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As a Reservist, an "bad-year" is meaningless unless you intend to retire from the military. More than likely, the President tried to transfer to Alabama, missed some drills and was advised to meet his obligation as an Officer and Pilot, he had to have a certain number of points, he made up those point and left the Guard. Hell, I am eligible to retire and I have two "bad-years" I am trying to fix. I know people that have paid hell trying to fix "bad years" from back in the 80's. It is a clerical mess. Besides, now Bush's nominal CO from Alabama is back tracking, by saying Bush may have been there he is not sure. Why, because the CO or his direct representative signs the muster sheet. Only a completely nincompoop would not know one of his officers was absent. "Absent", AWOL and Deserter to not apply to "drilling" reservists. Those are active duty designations and do not apply to drilling Guard members.

AWOL and Deserter to not apply to "drilling" reservists. I was unaware of that but AWOL could mean almost anything. It is a term used for missing duty for unexplained reasons. Once I was on a temporary assignment when a need came up for me to go home for a few days.
I was in Colorado, home was in Mississippi. I spoke with my First Shirt and he informed me that (due to my "in training" status) leave could not be granted, but that he could give me a week off work. He told me to be very careful because I would be over 100 or so miles (i think this was the number)from my duty assignment, and that if I was caught over that far away I would be considered AWOL. I went and came back with no problems, but it could have been considered AWOL.
I said all that to emphasize the point that AWOL is meaningless unless it's in a combat environment, under fire. A bit like taking an extra sick day from work.
If he had been considered a deserter he certainly would NOT have gotten an honorable discharge. I'll bet that where you did not find him was overseas, protesting our government. You would also not find him giving political aid (or any other kind of aid) to our enemies; UNLIKE the "man" he replaced in the Whitehouse OR his potential Democratic rival in the next election.

As usual, the Globe is either lying or stupid. You decide.

A "bad year" in the Reserves simply means getting less than 50 drill points and can be the result of any number of factors. Such a year does not qualify as a retirement year; you need at least 20 "good" years to earn Reserve retirement upon reaching age 60. I had several "bad years" because of moving and job conflicts, but still earned over 20 "good years" with which to have earned retirement.

But The Boston Globe -- stupid, biased, and utterly corrupt -- either chose not to learn these basics or else simply decided to lie to hurt Bush. Calling The Globe "garbage" simply slanders real garbage. And the Internet is shining a light on every lie they tell, now...