NY Times: Pentagon destroyed Bush records

[Union Carbide]

http://www.nytimes.com/2004/07/09/politics/campaign/09records.html?ex=1247025600&en=c62ede59872f7f12&ei=5090&partner=rssuserland

HOUSTON, July 8 - Military records that could help establish President Bush's whereabouts during his disputed service in the Texas Air National Guard more than 30 years ago have been inadvertently destroyed, according to the Pentagon.
It said the payroll records of "numerous service members," including former First Lt. Bush, had been ruined in 1996 and 1997 by the Defense Finance and Accounting Service during a project to salvage deteriorating microfilm. No back-up paper copies could be found, it added in notices dated June 25.
The destroyed records cover three months of a period in 1972 and 1973 when Mr. Bush's claims of service in Alabama are in question.
Oops!
There was no mention of the loss, for example, when White House officials released hundreds of pages of the President's military records last February in an effort to stem Democratic accusations that he was "AWOL" for a time during his commitment to fly at home in the Air National Guard during the Vietnam War.

Dan Bartlett, the White House communications director who has said that the [previously] released records confirmed the president's fulfillment of his National Guard commitment, did not return two calls for a response.
Funny, that.

Edit: Grr, edited to fix subject

[Jason McCullough]

Oh for god's sake, how stupid do they think we are?

[Andrew Mayer]

Rember when our leaders and other goverment agencies were held accountable for their actions?

I do. That's why I'm voting Kerry/Edwards.

[chet]

And people wonder why i am sarcastic or make a joke at this point. You have to. Because otherwise sane and intelligent people will either say this is hogwash, and it is just more bad luck for bush - or they will accept this point, but still say they support bush, because.... you know...

Bush lives on one assumption. If you are over the top obvious, no one will ever dare call you on it, because that would be crazy talk!

Chet

[Andrew Mayer]

Bush lives on one assumption. If you are over the top obvious, no one will ever dare call you on it, because that would be crazy talk!

Krugman points out that in Kissenger's doctoral thesis maintained that one way "revolutionary" governments take power from within by taking actions so dramatic that no one believes that they can seriously be intending to overthrow the current political process until it's too late.

Members of the established order find it nearly impossible to take at face value the assertion of the revolutionary power that it means to smash the existing framework. [They] therefore tend to begin by treating the revolutionary power as if its protestations were merely tactical; ...as if it were motivated by specific grievances to be assuaged by limited concessions. Those who warn against the danger in time are considered alarmists; those who counsel adaptation to circumstances are considered balanced and sane... But it is the essence of a revolutionary power... that it is willing, indeed eager, to push its principles to their ultimate conclusion.

One should regard America's right-wing movement - which now in effect controls the administration, both houses of Congress, much of the judiciary, and a good slice of the media - as a revolutionary power in Kissinger's sense. That is, a movement whose leaders do not accept the legitimacy of our current political system.

# When you're dealing with a revolutionary power, it's important to realize that it knows what it wants, and will make whatever argument advances that goal."

# "A revolutionary power, which does not regard the existing system as legitimate, doesn't feel obliged to play by the rules."

# "A revolutionary power... also doesn't accept the right of others to criticize its actions. Anyone who raises questions can expect a no-holds-barred counterattack."

# "Don't assume that the usual rules of politics apply." War profiteering, Enron games, and conveniently-timed terror alerts are all par for the course.

# "'But they wouldn't do that!' protest reasonable people - and a normal regime wouldn't. But we're not dealing with a normal regime here, we're dealing with a revolutionary power."

[MrJoshua]

Rember when our leaders and other goverment agencies were held accountable for their actions?


That last happened under Reagan, right? 8) Ok, ok, maybe Nixon. :P The point is, this kind of petty shit happens all the damn time.

I would also argue that the ultimate tool of accountability is something called an election. It worked for Carter, both ways. :twisted:

[extarbags]

Rember when our leaders and other goverment agencies were held accountable for their actions?


That last happened under Reagan, right? 8) Ok, ok, maybe Nixon. :P The point is, this kind of petty shit happens all the damn time.


Petty?

Yeah, it sure is petty to destroy records that show that someone has deserted their military post, which is a capital offense in some cases. Yup. Petty.

[MrJoshua]

Kind of like hiding Whitewater files in the White House for 2 years while they are under subpoena? All this stuff balances out in the long run. Both sides get away with small crap.

[Guido Jones]

So I take it you're all assuming the Pentagon is lying and they didn't accicdently destroy the records in 1996 or 1997?

[MrJoshua]

My point is I don't care. It isn't important to me and isn't going to change anyone's mind. Those who hate Bush will still hate him. Those that don't, won't be swayed by it.

The parallel to the Clinton hate is scary. I fell into that trap with Clinton, so I am sympathetic to the extreme overreactions to Bush on the left. I expect most of them will snap out of it like I did. It just isn't worth the energy.

[extarbags]

My point is I don't care. It isn't important to me and isn't going to change anyone's mind. Those who hate Bush will still hate him. Those that don't, won't be swayed by it.

The parallel to the Clinton hate is scary. I fell into that trap with Clinton, so I am sympathetic to the extreme overreactions to Bush on the left. I expect most of them will snap out of it like I did. It just isn't worth the energy.

It's so bizarre that people actually think that Bush and Clinton are somehow comparable.

[MrJoshua]

The irrational hate against them is, not the men themselves.

[quatoria]

The irrational hate against them is, not the men themselves.

I'm not sure it really is. In the case of most people on the forum that I've seen, the dislike for and complete mistrust of Bush isn't based on the same reasons it was for Clinton. In Clinton's case, it seemed to be more on his personality, the sense that he was "getting away" with things, the way he put Hillary in charge of health care reform, etc. In the case of Bush, it's more to do with the fact that we've watched him lie, over and over and over and over again, about something no less fundamental than the reasons our nation is going to war. A lot of the hawks don't seem to comprehend what a big deal that is, because they felt the war was justified no matter what excuse had to be use to "sell it", and that a justified war bought with lies and deceptions is acceptable.

It's because we've watched him lie directly to Congress's face to sell his medicare reform act, threatening to fire someone who actually produced the real numbers on its cost, not the cost he was touting. It's because we've watched him prevaricate and deceive on the true benefits and costs of his tax cut. It's because we've watched him run up the largest defecit this country has ever had, after its largest surpluss. (I still don't understand what logic conservatives use to justify this.) It's because we've watched his administration title a bill to increase logging the "Healthy Forests Initiative", and a bill that lowers standards on air pollution the "Clean Air Act". It's because we watched him stand in a flight suit under a banner reading "Mission Accomplished", and then lie, for months on end, about the fact that it was his PR people who put it there.

I could go on, but do I really need to? We dislike and distrust Bush because he's given us every reason to. Rather than being deceptive about his private life, he's been deceptive, and outright lied, about nearly every major policy initiative and act of his administration. His predecessor was called "Slick Willy" for his ability to charm his way out of trouble, but Bush has done nothing but lie and spin and make excuses from day one.

There are some people who have an irrational hatred of the man, I'm sure - but don't make the mistake of thinking everyone who distrusts him, everyone who thinks he's a terrible danger to the country at whole, fits into that category. There are a hell of a lot of perfectly rational reasons to be incredibly wary of the man.

[chet]

Also don't forget, the harder the republican party squeezed Clinton and yelled gotcha - the higher his approval rating rose. I think this did and still does confuse the republican party. They miss the point, most people like Clinton.

The same cannot be said of Bush, the more he is squeezed, the more his numbers shrink.

Chet