# Never mind the CBS memos . . . what did Bush do, or not do, in the National Guard? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [October 4, 2004, 6:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/never-mind-the-cbs-memos-what-did-bush-do-or-not-do-in-the-national-guard/267497 "2004-10-04T18:31:39Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 10\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [October 4, 2004, 6:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/never-mind-the-cbs-memos-what-did-bush-do-or-not-do-in-the-national-guard/267497/1 "2004-10-04T18:31:39Z")
The flap over Dan Rather’s hasty reliance on apparently forged documents to show that Bush was an indifferent and disobedient Air National Guardsman during Vietnam has obscured the underlying issue, if issue it be: What kind of guardsman was he? Did he get in through Daddy’s influence or did he not? Did he go AWOL, disobey orders, etc., or did he not? Did he use cocaine during his service, or did he not? Did his commanding officer “sugarcoat” his record, or did he not? Were his records purged just before he ran for governor of Texas, or were they not? These questions were being debated, based on various sources of evidence, before Dan Rather broke that story on _60 Minutes II._ We might as well try to settle it before the election, if we can: What do we **really** know about Bush’s Guard service? As a starting point, here’s the Master’s piece on the issue, written April 2003: [http://www.straightdope.com/columns/030411.html](http://www.straightdope.com/columns/030411.html) ---
**Author:** ![ElvisL1ves](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/5daacb/32.png) [@ElvisL1ves](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ElvisL1ves)\ **Post date:** [October 4, 2004, 6:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/never-mind-the-cbs-memos-what-did-bush-do-or-not-do-in-the-national-guard/267497/2 "2004-10-04T18:43:22Z")
> [@BrainGlutton](#): > > Did he get in through Daddy’s influence or did he not? Yes. TX then-LG Ben Barnes has been giving interviews admitting it and apologizing. > [@](#): > > Did he go AWOL, disobey orders, etc., or did he not? You already cited Cecil. There’s little else to go on. > [@](#): > > Did he use cocaine during his service, or did he not? Ah, 1972, the missing year. Not enough info to confirm it, none to refute it. > [@](#): > > Did his commanding officer “sugarcoat” his record, or did he not? Beyond the requirements of not getting into trouble with the powerful father of a champagne-unit Guardsman? No evidence of it - and that wouldn’t speak to Bush’s own character anyway. > [@](#): > > Were his records purged just before he ran for governor of Texas, or were they not? [Depends on who you believe.](http://www.boston.com/news/nation/articles/2004/02/13/doubts_raised_on_bush_accuser/) > [@](#): > > Retired Lieutenant Colonel Bill Burkett, who has been pressing his charges in the national news media this week, says he even heard one high-ranking officer issue a 1997 order to sanitize the Bush file, and later saw another officer poring over the records and discovered that some had been discarded. > … > George O. Conn, a former chief warrant officer with the Guard and a friend of Burkett’s, is the person whom Burkett says led him to the room where the Bush records were being vetted. But Conn says he never saw anyone combing through the Bush file or discarding records. > > “I have no recall of that,” Conn said. “I have no recall of that whatsoever. None. Zip. Nada.” > > Conn’s recollection also undercuts another of Burkett’s central allegations: that he overheard Bush’s onetime chief of staff, Joe M. Allbaugh, telling a Texas Guard general to make sure there were no embarrassments in the Bush record. All we know. > [@](#): > > What do we **really** know about Bush’s Guard service? Mainly, as he himself said, “When I was young and irresponsible, I was young and irresponsible.” The question is, what is he\* today\*? ---
**Author:** ![John\_Mace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_mace/32/185_2.png) [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)\ **Post date:** [October 4, 2004, 6:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/never-mind-the-cbs-memos-what-did-bush-do-or-not-do-in-the-national-guard/267497/3 "2004-10-04T18:46:35Z")
Call my cynical, but I can’t imagine that YET ANOTHER THREAD on this topic will shed any light on the subject. It’s been done to death here. ---
**Author:** ![ElvisL1ves](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/5daacb/32.png) [@ElvisL1ves](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ElvisL1ves)\ **Post date:** [October 4, 2004, 6:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/never-mind-the-cbs-memos-what-did-bush-do-or-not-do-in-the-national-guard/267497/4 "2004-10-04T18:48:22Z")
The CBS memos have been done to death, by those who have trouble seeing the point, but the OP is explicitly \*excluding \* them. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [October 4, 2004, 6:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/never-mind-the-cbs-memos-what-did-bush-do-or-not-do-in-the-national-guard/267497/5 "2004-10-04T18:50:23Z")
> [@John Mace](#): > > Call my cynical, but I can’t imagine that YET ANOTHER THREAD on this topic will shed any light on the subject. It’s been done to death here. Not since the _60 Minutes II_ flap, it hasn’t. **Razorsharp** started a thread ([http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=277468](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=277468)) which has now gone on for seven pages and which nominally has something to do with this story, but it’s really more about the “liberal media” than anything else. I’m just trying to move the focus away from Dan Rather, who is not running for president, and back to George Bush, who is. ---
**Author:** ![Eve](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/9e8a1a/32.png) [@Eve](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eve)\ **Post date:** [October 4, 2004, 8:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/never-mind-the-cbs-memos-what-did-bush-do-or-not-do-in-the-national-guard/267497/6 "2004-10-04T20:28:37Z")
It’s 2004. I don’t care if both Kerry _and_ Bush bit the heads off live kittens in 1968. I wish to heck they’d start dealing with current issues. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [October 4, 2004, 8:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/never-mind-the-cbs-memos-what-did-bush-do-or-not-do-in-the-national-guard/267497/7 "2004-10-04T20:35:52Z")
> [@Eve](#): > > It’s 2004. I don’t care if both Kerry _and_ Bush bit the heads off live kittens in 1968. I wish to heck they’d start dealing with current issues. Look, what do you expect? Bush is running as an incumbent “war president.” So the Dems nominated a Vietnam vet and attacked Bush’s own Vietnam-ear record. Then the Swiftvets waded in . . . there’s just no way, at this point, to un-issue this issue. But just be patient, there’s three more debates (counting the VP debate tomorrow) and I doubt any of this stuff will come up, even obliquely, in the course of those. ---
**Author:** ![XT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/xt/32/456_2.png) [@XT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/XT)\ **Post date:** [October 4, 2004, 10:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/never-mind-the-cbs-memos-what-did-bush-do-or-not-do-in-the-national-guard/267497/8 "2004-10-04T22:31:57Z")
Give it up BG…the issue is dead. No one except the true political partisans on either side GIVES A SHIT! It didn’t matter to most American’s that Clinton was a draft dodger for gods sake…it only mattered what he stood for, what his stance was on the issues, etc. People care about the issues now…not some obscure bullshit that happened 30 years ago when the two men in question were fucking KIDS. What will Bush/Kerry DO…today??? What will Bush/Kerry do about Iraq? What will Bush/Kerry do about the economy? The environment, social programs, taxes, international relationships, war on terrorism, etc etc etc? What will Bush/Kerry DO??? Dan Rather merely put the nail in the coffin for this issue…it was dead and stinking already, but now its got a stake through its heart. Only good thing Danny boy has ever done IMHO. Let it rest in peace… -XT ---
**Author:** ![John\_Mace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_mace/32/185_2.png) [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)\ **Post date:** [October 4, 2004, 11:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/never-mind-the-cbs-memos-what-did-bush-do-or-not-do-in-the-national-guard/267497/9 "2004-10-04T23:04:00Z")
> [@xtisme](#): > > …when the two men in question were fucking KIDS. They were? :eek: ---
**Author:** ![XT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/xt/32/456_2.png) [@XT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/XT)\ **Post date:** [October 5, 2004, 2:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/never-mind-the-cbs-memos-what-did-bush-do-or-not-do-in-the-national-guard/267497/10 "2004-10-05T02:46:28Z")
Obviously my grasp of english syntax is tenuous at best. I suppose that should have been ‘the two men in question were kids’. :smack: -XT