam with a guy I worked with. His comment, "I would have loved to go, but I was busy with law school." That's the "chickenhawk" position I criticize.
What do you think of that?
And if you think it's more or less forgivable for a twenty-year old, do you think that by the time someone reaches middle age, and is (or should be) a bit more reflective, they might agree that it wasn't the noblest thing to do? Not our leaders.
So put your post on the steaming pile of phoney defenses of our Potemkin President.
Robin,
I don't know where your numbers come from, or how they break down across time and assignments. I am confident that there were few volunteers among college students, regardless of their opinions. Remember too that "volunteers" were often simply those who, faced with the inevitability of being drafted, enlisted instead. And they didn't get to enlist in the Air Guard. So the draft was a way to "encourage" volunteers, as well as a more direct way to get soldiers, so the distinction is not quite so clear as it seems.
In any case, the marginal soldier in Vietnam, the one Cheney would have replaced if he hadn't had other priorities, was probably a draftee.
There are a couple of facts that might be of interest to people. The conduct of the war in Vietnam, at least in the 1970 onwards period, was changing all the time. I was on active duty with the Marine Corps starting in September of 1968. In the fall of 1969 I went to OCS, fully expecting to be assigned to Vietnam. Two months into The Basic School, where all new Marine officers learn all the ins and out of being a Marine infantry officer, the orders of previous graduating classes were being changed: the only new Marine officers being sent to Vietnam in the Spring of 1970 were artillery officers to act as forward observers. Two months later, even that was no longer true. I graduated from The Basic School in July of 1970 and NONE of us had orders to Vietnam. I finally made it over to SouthEast Asia (Thailand) in September of 1972, by which time there were no regular ground or air forces of any service in Vietnam. Missions were still being flown, but aviation forces were at bases in Thailand, Guam (the B-52's), and aboard carriers. I don't know what the expected progression of duty assignments was in the Air National Guard, but I doubt that many, if any, fighter pilot guardsmen were sent to Vietnam during the early 1970's, and the type of jet that Bush flew was not to my knowledge being used in Vietnam at that time.
The second item concerns drilling Reservists. After 11 years of active duty, I joined the Marine Reserves, and stayed with the Reserves for another 17 years. There are various categories of reservists, from drilling reserves (who get paid for their drills) to members of the individual ready reserve (IRR's), some of whom drill for retirements points but no pay and others who don't drill but are still carried on the books so they can be recalled to active duty if needed (as happened in the Gulf Wars I and II). In order for your drill points to count towards retirement, you need 50 points a year, and such a year is called a "good" year. There is no penalty for not getting your 50 points other than that it is considered a "bad" year for retirement purposes and eventually will count against you when promotions become very competetive. There was also no requirement for a drilling reservist to make up an excused absence, but there was a limitation on when you could do that. In Bush's unit, a make-up drill had to be performed within the same quarter as the missed drill. But not making up the drill is NOT considered being AWOL, because making up the drill is voluntary. However, most people make up missed drills because (1) they need the retirement points, and/or (2) they need the money. You don't get paid unless you drill. It certainly sounds like Bush had plenty of annual retirement points, because in addition to getting points for drilling, you get one point for every day of active duty, and he had a lot of days of active duty. Knowing what my finances were like at that stage in life, I'm sure that Bush needed the money, and it also sounds like he liked to fly.
Observation: you can't be AWOL unless you are required to be some place at a specific time, and being excused for a drill just doesn't meet that definition.
Observation: flying is a dangerous business, and every pilot in the military knows at least one person who has died during training. I'm not a military pilot and I knew pilots who died. One doesn't become and/or stay a pilot if one is a coward.
Bernard, you think someone should turn his or her life upside down to join the military just because they approve of a specific war? That kind of thinking hasn't been seen in the U.S. since WW II! If you haven't done it, you don't know how much changing plans to join the military disrupts things. Even the draft board understood it; that's why there were student deferments, and before they were ended, there were deferments for fathers. The three ways to avoid the draft in the 1960's were to go to school, marry and get a girl pregnant, or join the guard or reserves. If you had no plans after high school that included one of those options, you were likely to be drafted. And despite what people now say about it, all sorts of ordinary people joined the guard and reserves--it just took a little advance planning, since the waiting list, at least in the Upstate New York (Syracuse) area, was about a year long. So, while still in school, one could apply to join, and if the timing was right, one could go directly from a student deferment (or directly from high school) into the guard and reserves.
I didn't know of ANYONE who enlisted because they wanted to go to Vietnam and fight, but I'm sure there were some out there. Most people enlisted so they would have some say in what branch of service they ended up in. But then, the trade-off (there's always a trade-off) was that enlistments were for 3 or 4 years, whereas the draft was only for two years.
I did it the hard way--I dropped out of college in 1969 and enlisted in the Marines to avoid the draft. Two weeks after dropping out, I received a reclassification notice from the draft board changing me from a 2-S (student deferment) to a 1-A (we gotcher ass now). I took great pleasure in mailing a copy of my enlistment papers to the draft board, and thinking nah nah, you're too late.
But we're not dealing with a draft army these days; we have the luxury of an all volunteer force, and it's made a big difference in attitudes. There hasn't been much of a fuss on college campuses over this war, and that's because there aren't a lot of people who could be drafted driven by fear to become demonstrators. The number of people who legitimately opposed the Vietnam war on moral grounds were few and far between, as opposed to the people who just didn't want to endanger themselves by being drafted. I've noticed the same hypocracy with this war's protesters, in that most of the protesters are really protesting Bush instead of the war; otherwise, they would have been protesting our going into Bosnia, Kosova, and Somalia. Here in Ithaca we have a few serious anti-war protesters (Claire Grady and her friends) who have been protesting all along, and only with protesting this war have they been joined by the Bush-haters.
Posted by: Chris Pastel on May 9, 2003 11:32 AMThe facts are that calling President Bush AWOL is simply slander. There isn't evidence of unexcused absence and excused absences are not with in the definition of the crime of AWOL. Those who claim that they are saying something about President Bush's "character" are demonstrating only their own as slanderers.
Posted by: Robin Roberts on May 9, 2003 11:47 AMBill,
So you think Bush slipped in unoticed and seved his time in Alabama. haha No one is alive who saw or worked with him? haha You sure sharpened your rationalizer for that one. IF he showed someone would come forward. If he could name ONE person he worked with he would have him looked up and ask him to come forward. You think he couldn't find someone? You think Rove wouldn't find them?
Why is it so hard for some to go against the 'leader'?? Can you have negative thoughts about W?
Do really think that this dry drunk is incapable of such. That is what it looks like when you defend him on something like this. He could have come forward with proof. He is deceitful.
Posted by: sal on May 9, 2003 12:16 PM'Bush-haters'
What's wrong with that, the man's lack of knowledge of the world is destroying it. That wouldn't be anything to hate him for, but the way enjoys it, is.
Posted by: Dan on May 9, 2003 12:22 PMChris,
"I didn't know of ANYONE who enlisted because they wanted to go to Vietnam and fight.."
There were many who did, and many who re-upped and went back for more. They are the ones we call NON-HYPOCRITES.
'The three ways to avoid the draft in the 1960's were to go to school, marry and get a girl pregnant, or join the guard or reserves."
You could claim a cyst on your butt like Rush. My Dad had the same cyst in 1942 and served in WW2.
Face it, there is disproportionate number of right wingers who clamour for War and hide stateside with Daddy's help when the shooting start, just like w. They are called hypocrites and the right is full of them. I think it is part of the party platform.
Posted by: Sal on May 9, 2003 12:34 PMIf you hate Geoge Bush, fine, like most people on this earth he has likely done things that others find objectionable. There's much that I do not like about his behavior before and after his winning the White House. This AWOL stuff, however, like the alleged illegalities of his Teaxs Rangers partnership, are simply the yammerings of people, people who should often know better, who have let emotion gain control of reason, and it is a mirror immage of the yo-yos who did the same with Clinton on any number of allegations, although, it must be noted, no credible person on the order of Juanita Broaddick has given direct eye witness testimony regarding Bush's past behavior that anywhere approaches the seriousness of a rape allegation.
Posted by: Will Allen on May 9, 2003 12:42 PMhere, you might learn something...
http://dneiwert.blogspot.com/2003_05_04_dneiwert_archive.html#200265501
Posted by: Drew on May 9, 2003 12:42 PMChris,
The "turning your life upside down" argument works only in the absence of a draft. When people are being drafted it doesn't cut it. The draft turned people's life upside down; lots of times it ended it. What you're saying is it's OK to force others to make sacrifices you are able but unwilling to make; that your plans are more important than other people's.
When you support a war that will be fought by draftees, even in part, you are saying the following:
"This cause is so worthwhile that it justifies forcing people to go and risk death or serious injury fighting for it, whether they want to or not. It justifies interrupting peoples' lives and subjecting them to great danger and very unpleasant conditions, even if they are ultimately unharmed."
And now you're telling me that someone of military age, fit to serve, can say this, and yet avoid the war because he doesn't want his own life interrupted, and you don't see a problem?
As far as the guard goes, it's simply not true that anyone could join. Sure, some non-influential types may have gotten in. But there were huge waiting lists, and the Bush - Quayle types somehow seemed to find their way to the head of the line with considerable ease. And while you were waiting longer because of this line-jumping you could be drafted.
Thanks for supporting the statement that hardly anyone enlisted because they wanted to go to Vietnam.
Posted by: Bernard Yomtov on May 9, 2003 01:18 PMI checked out the page Drew cited above. The lengthy essay fails to take into account the commonness of military paperwork screw-ups, and fails to note that Bush completed more than his minimum service time. It also repeats the "famous and powerful family" charge, but at the time GWB enlisted, his daddy was a freshman minority-party congressman, not the powerhouse he later became. What powerful family connections? He enlisted in a unit that was at that very moment involved in active combat in Vietnam, so the claim that the TANG was a way to avoid Vietnam is ABSURD.
Posted by: Bill Hobbs on May 9, 2003 02:30 PMAt least Drew tried. Tbogg's blog reprints most of my essay, then says is so obviously bunk that he won't bother explaining why. A rather dishonest debating tactic, of course. If it's bunk, he should refute it point-by-point, with annotated sources and links. Instead, he just tells his rapt readers he knows the truth so just trust him. Perhaps that works when you preach to the choir. But as I've scanned various sites that linked to my post, I've found that my work changed minds because I presented facts and logic.
Posted by: Bill Hobbs on May 9, 2003 02:32 PM"like the alleged illegalities of his Texas Rangers partnership"
What 'alleged illegalities' are you talking about? I never heard he did anything illegal. That was just he and his billionaire buddies getting the taxpayers to subsidize/create their profit. It wasn't illegal, the Bushes and rich folks have been doing it for years. Look at Neil and Silverado. Look at the tax breaks Bush's 'investors' in his dismally failed oil businesses received. . Just investing in influence and tax write-offs, all legal, I am sure.
No, the baseball deal was just the tired and worn story of conservative hypocrisy. Bush and his billionaire buddies could have taken the risk with their own money, but no they hired Bush to sweet talk the taxpayers into supplying the profit. Yep, the folks in Dallas love their stadium and well they should they paid enough for it. The most damaging article I read on this 'legal' activity was in the American Spectator, how about them apples? Believe it was June of '99 issue.
Actually, it doesn't make Bush a hypocrite that he, the champion of the downtrodden taxpayer, would do something like this, you know why? Because the tax they used was a sales tax, disproportionately affecting the lower incomes earners. You could say the Bush mystic is a fraud. He called his and billionaire buddies efforts a 'land play all along' in an Austin paper. They finagled the state legislator into taking over some prime real-estate for them, got the taxpayers to build them a stadium, they then signed a sweetheart deal to take ownership of the whole works.
Magically, after a subsidy of 200 million by the taxpayers, can you believe it, the 'leader' puts in 606 grand and takes out 15 million. He is a genius, a free enterpriser. Oh, by the way, the people who had their land taken had go to court to get a fair price for their land, they had been offered a pittance.
check this out ..without this guy the conservative theo-fascists running our government would still be a fringe group of Birchers, This is who has us where we are today. Until this is looked at... all talk of drafts, taxes, and war is just fluff.
http://www.consortiumnews.com/archive/moon.html
You can live in your world, Bernard, and I'll live in mine. I faced choices and had to think out my philosophical position vis a vis the draft simply because it was hanging over my head. Was it hanging over yours too? If not, you really don't know what it was like. My obligation to my country, implemented as the draft and including possible death, makes the stomach of an 18 year older churn, but it forces one to crystalize one's philosophy. Being an 18 year old male in America means that you might have to pick up a rifle and fight for your country. Period. If you can't accept that, you can't accept what it means to be an American.
"Turning your life upside down" has no meaning unless the draft exists. The draft didn't turn people's lives upside down, because you could plan for it. If you didn't properly plan for your future, you ended up getting drafted.
The cause doesn't have to be worthwhile for us to have an obligation to our country. If you don't like the cause or our country's actions, then protest them, but that doesn't relieve you of your obligation to serve if your country calls you. If you have a true belief against "war", then you serve as a conscientious objector, but serve you will. If you don't like them apples, then work to change the law.
But it sounds to me like you think everyone should have to serve during time of war, without exception. That's just plain silly. I didn't have a problem with the way the draft priorities were set up back then, and I don't see a problem with them now. If you want to take advantage of the laws in place, that's your right and not something to be ashamed of. Or do you think that people who seek legitimate tax shelters are somehow immoral? I really don't understand why you think it is immoral to support the draft system while at the same time seeking to legitimately avoid the draft. Everyone has the same opportunity to choose.
I had my doubts about the all-volunteer army when it came into existence, primarily because it meant that the average IQ of enlisted men went down. Advanced training started to take a lot longer. Key billets (e.g., the corporal in supply that magically obtained everything needed) were no longer filled by the smart people who gravitated towards these jobs. What happened in the Marines is that after a couple of years, these billets were filled by WM's (woman Marines), who because of the limited number of WM's in the Corps, tended to average out to be much brighter than the males. Another positive change was that recruiting standards could be tightened, so that we were facing far fewer discipline problems. (Anyone else out there remember Project 100,000 where the services had to take 100,000 people of low IQ? What a disaster!)
But the first Gulf War really validated the all volunteer force concept. Not only did the servicemembers perform with distinction, but everyone at home knew at least one person (relative, neighbor, relative of a friend at work, etc.) who was in the military, and because the people in the military were all volunteers, the country couldn't blame the evil draft for putting little Johnny (or Janey) in harm's way. The result was a show of support that I couldn't believe. After my experiences during the Vietnam War, it was very gratifying to see a country that supported its military.
I still disagree with your characterization of the guard and reserve being staffed primarily by the influential. If that were so, the guard and reserve units would have been of totally different makeup than they actually were. In my experience, the wealthy and influential stayed in school to keep their student deferment long after anyone else had to leave school to work for a living.
And although only a few enlisted because they wanted to go to Vietnam, there were quite a few who, once they had a taste of it, wanted to go back to Vietnam for a second tour. I suspect that most of those people were not in front line combat units, and had discovered how much fun it was to live the life of Reilly in a foreign country. But there were a few, there are always a few, who found they enjoyed combat and wanted more of it.
Posted by: Chris Pastel on May 9, 2003 02:44 PMChris:
Among the vets I know who served more than one tour in Vietnam, they also seem to have been heavily oriented towards making the military a career. (I'll note that these are almost all officers.)
I don't know that they necessarily "enjoyed" it, but I think quite a few knew that their careers would be helped by staying (and, of course, surviving).
Well Sal, the Democrats' favorite pundit, Paul Krugman, dishonestly insinuated illegality regarding the Texas Rangers' partnership, and then ran an unethical and dishonest retraction when called on it. If one wishes to denounce the way Bush made his fortune, by all means do so. Few have denounced it at vehemently as I have; when I first heard that he was shooting for PA Avenue, I lamented the prospect of a guy who made his fortune via thuggish state subsidy gaining the office. However, it is more than a little amusing to see a prominent and well paid columnist like Krugman do so in the pages of the NYT, while remaining largely silent about the NYT making a pile via exactly the same route; having government build them a new headquarters.
Posted by: Will Allen on May 9, 2003 02:50 PMBill, do you honestly believe that NO one would come forward for the reward... or that Bush can't remember the name of someone, ANYONE, he served with in Alabama who could vouch for him?...do you think he would hide that? Do you think he gets a thrill out of people wondering? Like Rove woke up and said, "hey, we'll just screw with their heads a bit." Like maybe they don't want his approval ratings to go to high.
I am telling you, if he showed up in Alabama someone would have known it.
I have read things about this till I am blue in the face. Let me ask you, in your study of the reserves, is it common for someone to serve for year and half and no one see them? Work with them? I know the base in Al. isn't Elgin, but do they ever have more than one person show up at the same time in a year and half? Like maybe have coffee or something. Wouldn't someone say, even in a phone call, "Hey, George, you coming to gaurd this weekend, see you there. We'll pass out the mail, it'll be fun, maybe go for some brewskies afterward!" You know George would have gone for brewskies. In fact wghat does it say about him that he would on duty somewhere for a year and half and noy make a freind. What is that all about?
There comes a time when one must realize the desire to cover for someone is getting in the way of simple logic.
Do you think that going AWOL is beyond what you know Bush to be? Certainly not.
It wasn't hard for me to think Clinton might pull his pee pee out and have it played with, why is it so hard for some to see this rascal, Bush, for who he is?
Your pal,
Sal
what do you think of this?
http://nomoonies.tripod.com/a_moon_primer.html
Do you have something more specific on Krugman? Detail. I am sure it was discussed here and political blogs. Bush and his fat cat friends using the taxpayers to make their profit isn't even known by most voters as you know, let alone the nuances of the leagilities involved. Hell, half of them think Saddam flew the planes on 911. The same way they think Bush was a "baseball executive"
They don't even know Moon has financed the takeover of their government by these theo-fascist. Doesn't bother them ...haha Who is Moon, who cares? hahah. Without him, Bush wouldn't be president. haha Who cares?
http://www.mediachannel.org/originals/moontranscript.shtml
Posted by: Sal on May 9, 2003 03:19 PMSal, you can do a google search for "Paul Krugman", "George W. Bush", and "Texas Rangers", and look for a column of his from last summer. I really don't want to spend any more time with someone who tosses around the term "theo-fascist" is such a silly way.
Posted by: Will Allen on May 9, 2003 03:46 PMDean,
The officers I knew who spent more than one tour in Vietnam were pilots, and I don't know of any of them who actually requested to go for a successive tour before he had to. One major I knew had had three combat tours in Vietnam before 1970. I can't remember if he was an F-4 Phantom or an A-4 Skyhawk driver.
On the other hand, I did know some enlisted personnel who waived their OCD (overseas control date) so they could get back "in country" sooner.
Keep in mind that draftees did not have to do more than one tour in Vietnam because they were only on a 2-year enlistment. Anyone who did more than one tour by definition had to be thinking of the military as a career.
Posted by: Chris Pastel on May 9, 2003 04:04 PMAre you familiar with the information. Are you familiar with who is pulling the strings? Believe me I don't throw the term around lightly. It is not something I relish, I assure you.
Read this:
http://www.au.org/churchstate/cs6013.htm
(btw: the that article mentions David Caprara, Bush just named him to head VISTA.)
and after you study some of the other info, do your own searches, I think you will agree Barry Goldwater lost this fight, he lost it big time. Look around you.
http://quotes.telemanage.ca/quotes.nsf/quotes/ffcc042fbd8c52708525698100716fcc
Barry Goldwater:
"However, on religious issues there can be little or no compromise. There is no position on which people are so immovable as their religious beliefs. There is no more powerful ally one can claim in a debate than Jesus Christ, or God, or Allah, or whatever one calls this supreme being. But like any powerful weapon, the use of God's name on one's behalf should be used sparingly. The religious factions that are growing throughout our land are not using their religious clout with wisdom.
They are trying to force government leaders into following their position 100 percent. If you disagree with these religious groups on a particular moral issue, they complain, they threaten you with a loss of money or votes or both. I'm frankly sick and tired of the political preachers across this country telling me as a citizen that if I want to be a moral person, I must believe in 'A,' 'B,' 'C,' and 'D.' Just who do they think they are? And from where do they presume to claim the right to dictate their moral beliefs to me?
And I am even more angry as a legislator who must endure the threats of every religious group who thinks it has some God-granted right to control my vote on every roll call in the Senate. I am warning them today: I will fight them every step of the way if they try to dictate their moral convictions to all Americans in the name of 'conservatism.' " Barry Goldwater
---
Fascism? listen to part two of the Nov. 12, 2002 show here:
http://wfmu.org/playlists/DX
That's the mix, sorry.
Of course, none of this would matter if the old boy didn't have things like this hanging on him:
From a 1978 congressional investigation of the conservative's sugar daddy:
http://www.freedomofmind.com/groups/moonies/fraserport.htm
"Alan Tate Wood, a former UC member who had been president of the FLF, described to the subcommittee some of Moon's political ambitions and activities. He said that Moon, through the UC and its numerous front organizations, wanted to acquire enough influence in America to be able to "dictate policy on major issues, to influence legislation, and move into electoral politics."(228)
In the United States, the political goals of the UC and those of the KCIA "overlap so thoroughly as to display no difference at all."(229) Wood also charged that Moon was violating U.S. laws by importing aliens to raise funds and that fundraising by UC members was often done under false pretenses.
---
sad but true, read it and weep,
your pal,
sal
Various points:
Some units of F102 aircraft were in VN, used as air base defense, not being useful in close support. Turned out not to be a big deal, in retrospect, as the Russians and the Chinese refrained from going after our bases. But that was not a sure bet at the time, the operative phrase being AT THE TIME.
I chose Infantry for my branch with VN as first choice of duty station. My brother, a C130 nav, was killed in a crash on Taiwan. So I got off orders. I must be a chicken hawk.
The reason nobody's tried to pick up the Alabama reward is likely pretty simple. Even if forty-'leven people remembered Bush there, CAN THEY PROVE IT? Of course not. How do you prove you had a couple of beers with a guy three decades ago?
The folks who put out that dare knew exactly what they were doing. And, so far, it's worked.
What happens if Bush releases the records, presuming they didn't burn up in St. Louis in 1973 as so many did? And they prove he was absolutely golden?
Nothing. The lefties go on as if nothing had happened. Ever heard a Bush-hater say, sorry, I was wrong?
Nope.
The lefties will continue to make the allegation, hoping to confuse some of the terminally gullible. That it is false is kind of an unimportant quibble.
How many lefty errors are flat in the dust behind them while they continue to make more?
There is no possibility that as many as one Bush-hater or anybody who poses as concerned solely with the service record would change his position based merely on irrefutable fact.
> Bill, do you honestly believe that NO one would come forward for the reward
And we know that the relevant people are aware of the reward and that the awarders haven't played games because we just fell off the turnip truck....
However, please campaign on this issue. It might be the decisive factor in saving the democrats, although not in a manner that you might appreciate.
Posted by: Andy Freeman on May 9, 2003 04:34 PMthe rules of engagement are in flux and i'm not sure what the parameters of an honorable discharge is, but being awol for a year would appear to lend itself to dishonorable as compared to honorable.
this much i know, bush has involved america in two asian conflicts and his record is 2-0, pretty good commander-in-chief.
clinton's record was 2-1 (he won in Haiti but lost in Somalia)
Duba's father record was 3-0
Reagan's record 2-1 (but he ended the cold war)
Carter 0-0 (but he did suffer a defeat in Iran)
Ford 1-0 (there was that small island conflict)
Nixon 0-0 (i'm giving the loss in vietnam to Johnson)
Johnson 0-1
Kennedy 1-1 (Bay of Pigs and the Cuban Crisis)
Eisenhower 2-0 (i know korea was a tie, but i give the win to ike and the loss to Truman, i also give a win to ike for the suez crisis)
Truman 3-1 (a win for the cold war, as well as Japan and Greece, a loss for Korea and i don't know who lost china)
FDR-1-0 (a win in europe, some like to give FDR a loss for eastern europe but who wanted to go to war with the soviets)
Wilson 1-0
Dems 8-4
Reps 9-1 (the Bushes are 5-0)
on the banks of the Housatonic
by the way given the more liberal (anti-bush) definition of chichen hawk, 2 out of the 3 greatest presidents were chichen hawks, you go 3 for 4 if you include jefferson.
Posted by: Timmy the Wonder Dog on May 9, 2003 04:38 PMChris,
The difference also probably lies in the officers I knew (all but one of whom are Army, rather than USAF). Don't recall if the USAF guy served more than one tour (but, man, the stories he had about FAC flights).
Posted by: Dean on May 9, 2003 04:43 PMRichard,
"How many lefty errors are flat in the dust behind them while they continue to make more?"
Pretty good for a movement whose base bases its beliefs on the Clinton Chronicles. hehe Falwell sold 350 thousand of those -- played in church basements across the country, deceived millions who I doubt will ever know the truth. Sure got'em to hate Bill. I bet some of your beliefs bubbled through the echo chamber to you from that discredited piece of propaganda. What do you think?
AWOL George, look, the country would buy ANYONE standing next to George telling about how he remembers him. Has ANYONE done that? Did I miss that? Show me the video of Bush backslapping his Alabama guard buddies and talking about 'old times'. Do you think if ONE guardsman came forward and told Turnipseed that he remembered him, Turnipseed would have made a deal out of it. Say someone Turnipseed knows came forward, and said , "hell yes, old George was a lot of fun. We had brewskies."
I still want to know how you can be in Al. a year and half and not make some friends in your unit who would go on TV and stand up for you.
What am I missing, have there been a few people who said they couldn't collect the reward because they didn't have proof or are you just surmising?
Hey, talk about your money making ideas....take all his gaurd buddies from Al., take the whole group on the right wing talk show circuit, we'll make more money than Poppy did shilling for this guy:
http://www.hartford-hwp.com/archives/55a/018.html
"I have so much anger at the church; for 10 years, I spent all my strength working for nothing," Fukasawa said. "I am suing them to make it clear what they have done. These things should not be repeated. And they should apologize."
Timmy,
Bush takes half credit for Somalia.
Bush, 5-0 You counting Iraq twice? Quite a group the Bush's tackle in that 5-0. You aren't giveng two credits for Iraq are you? Did you see the boxes of skeletons from the people slaughtered in southern Iraq, while holier than thou watched?
My lord you think the US military pounding someone makes Bush a great cammander in chief....sheeesh. I have news for you, let me point the victorious Clinton military in any direction and I we'll do just fine, but that doesn't make me the 'leader'....
What was Reagan's loss? Lebanon? Did you count the bomb on Lybyia? Killed some folks there. Seems like Reagan did more.
andy, I don't give a damb about Bush's military record we know who he is. It happens to be the subject of this thread I thought. I ought to know I am the one who has been the most OT.
I wanna see that back slapping video. I want to see those poor souls who know they are being scammed by those viet nam vets.
Reagan... did you count Grenada?
..when was Grenada like a day or so after Lebanon? That was before the wag the dog movie wasn't it? Did you know Cap Wienberger said he 'begged' Reagan not to put the marines in Lebanon. They didn't even have ammunition one caller said on C-span and Cap didn't correct him.
Posted by: Sal on May 9, 2003 05:20 PMsal, clinton gets no credit for somalia 1, and yes i did count grenada as a win for reagan, but counted lebanon as a loss, but not a loss and a win. don't forget he originally saved the palenstinians. finally, yes i do remember marines carring weapons with no clips and i didn't forget Libya (the colonel went into hiding but we didn't get the mother*^&*+, did we) but i also remember lockerbie.
is my count subject of course, but we can go into the 19th century and the Reps are 2-0 (Spanish American and Civil War) and the Dems 1-1-1 (Mexican American War, a win, Civil War a loss and War of 1812, a tie)
the banks of the Housatonic
Posted by: Timmy the Wonder Dog on May 9, 2003 05:46 PMby the way sal, i did count the Gulf War and the Liberation of Iraq, as two different wars:
Bush 1 (Gulf, Somalia and Panama) 3-0
and finally sal, good old Lydon B put what 500,000 soldiers in war he knew he couldn't win. so the cic does makes a difference, doesn't he.
quess you waiting for the arab street to rise aren't you sal.
Posted by: Timmy the Wonder Dog on May 9, 2003 05:54 PMhi jane & devil bunny,
"I can think of loads of reasons not to release them, including the fact that lackluster military performance would probably hurt him electorally, as well as hampering his effectiveness as commander in chief. As they say in statistics class, absence of evidence is not evidence of absence."
and
"Would releasing it, and showing exceptionally good performance, help him electorally? Probably not much, as it would just spark another round of "if he was so good why didn't he go on active duty?"
Big downside, small upside. Why bother?"
i struggle to make sense of this position. you appear to be "winking" at president bush's service. maybe i am misconstruing what you are saying, but you appear to accept "luckluster" as a meme for "perhaps not very good, perhaps underperforming, perhaps in the manner his critics might be suggesting."
if that is the case, that is a problem, because the president is trying to make a lot of political capital out of his past service--he is trying to win votes as the "warrior president." if his records point otherwise, then (and i no that i am being totally naive)letting people see the whole picture and make judgements for themselves --good and bad-- would be better for the american democracy as a whole (stop laughing on the floor, that hurts my feelings...)
Posted by: cas on May 9, 2003 05:56 PMhowdy cas, bush schould release them right after hillary releases her commodity trading records and tax returns and daschle releases his tax returns.
Posted by: Timmy the Wonder Dog on May 9, 2003 06:00 PM'Somalia' big win - I forgot. Counting Iraq as two wins is just not right. Now fix it. haha
How many wins for Chevron? I think they actually should get the win in 91.
So they really didn't have ammo. Wonder what the liberal Rush would have said about that...
Posted by: Sal on May 9, 2003 06:05 PMsal, somalia big loss and no one was laughing, except for maybe you sal.
on the banks of the housatonic.
Nixon 0-0 (i'm giving the loss in vietnam to Johnson)
Johnson 0-1
then give somalia to bush. Nixon ran the war for years, lied about his secret plans to get us out and you're gonna dump it on LBJ? Come on. LBJ would still be sending kids over if he were alive today...
damn right sal, Lydon FUBARed it up big time, that is why he didn't run for a second term, right sal.
Posted by: Timmy the Wonder Dog on May 9, 2003 06:17 PMY'all, he served in Alabama for four days during the time in question, if I'm reading this right. Four days. Can I remember the names of people I spent four day seminars with ten years ago? Hell no. Not even their first names. You're stretching.
And Sal, when someone starts telling me that Bush is a moonie puppet, I stop reading, 'kay?
Posted by: Jane Galt on May 9, 2003 06:34 PMChris,
I don't think we disagree as much as you seem to think, though are some points I'd like to address.
"I faced choices and had to think out my philosophical position vis a vis the draft simply because it was hanging over my head. Was it hanging over yours too? If not, you really don't know what it was like."
I was draft-age at the time. I had a student deferment and then my lottery number came up very high, so I was not at risk of being drafted. That didn't mean I wasn't concerned about it, especially pre-lottery. And of course I had friends who were more likely to be drafted. So I didn't have the pressure you had, but I thinkI have an understanding of it.
"My obligation to my country, implemented as the draft and including possible death, makes the stomach of an 18 year older churn, but it forces one to crystalize one's philosophy. Being an 18 year old male in America means that you might have to pick up a rifle and fight for your country. Period. If you can't accept that, you can't accept what it means to be an American."
Yes. This is part of our disagreement. My belief is that, at the time of Vietnam, there were people who were never at risk. Bush likely would have been drafted had he not joined the guard, which he was able to get into through connections.
"The draft didn't turn people's lives upside down, because you could plan for it. If you didn't properly plan for your future, you ended up getting drafted."
I disagree. First, it's not necessarily a lot better to enlist than to be drafted. Even if enough people enlisted so no one would be drafted there were still going to a be a lot of people fighting in the jungle. "Planning" still meant, in most cases, doing something you really didn't want to do, because the alternative was being drafted. Remember, even if the selection process had been fair, there just wasn't room in the Guard for everyone. And the process was not fair.
"But it sounds to me like you think everyone should have to serve during time of war, without exception. That's just plain silly."
No. I don't think so.
"I really don't understand why you think it is immoral to support the draft system while at the same time seeking to legitimately avoid the draft. Everyone has the same opportunity to choose."
I disagree with your last sentence. That's not what I saw happening. I saw lots of people getting into the Guard, or reserves, because their father knew someone, or was a big shot, or the like, not because they signed up and waited a year.
As to why I think it's immoral, I don't know how to explain it any better than I did above. To say it's a good idea to force people, against their will, to risk their lives for some cause, and to be unwilling to risk your own, assuming you are able to do the job, seems wrong to me. And let me take it one step further, with specific reference to the Vietnam draft. It seems worse when you take advantage of personal privilege to avoid even facing the problem.
Was what Bush did legal? Yes. Was it admirable? No. Is it too much to ask that he and his defenders at least acknowledge that there was some moral ambiguity about all this? Apparently Bush&Co. think so.
Like I said, a Potemkin President, all the way from his military career through his phoney carrier landing, and pretty much everything in between.
Flame away.
Posted by: Bernard Yomtov on May 9, 2003 06:52 PMBernard, the only think flaming away is your liberal view of the world (no difference between good and evil, no general moral equivalence and the no new world world order driven by the lowest dregs of humanity). kiss it goodby Bernard, it aint't coming back.
on the Banks of the Housatonic.
Excuse me, Timmy, but what Chris and I are talking about is good and evil. We disagree about certain actions (and I'm being harsher than he is), but there's nothing in my posts here to suggest any of the views you claim to know I hold.
Moron.
Posted by: Bernard Yomtov on May 9, 2003 07:36 PMJane,
I didn't mean Bush was a Moon puppet, I said Moon co-opted the conservative movement and without Moon, Bush would NOT be president. His father has been shill for him and is bought and paid for.
Do you know much about what Moon believes? Honestly read this Jane, look at the links, don't try and find a way around it.
http://www.geocities.com/nomoonies/chronicles/a_moon_primer.html
This is documented, Moon's power and influence has been generating for years. I am NOT saying Bush takes his orders from Moon. I AM saying that the political beliefs of the current repub party are shared by Moon and they work with him, which HELPS Him. They are both witting and unwitting pawns because his agenda doesn't stop where theirs ends.
Do you think Sean Hannity came up with his extremist theo-fascist views on his own? haha This has been a production in the making for years.
I am saying you are being used and you don't know where you are being lead. You have no idea. You have been his vehicle. Do you know how much power you extended this group WORLD wide by bowing to the Washington Times? (that's how they see it when Moon travels, ever hear him brag about using the Washington Times to maipulate our politics?The same guy who gave NK a few billion to stay afloat works with the republican party politically.
Check it out here's one
http://www.au.org/churchstate/cs6013.htm
You may not come to the same conclusions but don't let it close your mind. This isn't a joke. This isn't tin foil hat.
http://www.geocities.com/nomoonies/chronicles/a_moon_primer.html
Please, don't shut your mind till you know what you are talking about.
--
Here from the family values president...
http://www.freedomofmind.com/presskitarticles/fisher.htm
"All these people should know better. My daughter would tell me over and over how in their recruiting films they would show Moon with Bush to impress young people. They use the films of Moon and Bush and other celebrities to reassure parents that it is okay that their children are on the streets selling flowers 18 hours a day." (Washington Post, July 30, 1996)
--
you think he doesn't control EVERYTHING he fiancées including Washington Times? Read this.
Better yet Moon's right arm Bo Hi Pak has a messge for you at the end of the video found here. See where this is headed...
http://www.mediachannel.org/originals/moontranscript.shtml
--
It goes on and on Jane, this is who your party has empowered.
http://www.freedomofmind.com/groups/moonies/fraserport.htm
He said that Moon, through the UC and its numerous front organizations, wanted to acquire enough influence in America to be able to "dictate policy on major issues, to influence legislation, and move into electoral politics."(228) In the United States, the political goals of the UC and those of the KCIA "overlap so thoroughly as to display no difference at all."
---
Why are conservatives so quick to close their minds? I have listened to thousands of hours of propaganda from Rush. I even watch the republican theo-fascist news network, FOX.
There may be a reason why conservatives close their minds. They have been trained. Starting in the 80's conservatives started demonizing sources of info. You know what you have been trained in, you can't believe CNN, ABC, CBS, NBC, The New York Times, the La Times, Dan Rather, Peter Jennings...they were going after Walter Cronkite last I heard. Anyway, twenty years of BS has made conservatives shut out massive amounts of info. If not shutting it out, doing what you are doing, find some reason quickly to tell yourself you don't have to believe them. Jane, I could be Fidel Castro with a booger hanging and it won't change the truth in those links, Sorry.
Anyway, after they got your (I am speaking of conservatives in general not you) mind only taking in the message they want, then they demonize people. You know what they do. Rush spent a day likening Daschle to Satan. Talk about controlling minds, if Tom is Satan, who has to listen to anything he says.
Oddly, information control and demonizing iones enemies is what the moonies do to their victims.
The conservative movement has given up its critical thinking to the theo-fascists so that is where we are headed. Again, I am just a messenger. Talk to the conservative leadership that has been manipulating you if you have a problem with it. I would think you would be pissed off. They sold out to Moon in the early eighties so they could get his money and media to help them defeat the evil commies and worse those un-american lieberals. Moon sells you on his anti-commie face while he was pumping money into NK. Just for the record Moon lumps democracy and communism in the same 'failed' systems barrel. You can find apologists for Moon, even a few demos who have fallen in the web.
I tell you this, you better get your spin hats on cause, if you aren't gonna face the truth on this, you will need them.
Thanks for letting me visit. Hope you aren't so frightened of these truths that you hide from them, your country needs you.
Posted by: Sal on May 9, 2003 07:47 PMBernard your comment
Potemkin President, all the way from his military career through his phoney carrier landing, and pretty much everything in between.
the decomposition of the above lead to my spot on analysis of your true views and purpose.
useful idiot
Posted by: Timmy the Wonder Dog on May 9, 2003 08:33 PMJane,
The third article down in this link(below). When you get to the end of the article there is a link to some Defense Intelligence Agency Documents. Think about this. This man has bought submarines for North Korea and given them billions. In my opinion when push comes to shove he will side with NK. Did you know Moon owns a chunk of South America the size of England.
Think about this, did you know ANY of this? Do you think you deserve to be informed about something like this in between shark attacks and the Gary Condit show? I know, I know,,,I know it so it can't be secret, well, I mean smeared all over the news like Condit for a couple of weeks so the country can decide what to think about it. I have NEVER met anyone who doesn't feel, after they learn the facts here, that doesn't think they should be informed.
I mean just for the fun of it, who all knew that a man who says he is the messiah and plans on creating a world government under his groups control, that he say, well say...owned United Press International? A man who said he would use his media to wrench control of the world and he owns UPI. I figure most know enough that he created The Washington Times.
Finding #3 from the 1978 congressional investigation of Korean relations:
http://www.freedomofmind.com/groups/moonies/fraserport.htm
"Among the goals of the Moon Organization is the establishment of a worldwide government in which the separation of church and state would be abolished and which Moon and his followers would govern."
Read the third article down here, and if you want to know what real evil is, read the whole series.
http://www.consortiumnews.com/archive/moon.html
Listen to Moon's x-daughter-in-law tell you about the conservative's benefactor here:
http://discover.npr.org/features/feature.jhtml?wfId=1000731
I think, at a minimum, if you become familiar with this info, you will see why I laugh my ass off when someone mentions lieberals being hypocrites. We all may be hypocrites at times, I don't always live my life the way I say I should. The question is, do we go to work everyday knowing there is this kind of hypocrisy in our party.movement and ignore it. Hypocrites on the left, I mean really. hahaha
The republican party should have been renamed after they gave Moon a place at the table of influence in the early eighties. Reagan and Bush gave the conservatives the nod, that it was OK to help Moon. They thought they were using him, hahah. Actually, Poppy was the CIA man when Moon hit the fan, Poppy knows exactly what/who Moon is.
Remember Barry Goldwater? He was a republican, not a theo-fascist. I guess John McCain is closest to being a real republican, but the right is suppose to hate him, right? Trained? Who else are we to hate, the French, the Germans, Tim Robbins, Dixie Chicks, who is the 'hate de jour'?
Anyway, here is quote of Sen. Goldwater's. He lost this fight, Jane. He LOST this fight bigtime. Kind of a long thread and day, I apologize if I have already posted this but it's important, it tells what the right has become. I don't have a date on when he said it, but he saw it coming and it is here, no stopping it now. Wait till Bush gets his little Fed Society Judges, Kiss what you have loved in America BYE BYE. Theo-fascism. Goldwater knew where the problem was and spoke out, but lost this fight he lost it bigtime...recognize anyone in here, the republican party is no more....
http://quotes.telemanage.ca/quotes.nsf/quotes/ffcc042fbd8c52708525698100716fcc
"However, on religious issues there can be little or no compromise. There is no position on which people are so immovable as their religious beliefs. There is no more powerful ally one can claim in a debate than Jesus Christ, or God, or Allah, or whatever one calls this supreme being. But like any powerful weapon, the use of God's name on one's behalf should be used sparingly.
The religious factions that are growing throughout our land are not using their religious clout with wisdom. They are trying to force government leaders into following their position 100 percent. If you disagree with these religious groups on a particular moral issue, they complain, they threaten you with a loss of money or votes or both.
I'm frankly sick and tired of the political preachers across this country telling me as a citizen that if I want to be a moral person, I must believe in 'A,' 'B,' 'C,' and 'D.' Just who do they think they are? And from where do they presume to claim the right to dictate their moral beliefs to me?
And I am even more angry as a legislator who must endure the threats of every religious group who thinks it has some God-granted right to control my vote on every roll call in the Senate. I am warning them today: I will fight them every step of the way if they try to dictate their moral convictions to all Americans in the name of 'conservatism.' "
Posted by: Sal on May 9, 2003 09:27 PMChris Pastel wrote: "Knowing what my finances were like at that stage in life, I'm sure that Bush needed the money"
Oh come off it. Bush comes from a family that's been wealthy for generations. He didn't need the money.
Posted by: Jon H on May 9, 2003 09:38 PMhi twd,
"bush schould release them right after hillary releases her commodity trading records and tax returns and daschle releases his tax returns."
ok, i don't have a problem with that. right after they become presidents--deal?
and, you didn't answer my question!
also sorry for being a bit culturally unaware but, what does "banks of the housatonic" mean in this context?
Posted by: cas on May 9, 2003 11:00 PM> andy, I don't give a damb about Bush's military record
Then why are you harping about it?
One of your co-religionists demanded that Bush provide copies of his military records. I pointed out some of the problems with that request. If that doesn't fit into your off-topic rants....
Posted by: Andy Freeman on May 10, 2003 01:11 AMI'm not too good at this. You made a comment about something I posted
"However, please campaign on this issue..."
Put it this way, the last thing I would think of would be Bush being AWOL as a campaign issue. The idea of anything like that working is slim. No, Bush gets a pass on everything. Period. I mean that. Drunk driving, insider trading, Stadium con, it's too late for all that. That is why Gore was failed candidate. He should have sat his butt next to that stadium, camped out till the press mentioned it. He failed to show the country who Bush was, that was his job.
"Then why are you harping about it?" It is the subject of the thread and, I made my point and still haven't had an explanation. Jane said something about him only having to be in Alabama doing something for four days. In a year and a half? I'm not convinced but I think being AWOL is the least of his ills. I thank everybody for their thoughts on his AWOLness but it really is minor in the scheme of things, even if proved without a shadow of a doubt. Don't you think? Let's get some proportion here. I mean, let's just say it's true. I don't think anyone died or anything. I am sure in his happy go lucky world he didn't mean any harm. Hell, he's a Bush!
you ever watch this, part two is LOL:
http://www.channel4.com/news/2003/special_reports/iraq_hard_place.html
Did I tell you Moon controls a college, he predicted he would in the '70's as part of the 'plan.' Said they neede to be able to license 'professional' people.
your pal,
sal
Sal. . . not helping yourself. The fact that some whacko said something, somewhere is not proof. And if the moonie accusation didn't, the use of the word "theofascist" would kill it.
Posted by: Jane Galt on May 10, 2003 07:30 AMhi all,
i think checking out uggabugga's site on this issue would be instructive:
uggabugga.blogspot.com/2003_01_12_uggabugga_archive.html#87590816
some of the material appears to contradict what was said here. did president bush for example check the box that says--"willing to serve overseas" on his application form and they have that wrong?
another point: president bush has made it very clear that he should not be questioned on his life before he was 35. why is it so hard to believe that if he screwed up many aspects of his own life before that age, that he didn't screw up his service to his country?
the question i have for those folks who defend him so strongly is: why? why not get it out into the open. the implication would seem to be that fear is the key issue. fear that the whole truth would sully the reputation of the "warrior president" and hurt his re-election chances. if he is the real deal, his integrity and reputation will survive the examination. i know, i am being naive again. but the defenses offered have a tinge of "desperation;" of an unwillingness to see thouroughly because of the fear of "hopeless spinning." i think that fear has to be faced if a rational discussion of this issue is to undertaken.
a thought experiment: what if everything that the president's critics is true? would that affect your judgement of the worthiness of the president to hold office. however you answer-why?
in gentleness
casimir
Hey, Cas. If everything the critics said about Bush were true, it would be in an alternate universe.
In which, since we're making up the rules, the media would camp out next to the rental property Gore owns with sewage running out the back door and no effort on the part of Gore to do anything about it.
That would be a really alternate universe.
Jane,
Please tell me what the problem is here. You are saying you don't care what any of those links say, because you don't like the way I worded something?. You don't like a WORD the messenger uses, so you are going to keep a closed mind? So, because what I bring is a message you know little to nothing about, (don't tell me some of that doesn't frighten you, it should) is against your belief system, YOU aren't gonna read or learn. That is VERY telling. I have been told by liberals that conservatives will NEVER be informed on this because THEY don't want to know, you don't want the truth. It is more important to support the 'leader' and the 'cult' of conservatism ...Jane that is JUST what the moonies do. Hide from the truth.
Prove something is in error in those links, Jane, don't just hide because it is against your belief system. You can find something, they aren't perfect and Moon doesn't exactly co-operate on finding the truth behind him.
I admit I am new to passing this info, my bedside manner may not be smooth, but tell me, just imagine for one second what I say is true, wouldn't you be a little 'fanatical' about it?
Jane, You don't have to come to the same conclusions. You can find a demo in this story and then, just like Enron and George acting like he never met Kenny Boy, you can tell yourself it was BOTH parties fault that he has been allowed to manipulate us. It won't be true, but I am sure Karl will tell you it's OK and you will buy it.
I hope I find some conservatives not afraid to learn. I hope I find some who aren't trained to shut their minds by using triggers like "OH, you said that like a liberal, I am sticking my fingers in my ears, I DON'T CARE ABOUT FREEDOM IN AMERICA."
That is what you are saying, whether you know it yet or not.
Find something wrong with the facts Jane. All you have to do is find ONE error, that will be more than enough for you ignore the rest.
I guess sadly for you, I will not stop, and this WILL become an issue and you all will have to face it, maybe not today, maybe not tomorrow, but some day, when you least expect it.
This is real tangible evil influencing your government and you will ignore it because you don't like a word I used. Do you see why we call it the Grand Hypocrisy Party? Because it is true, you give lip service to patriotism, lip service to the constitution, hypocrisy and you do as you're trained.
Tell the truth, when any liberal says something to you, can you even hear what they are saying? Do you say the person is bad so you close your mind or do you wait till they say a 'trigger' word you have to hide from?
That is what you are saying, If you read that information you wouldn't be so flip in flipping it off.
Hey, I will move along now, I have just shown you the tip of the iceberg. Hopefully some your readers will not be afraid of the truth.
Their country needs them...needs them now.
BTW; "Theo-fascism" is the best way to describe it. It is where we are heading at break-neck speed, sorry but facts are facts. Look around you. Did you read the Goldwater quote above?
Hey, maybe this will help. Picture any issue the evil liberals come up with to attack the 'leader'...like this thread, Bush's military record. You know how you all scramble to find the best spin so you can believe in the 'leader'? Well that is gonna happen with this, so, you better get ready, call Karl, get the smokescreen out. hahah I bet a year from now you will asking why Bill Clinton didn't do anything about the cult leader who has used your country as his own toy. hahaha You will buy it, I can tell by your reaction here. I mean you know how you look at a subject to find what you want to find, try it with this, You will be ahead of the game. You can explain what the spin is gonna be. haha
Maybe this will help. Would if, you heard some of this message from an EXTREMELY conservative UN hating right winger? Classic Bircher. HUH, would if, he use to write for the Washington Times? Would if, one of your own sees it? You see I am serious, I will have to face the fact that the UN will be no more, it will go by the boards like the old republican party. Moon is heavily moving on manipulating the UN. The conservative movemnets sugar daddy will destroy the UN and you will say, 'see we told it was bad." haha Kind of like what the republicans do with the government, don't support it, put up blocks wherever you can, choke off funding, put people in charge of departments who despise them, and then cuss it when it doesn't work. haha
Well here ya, go. A wingnut looks at Moon.
Moon declares he is the Messiah in 40 papers across the country, it was in my local paper. Did you see what Jesus had to say about "True Father?"
http://www.usasurvival.org/ck7502.shtml
Remember where I quoted the investigation which said that Moon's plan was to influence our intelligence services and what not? Ever hear of this guy. hahaha Believe me, this is not one those Pope will control Kennedy things, all moonies have ONE goal, to get the group to run the world, and they ARE winning.
http://www.usasurvival.org/ck06022002.shtml
Even if you don't think Moon is winning, why does your party work with him, which helps him try?
You're closed minded hypocrites, Jane, that is the truth.
Jane, if the country wants to enshrine Moon, fine, I just want people to investigate and report on the fact that, that is what is happening.
http://www.usasurvival.org/ck05292002.shtml
Dr. Laura, another moon shill,
http://www.usasurvival.org/moonbyslaura.shtml
Moon will work to tear us apart. He recently got pissed at the "white Christians'...
from one of your own:
"But since the end of the Cold War, I have seen an ominous turn in Moon's activities, away from a pro-American orientation to a pro-United Nations view of the world. I have seen this show up in the Washington Times. As you know, Moon has even been embracing the notorious Louis Farrakhan.
http://www.usasurvival.org/moon-un.html
--
Here's Moon's home page. Read about his 'take down the cross' campaign. This is NOT a Christian religion as they would have you believe.
http://www.familyfed.org/
here is something he said, does this sound like a friend of Christianity?
Moon:
"Since God has been carrying on His dispensation through the Christian church, He and we are responsible to convey this message to the Christians first. Until our mission with the Christian church is over, we must quote the Bible and use it to explain the Divine Principle. After we receive the inheritance of the Christian church, we will be free to teach without the Bible." (Syung Myung Moon, The Master Speaks Chapter 7 1965)
http://www.tparents.org/Lib-Moon-Talk.htm
thanks for the chance,
your pal,
sal
I wrote (in response to cas "I don't give a damb about Bush's military record")
> Then why are you harping about it?"
In reply
> It is the subject of the thread
So? You're not obligated to comment at all.
> and, I made my point and still haven't had an explanation.
(1) You're not owed an explanation.
(2) The point that you've made to most/many of us is likely not the point that you intended.
You come across as a guy with 1000 broken clocks. Sure, you've got better odds than a person with one broken clock, but ....
The other problem is that even if your accusations are completely correct, your conclusions don't follow. Even if we believed that Bush is trying to set up a theocracy, we may reasonably believe that he won't succeed and that the alternatives are significantly worse. Remember, we don't get to construct ideal politicians from bits and pieces, we have to choose between whole ones.
Posted by: Andy Freeman on May 10, 2003 01:46 PM
"The fact that some whacko said something, somewhere is not proof."
Jane, He has spent BILLIONS propping up your movement, you don't care what he believes and what his goals are? He says 'something' 'somewhere'
You haven't read have you? If you're looking for back and white right proof, you won't find it. You have to study and know your subject.
Why do you help him try?
I know you stand with him on much of what you THINK he stands for...
You don't think he has power? HUH.
sheesh Jane the man controls the paper youi have used for two decades to back up your 'conservative' views... we're not talking about some dream.
Read "media Wars" here
"A Well-Funded Media War"
http://www.mediachannel.org/originals/revmoon.shtml
You are gonna have to face it sooner or later...
Why do republicans help him?
Posted by: Sal on May 10, 2003 02:02 PM"we believed that Bush is trying to set up a theocracy,"
He doesn't see what he is doing. Never has bnever will. Do you honestly think he understands the resulots of his actions. Surely not, you have heard him.
You don't see what you are helping, why should he?
--
A member on a moon site told the story of W giving Moon advice when they met. According to the member, what do you think the advice Bush gave moon was? Stop disrupting families world wide. No. Stop trying tom undermine democracy in america? No.
Bush told he 'needed to change his image". See they love the guy. You read and decide what you think about him. See what you think he is up to?
Posted by: Sal on May 10, 2003 02:11 PMYou seem to be looking for a hammer to hit you over the head on this, it doesn't work that way. Much subtler than that.. This has been a production in the making for decades. You think the country naturally moved toward what you think to be 'conservative'? haha Moon's group is in this for the long haul, we are trained to look for smoking guns. There are smoking guns but to see them you have to be familair with the subject.
Posted by: Sal on May 10, 2003 02:16 PMBush gave 475 grand to 'Free Teens' a moon front group, so MOON could teach our kids about sex abstinence.
Bush's original Faith Based Program was designed to dole out billions directly to churches and believe me, from what I read, there would be little to no oversight. Billions for churches. That proposal, since watered down by pro theocrat Joe Lieberman(see you can find them), was the one the republicans used Moon's organization to promote.
If you read no other, read all of this. May be an evil liberal site, but the truth is the truth.
http://www.au.org/churchstate/cs6013.htm
There is a bill in congress to allow churches to spend 10% of their booty on politics and still stay tax exempt. Where do you think that would lead? match that with the theocrat judges Bush names and the LAW will put the theo's in complete control. Read the Goldwater quote above.
Bush is pawn. It's kind of like the Washington Times, Moon was heavily involved in directing the paper at first but, a string editors quit. The VERY conservative James Whelan who helped the paper gain credibility when it started quit calling it a a 'moonie paper' and saying he had 'blood on his hands' for helping it gain credibility. He was right.
When you find someone like Pruden to work for you, it becomes sort of like on auto-pilot. Also, keep in mind Moon burns the candle at both ends. While he may be supporting one thing you do he will be tearing something else down behind your back. I don't think most conservatives have a clue.
Do keep in mind it's not like he's God or something. He has his side bets and the ones he placed on the Bushes are paying off handsomely.
I think if you study his goals and where the country was and where we are headed it will shock you.
Once you start pushing this ball down the hill you aren't gonna stop it.
http://www.familiefederatie.org/2NwsMaart2.html
Wolf Blitzer: Mr. Vice President, controversy erupting over the president's faith-based
initiative, allowing the federal government to give grants to religious
charities to help in social services, drug rehabilitation, prisoners and
other areas. But now some religious conservatives, Pat Robertson, Marvin
Olasky, who is the author of compassionate conservatism, suggesting this
may not necessarily be such a good idea, if the federal government gives
money, for example, to the Nation of Islam or the Church of Scientology
or the Unification Church. What is the policy?
CHENEY: Well, the president's made it clear that he would in fact like
to be able to have these organizations play a more prominent role in
terms of dealing with community problems. They do tremendous work out
there now. As we campaigned last fall, we stopped and visited an awful
lot of these organizations
----
Decide what you wish, but please, just learn. Keep in mind there is ONLY one goal for the members of this group. Only one.
Too many think they are going to have to vote for theo-fascism. haha That ain't how this works. Moon is doling out gold watches to the black ministers, he is bypassing the congregations and working on the leaders. Falwell is a shill for him. When Falwell told his congregation "the lord saved us from bankruptcy" he didn't mention the money came from Moon. He in fact denied it for while, then he used his "well, the devil had the money long enough" deceitful line he uses to rationalize his involvement with evil.
You have to admit, your movement is largely a group of massive hypocrites. By the way, we on the left, we aren't falling for your fake patriotism, its called "NATIONALISM" folks. It ain't patriotism to hate people because they disagree with the 'leader' it's nationalism.
hi richard,
"If everything the critics said about Bush were true, it would be in an alternate universe."
no, i just asked you to consider what is at stake on this issue. there is a lot of fear (on the rep side), just as there was with the clinton imbroglio (from dems) on the significance of what he had done/not done. the need for political control got in the way of what the truth was. i expect that of politicians. do i have to necessarily expect that from the sage members of this forum?
Posted by: cas on May 10, 2003 07:50 PMA year and a half in Alabama and nobody remembers him?
Quite possibly. I'm thinking about whether I could find anyone from my Basic Training in 1978 who would remember me. I definitely remember the two drill sergeants (excuse me, instructors) - but I hope I wasn't such a big problem that they still remember me out of thousands of recruits they trained. And if records had burned so it was impossible to look up who was a instructor at the boot camp in May 1978, I doubt that "SSGT Merced" and "SGT Wolfe" would be enough ID for the records center to find them.
As for the other recruits, I can remember 3 last names and 1 full name - the black guy who introduced himself, "I'm Jimmy Carter from Georgia. My friends just call me Mr. President." But Airman Carter had a heart murmur and was on his way home in two days, he definitely wouldn't remember me. The other guys... Maybe the week of enlistment + the names "Smith" and "Trader" would be enough to find them, but if their memory is like mine the chances are about 4/50 that they would remember my name. Johnson could definitely be identified (very tall, black, his first child was born in New York City while he was in Basic), but I cannot think of a solitary reason for Johnson to remember me. And then the guy I remember best, looked like a small replica of Steve McQueen, talked like Steve McQueen, got into para-rescue training (which is as close to volunteering to be a hero as was possible), but all I remember of his name was that it was hyphenated and so long that his name tag wrapped around his back...
If that is all I remember of nearly fifty guys that I lived in one room with for six weeks, what's the chances that someone would remember Dubya from a few days of training, half of which they would have spent alone in cockpits or simulators? (Assuming he didn't report in drunk and ram the airplane into the control tower, that is. And I wouldn't think so. While Dubya might have been an irresponsible kid who drank too much, nothing I've heard indicates him carrying it that far.)
Posted by: markm on May 10, 2003 08:52 PMAbout the term "chickenhawk", which originally referred to a sexual predator in a mens prison: The first non-sexual reference I've seen for this was Dan Quayle, who allegedly [1] was pulling strings to get into a safe National Guard position at the same time as he was quite publicly in favor of the Army drafting other young men to fight in Vietnam. If all that's true, he was a hypocrite and a coward, and deserves the name. But now it's been stretched to the point of being applied to damned near anyone who didn't or couldn't get into combat, but 30-some years later is not categorically against fighting any war for any reason. And I definitely resent that new definition. It even applies to me, with my 9 years of honorable service in the Air Force.
As a child, I was for winning the Vietnam War until it became obvious that with our so-called leaders that just wasn't going to happen. (My opinion by the time I reached 18 in 1971: Johnson was neither willing to take the political flak involved in adopting a strategy with any chance of winning, nor that involved in pulling out. Nixon knew the war was lost before he took office, but was dragging it out for political advantage. Both were getting people killed for no good reason.) So I thankfully took my high draft lottery number and stayed out of the bungle in the jungle. And that's probably a good thing for the Army; I would have made a terrible infantryman.
I enlisted six years later, when the chances of a war starting were at an all-time low for the training and the family benefits. And I was guaranteed a specialty, avionics tech, which came with the training I wanted but also would have just happened to keep me in a fairly protected position even in a combat zone - probably safer than Bush was when learning to fly an obsolete fighter in the States.
And I certainly am now, and always have been, for any war that will both pull down a murderous dictator and advance major American interests, if it is winnable without disproportionate cost and if our leaders are going for a winning strategy.
So, absent any evidence that Bush was both pro-war in 1968 and simultaneously asking people to pull strings to keep him out of it, if he's a chickenhawk so am I.
[1] I have no idea whether the claims about Quayle were true. He certainly looks too naive to have known strings could be pulled when he was 20-something, let alone to have used his father's contacts to pull strings himself. Far more likely that his father was pulling the strings, and Quayle didn't even know. Likewise, Dubya may have been trying for a real combat flying position, and his father arranged to trick him with a unit that was then in combat, but was going to be back in the states before the kid was trained. I can appreciate how a father might feel the need to protect his kids - but what a contrast to, say, Senator Joe Kennedy, who let his two oldest boys go into two of the most dangerous WWII combat fields, getting Joe Jr. killed and Jack somewhat disabled. (Jack just squeaked through the Presidential election, so without his Silver Star there never would have been a President Kennedy - and the old bootlegger might have thought that prize was worth the cost. After all, he had four sons.)
Considering a third case, how the Army kept Gore wrapped in a protective cocoon (journalist, desk job in Saigon instead of out in the field trying to take pictures and fight for his life at the same time, bodyguards), starts me wondering if there was actually any string pulling at all in these cases. It would have been difficult for Gore Sr. to have arranged all that without running into some stubborn old officer with his retirement already assured and no need to kowtow to unreasonable demands from any Senator. I think it's equally likely that the high Army staff got worried that the Senator would be seriously pissed off if Jr. got himself killed, and arranged the cocoon on their own. The National Guard arrangements might have similarly happened "on their own" as soon as someone noticed who the father was, although I don't see how Quayle and Bush would happen to apply there if they actually wanted active service...
Posted by: markm on May 10, 2003 09:50 PMhi markm,
"A year and a half in Alabama and nobody remembers him?
Quite possibly. I'm thinking about whether I could find anyone from my Basic Training in 1978 who would remember me."
yes, they would--if you happened to become president of the usa. they would remember you. and if one of your army mates had become president, i feel pretty confident that you would remember them (assuming that you had actually gotten to know the person somewhat. unmits can be large...)
Posted by: cas on May 11, 2003 02:12 AMNow I am interested...
cas, would you remember someone you served with if a couple years later his father was named head of the CIA? Some people couldn't tell you who the director of the CIA is, but military folks can. Wasn't Poppy a congressman? Does anybody ever talk about who is the "congressman's son" in the service? Guess that's just in the movies.
Must say, Bush at least went through the motions. What do you think of Cheney saying he 'had other priorities' and Tom Delay saying something like the minorities took his spot? It is odd that many in the democratic leadership did serve and so many 'patriotic' screamers for blood didn't.
http://www.awolbush.com/whoserved.html
And what's the deal about Bush saying in his book that he 'continued to fly for several years' when he only flew less than two from the point he referred as I understand it.
ya here it is...
http://www.talion.com/georgebush.html
"In his book, Mr. Bush offers a lovely-sounding (but bald-faced) lie to describe his F-102 fighter pilot experience: "I continued flying with my unit for the next several years," he writes, but in fact he was suspended from flight duty in August 1972 and didn't fly at all for the last two years of his service."
----
another thing, some I meet talk like Poppy wasn't in a position to help him get in the Guard. Wasn't Poppy a big wig? Wasn't he a congressman and a millionaire? What else do you need? I thought those were the too main ingredients.
Poppy was a millionaire and a congressman what the hell else do you need? To say W's Daddy wasn't in a position to pull strings is a bunch of hooey. There family has been about string pulling for decades.
http://www.famoustexans.com/georgebush.htm
"In 1953, Bush got money from Brown Brothers Harriman and, with partners Hugh and Bill Liedtke, formed Zapata Petroleum. By the late 1950s they were millionaires....
Career: Political leader. Received the Distinguished Flying Cross for Bravery during World War II; U.S. congressman from Texas (1966-1970), ambassador to the United Nations (1971-1974); Special Envoy to China (1974-1975); Republican National Chairman (1975-1976); Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) director (1976-1977); vice president of the U.S. (1981-1989); president of the U.S. (1989-1993).
In 1964, Bush campaigned against the Civil Rights Act. He lost that election but was elected to Congress in 1966 and again in 1968. He was defeated in the race for Senate by Democrat Lloyd Bentsen in 1970"
Posted by: Sal on May 11, 2003 06:03 AM> In 1964, Bush campaigned against the Civil Rights Act.
Not unlike the vast majority of southern Dems at the time. The votes to pass it came from Northern Repubs....
You were getting ready to denounce Sen. Robert Byrd, who filibustered on this issue, right?
Posted by: Andy Freeman on May 12, 2003 12:57 AMBush wasn't in Alabama for a year and half. He was there for a few months. And the Guard is an extremely part-time thing - a couple weekends a month, generally - so, if he'd been there for 4 months, he'd have been on base for maybe 4 days per month - maybe parts of 16 days.
That's a lot less than a year and a half - and makes it more likely no one would recall him especially out of the thousands that were on that base.
Posted by: Bill Hobbs on May 12, 2003 02:45 PMLet me amend the comment above: That's 16 days on the base IF there were drills scheduled. We already know that by the time Bush was transfered to the Alabama base, he'd missed the Sept. drills, but - it being the Guard - he was allowed to make the time up later.
And of course we know he was honorably discharged having put in more than the minimum amount of time he was required to serve under his enlistment contract. Hence, he was discharged early.
Posted by: Bill Hobbs on May 12, 2003 02:47 PMHmmmm, that reminds me. I gotta invest in more Reynolds aluminum stock.
Posted by: Robin Roberts on May 12, 2003 06:57 PMhi bill,
maybe you are right, but from my own training in the reserves (admittedly in a different country), you also took more time, a chunk of training time as well that was scheduled in blocks-two week periods--to do more in depth training--there is not much one can do in a weekend.
Cas:
As someone who managed sign-ins (logging yourself in and out to account for your attendance) for our AF Reserve unit for six years, it was not at all uncommon for someone in the unit to not be 'seen' physically by me for months on end. You do your weekend a month, but scheduling can cause people to work other, alternate weekends or during the week - and their time and points count against the scheduled training weekends, so you just fill out a form and send it to Accounting and Finance, while keeping one for your records in the unit. After three years, you discard those - and they've got to be shredded since personal information's on them.
Sometimes units go on the two weeks en mass, sometimes someone goes over to Germany, or someone goes to Panama or points south, or gets orders cut to go to another unit on the base. People get scattered, but we know where they're at -