Did Laura Bush kill someone????

[LibraLiz1973]

I've read it around D.U. from time to time- that Laura was in a drunk driving accident with a former boyfriend? Is this right?


Does anyone have links to the story etc?

Thanks guys

[madame defarge]

1. From USAToday...

What could get more mainstream than that?

http://www.usatoday.com/news/opinion/e1698.htm

[Maestro]

2. I am not sure if she was drunk

but she did have an accident as a teenager or while in her early twenties in which she did kill someone. The accident was her fault. I have no link, sorry.

[Imagevision]

22. Douglas was thrown from the car and broke his neck

those details were not in the report.

''As far as we know, no charges were filed,'' said Midland city attorney Keith Stretcher. ''I don't think it's unusual that charges weren't filed.'' -- amazing!!

[SoCalDem]

30. He just "happened to be" her ex-boyfriend.. (cue Church lady)

How conveeeeeeenient:eyes:

[merwin]

25. They never gave her an alcohol test.

[nvliberal]

43. She ran a stop sign, I believe.

She was just 17 years old at the time, and, horribly enough, her boyfriend was in the other vehicle and was killed.

There was no alcohol involved.

I am not comfortable in condemning Laura Bush for this tragedy, years before she even met that dipshit over the barbecue pit. I have a relative who was in a similar cirumstance, and it's a tough burden to bear.

[Hissyspit]

3. Yes. snopes.com:

http://www.snopes.com/politics/bush/laura.asp

Claim: While a teenager, future First Lady Laura Bush caused the death of a classmate in a car accident.

Status: True.

- snip -

This is the story of one of those accidents. It resulted in the death of someone you've never heard of, at the hands of someone you have.

In May 2000, a two-page police report pertaining to a fatal accident that had taken place near Midland, Texas, in 1963 was made public. It contained the information that 17-year-old Laura Welch had run a stop sign, causing the death of the sole occupant of the vehicle hers had struck. According to that report, the future First Lady had been driving her Chevrolet sedan on a clear night shortly after 8 p.m. on 6 November 1963 when she entered an intersection without heeding the stop sign and there collided with the Corvair sedan driven by 17-year-old Michael Douglas. Also in the car with Laura Welch was a passenger, 17-year-old Judy Dykes.

How fast Miss Welch might have been driving is open to question. That part of the police report is illegible, although two biographies of the First Lady refer to her as having been going 50 mph at the time of the collision. The speed limit on that portion of road was 55 mph. According to the police report neither driver had been drinking, but no tests were performed. No charges were filed as a result of the accident.

MORE

[madokie]

5. as I remember it was a boyfriend who jilted her

[gauguin57]

44. I've always heard she sold pot when she was in college.

Maybe she was high, not drunk.

[Atman]

4. Yes. Ran a stop sign, broadside a car with a high-school friend in it

Of course, she was a society girl, so it was made to go away. Then she married into the perfect family to make it go away forever.

You wonder why these people have no concept of death? There is never any consequence for them, no matter how many people they kill.

[nonconformist]

6. She ran a stop sign and killed her friend. nt

[Frances]

7. Sorry I don't have a link

I remember reading that when she was young she ran a stop sign and hit another car killing someone in it who had been her boyfriend. I don't think she was charged with anything.

I have often thought that if Hillary had done something like that the right wing would have hammered it over and over. I think the right wing would have made the boy's family famous by having them on TV and in books and tabloids. I also wonder how the boy's family feels about Laura Bush now.

[Synnical]

8. Yes, and Prescott Bush also funded the Nazis n/t

[Tim4319]

9. His name: Michael Dutton Douglas

Check this out.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Dutton_Douglas

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Michael_Dutton_Douglas.jpg

[leftofthedial]

10. she ran over an ex boyfriend

in high school

[LibraLiz1973]

11. Thank you so much to all who responded!

I was telling my mom about this earlier & she was not believing me

[Ksec]

12. What are the chances that someone would just happen to be crossing the str

at the same time a jilted lover was driving through an intersection? What are the odds? Astronomical

[acmejack]

13. Actually in Midland in 63

The odds would have been better than you think. Small town, few roads, fewer people.

[QC]

24. Midland had 62,625 people in 1960.

Hardly a tiny little town.

[acmejack]

31. Consider they likely lived in the same neighborhood.

Since they went to the same school. They probably hung out at the same places since they obviously knew each other and by extension, the same people.

You aren't telling me you never r saw the people you knew from high school around town?

[Yupster]

35. The accident didn't happen in town

It was on a farmer's market road outside of town.

I live just a few miles away and travel those roads for business quite often.

The roads are flat and straight as arrows. The intersections are at right angles. There is just mesquite and tumbleweeds as far as the eye can see with a house here and there. It may be a mile or more between intersections.

Usually you are the only car within sight.

Cars go 60 and above on them today. It would be totally amazing for two cars going 60 to hit each other at one of those intersections because there just aren't any cars there and you can see them coming from so far away.

It's a hard accident for me to explain.

I don't think it could have been on purpose as you couldn't time a hit like that if you tried ten times with two cars going 60 miles an hour at right angles to each other. Also, there's no light on those roads, so yu wouldn't be able to tell who was in the other car coming from the other angle.

Laura Welch was certainly not part of the Bush clan back then. Her family had no influence in town as far as I know. She was just a 17 year old going to a party.

I'm assuming she was going to a party, paying no attention and wasn't familiar driving on the roads outside of town.

I'm surprised there wasn't some punishment though. It was obviously her fault and she obviously ran the stop sign. I'd have to see how similar accidents were handled back then in the same town.

PS - Once I was stopped by a sheriff's car late at night on one of these roads. He told me he stopped me because I was "weaving in and out of traffic". "Traffic?" I squeeled, "There's not a car within a mile of us" He said that was "neither here nor there," but he thought I might have been drinking and could see I wasn't so let me go on. I was driving in the middle of the road as I do on those roads at night because so many small animals jump in to the road without warning. There are almost no shoulders. You can see approaching cars a mile away so there's no danger.

So why didn't Laura see the other car? Even at a right angle, she should have seen it ong before hitting it.

[gollygee]

45. I got into a car accident with my brother

in a town of 80,000.

It isn't astronomical.

[daninthemoon]

14. Wasn't the movie "Natural Born Killers" based on george & laura?

[Poiuyt]

17. Why, I think you may be right!

:rofl:

[LisaL]

15. Yes, she killed her ex-boyfriend in a driving accident.

[Botany]

16. She is all heart.

The First Lady made a brief remark in March 2000 about the crash, "I know this as an adult, and even more as a parent, it was crushing ... for the family involved and for me as well."


ME AS WELL cut me a break

[philarq]

18. Full story and links

In May 2000, a two-page police report about a fatal car crash caused by Bush when she was 17 was made public. The report says that on November 6, 1963 Bush (then Laura Welch) was driving her Chevrolet sedan with her classmate Judy Dyke. It was shortly after 8 pm on a clear night when Welch entered the intersection of U.S. Highway 349 and Texas Farm Road 868. Bush failed to observe the intersection's stop sign and collided into a Chevrolet Corvair sedan driven by her ex-boyfriend Michael Dutton Douglas, also 17. Bush and Dyke sustained minor injuries; Douglas was pronounced dead on arrival at Midland Memorial Hospital. Welch was not ticketed or charged in connection with the collision.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laura_Bush

[KC21304]

19. Isn't that amazing ? How can you run a stop sign,

kill someone and not get a ticket ? And no tests done for alcohol.


But thank God she never made money on cattle futures.

[Tiggeroshii]

21. We all know this, because the liberal media is so good

at spreading awful things about wonderful people. "liberal media," meaning "only the liberals know?"

[UTUSN]

20. Again? n/t

[Imagevision]

23. Laura hides the fact that she's a chain smoking mama

Dime bag Laura ring a bell to some of you?

[VPStoltz]

26. What incredible foresight.

Even then the Bush clan was above the law.

[Silverhair]

27. A few facts that don't get mentioned on DU.

At the time, Laura's family were Democrats. That was when Texas was a solid Democratic state, as were ALL the southern states. In fact, in 1972 Laura helped campaign, locally, for McGovern.

She was not a "society girl". He father has a home construction business that he had started himself, from scratch. He had done well with the business, and had become affluent, but wasn't "society rich".

W had already been sent away, years earlier, to a rich boarding school. Laura stayed in the public school system.

In 1963, many things were a LOT different than today. In an accident like that one, there were not the intensive investigations that one would see today. If the officer on the spot decided that the driver was sober, then the decision stood. There was would have been no ticket as it would have been seen as needlessly adding to the grief.

To attack her for the things she does today is fair game. But to try to make a conspiracy theory out of a 17 year old girl's fatal accident only shows a pathological hatred. In the governor's race, Ann Richards knew about the accident, and told her campaign to be completely silent about it. Attacking her about the old accident is counterproductive. A moderate, persuadable, voter will view such an attack as unfair and will feel sympathy for the modern Laura.

[UTUSN]

33. Your Post Is Thoughtful and Reasonable and Fair

But I think that most of us who attack ANYTHING and ANYBODY having to do with Shrub do so from a therapeudic venting, in reaction to how the wingnuts have NEVER EVER let anything thoughtful or reasonable or FACTUAL get in the way of their bile.

[U4ikLefty]

39. Like perhaps the 20+ year of attacking Kennedy for his accident?

it's called tit-for-tat.

I await the "are we not better than THEM?" comments.

[ruggerson]

40. Kind of like what the PU's do to Ted Kennedy all the time?

[Crunchy Frog]

28. Can you imagine what they would have done to Hillary

if she had had that in her past? I think that it's very fair game bringing it up with respect to Laura. I guess the Republicans have sort of altered my beliefs about what is acceptable in public discourse.

[Horse with no Name]

29. I saw a special on her

And the Sheriff said they didn't charge her because she really didn't mean to do it and she felt bad.:puke:

[Maestro]

32. I have felt badly for some of the things I've done

as well, but I still paid the consequences. No wonder no one wants to accept responsibility in this admin. No one ever has before.

[Horse with no Name]

41. Agreed.

I've never got any do-overs in my life.
However, I guess we should be happy that at least one of the Bush's does feel bad for something.:shrug:

[spacelady]

34. This was actually included in a Reader's Digest Story About Laura

But was Glossed over as a regrettable youthful indiscretion. Kinda like hitting a deer or something. See how that goes over with a grieving family! Evil is as Evil does.

[Silverhair]

36. The grieving family DID understand, in 1963, that it was an accident.

Do you propose that all teenagers that are in the wrong in an auto accident should get life in prison? That seems to be what you are advocating.

[bearfan454]

37. 1973 Midland - Odessa I believe

She ran a stop sign. No charges were ever filed.

[Yupster]

38. Odessa is about 20 miles

west of Midland.

This accident happened a few miles south of Midland I believe. That would be far away from Odessa.

[Lucille]

42. What's interesting about his story is that no one who knew them talked

This was an extremely popular boy--not only accomplished and intelligent, but genuinely well-liked He was killed in a tragic accident by a girl who was also well-liked and in the same social circle.

If something had happened like this at your high school, wouldn't you talk about it? Wouldn't his death be a "landmark" type event in your life and the life of the community? Wouldn't the other suvivor talk about it? But no one has, not when Bush was a failed oil/man politician, not when he was governor, not when he was president.

Also interesting that the speed of Laura's car is illegible in the police report.