As we continue to sift through the spotty record of George Bush’s military service, it’s good to keep in mind the point Josh Marshall makes: “This isn’t about what President Bush did 30+ years ago. Or at least it’s not primarily about that. The issue here is that for a decade President Bush has been denying all of these things. He did so last January. He did so again as recently as last month. He’s continued to cover this stuff up right from the Oval Office.”
Or, as our Eric Boehlert puts it, “The controversy, after all, is not merely about how he received a million dollars’ worth of free pilot training and then stiffed the government when it came time to pay it back in service. It’s also about how, for the last decade, Bush and his advisors have done everything possible to distort, if not erase, the truth about Bush’s service record in order to advance his political career.”
Now we have a flood of new jigsaw puzzle pieces, including this strange one from May 19, 1972, in which Bush’s Texas commander writes: “Physical. We talked about him getting his flight physical situation fixed before his date. Says he will do that in Alabama if he stays in flight status. He has this campaign to do and other things that will follow and may not have the time. I advised him of our investment in him and his commitment. He’s been working with staff to come up with options and identified a unit that may accept him. I told him I had to have written acceptance before he would be transferred, but think he’s also talking to someone upstairs.” Another memo records a direct order to Bush to take the physical.
Now, I’ll accept that young Bush was a busy guy, with political campaigns to run and parties to attend — but here he is, he’s been in the Guard for four years, what’s the big deal about a physical? How long does it take, an afternoon? Why was it so important to him not to undergo this routine procedure?
I’m afraid this is the sort of query that leads one toward that other swamp of evasion in the Bush record — those questions about his alleged drug use that have always been answered with nods, winks, comments about having been “young and irresponsible” and denials of drug use carrying carefully crafted expiration dates. Earlier this year, Boehlert reported on the strange coincidence that Bush’s Guard disappearing act almost exactly coincided with the institution of random drug testing for military personnel: “At the time when Bush, perhaps for the first time in his life, faced the prospect of a random drug test, his military records show he virtually disappeared, failing for at least one year to report for Guard duty.”
The odds of our ever knowing the truth about that aspect of Bush’s life are even worse than the odds of our getting his service record clear. And bringing the issue up without knowing the truth is not the sort of thing that makes anyone feel good: Who did or didn’t inhale (or snort) three decades ago ought to be covered by veils of privacy and statutes of limitation.
But decorum feels like surrender in this mad electoral fight. The Bush campaign has gone completely off the rails in its smears of Kerry’s service record. Even if you don’t want to consider the facts and just look at the charges, there’s no equivalency here between the issues under dispute. In one case, we’re arguing over how serious a guy’s battlefield wounds were; in the other, we’re weighing whether to call absenteeism and cover-ups by their proper names. What a falling-off!
It may be ugly, it’s certainly no one’s idea of what this country should be talking about during this election, but with the whirlwind of attention on his military record Bush is reaping what his August barrage against Kerry’s record sowed. It’s rough justice.
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