This ain't Hell, but you can see it from here

Author: BooRadley

  • Monsters

    Monsters

    Adrian Peterson

    I don’t follow sports. But I’d have to be Amish not to know Ray Rice pummeled his fiancé and dropped her unconscious body trying to drag her out of an elevator on camera or that Adrian Peterson has been accused of whipping his 4 year old with a switch till he drew blood on the fronts and backs of his thighs and sent a text message to the boy’s mother saying he got the boy’s scrotum by mistake. I figure this is all for the courts and the NFL to sort out.
    But tonight, at my parents’ house, watching Fox Business, there it is– The difference between what Rice (allegedly) did and what Peterson (allegedly) did. I saw a man (who may or may not have some football background) tell the other hosts or guests that the difference between Rice beating his wife and Anderson beating his son is that Rice punched his WIFE and Anderson was disciplining his son. Are you kidding me? Evidently there is some kind of consensus like this out there. Rice is a monster and Anderson is just some dad like the rest of us trying to get his kid to mind.
    First of all, I don’t understand the comparison AT ALL. That’s like comparing salt in the wound to tabasco sauce in your wound. Like asking if you’d rather be cut with a razor blade or a k-bar. Dude. I’m pretty sure both suck. I supposed the talking heads are trying to justify the NFL’s response to either situation but why?
    But, since we are keeping score, whipping your kid till he bleeds in a fit of rage is worse than knocking out your wife.
    Rice’s wife, like most wives in the U.S., is an adult. Yes, being abused causes all kinds of emotional problems that mess up your thinking but in the end, a woman is still an adult. She is an adult who chooses to stay or go. I chose to stay. For over 10 years. Right, wrong, indifferent. I chose. She chooses. Women can choose. Sometimes they fight back. Sometimes they even start it. I know I did.
    If they do leave, women have the benefit of having overcome. Having gotten away. Of being free. A child does not have that benefit.
    That little boy, stripped naked and whipped by a damned NFL football player. He cannot choose. He cannot fight back. He cannot run. He can’t even hide. A child cannot defend himself. There is much debate about the propriety of spanking and pretty much any punishment these days. But can we all agree, that if someone whips a kid till he bleeds, not in just one place, but in a dozen, that that kid has been abused? Mistreated? And an abused kid has no hope for relief until he is finally a man. Would there be more outrage if it was a little girl, stripped naked and whipped?

    The man who beat his wife- and showed no remorse when he knocked her out, he’s a monster. The man who whipped his boy till he bled is a monster. Let’s add to this list the apologists who claim it’s a man’s right to wound his child in the name of discipline. You sir, are also a monster.

  • Personal Weapons Won’t Ensure Base Safety

    We hear a lot of talk about shooters targeting gun-free zones. The concept of a gun-free zone in the United States is absurd, although, I don’t know if they are specifically “targeting” these places. The carnage is escalated, sadly, due to the absence of someone prepared to confront an active shooter. Is it the same on military facilities? It isn’t really a gun free zone.  Is the idea of a fully armed military installation reasonable? This is a knee jerk response and isn’t a legitimate plan to stop armed intruders. According to Fox:

    Lawmakers, as well as survivors of the 2009 shooting, claim he could have been stopped sooner if others on base had their weapons by their side.
    “When our soldiers are unarmed, they will find themselves in a situation like yesterday and in 2009,” Sgt. Howard Ray, a survivor of the 2009 mass shooting in which 13 people were killed, told Fox News.
    One source who was at the scene when the Fort Hood lockdown was ordered Wednesday also raised concerns about current DOD policy.
    “When will they allow those who have concealed weapon permits to carry them on post?” the individual told Fox News. “We don’t have a way to protect ourselves. … We are all hostages on post.”
    Military installations largely do not allow soldiers to be armed or carry personal firearms while on post, except for law enforcement and security personnel.

    The Army issued regulations in 1993 specifically restricting who carries what on an Army base, but soldiers were not all sporting holsters and wild-westing it up prior to that, for sure. A select group of soldiers, chosen by the Army, was armed. Judge Andrew Napolitano said on Fox and Friends that as an officer he carried a side arm on Fort Knox in 1970. Maybe that is the solution. Maybe higher ranking  enlisted should be trained to be the ones carrying on base.

    The Army is not going to permit ANY soldier to carry personal firearms on base. I had to be issued CLOTHESLINE when I lived on Cherry Point as a Marine’s wife. Of all the things they regulate, they certainly are not going to relinquish control of weapons on base!  There is that whole issue of uniformity.

    It doesn’t matter if you earned your welding certificate in the civilian world, it’s worthless to the military. They train you anew.  Why would a concealed carry permit carry any weight with them? The weapon, and the permitting, would have to come from the military, and those who are trying to make this a simple fix know that. With nearly a million and a half active duty personnel where would the budget come from to issue, maintain, track all of these side arms?
    What about the Navy, where the only arms training recruits get is using a simulator? Few sailors even touch a real weapon during their training. Air Force installations?   The Coast Guard?
    As a parent of 3 military children, of course I want my kids to be able to protect themselves at all times, but I must trust that this team, this FAMILY, has in place protocol that protects the group, not a bunch of individuals protecting themselves. The services do need to rethink the limits they have placed on the group to do that protecting.

    More personnel should be carrying a MILITARY ISSUED weapon on base. More personnel should have quick access to weapons in the case of a terrorist attack or threat. More personnel should be ready to assert deadly force on a moment’s notice. In the event of an attack, protocol needs to be in place where hundreds of trained responders should be ready and able to put down one person with a gun, or a dozen. But, every soldier, sailor, airman and marine with a concealed carry permit traipsing about with their weapon of choice? No. Next thing you know the females will be demanding to wear their hair in twisties.

  • Women will pay for political maneuvering

    Veterans and enlisted soldiers aren’t staying quiet about how women in combat roles will affect the guys already in those jobs, but how will this change affect the females?

    In spite of the fact that Chairman of the Joint Chiefs, Martin Dempsey is already looking for a way to lower the physical standards for men and women in the military so that it’s “fair”  it is important to consider the ramifications for women trying to enlist, or already serving, if the standards are equalized by RAISING the standards for women, which must be done if we are to remain a viable fighting force in the world.

    But, doing so will significantly reduce retention and eliminate the military as an option for all but the most hardened teen aged girls.
    We all know a handful of women who can do everything a man can do (and better) but can that be said of all of the women who currently make up 14 percent of the Army? Add to that many young females have no idea what they are physically capable of and the initial physical requirements already seem daunting- will they even try if the bar is raised more? Like men, they get into training and are stunned by what they are able to do and many continue to push themselves physically to become their personal best. But if they have to perform the same as a man on their ISTs, will there be ANY females left in the Marine Corps? I have to assume it takes a little more work to transform a pretty blonde 17 year old in a PINK hoodie into a Marine.

    Will women make the weight standards? Many tall, strong, athletic young female would not make weight standards geared toward gangly 18 year old boys. Men are at their thinnest, most compact at that time, built nothing like a young woman. Perhaps women with breasts would be ineligible. Hmmm. “Sorry, CPL Smith, looks like you’ve, um, developed since your last weigh in.”

    Additionally, are women in combat specialties-trained to fight and nothing else- willing to face an admin discharge, possibly Other Than Honorable, if they make themselves useless by pregnancy? They can’t work though the pregnancy, and it is a choice. Fair or not- sex makes women pregnant, not men. A female mechanic can work, if not PT, through her pregnancy. Not so a combat Marine.

    What about the Navy? I don’t even know. Where do they fit into all of this? How will the American people react when the numbers of female dead and captured skyrockets? Will combat moms be at risk of losing their kids because of PTSD? Will there be backlash when offended populace wakes up to this nonsense?

    One thing is for sure, women are going to pay for this folly.

  • It’s OK to bully if you’re PC

    Bullying is the topic of the moment, obviously– although,  when the media gets bored with it they’ll just move on to something else that matters to them. Kids get bullied at school because of the nature of the beast: huge institutions used to house barely supervised children. School is Lord of the Flies, all day. Period.

    That being said, I read this story on Fox about the founder of an anti-bullying campaign, It Gets Better, that is evidently hugely popular– even President Obama has made a video for the group.

    It seems this founder, Dan Savage, who’s sexuality would be irrelevant if HE didn’t make it the POINT,  feels that it is the fault of Christians and, of course, the Bible that  bullying exists (specifically toward homosexuals) and he told a bunch of high school journalists so at a conference.  Many students walked out of his “rant” and were taunted by him.  Students report that he called them “pansy asses” as they left the auditorium.

    Rick Tuttle, the journalism advisor for Sutter Union High School in California, was among several thousand people in the audience. He said they thought the speech was one thing – but it turned into something else.

    “I thought this would be about anti-bullying,” Tuttle told Fox news. “It turned into a pointed attack on Christian beliefs.”

    “The first thing he told the audience was, ‘I hope you’re all using birth control,’” she told CitizenLink. “he said there are people using the Bible as an excuse for gay bullying, because it says in Leviticus and Romans that being gay is wrong. Right after that, he said we can ignore all the (expletive deleted) in the Bible.”

    As the teenagers were walking out, Tuttle said that Savage heckled them and called them “pansy asses.”

    I couldn’t care less if this guy is gay, and married to a man or anything he chooses.  It was publicly known he was gay before this incident.  Clearly he was not being bullied or in any way ostracized  for his beliefs and lifestyle choices– but he felt he had the right to bully and insult high school students for their beliefs and lifestyle choices.

    Hmmm. Students, some Christian,  were respectfully giving him a platform but he could not respect them in return.  Got it.

    CitizenLink sums it up, I think:

    So it’s significant—and extremely ironic— that Savage would feel the freedom to display such intolerance during a speech that was supposed to be about bullying prevention.

    Using profanity to deride the Bible—and then mocking the Christian students after they left the room—is obviously a form of bullying and name-calling. This illustrates perfectly what we’ve been saying all along:  Too many times in the name of “tolerance,” Christian students find their faith being openly mocked and belittled in educational environments.

     

    I’m a mother of high schoolers and a Christian (yes, I bleach my eyes after a day at TAH….  just kidding!)   I don’t  expect the government schools or the main stream to get it right. And I, especially,  don’t expect any government to legislate good behavior.

    But as individuals we can see right and wrong. We can see that painting ANY group of people with the same brush is bigotry, whether you’re insulting a gay man or a Christian high schooler.

    You don’t have to like me, Mr. Savage, just don’t BULLY ME.  Really.   And you damn straight better not bully my kids.

  • Navy MOH Recipient dies at 79

    You know I’m partial to the Navy and Docs.
    Navy Times is reporting that retired Master Chief Hospital Corpsman William Charette, Medal of Honor recipient, died yesterday at 79 years.

    Charette enlisted in the Navy in 1951 and joined Fox Company, 2nd Battalion, 7th Marines, which left for Korea in February 1953. It was March 27, 1953, during the Chinese attack on Marine outpost Vegas when Charette threw himself over his patient during a grenade attack, absorbing the blast with his own body, according to the Military Times Hall of Valor.

    In separate instances, Charette removed his battle vest to put on a patient, tore parts of his uniform to dress battle wounds and stood up in a trench, braving gunfire, to attend to a patient.

    Mr. Charette is like the  soldiers and sailors we know, trust, admire, served with: the kind of men and women we’re raising our children to be.  Unlike the filth we’ve been inundated with lately.

  • Male recruit dies at RTC Great lakes

    Chicago news services are reporting that a 19-year-old male recruit has died after passing out following PT at RTC Great Lakes.

    The incident happened at about 10 a.m. at Recruit Training Command in Great Lakes, according to a release from the Naval Service Training Command.

    The recruit’s name was being withheld pending notification of family.

    Lake County Coroner Artis Yancey confirmed that a recruit died at Great Lakes on Wednesday, but could not provide additional information, pending an investigation and notification of family.

    The recruit has been identified by the Daily Herald as Christopher Walker, a Pennsylvania native.

    We at TAH have served and many have children serving, so this hits pretty close to home.   The family of this young sailor and the recruits who knew him and  trained with him remain in our thoughts and prayers.

  • Coburn and Closing Base Schools

    According to Fox News,  Sen. Tom Coburn, R-Okla. has a plan to close schools on military bases INSIDE the U.S. in an effort to save around $50,000 per student, per year.

    Currently, the Pentagon operates nearly 200 on-base schools around the world. Sixty-three of them are in the U.S. and Puerto Rico.

    According to Coburn’s office, the Pentagon is spending an average of $51,000 per student per year to attend the U.S. schools on military bases. That figure is sure to rise as the Defense Department endeavors to repair the glut of schools that are in deteriorating conditions, though the military estimates the per-pupil cost is far lower than Coburn’s figures show.

    Coburn has proposed shutting down the U.S. schools, and sending students to nearby schools in the local communities to get their education. In exchange, his amendment would allow the defense secretary to send up to $12,000 per student every year to the schools that take those students — in turn saving the government $1 billion over five years, according to Coburn.

    The article goes on  to describe dilapidated schools with bugs and inadequate heat.   DoD argues that the cost of educating the students is much lower and has pledged to repair the buildings.

    The plan Coburn lays out doesn’t seem outrageous to me, aside from if the schools are located in communities with failing school districts.   School me.   I don’t think I’ve ever even seen a base school, and with the rudimentary search I did, I found that students who’s parent is at Great Lakes or Norfolk attend the local school district.  So, what about this plan?   To me, it sounds way better than slicing up retirement and medical.

     

  • Make a Fair Wind of it Homeward

     

    On this day, 11 years ago,  in the Port of Aden, Yemen, 17 sailors were killed and 40 injured aboard the USS Cole, while it was in port for a routine refueling stop.  Al Qaeda claimed responsibility.  Sailors were lining up in the galley for lunch when cowards blew their little boat up causing a 40 foot gash in the hull.

    They were honored, today, at the Cole memorial at Naval Station Norfolk.   CBSnews.com reported:

    The Cole’s current commanding officer, Cmdr. Andrew Ehlers, said during a rainy ceremony at the Cole’s homeport in Norfolk that much has changed since the last time they gathered to honor the victims a year ago. He noted that terrorist mastermind Osama bin Laden was hunted down and killed and that al-Nashiri now faces criminal charges.

    “Finally, perhaps, justice will be done,” he said….

    Each of the victims’ names were read as a bell rang and a wreath was laid at a monument in their honor. About two dozen people who attended the ceremony sought shelter from the rain under the 28 black pine trees at the monument, which symbolize the 17 sailors who lost their lives and the 11 children they left behind.

     

     

    I remember hitting my knees in front of the television,  8 years after I’d set foot on a Navy base for the last time, crying as if I knew those  kids,  personally.  I was stunned.  Outraged.  Overwhelmed with grief.  The rage and pain I felt  would,  sadly, be understood by average Americans less than a year later, in September.

    Americans would do well to remember the words of President Clinton at the memorial service:

    The idea of common humanity and unity amidst diversity, so purely embodied by those we mourn today, must surely confound the minds of the hate-filled terrorists who killed them. They envy our strength without understanding the values that give us strength. For them, it is their way or no way: their interpretation, twisted though it may be, of a beautiful religious tradition; their political views; their racial and ethnic views. Their way or no way.

    Such people can take innocent life.

     

     

    Remember them today, and the cowardice of our enemy in their little boats. They’ve no chance at success with their twisted excuses for homicide against the strength of a people endeavoring to do right.

     

    The Fallen:

    Chief Petty Officer Richard Costelow, Morrisville, Pennsylvania.

    Signalman Seaman Recruit Cheron Luis Gunn, Rex, Georgia.

    Seaman James Rodrick McDaniels, Norfolk, Virginia.

    Seaman Recruit Lakiba Nicole Palmer, San Diego, California.

    Operations Specialist 2nd Class Timothy Lamont Saunders, Ringgold, Virginia.

    Ensign Andrew Triplett, Macon, Mississippi.

    Seaman Apprentice Craig Bryan Wibberley, Williamsport, Maryland.

    Hull Maintenance Technician 3rd Class, Kenneth Eugene Clodfelter, Mechanicsville, Virginia.

    Mess Management Specialist Seaman Lakeina Monique Francis, Woodleaf, North Carolina.

    Information Systems Technician Seaman Timothy Lee Gauna, Rice, Texas

    Engineman 2nd Class Mark Ian Nieto, Fond du Lac, Wisconsin.

    Electronics Warfare Technician 3rd Class Ronald Scott Owens, Vero Beach, Florida.

    Engineman Fireman Joshua Langdon Parlett, Churchville, Maryland.

    Fireman Apprentice Patrick Howard Roy, Cornwall on Hudson, New York.

    Electronics Warfare Technician 2nd Class Kevin Shawn Rux, Portland, North Dakota.

    Mess Management Specialist 3rd Class Ronchester Mananga Santiago, Kingsville, Texas

    Fireman Gary Graham Swenchonis Jr., Rockport, Texas