February 12, 2004

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"We certainly don't want anything that is embarrassing in there"
Guard commander Maj. Gen. James III discussed "cleansing" Bush's military files of embarrassing or incriminating documents in the summer of 1997.

As Texas Gov. George W. Bush prepared to run for president in the late 1990s, top-ranking Texas National Guard officers and Bush advisers discussed ways to limit the release of potentially embarrassing details from Bush's military records, a former senior officer of the Texas Guard said Wednesday.

A second former Texas Guard official, who spoke only on condition of anonymity, was told by a participant that commanders and Bush advisers were particularly worried about mentions in the records of arrests of Bush before he joined the National Guard in 1968, the second official said.

Bill Burkett, then a top adviser to the state Guard commander, said he overheard conversations in which superiors discussed "cleansing" the file of damaging information.

Fun fact: Bush's own "pay" records show he was AWOL in Alabama.


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