RABBI SIMEON KOLKO Bush showed lack of character

Political pundits are investing much energy and ink trying to fathom the political meaning and larger implications of the sudden, intense interest generated in President Bush's record of service during the Vietnam War.
To some, the very real questions that have emerged regarding the Bush war record provide a window of political opportunity that becomes even more compelling when one juxtaposes the Bush record against the unquestioned heroism, loyalty, and patriotism displayed during Vietnam by the president's likely opponent in the fall, Sen. John Kerry. To others, the shelf life of this story serves as a dramatic reminder that the deep divisions evoked by our involvement in the Vietnam war, and the larger effort to define the legacy of this chapter in our history, continue to exert their toll on our collective psyche.
Larger questions
Unfortunately, the tendency to respond to this issue based on calculations of political self-interest ignores the profoundly significant larger questions that this episode raises.
There are two distinct kinds of issues raised by the president's war record: The question of character and its relevance to evaluating the performance of a president, and the issue of idealism and responding to the call of service and the role that these emotions and qualities play in determining the health of our communal and civic life.
President Bush's record of service to his country during the years of the Vietnam War is relevant today not as a tool to rekindle the ideological divisions evoked in this country over Vietnam, or as a potential issue obscuring the very real choices we encounter now in the United States. It is relevant precisely because, if properly understood, it is capable of being used as a device for forcing us to confront difficult truths and painful realities.
One of the realities that has so far been largely obscured in this discussion is that relying primarily on a volunteer army, particularly when our role overseas is expanding in response to new challenges, has certain inevitable cause-and effect-repercussions which raise urgent issues about justice, fairness, and who shoulders the burden for the commitments that we as a country undertake.
A volunteer army is inevitably composed of those who find themselves at the lower economic rung of society and who see military service as a means of securing opportunities for upward mobility which would otherwise be beyond their reach. That so many who serve in the military and place themselves in harm's way are responding to this set of economic and other incentives raises the most difficult kind of questions as to the voluntary nature of their service. It also compels serious examination of the basic fairness and morality of the process being used to garner the human resources needed to meet the military commitments that we determine to be in our national interest.
Equal sharing
If the cost of these commitments continues to be borne in disproportionate numbers by the economically disadvantaged and politically powerless, the toll will be greater than merely the lost lives that are the inevitable byproduct of large-scale military involvement. The larger but more difficult to fathom damage that this system causes is to our self-perception as an society of opportunity revolving around notions of justice, fairness, and the equitable sharing of rewards and burdens.
How can we honestly continue to believe these things about ourselves when military service, and the shouldering of our nation's security commitments, continues to be so fraught with inequity and so generous in offering an escape hatch to those with the savvy and ability to access it?
The degree to which the president's record of service is a subject of serious public discussion is a function of our ability and willingness to grasp the issues that it truly raises.
The second vital public policy issue raised by concern over the president's war record is the question of how to once again restore national service and commitment to others to their rightful place in defining that which is great and unique about America. Decades of anti-government rhetoric, coupled with relentless admonitions about the corrosive effect that reliance on others has on individual character, have combined to produce a culture which tolerates selfishness and undermines the impulse to do good which is basic to the human condition. The most disturbing aspect of President Bush's war record is that it seems to be part of a larger record which is stunningly lacking in the quest for achieving greatness through consecrating oneself to a larger, greater cause that is often the motivator for true public service.
The lack of military service as part of one's resume should not disqualify one from being president. The absence of a record informed by an awareness of public service as a noble calling is a different matter.
Foundation of social ethics
In Jewish tradition, the foundation of social ethics was articulated thousands of years ago by Rabbi Hillel: "If I am not for myself, who will be; If I am only for myself, what am I; if not now, when?"
Let the current controversy about the President's war record evolve from a political issue whose potency is tested in focus groups to a great national conversation about larger issues of service to others and fundamental fairness. In conducting this conversation, the vision of self-actualization through commitment to others provided by Rabbi Hillel provides an excellent starting point.
XRabbi Simeon Kolko is the rabbi at Beth Israel Temple Center in Warren.