"
When John Kerry was dodging bullets in Vietnam, George Bush and Dick Cheney were dodging the draft in the United States," Cecil Roberts, president of the United Mine Workers of America, declared Monday at a Labor Day picnic here.
In Akron, Ohio, Mayor Donald Plusquellic described
Bush as "hiding in the woods in Alabama" while Kerry "was defending our country."
And in Steubenville, Ohio, Rep. Ted Strickland (D-Ohio) introduced Kerry as
"a man who was carrying guns through the jungles of Vietnam while George Bush was neglecting his military service and carrying out his responsibilities as a cheerleader at Yale University."
Many of the group's assertions about Kerry have since been discredited, but
a new group, Texans for Truth, has sprung up to question Bush's participation in his National Guard unit while in Alabama during the war.
In a television advertisement to begin airing Friday, Bob Mintz, a lieutenant colonel in the Alabama Air National Guard during the time Bush was supposed to have been there in 1972, will say
he never saw Bush at the base even though he looked for him, according to a spokeswoman for the group.
Akron's Plusquellic, for example, said in an interview that no one from the campaign told him what to say and he did not read from prepared remarks. Though he said his primary concern is the nation's loss of jobs, Plusquellic,
the president of the U.S. Conference of Mayors, called Bush "a draft dodger."
"It's clear John Kerry was over there serving," said Plusquellic, who described himself as infuriated that Vietnam is an issue in the campaign.
"And George Bush did everything he could in his father's power to get out of going over there.
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