6 October 2010, 3:17 pm
Can you vote for anyone, no matter how many other good things he may or may not have done, that blatantly lied about serving in Vietnam? Richard Blumenthal addresses report he lied about Vietnam record He says he misspoke about Vietnam record General Richard Blumenthal, who is campaigning for a Senate seat, addressed allegations that he had exaggerated his military service record. By Ben Pershing Wednesday, May 19, 2010 Connecticut Attorney General Richard Blumenthal (D) was alternately apologetic and defiant Tuesday as he battled to deflect a potentially devastating blow to his Senate campaign: an accusation that he had exaggerated his military service record. Blumenthal, his party's presumptive nominee in the contest to succeed retiring Sen. Christopher J. Dodd (D), held a news conference in West Hartford to respond to the New York Times report Monday night that he has lied about serving in Vietnam. "On a few occasions I have misspoken about my service, and I regret that and I take full responsibility," Blumenthal said, flanked by veterans. "But I will not allow anyone to take a few misplaced words and impugn my record of service to our country." Blumenthal joined the Marine Corps Reserves in 1970 and served six years, all in the United States. He has accurately described his service many times in his career, but in 2008, he told an audience at an event in Norwalk: "We have learned something important since the days that I served in Vietnam. And you exemplify it. http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/05/18/AR2010051802208.html Candidate’s Words on Vietnam Service Differ From History At a ceremony honoring veterans and senior citizens who sent presents to soldiers overseas, Richard Blumenthal of Connecticut rose and spoke of an earlier time in his life. “We have learned something important since the days that I served in Vietnam,” Mr. Blumenthal said to the group gathered in Norwalk in March 2008. … There was one problem: Mr. Blumenthal, a Democrat now running for the United States Senate, never served in Vietnam. He obtained at least five military deferments from 1965 to 1970 and took repeated steps that enabled him to avoid going to war, according to records. … But what is striking about Mr. Blumenthal’s record is the contrast between the many steps he took that allowed him to avoid Vietnam, and the misleading way he often speaks about that period of his life now, especially when he is speaking at veterans’ ceremonies or other patriotic events. Sometimes his remarks have been plainly untrue, as in his speech to the group in Norwalk. At other times, he has used more ambiguous language, but the impression left on audiences can be similar. In 2003, he addressed a rally in Bridgeport, where about 100 military families gathered to express support for American troops overseas. “When we returned, we saw nothing like this,” Mr. Blumenthal said. “Let us do better by this generation of men and women.” At a 2008 ceremony in front of the Veterans War Memorial Building in Shelton, he praised the audience for paying tribute to troops fighting abroad, noting that America had not always done so. “I served during the Vietnam era,” he said. “I remember the taunts, the insults, sometimes even physical abuse.” But the way he speaks about his military service has led to confusion and frequent mischaracterizations of his biography in his home state newspapers. In at least eight newspaper articles published in Connecticut from 2003 to 2009, he is described as having served in Vietnam. The New Haven Register on July 20, 2006, described him as “a veteran of the Vietnam War,” and on April 6, 2007, said that the attorney general had “served in the Marines in Vietnam.” On May 26, 2009, The Connecticut Post, a Bridgeport newspaper that is the state’s third-largest daily, described Mr. Blumenthal as “a Vietnam veteran.” The Shelton Weekly reported on May 23, 2008, that Mr. Blumenthal “was met with applause when he spoke about his experience as a Marine sergeant in Vietnam.” And the idea that he served in Vietnam has become such an accepted part of his public biography that when a national outlet, Slate magazine, produced a profile of Mr. Blumenthal in 2000, it said he had “enlisted in the Marines rather than duck the Vietnam draft.” It does not appear that Mr. Blumenthal ever sought to correct those mistakes. Asked about the Bridgeport rally, when he told the crowd, “When we returned, we saw nothing like this,” Mr. Blumenthal said he did not recall the event. http://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/18/nyregion/18blumenthal.html?_r=1 Attorney General Richard Blumenthal of Connecticut lies about Vietnam http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eEl0wMmyZ2Q thejollyfatkid | May 17, 2010 Attorney General Richard Blumenthal lies about going to Vietnam... Read More »
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