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WASHINGTON – A former FBI agent assigned to the White House wants John Kerry to approve the official release of his confidential FBI file.

Gary Aldrich, who made waves during the Clinton years for writing the New York Times best seller "Unlimited Access," is leading a citizens' coalition in demanding that the presumptive Democrat nominee release his FBI dossier, protected under U.S. privacy laws.

Aldrich, president of the Patrick Henry Center for Individual Liberty, an organization that supports whistleblowers who expose government corruption, told NewsMax he thought it was critically important for Kerry to ask for the files release to clear the air about his anti-war activities in the early 1970s.

By releasing the file, Aldrich says, Kerry would put any rumors to rest.

Aldrich said his demand was reasonable. He noted that many Democrats demanded, without any proof of wrongdoing, that President Bush should release his military records because of baseless claims he was "AWOL" in the National Guard.

Aldrich, whose activities with the FBI gained a high profile in 1996 when he exposed the broken security system and lax attitude on security in the Clinton White House, will not say what he knows about FBI investigations of Kerry.

'Enlightening'

What he does say is this: “Yes, that’s precisely why it is my organization that can lead the campaign to get Senator Kerry to request these files. I think we’re going to find material in those files very interesting and enlightening, and bring some clarity to what is otherwise a very hazy explanation and description of Senator Kerry’s activity, both in Vietnam and in the U.S. after he returned.”

The Patrick Henry Center does not presume to know the truth about Kerry’s military service, Aldrich says, “nor is the center in receipt of any information about Senator Kerry’s FBI file, if indeed one exists.”

As to whether he has memory of any interest by the FBI in Kerry’s activities in those anti-war days, he is more circumspect. But this much he can say:

“It is well-established that Kerry was a key leader of the group known as Vietnam Veterans Against the War, or VVAW. It is also well-known that the FBI and other domestic intelligence agencies monitored activities of VVAW, and kept files about their leadership and members’ activities.”

Those files are not available to the public. Only the senator can authorize their release.

President Bush ordered the release of his Guard records once the Democrats decided to make an issue of them, possibly as a strategy to inoculate their candidate against any future questions about Kerry's own activities.

Now, says Aldrich, “Senator Kerry, the ball is in your court.”

Hmmmmm fare for the Goose fare for the Gander??

Hog

His records were not AWOL, they just 'seemed' incomplete. I'm active duty, still in, and if you review my enlisted service record, you'd swear I was promoted straight from E-4 to E-5, because they never entered my advancement to E-5, despite several attempts to get the situation corrected. My pay record is straight, but my service record is hosed, you think things were BETTER in the Air Guard of the 1970's???

hog: amen to that. i would have given ANYTHING to be able to serve in my country's military. ANYTHING.

i come from a military-oriented family -- dad WWII USMC so. pacific, 2 brothers US Army vietnam, one airborne, one tank division, 2 sisters, one a civvy working with the US Navy, the other a civvy working with the USAF. hell, my mom even (proudly) worked in the oakridge, TN, plant where "the bomb" was made. LOL

closest thing i got was to work with the USAF on a year-long project at wright patt's armstrong mil research lab, and that was a civvy thing. my psych prof worked there and got me into a biopsych project on flight sims and another project for NASA -- turned out that astronauts, being older than most pilots, had failing eyesight and couldn't read the letters on their monitors. *chuckle* so we did tests to determine what the threshold needed to be, or how big the fonts on their monitors had to be in order for the 'nauts to be able to read them easily. :)

but i couldn't get into the military to actually SERVE in it. i think my first word was "hooooah!" and i wanted to be a marine more than anything. i felt like part of me died when i was denied due to having a bone structure problem in my feet (hell, dad had flat feet but he was okay to serve during WWII). :P

anyway, what i mean to say is this -- i don't know ANYONE who has served their country for the pay, the medals or ANY personal reward of any kind. especially if you're enlisted, you're NOT gonna get rich working for the big uncle. and medals? if you've got the patience to wait for the bureaucrats...

people who serve most often do it because they feel that it's their DUTY to do it. with a family like mine (and many others), you do it because it's What You Do, period. there's no question about what johnny or juan or giovanni was going to do after high school. you grew up KNOWING that you *WERE GOING* into the military to do your part, period.

it wasn't for the money. it wasn't for help with college (most of these guys had zero desire to go to college ever, and all but one guy i know never did go after their service was done). it wasn't for the glory or medals or anything like it. you went because it's what you were supposed to do -- and you went because you WANTED to. you wanted the experience, the challenge, the seeing the world, the cameraderie, etc. and i think most who up and enlist still do it for those reasons.

honestly, there's some part of me that will never feel like i'm a "real man" because i never served in the military. war or no war, i'd STILL give anything for a chance to serve, and one of the hardest things i've faced in my life so far was the knowledge that it's just not going to happen for me in this lifetime.

well, this is a long threadjack, but THANK YOU to the vets who did and do serve. guys like CW and hog aren't in this "for the money" or "for the medals." it's impossible -- coz this is one "job" where it's almost like you have to pay your boss instead of the other way around. lol i'm sure that at one point or another in your careers you DID pay the uncle (or at least weren't comp'ed for things you did).