posted
A fascinating thing found while browsing the blogs. Much of Bush's military record has been obtained through the FOIA, leading to the conclusion that, whatever you want to call it, Bush was absent from guard duties for many months, nearly a year and a half.
However, someone recently pointed to another fascinating document that has been extensively redacted. The answer to the "Have you ever been detained, held arrested [etc]" question is redacted . . . and so is the "If yes, list the nature of the offense or violation [etc]" section.
posted
It's a matter of national security. If we showed that, we'd have to kill everyone with an Internet connection.
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posted
Of course, this information is available on the public record somewhere. It just might take some more searching.
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posted
Tstorm -- I'm really not so sure. It was a long time ago, and the locations its likely to have happened in are areas where the Bush family has a lot of influence. Also, its possible its been legitimately scrubbed from his record (juvenile offenses, for instance), though I rather suspect college as a time of occurence.
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quote: Book: Bush was arrested for cocaine in 1972 Texas author J.H. Hatfield claims the Republican front-runner did community service at a Houston center.
By Salon Staff
Oct. 18, 1999 | A new book by Texas author J.H. Hatfield claims that George W. Bush was arrested for cocaine possession in 1972, but had his record expunged with help from his family's political connections. In an afterword to his book "Fortunate Son: George W. Bush and the Making of an American President" (St. Martin's), Hatfield says he took a second look at the Bush cocaine allegations after a story in Salon reporting allegations that Bush did community service for the crime at the Martin Luther King Jr. Community Center in Houston's Third Ward.
Apparently, he had three sources which he quotes.
quote: But Hatfield quotes "a high-ranking advisor to Bush" who confirmed that Bush was arrested for cocaine possession in Houston in 1972, and had the record expunged by a judge who was "a fellow Republican and elected official" who helped Bush get off "with a little community service at a minority youth center instead of having to pick cotton on a Texas prison farm."
Hatfield quotes a former Yale classmate who told him: "George W. was arrested for possession of cocaine in 1972, but due to his father's connections, the entire record was expunged by a state judge whom the older Bush helped get elected. It was one of those 'behind closed doors in the judges' chambers' kind of thing between the old man and one of his Texas cronies who owed him a favor ... There's only a handful of us that know the truth."
Another source named only as "a longtime Bush friend" described the situation this way: "Say you get a D in algebra ... and now you're going to be required to repeat the class the following year, but your teacher says if you promise to be tutored during the summer by a friend of hers who's good in math, she'll change the D to a C. You spend a few hours a week during the summer vacation learning all about arithmetical operations and relationships, and then the teacher issues you a new report card, replacing the old one on file in the principal's office ... Something akin to that scenario is what happened with Bush in 1972."
I like this quote from, what I'm sure is a leftist publication. "That year certainly is out of character with the rest of Bush Jr.'s life. Before and after 1972, he was a rich, hard drinking playboy. Suddenly, and only that one time in his life, he worked for a liberal charity in an inner city ghetto. As soon as the year was over, he resumed his previous pattern and has done no charity work since"
Also, if the arrest was in 1972, he would have been 26 and it wouldn't have been a juvenile record that could be sealed. He also said he could pass a background check going back as far as 1974.
However, Bush admitted he was arrested in Maine in 1976 for DUI. Since he paid a fine of $150 and lost his license for 30 days, he would have been required to list that. (The thing said "excluding minor traffic violations for which a fine or forfeiture of $25 or less was imposed.")
What I can't figure out is why it is redacted. It's common knowledge. (Well, apparently not common knowledge, but it is information that can be found almost anywhere, so I don't know why it is suddenly secret in this particular form.)
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posted
This document was before he joined the national guard; he was in the national guard in '72 (when he avoided showing up for his regular flight test, meaning he dequalified, there's been speculation that the just instituted drug testing was the reason).
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posted
You know what, I don't care. Actually, I'll correct that, I don't care about the cocaine. I care about the drunk driving because no-one should drive drunk. But casual drug use isn't a disqualifying event in the past for a possible president as far as I'm concerned.
Lying and having daddy cover it up...that's a problem.
Addiction would be a problem too. If he was coke addict, that'd concern me.
Heck, the poor guy grew up with a dad who was head of the CIA, a hugely successful businessman, a famous war hero/pilot, and an ambassador. And he was basically a slacker in his youth.
That's got to have an affect on your psyche.
How he got to be a governor or the President of the United States will someday be a fascinating story.
Considering what a lackluster youth he was, he's done suprisingly well in his elected positions. Really, not a bad governor. Not a bad president.
I don't want him to get a second term, but he's almost like living proof that you don't need to be particularly intelligent to do a good job as president of the US.
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