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Oh, excellent! They can't argue with The Village Voice!

Here's CNN (you know they will accept that!)

Sen. Gore's political career was over; his son's military service had not helped. And then Gore received orders to go to Vietnam: Report after Christmas. Before Gore arrived in Vietnam, the men in his unit knew someone with connections was coming.

"He says, 'Look, I just want you to know we're getting a replacement - his name is Al Gore. He's the son of a senator," says Mike O'Hara, a friend from the army. "And I thought, 'So? So what? What difference does it make?'"

Once in Southeast Asia, Gore served an army journalist, writing about other soldiers for military and hometown papers. Friends say he never traded on his family name. But others say he was treated with care.

"The general said that it was not an order, but that he requested that we keep a very close eye on this individual and that we try to keep him out of harm's way," says Alan Leo, then an army photographer.

Leo says the officers did not want Gore in situations where he might be wounded, or worse.

"I actually had some negative feelings toward him before I even met him, for the simple reason that he was getting special treatment," says Leo. "Once I got into the field with him, I just treated him like anybody else."

Like most army journalists, Gore stayed in relatively secure areas. Gore sent some of his articles home. His father, in turn, shared them with the Nashville Tennessean.

"Our first byline from Al Gore came while he was in Vietnam," says Frank Sutherland, an editor for the Tennessean. "He sent a story that he had written about a fire base being overrun to his father."

Gore served in Vietnam less than five months. His total time in the Army amounted to one year and nine months. He was discharged early to go to graduate school.

http://64.233.161.104/search?q=cache:xIgh67fRXAUJ:www.cnn.com/SPECIALS/2000/democracy/gore/stories/gore/+Alan+Leo++al+gore&hl=en