I have been scratching my head trying to figure this one out since Bush started the whole war mongering effort last year: Why are Repubs so quick to forgive Bush for hiding out in the Guard, going AWOL on a cocaine binge while fellow Americans (including fellow politicians like Al Gore, John McCain, John Kerrey, Max Cleland etc etc) were risking their lives in a far away land. Whenever a D runs against an R and the D has a non-military background the R makes a point of a) pointing this out and b)subtly questioning the D's patriotism. Hell, even when a D did serve, his patriotism is questioned merely because he is a D. The worst example of this is what the RSCC did to Max Cleland in 2002. If a D with a military past as ignominous as Bush's were to pull a similar stunt like that one on the Aircraft carrier he would have had had his ass handed to him. Why the double standard?
Because the press likes Bush. They always have. If you watched the post-debate punditry during the campaign, it should have been clear that the press was goo-goo-eyed for W and he could do no wrong.
I get that with the press. They are a bunch of kool-aid drinking sheep...but I am more curious to hear from my Republican friends on this board about this. How/why do you give Bush a ride on his terrible Military background and allow him to send young men off to battle when normally you scream bloody murder if a guy like him were to pull some of his stunts?
Why, because Dan Quayle took the fall for all of the Vietnam era politicans who dodged or bent the rules to get out of service. Remember what Danny boy went through in 88?
Bush may have been given preferential treatment with his assignment, but Poppy Gore kept Al's SS out of the grass too (military journalism - "you're not a writer, Private Joker - you're a killer!"). Just common practice for the high & mighty in this country. What was Clinton doing during 'Nam?
Re: Re: Why the Double Standard? Yes, yes, and yes. But the question was: why the double standard? Why did Clinton get put through the ringer, but Bush can put on a flight jacket and parade around like a goddam general and not get called for being a hypocrite?
You don't really expect an honest answer from our "Republican friends", do you? I'll borrow a page from one of our friends and answer on their behalf, replete with guerilla psycho-analysis: "We are fixated at junior high-school level of socio-political consciousness. Whether we lacked the courage to confront our fathers as adults and subsequently rehabilitate their memories by adopting their world-views, or whether it helped us blend with our frat-bros is unimportant. What is important is whether "our guy" prevails, and never, EVER altering our socio-political opinions, as doing so raises the possibility that "our guys" and by association, we (and our fathers), might have mis-conceived certain complex issues. That's why we remain "staunch." Why else would so many of us go out of friggin' way to claim a patriotic high-ground with showy displays of "supporting the troops" and subsequently show complete indifference after it becomes apparent that the stated reasons these young Americans were placed in harm's way were illegitimate and perhaps even fraudulent? "Kicking ass" feels good and our guy looks good pretending like he actually does it. Ultimately, what matters most is that our guy got over and yours didn't. Now shut up and stop asking questions you unpatriotic coward." I don't care who this angers. The neo-cons here won't submit a good-faith answer to Finnegan's question anyway. Call it "pre-emptive posting."
Re: Re: Re: Why the Double Standard? I can't stand Bush, be he looks like he's got the right stuff. Clinton doesn't.
Re: Re: Re: Why the Double Standard? Clinton actively avoided ANY type of service - even an obligatory stint in the National Guard. He signed up for the Arkansas Guard in 1969 but went off to Oxford instead and was never heard from again (militarily speaking). Clinton looked out of place getting off the Marine chopper when he was president. He also actively protested the Vietnam War, as did many of his generation. But those people were never elected president. Knowing Clinton's calculating mind (he wanted to be President when he was still in diapers), protesting Vietnam was as big a gamble as smoking pot or avoiding military service. He effectively lied his way out of any of his background problems so why are you upset that Willie got a raw deal? Bush is always questioned about his Air Nat'l Guard days but at least he put some effort in and actually flew jets at one time. Clinton wouldn't be caught dead in a plane where he couldn't stretch out his legs and get a BJ from a fat intern.
This happens for the same reason that I believe that the first that the Republicans will provide the first non-Caucasian president, and probably the first female one as well. Think about why voters would cross party lines, keeping in mind that even most independents vote for 1 party significantly more often then the other. There are some political positions or bits of a candidate's history that only matter as a function of what party they are in. Military background is one, race and gender are another. It's not so much hypocrisy as priorities. No Republican would ever cross party lines to vote for a candidate with with Bush's military record, but since he was one of their own, it wasn't that important to them. As far as I can tell, Democrats don't really care at all about military service (or lack thereof), so those who preferred Bush's stated positions or found him more charismatic weren't likely to change their votes either. If Gore's campaign was intelligently run (A big if, I know), they wouldn't have bothered hammering Bush's AWOL issue because they would have understand that Democrats wouldn't care and Republicans would vote for Bush anyway. By the same token, there is plenty of polling information that makes it clear that Democratic voters are far more likely than Republicans to cross party lines to vote for a minority or female candidate. Some issues are only really important within a political party; others are only really important to you when it's the other party.
Because life aint fair. Quit the crying. Actually, it probably has more to do with the perception that R's are going to invest more in the military than D's. It's all about the Benjamins.
I will try to offer a rationale. Military spending is a republican priority and not a democratic priority. So, if you have a draft dodging republican, you have less fear that he is going to slash military spending because of his party affiliation. When you have a draft dodging democrat, military spending is not a priority. As a result, there is more fear that a draft dodging democrat will slash military spending and increase spending on social programs. I am not saying that I think this is true as it could just as easily be flipped around saying a democrat wouldn't want to be perceived as anti-military, especially if they are a draft dodger, so they would go out of their way to make sure that they don't cut military spending. Regardless, I think this is some justification for the double standard. We all know republicans for the most part, aren't out to cut military spending.
Hey some intelligent posts that avoid just attacking Clinton and try to answer the question! Thanks, those are some interesting points MLSNHTOWN and NER_MCFC. As a lefty I think a similar question could be asked about our support of Clinton in spite of the fact that he was a womanizing creep. I for one supported Clinton throughout the "BJ Scandal" because I looked at the bigger picture of what he was doing for the country as a whole so I could more easily forgive his obvious personal shortcomings.
I think this is a precise Democratic equivalent to what I was talking about. As a liberal democrat, I would be no more likely to vote for a Republican with Clinton's bedroom history than would a conservative Republican to vote for a Democrat with Clinton's 'draft-dodging' history. Within our respective parties however, other things matter more. Another difference on issues like this, I think, is probably differences between the parties on what to attack about an opponent. As I said before, I don't think anybody with a significant attachment to either party is ever going to be swayed by these types of issues, so I don't think it would be a good use of resources and bandwidth. It appears, based on the last couple of election cycles that the Democrats have a similar view to mine, but the Republicans obviously don't. It may be a historical legacy of the so-called bloody shirt strategy of the post-Civil War era. For at least 30 years after 1865, Republicans would 'wave the bloody shirt', i.e., pointedly remind voters that the Democratic Party had chosen the wrong side during the war. Given the dominance the GOP enjoyed during much of that period, it would have been natural to conclude that the bloody shirt strategy was why, even though it was probably a very minor factor.
Re: Re: Re: Why the Double Standard? This is amazingly astute. I think I'm quite a moderate, politically. (If "Moderate" means thinking that the two major political parties in this country are terrible at representing the people.) Since my official residence is California, I'm a Republican. If I officially lived in many other states, I'd probably be a Dem. If only the American people could realize that every recent president has been a poor choice for the job (as were most of the losers in elections), then maybe we'd be getting somewhere. Or maybe some of the non-voting population thinks exactly that already.