A Cowardly Liar at West Point

West Point graduates deserve better. Just because AWOL Bush occupies the White House does NOT make him worthy of giving their commencement address. As "Commander in Chief" he has betrayed all branches of the military by lying to them and sending them into harm's way, something he carefully avoided during Vietnam as a "fortunate son". His "military career" is spotty at best, from the Champagne TANG unit on daddy's coattails to his "disappearance" after a cocaine bust to serve community service instead of jail time.
If the cadets today saw through the propaganda and absolute lies Bush told them they'd be ahead of the eight generals who had to wait until they retired to tell it like it is, but I fear their vision will be clouded by the presidential seal, the pomp and circumstance and wanting badly to believe he speaks for upholding the Constitution. Sadly, it's not true. Bush promises to finish mission in Iraq "The war began on my watch, but it's going to end on your watch. Your generation will bring us victory in the war on terror." Who the hell is he kidding here? "And the best way to honor America's fallen heroes is to carry on their fight, defend our freedom, and complete the mission for which they gave their lives," he said. Didn't he say the Mission was accomplished three years ago? Oh, that's right, he lied.



There is absolutely NO DOUBT he was AWOL but the White House machine attacks and smears anyone who brings it up...their usual MO for those who speak truth to power. Max Cleland, Al Gore, John McCain, John Kerry, the list is endless of smears against those who actually served. Why does the nation buy this bullshit? Because the MSM is owned by winger corporations. The righties used these talking points to defend their boy but they leave holes and gaps all over the place and can't explain why nobody has taken up the reward offer of an easy $10,000 to anybody who can prove they served with the liar-in-thief.
Documented in Hatfield's book of the same name, "Fortunate Son", Hatfield mysteriously died shortly after writing about a Bush in an unflattering light.
As to why the story never got aired much, Hatfield's story is enough warning to even the most intrepid reporter, this is deadly business. Don't fuck with the Bushes.

At that same time, author Jim Hatfield had completed Fortunate Son, a biography about George W. Bush. The book had not yet gone to press, and the Salon article seemed to answer nagging questions about Bush's first full-time job as a Project P.U.L.L. inner-city youth counselor.

As Jim Hatfield writes, "Why would the carousing Bush, whose life seemed nothing more than one big party, abruptly quit behaving 'young and irresponsible' for just a few months before returning almost as suddenly to an existence of 'just living for the moment'?" Hatfield concluded that the Salon article was right about the drug bust, but got it wrong about the location of Bush's community service.

Hatfield first called the director of Houston's Martin Luther King, Jr. Community Center, Madge Bush. He told her he knew that Bush had not been ordered to do community service at the center. "Finally, someone believes me", she replied, having fended off inquiries from dozens of reporters across the country. Hatfield then pointedly asked her if Bush performed court-ordered community service at another agency, and after a pause she declined comment.

Hatfield then contacted three confidential sorces that had been helpful in writing his book, and all three confirmed Salon's story, but with the community service at Project P.U.L.L. instead of the Martin Luther King, Jr. Community Center. Ominously, two of the sources warned Hatfield to be careful and watch his back.

One source was identified only as a former Yale classmate who had partied with Bush in Houston in the late '60s and early '70s. He told Hatfield that George was arrested for cocaine possession in 1972, but "due to his father's connections, the entire record was expunged by a state judge whom the elder 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. In exchange for successfully completing community service at Project P.U.L.L., where Bush senior was a heavy contributor and honorary chairman, the judge purged George W.'s record."

Another source is described as a longtime Bush friend and unofficial political advisor. "Take this any way it sounds, but do you think George would take time out from speeding around town in his TR-6 convertible sports car, bedding down just about every single woman-and a few married ones- and partying like there's no tomorrow to go work full-time as a mentor to a bunch of streetwise black kids? Get real, man, this is a white-bread boy from the other side of town we're talking about."

The third source was a high-ranking advisor to Bush who had known him for several years. He again confirmed that Bush had been busted in 1972 and the community service at Project P.U.L.L. was court-ordered. This source also told Hatfield that "...I can confirm that W.'s Dallas attorney remains the repository of any evidence of the expunged record. From what I've been told, the attorney is the one who advised him to get a new driver's licence in 1995 when a survey of his public records uncovered a stale but nevertheless incriminating trail for an overly eager reporter to follow."
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What is eerie about reading Jim Hatfield's book is the warning this third source gave him. "Be careful and watch your back every step of the way...Without sounding paranoid, I think I would be amiss if I didn't remind you that George's old man was once director of the CIA...W's raised almost a staggering $60 million for his White House run in a matter of only a few months, and his corporate sponsors and the GOP fat cats aren't going to roll over and play dead when you expose the truth about their investment."

When Fortunate Son was released, it stirred up a hornet's nest. The Dallas Morning News received information about Hatfield's checkered past. Hatfield had done prison time for a 1988 conviction for solicitation of capital murder, a felony. That was all the Bush camp needed to discredit the book. The author was routinely discredited by pointing out that he was a convicted felon, but the accusations in the book could not be debunked. The only other defense the Bush campaign could muster was to dispute that the judge could not be Republican, as stated by one of Hatfield's sources, since at that time there were no GOP judges in that county. Two of the three sources merely said that the arrest was expunged by a state judge. The one source could easily have assumed party affiliation, since George senior was was Republican. CBS's 60 Minutes ran a story on Jim Hatfield, titled "Unfortunate and Untrue?". The piece concentrated on Hatfield's past but never refuted anything in his book. The original publisher, St. Martin's Press, panicked and recalled 70,000 copies from bookstores. Luckily, the book remains in print today through Soft Skull Press.
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The book sales were disappointing, and the character assault never let up. The American media danced to Karl Rove's tune, diverting inquiries about the drug bust into stories about Hatfield's criminal past, killing the book by discrediting the author. He lost two other book contracts. On July 20, 2001, Jim Hatfield's body was found in an Arkansas hotel room, an apparent suicide from taking two kinds of prescription drugs. Hatfield was only 43 years old.
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There's so much more information out there that we've all read over the years, unfortunately it has all been buried and instead the myth of a "compassionate conservative" has been shoved down the public's collective throat while he robs us blind and sends our youth off to wars for his own gain.