Candor from the candidates

0 Comments | USA TODAY, April, 2004

For many voters, the 2004 presidential campaign already is more tedious than enlightening. The candidates snipe at each other's records almost daily. Their allies launch personal smears. And in 18 hotly contested states, negative ads that play fast and loose with the facts are bombarding the airwaves.

But amid what may look like politics as usual, the candidates have been more forthcoming than White House contenders in previous campaigns. Under prodding from their opponents' camps, both President Bush and Democratic challenger John Kerry have released records about their pasts.

In February, after questions first raised in 2000 about Bush's National Guard service flared again, his campaign released some of his Guard payroll and medical-dental records. Similarly,...