Silicon Investor (SI) -- The First Internet Community

STOCKTALK

We've detected that you're using an ad content blocking browser plug-in or feature. Ads provide a critical source of revenue to the continued operation of Silicon Investor. We ask that you disable ad blocking while on Silicon Investor in the best interests of our community. If you are not using an ad blocker but are still receiving this message, make sure your browser's tracking protection is set to the 'standard' level.

Politics : Politics for Pros- moderated -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: LindyBill who wrote (77137)	10/13/2004 12:34:56 PM
From: LindyBill	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 793778

Kerry’s Discharge Polipundit UPDATE: There are some interesting posts about this in the Comments section. Just keep scrolling. Reader Joel Ard casts doubt on the story about Kerry’s possible not-so-honorable discharge. Here are Joel’s credentials: I spent six years in the USMC Reserves, the last three, during my tenure at University of Chicago Law School, doing discharge paperwork. Long and short of it, I know a LOT about military discharges - more than I know about everything else the Marine Corps does. Sad, I know. And here’s what he has to say about Kerry’s discharge: [NY Sun reporter] Mr. Lipscomb notes, without Kerry’s full records, the information we do have indicates he was not honorably discharged in 1972. The problem with this theory is that he couldn’t have gotten the discharge recharacterized until the Carter presidency, February 1978 according to the article, and he was already a county prosecutor by then. I doubt he could have been admitted to the Massachusetts bar with a discharge carrying any of the three lower characterizations. I am pretty confident that the character and fitness review for the Massachusetts bar would have looked into the characterization of discharge Kerry got, and I’m pretty sure they would have been very concerned about anything other than an Honorable or Honorable Conditions discharge. There are five possible characterizations of discharge: 1. Honorable. The person performed all required service and has no black marks in his records. Bush got this. 2. General - Honorable Conditions. This is usually granted for a person who did not complete his service but not for a bad reason, e.g., medical problems prevented completion of required service. We’d give this for chronic obesity. Kerry did serve all his time, so this wouldn’t be it. 3. Other Than Honorable Conditions. We used OTH in the Reserves for Marines who quit coming in or popped positive for illegal drug use on urinalysis. Although you COULD get them at a worse level, the OTH did not require a court martial and could be done entirely on paper - a huge advantage for the Reserves who just want the bad egg off the roster and don’t have the time to do the court martial. It’s a black mark, though - for example, you’d have a hell of a time becoming a cop or getting admitted to a state bar. Or even getting hired by the Postal Service. (At least, this was the line we gave kids to scare them into coming to drill again.) 4. Bad Conduct. The BCD required significantly more procedural mess, including officer review, hearings, etc. I can’t recall if it required a court martial (they, too, come in various flavors and levels; kind of like quarks). If you have a BCD, I am pretty certain you’d have grave difficulties getting admitted to the practice of law. At least today. Maybe the Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts in the 70’s preferred folks with BCDs but I doubt it. 5. Dishonorable. This is tantamount to a felony conviction. I very much doubt that Kerry could have been admitted to the bar or been hired by a county prosecutor with a Dishonorable discharge. In fact, it’s hard to believe that Kerry had one hanging over his head from ‘72 to ‘77 and even got in to law school. I was not admitted until 2000, but when I applied, they made some cursory check to insure I would eventually be able to pass the character and fitness examination for the bar. I assume they did the same thing in the ’70s. The bottom line, according to Joel, is that, if Kerry had gotten a less-than-honorable discharge, he would have paid for it in the ’70s. But then why won’t Kerry sign form 180 and release all his military records? His refusal to do so is only going to fan these flames. polipundit.com -- PoliPundit