
                         THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
                 Copyright (c) 1994, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: TUESDAY, June 21, 1994                    TAG: 9406210008 
SECTION: FRONT                     PAGE: A10    EDITION: FINAL  
SOURCE: Short 
DATELINE: 940621                                 LENGTH:

`REJECTED' HILLARY

{LEAD} Regarding ``First lady: Military rejected her'' (news, June 15): Hillary Rodham Clinton's account of her sincere attempt to join the military puzzles me. In 1975, she was hitched both personally and politically to Bill Clinton, a man with a decidedly anti-military stance. Did she really want to be a Marine, or was this another social experiment to discuss over coffee with her law-school buddies?

In 1975, I wanted to be a Marine Corps officer. That summer, I attended officer-candidate school in Quantico with a number of women who were 27 years old or older. Many in our class also wore glasses.

{REST} After being turned down by the recruiter, Mrs. Clinton supposedly said: ``Maybe I'll look for another way to serve my country.'' It is a shame that the first lady does not understand that knocking the military is not one of them.

If she had approached joining the military with the same perseverance and tenacity that characterizes her approach to other issues, I guarantee that she would be a field-grade officer in the United States Marine Corps today.

DOREEN M. BURGER

Major, U.S. Marine Corps Reserve

Virginia Beach, June 15, 1994

by CNB