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<p>An official Navy document on Senator Kerry's campaign Web site listed as Mr. Kerry's "Honorable Discharge from the Reserves" opens a door on a well kept secret about his military service.</p> <p>The document is a form cover letter in the name of the Carter administration's secretary of the Navy, W. Graham Claytor. It describes Mr. Kerry's discharge as being subsequent to the review of "a board of officers." This in it self is unusual. There is nothing about an ordinary honorable discharge action in the Navy that requires a review by a board of officers.</p>

IF JOHN KERRY hadn't already clinched the Democratic presidential nomination, his medals meltdown on "Good Morning America" this week would have sunk his campaign. Much as Howard Dean's crazed "I Have A Scream" speech jolted voters into wondering whether someone so hotheaded should be allowed anywhere near the nuclear trigger, Kerry's abusive tirade on ABC gave millions of viewers a foretaste of how far presidential discourse will sink if Kerry becomes president.

John Kerry's commanding officer was just interviewed on Fox News. According to Lt. Commander Grant Hibbard when Kerry showed up in front of him requesting a Purple Heart, Hibbard saw that he had a "scratch"(Hibbard's word) on his forearm. And because, according to Hibbard, there was no report of enemy action on Kerry's patrol that day and the "scratch" did not receive medical attention from a medical officer, Hibbard declined Kerry's request for a Purple Heart.

ANN ARBOR, Mich. -- Senator John F. Kerry, whose attacks on President Bush this week have becoming increasingly personal in tone, told voters yesterday that the Iraq occupation was faltering because of Bush's own ''pride" and that the president was afraid to ''look the people in the eye who have lost their job." At a town hall meeting in Toledo, Kerry spoke dismissively of the president, saying Bush had been ''selected" to hold office by the Supreme Court and had broken with most US presidents, including Ronald Reagan and Bill Clinton, who had worked with other nations and alliances on...

John Kerry—the most decorated of those who called each other "brother"—was going to be walking point. "So?" I said, as we stood under the stars, hugging ourselves against the chill. He smiled. "I got a better place for you to sleep." I trailed after him to a parking lot where half a dozen former junior officers in fatigues were leaning against a Mercedes sedan. John made introductions, assuring them that though not a vet, and in the employ of a publication that had declared Vietnam "the right war in the right place at the right time," I had spent a...

"Medalgate" — the inevitable name for the flap over Kerry's flip-floppery about what he did and what he said about his medals — is an amusing spectacle to behold and a story worth investigating. It's amusing because Kerry has forced himself to offer explanations that make pretzels look straight. It's worth investigating because Kerry has made his service in Vietnam a central qualification for his presidency. The superficial details of "Medalgate" are fairly easy to explain for anybody not determined to make Kerry sound consistent. From 1971 until about a decade later, Kerry wanted people to think he threw...