Was Bush AWOL?:

Memogate: The Armstrong Williams Gamble, January 15, 2005
Here's an interesting take on the Armstrong Williams story and CBS's memogate scandal, from a person who has an, uh, interesting perspective:In the opinion of this con-artist, one of the biggest scams perpetrated on the public in the last year was the CBS memo scandal, in which political partisans and the establishment media tried to get by with manufacturing a story to further their own ends. They did so consistent with an established BIAS and...

Memogate: They Weren't Looking, January 12, 2005
From Howard Kurtz's WaaPo media column today comes this bit of reaction to the report on CBS's use of fraudulent documents to slander President Bush, a report that lays out a mountain of evidence of political bias on the part of story producer Mary Mapes and then claims it could find no evidence that the story was motivated by a political agenda at CBS:CBS News Vice President Linda Mason, named to a new post overseeing...

Memogate Report: CBS Not Biased, January 11, 2005
Another brilliant editorial cartoon from Cox & Forkum. Click to enlarge. Also, dont' miss Jonathan Last's excellent analysis of the CBS report and the failings of the Thornburgh-Boccardi investigation into memogate....

RatherGate: Whitewash, January 10, 2005
Hugh Hewitt makes a good case that the CBS report on memogate is a whitewash. Powerline - one of the blogs that humbled CBS - also finds the report is, uh, rather lacking in crucial areas....

RatherGate Report Nails CBS; Four Executives Gone, January 10, 2005
The memogate fiasco at CBS involving those forged documents with with CBS' Dan Rather slandered President Bush, has finally resulted in CBS firing some people. I won't be dissecting the report here - you need to stick with Powerline, RatherGate.com, Little Green Footballs, RatherBiased.com and Instapundit for the heavy lifting. But it's worth noting that the just-released investigative report commissioned by CBS on the journalistic scandal is at odds with the recent piece written by...

Volunteering for Danger, September 27, 2004
Tim Worstall does the math after digging up this bit of information...The F-102 claimed the lives of many pilots, including a number stationed at Ellington during Bush's tenure. Of the 875 F-102A production models that entered service, 259 were lost in accidents that killed 70 Air Force and ANG pilots....and finds that Lt. George W. Bush was statistically only slightly less likely to get killed during the two years he spent learning to fly the...

More Facts Emerge on Bush's Guard Service, September 25, 2004
Via the invaluable PowerLine, I found a story out of Knoxville that you can bet Bubba don't wanna blog....

Memogate: A Kerry Campaign Connection?, September 20, 2004
Bill Burkett, described as the source of the forged memos upon which CBS News broadcast a smear-job on President Bush, now reportedly says he passed the info to former Sen. Max Cleland. Cleland, as you may recall, is a big-shot in the Kerry campaign. If the forged memos went from Burkett to the Kerry campaign via Cleland and then to CBS - Cleland tried to toss a grenade into the enemy's camp and blew his...

Memogate: A Rather Lame Statement, September 20, 2004
Here is the entire text of Dan Rather's statement regarding the forged memos......

Memogate: Graphic Proof, September 20, 2004
The WaPo deconstructs the forged memos with a devastating side-by-side comparison to actual Texas Air national Guard documents of known authenticity. What was Dan Rather thinking when he went ahead with a story based on such obviously fake memos? He was thinking about being the first anchorman to "call" the election for John Kerry on the evening of Nov. 2nd......

Memogate: CBS Trashes Staudt, September 18, 2004
Just as I predicted yesterday, CBS is dismissing the statements of Col. Walter Staudt rejecting the assertion by CBS - based on those forged memos - that Staudt pressured George W. Bush's CO in the Texas Air National Guard to "sugar coat" Bush's service record. CBS spokeswoman Sandy Genelius said: "In a debate this heated, one can hardly expect Gen. Staudt to endorse the point of view that he exerted undue influence." John Hinderaker at...

Memogate: Fake But Accurate Fake AND False!, September 17, 2004
The last remaining shreds of Dan Rather's credibility just went up in smoke. ABC News has just within the last 15 minutes or so posted an exclusive report based on exclusive interview with Col. Walter Staudt, the retired former brigadier general of the Texas Air National Guard. ABC News reports that Staudt is refuting CBS News' assertions (based on those now-infamous forged documents) that Staudt pressured others in the TANG to help cover for George...

Memogate: 60 Minutes Had Nada Without the Memos, September 16, 2004
Now that Dan Rather has as much as admitted that the memos at the heart of last week's 60 Minutes story about President Bush's service in the Texas Air National Guard in the early 1970s were forged documents, I have taken a look at the transcript of that story and edited it to show what the story would have said if every part of it related to the memos was left out. Read it for...

Memogate: About The Typewriter, September 16, 2004
CBS didn't ask Marian Knox about the typewriter she had at the Texas Air National Guard office back in '72-'73, but the Dallas Morning News did. It wasn't an IBM Selectric Composer, the fancy but expensive type-setting machine that some experts think could have produced the apparently forged memos that CBS presented as authentic.Knox said signs of forgery abound in the four memos. She said the typeface on the documents did not match either of...

Memogate: Secretary Changes Her Story, Helps CBS, September 16, 2004
Marian Carr Knox, the 86-year-old retired former secretary to Lt. Jerry Killian, who was Lt. George W. Bush's commanding officer in the Texas Air National Guard, has changed her story to suit the new CBS News spin that, as the NYT puts it, the memos are fake, but true. The Houston Chronicle, Sept. 14:Last week, Knox said she had no firsthand knowledge of Bush's time with the Texas Air National Guard...60 Minutes, Sept. 15:Knox remembers...

Memogate: Did Burkett Tip His Hand?, September 16, 2004
Retired Texas National Guard officer Bill Burkett, a long-time Bush-hater who has been named by several news outlets as a possible source for the forged documents in the CBS memogate scandal, wrote the following on August 13, 2004, for Democrats.com, before the memos surfaced......

Memogate: WHADDABOUT THE TYPEWRITER?!?!?!, September 16, 2004
Having read the transcript and watched the video of last night's 60 Minutes segment on the forged memos, I am shocked at just how bad a journalist Dan Rather is....

Memogate: 60 Minutes Tries to Save Dan, September 16, 2004
Here's the link to the CBS Evening News story last night on memogate. And here is the transcript and free-video link from the longer story that aired later last night on 60 Minutes, which was pre-empted in some markets by local affiliates airing a movie. in the 60 Minutes piece, Dan Rather interviews Lt. Col. Jerry Killian's former secretary, 86-year-old Marion Carr Knox, who tells Dan exactly what he wants to hear: the content of...

Memogate Roundup, September 14, 2004
Lots of new good reading today regarding those CBS forged memos. Here is a Dallas Morning News editorial. Also, RatherBiased.com takes apart Dan Rather's second attempt to defend his forged-memo smearjob. Via RatherBiased.com, you also find links to valuable coverage at Politicalities, Ed Morrisey, Patterico, Newsday columnist Jim Pinkerton, Beldar (who, it should be noted, once was CBS' attorney in a libel case), PowerLine, and Ernest Miller at tech news blog Corante.com. RatherBiased.com also links...

Small-Town Paper Proves Bush Not AWOL, September 13, 2004
The Decatur Daily in Decatur, Alabama, doesn't get listed when Big Journalism's grand poobahs are listing America's great newspapers, but on the story of whether George W. Bush was "AWOL" from his National Guard post back in 1972 and 1973, The Decatur Daily is doing much better work than CBS. They have found proof that Bush was, indeed, not AWOL. Captain Ed has the lowdown. Now... who was it that issued that $10,000 reward for...

Forgery Update, September 13, 2004
Donald Sensing has some more good information on the CBS memo-forgery scandal. If you think the memos are authentic because the IBM Selectric Composer existed in 1972 and could have produced them ... think again. Also, PowerLine has identified one of CBS' witnesses and provides evidence that he is not credible. And there's a new website, RatherGate.com dedicated to covering the CBS forgery scandal. Here's an American Spectator article looking at what's happening inside CBS...

Poll: Bush Leads Big, September 09, 2004
The latest WaPo/ABC News poll has President Bush up 52-43 over John Kerry among likely voters. No wonder the Kerry campaign and its allied 527s and the pro-Kerry media rushed to attack Bush with allegations based on what now look to possibly be forged documents. If the documents are proven to be forgeries - and it is looking like that may well be the case - there will be major damage to the reputation of...

Forgery Update, September 09, 2004
Glenn Reynolds has a comprehensive round-up of coverage of the investigation into the possibility that the memos that CBS says show George W. Bush shirked his Guard duty three decades ago are forged. Also, even the Associated Press is investigating the possibility that the documents were forged:Independent document examiner Sandra Ramsey Lines said the memos looked like they had been produced on a computer using Microsoft Word software, which wasn't available when the documents were...

Facts, September 09, 2004
Byron York has all the pertinent known facts about George W. Bush's National Guard service....

Refuting the Latest AWOL Slime, September 09, 2004
I was going to compile a thorough, documented post refuting point-by-point the latest media/Kerry campaign charges that President Bush shirked his duties in the Texas Air National Guard more than 30 years ago, but I don't have to because Jonathan Rothenberg already did. You can read it at BlogsForBush.com by clicking that link. Invaluable. UPDATE: Powerline has some compelling evidence that the documents the Boston Globe and CBS News are using to claim Bush shirked...

The Kerry Rumor ... and "Bush Was AWOL" is Dead, February 16, 2004
The rumor of Sen. John Kerry's rumored affair with a young intern is edging toward the mainstream press. An unnamed television network has reportedly taped a tell-all interview with the young woman, and is investigating her claims before airing it. Meanwhile, Chicago Sun-Times columnist Richard Roeper has mentioned the Kerry affair rumor, if only to say we should ignore it and focus on the "issues." Interestingly, Roeper also urges folks to forget the whole "Bush...

Holes, February 16, 2004
Kevin 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...

AWOL Roundup, February 14, 2004
Pejman has a very good, long, link-filled post on the AWOL lie - and Kevin Drum's role in spreading it. Are most of the commenters on Drum's site as deranged as the one's Pejman cites? YES! UPDATE: A reader emailed me the link to a Houston Chronicle story about one of President Bush's chief accusers on the AWOL story - Dan Burkett - who, it turns out, once faced court martial proceedings, and it not...

That Should Settle It, February 13, 2004
President George W. Bush's entire military service record has been released. Initial news reports I've heard say it completely refutes the "Bush was AWOL!" charge that was being pushed by leading Democratic Party figurs (McAuliffe, Kerry, Clark), and assorted Lefty anti-Bush bloggers. I expect we'll be seeing apologies over at CalPundit, SouthKnoxBubba, Atrios and others soon... Yeah. Right. More likely the goalpost will be moved yet again. UPDATE: It's already being moved. At 6:19 p.m.,...

Drumroll: Another Witness Saw Bush, February 13, 2004
A retired Alabama Air National Guard officer says he remembers seeing George W. Bush on post in Alabama several times in 1972. Retired Lt. Col. John "Bill" Calhoun told the Associated Press he saw Bush on the post on at least six occasions. Those pushing the "Bush was AWOL!" allegation have long said one of their key pieces of "evidence" against Bush was the lack of anyone who recalled seeing Bush on post in Alabama....

Another View, February 13, 2004
Brian O'Connell parses the package of lies known as "Bush Was AWOL." Noting that Bush's attendance at the Alabama Air National Guard was "never compulsory," O'Connell asks: How can you be "AWOL" ... when you have nothing to be AWOL from?. It's A good read - and O'Connell also provides a link to the George magazine story that debunked the Bush was AWOL lie four years ago....

It's Going Away..., February 13, 2004
The Boston Globe is reporting that one of the alleged key "witnesses" to an alleged "purging" of George W. Bush's Texas Air National Guard records has now denied it happened. This is a key development in the exposing of the "Bush was AWOL" charge as a lie - the "witness" undercuts a story told by one Dan Burkett, a retired Lt. Colonel in the Texas Air National Guard whose allegations are heavily hyped by such...

14 Questions, February 13, 2004
The Baseball Crank has an excellent post, chock full of links, boiling down many of the key issues in the Bush-AWOL debate, and then posing 14 questions for kevin Drum and others who insist on pushing the lie. One of the amazing things about the Bush AWOL lie is how parts of it persist even though they have been disproven. For example, those pushing the lie will say Bush got into the Texas Air National...

It Just Won't Go Away, February 13, 2004
Despite mounting evidence that George W. Bush fulfilled his National Guard duties - including, now, a witness who recalls Bush being on post in late 1972 - the Bush-haters of the rabid Left continue to twist scraps of facts to prop up their slanderous lie. For example, Kevin Drum, SKB and others are touting this story in the Memphis Flyer - a liberal alternative weekly of dubious journalistic fairness and balance - in which a...

A Debate I'd Like to See, February 12, 2004
A reader of mine, a college student, sent the following (slightly-edited) email:So my professor has challenged me to a debate on the Bush AWOL issue. Little does he know, he has no ground to stand on. I have done a lot of research and a lot from your site, but I was wondering if there is any information you can give me at all (as repetitive as it might be) on this subject. Any scans...

Case Closed 3, February 12, 2004
From the Washington Post today:The White House last night released a document showing that President Bush was at a military base in Alabama during the last year of his National Guard service, but aides backed away from his weekend pledge to release all his military records. Bush's staff provided copies of a one-page record of a dental exam, complete with drawings of Bush's teeth, that showed he was at Dannelly Air National Guard base in...

I Was Right - and Way Ahead of Big Media, February 11, 2004
On May 8, 2003, in my second blog post ever on the Was Bush Awol? controversy, I wrote this:More problematic is the recollection of one colonel who says he doesn't remember Bush ever being on the base in Alabama. But that's one man, looking back 31 years, and there's little reason he should have singled out Bush back then for special notice in his memory file. Bush back then was just a kid whose dad...

Case Closed 2: The Last Refuge, February 11, 2004
The last refuge of those who claim George W. Bush skipped out on his National Guard duties while temporarily assigned to a unit in Alabama in late 1972 and early 1973 was always the claim that "nobody" in Alabama at the time saw him and can confirm he showed up for drills. Well... now someone has....Further confirmation was supplied yesterday by a woman who dated the young George W. Bush in 1972 who says she...

Case Closed, February 11, 2004
We can put to rest the question of whether George W. Bush was or was not "AWOL" from his National Guard duties back in in the early 1970s. A squadron mate of his had written a long, detailed letter to the Washington Times that refutes, point by point, the slanderous charges of the Bush-haters who have been pushing to "Bush was AWOL" lie for the past four years. Retired Air Force/Air National Guard Col. William...

Bush AWOL? Readers Respond..., February 11, 2004
I have received numerous emails from readers responding to recent posts regarding the question of whether George W. Bush was "AWOL" from his service in the Texas Air National Guard - and, specifically, about a recent post by blogger Kevin Drum over at CalPundit (which I commented on here) suggesting he'd found a "smoking gun" that proves Bush didn't complete his service commitment. Here are two of those emails, which you'll find very enlightening......

More Evidence Bush Not AWOL, February 10, 2004
The White House is releasing pay records that indicate President Bush fulfilled his National Guard commitment....

Bush AWOL: Real Evidence or Just Spin?, February 10, 2004
Kevin Drum claims he has documentary proof of the Bush-was-AWOL claim. Drum is a well-known anti-Bush blogger, who has neverf let actual evidence keep him from pushing the Bush-was-AWOL claim, but now he claims these documents are some sort of smoking-gun proof that Bush shirked his National Guard duties. I think his interpretation is a tad too convenient and based on a series of assumptions tailor-made for his anti-Bush point of view, but I'm not...

Key Evidence for Bush Being AWOL Crumbles, February 06, 2004
One of my regular readers sent me the text of an AP story from July 2000 regarding the Bush AWOL question. It should put to rest the lie that George W. Bush served dishonorably in the Texas Air National Guard. Also, it's worth noting that one of the core pieces of "evidence" that the "Bush was AWOL" liars used to "prove" Bush was "AWOL" from his post - the testimony of an officer at the...

That Honorable Discharge, February 05, 2004
George Walker Bush got an honorable discharge from the Texas Air National Guard on October 1, 1973. Some Bush-haters are saying that it doesn't prove Bush wasn't "AWOL" because it states that Bush had "a six year service obligation...and has completed 5 years, 4 months, and 5 days toward this obligation." What garbage. Al Gore - you remember him, right? - well he joined the Army in August 1969, signing up for a two-year enlistment....

Cul-de-sac, February 05, 2004
Radio host Hugh Hewitt linked to me yesterday, right after a post linking to Lileks. How cool is that? Hewitt:If you missed the calls today from Vietnam vets outraged at what John Kerry said in 1971, you missed a first taste of the blowback from Terry McAuliffe's idiotic attack on President Bush's honorable service in the Texas air national guard. By now the dems have figured out that Michael Moore-Wes Clark-Terry McAuliffe-John Kerry have led...

Bush AWOL?, February 04, 2004
Glenn Reynolds has lotsa links to various postings on the Bush AWOL thingie....

Was Bush AWOL? Democrats Attack..., February 03, 2004
...and a Retired Naval Reserve Officer Responds In recent days, Democrats have ratcheted up their attacks on President Bush, using the slanderous lie that Bush was "AWOL" or a "deserter" from his service in the Texas Air National Guard back in the early 1970s. Democratic National Committee Chairman Terry McAulliffe says George W. Bush "never served in our military in our country," although, clearly, Bush did. Former Sen. Max Cleland, who ought to know better,...

Democrats Go Crazy, February 02, 2004
Have the Democrats gone insane? Consider this from Democratic National Committee chairman Terry McAulliffe:"I look forward to that debate, when John Kerry, a war hero with a chest full of medals, is standing next to George Bush, a man who was AWOL. George Bush never served in our military in our country. He didn't show up when he should have showed up."Apparently Mr. McAulliffe doesn't think members of the National Guard are in the "military."...

Bush AWOL? Google It, January 28, 2004
I ran a Google search for the phrase Bush AWOL, five minutes ago, to see what popped up. Well, whaddya know. I found this. Go ahead and try it - see what you find....

Rev. Artillery Weighs In on Bush AWOL , January 24, 2004
Don't miss Donald Sensing's excellent piece examining the charge that President Bush was AWOL or a "deserter" from his duties in the Texas Air National Guard. Sensing takes on both Wesley Clark, anti-Bush blogger Mark A. R. Kleiman, and the ever-idiotic Michael Moore. Sensing explains what "desertion" is - and it isn't what Kleiman claimed....

Bush AWOL? FactCheck.org Says No, January 23, 2004
FactCheck.org, a project of the nonpartisan Annenberg Public Policy Center of the University of Pennsylvania, analyzes the facts and concludes Michael Moore - leftwing lying filmmaker and celebrity endorser of Wesley Clark - is wrong to call President Bush a "deserter" in reference to Bush's service in the Texas Air National Guard during the Vietnam War. Says FactCheck:The fact is Bush was honorably discharged without ever being officially accused of desertion or being away without...

Clark: Bush Might Have Been AWOL, January 23, 2004
Wesley Clark has endorsed the wacko Left's lie that President Bush was "AWOL" from the Texas Air National Guard back during the Vietnam war. As Edward over at Zonitics says: "I see that Wesley Clark has been sucked into the depths of the conspiracy swamp." Clark indicated he doesn't disbelieve the charge during an exchange with moderator Peter Jennings, who twice gave Clark the chance to distance himself from filmmaker Michael Moore calling Bush a...

Searching for Bush Awol, January 09, 2004
The number one web search phrase that brings people to HobbsOnline is "Bush AWOL," according to the stats provided by my site's hosting service. In fact, as of today, almost half - 46 percent - of people who find HobbsOnline via a search engine do so while searching for information about the lie that Bush was "AWOL" during his Texas Air National Guard service three decades ago. HobbsOnline - both the old site and this...

Was Bush "AWOL"?, December 27, 2003
As the presidential campaign season heats up, you are sure to hear some Democrats charge that President Bush was, long ago, "AWOL" from his Texas Air National Guard duties - and imply also that he joined the guard to avoid Vietnam. Their allegations simply do not hold water....

Idiot, November 15, 2003
Slate's Jacob Weisberg says President Bush "never served in the real military, only in the Texas Air National Guard." Darren Kaplan notes that members of the same unit that Bush served with were deployed to Iraq, so it would seem that Weisberg is wrong. As I've noted in posts before, the day Bush joined the Texas Air National Guard to learn to fly fighter jets, pilots from the Texas Air National Guard were flying combat...

AWOL Update , May 12, 2003
AWOL Update I've received a fair amount of email on the "Bush AWOL?" story and while I'm not going to post everything, I thought I'd address the basic arguments of some of the letter writers who, despite the mounting evidence, believe Bush indeed did shirk his National Guard duties. They tend to conflate three issues into one. The basic charge against Bush is that he used family connections to jump ahead in line and get...

A Good Summation, May 09, 2003
Smythe's World provides a decent summation of the arguments for and against the proposition that George W. Bush was "AWOL" or otherwise improperly absent from his National Guard duties for much of 1972....

More Letters, May 09, 2003
My coverage of the "Bush AWOL?" story continues to generate emails......

The Power of the Blogosphere, May 09, 2003
Every so often, the blogosphere amazes me. The past two days, it did it again, and re-confirmed my belief that the blogosphere is both the most powerful journalistic media tool ever devised, and the foundation of a new kind of what I in the past have called collaborative peer-reviewed journalism....

More Comments on "Bush AWOL?", May 09, 2003
I touched a chord with my query yesterday about whether paperwork screwups like the ones that appear to form the basis of the otherwise baseless charge that President Bush was, back in '72, "AWOL" from his National Guard unit, are common. Yes, says B. Preston, at JunkyardBlog, relating a personal experience....

Physical Evidence, May 09, 2003
Rich Hailey explains why the anti-Bushies' blather about Bush's failure to get a flight physical in 1973 is much ado about nothing. And Bill Herbert examines the latest attack on Bush - that the carrier landing cost a lot of money and delayed the return of the ship - and explodes the charge efficiently, effectively and enthusiastically....

Hilarious, May 08, 2003
Here's a brief history of the Internet that is as factually accurate as claims Bush was AWOL - but much funnier. Hysterically funny in parts, actually. [Hat tip: InstaPundit]...

Bush AWOL?, May 08, 2003
Here are two emails I received from readers related to my posts about the spurious charge that President Bush was "AWOL" from his duties with the Texas Air National Guard back in '72......

Sparkey Weighs In, May 08, 2003
Sparkey over at Sgt. Stryker's Daily Briefing applauds Bush's military service record. And you really ought to read down through the comments and learn more about how bad paperwork problems can be in the Guard and Reserves. Sparkey commentson Bush's records in light of that charge that Bush managed to get assigned at the end of his Guard stint to a unit where he had no responsibilities, and perhaps never showed up, noting that by...

Bush AWOL? The "Evidence" Proves, May 08, 2003
I've looked at the issue of President Bush allegedly being "AWOL" from his Texas Air National Guard duties in 1972 and applied a well-honed journalist's skepticism to the evidence pro and con. Is there hard proof Bush didn't show up when he was supposed to? The short answer is, no. The evidence, such as it is, is a lack of paperwork on certain matters. The anti-Bushies spin the lack of paperwork as proof positive that...

Guarding the Truth, May 07, 2003
Blogger South Knox Bubba is fond of belittling President George W. Bush's service in the Texas Air National Guard, even repeating the charge that Bush was often "AWOL" during his stint in the Guard. It's a favorite accusation of the anti-Bushies, one given new life a few years ago by this story in the Boston Globe, which alleges a one-year gap in Bush's service record. But later reporting proved Bush wasn't AWOL.......