The TANG/AWOL story goes to the heart of the Bush message.

[GumboYaYa]

Tweety and the rest have to be made to give it the same attention that they gave the Swift Boat Liars. We have to barrage them with emails and letters starting tonight to force them to cover this.

The heart of Bush's campaign is that he is a straight shooting regular guy. Tweety fawns on him all the time for this very reason. The TANG story shoots that image down completely.

How many regular guys got moved to the top of the National Guard waiting list despite falling far behind others in qualifications. None, unless they happened to have a daddy who knew the Lt. Govenor. If your name was Ordinary Joe and you were fortunate enough to draw one of the few tickets out there to guard Galveston instead of slugging through the mud in Vietnam, you made damn sure to be at every drill on the list. Ordinary Joes who missed drills and refused direct oredrs to take a physical had their asses shipped off to the Mekong Delta. Not George Bush, with the help of his Dady's friends he jumped over numerous qulified candidates to get into TANG and once there had a General watching his back to "sugar coat" his abysmal record.

Bush claims to be a straight shooter, but he has been lying about this for years. He claims he fulfilled his duty, but records show otherwise. He claims no one pulled strings for him but direct testimony and written documents show that he pulled strings to get in the TANG and then pulled strings to avoid having to fulfill the few duties placed upon him.

If questions about John Kerry's record in Vietnam merit scrutiny because he made it a central theme of his campaign, then Bush's record deserves equal scrutiny as the evidence at hand seems to shoot down the central message of Bush's candidacy.

[papau]

1. Why is the fact the NYT has the story at the link below a "secret?"

.....www.nytimes.com/packages/pdf/opinion/lechliter.pdf

[GumboYaYa]

3. Wow, I guess it's no secret anymore.

That is a lot more solid documentation than anything the Swift Boat Liars have.

[Doohickie]

7. "Why is the fact the NYT has the story at the link below a "secret?""

Cuz it's friggin' BORING.

It's out there for the public, but without a little candy coating, no one is gonna read it.

[napi21]

2. The most important part of this is "His failure to perform to TANG

standards, and refusing a direct order to take his physical"! Lots of people will understand how men got into the NG in the 60's, and there are lots who did. What they also know is that the penalty for not obeying orders, or poor performance, was immediate active duty to 'Nam. I think what they'll be pissed about isn't that he got into the NG because of Daddy, but when eh got there, he still didn't do what he was supposed to do!!!

[bushwakker]

8. There are two points

I agree that his getting strings pulled to get into the Guard is not a story - lots did. However, they continue to deny it which makes it a story. You are correct that the biggest part is his failure to perform and the questions as to why he failed to perform.

[shraby]

18. And the biggest question is

when he failed to perform why wasn't he sent to the Mekong Delta?

[Doohickie]

9. The problem is that if he didn't adequately fulfill his duties,

it was up to his leadership at that time to take appropriate action. The fact that they didn't ship his ass of to 'nam implies that they thought he was doing a "good enough" job. Face it folks, even if there is a legit complaint about his service, it's way too late to do anything about it.

You can expose it, and maybe a few undecided voters will turn to Kerry, but this will not wreck the president's reputation.

[napi21]

12. The story is that they didn't activate him because it would have

exposed their own prior failures to enforce the rules on him before that time. They looked the other way for almost his entire tour, and they were covering thier a** by just passing him along with the "Honorable Discharge".

I don't know if that's going to fly this time or not. Most of the Commanders in charge back then are dead from what I understand.

I guess we'll see what happens in the media!

[aquart]

15. Yeah, it will. Reuters is now asking about the medal he didn't earn.

The ribbon he wore in the photograph.
The ribbon he wasn't entitled to wear.

But what is blown to shit and gone, is the carefully cultivated of the good ol' boy who's just like us.

This privileged bastard doesn't think he owes anyone anything, not his country then, not his nation now.

HE DIDN'T DO THE JOB.

Just like with the Presidency. Someone pulled strings and gave him someone else's place, and then he didn't do the job.

[GumboYaYa]

19. Exactly, the story is important b/c iot shows Bush

is not like everyine else. He is a child of privilige who used access to skate through life.

[PsN2Wind]

17. Bulls**t!

In a military that was and has become increasingly political it's not good for the old career to piss off a congressman, head of CIA, head of RNC, etc. His daddy is the most connected man in politics, that is why it was allowed to skate.

[Myrina]

4. My idea for an ad ....

Pics of TANG-man George ...
(voiceover from 9/7's Dem press conference)"...Now we know why Bush was trying so hard to withhold these records. When his nation asked him to be on call against possible surprise attacks, Bush wasn't there."

.... then the August 2001 PDB flashes across the screen ... then shots of George golfing or clearing brush or WTF ever he was doing ...

then the planes hitting the towers. fade to black ...

MORE THAN ONCE, WHEN HIS NATION ASKED HIM TO BE ON CALL AGAINST SURPRISE ATTACKS, BUSH WASN'T THERE.

[GumboYaYa]

6. I like that. It sounds just right for Moveon.

[bushwakker]

5. The story goes nowhere unless Kerry personally calls out Bush

to account for his lost year. Tweety and the rest will pay lots of attention and the Bush campaign will have to respond. I don't think JK has it in him to do it or he's getting really bad advice.

[Doohickie]

10. It would make for an interesting debate question..... (eom)

[DeadHead67]

13. Can you spell Mary Beth Cahill ? . . . . .

It was apparently she who curtailed the Kerry response to the swift boat liars during a good part of August. YOU CAN NOT PLAY NICE WITH THESE FUCKWADS!!! THEY PLAY FOR KEEPS, THEY FIGHT DIRTY, AND THEY KILL PEOPLE!!! They've already killed 1,000 of OUR wonderful men and women in the prime of their lives, not to mention God knows how many innocent bystanders. WHATEVER IT TAKES IN THIS CAMPAIGN, THEY MUST BE STOPPED. . .

[bushwakker]

14. To me this is a no brainer

a big fat juicy 85 mph meatball right down the plate - just swat it out of the park.

[A_Possum]

11. He's very "proud" of some pretty damn lousy service

I guess he thinks if you just put on a uniform and spend a lot of taxpayers' money to get pilot training before you cut out to have some fun, that's something to be proud of.

Sort of like Cheney, with "more important things to do" than serve.

Peas in a pod.

[alcuno]

16. * said, "I did my duty."

True or false. * opened the door.

[aint_no_life_nowhere]

20. Bush started all of this when he wore that flightsuit and started a war

in Iraq. He's the one who called himself a War President. He's the one who said "Bring It On" and did photo-op after photo-op with military uniforms in the background at his speeches, even serving plastic turkeys on surprise visits to the front. He's the one who has pushed on us his image of the Commander-In-Chief of an army on the battlefield.

Disregarding for a moment Kerry's own intellectual abilities and political skills, I feel that many people have supported Kerry because of his military record and that fact that he makes George Bush look very small by comparison.

The SwiftBoat smear didn't come about because Kerry made his Vietnam service an important part of his campaign. Kerry's Vietnam experience is seen by the public as important because BUSH MADE HIS WAR PRESIDENT ROLE THE SINGLE MOST ESSENTIAL ELEMENT OF HIS OWN PAST 4 YEARS IN OFFICE.

[grasswire]

21. hey, that's true!

He started it when he moseyed across the deck of the carrier and wore NAVY wings.