timberlandko wrote:Kerry saw combat and received combat citations. Bush didn't. Both were in the military, both were awarded honorable discharges, meaning quite unambiguously that both fulfilled their obligations honorably.
That last bit is quite strikingly and surprisingly wrong.
The article below takes the time to point out this exact point ... I mean, who else got their honorable discharge?
- Bobby Rush, weeks after "he went AWOL from his unit to help found the Illinois chapter of the Black Panthers";
- a Texan who later became sherrif, who "skipped out on Army service for several months in 1976 to "patch things up with his ex-wife"';
- John Allen Muhammad (of the D.C. sniper shootings), two years after "he was charged with striking an officer, stealing a tape measure, and going AWOL" ...
In short: "Far from being a mark of exemplar service, the honorable discharge is better thought of as a standard severance, something every soldier receives unless there's significant evidence of misconduct and a commanding officer eager to brave the paperwork, panels, and disciplinary hearings required to send the soldier home with anything less."
Here's the full story:
Quote:DAILY EXPRESS
Dubious Honor
by Josh Benson
Only at TNR Online
Post date: 02.12.04
George W. Bush has a stock response to questions surrounding his service in the Texas Air National Guard in the 1970s: "I did report," he has said. "Otherwise, I wouldn't have been honorably discharged."
But that's not quite true.
A cursory survey shows plenty of examples of servicemen with questionable--and occasionally criminal--histories who have nonetheless collected honorable discharges from the military. Far from being a mark of exemplar service, the honorable discharge is better thought of as a standard severance, something every soldier receives unless there's significant evidence of misconduct and a commanding officer eager to brave the paperwork, panels, and disciplinary hearings required to send the soldier home with anything less. Like any number of other officers, Bush could have ducked out of his service for months and still received an honorable discharge.
Going missing from military service and then squeaking out with an honorable discharge has a rich history among politicians. Current U.S. Representative Bobby Rush, a Democrat from Illinois, served in the army through the mid-1960s, becoming progressively more involved with radical antiwar groups. In 1968, after Martin Luther King's assassination, he went AWOL from his unit to help found the Illinois chapter of the Black Panthers. Weeks later, he was honorably discharged.
In 1999, a Texas sheriff up for reelection saw his candidacy unravel after local newspapers reported that, despite a subsequent honorable discharge, he'd skipped out on Army service for several months in 1976 to "patch things up with his ex-wife." (He lost badly in a primary shortly after the revelations broke.)
The list of people who've pulled the AWOL-followed-by-honorable-discharge stunt almost makes it sound chic: A co-star of "Sex and the City"; Igor Stravinsky's biographer and sidekick (later arrested for his desertion in a New Orleans brothel). A few years ago, a guest columnist for the St. Louis Post-Dispatch ruminated on going AWOL from his unit routinely with a "case of beer" to drink himself "into oblivion." "I don't know how, but I did manage to get an honorable discharge."
There's a simple reason these stories are so common: In the military, the status quo presumption is that all soldiers will receive an honorable discharge; if the government wants to change that, "it has to put together a case to overcome that presumption," according to Michael Noone, a professor of law at Catholic University and a retired Air Force judge advocate. Often, even with evidence of misconduct, the commanding officers don't want to bother with the lengthy hearings that securing a dishonorable discharge would require. "There may be lots of reasons why the government decides not to try to overcome that, from laziness to charity. Who knows?" Essentially, Noone says, "All you had to do was let the system run on by inertia, and [the soldier would] get an honorable discharge."
Retired Army Colonel Dan Smith, now a senior fellow in military affairs at the Friends Committee on National Legislation, adds that, oftentimes, even if there were serious questions surrounding a soldier's discharge, it wouldn't show up in the records; soldiers worked out informal agreements with their superiors all the time. "Back in the '70s, all you had to do was talk to your commander and that kind of thing wouldn't necessarily be noted. It would just be verbal." That kind of conversation would have been especially easy for someone with the kind of political connections of a young George W. Bush.
Perhaps more striking is how often serious questions of misconduct have been flat-out ignored. John Allen Muhammad, convicted last November for his participation in the D.C. sniper shootings, served in the Louisiana National Guard from 1978-1985, where he faced two summary courts-martial. In 1983, he was charged with striking an officer, stealing a tape measure, and going AWOL. Sentenced to seven days in the brig, he received an honorable discharge in 1985.
The point of these examples isn't to liken Bush's conduct to anyone else's. Indeed, precisely because his records remain incomplete, any comparisons to other officers are dubious at best. Rather, the point is that Bush's honorable discharge is basically meaningless as a testament to his conduct in the Guard: It would have been possible for Bush to earn an honorable discharge whether or not he skipped out on his duties.
Even if Bush did go AWOL, that doesn't disqualify him from serving as president. The country, to its credit, has always been willing to forgive the youthful transgressions of its leaders. More worrisome is that Bush refuses to own up to his conduct in the Guard, hiding instead behind an inconsequential discharge letter and pretending that it's evidence enough of his sterling record of service. "You don't just say, 'I did something' without there being verification," Bush has said. "Military doesn't work that way." Except that, sometimes it does.
