Thank you, Brian Weatherson

After "getting technical" about the Killian memos (and Matt Yglesias's take on the controversy), Brian Weatherson brought up the story that's been largely forgotten in the mess. To wit:

On the third hand, the really most interesting charge brought up against Bush in the last fortnight doesn’t rely at all on the Killian memos. That’s the charge that he was required to report for Guard duty in Massachusetts when he started at Harvard, but never managed to as much as join a unit. This is potentially worse than whatever he did or didn’t do in Alabama, where at least he seems to have put some effort into making up the time he didn’t serve. Now there’s dispute over what he was required to do in Massachusetts, but none of that dispute turns on whether folks used Times New Roman or TrippyHippyTopia on military documents in the 1970s.

In case you missed it the first time around, you can read the Boston Globe article.

Look. This isn't going to make it more likely that I'll vote for John Kerry; that was already a certainty. There are plenty of better reasons than this to vote for John Kerry come November. But George Bush needs to be called on this every time he brings up character or responsibility in this campaign.