Author: TSO

OK, first the video:

Look, there are a host of reasons I want to have kids: slave labor, keep my wife busy, someone to mow the lawn, easy to beat at basketball, etc. At the top of that list is having a kid to just dominate the shit out of mutton busting. Make no mistake, I probably won’t get rich of riding my kids success in this, but it just seems the market place is so open for a dominant kid to grab our attention. These kids all stink.

Like dude, #8, what was with that tackling the sheep thing? What did furry dude ever do to you? And you with the lollypop, get your head back in the game. I’m going to have the kids sitting there watching Teletubbies or whatever passes as entertainment for these little snot factories and make then keep making fists in huge tubs of sand. Your forearms hurt? I don’t care. Keep working it, or I will toss this sippy cup and blankie out in the snow.

And my kid isn’t wearing that helmet either. You might think the goal is to stay on the sheep, that’s all your little non-achieving mentality can grasp. My kid will be like the damn Zorro of mutton busting. That sheep will be up on 2 legs dancing around like Michael Irvin.

Can we just be honest? These kids suck. My kids will dominate this shit.

PS: Please spare me the ridiculous comments and emails, yes, this is about the cutest thing I have seen in weeks, and this was an attempt at humor. Would totally go watch this.

Got an email this morning from a reader noting we should have addressed the passing of Buck Compton. Honestly, I thought I cross-posted here, but looking back I realize I did not. The emailer noted that the world was all a rage over the passing of Whitney Houston, and virtually nothing on Buck. Yup. It’s horrible that such is the case, and pains me, no doubt about it.

Anyway:

This from the LA Times, by way of Blackfive:

As a Los Angeles deputy district attorney, Lynn D. “Buck” Compton was known for heading the three-man team that successfully prosecuted Sirhan B. Sirhan for the 1968 slaying of U.S. Sen. Robert F. Kennedy.

And after then-Gov. Ronald Reagan appointed him to the 2^nd District Court of Appeal in 1970, he was known as one of its most conservative jurists.

But it was long after he retired from the bench in 1990 that Compton became known for something that previously had been mentioned only in passing in newspaper articles about him: his World War II military service.

Compton was a first lieutenant in Easy Company, 2nd Battalion, 506th Parachute Infantry Regiment in the Army‘s 101st Airborne Division — one of the true-life characters who gained late-in-life renown when they were portrayed in “Band of Brothers,” the 2001 HBO miniseries based on historian Stephen E. Ambrose’s 1992 bestseller.

Compton, who suffered a heart attack Jan. 11, died Saturday at his daughter Tracy’s home in Burlington, Wash., said his family. He was 90.

For reasons that should be fairly obvious, I’ve always looked up to infantrymen who went on to law school.  My long time friend and Legionnaire Eddie Dentz (VA) was one of the people who convinced me to go to law school.  Eddie was the Chairman of the Legislative Council when I first came over to the Legion, and one of the smartest guys I ever met.  It wasn’t until years later that I came accross a reference to him in a book about WWII and found out he had actually been behind enemy lines for a long time during the Battle of the Bulge.  As Eddie neared the end of his life he asked me to come over to his house, and he gave me all of his law books dating back to 1946.  Including his meticulous notes.  Although they are of little actual financial value, they will always be among my most prized possessions.

And then about 5 years ago I was staying at a hotel in Alexandria, Virginia, and the event I was at started to exceed my ability to pay attention so I went outside for some fresh air.  Seated on a small bench in front of the hotel was a man smoking a pipe and wearing a small CIB.  I introduced myself as a fellow recipient of that medal, and thanked him for his service.  He introduced himself as Buck Compton.  “THE Buck Compton?” I asked.  “I’m the only one I know of” he repied with a small grin.

We spent about an hour talking on that bench, and it was hard not to just feel the awesomeness coming off this guy.  I’d read Ambrose’s book of course, and seen the video series, but to be honest, we talked mostly about his experiences returning to the states, and his subsequent law career.  In fact, the most interesting thing was going to law school when he got back, and his prosecution of Sirhan Sirhan, the man who murdered Robert Kennedy.

Buck was more than just an amazing soldier, leader and lawyer, his bio is something that reads like Forrest Gump.  For great men like Buck, the end of the war was not something that terminated his excellence, but was rather the start.  Before he even deployed he had sort of an interesting life, having attended UCLA, where he was an all-American selection for Baseball.  He played on the same team with Jackie Robinson.  He was also on the UCLA football team.  While at UCLA, Buck was in ROTC, serving under Cadet commander John Singlaub (who is amazing himself, having been a founding member of both the OSS and the CIA.)

After his return, according to Wikipedia:

In 1946 he turned down an offer to play minor league baseball, choosing instead to concentrate on a career in law.^[15] Compton married Donna Newman in October 1947 and the couple adopted two children.^[16] He attended Loyola Law School in Los Angeles, joined the Los Angeles Police Department in 1946 and became a detective in the Central Burglary Division.^[17] He left the LAPD for the District Attorney‘s office in 1951 as a deputy district attorney, and was promoted in 1964 to chief deputy district attorney.^[18]

During his time with the District Attorney’s office, he successfully prosecuted Sirhan Sirhan for the murder of Robert F. Kennedy.^[19] In 1970, Governor Ronald Reagan appointed him an Associate Justice of the California Court of Appeal.^[20] He retired from the bench in 1990^[21] and resided in the state of Washington until his death.

I’m glad I got a chance to meet him, and spend a quiet sunny afternoon on a bench talking to him.  He was an amazing man, and will always be one of my heroes.

 

Let me be clear right up front, I don’t like O’Keefe, and although I liked Rush’s books, I stopped listening or purchasing anything by him after the drug issue. So, I have no dog in this hunt in that I really don’t give two shits.

But the cognitive dissonance and dishonesty from the left on this is starting. First, for those that don’t know the O’Keefe thing:

During the Feb. 24 edition of Olbermann’s show “Countdown,” Shuster called O’Keefe a “convicted felon,” something that is not true. Shuster also said that there was a “rape allegation facing” O’Keefe, something that also isn’t true. That claim, according to O’Keefe’s lawsuit, was related to allegations political activist Nadia Naffe made against him last year. The transcript of Naffe’s court deposition attached to O’Keefe’s lawsuit, however, proves he was never alleged to have raped her. It also shows that a judge dismissed Naffe’s allegations that O’Keefe harassed her.

Ok, easiest to steal from wiki here, but here are the elements:

For example, in the United States, the person first must prove that the statement was false. Second, that person must prove that the statement caused harm. And, third, they must prove that the statement was made without adequate research into the truthfulness of the statement. These steps are for an ordinary citizen. In the case of a celebrity or public official trying to prove libel, they must prove the first three steps, and must (in the United States) prove the statement was made with the intent to do harm, or with reckless disregard for the truth. Usually specifically referred to as “proving malice”.

So, with O’Keefe, is he a felon or a rapist? The obvious answer is no. Those are facts, not opinions or some other thing that is subject to the vagaries of interpretation. Dude is not a felon. Proceed onward.

Compare that with Limbaugh who called a chick a slut. Politico has some bullshit today from various Democrats, two of which read:

Christopher Hahn
Democratic consultant; FOX News contributor: He should, he won’t and he will be sued. Congratulations Rush, for the first time something you said actually created another member of the one percent. Unfortunately for you, she, like most enlightened millionaires, will have no use for you.

Peter Fenn
Democratic media consultant: Not only should Limbaugh issue an apology but he should be sued for libel and should see the sponsors of his show withdraw.

Limbaugh has long cloaked his outrageous statements and outright falsehoods under the claim that he is an “entertainer.” There is nothing entertaining or enlightening about these latest comments.

Now, unlike the word “felon” which has a specific meaning, what the hell is a slut? Someone have an objective, empirical sentence? A Felon is a person convicted in court, or who has pled guilty to statutorily designated felony violations. Anyone know a definistion for “slut?” He didn’t say she let the entire dorm run a train on her or anything else. She testified before congress as to her sexual activities, and he ascribed to that a perjorative, that might not even be a perjorative, since a group of feminists are proudly organizing “slut walk.”

So am I to understand from Democrats that stating an opinion regarding someone elses character (slut) is legally actionable, but making a purported factual statement about someone being a felon, when that individual either knows that they are not, or should know, is NOT legally actionable?

Who wants to tackle that one for the left for me?

BTW- the legal standard that gives Rush the easy out is this one, from the CACI v. Randi Rhodes case:

The First Amendment also “provides protection for statements that cannot ‘reasonably [be] interpreted as stating actual facts’ about an individual.” Milkovich, 497 U.S. at 20 (alteration in original) (quoting Hustler Magazine, Inc. v. Falwell, 485 U.S. 46, 50 (1988)). This safeguard includes protection for “rhetorical hyperbole, a vigorous epithet” and “loose, figurative, or hyperbolic language.” Milkovich, 497 U.S. at 17, 21 (citation and internal quotation marks omitted). The safeguard is necessary to “provide[ ] assurance that public debate will not suffer for lack of ‘imaginative expression’ . . . which has traditionally
added much to the discourse of our Nation.” Id. at 20. Whether a statement can reasonably be interpreted as stating facts about an individual — whether it is rhetorical hyperbole, for example— is a question of law. See Hatfill v. New York Times Co., 416 F.3d 320, 330 (4th Cir. 2005) (“The question whether a statement is capable of having a defamatory meaning is a question of law to be decided by the court.”).

Just what I expect from this group bereft of an adult supervision.

For my part, I always thought he was great, and I truly appreciated him letting me write over at Big Peace.

I guess you can tell your value for the cause by who your enemies are. I’d like to think he is looking down on them now and pointing out how their heinousness is well suited.

UPDATE: Stay Classy!

To me he’ll always be the asshat that tried to play Alex Trabek with me by refusing to respond because I didn’t phrase my statement of his asshatitude in the form of a question. Apparently drink has further addled his already diminished mental faculties.

Short story is this. An advertisement in the DC Metro told President Obama to “Go to Hell.” Tasteless, perhaps, but Moran decided to up the ante by complaining to Metro to take it down. The Metro noted that it is required by the First Amendment to accept all advertising, since METRO is essentially run by the Gov’t. So Moran declares:

I am disappointed by WMATA’s defense of this inappropriate advertisement. If their current advertising guidelines do not prohibit profane advertisements on taxpayer-funded property, then WMATA should take the initiative and update them. Profanity has no place in the public forum.

“The specific language in the WMATA-approved ad that should be removed is not political, it’s profane. It defames the President of the United States in a way that coarsens the public discourse. All Americans have the right to make their voice heard under the First Amendment. But when we are talking about an advertisement on tax-payer funded facilities, as is the case with Metro, it should meet the minimum standards of propriety. I repeat my call on WMATA to exercise appropriate judgment and remove this offensive ad.

Let’s address first the “profane” charge. It’s idiotic. “Go to hell” is not profane by any definition I can find in the law. Public discourse that argues with the President is exactly why the First Amendment was incorporated. Moran as a legislator ought to know that. By noting the President explicitly in his statement he de facto acknowledges that. Offensive speech, whether Moran likes it or not is covered here.

Also, what he seems to be advocating here is a content based restriction on ads that appear in the metro. Does anyone for a second think that language like that would raise his hackles if directed at Mitch McConnell or Boehner? Of course not. I was offended by a ton of ads I saw on the metro in my days riding it every day. Hell, MoveOn had ads in there and I didn’t get all pissed about that, even when they referred to Petreus as “Betray Us.” Was that offensive? Damn right it was. Was it “profane” not really. But my question for Moran, if I could actually get him to respond to me, is why MoveOn is not guilty of “coarsen[ing] the public discourse” and yet “go to hell” is?

BTW- For Moran’s greatest hits, go here, and learn how those dirty Jooooos led us into the Iraq War, an 8 year old tried to carjack him, and how he said “When I become chairman [of a House appropriations subcommittee], I’m going to earmark the sh*t out of it.”

Well, that seems rather profane. Are we paying his salary? That language like that really bugs the fahkin shit out of me.

By now, everyone has probably seen the memo wherein the CJTF-1 Chaplain banned distributing Qurans to service-members who don’t have “Muslim” on their dog tags. In order to get one, you need to either have a DA3161 declaring that is your religion, or get a letter from his commander detailing why the soldier wants/needs one. Is there a Constitutional Issue in play here?

Frankly, I don’t know for sure, but it certainly seems to me that there are a few issues. The basic issue of military chaplains was resolved in the case of Katcoff v. Marsh, which essentially said that chaplains are allowed because the Free Exercise clause and the nature of military service essentially requires it. The case is about the conflict between the establishment clause and the free exercise clause, and the court seemed to weigh the merits and found while there was some trepidation about establishment, that you couldn’t offer free exercise to troops without having the religious personnel there to facilitate that. (Brief side note, the “Marsh” in the case name is Jack O. Marsh, who was the Sec Army at the time, and would later be a friend and professor of mine in law school.)

Establishment clause stuff is kind of in flux, but generally it is understood that the Lemon Test (Lemon v. Kurtz) is still controlling. Discussion of that would take more time or effort than you care to read, but baldly stated the Government has to try to avoid getting TOO entangled in religion. Of course, as noted above, in this case they can’t completely excise all religious stuff, or they run afoul of the free exercise clause. So you have to have Chaplains around, but the Government, or the military can’t choose winners and losers among those religions. Largely they do this by figuring out what percent of religious practitioners are say Roman Catholic, and then as closely as practical, assign that many Roman Catholic Chaplains.

The problem here is a sort of “equal protection” argument among the religions. You can’t allow the Baptists to have services in the chow hall, and relegate the Mormons to the latrines. Not that everything needs to be entirely equal, but disparate treatment needs to be made on the basis of something concrete. If there are 4,000 Episcopalians and 4 Unitarians, you don’t need to make sure they have equal access to rooms or funds, it should at least cognizably be relative to their numbers.

So what we have here is just head scratching. Now, I honestly don’t know, and hopefully someone can share with me, how the “imminent danger” aspect of this works in. I don’t believe for a second that this policy is aimed at either hindering or furthering the Islamic religion, it seems pretty clearly focused on stopping any future problems.

Nonetheless, facially this policy has some serious shortcomings.

1) It seems to discourage any non-Muslim from having access to the Quran, which would of course make it more difficult for anyone considering a change of faith from actually getting the info that they should have. I’ve wanted to read the Book of Mormon for a long time now, but I don’t ask for one because I know I will end up on a list. I don’t want to become a Mormon, but I do want to know enough to talk intelligibly on their religion. Likewise, serving in A-Stan, I am certain some Joes probably want to know more about the prevalent religion.

2) It treats Muslim service-members in a way different from any other religious practioners. This goes without saying. It’s not too far a leap in logic to see that there’s a short jaunt from requiring “Muslim” on a dog tag to get the Quran to some other identifying marking. And no one wants to envision the days of people wearing yellow stars to show their religious colors.

3) The “distribution” by the military of various holy books is now no longer content neutral. One can get a copy of the New Testament or perhaps the Hindi Vedas, but only by meeting certain pre-requisites can one get the Quran.

(As Matt rhetorically asked: “Does the chaplain refuse to give the bible to soldiers with Muslim on their dog tags?”)

Is the policy justified? I think from a security standpoint that might be the case. Clearly the military believes that to be the case, and I am loathe to dispute that, since I don’t have all the info I would need. Perhaps this was a prophylactic measure taken after much thought, in consultation with the ISAF headshed, Chaplains and JAGs. That would be my guess.

But from a Constitutional standpoint, this policy seems fraught with danger.

This blog has given me a lot of things, ranging from a wife to a full time job that beats any other job except Infantry Squad leader. And so a few weeks ago when I commented to one of our readers on something Patriots related, the inevitable outcome was a trip to Afghanistan. Now, how my love of Tom Brady morphed into a trip to a warzone is perhaps unclear, just trust me.

Either way, sometime this spring, I’ll be headed “over there” for a few weeks, if I ever get this Visa application horseshit filled out correctly. I am as excited to go as my wife is unhappy about it, which is to say a lot. I don’t know how much liberty I have in naming my benefactor, but since he mentioned it this morning, my thanks to HeadHunter Six for the opportunity. I will not be leaving before April 4 (more on that later) and will be returning before June, so there is your window.

Either way, what I am hoping is that someone out there in the Moronosphere that is our readership is either a PAO in theater, or knows a PAO in theater that wants to babysit and get some good press out of it. I will be writing an article for The American Legion Magazine (circ ~3 million) on my trip, and am completely leaving the topic open to see what I find. I would like to go back to Wardak and Ghazni to do a sort of “Six Years Later” thing on the area I served in. So, if any of you guys know a PAO, can you let me know? Perferably some sort of door-kicker unit, and a mech one at that, because my humping my fat ass up mountainside days are coming to an end.

For any prospective PAO’s, I guarantee you’ll never get a more sympathetic reporter. I have a CIB, I know how to brag about a good poop, and I don’t ever remember being offended by anything in my life. I also might wet myself (I am over 40) but you won’t have to drag my ass anywhere. You can just leave me in place. Maybe put some cones around me.

So anyway, there is your warning order. TSO is headed back to the stan, and taking all of you with me, in the horrific-writing style you have all come to know and detest.

This can’t be real, right?