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

Author: Hondo

  • This Week’s Friday Afternoon Funny

    An acquaintance sent me this, and I thought it worth sharing – thanks, Sam.

    Enjoy.

    — — —

    PUNOGRAPHY

    When chemists die, they barium.

    Jokes about German sausage are the wurst.

    A soldier who survived mustard gas and pepper spray is now a seasoned veteran.

    I know a guy who’s addicted to brake fluid. He says he can stop any time.

    I stayed up all night to see where the sun went. Then it dawned on me.

    This girl said she recognized me from the vegetarian club, but I’d never met herbivore.

    I’m reading a book about anti-gravity. I can’t put it down.

    I did a theatrical performance about puns. It was a play on words.

    They told me I had type A blood, but it was a Type-O.

    A dyslexic man walks into a bra.

    PMS jokes aren’t funny, period.

    Why were the Indians here first? They had reservations.

    Class trip to the Coca-Cola factory. I hope there’s no pop quiz.

    Energizer bunny arrested. Charged with battery.

    I didn’t like my beard at first. Then it grew on me.

    How do you make holy water? Boil the hell out of it!

    Did you hear about the cross eyed teacher who lost her job because she couldn’t control her pupils?

    When you get a bladder infection, urine trouble.

    What does a clock do when it’s hungry? It goes back four seconds.

    I wondered why the baseball was getting bigger. Then it hit me!

    Broken pencils are pointless.

    I tried to catch some fog. I mist.

    What do you call a dinosaur with a extensive vocabulary? A thesaurus.

    England has no kidney bank, but it does have a Liverpool.

    I used to be a banker, but then I lost interest.

    I dropped out of communism class because of lousy Marx.

    All the toilets in New York’s police stations have been stolen. Police have nothing to go on.

    I got a job at a bakery because I kneaded dough.

    Haunted French pancakes give me the crepes.

    Velcro – what a rip off!

    Cartoonist found dead in home. Details are sketchy.

    Venison for dinner? Oh deer!

    Earthquake in Washington obviously government’s fault.

    I used to think I was indecisive, but now I’m not so sure.

    Be kind to your dentist. He has fillings, too.

    Never fall in love with a tennis player because to a tennis player, love means nothing.

  • The 1999 Kosovo BSM Fiasco

    In a couple of earlier comments and a previous article, I’ve referenced something I’ve called the “1999 Kosovo BSM Fiasco”.   However, it occurs to me that many regular readers of TAH – especially those who are younger – might not know the history of that little escapade, and might have also missed the references.  So I decided to write and post a brief summary of what happened and what resulted afterwards.

    Background

    In 1999, the US found itself engaged in hostilities with Serbia as part of NATO.  The primary hostile actions were US and NATO airstrikes against targets in Serbia and Kosovo.  The NATO operation was called Allied Force; the US operation was called Noble Anvil.

    USAF and USN forces participated in this air campaign.  Since the campaign involved hostilities, the Bronze Star Medal (BSM) was an authorized award for those participating in the operation.

    Unfortunately, the USAF and, to a lesser degree, the USN decided to interpret the phrase “in connection with military operations against an armed enemy” inanely loosely.  The resulting fiasco severely cheapened the BSM.

    (more…)

  • Why Combat Decorations Are So Screwed Up Today – and How to Begin Fixing It

    It’s common knowledge that there are serious issues with military combat decorations.  To most civilians, this seems to be a minor issue.  But as anyone in the military knows, to folks in uniform this is indeed a big deal.  Inequity in awards is at the least a morale killer, and at worst can kill a unit’s faith in its chain-of-command – and thus seriously degrade its effectiveness.

    I’ve done a bit of thinking about the situation over the past few months.  And since you’re reading this, well, you probably already have figured out that I’m about to wax soporific on the subject.  (smile)

    I don’t personally think the situation is FUBAR at this point.  But things are IMO seriously out-of-whack; corrections are needed.  I also think I have a few decent suggestions as to how to improve the situation.   They don’t constitute a perfect solution, but they should IMO improve the current situation substantially.

    Anyway:  that’s my story, and I’m sticking to it. (smile)

    Introduction

    I won’t attempt to detail all the known “gripes” about combat decorations today.  A partial list:

    1. Decorations are rank-preferential
    2. Decorations are awarded inconsistently in different units and services
    3. Combat service is not properly recognized
    4. Noncombat service is improperly recognized with combat decorations
    5. Favoritism in award of decorations

    There are, of course, many others.

    IMO, many of these gripes are based on reality; some are at least partly perception.  In some cases there is a reasonable explanation, while in other cases it’s simply due to abuse of the system.  My purpose here is to identify some of the factors that have contributed to this situation – and to suggest how to reduce the magnitude of the problem.

    As my background is Army, I’m going to discuss this from the perspective of Army decorations and practices.  Fair warning:  this article is kinda long.

    (more…)

  • PFC Roosevelt Clark, Home From Korea

    Another missing soldier has come home from the Korean War.

    PFC Roosevelt Clark, formerly of Arvin, CA, was assigned to Company E, 35th Infanty Regiment, 25th Infantry Division, US Army.  He was lost in action near Unsan, North Korean, on November 28, 1950.  PFC Clark’s remains were among those in 208 boxes of remains repatriated by North Korea between 1991 and 1994.  Modern technology allowed the positive identification of PFC Clark’s remains.  His remains were returned to his family today for burial.  Funeral information is not currently available.

    Rest now in peace, my elder brother-in-arms.

    Over 7,900 US personnel remain unaccounted for from the Korean War.  If you are relative of one of the individuals listed here, please consider reading this link to see if you qualify to submit a mtDNA sample – and if you do qualify, please do so.  By doing so, you may be able to help identify US remains that have been repatriated but not yet positively identified.

    Everybody deserves a proper burial.  That’s especially true for those who gave their all in the service of this nation.

  • Where the (Federal) Money Goes

    Quick – what Department or Agency of the Federal government spends the most?

    If you said the Department of Defense – not even close.  That’s a “NO GO” at this station.

    It’s not the Social Security Administration, either.  I was rather surprised by that.

    Rather, the dubious “honor” goes to the Department of Health and Human Services.  According to the 2011 Financial Report of the US Government (chart, p. v), HHS now spends approximately 24 cents out of each Federal dollar spent – or nearly 1 out of every 4 dollars spent by the Federal government.  Social Security is second with 21 cents; DoD is third with 20.  The remaining 35 cents are spent by the VA (about 5 cents out of each Federal dollar), on interest payments to the public (7 cents per dollar) and the rest of the Federal government combined (spends the remaining 23 cents).

    Something is seriously wrong when we are spending literally 45% of Federal outlays on what are only a partial list of Federal social welfare/unearned entitlement programs (others exist outside of HHS; the SNAP program, AKA “food stamps”, spends $80 billion annually but is run by the Department of Agriculture).  It’s also seriously wrong that this unearned entitlement spending totals more than twice that spent on defending the US.  But that’s precisely the case today.

    It’s not the job of the Federal government to feed, clothe, house, or provide medical care for everyone in the USA.  It’s also not the Federal government’s job to provide income for for everyone’s retirement.  Those are all individual responsibilities.  But to a large degree that’s exactly what the Federal government is doing today – and it’s not so slowly bankrupting the country.

    Gee – thanks, FDR and LBJ.  Thanks a lot.

  • If You Needed Another Reason to Be Leery of Early Voting by Mail . . . .

    . . . here it is.

    An interesting thing happened last year in the Miami area during last year’s primary elections.  Over 2,500 fraudulent absentee ballot requests were submitted by unknown on-line actors during a 2 1/2 week period before the elections.

    The scam requested that absentee ballots be sent to roughly 2000 voters who had not requested an absentee ballot (about 500 were duplicate requests).  Making such a bogus third-party request is a felony violation of Florida election laws.

    The timing and sources of the on-line requests were what initially tipped off authorities of the problem.   At times, the bogus requests appeared to have been submitted entirely too fast to be from humans.  Further, the 2500+ requests appear to have originated from only 15 IP addresses – 12 of which were located outside the US.

    The perpetrators of this scam targeted 3 voting districts.  In one Congressional district, the scam overwhelmingly requested ballots for voters who were registered Democrats.  In contrast, two Florida state House districts showed requests for bogus ballots overwhelmingly for registered Republicans.

    Yeah, the “system” caught this because someone noticed an obvious pattern.  But that was only because the scam’s perpetrators were stupid enough to be obvious.  If they’d been more subtle, they might have gotten away with it.

    Voting is a right.  But attempting to make it too “convenient” has the unintended consequence of also making it easier for someone to scam the system.  And where someone thinks the system can be scammed – someone will try.

    I used to be a fan of the idea of early voting via absentee ballot.  Not any more.  Allowing unrestricted absentee early voting simply introduces too many opportunities for fraud.  Personal convenience is nice, but fair and honest elections are far more important than personal convenience.

  • This Weeks’ Nominee for “Dumbass of the Month”

    That would be an individual calling himself “Dogg” – a snowplow operator in Boston Lowell, MA.

    As you might remember, Massachusetts had a severe snowstorm recently.  Recovery from severe snowstorms requires lots of things – one of which is plowing the roads.

    “Dogg” was a contract snowplow operator in the area.  And he enjoyed his job, too.

    He especially enjoyed it when he got to bury cars in snow while plowing.  That was apparently his favorite part of the job.

    He liked that so much that he made and narrated a video of his work, shot through the windshield of his snowplow truck, while plowing streets in Lowell during and after the recent blizzard.  Then he posted his video to YouTube.

    Maybe that wasn’t the best idea.

    It seems a few people saw his video.  Like some folks at a local TV station – which later broadcast “Dogg’s” video.  It was then seen by the Lowell city manager, and by his employer – the company that had a contract to plow streets in Lowell.

    Oops.

    Did I say “employer”?  I should have said “former employer” – because “Dogg” is now unemployed.  The company fired him last Friday.

    But don’t feel too bad for “Dogg”.  In Massachusetts, he may be eligible for unemployment compensation anyway.  He can make a decent argument that he was fired for PR reasons and not truly for cause because he was just “doing his job as prescribed” and was being honest about what parts of it he enjoyed most.  And Massachusetts also has the reputation of being relatively strict on what they consider a firing “for cause” that disqualifies one from receiving unemployment compensation.

    He’s also gotten inquiries from reality show producers in NYC and LA, telling him that they think he’d make a “really good reality show star”.

  • Derek Kent Rose – Epilogue

    About a month ago, a few individuals showed up to comment on Jonn’s Derek Kent Rose article from early June 2012.  At least one of these individuals appears to be defending Rose.   That individual specifically questioned whether or not the original DD214 for Rose presented in Jonn’s article is genuine or not.

    Well, here’s a FOIA response from the National Personnel Records Center on Derek Kent Rose, dated 14 February 2013 (format is downloadable Adobe PDF).  For those who are not familiar with the NPRC:  that is the Federal activity that has archive responsibility for the Official Military Personnel Files (OMPF) for all veterans.  In other words:  they have his military records.  And they consult those records when responding to a FOIA request about an individual.

    FOIA responses don’t typically include a DD214.  However, they do include dates of service; assignments; units and locations; awards and decorations; and other info.  This one includes all of those – and a bit more, if you have the background to understand what’s there.

    This new FOIA is 100% consistent with the original DD214 Jonn posted.  In particular, it shows the same dates of service, the same decorations, and a punitive discharge (inferred from the fact that the discharge authority is NAMALA and occurred well before the normal end of his enlistment).  It also shows the same “lost time” due to confinement (14 Mar to 25 Apr 1997).  So yes, “youdontsay” – the original DD214 Jonn posted does indeed appear to be the “real deal”.   This appears means Rose appears to be a forger as well as a lying sack of . . . stuff (LSoS).

    By the way:  there’s a good reason for the old saying “15 will get you 20”, “youdontsay”.  In most places in the US, a 15-year-old is legally a child and is thus below the age of sexual consent.  Sex between an adult and a 15-year-old is commonly referred to as “statutory rape” – and is a felony sex crime in most places.  Ignorance of a partner’s age is generally not a valid defense, either.  You’re doing Rose absolutely no favor by telling the world  that all he did was get caught “boinking” a 15-year-old girl.

    None of this is likely convince anyone who doesn’t already believe Rose is a lying tool and a criminal.  But posting this here will provide proof of his actual service – and allow detection of his future lies – in a downloadable form for anyone who meets Rose and wants to check on him.