John Forbes Kerry Refuses to Release Military Records

Pretty funny, Trader_J.
I remember you denouncing the "greed" of our people in the military last year, if I've got the time period right. Or was it the "greed" of veterans... maybe it was both. They were silly enough to think they should have better benefits for themselves and their families. Golly, I wish I had that thread handy. It would be perfect to show the folks right now. At least I can get a chuckle from yet another example of your perfidy.

 

I don't know about some of you bloodthirsty freaks, but four months of that would be more than enough for me. I'm well aware that others spent much more time there, willingly and otherwise, but to b**** about his spending ONLY four months chasing down the enemy through the brush seems a little absurd, even for the regular dunce cap wearers around here.

This board is quite a service. One can drop by every three or four days and within twenty minutes or so have a pretty good read on what's been ailing the am-radio caricatures and the Fox news types without actually having to subject one's self to the torture not only of listening to the dreck but of the interminable commercials.

Yeah, actually, you am-radio listening necks - how do you do it? I mean, as far as you're concerned those blowhards are really on the money! They really nail it! Yeah! And the callers get it! Yeah! You know, fine. I'm sure many of you think that the funny pages in your daily newspaper are pretty damn amusing. Hey, it's a big old world. Anyway, how can you possibly stand 8 minutes of 'information' followed by 12 minutes of ads? That more than anything is what I don't get, seriously.

 

andy -

You do know about the ignore feature, right?

It seems clear Trader_Jorge is trying to rattle you - maybe it's time to let it go.

 

http://www.thesmokinggun.com/archive/0421041kerry1.html

Enjoy. It's one of the official reports released today (and I think a few more are coming). How long did it take for Bush to release records? How long did it take Kerry?

Remember, both ultimately required coercion to release their records.

 

Well the Records are released, and Kerry really was heroic. He had shrapnel in his rear, and was bleeding from his arm, when he jumped in the water and rescued another soldier that had been thrown overboard from his own raft, and was currently under fire from both banks of the river. Kerry then also ordered his boat to turn around and tow the other boat to safety.

Tell me, Bamma, just how dishonerable was Kerry's service again?

The thing is that it's just a portion of what Kerry did. Unlike Bush all of Kerry's officers seem to remember him showing up for duty and speak very highly of him and his service. At this time GW Bush was failing to take his physical, and being removed from active flight duty in the Air Guard back at home.

Now I'll admit that both of these two very different military careers were a long time ago, and may or not be relevant at all in the Presidential race. But this thread was started by a Bush supporter so I see no problem with making the comparison for the purpose of this thread, if it influences anyone to vote differently or not, is another thing.

 

That's all we asked for. If Bush is going to be asked to release records, Kerry should do the same. I'm glad he did release them now.

 

Bush still hasn't released everything.

 

bammaslammer do you understand the First Ammendment or the legal standard of "treason"?

One of the principals to our freedoms is that we can say pretty much anything we want about our political leaders and military and not end up in a gulag for being a traitor. I have great respect for our troops, even you, and don't like it when people start calling them baby killers. That said its their right to do so. Unless there was known collusion with the enemy merely calling our troops "baby killers" in no way constitutes treason.

Anyway no matter how you slice it Kerry still served willingly in hazardous duty and distinguished himself enough that he was awarded the Silver Star (something that neither you or TJ seem to be contesting, yet) so if anyone deserves to vent about Vietnam it was him.

That said I don't think military service is a requisite to higher office and wasn't really a big issue for me. Frankly until now I really didn't know that much about Kerry's service but after reading the USA Today article you posted I am definately impressed at Kerry's bravery even if he is an ambitious climber.

 

I have been considering it. Sometimes it is just too much fun to have a lap dog to beat on (figuratively) even if it only takes the brain power of a tulip to do it.

I just have to remember not to go off like Achebe.

 

It helps to think of him as a comedian. The guy has skirted the edge of being booted many times... shoot, I've been surprised before that he wasn't, but remember that his biggest delight is if you take him seriously and become angry. Trader_J just eats that up.

Where is Achebe? I thought he'd be back by now.

 

It is what he did afterwards that was the worst. The man actively helped the cause of the enemy by parroting the propaganda line of American soldiers as brutal, evil, inhuman sonuvabitches. It's bad enough he didn't have the fortitude to stay longer than 4 mos. in a combat zone (I was in Somalia for the entire time my unit was over there. No free ride home for me, but I didn't want one even though it was a place that made hell seem hospitable) but far worse what he did when tried to make himself a public figure by hitching his ambitions to the anti-war movement. Yeah, that's a guy I want to elect president. A real hero. Sure, I don't like Bush, but Christ, any warm body is a better alternative than Kerry! This guy is not fit to be president and if the American people are dumb enough to elect this rudderless fool, we deserve whatever horrors follow from his bumbling.

 

Have you just decided to be a bobblehead and parrot the party line now?

 

The comfort the enemy got from the anti-war movement was that it helped end the war. There's nothing traitorous about that. If you don't like his stance on the war that's fine, but joining a movement against an unjust war isn't a traitorous thing. If the unjust war ends because we pull out and the enemy rejoices that still doesn't make it traitorous. And rather than getting soldiers killed it saved their lives, as well the lives of others who might have had to go into that conflict.

Protesting and rallying around issues is about as American as it gets.

 

Did you get injured?

 

I stole this from some other website but here's the timeline on the Kerry records.
While at Yale

Kerry
Enlisted in the US Naval Reserves. Feb. 18, 1966
Bush
Bush received student deferments until June 1968; that year marked the height of the Vietnam draft. [Washington Post, 7/28/99]

Applied for spot in Texas Air National Guard in January of 1968, before graduation. Before he graduated, Bush personally visited Col. Walter "Buck" Staudt -- the commander of the Texas Air National Guard -- to talk about the Guard.

After Bush met with Staudt, he applied and was quickly accepted -- despite a waiting list of over 150 applicants.

Contrary to Bush's denials of special treatment, it was later disclosed that a personal friend of Bush's father had secured the spot in the Guard for Bush.

Bush later acknowledges he entered Guard to avoid going to Vietnam: "I was not prepared to shoot my eardrum out with a shotgun in order to get a deferment. Nor was I willing to go to Canada. So I chose to better myself by learning how to fly airplanes." [Houston Chronicle, 5/8/94]

After Graduation
Kerry
Enters and Completes Officer Training School
Bush
Bush joined the Texas Air National Guard after his student deferment ran out when he graduated from Yale in 1968.

"His score on the pilot aptitude section, one of five on the test, was in the 25th percentile, the lowest allowed for would-be fliers." [Dallas Morning News, 7/4/99]

Bush received a direct appointment, allowing him to become a second lieutenant right out of basic training without having to go though officer candidate school. The direct appointment also cleared the way for a position in pilot training school. [Houston Chronicle, 10/10/92; Los Angeles Times, 7/4/99]

On Bush's application to the 147th Fighter Group at Ellington Air Force Base in Texas, Bush was asked what his "Area Assignment Preferences" were. Bush checked the box beside "Do Not Volunteer" for overseas duty. [Application for Extended Duty With The United States Air Force, 5/27/68]

First Assignment
Kerry
Deployed to Western Pacific to Support Operations in Vietnam
Bush
In the summer of 1970, Bush moved into the Chateaux Dijon apartment complex, "a popular spot for singles, it offered fancy street lamps and striped awnings and six pools filled with ambitious secretaries, students and young businessmen. Bush relished his bachelor life there. He played hard, plunging into all-day water volleyball games, but left frequently for 24-hour flight duty in the alert shack at Ellington Field." [Washington Post, 7/28/99]

Request for Second Post
Kerry
On Feb. 10, 1968, Kerry requests duty in Vietnam. He lists his first billet preference as an Officer in Charge of a swift boat and his second as a patrol officer in a River Patrol Boat (PBR) squadron.
Bush
In May 1972, Bush gets a job on an Alabama Senate Campaign. He leaves Houston and requests transfer to the 9921st Air Reserve Squadron in Alabama. Although Bush notes his aeronautical rating as "flying status," his request is turned down because the 9921 was a postal unit. His transfer is later approved to a different Alabama unit. [AF 1288--Bush signature, 24 May 72; Approved: 26 May 72]

Second Assignment
Kerry
Kerry leaves his post on the Gridley, and becomes a student at the Naval Amphibious Base, in Coronado, California in preparation for service on a swift boat in Vietnam. He is promoted from Ensign to Lt. JG and extends his active duty commitment by six months.
While in Vietnam Kerry is involved in more than a dozen missions receiving hostile fire.

He is wounded three times and decorated with three Purple Hearts, a Bronze Star and a Silver Star. Kerry is ordered by Naval regulations to return home after being wounded three times.

Bush
During Bush's service in Alabama:
He is suspended from flight status for his failure to take required annual medical exam. [Washington Post, 2/15/02; Aeronautical Orders, Number 87, 29 Sept 72; AFM 35-13, Para 2-29m]

He attends the Republican National Convention in Miami, Florida with his father. [Bill Minutaglio, First Son, p. 144].

Pay records released by the White House show that he was paid for 2 days service during the six-month period covering the Blount campaign. [White House Release: Bush Pay Records]

Bush's superior officers were unable to complete his annual evaluation for 1972 because, "Lt. Bush has not been observed at this unit during the period of report." [AF-77, 2 May 73]

Additional Service
Kerry
Completes Full Active Duty Commitment
Bush
According to records released by the White House itself, Bush may fallen short on minimum requirements expected for Guard members. Bush served 25 days of combined active and weekend Guard duty between May 27, 1972 and May 26, 1973, even though minimum requirements were one weekend a month--24 days a year--plus another 15 days of active duty. Moreover, in 1973 Bush received 15 extra (called "gratuitous") points toward the 50 points needed each year toward his retirement. Guard members commonly received such extras if they had already met the minimum 50 points each year without the additional points. Bush only earned 41 points during the 1972-3 year. According to Wayne Rambo, who was chief administrative officer of the Alabama unit to which Bush was assigned, "that would have been a decided violation of the norm" because extra points were meant "only as a reward to reservists for meeting their bottom line." [Boston Globe, 2/11/04; Memphis Flyer, 2/16/04]

 

Here's a smoking gun. John Kerry has killed at least twenty people.



http://www.thesmokinggun.com/archive/0421041kerry2.html


They were all armed Viet Cong, but hey, gotta steal those Republican attacks before they can use them against you!





http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/national/AP-Kerry-Purple-Hearts.html?hp
Kerry's Military Records Show a Highly Praised Officer
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

Published: April 21, 2004


WASHINGTON -- Records of John Kerry's Vietnam War service released Wednesday show a highly praised naval officer with an Ivy League education who spoke fluent French and had raced sailboats -- the fruits of a privileged upbringing that set him apart from the typical seaman.

With Republicans questioning his service in Vietnam, the Democratic candidate for president posted more than 120 pages of military records on his campaign Web site. Several describe him as a gutsy commander undertaking a dangerous assignment in Vietnam and detail some of the actions that won three Purple Hearts, a Bronze Star and a Silver Star.

Kerry's most harrowing experience came during the nearly five months when he commanded a swiftboat along Vietnam's Mekong Delta. The future Massachusetts senator was commended for gallantry, heroism and valor during the tour, which was cut short when Kerry was wounded three times and sent back to the United States.

Throughout his four years of active duty, Kerry's superiors gave him glowing evaluations, citing his maturity, intelligence and immaculate appearance. He was recommended for early promotion, and when he left the Navy in 1970 to run for Congress, his commanding officer said it was the Navy's loss.
.
.
.

 

So, let me get this straight. The opposition is arguing by implication that some guy in his 20's is able to manipulate the Navy because he (and those in the Navy going along with it) recognizes that in 2004 he will be running for President and needs a good war resume because the guy he's running against doesn't but petends he does.

They then argue that the wounds Kerry received aren't horrific enough, didn't maim enough, were not deadly enough (after all, if he had just died out there in the Mekong Delta like he was suppossed to, they wouldn't have to contemplate defeat in November).

They further argue that his three wounds did not qualify him to leave Vietnam, this is evidence of his dishonorable service, and so back to the first and second arguments.

A side argument is that Kerry plays too much on his Vietnam experience and he should just keep quiet about it... Why? Because that would spare Bush the anxiety of having to talk about his Vietnam-era record and allow this administration to wrap itself in the flag even more than it is doing now.

Republicans may disparage Kerry's frequent references to Vietnam, but let's assume there was a Dem in the WH with Bush's resume and similar foreign policy disasters who happened to be running against a Repub with something similar to Kerry's biography. Does anyone doubt that the Repub campagin would have been much more aggressive and over the top touting their candidate's glorious history in Vietnam?

TWENTY GOOK KILLS!!!!! WHAT A MAN!!!! I'VE HEARD HE WAS THE INSPIRATION FOR RAMBO!!!!!!

If this were a competition in a Freshman Logic class, the Republican side of this argument would look like the first wave of my favorite college game, Missile Command. The only real challenge is seeing how few arguments you have to fire in order to shoot it all down. Actually, it reminds me more of the Twain saying (paraphrasing): "In the battle of wits, make sure your opponent is armed, othrwise, it's unsporting to engage in the contest."

 

595 US soldiers have been wounded in the last two weeks.

I hope all their wounds are severe enough and crippling enough so that they will be able to run for national office in 30 years.

 

I have noticed a pattern.

Whenever someone expresses a POV with which andymoon disagrees, he is accused of being something like a bobblehead and is guilty of parroting the (Republican) party line.

Since andymoon is an independent, shouldn't we expect to see this same accusation hurled in the direction of someone parroting the Democratic party line?

We never do. Just wondering.... about this inDepenDence you claim. It must be HEAVILY tilted! Notice that there are no "R"s in inDepenDence.

 

Nothing like discussing the issues.