Did Curt Weldon Dodge the Draft?
13 September 2006 7:04 am by Taylor Marsh
–updated–
cross-posted at Firedoglake and Huffington Post
If you're not familiar with Curt Weldon, he's the guy who wanted to take his
shovel to Iraq, and excavate the country in hopes of finding WMD nobody else
could find. It earned him a little chiding and by inference the title of Indiana
Weldon in the Philadelphia
Inquirer. He was also the leader in the Able Danger campaign, doing blogger
conference calls ad nauseam to drum up support for the now infamous group. Well,
in the past months, something else has come to my attention that casts further
doubt on Mr. Weldon's credibility.
“Where is Weldon's uniform? Why didn't Weldon serve during the
'60s. There was a war on; there was a draft. … He wasn't drafted. Why?”
– Rocco Polidoro,
Republican co-chair of Veterans for Sestak
I got interested in the Weldon – Sestak race when Curt Weldon decided to swiftboat
Joe Sestak, starting with a smear against his daughter, who just so happened
to be fighting
a malignant brain tumor at the time. Classy stuff in this race, because
Weldon didn't stop there, next swiftboating Sestak for wearing his uniform, which was quickly smacked down. Evidently Curt was a little jealous he didn't have one. Which brings me to the
point of this post. Why didn't Curt Weldon have a uniform of his own?
As Rocco Polidoro asked back in July, why wasn't Curt Weldon drafted? It's
a logical question given his birth date is July
22, 1947. That would have made him of prime drafting age when the first
lottery was launched in December 1969. Why does this matter today?
Curt Weldon, in addition to swiftboating his veteran opponent Joe Sestak, is
the second ranking member of the House Armed Services Committee. He sits along
side one of my other favorites Rep.
Duncan Hunter who has been front and center in the swiftboating
of Jack Murtha, which I chronicled for The
Patriot Project. I've done many pieces on swiftboating, my most recent for
Alternet. Weldon is also
always trumpeting his support for the troops. But if Weldon is so supportive
of the troops why didn't he serve when he had the chance? And boy did he have
a chance.
The following comes from a New York Times piece dated December 4,
1969 by David E. Rosenbaum, “Questions and Answers of Draft.” As a
blog reporter, one of the many hats I wear that includes radio host, I get lots
of things slipped to me over the transom, while other things just fall into
my lap. This was one of them, which is just a sampling of the material I've
received over the last couple of months. Oh, and by the way, none of the information
in this post was given to me by the Sestak campaign. Let's just say Weldon has
made some enemies, especially when he started swiftboating a veteran.
Since the draft lottery was conducted Monday night, the national Selective
Service headquarters, local draft boards and newspaper offices have been deluged
with telephone calls from persons with questions about their draft status.Following are some of the most frequently asked questions and their answers:
Q. Who was affected by the lottery. A. Men born between Jan. 1, 1944, and
Dec. 31, 1950. In other words, men who have had their 19th birthday by Jan.
1 but not their 26th.(snip)
Q. What numbers are likely to be called?
A Pentagon experts say that the first third–numbers 1 to 122–are certain
to be called; the last third, 245-366, certain not to be called; and the middle
third not certain one way or the other. One expert who has done careful calculations
believes the cutoff number will be somewhere between 165 and 195.Q. Is the sequence applied nationally, or is it my place in the sequence
within my own draft board that counts?A. It is the sequence in each local board that matters. But the cutoff number
between those who are drafted and those who are not will not vary much from
board to board. …Questions and Answers on Draft (Dec 4, 1969)
by David E. Rosenbaum – Special to The New York Times
According to the Selective Service
System, using his birth date, Curt Weldon would have had number 153 in the
first draft lottery held since
1947: “This event determined the order of call for induction during
calendar year 1970, that is, for registrants born between January 1, 1944, and
December 31, 1950.” According to official
records, 162,746 men were inducted in 1970.
Rep. Curt Weldon says he wanted to serve. According to the DelcoTimes the reason
he didn't was because his eyesight was so bad they wouldn't take him.
Pete Peterson, a Weldon spokesman, said Polidoro's position within the Sestak
campaign proves that the Memorial Day parade was a political event in which
a Navy uniform cannot be worn.“That demonstrates right there that his invitation was political,”
Peterson said.He added that Weldon, 59, “wanted to serve, but the military would not
take him because of his extremely poor eyesight.”
Here are the Medical Fitness Standards used back in 1969 for the Selective
Service, for which I can't provide a link, but I offer verbatim through section
“2-13. Vision”.
The causes for medical rejection for appointment, enlistment, and induction
are listed below. The special administrative criteria for officer assignment
to Armor, Artillery, Infantry, Corps of Engineers, Singal Corps, and Military
Police Corps are listed in paragraph 7-15.a. Distant visual acuity. Distant visual acuity of any degree which does
not correct to at least one of the following:(1) 20/40 in one eye and 20/70 in the other eye.
(2) 20/30 in one eye and 20/100 in the other eye.
(3) 20/20 in one eye and 20/400 in the other eye.
…or if an ophthalmological consultation reveals a condition which is
disqualifying. …
How bad do your eyes have to be before you weren't accepted in 1969? I wasn't
able to find anyone to answer that question, but it seems the Army can always
find something for a near-blind soldier to do. In fact, one eye specialist who
would not go on record simply stated that you'd have to be almost blind not
to go, using the vision guide above. The following is from another war, but
an interesting anecdote to say the least.
I did have another ace, however. My eyesight was 20/ 400, far below minimum
army requirements. I was, again, so sure the Army would not accept me that
I told my New York roommate not to pack my things . . . I’d be back
in a few days. At my physical exam the Army doctor asked me to read the top
line of the eye chart. When I claimed, half in jest, that I couldn’t
even see the chart, he laughed, patted me on the back and assured me that
the Army could always find some job for a near- blind draftee. After all it
was only for twelve months. Trying a different tack, I unleashed on the doctor
my outrage over the Army’s carefree willingness to relax its high standards
for service. But he was already examining the next recruit, and I was soon
off to Camp Shelby, Mississippi, to join the Ohio 37th National Guard Division
training there, accompanied by my dear childhood friend, Carl Ablon, who was
not drafted but volunteered because he wanted to share this experience with
me. A RELUCTANT SOLDIER
If Rep. Weldon did indeed have eyesight too poor to be drafted, he would have
had an Armed Forces Medical Examination during his Induction physical in which
he would have received a medical exemption . There is the other possibility
that he was pronounced medically unfit, as a colleague said to me, prior to
being called to report. If none of these things happened then Curt Weldon would
have been drafted, because his number was low enough for Uncle Sam to reach
out and touch him directly.
So if Weldon's spokesperson Pete Peterson was correct, that Weldon “wanted
to serve but the military would not take him because of his extremely poor eyesight,”
there should be records of what exactly went down, right? Has anyone in the
media asked him these questions? To my knowledge no one has ever pressed Rep.
Curt Weldon on the specifics of his draft story. Did Curt Weldon seek a medical
exemption after drawing number 153 in the Vietnam draft of December 1969? If
not, why wasn't he drafted?
That would be the only question except that Weldon's bad eyesight story is
new. This really bothers me. Because whenever a politician has shifting rationale
for something as important as why he didn't serve in the Vietnam war, alarm
bells always go off. This is especially true when the person in question is
an avowed hawk and military cheerleader, while taking every opportunity to swiftboat
his political opponent who is not only a veteran, but a Democrat. I lived through
Vietnam and remember the panic, especially during the 1969 draft. No one wanted
to go to Vietnam by 1970.
During the 2000 elections, when Curt Weldon was railing at Al Gore, a completely
different reason was given for why he didn't serve in Vietnam.
Weldon never served in the military. His office has said he used student
and teaching deferments during the Vietnam era, and had a low number when
the draft lottery was reinstated.
Obviously, the writer of the above article got something wrong, or was it a
freudian slip by Weldon's “office”? A “low number” is exactly
what Weldon had in 1969 (number 153). The writer meant a high draft number,
which would mean he wouldn't be called. As for his deferments, they would have
run their course and not covered the period after 1969, as far as I've been
able to discern. Note: One of the reasons I used the graphic above is that it's quite possible that Weldon did have deferments to teach in 1969. Just maybe Weldon felt a medical exemption story because of bad eyesight was better than a deferment.
Why did Weldon say one thing about not serving in Vietnam in 2000, talking about deferments, then come up with the bad eyesight version in 2006? Did Democratic veteran Joe Sestak make him feel like a punk?
So did Curt Weldon, an avowed war hawk and a man who drapes himself in the
military dodge the draft? Reached for comment, no one was available, so I left
a message with Weldon's Director of Communications John Tomaszewski, who was
with the congressman when I called. He has not gotten back to me as of this
posting.
Maybe the DelcoTimes can get busy getting answers to these questions, which
is their job. Because the voters in Pennsylvania's 7th Congressional District
need to know if a pro-war hawk who swiftboats Democratic veterans, but fabricates
his own draft story that has changed at least once, is really a poser at heart.
Draping himself in servicemen and women today shouldn't let him off the hook
for his shifting Vietnam draft stories.
Speaking of Weldon being a war hawk, there is a new development on that front.
Mr. Weldon has presented a plan for Iraq “withdrawal”. It's called,
Iraq: A Milestone
Plan for Withdrawal. If Indiana Weldon, the man who trumpeted Able Danger,
wants to withdraw from Iraq, Republicans must be indeed be getting very nervous.
But if you think that's interesting, did you hear the one about Weldon using
his congressional office to put together a “hit list” of people in
the national security field who dare to contribute to his opponent, veteran
Joe Sestak? It doesn't sound very kosher to me.
to be continued…
