MISCELLANEOUS STUFF. "I'm a liberal, and proud of it" said John Kerry in 1991.

Americans For Democratic Action, a leftist group, gives Mr. Kerry a rating of 92%, two points more liberal than Ted "I Seem To Have Lost My Date In The River" Kennedy.

John Kerry still has not released his military records.

The document Mr. Kerry exhibits as his honorable discharge says it came after a review by a board of officers. Why did it take a board of officers? The normal discharge does not require this.

The authority of reference for this board was Title 10, U.S. Code Section 1162 and 1163, which references the grounds for involuntary separation. Did the Navy separate Mr. Kerry from service involuntarily?

Mr. Kerry's discharge is dated February 16, 1978. But he went into the Navy in 1966 for a six year commitment. That means his discharge should have been in 1972. What happened to delay it until 1978? He was already out and leading Vietnam Veterans Against The War long before then. In fact, Mr. Kerry met the North Vietnamese and Viet Cong delegation to the Paris Peace talks in May 1970 (during the War!).

Mr. Kerry demonstrated against the war in July 1971 in D.C. He wanted Congress to accept North Vietnam's peace proposal without change.

So, what happened in 1978? The board of officers review says it was held at the direction of the President. Who was president then? It was Jimmy Carter. Yes the same Jimmy Carter that travels around the world blaming every crisis on America. It is also the same President Carter that granted amnesty for draft dodgers in the first hour of his presidency.

In March 1977, the Department of Defense expanded the order to include those who had general, bad conduct, or dishonorable discharges. To get your record clean, though, you had to have a review before a board of officers.

Did I mention that Mr. Kerry has refused to release all his military records?

Oh, and just in case you wanted a "misstatement" for the record, his spokesmen said all his records were posted on his web site. The Washington Post, which supports Kerry, says that the Navy says they had about 100 pages of Kerry's record he had not released. That is a lot of pages. It is even enough to be the transcript or record of a board of review.

Did anyone else help Kerry clean up his record? Well, he got his medals reissued a few months after being elected to the Senate.

I think it would make a great first question in the debate. Or a good first answer?