USA Today ran a thorough report today on the AWOL controversy, detailing many of the unanswered questions. It’s definitely worth reading; there are some areas of the controversy discussed here that I haven’t seen explored in detail elsewhere.
Bush was a proficient pilot, as the available records clearly show. With this in mind, however, USAT asks why Bush decided to quit flying altogether two years before his commitment to the National Guard was up. The article also noted that Friday night’s “document dump” did little to resolve this ambiguity in Bush’s record.
The same article details the special, and sometimes extraordinary, treatment Bush received at the time that other pilots did not.
* Bush was accepted into pilot school even though he scored in the 25th percentile on a standardized test. The test was given to all prospective pilots and there was no specific score that disqualified a candidate. In addition, Bush had two arrests for college pranks and four traffic offenses before applying for pilot training. Former and current military pilots say it was uncommon for an applicant to be approved for training with such a record.
* There is no record of a formal procedure called a “flying evaluation board,” which normally would have been convened once Bush stopped flying in April 1972.
* Bush’s records do not show he was given another job in the Air Guard once he quit flying. Pilots and Bush comrades say his records should reflect some type of new duties he was assigned.
Asked for an explanation about why Bush stopped flying, the White House said Bush “served admirably” in the Guard, was given permission by commanders to fulfill his obligations in ways that did not involve flying and was honorably discharged. “President Bush is proud of his service,” said Dan Bartlett, communications director.
I don’t think Bartlett realizes that these evasive, ambiguous answers that intentionally skirt the substance of the controversy only reinforce suspicions that the White House has something to hide. If we want to know why Bush never stepped foot in another cockpit, and the White House response is that Bush is “proud of his service,” we’re left to believe that the White House couldn’t come up with a good enough lie on the spot so they’re leaning on platitudes that don’t make a lot of sense.
USAT also pokes a whole in one of the White House’s main talking points.
After Bush stopped flying fighter jets in April 1972 and did not take an annual physical examination required of all pilots, the Air Force should have required a hearing known as a flying evaluation board to determine his fitness to fly. Because the federal government spent hundreds of thousands of dollars to train each pilot, it typically did not allow them to stop flying without a formal proceeding. Bush’s records do not mention a flying evaluation board.
The president’s advisers and friends have explained that Bush stopped flying because his unit was phasing out the F-102 in 1972. They also say he was not able to get a required flight physical in Alabama, where his records show he was granted permission to train in the fall of 1972. Bartlett said there was no need for a physical exam because Bush stopped flying.
Guard records, however, show pilots in Bush’s unit in Texas were still flying the F-102 in 1974, a year after Bush left the Guard.
These guys never learn. Lying about the crime is almost always worse than the crime itself.
So, to summarize the article: Bush got special treatment to get into a pilot program he should have been rejected from, while in the Guard there’s scant evidence of him fulfilling his responsibilities, the special treatment he received before his time in the Guard continued while he was in it, and most of the defenses the White House has offered in Bush’s defense have been proven untrue or unreliable.