Why Bush left Texas -- new in The Nation

[rawstory]

Just emailed to me from Russ himself! Very interesting stuff....

by Russ Baker

Growing evidence suggests that George W. Bush abruptly left his Texas Air National Guard unit in 1972 for substantive reasons pertaining to his inability to continue piloting a fighter jet.

A months-long investigation, which includes examination of hundreds of government-released documents, interviews with former Guard members and officials, military experts and Bush associates, points toward the conclusion that Bush's personal behavior was causing alarm among his superior officers and would ultimately lead to his fleeing the state to avoid a physical exam he might have had difficulty passing. His failure to complete a physical exam became the official reason for his subsequent suspension from flying status.

<snip>

Even more significantly, in a July interview, Linda Allison, the widow of Jimmy Allison, the Alabama campaign manager and a close friend of Bush's father, revealed to me for the first time that Bush had come to Alabama not because the job had appeal or because his presence was required but because he needed to get out of Texas. "Well, you have to know Georgie," Allison said. "He really was a totally irresponsible person. Big George called Jimmy, and said, he's killing us in Houston, take him down there and let him work on that campaign......Allison said that the younger Bush's drinking problem was apparent. She also said that her husband, a circumspect man who did not gossip and held his cards closely, indicated to her that some use of drugs was involved. "I had the impression that he knew that Georgie was using pot, certainly, and perhaps cocaine," she said.

<snip>

It is notable that in 1972, the military was in the process of introducing widespread drug testing as part of the annual physical exams that pilots would undergo.....

LONG INVOLVED AND EMINENTLY readable piece. Spread the word

http://www.thenation.com/doc.mhtml?i=20040927&s=baker

[cal04]

1. good read on this topic

I've said it before, but apparently it is worth saying it again:
"Rove is on his game here. By holding back the military records he has made the military records the issue, and has managed to divert the media from the real issue, which is the community service. If those legal files ever get out, showing that Bush was convicted of a serious drug offence, his political career will be finished. The real reason that Bush went AWOL was that he couldn't afford to take a drug test. The real reason he couldn't afford to take a drug test was that it would have been a condition of his sentencing that he remain clean. If word of the failed drug test had filtered back to the court, he would have gone to jail. His fear of the criminal legal consequences is why he went AWOL, and that's why the community service is the key to understanding what is going on here. By concentrating on the military records, the media is walking right into Rove's trap."

The details of Bush's service, or lack thereof, will always be buried in the selective releases of laundered records released by the White House and the Pentagon (isn't amazing how each release is described as all the documents, only to be followed by more releases when specific new points require a response?). Those who want to believe in Bush will always be able to fool themselves into believing what they want to believe. At this point, with all many documents available, and the new allegations of forgery from Bush's true believers, undecided voters will just throw up their hands in disgust at the whole issue. If Democrats want to win, the only way they can do it is to get information on what happened in that Texas court room in 1972.

http://xymphora.blogspot.com/

[RevCheesehead]

2. Do you think the Bushes have a hit-list?

>snip<
One of the difficulties in getting to the truth about what really took place during this period is the frequently expressed fear of retribution from the Bush organization. Many sources refuse to speak on the record, or even to have their knowledge communicated publicly in any way. One source who did publicly evince doubts about Bush's activities in 1972 was Dean Roome, who flew formations often with Bush and was his roommate for a time. "You wonder if you know who George Bush is," Roome told USA Today in a little-appreciated interview back in 2002. "I think he digressed after awhile," he said. "In the first half, he was gung-ho. Where George failed was to fulfill his obligation as a pilot. It was an irrational time in his life." Yet in subsequent years, Roome has revised his comments to a firm insistence that nothing out of the ordinary took place at that time, and after one interview he e-mailed me material raising questions about John Kerry's military career. Roome, who operates a curio shop in a Texas hamlet, told me that Bush aides, including communications adviser Karen Hughes, and even the President himself stay in touch with him.

[Eloriel]

15. Yes, of course.

There are a number of people who could've done them harm by revealing too much information who have ended up conveniently dead. Danny Casolaro, James Hatfield, many others including a pretty good handful of U.S. Senators. Of course, I and other DUers like me get called tin-foil hat conspiracy theorists when we say such things, but you can't hide the truth -- that a lot of people who had the truth about the Bush Family or could have otherwise impeded their efforts are now dead, often mysteriously or under conditions that have never quite been adequately explained. They are either very, very lucky, or they make their own luck. I believe the latter is the case.

[KoKo]

24. Kitty Kelly has verified that they don't take kindly to being talked about

She was on Tweety (I held my nose to watch it) and she didn't back down. She said no one wants to be on the record talking about the Bushes...

Eloriel is correct...in that who knows how many folks have gotten in their way and been punished for it.

[Carolab]

31. I thought Kitty was dead on

saying she felt like she "needed to be on the witness protection list" after her interviews with Lauer...

[leesa]

28. Of course they do. A Chedder head or brick??

Please help Wisconsin. I am from there and it makes me so sad to see their proud progressive heritage destroyed by this 'willful ignorance' movement

[krkaufman]

3. "...a President famed for his superlative memory" WhaT?

Sort of a summary/rehash of previous stories, but necessary to keep the heat turned up.

I just hope The Nation is also running stories on his present-day failings, which are more relevant to this year's election.

[kskiska]

4. Where does the coke bust fit into all this –

and the PULL community service? I had assumed that was the reason he suddenly had to quit and move out of state.

[cal04]

6. could that be why he

was in court in 1972
maybe someone needs to find out if this is true and what happened

[mahenphx]

5. Read this few days ago...

Problem with piece is in her further ramblings Allison recounts a dispute and hard feelings with senior Bushes which the proB's will hang on as proof she can't be believed because she's got an old grudge. Shame because it's a reasonable explanation that can be related to by most people...selfpreservation and risk of exposure for Daddy B. It's a damn shame. Could have gotten reasonable play and was from horse's mouth so to speak.

x( Ma Hen in Phoenix

[yardwork]

13. Allison's telling about the hard feelings was a strength, imo

It makes it clear that she is honest and willing to recount all aspects of her relationship with the Bushes.

Also, I didn't feel that Allison's account was "rambling." It seemed quite specific and to the point when I read it.

[bobbyboucher]

18. Whatever.

Damn there is alot of carrying going on these days. Must be the writing on the wall.

******BLAST FAX******
We need everyone to hit all liberal/progressive blogs and discussion boards and load up everything we got to diminish, distract, and destroy this whole Bush TANG story. Pull out all the stops. Try to infiltrate and poo-poo everything. If this gets out W is finished.

[Ms. Clio]

21. Mayday! Mayday!

He's been holed and he's going down!

[skooooo]

7. Cocaine is a hell of a drug!

[David Dunham]

8. None of this helps us win over moderate voters.

[NewYorkerfromMass]

9. Reporting for duty and fighting in Vietnam and earning honors

compares very favorably to Bush's actions in any moderate view point.

So I beg to differ- yes it does.

[Pepperbelly]

11. so?

None of us are running for President and I like seeing Bush's dirty drawers exposed for my amusement. There is always the power of not clicking on something that doesn't interest you.

Peace, out.

:D

[wellstone_democrat]

19. Yeah, what Pepperbelly said...

if all I get is some relief from the horror of his "presidency" by being entertained by his failures, I can live with that.

[sffreeways]

12. No it hurts his base

it weakens his base. That's the way it's going to work. The hardcore base will stay home.

[KoKo]

22. Clinton's Monica escape turned off moderate voters to Gore...so maybe

Bush's dereliction of duty and drug use will turn off moderate voters to him. We need all the votes we can get. And, it's payback time for Bush's escapades. No reason why Clinton was hounded for Whitewater and not "inhaling" and Bush gets a pass for illegally selling stocks, snorting, swigging and not serving time in the military while he sends National Guard soldiers out to die for his war based on lies.

Bring in On...

[sally343434]

10. Was this when he got the new driver's license?

Texas ties all state records, including criminal convictions, to a person's driver's license number. Somewhere along the way, Bush suddenly was issued a brand new driver's license number, apparently in an effort to bury this connection.

[City Lights]

23. I believe he was issued a new driver's license around the time

he became governor. pickles got a new one too.

[UpInArms]

14. Book: Bush was arrested for cocaine in 1972

http://www.salon.com/news/feature/1999/10/18/cocaine/

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.

The center's executive director, Madgelean Bush (no relation to George W. Bush), had told Salon News and others that Bush did not do community service there, and the Bush campaign likewise denied the allegation. But the Texas governor had admitted to working at Houston's Project P.U.L.L. in 1972, and Hatfield says he began to wonder if that was actually the community service sentence. Hatfield says he confirmed those suspicions with three sources close to the Bush family he had cultivated while writing his biography, which publishes Wednesday.

<snip>

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."

...more...

Wish Hatfield were still with us :(

[Disturbed]

17. The Community service and..

the physical are the smoking guns. Hopefully, an investgator can find evidence. Everything else is smoke screen. The Kerry campaign is floundering and the Neon Fascists must be brought down. This is the way to do it.

[truthisfreedom]

16. crazy! what a great article.

thanks for posting it!

[Ms. Clio]

20. Provides real insight into his sociopathic character

One middle-aged woman whose general veracity could be confirmed told me that she met Bush in 1968 at Hemisphere 68, a fair in San Antonio, at which he tried to pick her up and offered her a white powder he was inhaling. She was then a teenager; Bush would have just graduated from Yale and have been starting the National Guard then. "He was getting really aggressive with me," she said. "I told him I'd call a policeman, and he laughed, and asked who would believe me."

[Eloriel]

25. Thank you -- that fits perfectly with how I intuitively perceive

about him but I've never seen anything to support it -- not just an arrogant sociopath, but a woman-hater too.

[Ms. Clio]

27. And can't you hear him saying to someone, "Yeah, sure, we let 9/11 happen"

Go ahead, call CBS call CNN, tell them I said it--nobody will believe you."

[Eloriel]

32. Yes -- such is the power of The Big Lie

:kick:

[PartyPooper]

26. A psychologist weighs in with a frightening history of George W. Bush.

"So George, how do you feel about you mom and dad?"

Oliver James
Tuesday September 2, 2003
The Guardian

As the alcoholic George Bush approached his 40th birthday in 1986, he had achieved nothing he could call his own. He was all too aware that none of his educational and professional accomplishments would have occured without his father. He felt so low that he did not care if he lived or died. Taking a friend out for a flight in a Cessna aeroplane, it only became apparent he had not flown one before when they nearly crashed on take-off. Narrowly avoiding stalling a few times, they crash-landed and the friend breathed a sigh of relief - only for Bush to rev up the engine and take off again.

Much more...

http://www.guardian.co.uk/print/0,3858,4745079-110878,00.html

[Zorra]

29. Great article. The Nation is awesome. n/t

[struggle4progress]

30. "Well, you have to know Georgie .. really was .. totally irresponsible .."

And he still is. :evilfrown: