''The responsibility to show up and do your job.''
- Texas Governor George W. Bush, reflecting on the values he learned as a Texas Air National Guard pilot during the Vietnam War era, in a 1998 interview with the National Guard Review.
For Vice President Al Gore, the character issue is like chewing gum stuck to the sole of his shoe: Hardly a day passes without Republicans challenging Gore's character, especially his storied tendency to embellish facts.
But Democrats are crying foul, saying that Bush has overstated his own record and with far less political consequence. Belatedly, they are calling attention to misleading claims Bush and his campaign have made about his Vietnam-era service as a fighter pilot with the Texas Air National Guard, and to documents that contradict Bush's insistence that he attended required drills in Alabama and Texas in 1972 and 1973.
Five months after the Globe first reported those discrepancies, Bush's biography on his presidential campaign Web site remains unchanged, stating that he served as a pilot in the Texas Guard from 1968 to 1973.
In fact, Bush only flew with the 111th Fighter-Interceptor Squadron at Ellington Field in Houston from June 1970 until April 1972. That month he ceased flying altogether, two years before his military commitment ended, an unusual step that has left some veteran fighter pilots puzzled.
In Alabama, a group of Vietnam veterans recently offered a $1,000 reward for anyone who can verify Bush's claim that he performed service at a Montgomery air guard unit in 1972, when Bush was temporarily in Alabama working on a political campaign.
So far, no one has come forward. The reward is now $3,500.
What's more, a Bush campaign spokesman acknowledged last week that he knows of no witnesses who can attest to Bush's attendance at drills after he returned to Houston in late 1972 and before his early release from the Guard in September 1973.
There is strong evidence that Bush performed no military service, as was required, when he moved from Houston to Alabama to work on a US Senate campaign from May to November 1972. There are no records of any service and the commanding officer of the unit Bush was assigned to said he never saw him.
During Bush's Alabama sojourn, he was suspended from flight duty for not taking his annual flight physical. The Bush campaign's initial explanation for the lapse, it now admits, was wrong.
Dan Bartlett, a Bush campaign spokesman, pointed to incomplete records - one a torn page without Bush's name or any discernible dates - as evidence that he did enough drills in Houston in the closing months of his service to satisfy military obligations.
Major Thomas A. Deall, a spokesman for the Air Reserve Personnel Center in Denver, said last week that officials there now believe that after looking at Bush's records, he met minimum drill requirements before his discharge.
Still, as the Globe reported in May, two documents and the recollections of officers who said they believe that Bush did not return to his Houston base after leaving for Alabama raise questions about whether Bush performed any duty between April 1972 and September 1973, the month Bush entered Harvard Business School.
The result is that Bush's discharge was ''honorable.'' But, for understandable reasons, it is not a period of Bush's life he has called attention to.
Other current and retired Air Force officers said Bush's military records are much like those of countless other Guardsmen at the time, when the federal government was reducing its force as the Vietnam War came to a close: guardsmen who lost interest in their units, and commanders who found it easier to muster them out than hold them to a commitment many made to avoid Vietnam.
Jesse Brown, the former Veterans Affairs secretary who was seriously wounded while serving as a Marine in Vietnam, said he is irritated that Bush's military service lapses have not become part of the campaign debate.
''It goes right to the heart of the character issue,'' Brown said. ''If you served on active duty during that time, you knew that people went into the Guard and Reserves so they wouldn't have to put their asses on the line. But once they made that decision, they should honor the obligation, do their duty and do it well. Bush did not.''
Retorted Bartlett, Bush's spokesman: ''Jesse Brown served honorably, but you mean to tell me he has no problem with Bill Clinton's avoidance of military service?''
If Bush's lackadaisical approach to his six-year obligation has attracted scant attention, it could be for that reason: He is running to succeed a president who actively and successfully sought to avoid military service.
Even so, enough unanswered questions remain about Bush's service in the Texas Air National Guard to draw the interest of presidential historians if the Texas governor is elected to the White House next week. The evidence is strong that political influence got Bush into the Guard, when the alternative was the draft or an enlistment. The mystery is whether political clout accounts for Bush's abbreviated career as a Guard pilot.
Reviewing the outstanding questions:
How long did Bush fly with the 111th?
In his autobiography, ''A Charge to Keep,'' Bush said he flew with his unit for ''several years'' after finishing flight training in June 1970. His campaign biography states that he flew with the unit until he won release from the service in September 1973, nine months early, for graduate school.
Neither assertion is true. Bush flew with the 111th for 22 months, until April 1972, and never flew again. Bartlett said last week that he could say unequivocally that Bush was not grounded by his superiors. Asked that question last July, Bartlett, after conferring with Bush, was more equivocal: He said Bush could not recall ever being grounded.
What happened to 1st Lieutenant Bush after April 1972?
Bush and his campaign have said that he performed ''alternative'' duty at the 187th Tactical Reconnaissance Squadron in Montgomery from May to November 1972, while he was working on a Senate race in Alabama. Such duty was normal for Guardsmen who were temporarily away from their home units.
But Bush's own records contradict that assertion.
First, with the approval of his superiors, Bush in May 1972 sought a permanent transfer to a postal unit in Alabama that didn't require weekend drills or active duty. Guard headquarters overruled that decision. Bush did not do any drills from May through September 1972.
In July 1972, Bush failed to take his annual flight physical. In August, National Guard headquarters suspended him from flying status. Last year, the Bush campaign erroneously claimed that Bush did not take the physical because his personal physician was in Houston. In fact, only Air Force flight surgeons can give annual flight physicals to pilots. Bush could have taken the exam at Maxwell Air Force Base in Montgomery.
In September 1972, Bush won approval to do temporary ''alternative'' training at the 187th Squadron in Montgomery. He was cleared to attend weekend drills in October and November. But two of the 187th's officers said Bush never appeared. ''I'm dead-certain he didn't show up,'' said the unit's commander, retired Brigadeer General William Turnipseed.
Bush, who has declined requests for an interview on the issue, has said he did appear, though he does not recall what he did. There are no records in his file to show that he did any training in Alabama.
What happened when Bush returned to Houston in late 1972?
Bush and his spokesman have said that Bush did not fly again because he planned to go to graduate school. Also, they say that as the unit was upgrading to a newer fighter, the F-101, it made little sense for the Guard to retrain him for that jet. In fact, the unit flew the F-102 for a year after Bush left the service.
Bush has said he performed administrative duties with the 111th's parent unit, the 147th Fighter Group, though Bartlett has said Bush cannot recall what those duties were.
There is other evidence that Bush's attendance was so inconsistent that his commanders did not know he had returned to the Houston base.
On May 2, 1972, Bush's two immediate superiors at the 111th, one of them a friend, signed a document stating that they could not perform his annual officer efficiency report for the period of May 1, 1972, to April 30, 1973, because Bush ''has not been observed at this unit during the period of this report'' and ''has been performing equivalent training'' at the Montgomery unit. The document is dated a day after Bush was supposed to have done duty in the unit. Both men have since died.
The official record that chronologically lists Bush's service includes no evidence of service between May 1972 and October 1, 1973, the official date of his discharge.
