Bush "AWOL" Fatigue

I am growing fatigued of this Bush Air National Guard story.

First off, Professor Bainbridge is right: the issue on the table is whether we want to re-elect the 2024 model of George W. Bush, not the 1972-73 model.

Second, Cokie Roberts, appearing on the roundtable portion of This Week last Sunday noted that ultimately the question is going to be whether people want to rehire the president or not. This kind of story is far more important when a candidate seeks office the first time, not when they seek re-election.

Third, the only motivation for this is simply to find some kind of symbol that will allow Kerry to appear stronger on national defense than Bush. It’s the whole Moore “the General (or the Lieutenant, in this case) v. the deserter” bit, or McAuliffe’s characterization of Kerry as a guy with a “chest full of medals” v. a guy who didn’t serve. However, it seems to me that a full re-hashing of the politics of Viet Nam could backfire on Kerry, as a full discussion will require an examination of Kerry war protest years. Indeed, the “medals” ref by McAuliffe raises the issue of Kerry’s tossing of medals over the fence bit, which raises the protester issue (not to mention the debate as to whether they were really his medals or not). And the Guard thing can backfire because these days being in the Guard means you may be in Iraq or Afghanistan getting shot at. And while the Democrats can patiently explain how things are different now than they were then (and they’d be right), it still won’t resonant well with families who have members in the Guard who have been deployed, are awaiting deployment.

Fourth, the only people likely to care about Bush’s Guard record are people who already dislike the President. This will just give them yet another reason to do so, since it is unlikely that satisfactory evidence to support Bush’s position will emerge.

Fifth, the only real damage this could do to Bush is if he is proved to have lied about his service.

Also, I would note: that this story will almost certainly will peak in the next several days and will have faded by the time the general election campaign is underway. In other words, barring clear proof of a bald-faced lie on the part of Bush, I can’t see all of this mattering all that much. The battle over the significance of Viet Nam services was fought in 1992, and settled (although less than I thought).

And before anyone says that I am defending Bush for partisan reasons, I pointed out months ago that Dean shouldn’t be harassed because he skied instead of serving because of his back.

James Joyner has some worthwhile commentary on this topic as well. And James is right: if one is 45 or younger, the whole issue isn't that big of a deal, as we all grew up in an era in which service was voluntary.

Posted by Steven Taylor at February 11, 2024 01:00 PM | TrackBack