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THIS RETIRED NAVY
COMMANDER'S LETTER IS TOO GOOD NOT TO BE SHARED. HE TELLS IT LIKE IT
IS....
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)
14095 Burnt Store Rd
Hughesville, MD 20637
301-274-0975
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