For shame, you whiny chickenhawk

From conservative columnist Debbie Schlussel...Sean Hannity's charity scam.

For the last several years, Sean Hannity and the Freedom Alliance “charity” have conducted “Freedom Concerts” across America. They’ve told you that they are raising money to pay for the college tuition of the children of fallen soldiers and to pay severely wounded war vets. And on Friday Night, Hannity will be honored with an award for this “Outstanding Community Service by a Radio Talk Show Host” at Talkers Magazine’s convention.

But it’s all a huge scam.

In fact, less than 20%–and in two recent years, less than 7% and 4%, respectively–of the money raised by Freedom Alliance went to these causes, while millions of dollars went to expenses, including consultants and apparently to ferry the Hannity posse of family and friends in high style. And, despite Hannity’s statements to the contrary on his nationally syndicated radio show, few of the children of fallen soldiers got more than $1,000-$2,000, with apparently none getting more than $6,000, while Freedom Alliance appears to have spent tens of thousands of dollars for private planes. Moreover, despite written assurances to donors that all money raised would go directly to scholarships for kids of the fallen heroes and not to expenses, has begun charging expenses of nearly $500,000 to give out just over $800,000 in scholarships.

Beer for my horses.....

I posted the previous entry without comment, as I was a bit rushed. But I'd like to take the time now to comment on it, a reaction spurred by a comment from RealityZone:

Ya, lets not talk about the real problems. Lets just booze em up, so they can be zombies.
This is not looking out for our soldiers, this is making it worst. There is already a big enough problem among our soldiers when it comes to booze, dope, and suicide.
Why not talk about the the real problem?
Deployment, after deployment. Sending them back into the shit with no other recourse.
The only thing that our government cares about is BOOTS ON THE GROUND.
So, do they now want to condone putting our soldiers in an altered state of mind, so they can kill, and be killed without a conscience?

I disagree my friend...and here's why. Alcohol has long been known as a social lubricant, and that's no different when applied to it's use by military personnel. It's use, while often negative, can also be positive. I left Baghdad just under two years ago; 15 months of no alcohol, no escapism, no pressure valve...except for 2 weeks of R&R leave. In theater, there is often no comfortable outlet for guys to parse their experiences and come to terms with what they may have witnessed or experienced. Those influencers quite often get pushed down deep inside you...until a trigger or some random tick of the clock sends it all pouring out. There are still things I haven't and likely won't tell my wife... not because I couldn't drink in theater, but because I never had the chance to sort out my emotions soon after things occurred. I believe without a doubt that if given the chance to pop a couple of cold-ish beers with my guys, and have that time to come together, to let my guard down, to evaluate the events and the losses....I would have an easier time of it.

As it stands, soldiers are offered Combat Stress counseling with a stranger, a person who has not experienced what you just did, in a semi-clinical environment. It may help some people, but cracking a cold one may certainly help others....instead of waiting until they re-deploy.....to go from zero alcohol and escape to full on drunken retard in the span of a weekend. The families and the soldiers themselves pay the price [sometimes a very heavy price] for soldiers dealing with their issues after they have simmered and stewed. It may seem trivial....how can a few beers solve complex emotional issues that can range from accidentally killing a child to seeing your HMMWV crew killed by an IED? I don't know how. But it can.

I agree with your comment regarding multiple deployments for a cause that probably doesn't warrant the loss of our national treasure. And there are many guys coming back with stress that cannot hope to be cured with beer and bonding.....but when it comes to saving and helping who we can...our brothers....a little hops, malt and water can go a long way.

Make no mistake, any allowance of beer in theater will be rationed and allotted during down cycles. It will not be allowed to endanger the mission or the men.

It's about damed time

Sen. Jim Webb, D-Va., a Vietnam veteran and former war correspondent who now chairs the Senate panel that oversees military personnel policy, seemed to endorse the idea of letting troops in war zones drink alcohol as a way to relieve combat stress.

At a hearing of his Senate Armed Services military personnel panel, Webb asked defense and service officials about mental health issues facing deployed service members and, in particular, about a recent Military Times investigation into the military’s use of anti-depressants and other drugs for treating mental health issues.

The reported increase in prescription drug use and self-medication by deployed troops “is, quite frankly, astounding to me,” Webb said, adding that it is a clear indicator of the overall fatigue of combat troops who are not getting enough time between deployments.

“We do have a really stressed force,” said Webb, who also is a former Navy secretary.

One thing worth investigating, Webb said, is whether a ban on alcohol consumption in the war zones — which he said is primarily a nod to host-nation sensitivities — should be lifted.

Webb said stress relief is handled differently in every culture and suggested that U.S. commanders should reconsider allowing “alcohol for stress relief.”
Army Times

Time honored trickery

Is the hope for sanity in Washington?

Likely not...but this is a good sign nonetheless.

Senior senators on both sides of the aisle leveled heavy criticism Tuesday against a controversial ad put forth by Liz Cheney and William Kristol, which labeled Justice Department lawyers as the "al Qaeda 7."

The ad, paid for and produced by the group Keep American Safe, referred to the U.S. Justice Department as the "Department of Jihad," and called out Attorney General Eric Holder for hiring but not revealing the names of several attorneys who had previously worked to defend terrorism suspects. More than a dozen Bush administration era legal officials have already condemned the ad.

Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., a member of the Senate Armed Services and Judiciary Committees, told The Cable Tuesday that the Cheney-Kristol ad was inappropriate and unfairly demonized DOJ lawyers for doing a noble public service by defending unpopular suspects.

"I've been a military lawyer for almost 30 years, I represented people as a defense attorney in the military that were charged with some pretty horrific acts, and I gave them my all," said Graham. "This system of justice that we're so proud of in America requires the unpopular to have an advocate and every time a defense lawyer fights to make the government do their job, that defense lawyer has made us all safer."

Foreign Policy

The Hurt Locker review....that I would write

if I could write that well. Bouhammer has a must read review of the Academy Award winning movie - The Hurt Locker.

There were only two good things in this movie and by good I mean realistic. These were the way that iraqi civilians were portrayed as always watching and leering at the soldiers and the way the explosions happened. Rather than the over-the-top, fuel-infused, fireball style explosions that are normally in Hollywood movies, the ones that happened in this movie were very realistic. They were true to form in that they showed the violence of a shockwave and dust all at once. I could see why there were some warnings on the internet for those with combat experience about watching it. It is understandable why some could have issues with watching this movie.

Well that was it for what was realistic in the movie. So let me list what wasn’t realistic. Just about everything else. Before I had seen this movie, I had the impression that it may be a movie that could be closely compared to what it would be like if a few ex-EOD guys were sitting around a bar years after being in war together telling war stories to hapless civilians. Now that I have seen it, I can honestly say that is what it was like. The life of an EOD tech is not that glamorous and is really filled with 95% boredom. However in this portrayal you would think that they have the most exciting job in the world that is part wire cutter and part door kicker.

What was important to me was the way this movie mis-represented the military, the tactics and the overall conduct of many brave men and women in combat (especially Iraq). Three EOD guys spend the entire movie running around Baghdad by themselves in a Humvee. Almost never with other units and in one scene even completely by themselves out in the open Iraqi desert. That is so BS it isn’t even funny. I know that sometimes EOD teams need to get away from populated areas in order to blow ordinance, but they never do that by themselves and never without security. Of course in this one scene they somehow come across some type of British mercenary or special operations team escorting prisoners. This turns into a sniper vs. sniper battle with some insurgent snipers in the only structure for as far as the eye can see. These Brits who don’t have a way to change a flat tire, somehow have a Barrett .50 cal sniper rifle. Even with this firepower I guess they are not smart enough to use it and their british sniper ends up sky-lining himself and getting taken out in one shot, dead center by a insurgent sniper. The EOD jr. sergeant is somehow a skilled sniper and knows his way around a Barrett. The renegade sr. sergeant is a skilled spotter and together they posses the rare abilities to maintain patience and discipline to stay in shooting positions that only the best trained snipers can do. Of course it must have been while this scene was being filmed that the actor playing the jr. enlisted (and third member) of the EOD team wanted to get at least one shooting scene. While the “super disciplined” EOD snipers sat in place, the jr soldier along with two British mercs hide behind a dirt wall and all by himself and without any help from the brits, the junior soldier sees one, and only one, Insurgent drawing a bead on him and he asks his EOD sergeants what he should do. They tell him to “handle it” and he shoots and kills this guy (even though the enemy already has the soldier in his sights) and without the brits even flinching.

Near the end of the movie they go out to do a bomb damage assessment and even though there are apparently about 100 infantry soldiers at the scene also, SFC James takes his two fellow EOD “heroes” and they go down three separate alleys looking for a triggerman of an explosion that had to have happened more than an hour prior. There isn’t an infantrymen in basic training that would go down an alley by himself in Iraq in 2004 at night. Not one, not EVER.

There were many other scenes and things that happened in this movie that were complete bull*** also, but I am just tired of writing about them. Watching this movie was like watching two trains heading towards each other at 25mph on the same track. You know its going to be bad and you know you have time to turn away, but you just can’t. You have to watch to see how bad it is gong to be. My buddy wasted his money on this movie and went to bed half-way through. I stayed up to watch it, because I just had to watch how much worse it could possibly get. I was amazed that a movie so bad could get any kind of accolades from anyone.

Some say “who cares, it is only a movie”, but I can’t look at it that way. I had 78 of my soldiers in Iraq in 2004 of which only 77 came back. I consider this movie a complete sign of disrespect to them and all of the other soldiers that have not only served in Iraq but especially those that have served in the EOD. If anyone who has never served in he Global War on Terror thinks this movie represents what it is like, then you they are completely and utterly wrong. They could not be further from the truth.

More Amazing Guitar

I try to share music that I come across....music that impresses the hell out of me. here's John Butler.

Zero Tolerance = Zero Sense

I wouldn't have lasted two hours in school if this nonsense was in play when I was a kid.

YAKIMA, Wash.- Manuel Alvarez eats breakfast and gets ready for school. He's eager but nervous. He was expelled Monday from Barge Lincoln Elementary for making a gun with his hands. His mom says it's a hand gesture that could have easily been corrected.

"He didn't know did they talk to him about it what actions were taken to tell him this isn't allowed," Lorena Hurtado, Manuel's mother.

Manuel has a clean record never in trouble before his mother says a warning would have worked or even a parent-teacher meeting. Instead, His mom says, Manuel's afraid.

"I got a call from the School saying he's not raising his hand or speaking up. He's scared after we talked about not doing any gestures, he probably doesn't want to to do it because that could be a gesture. It might get him pulled out for two days," said Hurtado.

Manuel's mom doesn't see anything wrong with her son putting his hands like this and shooting down at the ground. She doesn't think it poses an immediate threat to the school or Manuel's classmates. We took the issue to School District employees and asked them about their policy.

"When students are at school they should be concerned about learning….safety shouldn't be a concern at school, we have a zero tolerance policy," said Dr. John Irion, from the Yakima School District.

Hurtado understands the policy, but in this case doesn't think the punishment fits the crime, especially when the student in question is in kindergarten.

"A five-year-old shouldn't be held to the same policy as a 12th grader...he is in kindergarten," said Hurtado.

Lorena Hurtado is appealing the expulsion and wants to try to clear her son's record. She says she doesn't want her five-year-old to be labeled as a troublemaker.

kndu.com

Bob.......Fat Bob

My new baby.

Daily Screed

I'm trying to be utterly Independent in my blogging, because I truly believe that both Democrats and Republicans [and the two party tyranny in general] are the most prevalent threat to liberty. But over the last year or so, the disgust and revulsion that I have felt for the Party I used to belong to....the GOP....has surfaced in most of my writing. Perhaps it is because of my former connection to them, perhaps it is because of the unprecedented rank hypocrisy and lying that has become the hallmark of said party. Make no mistake my esteemed readers, I am not now, nor ever be a Democrat. But until the ship of political discourse rights itself and both parties settle back into the keel with the bilge and the rats, the GOP will remain my primary target.

On that note, Americas' Most Trusted Blogger, Truth 101....has an excellent piece that speaks to my rant above.

Greed, fear and selfishness. The republican's best friends. It puts greed above all else in the pursuit of profit. No job is safe. Society isn't safe. Republicans will blow the loudest horns in an effort to get contracts for their chosen ones that build prisons. But when it's time to open them and keep criminals behind bars, republicans say "we don't have the money. Their promises of jobs and security are meaningless. They don't care about working Americans. They especially don't care about Americans that aren't working. Even though republican policies and obstruction create more of them. Look at Senator Bunning.

Republicans exploit selfishness and fear. Iraq was no threat. Yet republicans steered us into a war and occupation driving us billions of dollars into debt. Costing our Nation more lives than were lost on 9/11. Yes. Every Soldier that died in the Iraq War and occupation. Every one that was injured, is just as much a victim of terror as those who were killed and injured on 9/11. Republicans used fear of being called "Soft on terror" to keep Democrats and their own in their pro invasion fold. Shame on the Democrats especially that cowardly voted for this invasion because they feared being called "soft on terror."

Republicans use fear and selfishness to keep the paranoid in their fold. Pro gun nuts at all costs are being riled up by fantasies of G-Men coming to their homes and taking away their guns. Of criminals walking the streets with impunity because the police are rounding up law abiding citizens and taking their guns. Wackos complain about "waiting periods" or background checks" for gun buyers. Yet, every one of these people thinks the Patriot Act and it's warrentless wiretaps. Or locking people up without being charged indefinitely is a good thing. That's where the republicans exploit selfishness. Why should you care if it's happening to the other guy?