who truly believes that john dowd wrote that tweet. it was clearly trying to clean something up, perhaps in the process of some sort of attorney/client privilege if there are questions about exactly how this tweet came to be. but clearly just the same kind of clean up after the fact, after some sort of mistake is made, to try to allay the fears of the president and give them a talking point to try to explain this away. it s tough. john, jonathan, does the fear now go to kushner, people who are looking forward, looking at the next pieces? do all eyes move to the son-in-law and senior advisor? it s serial certainly possible. it s a short list of candidates. he has been identified by source as the very senior official who mike flynn talked to during the transition, who, you know, reached out to russian officials at that behest, therefore essentially carrying the message of the president.
of the medal of honor for his combat actions in vietnam. he s also an msnbc military analyst. john meecham is here as well, including books on presidents jackson, jefferson and bush 41, also an msnbc contributor. jack, i d like to begin with you. it s a complicated topic. i come from a family, world war ii era captain, two sons, he supported both of their efforts he could to not go to vietnam, which surprised us. when you look to your right and left when you were in vietnam, did you have ivy leaguers, did you have guys from the old neighborhood? what was it like, and how did you feel about the people who fought and the people who got out? well, we had a little bit of both. it s a common misunderstanding, but in fact i think fewer than 50%, i think it was closer to 25 or 30% of the people who served during the vietnam era were actually drafted.
draft even if you were in college and were graduated until much later in the war. by and large, therefore, the large majority of people who were drafted who couldn t escape the draft by one subterfuge or one reason or another, the way it was structured happened to be people who couldn t otherwise escape. we re not very happy about getting drafted, although now when they re 70 years old, they look back on their service with a great deal of pride. john, we hasten to point out that in the civil war you could indeed hire someone to take your place and go fight. roosevelt s father. i also want to know how our wars have changed over the years. well, it s amazing, isn t it? 25 years after the 1992 campaign when this cultural divide became a central part of our politics, it continues. and one of the reasons i think that we re in the 17th year now,
american to serve, every american should serve. during his appearance today on the view, john mccain said he doesn t consider president trump as a draft dodger, but he blamed the system at the time saying, quote, certain americans could evade responsibility to serve the country. it s an interesting topic, and a puzzling one. and here to talk about it with us tonight, retired u.s. army colonel jack jacobs, one of now 73 living recipients as of today of the medal of honor for his combat actions in vietnam. he s also an msnbc military analyst. john meecham is here as well, including books on presidents jackson, jefferson and bush 41, also an msnbc contributor. jack, i d like to begin with you. it s a complicated topic. i come from a family, world war ii era captain, two sons, he supported both of their efforts he could to not go to vietnam, which surprised us. when you look to your right and
of which people don t even know we have troops. speaking of niger. for example. we have troops in uganda. thousands of troops in djibouti, for example. we have people in the philippines and so on. i think in circumstances in which there is this gap i think it tends to get wider over time. and in a fragmented and polarized society gets wider yet, and i think that s extremely dangerous. john, i mention this because it s germane. the president s in the middle of this fight with a gold star widow and awards the medal today. has this president s lack of military experience been more pronounced to you than others who have lacked military experience? i think like so much of this presidency it s there s a certain astroturf quality to it. he likes the theatrics of the military. he likes having generals around. he went to military school. but it s almost as though it s a reality show and it s more a show than reality. and i think when confronted with the flesh and the blood and the sac