Democrats & Liberals: Archives

Yeah. What did Bush mean by saying he released records. I don’t remember that. Why didn’t Russert follow up with that?

Bush: “If we still have them, but I you know, the records are kept in Colorado, as I understand, and they scoured the records.”

Who are “they”? What did they “scour”? What the heck is he talking about?

-Cf

He should have to explain all his lies. Has he ever come forward and explained his assertion in the 2000 campaign that he had never been arrested since his college days. Then a week before the election, documents surfaced where he had been arrested for DUI in Maine and his license suspended. He was 29 or 30 years old for the second arrest.

There is a pattern of lies here. The big one being in the 2003 State of the Union where Iraq had purchased uranium raw materials from Niger. If the media can jump on Dean for the “war cry” because he had the perception of being angry, they sure as heck can go after Bush for his falsehoods.

Russert should have challenged Bush on his administration (Cheney in particular) influencing our intelligence agents to bias their reports to build up the Iraq threat. These guys must be able to operate independent of political pressure or their reports are meaningless. I still haven’t seen anything other than we had no proof that Hussein wasn’t running a WMD program. Is that all that’s needed to send our boys to war?

The problem is, Meet the Press has to hit so many topics in a certain amount of time. Therefore, Russert could not go proding for the truth.

Also, they sent an edited copy to the White House for approval so what was shown was not the full interview.

The Story here (according to Salon), is that the records that would show the extent of Bush’s absence qualify as private files which are kept confidential pending the personal authorization of the subject. Also, his absence is not covered under national military codes of justice, since he was not on active duty, but instead on the state codes, and the local commanders have a lot of discretion as to how they hand out punishments. What Bush die was wrong, but because the local commanders didn’t push it, he got an honorable discharge.

Basically, he gets off on a technicality.

My favorite part, where Russert really threw a softball was this:

Russert: You were allowed to leave eight months before your term expired. Was there a reason?

President Bush: Right. Well, I was going to Harvard Business School and worked it out with the military.

What the heck does “worked it out with the military”? Why didn’t Russert ask that?

Russert’s question is weird, when you think about it. His very question hands Bush a gift-wrapped, packaged answer to all of his accusers: “You were allowed to leave eight months before your term expired. Was there a reason?” It’s as if Russert already knows that Bush had permission.

How could he know this? Because it’s the most obvious and logical explanation. The real scandal is not so much that he was a common criminal deserter, but that he was the beneficiary of back-door dealings that allowed him to legally avoid his duty (this is business as usual for Bush, it seems).

Someone once pointed out that it doesn’t count as “Absent With Out Leave” if you have been actually given “Leave” by your superior officer, which is almost certainly the case here. It’s painfully obvious that NOBODY is alleging that Bush stopped showing up for the Guard without telling people about it, that they didn’t know where he was.

I mean, it’s not like he’s a fugitive!

Obviously he had gotten some form of leave, or at the very least somewhere in the chain of command there was a person who decided that Bush didn’t need to serve his country the same as most of the other guardsmen.

The question is not “Did you desert your unit like a coward?” More precisely, the question should be “How the heck did you ‘work things out with the military’ to avoid your patriotic service obligation? Did this arrangement by any chance involve any power-broking or unethical dealmaking by your family?”

Russert was focused on the “deserter” and “AWOL” epithets (words that some exuberant anti-Bush pundits have thrown around) trying to make Bush squirm in response to those particularly harsh terms. The real story is not that he was AWOL (he wasn’t). The real story is as Bush put it: he simply “worked things out”.

Journalists, stop trying to look into hyperbolic AWOL charges and look into the truly disgusting cronyism that is *most likely* behind Bush’s apparent dereliction of duty.

-Cf

No, no, he doesn’t get off the hook that easy: He failed to show up for a whole stretch of time that he was obligated to show up for. That’s being AWOL. Now, he didn’t abandon his post during one of those sessions, which would have had the federal UCMJ on his ass. But he had a pattern of absence, including missing a physical that forced the Air National Guard to ground him. That at least put him under the State USMJ.

What got him out of it is blindingly obvious. His dad pulled strings. Since the commanders of the National guards have great leeway in deciding punishments, Bush could get away with it, with a few cram sessions no one ever saw him attend.

What gets me is that Bush is an underachiever who’s thrived by his connections. Because of that, we’re stuck with an incompetent president who takes it as a sore point when people question the PR and propaganda he smokes screens his past and his failures with.

Whatever the “official” story is, I’m sure rules were bent and exceptions made because Bush I was already a Congressman and then Ambassador to the UN. The fact of the matter is that W. clearly got preferential treatment compared to others serving, which shows a disrespect for the system and an attitude that he’s above the law.

Stephen, I take your point: I wasn’t trying to imply that Bush is less of a sleazeball because his family pulled strings instead of him simply abandoning his post to go on a bender.

From what some Bush defenders are saying, it’s normal for the National Guard to occasionally grant unusual leaves, such as for family emergencies or critical career needs. That said, Bush’s leave seems egregiously long, politically motivated (to work on a campaign?), and poorly timed (during a war!?).

If his commanders actually gave him oral if not written permission to disappear, then it’s not plain old AWOL. It’s more like a “conspiracy to commit AWOL”, or something like that. My point was that what he did is *worse* than just running away from the base - it’s worse because it is organizational corruption, not just the ethical failings of an individual person. Maybe we can drag the whole Bush family in on RICO charges!

-Cf

The reason that Tim Russert didn’t ask the hard questions was not that he didn’t have enough time, but because he can’t get away with it. Remember Helen Thomas? Anyone journalist who is critical to Bush’s face, never gets another opportunity to interview him.

Tammy, I do believe you are 100% correct.

-Cf

Back in August of 2003 I saw copies of military documents that addressed Mr. Bush’s disciplinary orders. He was assigned to duty in Colorado. The address is www.talion.com/georgebush.html

When I tried to access this site two days ago, only two of the links to the copies worked. The rest of them led to an error page. The two document copies that did work were rather benign, and not too damaging to Mr. Bush’s story about his military duty. Does any one out there know of a site where one can view these document copies, or does any one have them downloaded?

It is apparent by both the comments posted on this site and the questions raised by Russert that there are far too many people in this nation who have no knowledge whatsoever about how our military actually functions. The way in which you may not be present on a given drill date is that you serve the same amount of time on another day whether it be in training, flying missions or supporting another unit at another location. One way another service was rendered. Soldiers don’t just get paid nor do they get credit nor do they get honorable discharges for not serving.
Partisan politics blinds many.

It is interesting that the link to the person who wrote the comment above “explaining” how the military works does the same thing the links to Mr. Bush’s damaging military record do - it goes to an error page. hmmmmm

The writer (I can not read the “name”) neglects to point out Mr. Bush’s privileged status. He has worked the “privileged few” routine all his life. I refer the readers to an op-ed by Bob Herbert in today’s NY Times. It gives a telling discription of Mr. Bush’s method of operation, mentioning among other things, Bush’s “cavalier” attitude regarding his responsibilities in the Guard while his contemporaries were dying in Vietnam. Bush approved of the war, but jumped ahead of 500 on a list waiting to get into the National Guard so he could, apparently, avoid going himself.

Yes, I am sure the military does not give pay and honorable discharges to “soldiers” unless they serve their duty, but I wonder if there is room to consider the thought that some “soldiers”, the sons of the rich and influential, are given special consideration from time to time.