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

Author: Doc Bailey

  • Something I Want You to Think About

    When I got out of the Army in 2009, Veterans of Iraq and Afghanistan were committing suicide at a rate of roughly 12 a day.  That would be one every two hours.  Now they’re up to at least 22 a day.  That’s almost one an hour.  So here’s something I’d like you to consider; May 17th is the 137th day of the non leap year.  If the rate remains the same as last year (which all evidence seems to suggest is actually increasing) at 22 Veterans a day, that means that so far this year we’ve lost 3,014 Veterans to suicide.

    So, while your going about your day today I challenge you to think of a way you can help curb that number.  The VA isn’t coming to save us, and the American public at large are more interested in the false operas of the Kardashians and the Mall, so I challenge each and every member of the community to come up with a way to save our brothers and sisters.

    If you really support our troops, then say to yourself at some point today: 3,014, and resolve to do more than wear red or put a yellow ribbon on your car.  Find something constructive to end this epidemic.

  • From The Whiskey Tango Foxtrot Files

    the era of Über political correctness has struck the a brigade in Army’s 4th Infantry division.  Before I get to commenting too much about the major douchegasm that a full bird Colonel just had, I’ll let you read what he wrote.

     

    Hazing

    Hazing2

     

    Done reading?  Are the NCOs in the audience turning red?  that’s right sports fans, you are no longer to “smoke” your privates, as this might be considered “hazing” and is counter productive.  Correcting deficiencies will now fall to sending the hapless privates to a class and inspecting the deficiencies until they’re corrected.  There will be no unique or embarrassing corrective measures.  The memo makes it pretty clear that all the measures that were effective and novel in making sure shit bag privates square themselves away most ricky-tick will now be a thing of the past.

    Pah-THETIC!  Look any private that isn’t terrified of his NCO’s wrath obviously has some bad NCOs.  Everything from cleaning their room, to having their weapon cleaned properly and in a timely fashion are vital to military life, and though the Army can sometimes focus on the bullshit routines of garrison there is nonetheless a solid reason for each of those routines.  Having a private yell out “I LIKE TO F**K MY BUDDIES!” as loud as he can while running in a circle holding his rifle over his head might seem cruel at first glance, but ask that private if he’ll ever flag a friendly with a loaded weapon again.

    I have learned a lot of vital lessons because an NCO took me out to the grass and smoke the crap out of me.  Because I knew that my NCOs would come down on me like a ton of bricks my uniforms for Motorpool Monday formations were always pressed and my boots were so well shined I could have used them to shave with.  Because of an NCO making me do elevated push ups while I listed the parts of a 9-line, I remembered them.  Because of an NCO dummy cording a giant brick to a guy and making him carry it everywhere, I never forgot my weapon.  These lessons have a way of staying with you too.  Even now long after I’ve gotten out of the Army I’m always early to any meeting I might be having.

    Expecting the NCOs to churn out quality soldiers that can go anywhere do anything, while simultaneously tying their hands up makes about as much sense as a poopy flavored lollypop.  Unfortunately the society that America is becoming sees adversity  and hardship as having no value.  Everyone is a special little rainbow.  All we seem to be producing are obnoxious self obsessed fat assholes.  How we expect our Army to continue to rock and roll kicking asses and taking names when we can’t even drop someone is beyond me, but no doubt that is exactly what we’ll be expecting of them

  • Not a good week to be the President

    Well it isn’t even Wednesday yet and already President Obama is having some serious migraines.  First there were the Benghazi whistle blowers (and apparently there are even more waiting in the wings) whose testimony is both scathing and damning.  Then there was the IRS scandal, in which the IRS targeted both conservative (specifically but not limited to the TEA party), and Jewish groups.  NOW there is news out of the Associated Press that they had tons of their phone records seized in an apparent dragnet to find leaks.  If he wasn’t already in hot water he sure is now, and the shuckin an jivin isn’t cutting the mustard that it used to.  Many of the journalists and news services that the Obama administration could count on as go to guys are starting to ask very tough questions.  Watching Jay Carney or the President’s most recent press briefings look down right uncomfortable.

    Let’s deconstruct some of this real quick to see just how much trouble the President is in.  Let’s start with the big one last week; Benghazi.  At first glance it’s pretty straight forward, someone screwed up and people died.  Ask any Joe that ever had a 2LT call for fire and they’ll tell you it happens a lot more than we’d like to admit.  But there’s more to it than that.  We know for instance that Tyrone Wood’s team from Global Response Staff (GRS) were clearly aware of the attack at the consulate in Benghazi at 2140, and were ordered ordered by higher not to go.  They left anyway at 2205 local.  We know that Glen Doherty’s team was actually in Tripoli, and had to bribe or even hijack a plane to go to Benghazi.  We know that an SF LTC was ordered to stand down by higher (presumably AFRICOM) and said to the acting Chief of Mission “this is the first time the diplomats had more balls than the military.”  We know that Ambassador Stevens and Sean Smith were overcome by a petroleum fire in their safe room after the compound was breached, and we know both were dead by the end of the night.  The ride back to the CIA annex by Woods’ team was under fire and one of the vehicles had flat tires but nonetheless made it to the compound where they received sporadic fire all night.  At some point during this Doherty’s team managed to make it into the compound before the final assault which included mortar rounds began.  When it was over Woods and Doherty were dead.

    What followed was undeniably a cover-up for political purposes.  A really shitty video was blamed and the denials for support were covered up.  UN ambassador Susan Rice became an unwitting pawn in this and went on all the Sunday talk shows with this truly ridiculous story, which we already knew was wrong.    From all that we’ve been able to glean they knew within 24 hours that it was Ansar al-Sharia, and they knew that this was specifically a terrorist attack.  White-wash or cover up, the American people were lied to, and they kept on lying to us.  Even now they’re making like this is all politics.  It begs the question if they’ve lied about this monumental goof, what else aren’t they telling the truth about.

    And then there’s that IRS bit.  See this is actually the most serious for the President and his team.  Why?  Well look at the first bullet point of Article 2 of the Nixon Articles of Impeachment.  As Joe Biden might say “it’s a big F**king deal.”  The fact that he even joked about it in 2009, is all the more disturbing.  Asking a Jewish group “what you feel about Israel,” or asking a conservative group who their donors are is not only highly irregular, but flat out illegal.  The key words being used for this scrutiny should have everyone’s jaw dropping.  Giving undue scrutiny, or harassment to a group concerned our president is violating the constitution is extremely disturbing.  More than that we’re now learning that this wasn’t just a few low level joe schmos, but high level people were aware of this program, and if they did not encourage it they certainly did nothing to stop it.  Potentially the head of the IRS may have lied to congress in May of 2012.  The president is trying to downplay it saying that investigation is needed, but there’s already been one, and it’s pretty clear what happened if not whose behind it.

    Then there’s that little bit about the AP.  Now as far as we know none of the phones were tapped, but as many as 300 reporters may have been effected.  In the journalist world nothing, and I mean nothing will make them go on the attack like even the insinuation that someone’s spying on them.  Keep in mind that this can not happen without the Attorney General, Eric Holder signing off on it.  This was all done in secret, without anyone at AP’s knowledge, and is potentially violating the First Amendment.  This is pretty important too, because if there has been one group covering for Obama more than anyone else, it has been the press.  Stories that might be considered embarrassing to the Obama administration have for years not received the full attention of the press with a few notable exceptions.  I truly think these days are over.  Whatever else happens from here on out the Obama administration is going to have a lot of explaining to do.

    So where does that leave us?  Well Benghazi is most definitely not a “sideshow,”  and despite what some say, help could have been given, if the administration acted immediately after the first attack, and could have helped to fend off the final attack.  If there truly was no help available then why in the world were so many commands caught with their pants down when everyone on the ground clearly stated they needed more security not less?  With The IRS scandal, well need I remind you that is an impeachable offense (not making this up).  Will the president be impeached?  Probably not, but it is possible.  At the very least it will get congress off their asses and taking a close look at how the Gub’ment is being run.  We might have a very real, and practical example of Big Government being so big it literally does not know what it’s doing, or we might have the truly dirtiest part of Chicago politics at play.  Either one is not good for “We the People.”  Lastly we have the AP scandal.  While in itself this is perhaps a minor event in the era of the PATRIOT Act, do not be surprised if there’s serious push back on this one.  Nothing chills a reporter’s bones like the federal government scaring away their souses, and potentially censoring them.

    In my personal humble opinion I think Obama is going to wish he hadn’t gotten reelected.  His second term is not starting off great, and his Dodge Dip Dive Duck and Dodge routine isn’t working anymore.  With Fast and Furious, a DOJ that suppressed a voter intimidation case, a DHS that refuses to enforce immigration, a total overhaul of health care that gives frightening powers to non-doctors, an AG that was held in contempt of congress (a first in history), A stagnant recovery, “Green Jobs” that are just a very expensive way to waste money, and a national debt that is not getting any better any time soon. . . Well to say that things are going to look pretty bad for his legacy is something of an understatement.  The word Impeachable is actually not out of the realm of possibility sadly enough.  Of course if that ever were to happen, Joe “fire a shotgun in the air” Biden will be our new president.  I don’t know about you but I wouldn’t trust that man to run a latrine detail.

  • Apparently Partial Birth Abortion IS Murder

    Dr Kermit Gosnell, is really the poster child for what those wacky Republicans are always talking about when they scream about partial birth abortions.  He’s also a poster child for why politics interfering with medicine can be a very very bad thing.  Apparently over a decade went by between his last health and safety inspection and when his clinic was finally shut down.  Even after he killed a patient (pregnant woman), no one bothered to inspect his clinic.  You can find all sorts of reasons and bureaucratic hand wringing why this was, but the simplest explanation is that he was considered to be doing good works for poor people so the PA authorities turned a blind eye.

    But now that is no longer the case.  In a case that might be considered landmark, Gosnell, 72, was convicted of three counts of first degree murder and acquitted of a fourth.  He could face the death penalty which would be rather ironic given what he was convicted of.  He was also convicted of involuntary murder when he killed a 41 year old woman by administering too much anesthetic. Pennsylvania also has laws prohibiting abortion after 24 weeks, which he was convicted of over 21 counts of abortion of the unborn.  If you haven’t seen any of the testimony, or heard some of the things surrounding the trial I really recommend you do.  “House of Horrors” is not an unfair assessment of his clinic.

    The problem this case presents is that it busts wide open a debate we’ve been having since Roe V. Wade, and may bring abortion back to the forefront of our politics.  Our president, when he was a state and US senator (and not just voting present) voted down every single measure that might restrict abortion put before him to include strict prohibitions on partial birth abortions.  Anyone that watched the DNC in 2012 would have noticed how often abortion was brought up, so expect a lot of push back from Democrats across the country.

    Believe it or not there is precedent for killing the unborn to be treated as murder.  In several states there are laws wherein if a person kills a pregnant woman while in commission of a crime the offender is charged with TWO murders.  There have been numerous cases and convictions of just such occurrences, even if the offender did not know the woman was pregnant, he is still criminally responsible for the loss of two lives.  There have been several cases of malpractice where a botched procedure lead to the death of a baby, and some cases where a botched abortion lead to the death of the mother.  Gosnell’s case however is unique.  It’s the first documented time that anyone has been convicted of murder in the act of committing an abortion.

    One thing Gosnell’s conviction brings to the forefront is one of the central questions of the abortion debate “when are babies alive?”  For a lot of Christians, the answer at conception.  For a lot of abortion advocates a baby is not alive until it is carried to term and born either vaginally or by caesarian.  Apparently a jury in Philadelphia (not exactly a red state) rejected at least in part the assertion that a baby is not “alive” until they’re at the hospital in the maternity ward.  There is no doubt that this WILL go to the supreme court, but for the time being at least in one state, killing a baby showing signs of life after an abortion is considered murder.

  • About that IRS thing

    The TEA Party is pretty wary of the federal government, its a well known fact that they think the Federal Government has become corrosive towards individual liberty.  You could call the TEA Party a coalition of conservatives and libertarians.  You could call them paranoid.  You could call them funny.  You could call them idealistic.  You could call them wacky.  All of these tittles do have some element of truth to them.  It’s not like a guy walking around in a tri-corner hat with teabags hanging from it  is necessarily hard to make fun of.  But whatever else the TEA party is/was, it was and remains a legitimate political movement.  Our laws are created to protect any group of people that are passionate about any issue, and there are groups from both sides of the isle that are exempt from taxes because they are legitimate political groups.  Speech, it would seem is the one thing the Government isn’t trying to tax these days.

    Only, that doesn’t seem to be the case.  Apparently the IRS has been harassing groups with the words TEA party or Patriots in the title.  What it all boils down to is after the Citizen United ruling in 2010, the number of groups seeking 501(c)(4) status increased in order of magnitude.  Many of those groups were conservative, like the TEA party.  What appears to have happened is that following this sudden outgrowth of the TEA party, and the Citizens United ruling, some low level bureaucrats in the IRS specifically targeted the conservative groups.  They would target for auditing, demand donor information (which is illegal), name of who sat on the board (inappropriate), and in certain cases apparently asked question about the children of the leaders of these groups (HIGHLY inappropriate).  Keep in mind all of this is in the space of 2010-2012.  The run up to the 2012 election saw a lot of TEA party groups complaining about harassment, which most everyone dismissed as right wing wackos who were paranoid about the government.  Turns out they were right.

    Let’s step back for a second and look at that.  The IRS was using it’s almost God-like powers of paper to cause these people no end of grief.  If you haven’t been harassed by a government agency you have no idea what a nightmare it is.  Think bumbling psycho stalker that happens to have all the keys.  The term “harassment” doesn’t do it justice.  But there’s something else that should send a cold chill of fear down your spine.  a branch of the Federal Government used its power to assist a political ideology, or  more accurately to punish an opposing political ideology that could have potentially, affected the election.  That should stop everyone cold.  That should cause congress, and the American people in all areas of the political spectrum break out in a cold sweat.  The gears of government are choosing a winner.

    I know that Romney probably would have lost anyway, I know that Obama was still riding the “historic” wave, and the TEA party were just dismissed as loonies, but history has shown time and again that suppression of a political ideology by gears of the governing body is a very bad thing.  I’m not saying that the Sturmabteilung are going to be marching down the streets, or that the anarchists are going to finally “bring it all down.”  What I’m saying is that like Rome we have reached the apex of our power.  Our great philosopher leaders have come and gone.  We’ve had our Ceasars, we’ve had our Marcus Aurelius, and now the Praetorian Guard is auctioning off the crown.  This is a mark of corruption, perhaps of well meaning individuals, though that’s probably not the case.  We have devolved to the point were we are willing to intimidate and bully the very people our Constitution was designed to protect.

    It should not matter to you where you stand on the political spectrum.  You may personally despise the TEA party.  You may be diametrically opposed to everything they stand for, at the end of the day you should still defend them from government abuses, and protect their right to free speech.  It should not matter how despicable you find them, the principle is the same, if it can be done to them, it can be done to you.  If you are say a died in the wool Paulbot, or a die-hard Obamanut you should be on your phones to your senator or representative, calling them demanding an investigation.  Your party affiliation should never matter when the feds are harassing someone about their political beliefs.  What’s even worse is that this is being put out by pencil pushers.  Its a tyranny of bureaucracy.  There’s no congress critter to throw out of office.  Much like a “fire and forget” javelin anti tank missile once the mountain of paper avalanches on someone, there’s no way to recall it.  It should give you all a cold sweat that one stroke of a pen in the wrong place, one decimal point in the wrong spot, one “low level” clerk in an office in Ohio can make your life a living hell or send you to jail.

    This is your government doing this.  You, sitting there reading this, have a roughly 1/308,745,538 +/- ownership stake in the federal government.  Every bit of good it does on your behalf, every piece of property it owns, and every misstep it takes belong in some portion to YOU.  Abraham Lincoln called this a government “Of the People, By the People, and For the People.”  If the Government is picking winners, if the People don’t give a damn.  If the People are so apathetic that they do not act when their rights are clearly threatened, that they do not take ownership of their government, then this will no longer be the case.  It will be a government “Of the Government, By the Government, and For the Government,” and the people can go screw themselves.

  • Ethan McCord: Karma’s a Bitch

    Define a hero.  Is it someone that stands up to the enemy?  Someone that saves a life?  Someone that’s caught on camera at just the right moment?  A lot of things could be considered heroic that the military does, but for the most part “doing your job” is still just doing your job.  Doing the bare minimum while in the military is not looked well upon within the community will often earn you open scorn.  If you were to use said minimum as a stump, and go on about how hard your life is for some drooling hippie, you’ll pretty much be black balled for life.  We all know people like that.  The guy that tells a sob story, to make the ladies all love his “heroism.”  Even “speaking truth to power” is somehow heroic if you’re on the right side of the issue (but if you’re, say telling the truth about Benghazi you’re a liar).

    2nd Battalion 16th Infantry is a unit like any other.  It’s ordered to do pretty much the same things every other light infantry battalion is ordered to do.  For some reason however 2/16 has more than it’s fair share of people trying to cash in on the unit’s illustrious, and sometime infamous history.  We all know about Ward Reilly, a faker that has gone around wearing a Ranger tab, he didn’t earn and saying he was a Ranger that refused service in Vietnam (which would have been hard seeing as the unit pulled out in 1970).  He tried to cash in on 2/16’s name, as an anti-war douche first for VVAW and now for IVAW.  Then there’s Ethan McCord.  Now he’s said a lot of things, which have been proven to be flat out untrue (rotational fire for instance) and taken videos from soldiers that were misbehaving to blow incidents way out of proportion.

    But the Anti-war crowd’s darling hero has a bit of a shady side.  For one, according to a source, [TSO: Deleted.  We don’t have a second source on this, and we’ll await more info.  What remains is as attributed, and is what we believe to be true.]  His first wife told me how he got the boot from the Navy Reserve, so in desperation he joined the Army.  The only problem is apparently Army basic was too tough for him so he called back to see if his soon to be ex-wife he was in the process of divorcing would fake a red cross message that his son was deathly ill so he could go home.  She hung up on him.  Continuing his shady streak after Basic, he married his second wife the same month he divorced his first.  Just to mess with her he, apparently, at one point he faked a PTSD episode while he was at the Ft Riley Warrior Transition Battalion.  The “episode” was so bad that his wife was in a near panic calling the command, asking what she should do.  The “episode” was resolved when he snapped out of it and said “just kidding.”  His Med Board process was something of a joke, but the Army went through it anyway.

    As for his life as a soldier, well its already been said by several of his former comrades that he sought to do the minimum.  You really can’t blame a guy for being scared, but when you get to Iraq as an infantryman, it’s too late for second thoughts.  The malingering and constant attempts to get out of going on patrol did not make him popular.  His NCOs refused to send him to the board, and there was some butt hurt about that because he had assured his wife (at the time) that he’d soon be E-5.  To my knowledge his only combat experience just so happened to be the same day some Apaches from 1/227 Aviation responded to Bravo 2/16’s troops in contact during Operation Ilaaj.  It was a hot long day, that had Bravo in contact nearly all day.  When all was said and done two Reuters photographers were dead, as well as the insurgents they were with, and a family that was on the battlefield for no apparent reason.  McCord very shortly after went home on mid-tour leave and refused to come back.  He probably would have been forgotten if not for a hissy fit thrown by Brianna Manning, and a man I like to call Ass-hat decided to release a video that was then two years old and call it “collateral murder.”

    In an instant he became a media darling.  He was all over RT, and Susan Sarandon called him up urging him to stay strong (whatever that means).  He joined “Not your soldiers” a truly hideous group of douchebags who lie to school children, then got married again and had more kids (last count is at least five by three women).  Then a documentary came out where he was the only featured speaker, and that documentary got nominated for an academy award.  It got the 2/16 veterans royally pissed and they all called him out on it.  I’m not sure if it was getting a tattoo of one of the company’s KIA’s that wasn’t even in his platoon (and who personally despised him) or that he said “collateral murder” happened every day in Iraq but the level of anger he incurred can not be understated.  He then got delirious over how his former comrades were issuing “death threats” (really just angry veterans hoping Karma struck and he got hit by a bus) and the hippies just gobbled that up.  He got WAY more attention than he should have, but thankfully his 15 minutes ended, and the veterans of 2/16, as well as 1/227 who’d had their names dragged through the mud went on to be the outstanding individuals they were.

    Now apparently we’re not taking care of him.  Apparently he can’t pay his bills and someone slashed the tires on his car.  Apparently life sucks for him, and he’s a victim.  Apparently Karma is a bitch.  I really have no doubt that he pissed off one of his neighbors, or said something next level stupid that went too far.  Hell I wouldn’t be surprised if he did it himself to further his “victim” status.  I also have no doubt that this “victim” will find some sucker to bail him out.  If you’re honestly thinking of loaning him a couple of bucks, here’s my advise: Don’t.  He’s a manipulative little [expletive deleted] that you should not waste the time of day on.  Also doubtless some [expletive deleted] will get it in his/her/it’s head that this “poor baby” really needs help that the cruel evil military wouldn’t give him.

    In the end, I have no doubt that the children he fathered from previous marriages will be stiffed his time, effort, or finances.  He never seems to have grasped the very basic concepts of Duty or Honor.  He never made a plan for what he’d do once “his” war ended or once the spotlight on the video faded.  He used everyone that ever gave a crap about him, and abandoned those that he didn’t consider useful.  All that artful shucking and jiving, and where has he gotten?  Nowhere.  If he stays at the ass end of Kansas, friendless, and barely able to make ends meet, then he brought that on himself.  All his manipulations, all his lies, and all the crocodile tears all the mud slinging he did to his former comrades all for what?  15 minutes in the spotlight.  Pah-Thetic!