Two Wrongs Make a … Confusing Mess

In the panhandle of West Virginia, there’s a 109-year-old man named Frank Buckles. He’s the last surviving American doughboy from World War I. Apparently, Mark Kirk owes Buckles a personal apology, for claiming to fight in a war he never fought in.

Mark Kirk never claimed to have shouted “Lafayette, We Are Here,” or ridden in the back of a Curtiss Jenny that dueled with the Red Baron. But Democrats are now asking Kirk to apologize to veterans of wars he was too young to lie about fighting in.

During an interview with Fox Chicago, State Rep. Linda Chapa LaVia (D-Aurora), said of Kirk, “I would hope that he would come out and apologize to all the veterans, especially the Vietnam veterans, because that’s when he supposedly served. And not only that, allegations are starting to come out where he falsified he served in Iraq and Afghanistan, too.”

Mark Kirk was born in 1959. As he pointed out in an e-mail to supporters, “I was 13 years old when the Vietnam Paris Peace Accords were signed in 1973.” He would have been a sophomore at New Trier High School when the Vietnam War ended two years later -- too young even to lie about his age to join the Navy.

Kirk also pointed out, “I served over Iraq as part of Operation Northern Watch in 2000 and twice served in Kandahar, Afghanistan.”

Now Mark Kirk’s problem is that he’s been caught in so many lies about his military record that his enemies are having trouble telling the truth about it, too.
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