Little Prince Bone Spurs
by digby
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| An 18 year old invalid |
Of course, his father got him out of the draft. Of COURSE he did. After all, his father got him out of every jam he ever got into for the next 30 years. And the list of jams is endless. It is the story of his life:
In the fall of 1968, Donald J. Trump received a timely diagnosis of bone spurs in his heels that led to his medical exemption from the military during Vietnam.
For 50 years, the details of how the exemption came about, and who made the diagnosis, have remained a mystery, with Mr. Trump himself saying during the presidential campaign that he could not recall who had signed off on the medical documentation.
Now a possible explanation has emerged about the documentation. It involves a foot doctor in Queens who rented his office from Mr. Trump’s father, Fred C. Trump, and a suggestion that the diagnosis was granted as a courtesy to the elder Mr. Trump.
Mr. Trump, center, during his senior year at the New York Military Academy. He would receive a medical exemption from the draft a few years later.
Mr. Trump, center, during his senior year at the New York Military Academy. He would receive a medical exemption from the draft a few years later.
The podiatrist, Dr. Larry Braunstein, died in 2007. But his daughters say their father often told the story of coming to the aid of a young Mr. Trump during the Vietnam War as a favor to his father.
“I know it was a favor,” said one daughter, Dr. Elysa Braunstein, 56, who along with her sister, Sharon Kessel, 53, shared the family’s account for the first time publicly when contacted by The New York Times.
Elysa Braunstein said the implication from her father was that Mr. Trump did not have a disqualifying foot ailment. “But did he examine him? I don’t know,” she said.
For decades, Dr. Braunstein saw patients in a congested ground-floor office below Edgerton Apartments in Jamaica, Queens, one of dozens of buildings owned by the Trumps in the 1960s. The family sold the building in 2004, records show.
A portrait of Dr. Braunstein from his podiatry school yearbook. His daughters say he made the diagnosis as a favor to Fred C. Trump, Donald’s father.
A portrait of Dr. Braunstein from his podiatry school yearbook. His daughters say he made the diagnosis as a favor to Fred C. Trump, Donald’s father.
“What he got was access to Fred Trump,” Elysa Braunstein said. “If there was anything wrong in the building, my dad would call and Trump would take care of it immediately. That was the small favor that he got.”
No paper evidence has been found to help corroborate the version of events described by the Braunstein family, who also suggested there was some involvement by a second podiatrist, Dr. Manny Weinstein. Dr. Weinstein, who died in 1995, lived in two apartments in Brooklyn owned by Fred Trump; city directories show he moved into the first during the year Donald Trump received his exemption.
Dr. Braunstein’s daughters said their father left no medical records with the family, and a doctor who purchased his practice said he was unaware of any documents related to Mr. Trump. Most detailed government medical records related to the draft no longer exist, according to the National Archives.
In an interview with The Times in 2016, Mr. Trump said that a doctor provided “a very strong letter” about the bone spurs in his heels, which he then presented to draft officials. He said he could not remember the doctor’s name. “You are talking a lot of years,” Mr. Trump said.
Little princelings didn't go to Viet Nam and Trump was a very, very privileged little princeling. He was sent to military school, trained to be an officer but there was no way he was going to go to an actual war. He was much too valuable to be wasted on something like that. That was for others.
I don't hold it against people for not wanting to go, of course. It was a terrible war. People like Bill Clinton didn't have the money to buy off doctors but he worked the system furiously for years to get out of it, including calling on powerful local friends to help him out. But the rich kids like Trump and George W. Bush just had their daddies write a check or make a call even as they and their friends all supported the war. And then their supporters went crazy on politicians like Clinton while ignoring their own offspring who couldn't be bothered.
Trump is even doing it today, going after Senator Richard Blumenthal who did join the military and made the mistake of calling himself a Vietnam vet instead of a Vietnam era vet. Of course he is shameless in every way, why should this be an exception?
Trump's voters, who spent their lives waving the flag and railing against anyone who didn't serve are now completely tolerant of their cult leader's privileged refusal to join. Nothing new there. Recall that Dick Cheney said he "had better things to do." There were plenty of other right wing war mongers who did the same thing.
Trump hasn't started a new war yet. He's threatened one, of course, and it's a big one, so nobody should feel too sanguine about his alleged "isolationism."
I wouldn't be too impressed with his abrupt withdrawal of troops from Syria and Afghanistan either. Keep in mind that those wars were begun under other presidents and his fundamental foreign policy, from the Paris accords to Russian sanctions to NAFTA is to simply reverse everything his predecessors did. That's all he knows. If he wants to start a new war, all his own, he will do it without a second thought.
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Buckle up everybody. It's going to be a very bumpy New Year!
cheers --- digby
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