Val, I gave my responses about Bush in other posts.
Now, I will give you credit, you put the best spin on the Kerry fiasco that you could by relying on phantom documents that exist but Kerry won't release. Key points:
--There is no document released for us to see for his discharge from active duty. When you are discharged from active duty you are discharged in a status. The Form DD 214 has this information. Both the officer (Kerry) and an authorizing officer who is doing the processing sign the document. There are seven sections to the document, one being "discharge data". Item 13 on the form is "character of service" which on my form (that I pulled from my files) states "honorable". That is what happens when you leave active duty. Of course, if you quit early and request to be discharged before your obligation is fulfilled it makes sense that the "character of service" would be classified as "general" or maybe even "dishonorable". That is why Kerry will not release this document, because he does not want the voting public to see that he was released from active duty with less than an honorable discharge. So, Val, if you can find a copy of Kerry's DD 214 then we can another discussion but until then it appears he got less than an honorable discharge from active duty.
--There is also no indication he remained on Navy reserve duty until 1978. His time would have been up by 1972 at the latest. But, in any case, it is irrelevant because the issue is his release from active duty. The document I posted showed that in 1978 he received an honorable discharge. There is no reason for that non-conforming form to be filed at that time. When I was released from my six year reserve commitment on 7 Feb. 1973 I received a form letter from the Department of the Army, Office of the Adjutant General, U.S. Army Reserve Components Personnel and Administratin Center where I was "relieved" from USAR Control Group, Standby, to an assignment of "Inactive". There was no mention anywhere on the document about discharge status or the use of the word "honorable". That applies to when you are discharged from actice duty.
On the other hand, the document I posted for John Kerry did in fact address the issue of discharge allowing for an "honorable discharge", eight years after he was discharged from active duty in another status, undoubtably a status of "less than honorable". This document references the President of the United States, references a Board of Officers which is a review panel set up under President Carter's Amenesty Program signed into law via Executive Order on the day of his inauguration, and references two Codes having to do with involutary discharge from the Navy.
Now, maybe I just fell off the turnip truck and don't get it, but it sure appears to me that John Kerry received his "honorable discharge" eight years late under Jimmy Carter's amnesty program as a way to upgrade his previously received less than honorable discharge from active duty. That was one of the purposes of the Carter amnesty program. The form used was non-conforming to Department of Defense procedures and had all the information necessary to point to special action under the amnesty program.
Anyway, this can all be cleared up by releasing John Kerry's DD Form 214. So why won't he do this? Because it shows he was discharged from active duty with a "less than honorable" discharge.
Val, end of this discussion. I give you credit for taking an enigma and turning into a riddle with enough spin to get those who want to believe in John Kerry to believe he had an honorable service record. But he didn't.