-----Original Message-----
Sent: Wednesday, February 11, 2004 9:04 PM
To: 'imus@msnbc.com'
Subject: Cover up?

Have you seen these articles?

http://billhobbs.com/hobbsonline/003264.html

http://www.washingtontimes.com/op-ed/20040210-082910-8424r.htm

If the identity of Col. Campenni can be confirmed, the bona fides of his account established, and the assertions laid out in Bill Hobbs' article confirmed, will you retract your charge that the President engaged in a cover up of his service in the Air National Guard? Perhaps the more appropriate charge would be that the President is guilty of allowing those partisans who choose to think the worst of the President to express their black thoughts, and thereby expose their small minds and shriveled hearts before the nation. I think much more of you than I do of that wasted poseur "Fat Teddy", Don.

I volunteered for the Air Force even though I wasn't drafted. It gave me a skill--computer programming--that I turned into a career. I've worked for two start ups as well as, EDS, Apple and Microsoft in my time. The biggest impression that any organization made on in all those years me was the Air Force. The men I served with there were bitter that they weren't allowed to use their full skills and the total power of the Air Force until Nixon authorized Linebacker II. Like the air operation in Afghanistan, the North Vietnamese air defenses were destroyed in days, its infrastructure and war making ability eviscerated, and the North Vietnamese leadership suddenly dropped their bravado and came to the table without pretense. This could have been done on Johnson's watch, or earlier in Nixon's, saving untold thousands of lives.

Veterans like Bush--love Bush--because he doesn't commit troops unless there are no shackles. Once sent to fight, we fight to win, and then to come home, not to die in vain attempts to bomb truck parks, defend non-strategic territory and defoliate the landscape. If the intelligence is bad, that's bad, and the root causes should be corrected. However, what if we'd acted on "bad intelligence" to take down Al Qaeda and the Taliban in August, 2001? Would you "blame America first" like the rest of the fat, smug self proclaimed intelligentsia?

This may be the last time that these real veterans rise up before passing the torch one final time. I predict that they and their brothers and sisters in every service will join them in their rebuke for Kerry and his ilk.

Kerry painted virtually every Vietnam veteran as a war criminal after his discharge. Let him explain himself, not to gatherings of photo op vets, but the thousands of real vets who remember being cursed and reviled, not only by the press and uniformed civilians, but by his "brothers" in uniform. They haven't forgotten the slander, and neither have the families of the POW/MIAs whose hopes for closure he dismissed. At last, Hanoi Jane and the VVAW will have their answer, and the humiliation and shame will be lifted from those shoulders that bore more than just the scars of battle. They suffered unfair curses from the very citizens that they in their innocence were sent by their nation to protect, like so many simple men and women in so many wars before.

The New York Air National Guard flies one of my favorite aircraft, the A-10 tank killer. This is the preeminent close air support fighter bomber, in my opinion. The pilots are brave men and women, some of whom may fly some of your listeners on commercial aircraft when they're not called to duty. President Bush's F 102 Delta Dagger was tasked with the defense of the homeland from a possible Soviet bomber attack. It wasn't meant for ground attack or bombing roles. That is the main reason why that group wouldn't have been called to duty in Vietnam. Lt. Bush had too little time remaining in his service commitment in 1972 to begin the years of training to become proficient on a new aircraft.

I think that he had to be pretty skilled to fly a supersonic interceptor. Taking your concentration from the controls of the twitchy Delta Dagger for a few seconds was a much more serious mistake than looking away from the dash of a Maybach.

I often watch your show when I pull an "all nighter" because I enjoy the humor and your conversations with most of your guests. In the future, I suggest that you take your own advice and just "shut up" until all the facts are in on such stories involving attempts at partisan character assassination of either candidate.

Best regards,

JDF
Tacoma, WA
USAF 1975-79