Keltic,
Were you there?
And can you prove it?
If you werent there,why not?
Did you dodge the draft? Did you join the NG or reserves to avoid going?
Show us your records that prove you went to Vietnam.
My uncle John was a fighter pilot with the California ANG during the late 60's,and he also flew the F-102.
Are you saying that all the ANG F-102 pilots were just trying to avoid service?
Bush Guard Service, The True Story
Written by Gordon Bloyer
Thursday, August 26, 2004
This is the only place that you will get the full and true story of President Bush's Air National Guard service. There are no UNANSWERED questions. There are no missing records. He did not miss any meetings. The truth is known. You can find everything in this article, in other publications but none of the others are complete. You have to put them all together to get the full story. It is a shame that our national "objective" media refuse to do their job and put the whole story together.
First, in answer to the charge that Bush was AWOL or missed meetings, George Bush was NEVER assigned to the Alabama Guard. This is a myth promoted by the "objective" media. Here is what really happened. Here is what the head of the Alabama Guard said.
Turnipseed states Bush was never ordered to report to the Alabama Air National Guard. He points out that Bush never transferred from the Texas Air National Guard to the Alabama Air National Guard. He remained in the Texas Guard during his stay in Alabama. This was confirmed by the Texas Guard. And Turnipseed added that Bush was never under his command or any other officer in the Alabama Guard.
Turnipseed added that Bush was informed of the drill schedule of the Alabama Guard as a courtesy so he could get credit for drills while in Alabama for his service record in the Texas Guard. There was no compulsory attendance. This was also confirmed by the Texas Guard.
This was reported in the Chicago Sun-Times and has never been picked up by any other news organization. Turnipseed then also added.
For Bush to be "AWOL" or "away without leave," he would have had to have been assigned to a unit and under its command.
For the liberals reading this, go back and read it again. You see, Bush did NOT miss any meetings. The whole argument is nonsense. He got permission from his commanding officer to go to Alabama and attend meetings as a courtesy so he could attend when he could. Another part of this attack is that no one saw Bush at the meetings he did attend. It was reported that Turnipseed never saw Bush. Read what was reported about that.
Turnipseed reversed gear after retired Lt. Col. John "Bill" Calhoun went public to say that not only did he remember Bush in Alabama, but that it was Turnipseed himself that introduced the two. Oops. And really...the media is completely asleep at the switch on this one. How many people that you saw a few times do you remember from 30 years ago?
Why didn't fellow pilots see Bush in Alabama? The planes being flown by the Alabama Guard were not the same as the F102 that Bush was trained on. Why would pilots see him if he was not flying? That is why Lt. Col. Calhoun came forward to say that was Bush was in his office for study and drill time. Remember he was not assigned to the unit, he did NOT have to be there.
The following is from a letter by Col. William Campenni Ret. published in the Washington Times.
There was one big exception to this abusive use of the Guard to avoid the draft, and that was for those who wanted to fly, as pilots or crew members. Because of the training required, signing up for this duty meant up to 2½½ years of active duty for training alone, plus a high probability of mobilization. A fighter-pilot candidate selected by the Guard (such as Lt. Bush and me) would be spending the next two years on active duty going through basic training (six weeks), flight training (one year), survival training (two weeks) and combat crew training for his aircraft (six to nine months), followed by local checkout (up to three more months) before he was even deemed combat-ready. Because the draft was just two years, you sure weren't getting out of duty being an Air Guard pilot. If the unit to which you were going back was an F-100, you were mobilized for Vietnam. Avoiding service? Yeah, tell that to those guys. The Bush critics do not comprehend the dangers of fighter aviation at any time or place, in Vietnam or at home, when they say other such pilots were risking their lives or even dying while Lt. Bush was in Texas. Our Texas ANG unit lost several planes right there in Houston during Lt. Bush's tenure, with fatalities. Just strapping on one of those obsolescing F-102s was risking one's life.
Here is some information that the "objective" media avoids telling you. John Kerry joined the Navy Reserve, he did not JOIN the Navy. The Reserve was just like the National Guard. Kerry did NOT know he would be sent to Vietnam.
George Bush joined the Guard for a SIX-year term. If you are drafted, you only have to serve TWO years. Bush probably did not need to pull strings to get into a jet fighter unit. Jets required a greater time commitment than normal Guard postings. Pilots from the unit that he joined were being sent to Vietnam. All the publications that have researched this have concluded that there is NO evidence that he used any influence to get into the Guard. The liberal publications will say that there is no evidence, but it is still suspicious. That is a good journalistic standard? So, do you get it, Bush joined a unit that at the time was serving in Vietnam.
The following is research from aerospaceweb.org ........
Nevertheless, we have established that the F-102 was serving in combat in Vietnam at the time Bush enlisted to become an F-102 pilot. In fact, pilots from the 147th FIG of the Texas ANG were routinely rotated to Vietnam for combat duty under a program called "Palace Alert" from 1968 to 1970. Palace Alert was an Air Force program that sent qualified F-102 pilots from the ANG to bases in Europe or southeast Asia for periods of three to six months for frontline duty. Fred Bradley, a friend of Bush's who was also serving in the Texas ANG, reported that he and Bush inquired about participating in the Palace Alert program. However, the two were told by a superior, MAJ Maurice Udell, that they were not yet qualified since they were still in training and did not have the 500 hours of flight experience required. Furthermore, ANG veteran COL William Campenni, who was a fellow pilot in the 111th FIS at the time, told the Washington Times that Palace Alert was winding down and not accepting new applicants.
As he was completing training and being certified as a qualified F-102 pilot, Bush's squadron was a likely candidate to be rotated to Vietnam. However, the F-102 was built for a type of air combat that wasn't seen during that conflict, and the plane was withdrawn from southeast Asia in December 1969. The F-102 was instead returned to its primary role of providing air defense for the United States. In addition, the mission of Ellington AFB, where Bush was stationed, was also changing from air defense alert to training all F-102 pilots in the US for Air National Guard duty. Lt. Bush remained in the ANG as a certified F-102 pilot who participated in frequent drills and alerts through April of 1972. ... By this time, the 147th Fighter Wing was also beginning to transition from the F-102 to the F-101F, an updated version of the F-101B used primarily for air defense patrols. Furthermore, the war in Vietnam was nearing its end and the US was withdrawing its forces from the theater. Air Force personnel returning to the US created a glut of active-duty pilots, and there were not enough aircraft available to accommodate all of the qualified USAF and ANG pilots. Since USAF personnel had priority for the billets available, many of the Air National Guard pilots whose enlistments were nearly complete requested early release. The ANG was eager to fulfill these requests because there was not enough time to retrain F-102 pilots to operate new aircraft before their enlistments were up anyway. Bush was one of those forced out by the transition, and he was honorably discharged as a first lieutenant in October 1973, eight months before his six-year enlistment was complete. Bush had approximately 600 flight hours by the time he completed his military service.
The folks at aerospaceweb concluded.........
While Bush did not see combat in Vietnam, it is also obvious he was not seeking a way to avoid the risk of being sent to Vietnam. At the time he was training to be an F102 pilot, ANG units and that aircraft type were based in Vietnam.
In conclusion, there is no evidence Bush got special treatment to join the Guard. He did NOT miss any meetings, he was not assigned to the Alabama Guard. The reason the so called "objective" media holds on to this myth is that it lets them keep asking, where was Bush? The issue of his being grounded is also answered because he would no longer be flying since his plane was obsolete and he did not have enough Guard time left to train in a new jet. You don't need to report for a physical if you are not flying. Duh!
Kerry joined the Navy Reserve and did not expect to go to Vietnam. When Kerry did go to Vietnam the swift boats were not during river patrols. They were doing coastal patrols and were not in much danger. That is when he volunteered to join the Swiftee's. The assignment of those boats was changed after he was accepted for the duty. Surprise, he got action and the rest is disputed history.
The information in this article was published in "George Magazine", "New York Times", "Washington Times", "Chicago Sun-Times", "Washington Post" and aerospaceweb.org.
Those Unresolved Issues Surrounding Kerry's Military Service
Written by Edward L. Daley
Wednesday, August 25, 2004
Before Bill Clinton was impeached back in 1998, liberals everywhere focused almost exclusively on his sexual affair with Monica Lewinsky, saying it was nobody's business but his, and that America needed to just ''move on.'' After his impeachment, they turned their attentions to Kenneth Starr, the man who investigated Clinton, excoriating and slandering the good judge relentlessly for simply doing the job he was appointed to do... a job he did quite well and admirably, by the way.
The one thing they didn't do at any time surrounding the impeachment scandal is concentrate on the single most important aspect of the situation; whether or not the president actually committed perjury and obstruction of justice! Now it's six years later, and candidate Kerry is being confronted with allegations that, among other things, he fraudulently acquired military awards that he did not earn, and knowingly committed war crimes. These charges, if proved true, are not only grounds for the removal from office of a public official, they are so grievous that the penalties for them include long-term imprisonment, and (in the case of the latter charge) possibly worse.
And what are liberals saying this time around? Not surprisingly, they're parroting the same mindless arguments they used the last time one of their top dogs was up to his eyeballs in excrement. Their current tactics are no different than the ones they used in 1998, and include attacking the accusers and preaching to the rest of us that we need to stop living in the past and discuss ''the issues,'' as if possibly electing a felon to the highest office in the land wasn't a HUGE issue.
One babbling left-winger I heard on a talk radio program just the other day actually had the cajones to proclaim to the conservative host, ''We're at war in Iraq,'' and ''We should be talking about how to win the current war instead of what happened in the war we lost.'' That's all we need, some spineless peacenik telling us how important the Iraq War is, as if we, the very people who've supported it from the beginning, didn't already know that. Suddenly the anti-warriors have decided that we ought to concentrate on winning the very war they did everything in their power to prevent!
Talk about a subterfuge, this attempt at political prestidigitation is so conspicuous I have to wonder if they really believe they're going to fool anyone with it. The more I think about it, the more I feel like shouting the same thing at liberals that John McEnroe once did to the umpire of a tennis match he was playing... ''You cannot be serious!'' Of course most of them ARE serious, and some are more than a little delusional. It's this last bunch which disturbs me the most, because none of the people in it seem to have a clue as to what's really going on here.
What they don't understand, or simply won't admit to themselves, is that the Vietnam war, like the Lewinsky affair during the Clinton years, is only the backdrop in this political play. It's the potentially criminal behavior of John F. Kerry which makes up the stage, and John O'Neill's swift boat vets and their supporters constitute the footlights illuminating that stage. This isn't about the past, it's about the veracity, honor, and integrity of a man who wants to be President of the United States right NOW! It's also about how we intend to fight the Iraq War and every other conflict we face in the near future, and anyone who can't understand that shouldn't be allowed to vote in November.
Once again the entire leftist white-washing machine is stuck in full spin mode, while the useful idiots who eat up it's rhetoric like free government cheese, attend protests against George W. Bush and complain about losing rights they never knew they had until Michael Moore pointed them out. The leaders of the Democratic Party have predictably chosen the most deceptive course of action, now that they're faced with the reality that they may well have chosen yet another dishonorable liar to champion their causes.
In the meantime, responsible citizens all over the country have begun to question the sincerity of the junior senator from Massachusetts, and are fast becoming disillusioned by his failure to address the various unresolved issues surrounding his military service. The lefties can badger and berate the ''Swift Boat Veterans For Truth'' all they want, but it's not going to make any difference unless John Kerry comes up with a few reasonable answers to the questions they're raised.
... Now, as a Democrat, what can I say to that except that, because my party has been taken over by an astonishingly self-destructive bunch of lunatics who are so dazzled by Hollywood that they think their ideas make sense, I have to agree that, right now, any president but Bush and any Congress but a Republican-dominated one would be disastrous.
As a Democrat, I would hope that a solid trouncing of our fanatic-ruled party at the polls this November would serve as a wake-up call and remind Democrats that they only get to do the things that the Democrat Party exists to do if they get enough votes to control the White House and Congress. Which requires that you have serious candidates and embrace serious issues that most Americans, not just tiny pressure groups, care about.
And on that day, Democratic moderates can take the party back. And yes, Democratic moderates actually exist. They're all voting for Bush this year, but they'd rather have had a Democratic candidate to vote for ...
President Bush was ranked in the middle of his Air National Guard class and flew more than 336 hours in a fighter jet before letting his pilot status lapse and missing a key readiness drill, according to his flight records belatedly uncovered Tuesday under the Freedom of Information Act.
The Pentagon and Bush's campaign have claimed for months that all records detailing his fighter pilot career have been made public, but defense officials said they found two dozen new records detailing his training and flight logs after The Associated Press filed a lawsuit and crafted new requests under the public records law.
"Previous requests from other requesters for President Bush's Individual Flight Records did not lead to the discovery of these records because at the time President Bush left the service, flight records were subject to retention for only 24 months and we understood that neither the Air Force nor the Texas Air National Guard retained such records thereafter," the Pentagon told the AP.
"Out of an abundance of caution," the government "searched a file that had been preserved in spite of this policy" and found the Bush records, the letter said. "The Department of Defense regrets this oversight during the previous search efforts."
The records show Bush, a lieutenant in the Texas Air National Guard, was ranked No. 22 in a class of 53 pilots when he finished his flight training at Moody Air Force Base in Georgia in 1969.
Over the next three years, he logged 326.4 hours as a pilot and an additional 9.9 hours as a co-pilot, mostly in his the F-102a jet used to intercept enemy aircraft.
The records show his last flight came on April 1972, which is consistent with his pay records that show Bush had a large lapse of duty between April and October of that year, a time he says he went to Alabama to work on an unsuccessful Republican Senate campaign. Bush skipped a required medical exam that cost his pilot's status in August 1972.
<buncha baseless partisan blather snipped>
... He missed that physical because he knew he couldn't pass the recently-instituted drug screening.
Because he was using cocaine.
Read thisd again, PDiddie
... In conclusion, there is no evidence Bush got special treatment to join the Guard. He did NOT miss any meetings, he was not assigned to the Alabama Guard. The reason the so called "objective" media holds on to this myth is that it lets them keep asking, where was Bush? The issue of his being grounded is also answered because he would no longer be flying since his plane was obsolete and he did not have enough Guard time left to train in a new jet. You don't need to report for a physical if you are not flying. Duh! ...
<buncha baseless partisan blather snipped>
August 26, 2004, 10:25 a.m.
The Facts about Bush and the National Guard
The Democratic charges fall apart.
By Byron York
EDITOR'S NOTE: The still-escalating fight over the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth and their criticisms of John Kerry's Vietnam War record has led to new Democratic attacks on George W. Bush and his service in the Texas Air National Guard. "George Bush used his father to get into the National Guard, was grounded and then went missing," says an ad produced by MoveOn.org's political action committee.
Democrats made similar attacks earlier this year. In April, Kerry referred to Bush as a president who "can't even answer whether or not he showed up for duty in the National Guard," and who "has yet to explain to America whether or not, and tell the truth, about whether he showed up for duty." In February, Kerry said he wanted answers about Bush's service in Alabama, saying "Just because you get an honorable discharge does not, in fact, answer that question."
Lost amid all the charges are the facts about Bush's time in the Guard. When did he serve? What did he do? Did he fulfill his responsibilities? Was he in Alabama? In the March 8, 2004, issue of National Review, Byron York investigated and found the answers.
Ask retired Brig. Gen. William Turnipseed whether the press has accurately reported what he said about George W. Bush, and you'll get an earful. "No, I don't think they have," he begins. Turnipseed, the former head of the 187th Tactical Reconnaissance Group of the Alabama Air National Guard, was widely quoted as saying he never saw Bush in Alabama in 1972, and if the future president had been there, he would remember. In fact, Turnipseed says, he doesn't recall whether Bush was there or not; the young flier, then a complete unknown in Alabama, was never part of the 900-man 187th, so Turnipseed wouldn't have had much reason to notice him. But most reporters haven't been interested in Turnipseed's best recollection. "They don't understand the Guard, they don't want to understand the Guard, and they hate Bush," he says. "So when I say, 'There's a good possibility that Bush showed up,' why would they put that in their articles?"
In recent weeks, Turnipseed has found himself in the middle of a battle in which Democrats have called the president a "deserter" who went "AWOL" for an entire year during his time in the Air National Guard. When Democrats made those accusations amplified by extensive press coverage the White House was slow to fight back, insisting that the issue, which came up in the 2000 campaign, was closed and did not merit a response. It was only after NBC's Tim Russert brought the story up during a one-hour interview with the president on February 8 that the White House changed course and released records of the president's Guard service.
Those records have not quieted the most determined of the president's enemies no one who watches the Democratic opposition really believed they would but they do make a strong case that Bush fulfilled his duties and met the requirements for Air National Guard officers during his service from 1968 to 1973. A look at those records, along with interviews with people who knew Bush at the time, suggests that after all the shouting is over, and some of the basic facts become known, this latest line of attack on the president will come to nothing.
FOUR YEARS OF FLYING
The controversy over Bush's service centers on what his critics call "the period in question," that is, the time from May 1972 until May 1973. What is not mentioned as often is that that period was in fact Bush's fifth year in the Guard, one that followed four years of often intense service.
Bush joined in May 1968. He went through six weeks of basic training, a full-time job, at Lackland Air Force Base in San Antonio, Tex. Then he underwent 53 weeks of flight training again, full time, at Moody Air Force Base in Valdosta, Ga. Then he underwent 21 weeks of fighter interceptor training full time at Ellington Air Force Base in Houston. Counting other, shorter, postings in between, by the end of his training period Bush had served two years on active duty.
Certified to fly the F-102 fighter plane, Bush then began a period of frequenyt, usually weekly, flying. The F-102 was designed to shoot down other fighter planes, and the missions Bush flew were training flights, mostly over the Gulf of Mexico and often at night, in which pilots took turns being the predator and the prey."If you're going to practice how to shoot down another airplane, then you have to have another airplane up there to work on," recalls retired Col. William Campenni, who flew with Bush in 1970 and 1971. "He'd be the target for the first half of the mission, and then we'd switch."
During that period Bush's superiors gave him consistently high ratings as a pilot. "Lt. Bush is an exceptional fighter interceptor pilot and officer," wrote one in a 1972 evaluation. Another evaluation, in 1971, called Bush "an exceptionally fine young officer and pilot" who "continually flies intercept missions with the unit to increase his proficiency even further." And a third rating, in 1970, said Bush "clearly stands out as a top notch fighter interceptor pilot" and was also "a natural leader whom his contemporaries look to for leadership."
All that flying involved quite a bit of work. "Being a pilot is more than just a monthly appearance," says Bob Harmon, a former Guard pilot who was a member of Bush's group in 1971 and 1972. "You cannot maintain your currency by doing just one drill a month. He was flying once or twice a week during that time, from May of 1971 until May of 1972." While the work was certainly not as dangerous as fighting in the jungles of Vietnam, it wasn't exactly safe, either. Harmon remembers a half-dozen Texas Air National Guard fliers who died in accidents over the years, in cluding one during the time Bush was flying. "This was not an endeavor without risk," Harmon notes.
THE MOVE TO ALABAMA
The records show that Bush kept up his rigorous schedule of flying through the spring of 1972: He was credited for duty on ten days in March of that year, and seven days in April. Then, as Bush began his fifth year of service in the Guard, he appears to have stepped back dramatically. The records indicate that he received no credit in May, June, July, August, and September 1972. In October, he was credited with two days, and in November he was credited with four. There were no days in December, and then six in January 1973. Then there were no days in February and March.
The change was the result of Bush's decision to go to Alabama to work on the Senate campaign of Republican Winton Blount. With an obligation to the Guard, Bush asked to perform equivalent service in Alabama. That was not an unusual request, given that members of the Guard, like everyone else, often moved around the country. "It was a common thing," recalls Brigadier General Turnipseed. "If we had had a guy in Houston, he could have made equivalent training with Bush's unit. It was so common that the guy who wrote the letter telling Bush to come didn't even tell me about it."
The president's critics have charged that he did not show up for service was "AWOL" in Alabama. Bush says he did serve, and his case is supported by records showing that he was paid and given retirement credit for days of service while he was known to be in Alabama. The records also show that Bush received a dental examination on January 6, 1973, at Dannelly Air National Guard base, home of the 187th (January 6 was one of the days that pay records show Bush receiving credit for service). And while a number of Guard members at the base say they do not remember seeing Bush among the roughly 900 men who served there during that time, another member, a retired lieutenant named John Calhoun, says he remembers seeing Bush at the base several times.
What seems most likely is that Bush was indeed at Dannelly, but there was not very much for a non-flying pilot to do. Flying fighter jets involves constant practice and training; Bush had to know when he left Texas that he would no longer be able to engage in either one very often, which meant that he would essentially leave flying, at least for some substantial period of time. In addition, the 187th could not accommodate another pilot, at least regularly. "He was not going to fly," says Turnipseed. "We didn't have enough airplanes or sorties to handle our own pilots, so we wouldn't have done it for some guy passing through."
On the other hand, showing up for drills was still meeting one's responsibility to the Guard. And, as 1973 went along, the evidence suggests that Bush stepped up his work to make up for the time he had missed earlier. In April of that year, he received credit for two days; in May, he received credit for 14 days; in June, five days; and in July, 19 days. That was the last service Bush performed in the Guard. Later that year, he asked for and received permission to leave the Guard early so he could attend Harvard Business School. He was given an honorable discharge after serving five years, four months, and five days of his original six-year commitment.
The records indicate that, despite his move to Alabama, Bush met his obligation to the Guard in the 1972-73 year. At that time, Guardsmen were awarded points based on the days they reported for duty each year. They were given 15 points just for being in the Guard, and were then required to accumulate a total of 50 points to satisfy the annual requirement. In his first four years of service, Bush piled up lots of points; he earned 253 points in his first year, 340 in his second, 137 in his third, and 112 in his fourth. For the year from May 1972 to May 1973, records show Bush earned 56 points, a much smaller total, but more than the minimum requirement (his service was measured on a May-to-May basis because he first joined the Guard in that month in 1968).
Bush then racked up another 56 points in June and July of 1973, which met the minimum requirement for the 1973-74 year, which was Bush's last year of service. Together, the record "clearly shows that First Lieutenant George W. Bush has satisfactory years for both '72-'73 and '73-'74, which proves that he completed his military obligation in a satisfactory manner," says retired Lt. Col. Albert Lloyd, a Guard personnel officer who reviewed the records at the request of the White House.
All in all, the documents show that Bush served intensively for four years and then let up in his fifth and sixth years, although he still did enough to meet Guard requirements. The records also suggest that Bush's superiors were not only happy with his performance from 1968 to 1972, but also happy with his decision to go to Alabama. Indeed, Bush's evaluating officer wrote in May 1972 that "Lt. Bush is very active in civic affairs in the community and manifests a deep interest in the operation of our government. He has recently accepted the position as campaign manager for a candidate for United States Senate. He is a good representative of the military and Air National Guard in the business world."
Beyond their apparent hope that Bush would be a good ambassador for the Guard, Bush's superiors might have been happy with his decision to go into politics for another reason: They simply had more people than they needed. "In 1972, there was an enormous glut of pilots," says Campenni. "The Vietnam War was winding down, and the Air Force was putting pilots in desk jobs. In '72 or '73, if you were a pilot, active or Guard, and you had an obligation and wanted to get out, no problem. In fact, you were helping them solve their problem."
THE UNENDING ATTACK
Despite the evidence, Democrats have continued to accuse the president of shirking his duty during his Guard career. "He went to Alabama for one year," Democratic National Committee chairman Terry McAuliffe said on ABC on February 1. "He didn't show up. Call it whatever you want, AWOL, it doesn't matter." After Bush made his Guard records public, McAuliffe released a statement saying the documents "create more questions than answers." Other Democrats, as well as an energetic team of liberal columnists and bloggers, echoed McAuliffe's comments.
Perhaps the most impressive accomplishment of Bush's detractors is that they managed to sell the idea mostly unchallenged in the press that Bush's Air National Guard service consisted of one year during which he didn't show up for duty. Far fewer people asked the question: Just how did Bush become a fighter pilot in the first place? Didn't that involve, say, years of work? Bush's four years of service prior to May 1972 were simply airbrushed out of the picture because many reporters did not believe they were part of the story.
It also seems likely that some of Bush's adversaries used the Guard issue as a way to get at other questions about the president. The Guard record was said to have a bearing on Bush's credibility, on the war in Iraq, on his fitness to lead. In addition, some journalists were nearly obsessed with forcing the president to release medical records from his time in the Guard because they hoped those records might reveal some evidence of drug use. The White House did not release the full set of medical records but did allow reporters to view them; the documents were entirely unexcep tional and contained nothing about drug use.
While all that was going on, both the White House and the Bush reelection campaign seemed consistently to underestimate the ferocity and resolve of the president's adversaries. For weeks, as the controversy grew, the president did nothing to defend himself. Those who wanted to speak up in his defense, like William Campenni and Bob Harmon, were not contacted by the White House; instead, they decided to go public on their own. Even when John Calhoun, the man who remembers Bush in Alabama, sent the White House an e-mail saying he had useful information, he received a stock response, without any indication the White House was interested in what he had to say.
Now the evidence is public; anyone who is interested in learning about Bush's service can do so. In the end, the president had the facts on his side. But he also had the good fortune to have the allegiance of men who feel so intensely about the Guard and their service that they wanted to speak out even if the White House didn't seem to care. Men like Campenni and Harmon were deeply offended when Democratic presidential candidate John Kerry equated Guard service during the Vietnam War with fleeing the country or going to jail. That was simply too much. "I'm not a Bushie," says Harmon. "The thing that got a few of us crawling out from under a rock, at no instigation from the White House, was that Guard service was being portrayed as being like a draft dodger."
Keltic,
Also,you admit you werent in the service,and you have the nerve to question someone that was?
Keltic,
You made the claim that Bush 41 was in position to help Bush 43 because of his House service.
Well this is from the official Bush 41 biography...
"...Mr. Bush was elected to the U.S. House of Representatives in 1966 from Texas' 7th District. One of the few freshman members of Congress ever elected to serve on the Ways and Means Committee, he was reelected to the House two years later without opposition.... "
Ways and Means had nothing to do with the House armed services committee.
So,the USAF didnt have to tell Bush anything.
As a member of the ways and means committee,he would have had no reason to know what planes were being phased out.
Then there is this..."A total of 1,000 F-102A interceptors and two-seat trainers were built for the US Air Force, and many were later transferred to Air National Guard units. The last of these aircraft were not withdrawn from service until 1976."
So,your claim that his dad helped him is wrong.
