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« Your Government At Work | Main | The Kerry Rumor ... and "Bush Was AWOL" is Dead » February 16, 2004HolesKevin Drum desperately wants to believe Dan Burkett, who claims President Bush's aides sanitized Bush's National Guard records a few years ago, even though Burkett's credibility has taken a beating recently. Drum's long and boring post claims to be an example of "forensic journalism," but what it really is is Drum flailing around for reasons to believe a man who has no evidence for his charges against Bush. Why does one of the chief priests of the Cult of Bush Was Awol, keep beating the drum for Burkett? Simple. Because the documentary evidence - now fully released - proves Bush served honorably in the Texas Air National Guard, and completed his duties. The Bush-haters' charges that Bush was AWOL, or never showed up for duties in Alabama in late 1972 and early 1973, have been positively debunked by military documents and multiple eyewitnesses. So, all that Drum and the rest of the acolytes of The Cult of Bush Was AWOL have left is Burkett. They have to prop him up. And Drum does an admirable job, mixing facts with assumptions skillfully to produce a piece that, no doubt, will soon be hyped throughout the Left side of the blogosphere. Someone will probably call it "Pulitzer-quality work," or some such nonsense. It isn't.
1. Burkett's story hasn't changed over the years - well, okay, it has changed, but not much, so we'll claim that it hasn't changed. 2. It doesn't matter that the three people Burkett accuses of sanitizing the files all emphatically say it didn't happen, and that some of the people Burkett said he told about the alleged incident contemporaneously with the alleged incident say he didn't tell them any such thing obviously all of these people are lying because Burkett is a truthful man and anyone who says anything that contradicts Burkett is a liar because Burkett is truthful. Drum's piece starts by asking "Is his story true?" - but Drum doesn't bother to actually answer that question. Instead, he writes 2,033 words examining Burkett's credibility, not examining the specific allegations. His conclusion: Burkett is credible. And Burkett probably is credible, on many things. If you asked him what kind of car he drives, or where he lives, or to verbally give you his résumé, he'd probably tell it to ya straight. But Burkett's general credibility is not the issue. The issue is whether the specific incident he alleges is true. Drum doesn't go there because there's no there there. Burkett has provided no evidence, no witnesses. And the "facts" he aserts are themselves problematic. For instance, as the Houston Chronicle recently reported Burkett alleges Bush's personnel records were sanitized at a museum at Camp Mabry in Texas - but the Texas Air National Guard says its personnel records were never stored at the museum. Details of Burkett's story rang false to some Guard officials. For one thing, Texas Guard officials said no personnel records were ever stored at the museum.If the incident occurred, it did not happen where Burkett said it happened. Also problematic: Burkett says the records were sanitized in 1977 - but by 1977 most of Bush's personnel records were stored in Colorado on microfilm. Burkett says he saw paper documents in the trash in Texas. But Bush's records were stored permanently on microfilm in Colorado. Burkett has been making his allegation against Bush for years but has, to date, produced zero witnesses who can corroborate his story. The three people who he accuses say it didn't happen - a fact that Drum dismisses by saying, in effect, guilty people always plead innocent. That's true. But innocent people always plead innocent too - and, though Drum fails to address it, the burden is on the accuser to prove guilt. The Chronicle notes that Burkett said last week that there are other witnesses but they are too scared to come forward. Burkett could produce no one to directly corroborate his story. He said Friday that a few people knew about it around the time it happened. But he said two of those refuse to come forward, fearing retaliation by current Guard officials, and he didn't want to expose them.Burkett's claim of mystery witnesses who refuse to come forward is classic. If they don't exist, they'll never come forward - allowing Burkett to maintain the existence of fantasy witnesses forever, while denying his critics the opportunity to cross-examine them. I doubt they exist. Consider the reason Burkett says they won't come forward: They are afraid of retailiation. That sounds good to people like Drum, who want to believe Burkett, but it doesn't make sense. The witnesses -if they exist - are only at risk until they go public. If they came forward and corroborated Burkett's tale, the media spotlight would wrap them in a cocoon of protection, and their courageous whistleblowing would lead them to fame, fortune, and the inevitable book deal. UPDATE: Don't miss John Cole's rather far better fisking of Drum's "meme-u-facturing" piece on Dan Burkett. Posted in Was Bush AWOL?
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Wild stab in the dark: perhaps Burkett saw hardcopies of the microfilm record? That would mean he saw what he claims, but that it didn't mean what he believes it means. I think it's more likely he's just lying, but this is a charitable interpretation. Posted by: Robert Crawford at February 16, 2004 09:33 AMOh, and let me offer this prediction: this story will quietly disappear down the press memory hole, with no damage to the credibility of those who took part in the feeding frenzy. The tin-foil brigade will try to keep it going, however, and it will show up on a list of "stories you never read about" in leftist papers all over the nation. Drum has demonstrated his abject ignorance of all things military from day one, writing on this issue. He recently wrote that he hopes the president's DD-214 would be included in the released documents, apparently oblivious to the fact that Guardsmen actually get an NGB Form 22 as an equivalent. Bush's NGB 22 has been on the internet for quite some time, and Drum could have easily checked it. Of course, he'd have to actually know what it is first. Posted by: Bill Herbert at February 16, 2004 09:47 AMI'm looking forward to when they discover that Bush was honorably discharged afer 3 months, just before he was commissioned. I vote we give them a couple of days with it before we explain. Posted by: Charlie (Colorado) at February 16, 2004 11:24 AMBy the way, notice that kevin is claiming as "corroboration" the fact that some oof the "witnesses" say "yeah, I talked with him, but he never said any such thing." Things sure must be different in Cloud Cuckoo Land there -- where I come from, we'd call that "contradiction". Posted by: Charlie (Colorado) at February 16, 2004 11:37 AMWhy are you reading a discredited site, Bill? Posted by: Ricky at February 16, 2004 11:43 AMTo see what the latest permutation of the Big Lie is, so I can waste valuable time debunking it. Posted by: Bill at February 16, 2004 12:19 PMFair enough! :) Posted by: Ricky at February 16, 2004 12:20 PMPersonally, I'm waiting for the holding-my-breath-until-I-turn-blue, pounding-my-head-on-the-floor stage of Drum's investigation. The current stage is getting incredibly dreary. The just short of hysterical stage might be interesting at least. Posted by: JorgXMcKie at February 16, 2004 02:17 PMDrum says the Kerry/affair rumor can be put to rest - his exact words were "stick a fork in it" - because Kerry denied it, and the girl denied it. Seems there is a lack of evidence and no eyewitnesses. Which of course doesn't seem to be the same standard he applied in the AWOL case or the Dan Burkett sidebar. Posted by: Bill Hobbs at February 16, 2004 03:38 PMDrum says we can "stick a fork in" the Kerry-affair rumor bcause her parents denied it and she denied it. Seems there is a lack of evidence for the accusation, and a lack of witnesses to corroborate the story. Well. Would've been nice if he'd applied the same standards to the Bush AWOL story and the Dan Burkett sidebar. Posted by: Bill Hobb at February 16, 2004 03:41 PMWell, who can forget that 'obvious racial baggage' that Arnold had because of his dad's history (before he was born)? Yeah, that Drum, as intellectually consistent as an earthquake pattern. Posted by: Ricky at February 16, 2004 07:20 PMDrum should have stuck with his first impression which was that Burkett is a complete flake. Calpundit's first post on Burkett indicated that Burkett didn't pass the smell test because his story had not stayed consistent over time: "When he clarified his remarks in his press release in 2000, why didn't he tell the story he's telling now? It's pretty sensational, and surely deserved an accusing finger.Of course, Drum was dismissive of Burkett when he thought that he had "smoking gun" documentary evidence. Now that his evidence has gone up in smoke, Burkett is the paragon of reliability. Posted by: "Edward at February 16, 2004 10:34 PM 1. You have the wrong dates - Burkett claims the records were sanitized in 1997 - not 1977. 2. Consider Bush's DUI in Maine - if the "bushies" were going to "sanitize" his National Guard record (of what, only Kevin Drum knows), why didn't they also sanitize the DUI records in Maine while they were at it. I'm sure they could have used their terrorizing ray or connections or whatever on the Kennebunkport police just as they did on the Texas National Guard to disinfect his Maine driving record. 3. Somebody needs to intervene with Mr. Drum before he starts trying to free money squirreled away in Nigeria. Posted by: Kevin "fun" Murphy at February 17, 2004 02:04 PMWasn't Bushes Texas driving record sanitized? And what about the court-ordered community service question? And now we'll have to deal with the abortion thing that's coming out. They're looking deeply into the background of James Bath. It's turning into another one of those "Bush is a Machiavellian genius, except he's an idiot" stories. The Bush Machine&tm; is supposed to have used political pull to sanitize his record, get his F-102 crash covered up, let Bush get arrested, convicted, and sentenced to community service for cocaine while still eliminating all the records -- and still do so in such a way that there aren't any records that tell the cover story, no one prepped to come right out and say "yep, saw him!", and no 1000-page service record with every hole covered with some written order. Clearly, the Chimp is so deeply slick that he not only covered all that stuff up, he managed to cover up the cover up so well that there is always this little tantalizing bit of information that only the DU folks can see. Adam Weishaupt and the Illuminati couldn't do better. (Although I suppose if you hummed a few bars they could try to ad lib something.) Posted by: Charlie (Colorado) at February 18, 2004 12:13 AMNiccceee pagee Posted by: Creno at February 20, 2004 06:33 AMgee...heres an observation bout the flack over bush's service record....i for one believe he served his time honorably but the only prob i have with the mental midgets of the left is the use of the term "awol"...correct me if i'm wrong but unless bush's guard unit was federalized...that term doesent come into play..do these idiots even understand anything bout the military that isnt listed in the "medal of honor" game series? Posted by: Craig Terlizzi at February 20, 2004 11:22 PMPost a comment
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