That legacy of death, destruction and conflict continues to blight entire regions -- and was all started on the watch of a man who preferred to party in mess halls than to serve his nation in a time of need.
Donald Trump's own history certainly sounds disreputable. At age 22, he availed of four military service deferments for "educational reasons" and one for having an alleged bone problem in one his feet. Years later, Trump said he couldn't remember which foot was the cause of the "medical" problem.
No doubt Trump's millionaire father had some bearing on why young Donald was able to avoid being shipped out to the jungles of Vietnam, unlike so many others of his generation.
Trump has also not done his tawdry past many favors either. He has made the inane and flippant comparison that his "personal Vietnam" was avoiding contracting sexual diseases during his wild youth.
More recently the Republican candidate's ugly public spat with the Muslim parents of a slain US veteran killed during the Iraq War has also compounded accusations that Trump is not respectful of military servicemen and women. That echoes with Trump's earlier disparagement of Senator John McCain as not being a qualified war hero because he was formerly a POW in Vietnam. "I prefer heroes who don't get caught by the enemy," quipped the bumptious Trump.
Trump's glib views on the NATO military alliance and towards European and Asian allies are also pulled up by his detractors as further evidence of profanity towards "our national treasure," as Hillary Clinton obsequiously describes the armed forces.
The maverick Republican nominee has a knack for sounding "anti-establishment." Trump has efficiently tapped the discontent of millions of ordinary, working class Americans.
His background suggests, however, that he is very much part of the ruling establishment -- a rich kid who inherited wealth to finance a property empire. In many ways, Trump is no different from George W. Bush, right down the personal history of dodging military service.
But Trump's ambition has caused him to cross red lines in the eyes of the establishment. Calling political rivals like Clinton "crooked" and rubbishing the supposed democratic process as "rigged" are intolerable disclosures. For the ruling "one percent," Trump's iconoclasm of American myths is too destabilizing. He is a risk to the entire power structure and pretense of US democracy.
Hence, the US plutocracy are closing ranks to dump Trump. Whether Republican or Democrat, Conservative or Liberal, the ruling class are moving to foreclose on Trump's candidacy.
The torrent of character flaws being leveled against Trump is not the real issue. The flagrant hypocrisy over his draft-dodging compared with that of George W. Bush and other one percenters is proof of that.
What is at issue is how the US presidential election is being decided by a powerful minority.
Nothing new here, one might add, except the brazenness by which democratic choice in the US is made obsolete.
Arch-conservative Robert Kagan, husband of Victoria "F..k the EU" Nuland, is one of the growing number of top Republicans who are now backing Democrat Clinton for president. Kagan claims that Trump poses a danger for "fascism coming to the US."
The truth is that Trump is only a symptom of the political disease that is already endemic in the US.
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