Strange Evaluation Standard

Phil Carter of Intel Dump does not have comments on his blog, so I will post my question here. Phil said:

Now that the pay stubs and retirement records have been released, we may have started to get a handle on the *quantity* of the President’s National Guard service. These records look inconclusive right now, especially about the summer of 1972, but let’s stipulate for the moment that this issue will eventually be resolved. The records being released tonight will probably shed a lot of light on this question.

The rest of the President’s personnel records – particularly his evaluation reports for the entire period of duty – are as important because they indicate the *quality* of his service.
- Was he really the kind of junior officer that we now want to be Commander-in-Chief?
- Was he, to use the term of art, a "sh*t-hot" pilot?
- Was then-Lieutenant Bush a natural leader? An effective officer?
- Did the President do his duty, or did he just show up for duty?

The evaluation reports will show all of this. Generally speaking, all such reports are written positively, with degrees of praise indicating the quality of an officer. (Example: a slacker officer's report says he "performed his duties well" or "met the standard", plus a lot of boilerplate language. A stud officer's report says he/she "performed his duties in an outstanding manner" and "always exceeded or set the standard".) Damning by faint praise is common in officer evaluation reports where an officer's performance is mediocre, but not so bad as to merit being spiked on the report. So you might have to engage in some interpretation to divine what his evaluations really mean. But the contents of these evaluations are relevant, because they will indicate the quality of the President's performance. And to me, these evaluations of his quality are more important than whether he missed an occasional drill.

There are a few things I could comment on, but my real curiosity is with this quote: "Was he really the kind of junior officer that we now want to be Commander-in-Chief?"

Would it not be better to ask, "Has he been the kind of Commander-in-Chief that we would want to be Commander-in-Chief?" It's not like he's Kerry - with no record as CinC to run on. You can actually judge the President by how he's actually performed his duties. Why do you need or even want to look at his record as a junior officer in performing such an evaluation?

The only answer that I can come up with is that a reasonable evaluation of President Bush's record shows him to be a fine - far better than average - CinC, and that this conclusion is inimical to Phil's built-in preference. For example, note the goal post moving from here (these records should be available and would prove Bush did his duty) to here (why don't people remember him?). Oh, they do. Will the next tactic now be that these are not reliable witnesses?

UPDATE (2/18): Armed Liberal comments on Phil's (related) op-ed in the Chicago Tribune.

Posted by Jeff at February 16, 2004 02:36 PM | Link Cosmos