Holding Their Partisan Fire
On Memorial Day 2000, Al Gore recalled his Army tour in Vietnam with nostalgia and some humility, while George W. Bush looked ahead to the future without mentioning his own military background.
Along the banks of the Monongahela River, cutting through western Pennsylvania's old steel towns, Gore navigated a tangle of the official, the political and the personal in his remarks.
"I know that my service doesn't in any way match that of the heroes that we honor on this day," said the Democratic presidential candidate in Elizabeth, Pa., a town of 1,600 which lost six sons in Vietnam.
Gore, who has said his five months in Vietnam as an Army journalist included brushes with enemy fire, rarely speaks of what he did there. On Monday, when Americans paused to remember the war dead, the snapshot Gore chose to share with his audience of about 500, including many veterans, was, oddly, a lighthearted one.
One time we borrowed, or commandeered, a Jeep and went over to Vungtao, a soldiers' R&R facility on the Vietnamese coast. "Anyway, we had many great times together," Gore said with a gesture towards Bob Delabar, an Army buddy who introduced the vice president at Monday's event.
Bush, the Texas governor and GOP presidential candidate, stayed closer to home. He told about 1,000 people at Fort Hood, Tex. that veterans' sacrifices must be honored always. The bulk of the U.S. peacekeeping force in Bosnia was drawn from the base, about 130 miles south of Dallas.
As we recall our fallen heroes, we're privileged to be in the company of heroes, he said in brief remarks in a flag-filled amphitheater. "Thank you for serving our country. You make us all proud to be Americans."
Bush, who did not mention his presidential bid, his White House rival, or his own military background, said it was fitting on Memorial Day to remember the following biblical verse: "Greater love hath no man than this, than he laid down his life for his friends."
Introduced as a former member of the Texas Air National Guard, where he served stateside during the Vietnam years, Bush said the challenge in coming years is to instill patriotism in future generations. He also stressed the need for a well-paid, well-equipped military.
"We must pass the story of American courage to the next generation to raise a monument in their hearts," said Bush. "This is the greatest nation on the earth."
With former Veterans' Affairs secretary Jesse Brown in tow, Gore also used his Memorial Day trip to assail Bush's Social Security proposals.
Currently six points behind Bush in public opinion polls, Gore plans appearances all week highlighting pieces of a biography that his campaign contends that voters do not yet know.
And so on Memorial Day, the vice president talked about his enlistment in the Army. On Tuesday, Gore will highlight his environmental advocacy. On Wednesday, he will tout his wife Tipper's advocacy fomental health. For Thursday and Friday, Gore plans speeches on cancer - which killed his older sister - and on fatherhood.