Bush and the Guard: The Dems Use the Press to Prepare the Battlefield

Should Democrats be pushing the President to get the full story about his Vietnam-era National Guard service? Or, to be more accurate, should Democrats, but not John Kerry himself, be prodding the President to tell the full story of his service, and cheering on reporters who are trying to get to the bottom of it?

It seems doubtful to me that there is any smoking gun in the records, or, as the case may be, formerly in the records (because there is a claim floating around that the record was “cleansed” of any damning material a few years back). But journalists and commentators remain considerably more dubious of the Administration's recent partial release of W.'s records and the sudden materialization of someone who actually remembers seeing him in Alabama. What does seem clear is that, while the President may have served honorably in the strict sense of the term, he didn’t serve very much. He can’t provide many details of what he did for the Guard during his stint in Alabama campaigning for a Republican Senate candidate, who no doubt supported the war, precisely because there aren’t any real details! I think we have the full story -- that George Bush’s National Guard service consisted of getting special treatment to enter the Texas Guard in the first place; then he got special treatment to go to Alabama to campaign; then he got special treatment to get out early to go to Harvard, while people like John Kerry, who probably could have gotten special treatment but didn’t, fought heroically in Vietnam.

That’s the story, and that’s also why the Democrats should want it emphasized now, rather than later or not at all. What Democrats gain from this issue being pressed at this stage in the campaign is that it softens the battlefield for the General Election. It helps diminish the “war president” theme that W. wants to run on before the President’s campaign has even gotten off the ground. The story is about reminding voters that they don’t have a real soldier at the helm, and that is perhaps why the Iraq war has been so badly bungled. And as Kerry defines himself, he will be able to contrast his Vietnam service favorably without ever even mentioning the President’s Guard service.