Get 'Em, Tiger

The TigerHawk clawed (swooped down on?) Times Public Editor and Master of Arcana Clark Hoyt last Sunday, but I am just catching up.

Comments

[oOther Tom]

The series on the veterans is just about the lowest that low propaganda mill has sunk. Simply disgusting.

[pagar]

Glad you said "has sunk" OT. Every time I see the leftists at what looks like it might be the bottom, they always seem to find a way to go lower.

[Soylent Red]

I don't know why the "f*cked up veteran" theme should come as any surprise. It's the set up for the "victims of Bush's war" theme, a subcategory of the "Republicans are heartless warpigs" theme.

For a preview on stories yet to come, simply go down to your library and review the NYT from about 1975 to 1980.

[clarice]

I given the f u vets theme a lot of thought, beginning with the Swift Boats campaign. Here's my thought: It's jealousy and guilt. Those men who haven't served know in their hearts that they are less manly and have to put down the military and vets to preserve their own self esteem. (Just as service in the military probably showed Kerry he wasn't as wonderful as his imaginary self told him he was, and, therefore, after he cheated his way out be had to put down those who didn't.)

[Soylent Red]

Clarice:

I too have given it a lot of thought. My take is this...

No liberal can ever admit that their world view might be wrong. Thus, those who participate in something as reprehensible as "military service" much less "conflict" are the ones who are inherently wrong.

But a liberal can also never admit that any individual is "wrong". So there must be a "root cause" for their "wrongness". That root cause is, of course, their misguided and jingoistic indoctrination in the American Myth, as sponsored and embodied by Conservatives and Conservative Government.

Thus, while liberals love government, they hate conservative government because it encourages ideologically incorrect behavior, and thereby "victimizes" unwitting souls who participate in this behavior.

And so, veterans will tend to be nutso because they are unwitting victims of a cruel government that used them to perpetuate an imperialist mythology.

At least that's my viewpoint. What do I know? I'm "at risk" you know...

[clarice]

I think we are both right.

[Porchlight]

My ultra-liberal co-worker who served in the Navy when just out of high school, misses no opportunity to ridicule the Navy. I think Soylent is right - in order to square his (now) liberal worldview with his previous service, he has to believe he was duped into joining up.

I never go along with his crappy attitude - I ask respectful questions about his service that are phrased in a way that will make him sound petty if he answers in a negative way. This drives him nuts. :)

[Pofarmer]

Soylent, you are making my head hurt in a good way. Or maybe it's the Kessler's.

[Other Tom]

Porchlight, everybody who ever served in the Navy (or any other service) knew a few guys like your friend. We had a saying that "five percent of your people cause ninety-five percent of your problems." Always whining, always complaining--everything, in their minds, was all f***ed up. And they were the last people you'd ever look to for any effort to improve things.

If you read what Kerry's colleagues say about him--in fact, if you read Kerry's own accounts--you can finger him as one of that crowd from a mile away.

[Soylent Red]

We had a saying that "five percent of your people cause ninety-five percent of your problems."

We still have that saying, even in the superior branch.

And yes, Kerry strikes me as one of those junior officers who spends all of their time discovering ways that they are smarter than everyone else. If only they would be put in charge, they would get things squared away post haste.

So when no one puts them in charge because they are not as smart as they think they are, they "system" is obviously screwed up.

Project forward from there.

[kim]

A favorite of the left is the chickenhawk argument which, of course, demeans the service of our military. But try to get a progressive to understand that. It's a congenital flaw, not inborn genetically, but inborn with their warped progressivism.
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[JM Hanes]

I've always been surprised at how rarely anyone mentions the fact that Kerry enlisted after his draft board rejected the deferment he requested. I was in college in New England during the VietNam war, where a lot of folks enlisted in the Navy to avoid being sent to VietNam as Army "grunts." If anybody fits that profile, Kerry does. He was already a Skull & Bones elitist among his own peers at Yale -- an elite elitist as it were, before he served day one. In the course of checking the timeline, I was struck again by details that seem interesting in that particular context.

Per Wikipedia, he was a prize winning speaker at Yale, asserting in his junior year that, "It is the spectre of Western imperialism that causes more fear among Africans and Asians than communism, and thus it is self-defeating." As a senior giving the "class oration at graduation," in 1966, "His speech was a broad criticism of American foreign policy, including the Vietnam War, in which he would soon participate." The Boston Globe notes that: "In what may have been an allusion to his own plans to enlist, Kerry added: `We have not really lost the desire to serve. We question the very roots of what we are serving.'" He enlisted the same year, but I'm sorry to say, I seriously doubt his desire to serve.

He was among the first to voice such critiques at the time; so, was he just against the war, before he was for it, before he was against it? Or did he decide he'd have no leadership cred as a draft dodger when his deferment was rejected? Apparently it was Kerry's close friend Richard Pershing who "set the tone. 'When a war comes along, you go,' the grandson of the general of the US armies would tell the bonesmen." Kerry did not, however, follow Pershing into the Army, he joined the Navy -- or rather, per Wiki, he joined the Naval Reserves. Can anyone here tell me if that's a distinction worth contemplating?

I ask because elsewhere on Wikipedia I learned that: "On January 28th, 1968, several Naval Air Reserve squadrons were activated by President Lyndon B. Johnson after the seizure of the intelligence ship U.S.S. Pueblo in North Korean waters. These units were the only Navy Reservists activated during the Vietnamese War period." They refer to the "Naval Air Reserve," here, but it left me wondering if Kerry ever originally expected to go to VietNam at all.

In Kerry's case, I think we have one of those if-it-weren't-for-bad-luck stories! He can't get out of serving, his "crowd" is signing up, so he picks the least likely branch of the service to see time on the ground. I've always thought he expected to be more observer than participant, if anything. He's already haunted by Beaucamp like visions of "violence and war" all around him, before the good ship Gridley even leaves Hawaii -- which is where he was when he described a world "fitted with primitive survial, with destruction of an endless dying seemingly pointless nature...." So he signs up for the relative safety of swift boats, maybe looking for a few iconic JFK style photo ops, and then, Oh no! What to do?

[anduril]

The National Guard and Coast Guard were also favorite safe spots in those days.

In those days (1973-1976) I was in law school and had a #52. I was never called up, although my understanding was that I might have expected a callup. I recall telephoning my draft board to tell them of my change in status (I was no longer an undergrad). My recollection is that I received some vague acknowledgment but never heard from them again. From that I surmise that some (maybe more than some) local draft boards exercised their discretion in ways that went beyond the letter of the law, but obviously that's a guess. There were a lot of unfair things that went on back then.

[kim]

JMHanes adds another display in the Hall of JOM Goddess Trophies. Remember, it was easy to oppose that war in the post-colonial era. What fooled people, and still the left since fools they be, is that vicious Stalinist authoritarianism came cloaked in nationalism. We were right to oppose the Stalinism, we were dissuaded by mistaken value in nationalims.

By the way, JMH, I'm convinced that the pictures and videos are the most damning article in the Kerry canon. I imagine he shivers as if under fire at the thought of the web's treatment of images.
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[Pofarmer]

The other interesting thing JM Hanes, is the argument by the lefties that "Bush never served."

Bush was in the Texas Air National Gaurd. Kerry was in the Naval Reserve.
Bush flew fighter jets that too hundreds of hours of instruction and training just to get in the cockpit.
Kerry drove a boat.
Bush squadron didn't happen to get called up.
Kerry did.

Personally, I don't see much difference in the two resumes. In fact, at least Bush doesn't have a 3 month stint in Vietnam followed by years of trash talking his fellow "veterans".

The whole confabulation of Kerry as some kind of hero and Bush as some kind of neer do well is just too much.

[Jane]

I'm going to the Tiger thread. Everyone needs to contribute - please

[Jane]

I guess I'm already here. I'm already choking on the end of Keith Olbermann who I hear is now running MSNBC. That's just sad. He doesn't understand why the republican party dislikes John McCain. Chuck Todd says it's the "talk radio" wing of the party.

Oh to be in Boca Raton. It's about 22 degrees here. Like S. carolina you have to win in Florida to get the nomination. So if Romney wins I guess we can't go on since McCain won S. Carolina. Oh dear, what will we do?

Brian Williams is wearing a purple tie, undoubtedly trying to mask his bias.

Ron Paul is there, as is Mike Huckabee.

Who will reign supreme?

[JM Hanes]

Present, but not accounted for.

[JM Hanes]

OK We're drinking on "pork" for starters.

[JM Hanes]

Drinking on "tax cuts," of course, is always obligatory.

[Patrick Tyson]

Tom added a topic.

[JM Hanes]

Russert zings McCain. McCain says being a soldier in the Reagan revolution is all the economic cred he needs. That and all the economists who think he's ignorant enough to listen to them.

[JM Hanes]

Thanks Patrick!

[Jane]

The Economy:

Romney - are you bummed out that the President didn't follow your plan?

Romney wishes he went further. He notes his permanent tax cut and a savings plan. Talks about capital investment, and jobs, and the FHA crisis.

McCain - will you vote for the compromise?

Yes, and I'm disappointed that it didn't make the tax cuts permanent and cites uncertainty in people who are planning their 2010 budgets. Slams income tax and says it is important to not add pork - (good). He emphasizes tax cuts and spending restraint.

Rudy: Do you think it is a mistake that tax cuts are not in the package?

It doesn't go far enough. My tax package is better. It will make America more competitive. We are running business out of the country because of regulation.

Economy has taken precedence over national security. McCain you admit you don't know the economy very well.

McCain: Not true because I was at the Reagan revolution. I'm very well versed in economics and lots of economic savvy people support me, like Jack Kemp.

You are all tax cutters. Huckster, do you trust Romney?

That's up to the voters, I was great, and made great tax cuts (watch his nose grow) I'm concerned that we are borrowing from the Chinese and we will buy Chinese goods with the rebate. Instead, let's make I95 2 lanes wider and used American workers. I say that because I made a highway in Hope Arkansas and now it is the best place on earth.

Romney do you trust Mccain and Guiliani?

Yeah I trust them. We all want to see spending go down and taxes down. I did it in MA without raising taxes. (It's all changed Mitt, we are once again Taxachusetts.) Criticizes McCain's vote against tax cuts. He spent his life in the private sector and will create jobs.

McCain is raising fees the eqivilant of raising taxes. I voted against tax cuts because of spending. (These poor guys have to repeat everything over and over and over and I'm getting sick of it.) But he's proud of his record. And he's consistent and he will stop pork (YAY)

Paul: Should gvt have any role? We should not get involved in the funds rate. Gvt should lower taxes and get rid of regulation. And now his voice goes up another octive. The war is bad, bad bad bad.