Talk:George W. Bush military service controversy
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
 |
Make sure to supply full citations when adding information and consider tagging or removing uncited/unciteable information. |
 |
The references in this article would be clearer with a different or consistent style of citation, footnoting, or external linking. |
 Archives |
| 1, 2Index |
[edit] Flight pay - need more than two original documents to make statements about this.
I've reworked the following:
There is no record of a physical being taken in either 1972 or in 1973, the last two years in which Bush attended drills, and was paid as pilot. Although, according to his released military records, Bush never flew again as a National Guard pilot after April 1972, and was suspended from flying on August 1, 1972, he continued to get paid as a pilot, [1] with flight pay for 52 more days, over 18 months, until his discharge.[2]
Neither of the sources cited is a secondary (interpretive) one, and - based on what was discussed in 2004 when the article was fully developed - I don't believe either supports the bolded text in the article. I'd be happy to be proven wrong, but I think Bush was paid as a National Guard member, and did not get special/extra pay as a pilot.
If someone is saying, well, he was a pilot, and was paid, and therefore he was "paid as a pilot", that's an unnecessarily complicated way of saying "he was paid"; and it's potentially wrong because pilots in flight status get paid - at least while on active duty these days - extra money.
If the claim is that Bush got paid money for being in flight status that he didn't deserve, because the National Guard failed to adjust his pay, then that's something beyond what primary documents can possibly be used for per WP:NOR - such an interpretation is not allowable by individual editors; it needs to come from a newspaper or similar article. (I don't remember the claim ever being made in 2004, and it's something that I think I'd remember; again, I'd be happy to be proven wrong.) -- John Broughton (♫♫) 19:43, 16 January 2008 (UTC)
- Hmmm, what do you need for sources? Bush's DoD records show him never technically leaving the command of Ellington even when he was in Alabama. Matt Kelley of the Associated Press (which was the most aggressive news organization in obtaining missing records) did one of the last analysis of Bush's records, a reprint of which is here. That end of the piece has the pertinent info:
-
- Pay records show Bush was credited for training in January, April and May 1973; other files indicate that service was outside Texas.
-
- A May 1973 yearly evaluation from Bush's Texas unit gives the future president no ratings and stated Bush had not been seen at the Texas base since April 1972. In a directive from June 29, 1973, an Air Force personnel official pressed Bush's unit for information about his Alabama service.
-
- "This officer should have been reassigned in May 1972," wrote Master Sgt. Daniel P. Harkness, "since he no longer is training in his AFSC (Air Force Service Category, or job title) or with his unit of assignment."
-
- Then-Maj. Rufus G. Martin replied Nov. 12, 1973: "Not rated for the period 1 May 72 through 30 Apr 73. Report for this period not available for administrative reasons."
-
- By then, Texas Air National Guard officials had approved Bush's request to leave the guard to attend Harvard Business School; his last days of duty were in July 1973.
-
- Sorry if I wasn't clear - I'm not disagreeing with any of what you just added; I was just noting that I changed the wording in one paragraph to make it clear (I hope) that Bush didn't get extra pay after April 1972 for being on flight status ( believe this is true; again, if untrue, there needs to be a good source). That is, I disagreed with the bolded information in the paragraph shown at the top of this section, but not with the rest of it. -- John Broughton (♫♫) 20:32, 16 January 2008 (UTC)
-
-
- My bad (I was a little distracted) -- once Bush got suspended on August 1st, 1972, he lost his flight status, but continued to be paid for another 52 days, starting in October. Lechliter and others have claimed that this form shows no change in Bush's pay status before and after the suspension. This is not something I'm an expert at, so I don't know if there was anything to distinguish "flight pay" from normal pay, but the records do show another 52 more day of "pay" for Bush after the suspension, and apparently there was no change in pay status either. For what it's worth... -BC aka Callmebc (talk) 21:07, 16 January 2008 (UTC)
-
-
-
-
- The seperation form you link to is in no way a pay form; it's not going to show (a) if Bush was even getting flight pay (that's extra pay for being a pilot) before he stopped flying or (b) if his pay changed after the suspension. I'm not disputing the 52 days of pay (see my edit). I'm disputing whether the suspension in any way affected his pay. (If someone is arguing that the suspension meant he was no longer entitled to any pay, that is completely bogus; I would be astonished to find a link to a news article or other detailed analysis saying that.)
-
-
-
-
-
- So, at this point, if someone wants to change the current wording, I think a clear source is needed. Even a link to a specific argument made by Lechliter would be a good starting point. -- John Broughton (♫♫) 04:29, 17 January 2008 (UTC)
-
-
-
-
-
-
- Lechliter also has a very detailed and apparently comprehensive guide to sorting the complexities of Bush's payroll records here and the corresponding points here. In the first part, there's a reference to "Flight Status Incentive Pay": Members who had "flight status" were eligible for "Flight Status Incentive Pay" when on active duty, or performing UTAs (or substitutes) or AFTPs.
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
- Now Lechliter, the Air Force Times article, and the Boston Globe mentioned a record showing Bush being on "PLT On-Fly" status -- meaning he was considered an active, available pilot -- well after Bush was suspended from flight status on August 1, 1972. I found a good copy of the record here. Scroll down a little bit to the block with his name -- it's right after his date of birth. This record isn't dated, but it covers Bush's May 27, 1972 - May 26, 1973 period. By all other records, Bush never flew at all during this time, but he got a lump sum credit of 56 points (41 earned and 15 "gratuitous") for that period. As I said, it looked to me as though it made no difference in pay if Bush flew for 2 hrs or did 2 hours of equivalent duty. If Bush's status was indeed left as "PLT On-Fly" right up until he left for college, then it would seem that he received "Flight Status Incentive Pay" all along. But I think this would really be getting into WP:OR to claim it explicitly as such. For what it's worth....
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
- By the way, this doesn't have a direct connection to the above, but this DoD site supposedly maintaining Bush's records, is now missing two: "Document 1" and "Document 2" under "October 5, 2004 State of Texas Release". I keep a mirror site handy, though, here, and that has copies of the missing PDF's. FYI. -BC aka Callmebc (talk) 18:32, 17 January 2008 (UTC)
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
- I suppose I should also mention that on closer inspection, it appears that the upper part of the second page of that now missing file had been "adjusted" at some point. An FYI and a "Hmmm...." for those interested. -BC aka Callmebc (talk) 15:07, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
-
-
-
-
- Does a change in someone's flight status require a pay change? Maybe his contract was for a certain pay rate when he reached flight status. There has been mention that there were too many pilots available, and maybe flight pay is not lost if they're not needed (that is, the government decided to make them not fly). Again, a source is needed which states what the situation was; we can't infer what should have happened. -- SEWilco (talk) 04:56, 17 January 2008 (UTC)
-
- Military servicemembers in the U.S. don't have "contracts" with regard to types of pay - at most (these days) a contract would generate some sort of bonus (lump sum) extra dollar amount. What's not clear is whether Bush being assigned to a non-flying position (as was the case after he failed to take the flight physical) affected his pay. Possibly not, given that payroll and personnel systems weren't integrated back then. It's also not clear if paying flight incentive pay required a positive action by a payroll clerk (check off a box) or whether it would continue, once a person was in flight status, until someone recorded that person as leaving flight status.
-
- But of course the bottom line is that we can speculate as much as we want on this page; as noted, Wikipedia articles shouldn't have personal inferences, per WP:V and WP:NOR. -- John Broughton (♫♫) 20:50, 19 January 2008 (UTC)
[edit] Insert of "and no evidence that he did not"
IP 72.208.120.98 inserted "and no evidence that he did not" in the "Flight Physical" section regarding whether Bush complied to the provision in AFM 35-13 that requires Bush to acknowledge the suspension in writing ("Off will comply with para 2-10, AFM 35-13"). Since such an acknowledgment would be an official record, it would have been archived along with all of Bush's other records by the DoD in this depository. Since there is no such record there indicating Bush complying with the provision, that logically amounts to defacto evidence that he didn't. I reverted the insert by the IP, but then SEWilco put back the IP's insert with the claim in the edit summary of "Not finding records is not evidence". I don't want to get into a revert war over this little matter, so I'll do one more revert back to how it was. If the IP stuff gets put back, I'll leave it to someone else to deal with it for the time being. -BC aka Callmebc (talk) 16:00, 1 March 2008 (UTC)
- Of course another short lived anonymous IP, 70.13.183.189, ignored this Talk page and reverted back to 72.208.120.98's insert. Since I'm at 2 reverts and under VERY close watch for 3RR violations, I'll just leave this for someone else to take care of this. -BC aka Callmebc (talk) 19:57, 1 March 2008 (UTC)
-
- 70.13.183.189 made further, very dubious (to say the least) changes, so I reverted those since they were different from 72.208.120.98, but put back the first IP edit to stay away from any 3RR charges, and that'll be my last revert in this situation. -BC aka Callmebc (talk) 20:48, 1 March 2008 (UTC)
-
-
- I thought it was permitted for anons to contribute. The paragraph in question that I removed only refered to primary sources and seemed to be an editorial trying to make a point and not encylopedic. The citation is from a anti-Bush group and a neutral, preferrably MSM cite would be better.
- The other one which the "maybe/maybe not" phrasing was rediculous and doesn't belong here. --70.13.183.189 (talk) 23:27, 1 March 2008 (UTC)
-
-
-
-
- You are badly mistaken on most counts. If you had bothered to check, you would have noticed that the "Common Dreams" ref is just a reprint of an Associated Press analysis of Bush's records. And glcq.com is currently the sole source of many hard to find AF regulations, and the owner of the site is Gerald Lechliter, who's responsible for the most detailed analysis done on Bush's Guard service, which he did for the NY Times here. But anonymous IP's are indeed usually permitted to contribute, but the problem is that the bulk of them don't actually really "contribute" when it comes to political sensitive articles. You should revert yourself -- you've made the article worse. I'm not doing anymore reverts this weekend, though. Hopefully someone else will deal with this. -BC aka Callmebc (talk) 03:36, 2 March 2008 (UTC)
-
-
- There is no evidence that William Howard Taft stopped beating his wife, so should that be mentioned in his article? -- SEWilco (talk) 04:50, 2 March 2008 (UTC)
-
- How about slightly more applicable examples like: "There is no reason for the IRS to think you didn't file your taxes the past 4 years just because they have no record of you filing your taxes"? or "There is no reason for the police to accuse you of driving an unregistered motor vehicle just because there is no record of it being registered"? or "There is no reason for the electric company to shut off your electricity just because they have no record of you paying"?
[edit] The Nation
The Nation is a reliable source. David Corn is the Washington editor of The Nation magazine. These sources were improperly removed as "partisan blogs." Even blogs discouraged yes, but this one is a reliable source. I'm restoring.Giovanni33 (talk) 05:13, 10 May 2008 (UTC)
