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Featured will be Ben Barnes, former Lieutenant Governor of Texas, who is a featured player in the newly rediscovered story of Bush's National Guard record. Barnes has stated publicly that he got Bush into The National Guard as a favor to a Bush family friend (those Bushes were exercizing plausible deniability even way back then) and that he did it for sons of many prominent rich families and severely regrets it.

Considering the elevation of this story to the mainstream media, we should be hearing more from The White House on this issue, including an attempt to discredit this guy. Their attempt at covering up the story worked for almost 4 years but this is fair game for a guy who's running as a war president. Surrogates are already painting Barnes as a partisan Democrat. Barnes is a Democrat and an active supporter of John Kerry, but being a Texas Democrat, he also has ties to Republican Senator Kay Bailey Hutchinson.

Since the story has re-emerged, they've been surprisingly silent on the issue. Here's what Bush has said previously:

On "Meet the Press," Bush said, "I put in my time, proudly so." When pressed by Russert on why news reporters who previously investigated the charge could find no records of his Alabama service, Bush said, "They're just wrong. There may be no evidence, but I did report; otherwise, I wouldn't have been honorably discharged. In other words, you don't just say `I did something' without there being verification. Military doesn't work that way. I got an honorable discharge, and I did show up in Alabama."

When asked why he served less than the six-year commitment, Bush responded, "I was going to Harvard Business School and worked it out with the military."

Did he actually lie about his service since records now show that he blatantly did not report for his full duty? Another imminent debate, one that couldn't have come at a better time.