[Rhodes22-list] Politics: Good Morning Vietnam, uh I Mean Bill Effros

brad haslett flybrad at yahoo.com
Thu Sep 30 07:33:13 EDT 2004


Good Morning Bill,

Ahhh sleep, what a wonderful concept.  Where were we? 
Oh yeah, the horse was still breathing and deserved
some more beating.

First lets begin with a long -winded story. In the
early 80’s I was flying for an Arkansas based commuter
airline.  Remember Lou Holtz, then football coach of
the Razorbacks, later Minnasota and Notre Dame and now
South Carolina?  Holtz was a frequent guest on Jonny
Carson and used to joke, “Fayetteville, Arkansas is so
small that the local airline doesn’t sell tickets,
they sell chances”.  That was Scheduled Skyways or as
our passengers affectionatly called us “Scheduled
Scareways”.  About a third of our seniority list
belonged to either the Ft. Smith Air Guard flying
F-4’s or the Little Rock Guard flying KC135 tankers. 
Nearly all were former active duty.  The Little Rock
guys wanted me to join because they were always going
on training missions to South America and wanted me
along to party.  I said I would if I could get a pilot
slot.  They agreed to run my name “up the flagpole”
but the unit got only two training slots per year and
it was very political.  Well, two of my best clients
from charter flying was Senator Dale Bumpers and
Congressman Wilbur Mills (Mills had been out of office
for some time over the Fanny Fox/Tidal Basin incident
but still had power in Arkansas).  I contacted Bumpers
and Mills and they both promised their support.  The
very cyclical airline industry was starting to improve
and I eventually decided not to pursue the Guard
because it would have put me in Air Force pilot
training right in the middle of a hiring cycle.  I
already had eight years of professional flying and
felt the heavy jet time wasn’t that important.  What I
learned from the experience is this: to get a pilot
training slot in the Guard you have to have
connections, either interanlly from the unit or
externally from politics.  So, when someone says Bush
43 got his pilot slot from family connections my
response is, Duhhhhhhhh!   

My older brother was drafted and went to Vietnam in
1968, made a career of the Army, and returned to
Vietnam in 1970.  Two kids from my hometown became
conscientious objectors which, quite frankly, in a
town of 630 people was more dangerous than going to
the jungle.  At the time I didn’t have much use for
war protesters or people who didn’t go and fight, but
by the time I was old enough to go, the war was over. 
With the benefit of hindsight and middle age, I fully
understand the war protesters mindset, why some such
as Bill Clinton used their opposition to the war to
avoid service, and why a Guard slot in the late 60’s
was preferable to sloshing through rice paddies.

Now to the present situation, Bush was certainly safe
from the war during eighteen months of pilot training
(but not necessairly safe).  There was no way of
knowing in 1968 how long the war would last or what
units would be activated.  He put in almost four years
of full time guard duty.  By 1972 Nixon was already
pulling troops out of Vietnam, there was a glut of
pilots, and a lot of returning pilots wanted guard
slots to continue accruing service points.  Bush had
enough service points and was ready to move on to
other things.  It is not unusual for Guard members to
go inactive during peactime provided they have met
their minimum requirements.  This whole Guard issue
with Bush is much to do about nothing.  The war was
ending, he had fulfilled his obgligations, and they
gave him an honorable discharge.  

>From the floor of the Senate on February 27, 1992,
John Kerry said “What saddens me most is that
Democrats, above all those who shared the agonies of
that generation, should now be re-fighting the many
conflicts of Vietnam in order to win the current
political conflict of a presidential primary…..We do
not need to divide America over who served and how”. 
In 1992 Kerry also blasted then President Bush 41
with, “Mr. President, you and I know that if support
or opposition to the war were to become a litmus test
for leadership, America would never have leaders or
recover from the divisions created by that war”.

Bill, this horse is dead.  Let it rest in peace.

Brad Haslett
“CoraShen”

PS:  This guy Mintz, the one doing the ads for the
Kerry campaign saying “I was in the Alabama Guard and
never saw George Bush” is a DC10 Second Officer (over
age 60 guy) with my company. For such a small group,
about 600 out of 4200 pilots, it’s unusual we’ve never
flown together.  I’m professional enough  not to make
it an issue in the cockpit but I doubt I pick up any
bar tabs on a layover if we ever do.





		
__________________________________
Do you Yahoo!?
New and Improved Yahoo! Mail - Send 10MB messages!
http://promotions.yahoo.com/new_mail 


More information about the Rhodes22-list mailing list