Sorry, Travis. You're dreaming. If he has a past DD or BCD, for one thing, it may not even be in the records. When the CIC gets involved, a Service Record can clean up quite nicely. The tell-tail signs may be there, i.e. the Board convened 10 years late, reissued medals, etc., but there may not be a single word explaining the actions of the board, or why the action was taken.
I have very little hope that Kerry will sign the 180, nor that anyone in the mainstream press will challenge him to do so. All it would take is one question in one debate.. just one, and it'll never happen. Even if 100 people WANTED to ask that question in the last debate, ABC's Gibson would never allow it. What on earth would cause Kerry to fall on his sword at this point?
This is a dead issue. The only thing, and I mean ONLY thing that would reopen it is if the officers on the convening board spoke up, and to be honest, if I were one of the Flag officers on it, I think I'd be duty bound to say nothing, unless the Dept of the Navy directed me to comment. We need their testimony, and some "smoking gun" documents from before the Service Jacket purge.
SFS
Is there any way to determine who was on this board?
Would this be something done by executive order?
The very fact that John Warner was secretary of the navy and he won't comment is pretty telling. Warner is a Republican. I'll bet Bush knows and doesn't want to make it an issue. If you notice it's really difficult for him to badmouth someone... unless he gets really angry.
For the sake of accuracy can we please use correct terms and understand what they mean? An officer DOES NOT GET A DISCHARGE!!! Only enlisted receive discharges. Additionally, a Dishonorable Discharge and a Bad Conduct Discharge are punitive discharges and can only be given as a result of conviction by a general courts-martial. That conviction would be a public record and we would know about it. An officer would not receive a Dishonorable Discharge. He or she would instead be Dismissed from the Service.
What people are referring to is the character of service contained on his DD214, Record of Service.
The records may be purged (and it all could be quite legal) but there seems to be enough here to justify some very specific and direct questions to the candidate.
I think Bush knows what's up, and I think he has deliberately avoided the issue. He would prefer to win without this kind of mudslinging.
But it is beyond his control.