The Mark Kirk Naval Finagle

The Mark Kirk kerfuffle has all the marks of metastasizing into a full-fledged flapdoodle over which Navy award was the Congressman bestowed and when was he bestowed it? The blogosphere is abuzz over the Washington Post revelation that Senate candidate Mark Kirk never received an Intelligence Officer of the Year Award from the Navy, even though he has been claiming just that for years.

A politician not caught in a lie is a politician whose lips aren't moving, so Kirk's antics barely produced a blip on the LakeCountyEye radar. However, since your LakeCountyEye sat out the last few wars in the Dick-Cheney-Members-Only-80-Proof-Bunker, it was a revelation to learn that behavior like Kirk's does not sit well with other servicemen. It was all reported on this blog ...

Mark Kirk Caught with His Pants Down

where the commenters insist that Kirk's actions are a violation of Navy protocol.

The issue may be one between Kirk and his fellow servicemen, but not surprisingly Team-Kirk is framing it differently. A week had passed before the Navy responded to the Wash-Po's questions about Kirk, enough time for all erroneous mentions of the ballyhooed Award to disappear from Kirk's website. At the same time, Team-Kirk seized on an admission by the Wash-Po that their investigation was ...

sparked by complaints from a representative of state Treasurer Alexi Giannoulias
Illinois Senate candidate admits claim about military award was inaccurate

This provided enough fuel to reframe the story as an attack on Kirk's service record. And an attack precipitated by someone who never served in the armed forces. As reported today by the News-Sun ...

Kirk, R-Highland Park, said his Democratic opponent's criticism of the mistake amounts to an attack on his 21 years of service in the Naval Reserves. Kirk faces Chicago Democrat Alexi Giannoulias, who has no military record, in the general election in November. "When I was wearing a uniform in Aviano, I think he was wearing the uniform of a basketball team in Greece," Kirk said.
Kirk accepts blame for misstating award

What by all rights could be viewed as a question of honor to be decided among servicemen, is instead portrayed as an attack from the outside. Has Kirk dishonored himself before his fellow servicemen or is he defending them from criticism by someone who never served? All your LakeCountyEye has to say is this is how damage-control is pursued in the big leagues.