! MisGuided Rhetoric !

[CutLass]

Democrats
* Richard Gephardt: Air National Guard, 1965-71.
* David Bonior: Staff Sgt., Air Force 1968-72.
* Tom Daschle: 1st Lt., Air Force SAC 1969-72.
* Al Gore: enlisted Aug. 1969; sent to Vietnam Jan. 1971 as an army journalist in 20th Engineer Brigade.
* Bob Kerrey: Lt. j.g. Navy 1966-69; Medal of Honor, Vietnam.
* Daniel Inouye: Army 1943-'47; Medal of Honor, WWII.
* John Kerry: Lt., Navy 1966-70; Silver Star, Bronze Star with CombatV, Purple Hearts.
* Charles Rangel: Staff Sgt., Army 1948-52; Bronze Star, Korea.
* Max Cleland: Captain, Army 1965-68; Silver Star & Bronze Star,Vietnam.
* Ted Kennedy: Army, 1951-1953.
* Tom Harkin: Lt., Navy, 1962-67; Naval Reserve, 1968-74.
* Jack Reed: Army Ranger, 1971-1979; Captain, Army Reserve 1979-91.
* Fritz Hollings: Army officer in WWII, receiving the Bronze Star and seven campaign ribbons.
* Leonard Boswell: Lt. Col., Army 1956-76; Vietnam, DFCs, BronzeStars, and Soldier's Medal.
* Pete Peterson: Air Force Captain, POW. Purple Heart, Silver Star and Legion of Merit.
* Mike Thompson: Staff sergeant, 173rd Airborne, Purple Heart.
* Bill McBride: Candidate for Fla. Governor. Marine in Vietnam; Bronze Star with Combat V.
* Gray Davis: Army Captain in Vietnam, Bronze Star.
* Pete Stark: Air Force 1955-57
* Chuck Robb: Vietnam
* Howell Heflin: Silver Star
* George McGovern: Silver Star & DFC during WWII.
* Bill Clinton: Did not serve. Student deferments. Entered draft but received 311.
* Jimmy Carter: Seven years in the Navy.
* Walter Mondale: Army 1951-1953
* John Glenn: WWII and Korea; six DFCs and Air Medal with 18 Clusters.
* Tom Lantos: Served in Hungarian underground in WWII. Saved by Raoul Wallenberg.


Republicans
* Dennis Hastert: did not serve.
* Tom Delay: did not serve.
* Roy Blunt: did not serve.
* Bill Frist: did not serve.
* Mitch McConnell: did not serve.
* Rick Santorum: did not serve.
* Trent Lott: did not serve.
* Dick Cheney: did not serve. Several deferments, the last by marriage.
* John Ashcroft: did not serve. Seven deferments to teach business.
* Jeb Bush: did not serve.
* Karl Rove: did not serve.
* Saxby Chambliss: did not serve. "Bad knee." The man who attacked Max Cleland's patriotism.
* Paul Wolfowitz: did not serve.
* Vin Weber: did not serve.
* Richard Perle: did not serve.
* Douglas Feith: did not serve.
* Eliot Abrams: did not serve.
* Richard Shelby: did not serve.
* Jon Kyl: did not serve.
* Tim Hutchison: did not serve.
* Christopher Cox: did not serve.
* Newt Gingrich: did not serve.
* Don Rumsfeld: served in Navy (1954-57) as aviator and flight instructor.
* G.W. Bush: six-year Nat'l Guard commitment (in four).
* Ronald Reagan: due to poor eyesight, served in a non-combat role making movies.
* Bob Dornan: Consciously enlisted after fighting was over in Korea.
* Phil Gramm: did not serve.
* John McCain: Silver Star, Bronze Star, Legion of Merit, Purple Heart and Distinguished Flying Cross.
* Bob Dole: an honorable veteran.
* Chuck Hagel: two Purple Hearts and a Bronze Star, Vietnam.
* Duke Cunningham: nominated for Medal of Honor, Navy Cross, Silver Stars, Air Medals, Purple Hearts.
* Jeff Sessions: Army Reserves, 1973-1986
* Colin Powell: Long career in military management.
* Wayne Gilchrest: USMC in Vietnam; wounded in action.
* Don Nickles: Biography does not list military service.
* Dana Rohrabacher: did not serve.
* John M. McHugh: did not serve.
* JC Watts: did not serve.
* Jack Kemp: did not serve, due to "knee problem", although continued in NFL for 8 years.
* Dan Quayle: Journalism unit of the Indiana National Guard.
* Rudy Giuliani: did not serve.
* George Pataki: did not serve.
* Spencer Abraham: did not serve.
* John Engler: did not serve.
* Lindsey Graham: National Guard lawyer.
* Arnold Schwarzenegger: AWOL from Austrian army base.
* G.H.W. Bush: Pilot in WWII. Shot down by the Japanese.
* Tom Ridge: Bronze Star for Valor in Vietnam.
* Sam Johnson: Combat in Korea and Vietnam, POW in Hanoi.
* Ted Stevens: WWII pilot, DFCs, two Air Medals.
* John Warner: Served in the Navy during WWII as a RM3
* Heather Wilson: Air Force 1978-1989
* Gerald Ford: Navy, WWII

Pundits & Others
* Sean Hannity: did not serve.
* Rush Limbaugh: did not serve (4-F with a 'pilonidal cyst.')
* Bill O'Reilly: did not serve.
* Michael Savage: did not serve.
* George Will: did not serve.
* Chris Matthews: did not serve.
* Paul Gigot: did not serve.
* Bill Bennett: did not serve.
* Pat Buchanan: did not serve.
* John Wayne: did not serve.
* Bill Kristol: did not serve.
* Kenneth Starr: did not serve.
* Antonin Scalia: did not serve.
* Clarence Thomas: did not serve.
* Ralph Reed: did not serve.
* Michael Medved: did not serve.
* Charlie Daniels: did not serve.
* Ted Nugent: did not serve.

[Epee_Pox]

And your point is what, exactly?

It's not like the Republicans have questioned the patriotism or willingness to serve of the Democrats -- it seems to me that the Democrats frequently feel the need to defend their patriotism when it was never challenged in the first place. I do not know why.

[mrbiggs]

I just want to say that I do agree with the basic point, but there are many congressmen, governors, etc. not included here.

[Peach]

Hmmm . . . military service makes people liberals?

[Westley]

Hmmm..... Nothing stereotypes liberals like a buzz cut, rippling muscles, and beds you can bounce quarters off of....

[Westley]

That should be the new democratic symbol- an army/air force soldier with a buzcut, hard muscles, and put against a blue background of the rippling sea and star specked night. That would be awesome for Kerry. Get rid of that association dems have to being weak. Soldier- you republican?

[Inquartata]

As epee pox said, this carefully chosen listing purports to
demonstrate---what?

[telkanuru]

That the entierety of the people who support the current war have never been in one, which is different than those who do not support it.

And if no one is criticizing the dem's patriotism, what, dare I ask, are the swift boat veterans for truth doing?

[telkanuru]

Oh, right, and we have a politics forum for a reason.

[Inquartata]

Originally Posted by telkanuru

That the entierety of the people who support the current war have never been in one, which is different than those who do not support it.

Which in turn proves---what?

( BTW, when I noted that the lists were carefully compiled, including those who help make a point and excluding those who don't, it was for good reason: apparently only the conclusion matters, and if it takes selective evidence to prove it, so what? )

And if no one is criticizing the dem's patriotism, what, dare I ask, are the swift boat veterans for truth doing?

Criticising ONE Democrat's veracity?

[telkanuru]

1) I dunno, I find the fact that there are no persons in charge of a war who have war experience slightly disturbing. Perhaps this explains interesting things like troop strength and Jungle BDUs in a big sandbox.

2) The one democrat who just happens to be the leading representative of his party. You criticize the leader, you criticize the platform and they party by default.

[Inquartata]

Originally Posted by telkanuru

1) I dunno, I find the fact that there are no persons in charge of a war who have war experience slightly disturbing.

cough* Colin Powell*cough

2) The one democrat who just happens to be the leading representative of his party. You criticize the leader, you criticize the platform and they party by default.

Well, that's a novel premise...might I suggest that it's not widely shared by the people you're talking about, ie Republicans?

Still, even if ( for the sake of argument ) one were to accept it---how does it make the leap from the Party to every member of the Party? Isn't that stereotyping? Or at least the fallacy of division...

[telkanuru]

First, as if Mr. Powell will not be the first to go even if the Bush administration gets its 4 year extension. There is every indication that he has been dragged into this thing kicking and screaming.

Second, I must have missed something (or, it is possible, you misunderstand myself). Follow thusly: The chief representative of the party both proclaims and is the physical embodiment of the agenda/platform of the party. Thus, if the representative is criticized, then the agenda and therefore the party is criticized. To call Kerry a "flip-flopper", for example, implies general weakness of resolution on the part of democrats as a whole. To call him dishonest likewise insinuates that democrats are dishonest. Et cetera.

[Inquartata]

No, what I'm saying is that I don't believe that's a widely held belief, or theory. It may be so to you, and thus you may take the criticisms to mean that, but consider the possibility that yours may be a minority view in that regard. I truly think that, although we say "the liberals think so-and-so", or talk of "the Democrats", it's just a sort of shorthand---at base we don't believe that there is such a thing as a monolithic Democratic Party all of whose members think the same things and feel the same ways. We know that the same Party contains Ted Kennedy and Zell Miller, Barbara Boxer and Joe Lieberman. It's just that one cannot, in conversation, really talk about each of a hundred individuals' various views or propensities. To a certain extent, one has to aggregate or get bogged down in the details of disparity...

But to go to the extreme of annointing one man as the only real person in a Party and everyone else merely shadows or reflections of him is I think to go much too far.

[jeff]

And your point is what, exactly?

That the guys to be tough on war are the ones who never serve. Chickenhawks. And then shamelessly attack the liberals as weak.

It's not like the Republicans have questioned the patriotism or willingness to serve of the Democrats

Uh, actually, they do that all the time.

[Inquartata]

Originally Posted by jeff

That the guys to be tough on war are the ones who never serve.

Ah, I see---it's a sort of ad hominem ( circumstantial ) attack: because they "did not serve" in a war, their arguments cannot possibly be correct? And similarly, because certain Democrats DID serve, their theories must be the more correct? Is this the hypothesis?

Chickenhawks.

Come on, Jeff, you're a smart guy. You don't have to fall back on hackneyed old mock-cute euphemisms. It shows a lack of imagination.

And then shamelessly attack the liberals as weak

And then the tu quoque argument. Even if it can be shown that the Republicans themselves are "weak", that does not demonstrate that their assesment of the Democrats as weak is incorrect. Whether Bush and his Cabinet and advisors carried a rifle in some proxy war somewhere or not really as zero relevance when it comes to evaluating their arguments or observations about their political opponents...

Uh, actually, they do that all the time.

Only in the sense of a shorthand aggregation, as I've said. I don't think you hear many Republicans other than the talk-radio blowhards characterizing all Democrats as cowardly or unpatriotic.

There is, it is true, a good deal of finger-pointing and attempted character assassination by the leadership of both sides, egged on by the punditry. And the attacks take different forms depending on the Party and the person---the Dems tend to level accusations of stupidity and immorality ( "nukyuhler", "the Halliburton War", etc ) while the Reps tend to impute weakness of will, irresoluteness and yes, sometimes lack of patriotism. But these are both far cries from the claim that ALL of "the other guys" are those things.

[jeff]

Oh no, Inq - that just won't do. I'm pointing out that the Republicans frequently engage in ad hominem attacks on Deomcrates as weak, unpatriotic and cowardly, and you characterise what I do as ad hominem? You've got the gun pointed in the wrong direction.

[Inquartata]

Originally Posted by jeff

Oh no, Inq - that just won't do. I'm pointing out that the Republicans frequently engage in ad hominem attacks on Deomcrates as weak, unpatriotic and cowardly, and you characterise what I do as ad hominem? You've got the gun pointed in the wrong direction.

Again, tu quoque. "Well, they did it first and more, so comparatively speaking I'm innocent!" It doesn't work that way. BOTH parties to a debate can be guilty of the same practice, and it's equally reprehensible ( and equally human ) for both. An action which is objectionable for your opponent is not acceptable when you do it. Meanwhile doing something you decry from your opponent isn't going to conquer you the moral high ground.

The gun can point BOTH ways, and fairly.

[jeff]

You're missing my point. Let's break it down.

1. Smearing others is bad. I think we agree here.
2. Pointing out that somebody is smearing is appropriate. This is my primary point. I hope we agree.

To the specific instance that starts this thread:

3. Pointing out that one group (let's call them R) smears another group (D) for lack of certain virtues falls under #2. Mentioning that group R's most notable proponents and smearers lack those virtues, while the very people they attack in D have them, emphasizes R's hypocrisy and dishonesty.

If I mug kids for their milk money, and bilk widows and orphans out of thei savings - and then turn and accuse you of being a thief - if you turn around and say "No, you're the crook", I don't think an accusation of 'tu quoque" would be in order. Just because it's in Latin doesn't make it right.