What they said in '92 about the draft...

[Fight_n_back]

Statement made by Oliver North when asked to comment on Clinton's draft record.
"I would rather vote for Jane Fonda than Gov. Clinton! At least she has been to North Vietnam."
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http://www.totse.com/en/politics/political_spew/buchanan.html
Pat Buchanan's speach at Rep. Convention '92
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George Bush was 17 when they bombed Pearl Harbor. He left his high school
class, walked down to the recruiting office, and signed up to become the
youngest fighter pilot in the Pacific War. And Mr. Clinton? When Bill Clinton's
turn came in Vietnam, he sat up in a dormitory in Oxford, England, and figured
out how to dodge the draft.
Which of these two men has won the moral authority to call on Americans to
put their lives at risk? I suggest, respectfully, it is the patriot and war
hero, Navy Lt.j.g George Herbert Walker Bush.
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http://archives.cjr.org/year/92/6/draft.asp
DRAFT
by William Broyles, Jr.
Broyles, former editor-in-chief of Newsweek and California magazines, was also founding editor of Texas Monthly. A decorated Marine corps Vietnam veteran, he is the author of Brothers in arms: A journey from War to Peace, an account of his return to Vietnam in 1984. He was co-creator and executive consultant of the television series China Beach, and creator and executive producer of Under Cover, another series.
As the coverage of Bill Clinton's draft history and its coverup reminds us, the Vietnam war, which brought out the best and worst in America, did the same for the press. In the beginning the stories were all body counts and no context, no history, no help. the good news is that these dumb simplifications gradually gave way to more thoughtful complexities. The story, over time, got told.
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The Republican attack apparatus helped keep the story alive, even as polls were showing that voters were much less interested in this issue than the press seemed to be. The Republicans could hammer the issue of credibility and draw the constant, unspoken contrast between Bill Clinton, Draft Dodger, with George Bush, War Hero. But if the issue was Clinton's credibility, why was the attack carried at the beginning by Bob Dole, whose crippled arm was a vivid reminder of his own war service? Why even refer to Bush's war service at all?
For a time, the Republican attack diverted attention from the fact that so few leading Republicans had served in Vietnam. To its credit, the press refused to be diverted. Stories homed in on the questionable war records of leading Republicans like Dick Cheney, Rich Bond, Pat Buchanan, and the man most likely to be inspired by George Bush's war record, his son, George W. Bush (who rushed to fulfill his patriotic duty in that haven of draft evaders, the National Guard). In an op-ed piece in The Washington Post on the day Bush and Clinton addressed the National Guard Association, James Fallows wrote that "listening to Bush campaign strategist Mary Matalin Call Clinton a draft dodger made me feel like women must feel when men lecture them about abortion."
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http://www-tech.mit.edu/V112/N53/bush.53w.html
Upbeat Bush Steps Up Rhetoric
By Ann Devroy
The Washington Post
Pumped up by the polls and the moment, President Bush raced across Michigan Thursday in rhetorical overdrive, attacking the "way-out, far-out" Democratic ticket on everything from northern spotted owls to his opponent's draft record.
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The whole Bush campaign, including the warm up speakers, were charged up Thursday. At the Warren event, Democratic state Sen. Gilbert J. Dinello churned the crowd into a frenzy by calling Clinton a draft-dodger, a liar and a man who "wails, whines and wimps out."
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http://www.urbin.net/EWW/polyticks/ark-bill.html
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Right to presidency lost"
" When considering the particulars surrounding Clinton's draft record <http://www.urbin.net/EWW/polyticks/bc-rotc.html> and the double-taking he has done in dealing with it, which portrays character, it is my belief he has forfeited his right to even ask to be awarded the honor of the office of President."
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http://www-tech.mit.edu/V112/N48/campaign.48w.html
Focus on Clinton Raises Question about Bush Campaign Character
By Dan Balz
The Washington Post
For months, aides to President Bush have tried to make character the central issue of the presidential campaign. But in attempting to focus attention to Bill Clinton's 1969 trip to Moscow during the Vietnam War, Bush has raised potentially damaging questions about the character of his own campaign.
Vietnam has stalked Clinton since early last winter, when discrepancies in his draft record and his conflicting statements on the subject nearly tripped up his candidacy before the first votes were cast. Just beneath the surface of the controversy over Clinton were some old antagonisms and arguments over the war that still remain unresolved.
Republicans have attempted to revive and expand the draft issue this fall, as a surrogate for questions about Clinton's character and credibility. But it was not until this week that they moved the issue to a different level by invoking the old specter of anti-communist suspicion and innuendo that marked American politics of an earlier era.
Aides to Bush tried to back away from suggestions that they were attempting to bait Clinton about communist ties as a student war protester, but they insisted Clinton was not telling the full story of his involvement in opposing the war. Clinton advisers, who struggled all week to deflect an issue that was lurking on the edges of the campaign, appeared relieved that Bush's comments on "Larry King Live" had given them the vehicle for fighting back.
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Nonetheless, each inconsistency, whether on how he escaped the draft or how much involvement he had in the anti-war movement, has given the Bush campaign ammunition to hammer the Democratic nominee.
Prodded by such conservatives as Rep. Robert Dornan (R-Calif.), the Bush campaign is now attempting to portray Clinton as a major leader of the anti-war movement, with the suggestion that he had ties to international protest leaders and communists.
"Larry, I don't want to tell you what I really think because I don't have the facts. But to go to Moscow one year after Russia crushed Czechoslovakia, (and) not remember who you saw in Moscow. ... I'm just saying level with the American people on the draft, on whether he went to Moscow, how many demonstrations he led against his own country from a foreign soil. Level."
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http://www.fair.org/articles/private-lives.html
November 1999
Covering The Private Lives of Politicians
by Jeff Cohen
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Today, one hears the absurd claim that Bill Clinton -- with the most scrutinized personal life in presidential history -- has gotten off easy compared to George W. Bush. Cyberpundit Matt Drudge, for example, recently complained about a Los Angeles Times story on Bush's Vietnam era draft-avoidance: "I don't ever remember the Los Angeles Times doing full exposes on Clinton dodging the draft," said Drudge. In fact, the L.A. Times repeatedly probed Clinton's draft evasion and its page-one expose on Sept. 2, 1992 re-ignited the story.
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http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bill_Clinton
Bill Clinton
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Clinton's opponents raised various "character" issues during the campaign, including Clinton's apparent evasion of the draft </wiki/Draft> during the Vietnam War, and his glib response to a question about past marijuana </wiki/Marijuana> use. Allegations of womanizing and shady business deals also were raised. While none of these alleged flaws led to Clinton's defeat, they did fuel unusually vehement opposition to Clinton's policies among many conservatives </wiki/Conservatives> from the very beginning of his presidency.
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http://ap.grolier.com/article?assetid=0068080-00&templatename=/article/article.html
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Bush also attacked his opponent's character, criticizing him for allegedly not explaining how he had avoided the draft during the Vietnam War.
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http://www.awolbush.com/whoserved.html
Who served in the military?
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