All I want to know is, what record would definitively establish L'il Georgie's presence at the time under discussion and what does it say?
This is being handled exACTly the way the run-up to invasion was handled. Find some scrap of data that tends to support what you want to say and ignore all the rest.
Dental records are typically used to identify the dead.
Last night, the White House e-mailed the press corps a copy of Lt. George W. Bush's dental exam -- to prove that Bush was alive, and not AWOL, at an Alabama Air National Guard base.
The day Bush went to the dentist -- Jan. 6, 1973 -- was one of the days for which he was paid, according to other military records released on Tuesday. But those records did not indicate where he was or what he was doing. The teeth definitively put him in Alabama.
And it wasn't the only time the White House showed some teeth yesterday. Press secretary Scott McClellan repeatedly lashed out at those who questioned Bush's service as engaging in "gutter politics" and "trolling for trash." (In his mid-day briefing, he said "gutter politics" five times and "trolling for trash" three times, and that's not even counting the morning gaggle.) Here's the transcript and the video.
Most strikingly, however, White House officials yesterday backed off Bush's unqualified pledge Sunday on NBC's "Meet the Press" to open his entire military file.
Also, the Boston Globe says that Bush's suspension from flying should have triggered an investigation, according to guard regulations.
And USA Today and the New York Times both give a lot of play to one man's allegation that Bush advisers in the late 1990s discussed ways to limit the release of potentially embarrassing details from his military records.