Romney's Shifting Vietnam Sentiments
by Ryan Sager
Thu, 10 May 2007 at 9:04 PM
updated Thu, 10 May 2007 at 9:10 PM
From Time.com today:
"The closest he has ever come to a personal religious crisis, he recalls, was when he was in college and considering whether to go off on a mission, as his grandfather, father and brother had done. Mitt was deeply in love with Ann, his high school sweetheart and future wife, and couldn't bear to spend more than two years away from her. He says he also felt guilty about the draft deferment he would get for it, when other young men his age were heading for Vietnam."
From the Boston Herald in 1994:
"Romney, however, acknowledged he did not have any desire to serve in the military during his college and missionary days, especially after he married and became a father. ‘I was not planning on signing up for the military,' he said. ‘It was not my desire to go off and serve in Vietnam, but nor did I take any actions to remove myself from the pool of young men who were eligible for the draft. If drafted, I would have been happy to serve, and if I didn't get drafted I was happy to be with my wife and new child."
I'm not sure this is a huge contradiction. One could easily not have wanted to server in Vietnam, yet, at the same time, feel guilty about getting a deferment. But is a convenient shift in how he describes his sentiments — one that seems to move with the audience to which he is pitching himself.
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