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May 31, 2007

Hook up the jumper cables 

With enough volts, I'm betting we could reanimate Robert Mitchum and then unleash him on Sean Penn, George Clooney, et al. The last six seconds of this so totally rocks...



h/t to Treacher
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May 28, 2007

Memorial Day 

All gave some...



Some gave all...



"My first wish would be, that my military family and the whole army consider themselves as a band of brothers, willing and ready to die for each other."
- George Washington, 1798
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May 9, 2007

Vive la... what? 

There has been a general outpouring of happy on the conservative side of the blogosphere over the recent election of the conservative, pro-American Nicolas Sarkozy in France to the office of president. I was inclined to join in, but then realized that all I knew about the guy was two things: that he was NOT a declared Socialist (unlike his opponent, Segolene Royal), and that he was NOT Jacques Chirac (unlike Jacques Chirac). I had a little quiver of concern when I heard that his only comment for America in his acceptance speech was to
"[accept] that your friends might think differently and that a great nation like the US of A has a duty not to obstruct the struggle against climate change, and on the contrary to take the lead in this fight, because what's at stake is the fate of all mankind."
So I figure, 'Ok. I'll accept him bowing at the alter of Gore, as long as he can stop Shari'a from taking over France and maybe bring France back to being a friend to the United States for a change.' But I want to know more, so I go look up someone who I haven't read in a great long while (and with good reason - his last post was eight months ago): The Dissident Frogman. I figure that somebody who lives in France, is conservative, and supports America might actually know what the hell's going on. And what does the Frogman have to say?

Meet the new clown, same as the old clown
Sarkozy is all talk, no walk. Or worse: talk, but walk the other way. A politician as cunning and deceitful as Chirac, only younger.

From his opponent however, the (official) Socialist Royal, one can definitely expect that every single bad political, social and economical idea would be devised and enforced, no matter the cost, and no matter annoying parameters such as "Reality" and "Facts" that do tend to get in the way of Great Social Experiments for the Greater Good of l’Humanité -- and are frankly the only things preventing us from reaching the well overdue Workers' Paradise.
...
With that in mind, I therefore went to cast my vote. Against Royal.
It don't look much better from there. So, until further notice, I'm here to report that my official stance on France remains unchanged: the Marquis de Lafayette was the last Frenchman worth getting excited over. I like Jean Reno too, but according to his bio he's not actually French by birth or heritage (heh - I shoulda figured), so I'm back to Lafayette.

Here's hoping that the Frogman gets back to blogging regularly. That's a data feed worth plugging into.
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May 8, 2007

We have hit a new level of stupid 

In WWII, Americans fought and died to free the island of Guam from the grasp of the Japanese Imperial Army. Apparently, however, certain elected representatives - AMERICAN elected representatives - think that we should now pay Guam reparations for being taken by Japan. My head hurts…
SEC. 3. PAYMENTS FOR GUAM WORLD WAR II CLAIMS.

(a) Payments for Death, Personal Injury, Forced Labor, Forced March, and Internment- Subject to section 6(a), after receipt of certification pursuant to section 4(b)(8) and in accordance with the provisions of this Act, the Secretary of the Treasury shall make payments as follows:
And it goes on from there. Did you see that list? Death, Personal Injury, Forced Labor, Forced March, Internment? How does the US owe these folks cash for this? If anyone, shouldn't it be Japan pulling out their checkbook?

This is being billed as a payment of "thanks" for undergoing all those things at the hands of the Japanese. What it appears to actually be is a classic case of liberal guilt. Fully 80 percent - 51 of 64 - of the sponsors of the bill are Democrats. The good people of Guam are United States citizens and underwent terrible things at the hands of the Japanese. But since when do I owe somebody money after I save them from getting their ass kicked? While we're at it, why don't we pay the French for having to save them from getting utterly demolished by Germany? $126,000,000 for Guam sixty years after the fact, but no cash without a withdrawal date preplanned defeat timetable for troops in Iraq. I wish I could say I was shocked.

Sorry, but America already paid in blood. The cash can stay in our pockets.

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hat tip to Michelle Malkin

UPDATE (Bumped to top): They effing passed it... by two thirds. We as a nation are doomed to fail from stupidity. It's all very clear to me now.

UN.BE.F@CKING.LIEVABLE.
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Special dedication 

I'd like to just take a quick second to send a shout out to everyone's new favorite stupid jihadis. A VERY BIG Thank You must also be extended to "John Doe" of course, but on this ocassion I'd like to dedicate the following song to a group of guys who will hopefully be the first to be put in front of a firing squad in this country in decades.

Fellas, this one's for you.
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May 5, 2007

Gimme that old time religion propaganda 

Dehumanize the enemy? Check.

Make fun of him? Check.

Kick his ass? Check.

And who did all that? DAFFY DUCK, baby.



Ahhh... that's the stuff.

hat tip to My Bro
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May 4, 2007

Did Milbloggers go for the headfake? 

Seems maybe we did. But some think that was the whole point...
The policy has always been tight, but they just FLASHED it a bit in everyone’s face to remind we military trash that Big Brother is still watching.

My take is that they “tightened” it PRECISELY SO THEY COULD LOOSEN IT. (Like the British hostages were taken so they could be released.)
This is the Army equivalent of Crash Davis having Nuke LaLoosh throw the next pitch at the bull. It lets us know they're willing to throw one at our head so that our knees buckle on the next curveball. Not cool.
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May 2, 2007

Enough to make ya nervous 

I don't belong to the Army (and I thank God every day for it), but these kinds of regs have a tendency to escape to the whole DoD. What I'm talking about is the Army's decision to effectively kill all soldiers' blogs. Like I said, right now - as far as I can tell - this still doesn't effect me. But I can see the storm clouds on the horizon.

This is simply the worst thing that the Army could do. The excuse/reason they site is Operational Security. The more likely reason is that the brass don't want to hear the soldiers' gripes from the trenches. While the enemy is harnessing the power of the internet to spread his message, we're pulling the plug. Apparently nobody told the Generals that this ain't their daddy's war. You can't censor every piece of info in the digital age. Oh you can try, but it ain't gonna work.

Matty O'Blackfive:
Operational Security is of paramount importance. But we are losing the Information War on all fronts. Fanatic-like adherence to OPSEC will do us little good if we lose the few honest voices that tell the truth about The Long War.
Hugh Hewitt:
I find this decision to be so amazingly ill-informed about how the milblogs have served the war effort and the cause of the military as to raise real doubts about the military's ability to ever get ahead of the enemy in the information war. Really, if such a blunder can happen without anyone even asking about the ill effects on the effort to keep information flowing from people in the know to combat the ceaseless propaganda from the enemy, then the brass involved cannot possibly understand how the information war is playing out.
And your's truly, from August 2005:
Anyway you slice it though, OPSEC is a big deal. Loose lips still do sink ships, and people who say the wrong thing at the wrong time can give away important information that would be best kept out of enemy hands. Like I said, I know what I can and can’t say, and I know WHEN I can and can’t say it. I think most Milbloggers do. Good on the Army for making sure, but nobody likes to write with someone staring over their shoulder. I think we may see the ranks of active-duty Milbloggers (at least the Army ones) thin out due to Soldiers not wanting to be regulated, instead of the Army actually regulating them.
And sadly that's what's going to happen. The Army has told soldiers that they must pass all items that will be posted in a public forum through their chain of command for approval. Hell, I'd be willing to bet that over 75% of military commands don't know if their troops have blogs or not. Mine doesn't know about this one. How many military folks have MySpace pages these days? How many send out mass emails to friends, family, their church groups, whatever, back home telling them how things are going on deployment? Once all that stuff starts coming in, do you think those commands will want to deal with it? They'll probably just tell everyone to pull the plug, thus solving the problem of having to actually check anything for OPSEC violations while simultaneously covering the letter of the law: "We checked them all, and they were all bad. And by 'checked' I mean 'were told it existed and then ordered it shutdown."

Hell, the enemy is only too happy to take the fight into the media. If the front-line bloggers go down, all we'll have left is the Big Media and the bad guys to tell us how the fight's going... and they'll be using the same talking points.

Smooth move, Army. Hooah.

UPDATE: Expect this to get covered a lot at Milblogging and the Mudville Gazette.

UPDATE 2: This should make the Milblog Conference infinitely more intense than before.
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