May 23rd, 2003, 10:02 PM
Amusing letter to Sen. Byrd
I guess Byrd's speech from awhile back got some military person's dander up, so they decided to write a letter which wound up in my dad's inbox. It's a pretty amusing read.
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----- Original Message -----
From:Subject: Letter to Senator Byrd from Retired
USN Cdr McIntyre
Senator Byrd,
As a retired Naval Officer, with two Gulf carrier deployments under
my belt, I find your criticism of President Bush's visit to
the Lincoln offensive in the extreme! This is the first time that the
Commander-in-Chief took time out of his busy wartime
schedule to pay a visit to thank those who served in the line of fire, in
way that was both dramatic and meaningful to those on
the carrier. Perhaps if LBJ got off his fat ass to do something similar,
our troops' morale in Vietnam might not have been so
low.
As a Naval officer, I am extremely sensitive to styles of
leadership. That is, after all, our stock in trade. And it was not
lost on me that the President spent about thirty seconds shaking hands with
the Admiral, CO, and CAG (If you don't know these
abbreviations just look them up in your Funk & Wagnalls!). He then spent
the next forty-five minutes putting himself at
the disposal of the people who make that ship work, the yellow shirts, the
green shirts, the purple shirts, the chiefs, the
sailors. If you don't know the significance of those colored shirts, look
it up in your Blue Jacket's Manual. Not dressed out in
formal uniform (I understand at Bush's request), but in their greasy,
smelly, sweaty working uniforms... working a flight
deck is hot, hard work. And yet he, in his flight suit, put himself at
their disposal, this was their moment for 19 or 20
something year old kids a few years out of high school, to get a picture of
themselves with the President of the United States,
his arm draped around their shoulder. That is a moment that those kids
never dreamed would ever happen to them, maybe
not even when they knew he was coming aboard. Surely, he would see the
brass, not the troops. But it was the troops to
whom he gave his time...and it was the most natural moment in the world.
You might have thought it was a family reunion,
and in a way, it was... Bush is one of them, the common man, and while he is
still the most powerful man on the planet right
now, he hasn't lost his touch for them.
Was it a political moment? What moment of a president's life is NOT
a political moment? Was it grand standing, to come in
to an OK pass to a 4 wire, a bit high in close, correcting, left of
centerline? Well, hell, he didn't fly the approach anyway, though I
understand from the pilots who flew him that he did a pretty good job at
formation flying, tucked in close for a lead change. You can
always tell a fighter pilot, you just can't tell him very much. And
apparently after thirty years, it all comes back, with a little coaching,
I am sure. Frankly, I would have liked to see him come aboard in an FA-18,
but the Secret Service vetoed that, and Bush accepted
their judgment... again, a mark of a good leader.
If you had spent some time in the service, instead of the Klan, you
might understand the significance of that moment to all
the men and women aboard the Lincoln, and indeed to all the men and women in
the service who shared that moment vicariously.
But you chose the bedsheet instead of the uniform, and so you don't.
I am half-tempted to move to West Virginia just so I could vote
against you in your next election.
Lewis F. McIntyre
CDR, USN (Ret)
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