The military experience of the candidates thirty years ago is really of no consequence to anyone except the thousand-plus soldiers who have died, their grieving families, the tens of thousands of soldiers and Guardsmen who are now in Iraq, our allies and former allies around the world, and the millions of American middle- and lower-class taxpayers who will pay the half-trillion dollar bill for the cost of Bush's apprenticeship in the art of nation-building. Notably, George W Bush failed at keeping our soldiers out of harm's way and at "democratizing" and rebuilding Iraq, but did indeed succeed at settling his family vendetta. After all, Saddam Hussein did not try to kill Kerry's dad.
Actual Guardsmen, who are paying for Bush's on-the-job training with their own blood and tears, are not amused:
Retired Air Force Gen. Merrill A. "Tony" McPeak said in a statement, "Until we know the truth about President Bush's service -- how he got into the Guard, how and why he neglected his duty, how and why he was not disciplined -- this issue will hang around and smell up the place."
Retired Adm. Stansfield Turner, a former CIA director under the Carter administration, said, "The president dishonored the Guard decades ago, and he dishonors them today by the way he misuses and mistreats them. He's turned our Guard and Reserve forces into a backdoor draft. . . ."
Because of the increasingly desperate situation in Iraq, one that America is now forced to face regardless of who is president, the point comes back to the fundamental questions of leadership and character in a military setting: Were Bush's Air National Guard absences and the missed physical exam due to drug use, or a mandatory sentence of community service, or what? Kerry has no absences to explain — why does Bush?
Why is it that not one of the guys Bush supposedly served with has come forward to offer personal reminiscences about his service? Kerry's did — why not Bush's?
...the Securities and Exchange Commission declined to make public testimony provided by Vice President Dick Cheney during the agency's probe into Halliburton, which Mr. Cheney ran as chief executive from 1995 to 2000, when he resigned to join George W. Bush in a run for the White House.
[...]
Meanwhile, regarding Mr. Cheney's testimony, "Since the records were compiled for law-enforcement purposes, the release of which could reasonably be expected to interfere with enforcement activities undertaken or likely to be undertaken by the Commission, I am withholding them," wrote Valerie Lewis, the branch chief in the SEC's Freedom of Information Act Office.
The SEC had investigated the company's failure to disclose a 1998 accounting change made when Mr. Cheney was still running Halliburton. It found Halliburton's change in its accounting treatment for cost overruns on construction projects was appropriate, but that failing to disclose it for a year and a half misled investors. The agency said the then-new accounting treatment reduced losses on several large construction projects.
You can almost understand Cheney's eagerness to mislead voters, or Congress, or US soldiers -- but misleading Halliburton investors? That's downright unenthical, and it sends the wrong message to potential campaign contributors who expect something tangible from their investment in a Bush-Cheney administration. Fortunately, once in office, Cheney was able to focus his generosity on Halliburton investors after his initial apparent deception.
The SEC, four years after the reasonable onset of investigative action against Cheney/Halliburton, has suppressed its role as the voice of the small investor and instead is doing its part to insulate Cheney's reputation and its necessary shroud of secrecy.
