What kind of Idiot is Sen. Blumenthal?..

[busterbrown]

to have mis-represented his service in the military(Vietnam) while running for office several years ago..
It just goes to show you how wealthy influential men think they can get away with lies...but while running for the Senate? Where the press is reporting on every word you state.. Just Fucking Crazy..

Yea and don’t get me started on Trump with his five deferments with his fucking bone spurs..He can’t even recall which heel it was on, in one interview he had back whenever.

But again...I just don’t see how Blumenthal could have thouight that his mis-representations wouldn’t come back to haunt him..

By the way? This is not an Anti-Blumenthal Post.. I’m just so dissappointed...Trump’s tweets regarding this issue.. piss me off no end... Plus Blumenthal served in the military.. But please.. It was a dumb political decision which has had some reprucussions in 2017.

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/18/nyregion/18blumenthal.html?pagewanted=all&mcubz=1

[gratuitous]

1. Wow! White hot news from seven years ago

Thanks, eagle-eyed news aficionado!

[busterbrown]

7. That news from 7 years ago?

Has given that asshole Trump something to Tweet about which is true... He’s done it a couple of times and continued to do so... So much for the “Hot News”

Go have another beer..

[Judi Lynn]

14. Why would you want to drag it around now? Why give it new life? It has been done to death. n/t

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

29. Yes, it was foolish. He apologized. Why clutch your pearls about it now?

It won't make a past error go away. Don't keep it alive, FFS.

[hlthe2b]

2. Well, he was a Vietnam ERA veteran--beyond that his comments were clearly misleading...

but he faced "the music" on this several years ago. He was wrong, he apologized and the electors decided that was sufficient.

Why is it that when a REPUG commits a misdeed, it is immediately forgotten/forgiven/"old news" and for a Democrat, it is NEVER forgotten/forgiven/or irrelevant? (even among some DUers?)

[GoCubsGo]

81. Yep. At least Blumenthal went into the military, instead of dodging the draft.

Can't say that about Donnie Doll Hands, Dick Cheney, Rush Limbaugh, Ted Nugent, and any one of the numerous republicans who were of draft age, but faked injury or mental illness, or found other ways of dodging the draft. So, Blumethal misspoke. Big fucking deal. At least he served. Can't say that about the vast majority of his critics.

[riversedge]

3. Blumenthal Apologizes for Vietnam Service Claims

Let is rest. He has apologized. AND MY ADVICE is to take down your post.





Blumenthal Apologizes for Vietnam Service Claims
David M. Halbfinger
2-3 minutes

Attorney General Richard Blumenthal of Connecticut, whose acknowledgment last week that he had misrepresented his Vietnam record overshadowed his nomination as Democratic candidate for the United States Senate, has apologized.

“I have made mistakes and I am sorry,” he said in a statement e-mailed to The Hartford Courant by a campaign aide on Sunday night. “I truly regret offending anyone. I will always champion the cause of Connecticut’s and our nation’s veterans.”

Mr. Blumenthal, who repeated his apology in person in New Haven on Monday, came under attack on May 17 when The New York Times reported that he had sometimes claimed to have served in Vietnam, though he actually served stateside in the Marine Reserve after receiving five draft deferments.

“At times when I have sought to honor veterans, I have not been as clear or precise as I should have been about my service in the Marine Corps Reserves,” Mr. Blumenthal said in the statement on Sunday, The Courant reported. “I have firmly and clearly expressed regret and taken responsibility for my words.”


http://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/25/nyregion/25blumenthal.html?mcubz=0

[busterbrown]

10. Hell No?

Trump’s been tweeting about his misrepresentations constantly.

Amazing how so many around here are sticking their heads in the sand..

[6000eliot]

18. Who the fuck cares what Trump has to say about anything?

Beyond his deplorable base.

[sharp_stick]

21. I can't understand why someone

would give a flying shit what Trump tweets about. There are actual issues to be pissed off about this isn't one of them.

[rockfordfile]

77. Why are you trolling?You don't even answer people's questions

[DonViejo]

83. "constantly?" I've read two tweets about it from

Trumpty Dumpty, both done the day after the Senator criticized him

[Warpy]

4. Looks like the same resume padding a former "fighter pilot" pResident did

He implied he'd been to war when he finished his education and then was a reservist close to home.

At least no one is saying Blumenthal failed to show up when his reserve unit needed him for something.

However, yes, it's pretty damned dumb. Probably learned it from Nixon.

[busterbrown]

9. Yep.... I expect this kind of stuff from Repubs.. But a Conn. Dem Senator?

[Warpy]

13. He worked in the Nixon White House

It very likely rubbed off on him in some way.

Draft deferments to pursue education were legitimate. I don't know why he feels a need to claim war service at this late date. It's ridiculous and diminishes him.

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

76. "This late date" was seven years ago.

[Judi Lynn]

15. Your intentions are crystal clear. But from a progressive poster at Democratic Underground? n/t

[chillfactor]

5. Good grief!

give it a rest already...old news! And he has more then redeemed himself with his latest comments.

[busterbrown]

8. Old News? Trump cant stop Tweeting about it? n/t

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

30. How do you figure to make him stop?

What happened happened. It was dumb; Blumethal apologized. He got re-elected. It's over in everybody's mind but Trump's, and he doesn't count.

[lpbk2713]

6. Mind listing what kinds of idiots there are to choose from?

There are so many these days.

[wasupaloopa]

11. I think that only about 1 or 2 % of us have ever been to war but all of us are experts at all

things surrounding it.

I was drafted and sent to Vietnam and I don't give a shit about what Blumenthal said.

[busterbrown]

17. Im only an expert on those things which

effect our dump of a President.. Whos has become persistent in his attacks on Blumenthal.

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

35. What do recommend to make him stop?

Go back seven years in a time machine and make Blumenthal not commit his misstatement? If you can do that, maybe you can also maroon Trump on a desert island while you're there, and we won't have to be dealing with him at all now.

[rockfordfile]

78. Trump is a un-American idiot.

[chelsea0011]

12. OK. He spoke and made it "seem" like in was in country. He wasn't, but he was

in the military during a period of war. Do you want to hate on servicemen and women who were stateside during WW2 and said they served during WW2?

[busterbrown]

16. He was guareenteed no deployment..

Your comment on hating stateside servicepeople...? Please your smarter than that!

[Me.]

23. You Condemn A DEm

Yet don't even mention the 5 deferments 45 had. At least the Senator served. Even Brian William got a better shake than this.

[busterbrown]

25. Please! Pay attention.

This about Blumenthal giving Trump a chance to point out a Dem out right lie..Which he has done several times!

You would think that DEM. Blumenthal, would have considered consequences, before his misrepresentations.

And Yes he did apoligize.. My point? Come on Richard WTF were you thinking?

[Me.]

42. Listen Mr. Perfect

How many times does he have to apologize before people like you are satisfied, or perhaps you weren't paying attention 7 years ago? Will nothing less than drawn blood suffice? He has been fighting the good fight ever since. What have you done?

[busterbrown]

48. Wow! Childish response..

What I’ve done.. would surprise you...

[Me.]

56. Nice Try In Deflecting Your Poutrage

Wondering what your agenda is

[DemocratSinceBirth]

69. Maybe we should make Senator Blumenthal wear a hair shirt.

[Me.]

72. Is That Even Harsh Enough?

So what's going on here with this thread? The draft dodger in Chief does one of his don't look at me memes and this guy goes all crazy......or, he wants to keep pointing it out so we don't pay attention to anything else?

And BTW, the people who keep the Senator in office don't seem to have the problem with him this guy does. I'll take their opinion over any other.

[DemocratSinceBirth]

73. He was a Vietnam era veteran. He gilded the lily. So what. None of us are perfect.

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

75. No, he needs to quit the Senate and enter a monastery

where for the rest of his life he can contemplate and repent of his terrible sin of giving Trump something to tweet about.

(in case that's necessary)

[VMA131Marine]

59. Go ahead, surprise us.

Otherwise, I say you are full of it!

[mythology]

92. So now you're blaming Blumenthal for not realizing that 7 years after saying something dumb

Donald Trump would somehow be president and a couple of times tweeting about it? Can I blame Blumenthal for not giving me the winning lottery numbers too?

Also given that Trump's base tends to believe whatever load of bullshit he shovels them, Trump would just make something up. For example, see his tweets yelling at McConnell to do away with the filibuster to pass the Republican health care law even though they couldn't muster 49 votes via reconciliation.

[dsc]

19. He should kill himself he is unfit to breathe our air

His horrid flaws bring shame upon the nation, no nay the entire world, no nay the entire galaxy and galaxies far far away. I just don't know how we will survive being on the same earth as him. Rumor is the sun is so ashamed that tomorrow it will hide behind the moon so it doesn't have to shine upon his vile face.

[wryter2000]

32. Lol

You win the thread, if you want it.

[dsc]

46. thanks.

[Alice11111]

62. !!!

[wryter2000]

64. Once again the Alices agree

[Alice11111]

93. Oh, of course the Alices are making sense of the nonsense.

[wryter2000]

94. As Alices always do

[haveahart]

20. Since no one is perfect and decent men and women can recover from mistakes,

he is ok with me. I just refuse to cast the first stone an so do many of his flawed colleagues and fellow citizens.

[ornotna]

22. It's not helpful

When Trump drags out a dead horse to beat and you go flogging on it as well.You're pretty much standing shoulder to shoulder with him when you do this.

[Me.]

24. +1

[busterbrown]

28. Nope... It tells you a bunch about Blumenthal

IMO I have an obligation to call him out.. It was a stupid fucking thing to do...And is coming back to haunt us.
Our piece of shit Pres. .. Can’t stop tweeting about it..

[ornotna]

39. Actually

It tells me a bunch about you.

I too have an obligation.

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

54. Blumenthal has been a good senator who is doing a fine job. Maybe you should read up

on what he is actually doing now. Among other things: he and Rep. John Conyers Jr. of Michigan, led a group of 196 congressmen in the filing of a federal lawsuit accusing Trump of violating the emoluments clause of the US Constitution. He's trying to get the DoJ to investigate white-supremacist and Nazi groups as terror groups. He's defending DACA. He's supporting legislation that would prevent Trump from firing Bob Mueller. And you're shitting on this guy - a guy who's been busting his ass trying to prevent the Trump administration from doing even worse than they've been doing - over something that happened seven years ago and nobody cares about? WTF?

And here's the real story on the military service gaffe:

On May 17, 2010, the New York Times disclosed that Blumenthal delivered a speech in Norwalk, Connecticut, in March 2008 in which he referred to having served "in Vietnam". In one other case, in 2003, Blumenthal also appeared to have suggested that he had been among those returning from Vietnam. Blumenthal's prospective Republican opponent at the time, Linda McMahon, briefly posted on its website that her campaign research team had found video footage of the 2008 speech and provided the story to The Times. After the Times story was published, Rasmussen Reports indicated that Blumenthal's lead over McMahon had shrunk to three percentage points. Politico covered criticism of the Times, which noted that Blumenthal had accurately described his military service record at the outset of his Norwalk speech by saying he had "served in the military during the Vietnam era in the Marine Corps". Politico also quoted Times editor Bill Keller writing that Blumenthal's introductory statement "does not contradict his later statement that he served ‘in Vietnam’". Connecticut's The Day newspaper, meanwhile, stated that its staff could find no articles in its archives with any suggestion by Blumenthal that he had served in Vietnam but also noted the 2003 and 2008 occasions, saying such misstatements by him "were rare errors among hundreds of speeches he has given before veterans groups." It quoted Blumenthal defending his representation of his military service: "On a few occasions, I have misspoken about my service and I regret that. I take full responsibility, but I will not allow anyone to take a few misplaced words and impugn my record of military service." Blumenthal explained that he meant to say he served "during" Vietnam, not "in" Vietnam, and he stressed that "there were no special favors, no privileges involved" in his securing a slot in the Marine Reserves.

Blumenthal's commanding officer in 1974 and 1975, Larry Baldino of Woodbridge, Connecticut, addressed the controversy in a letter to the editor in the New Haven Register. Baldino wrote that the misleading statement was too 'petty' to be the basis for supporting or not supporting Blumenthal. Baldino further portrayed Blumenthal as 'good natured' and described him as 'one of the best Marines with whom I ever worked'.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Blumenthal

[DemocratSinceBirth]

26. Huckleberry Finn On A Pogo Stick

The man was a Vietnam era veteran and a sergeant in the Marine Corps Reserves. He gilded the lily. So what. He's not the first. If that is the test none of us can pass.

Oh, and Trump is an inveterate liar.

[busterbrown]

34. He never served in Vietnam. n/t

[DemocratSinceBirth]

40. He was a Vietnam era veteran. He gilded the lily. So what. None of us are perfect.

Trump received five deferments for a mythical ailment.

[busterbrown]

49. Read the original post again

Might do you some good!

[DemocratSinceBirth]

63. Relax, Buster.

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

27. It was seven years ago, got press at the time; it was stupid

and he apologized. Let it go.

[busterbrown]

31. Perhaps you are part of the problem..

When your back is against the wall.. fighting tyrants.. Call out your mistakes....We can’t afford any mistakes like this if we want to make our country whole again.

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

37. How do you propose to make that mistake NOT HAVE HAPPENED?

[DemocratSinceBirth]

43. He made the mistake seven and fourteen years ago.

The only way to fix it is to put the poor fella in Doc Brown's DeLorean.

[geek tragedy]

33. "By the way? This is not an Anti-Blumenthal Post."

[busterbrown]

38. So we now can not be progressives..

if we critisize our own.. Seems to me that most of you want to bury your heads in the sand.

[DemocratSinceBirth]

44. "People worry about all the wrong things."

[rockfordfile]

82. This is something a gop or pro Russian would do. Trying to turn Democrats against one another

Give it up. The Senator is a good Senator. Don't like it go join the GOP idiots.

[JI7]

36. Fuck this thread

[busterbrown]

41. Self Rightous Progressives?

Never state anything which might distract.. Enjoy Trump’s Tweets today.. concerning this issue.

[JI7]

45. Trump tweets about bloody women.

Last edited Sun Aug 20, 2017, 11:45 PM - Edit history (1)

you are going to blame women for menstruating ?

[DemocratSinceBirth]

47. I don't believe Trump, he of the five deferments for a mythical ailment, tweeted about it today.

https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump?ref_src=twsrc%5Egoogle%7Ctwcamp%5Eserp%7Ctwgr%5Eauthor

[busterbrown]

50. Exactly what I stated in my original post n/t

[joeybee12]

60. Exactly. Thank you. Nt

[OnDoutside]

51. In the whole scheme of things, it's nothing. A mistake. But what's getting at you is that you KNOW

the Republicans use this endlessly.

It's just something he has to bear, but it doesn't stop him from being a good Senator.

Just prefix his answers by "But Trump didn't even join the military".

[busterbrown]

55. I agree whole heartedly

But it shouldn’t be burried .. Too important

[OnDoutside]

57. And all he can do is get ahead of it, whenever it's brought up. People accept contrition. I'm sure

the Republicans will be checking for anything even remotely similar and then big it up to say "Look, he's always like this - you can't trust him".

[still_one]

52. Now I am confused. Should I be more angry with Tina Fey and the SNL writers, or Blumenthal?

[moonscape]

61. LOL!

[elleng]

53. What kind of 'foolishness' publishes such negatives about Democratic senators?

Folks, a major part of our jobs now include PROMOTING Democratic public figures.

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

66. And I do believe it violates DU's TOS:

Don't bash Democratic public figures
Do not post disrespectful nicknames, insults, or highly inflammatory attacks against any Democratic public figures. Do not post anything that could be construed as bashing, trashing, undermining, or depressing turnout for any Democratic general election candidate, and do not compare any Democratic general election candidate unfavorably to their general election opponent(s).

Don't peddle right-wing talking points, smears, or sources
Do not post right-wing talking points or smears.

[elleng]

84. You're probably, right, Ocelot.

[joeybee12]

58. Thanks for posting shit from 7 years ago

You might want to post it on Free Republic or somewhere where assholes care about this crap

[Mike Nelson]

65. Why is this a thing...

...he misrepresented his service, owned up and apologized. Good example of how to deal with it - Trump should look at Blumenthal as an example of how to act.

[PoorMonger]

67. My issue with this response..

Saying that it gives Trump some drum to beat about a Dem lie is all based on people actually caring. It isn't swaying anyone new to his side - provided they have working eyes and ears. I mean how many outright lies does Trump get caught in on a weekly basis? And how many are worse than Blumenthals misrepresentation of his service ? You really think it's the difference between us winning nationally? I don't. The Senator's constituents have had an chance to vote him out ; and they didn't because they find him to be generally good at his job.

[left-of-center2012]

68. He served DURING Vietnam

He didn't serve IN Vietnam.

He has apologized.

Get over it and move on.

[DemocratSinceBirth]

70. I have a couple of buddies who served in Germany during the Vietnam War.

They are Vietnam era veterans and lucky.

[hlthe2b]

71. and while they could quite honestly state that they were "deployed overseas during Vietnam",

I'm sure someone would infer something more into that....

I don't get why this is such an issue, especially now.

[trof]

79. I have never alerted on a thread before. I just did.

This is ancient history and has no place on DU now.

[DemocratSinceBirth]

85. Plus One

[karynnj]

80. He misspoke one or two times -- he usually said Vietnam ERA service, which was true

You could argue that was too clever by half and intended to mislead, while being accurate. He also was an excellent Attorney General of CT when he ran. A few times, it came out as having Vietnam service.

Not to mention, if you want to speak of errors claiming things that were not true - what about a former first Lady speaking of being under fire in Bosnia with her daughter -- something that would have been first page news around the world --- or claiming she tried to enlist but they would not take her ... shortly before she got married. (In the first case, she WAS in Bosnia, which had shortly before been a war zone which likely concerned her. In the second, I assume it was almost just conversation.)

I would say it might be a culture that puts so much value on being in the service or under fire that people running make such claims ... but both of these occurred after 2004, when a genuine war hero, who not only serviced for about 4 years, but earned two prestigious medals for heroism had his honest recoord attacked.

Can we concentrate on going after Trump, who lies on a daily basis.

[Bradshaw3]

86. Yeah Democrats have to apologize and apologize

For years and years about every real or perceived indiscretion. Repubs not so much.
Sexual: Vitter, Craig, Trump, the list is endless
Criminal: North, Casey, Arpaio, the list is endless
Financial: the list is endless

[busterbrown]

88. Oh Bullshit.. This is not a post about conflation.

Trump Republicans are cheating, lying, Msogynistic,homohopic Xenophobic assholes..

I just don’t want to give Trump any fuel whatsoever!

Thats what this is about.

[JI7]

89. but that's exactly what you are doing with this type of thread

[Bradshaw3]

90. You totally missed my point

Which was an aside pointing out that repubs get a pass while Democrats get dragged over the coals for much less, not trying to conflate the two. But your misunderstanding and overreaction say a lot about the wisdom of the original post too.

[Kaleva]

95. I disagree that this is about not giving Trump ammo.

The statements in question happened back in 2003 and 2008. Senator Blumenthal apologised for them when he ran for Senate in 2010. This was looong before Trump declared himself to be a candidate for president.

[oasis]

87. Should Sen. Blumenthal call a prominent Democrat an "IDIOT"

you'll have your answer.