White House Releases Bush's Guard Records

Great Debates
101

So let me understand - If Kerry was lying to his wife and sleeping with a 20 year old girl in the recent past while contemplating a presidential run, it’s his ‘private life’, and off limits, right? What one does outside of the office should have no bearing on anything, right? It’s no reflection on his capability for exercising good judgement, self-control? Says nothing about his ability to, say, keep his word?

But if George Bush, as a young man over 30 years ago, wasn’t totally diligent about attending guard drills for the last couple of years of a service that otherwise appears to be exemplary, THAT is a scandal that is completely relevant to his performance as president today?

The double standards are flying fast and furious.

102

See, here’s how ridiculous this Kerry thing is: people can’t even agree on what the freaking allegations are. One minute I read he had an affair with some lawyer between his marriages. Then I read that the father of one of his campaign workers thought he was sleazy. Now Sam says he slept with the campaign worker, in spite of that never having been alleged (to my knowledge), only left to the imagination of the reader.

On the other hand, there’s a fairly clearcut case for asking why there’s no documentation whatsoever for Bush’s Guard service in Alabama. Why is there no evidence that he showed up there? Why is there still no evidence after “all” of the papers are released?

And Sam complains about the double standard? What double standard? On the one hand, we have a legitimate question, and on the other hand we have nothing but vague innuendo. But of course the media is dominated by liberals, so the vague innuendo hasn’t, after two days, received the same amount of attention that the serious question has after 4 years. Oh, the injustice of it all!

I find myself in agreement with friend 'luci. Cognitive Dissonance is the number one threat to our society.

103

Fer chrissakes, Sammy, do you ever bother to get the facts first? Ever?

But let’s see what you do say in this desperate attempt to find some comforting moral equivalence:
“Lied” - You define no lie.
“to his wife” - They were separated on the way to divorce.
“Slept with” - just hit on, she said no, and her dad thinks he’s sleazy now.
“Ability to keep his word” - What word did he give?
No, you can’t even keep your own story straight, can you?

Bush “not totally diligent” - the discussion is about AWOL and desertion in the past, and attempt to cover it up in the right frickin’ now.

It really looks at times like you don’t even know what credibility is, much less how important it is. You just posted some shit you simply made up, and are demanding why it isn’t taken even more seriously than Bush’s possible criminal past, and current moral authority as Commander in Chief?

Now support your allegation about Kerry, or even simply define it, or get lost. You’re not contributing to this discussion at all.

104

And the Bush apologists grow ever more desperate.

Sheesh, Sam, keep up this level of denial, and you’ll be burned out by June, never mind November…

105

The Soviet bomber fleets might have descended upon Saigon, with not enough old Guard F-102’s and Texas-trained pilots there to stop them, and **Sam ** is willing to shrug that off? Gawdamighty. Ain’t enough rolleyes smileys around for that.

106

Hang on here… I’m not accusing Kerry of anything, and I have no idea of what he has actually done. I’m specifically addressing the argument that the entire line of questioning should be off limits because it has to do with Kerry’s PRIVATE life. The same was argued about Bill Clinton. You guys used to scream that all that mattered was what the man did as president or in office before being president, and that his private life should be completely off limits.

But here you are going absolutely ape over allegations that Bush was a Guard slacker 32 years ago. Why are you not applying the same standard to this? If Bush was lazy when he was 25 and did his best to do the absolute minimum to get out of the guard, how is that relevant today? Why is this even an issue?

If you’re about to say it’s because he’s lying and covering up what happened in the Guard, and therefore it’s relevant, be very careful. Because people on the right used the EXACT same argument against Clinton.

I’m not denying anything. I’m not arguing the merits of the case against either Bush or Kerry. I’m asking why YOU think one is of grave importance to the union, while the other is a private matter that should not be discussed.

107

Sam, do you truly believe that fulfilling one’s obligation to one’s country in the form of military service constitutes part of one’s “private life”?

I have no particular issues with accusing Kerry of boinking some intern, if there were actually anything resembling something that might be mistaken for evidence that it happened. I do think that who Kerry might have boinked is completely irrelevant to his abilities as president, and would not think highly of the thought processes of anyone who gave substantiated allegations of an affair much weight in the process of deciding who to vote for, but that’s really neither here nor there.

There are two issues here: one of evidence, and one of relevance.

If there were evidence of this Kerry affair, the media would be entirely entitled to report on it. Those on the left might, in my opinion, protest loudly that the issue is, or should be, irrelevant to the presidential race. But these two are seperate issues.

In the Bush Guard case, there is evidence, and so the media is entitled to report on it, and will precisely as long as they think people are interested in it, this being the nature of market economics.

The Bush Guard case is also relevant, in my opinion, since it highlights past failure to fulfill duties and obligations, and present mendacity in obscuring the facts. If some Bush sex scandal broke, I would hold it to be irrelevant as well.

Now, you might protest that a sex scandal isn’t entirely irrelevant, since it does reflect negatively on character. I submit this would be true if the “60-year old senator boffs 20-year old campaign worker during his second marriage” rumour were the story, but not if the “Seperated-but-not-yet-finalized-divorce politician has sexual liason with peer” story is the operative one. But even in the former case, the relevance isn’t as great as the AWOL case. Think of it from a hiring perspective. You’re interviewing two job candidates. Of one, you learn of an extramarital affair with a younger partner. Of the other, you learn of deliquency at a previous job and a present attempt to cover up the incident. Which candidate is in more trouble, other things being equal? I should think the answer is self-evident.

So in Kerry’s case, we have no evidence, and only marginal relevance at best. In Bush’s case, we have some, though not ironclad, evidence, and substantial relevance.

Now explain to me where the double-standard is again?

108

**Gorsnak ** covered the “merits” of your position pretty well, and I have nothing to add. Now, are you willing to explain why you think the Kerry “news” (as you called it before yet another big step back that you now laughably deny taking) should be given the same attention and outrage as the Bush AWOL story? That is what you’re claiming, after all - that the media has the obligation to report the same volume of sleaze about any candidate? Do you really think they’re all equally bad (as you’ve told us before about pols in your own country)?

Never mind. Just answer the challenge as to why you’ve made shit up, posted it here, and are puzzled at the lack of outrage. Or else knock it off - you’re hurting your case and your own credibility, pretty badly.

109

Sam asked:

Well, some might consider it somewhat important because right now he is sending people in the military to fight and die in his war in Iraq.

Similarly, some might consider it important if, say, a candidate did cocaine when younger and then later in life pushes for hard time for cocaine users.