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

Category: Antiwar crowd

  • Who wants to do some research? (UPDATED)


    IVAW took their circus on the rode to Texas, and this guy had some….compelling (??) testimony:

    Rooster Romriell
    Branch of service: United States Army (USA)
    Unit: 1-41 ARmored and 1-8 Cav
    Rank: means nothing to free men
    Home: Texas
    Served in: Ft. Riley, Ks, Ft. Hood, TX, Sadr City, Baghdad, Iraq, Abu Graib, Iraq.
    I learned to cherish the sanctity of life in the fires of war and came to my studies of Buddhism in Iraq. As an infantryman I saw the worst of the war and took it home on my shoulder. 1-41 was known for it’s murder scandals and I was the man who broke the case open, the one who stood against the evil of our own, regrettably it had to be done. Our nation is now falling to the ashes of Rome, fascist Germany, and the Persian empire. WE are weakened by our wealth and power, and this once great Babylonian fortress is set to collapse. Let’s set it free!

    Anyway, set your BS detectors to stun, and ponder his testimony.

    First beer is on me at the Milblog conference who can verify/demolish this guys tale of woe.

    Anytime a guy claims that he was the sole person standing for truth and justice, I imediately suspect a phony. I’m sure he served there, but his “I was the man who broke the case open, the one who stood against the evil of our own” translates into grunt speak as “listen to the mating call of the endangered Blue Falcon….”

    Have at it kids!

    UPDATE: Well, it would seem that most of this is truth, which I find rather shocking. I did note this one sentence in a WaPo article:

    An Army investigator described Romriell as the black sheep of his squad in part because he opposed the war in Iraq. The private has since been transferred to another unit for his safety.

    Young testified that Williams had said, “The first chance he gets, ‘I’m going to kill Romriell.’ “

    Black sheep or no, that’s pretty messed up.

    So, I’ll give this guy a temporary tip o’ the hat on this one. You do screwed up stuff, you do the time. Still can’t buy into the other 99% of IVAW stories, but this guy looks legit at first read.

    Jonn added: Well, the guy doesn’t get a complete pass. He says his unit is known for “murder scandals” as if the whole unit was complicit a widespread murder spree and cover up. There was ONE SCANDAL. The offender eventually pleaded guilty. Romriel continues in his IVAW profile like he personally brought down the “empire” by sliding a note under his CO’s door. If his commander decided to investigate the crime and prosecute the criminal, that should be sufficient evidence that our military isn’t the out-of-control murder machines Romriel tries to tell us it is.

    On top of all of that, Romriell calls the unit 1/41st Armor. It’s the 1/41st INFANTRY. If he wasn’t such an ate-up, pot smoking hippie, he’d remember that and be proud of it. In fact, he was in C Co. 1/41st – the same company COB6 and I were in together in Desert Storm. Romriell wore a Valorous Unit Citation over his right pocket that we earned for him. He could at least remember the branch he served in.

    And that drama queen answer about rank – that means he was probably a screw up and got out as an E-1 or E-2. He did an honorable and brave thing by turning in the murderer, but then he beclowned himself to make emo friends in the IVAW. Legit? Barely.

  • Safe enough for ya now, TJ?

    We got an IVAW press release today announcing their intention to send two representatives to an Iraqi Labor Conference. It’s um, pretty funny;

    Since the U.S. occupation began, Iraqi workers have been targeted in an attempt to suppress the population and control Iraq’s natural resources. Labor leaders have been killed, tortured and imprisoned; worker’s rights have been routinely violated; and union bank accounts have been frozen. In turn, Iraqi labor unions and workers have been among the leading non-sectarian forces defending Iraqi sovereignty and democracy.

    Notice how they fail to mention who is doing the killing of these labor leaders. The implication, of course, is that either US troops or the Iraqi government is doing it. I’m not going to speculate about who they think is responsible – but it sounds like they lifted the whole line from a presser from the US labor unions about Colombia. You’d think they’d point fingers at who they they think is the culprit.

    IVAW members Aaron Hughes and TJ Buonomo will represent IVAW as the only non-labor union participants at this historic conference. We have accepted this special invitation as an opportunity to powerfully show our support for the Iraqi people’s struggle for a democratic and sovereign Iraq, free of foreign domination. IVAW believes this can only be accomplished by ending the occupation and removing all foreign troops and bases, said Aaron Hughes, Iraq veteran and former Sergeant with the Illinois National Guard.

    Oh, good, two clowns who’ve never held a job are going to a labor conference. Here’s Thomas J Buonomo’s profile at IVAW;

    Buonomo’s story goes like this: He went to the Air Force Academy, got commissioned in the Army, went to intel school in Arizona and then got cold feet about being being deployed away from the lifestyle he’d grown accustomed to in the Air Force Academy.

    In his profile he explains;

    After examining statements made by numerous journalists and public officials with firsthand information on these matters, I came to the conclusion that the Iraq war was not only irresponsible but illegal and immoral….

    Brilliant, huh? He read “numerous journalists” whom we all know are infallible experts on every subject in the world. And this snot-nosed green El-Tee swallowed their BS and used it as an excuse to avoid the service that he OWED the country because of the free education he received.

    But I guess it’s safe enough now for TJ to venture over to Iraq – last time they sent Hughes and Millard. I guess Buonomo figures that they made it back in one piece he can stick his cowardly nose in where it doesn’t belong.

    The trip is being funded by USLAW (US Labor Against the War) an affiliate of United For Peace and Justice.

  • This ain’t the 60s, Cindy

    I found this at IVAW Actions about Cindy Thomas, an Army wife who opened “Under the Hood”, an IVAW “coffeehouse” that sprang from the coffeehouse plot of VVAW in the 60s to undermine military authority and help facilitate an end to the Vietnam War.

    Now, I’m not going to demean the sacrifice that Cindy Thomas has already made, but if that’s the excuse she’s going to use to undermine order and discipline in the Army, she really needs a dose of reality. Yes, her husband was injured. Yes, her step-son VOLUNTEERED to join the Marines – but they’re all making their own respective choices to fight this war – they’re not being drafted and force to participate. It’s not the 60s, Cindy.

    The title of the post is “New cafe a refuge for dissent”. Dissent of what? Cindy – look at your husband. Do you think he’d want you to facilitate dissent in the Volunteer Army? If he’d come home from work and complained about some “dissenting” soldiers in his unit, what would you have thought of them? What would your husband have thought of them?

    By encouraging dissent among volunteer military members, you’re causing more deaths in this war because dissent makes them unreliable in combat. You might as well strap on a bomb vest, pick up an AK and wrap a head scarf around your head and attack the Fort Hood Rod and Gun Club (the only place to go to get a decent meal and a beer on Hood as far as I remember from my years there).

    Wouldn’t it be easier to to join Soldiers Angels and actually do something supportive for the soldiers instead of something completely destructive? Besides, you’ll lose your ass if you think you’ll be able stay open on what those derelicts will spend on coffee.

  • Kokesh: “They” better watch out

    Mr. “Xanax and Gin” Kokesh got to shoot a pistol this week so he warns some nebulous “They” to watch out. It’s obvious that the Wilson Hill Pistol Club doesn’t have drug tests before letting people shoot on their range.

    The fact that the local Nashua, New Hampshire Telegraph newspaper pegged Kokesh as a Libertarian is exactly the reason the Libertarians are so low on my list.

  • Why States don’t fight wars

    Jerry920 sent us this article from the Army Times which reports on the efforts of one State Senator of mine in the sorry state of Maryland.

    Sorry? Yes, because they have a long history of being two-faced and populated by morons. They were one of the slave states that remained in the Union during the Civil War having their cake and eating it, too, since the Emancipation Proclamation didn’t apply to them. It was Marylanders that Pinkerton had to protect the new President Lincoln from as he made his way to his first Inauguration. It was Marylanders that hid John Wilkes Boothe until he could cross the Potomac into Virginia. In fact, John Wilkes Booth was a Marylander. Well, you see where I get this intense dislike of my neighbors.

    Back to the article;

    A Maryland state senator is pushing a bill that would require the governor to prevent the mobilization of the state’s National Guard for federal duty unless Congress has authorized the use of military force or issued a declaration of war.

    The bill also would authorize the governor to ask for the return of deployed units in certain circumstances.

    While the sons and daughters of 49 other States fight and die for the security of the chuckleheads of Maryland.

    Madaleno, a Democrat [as if you hadn’t guessed at this point], said he supported the Iraq invasion, although he said he believes there were “serious gaps in how the war was prosecuted after…the first six months.”

    At the same time, he argued, “If we are actually going to be actively engaged in conflicts around the world for a variety of reasons, how do we create a political process that makes sure that the people remain engaged and supportive of the conflicts that we’re in? It shouldn’t just be the executive branch that is solely responsible for that decision-making. We have to create a political process that keeps the public engaged, informed, through their elected representatives.”

    Never mind whether we win or lose, or if we’re secure in our homes – it’s more important that the public remain engaged. It’s all about feelings.

    It’s all a part of the “Bring The Guard Home” Movement which I’ve written about before here. They’re perfectly willing to let other soldiers fight their wars while they feel good about their neighbors sitting out a war at home. There’s probably a movement in your state, too. And Oh, they have the backing of Code Pink, too.

    “By doing it this way, I’m trying to take a slightly different tack than several other states, where they’ve focused solely on the resolution to bring the Guard home from Iraq now,” Madaleno said. “And I’m trying to refocus and broaden the debate a little bit: What are the lessons of this conflict that inform us for the next conflict?”

    This is why States and the US Congress don’t fight wars – they don’t understand that you can’t hamstring your military and the application of military power where and when it’s needed by setting up a series of useless and unnecessary legislative hoops to jump through.

    Jerry asked me about Minnesota – according to National Review;

    The United States Supreme Court settled this question definitively in 1990, when the then-governor of Minnesota complained that Guard troops from that state had been sent to Central America. In that case — Perpich v. Department of Defense — the Supreme Court ruled unanimously that the governor of Minnesota had no such authority over the Guard troops, and recognized “the supremacy of federal power in the area of military affairs.”

    Wikipedia concurs. The actual decision says;

    Congress has provided by statute that, in addition to its National Guard, a State may provide and maintain at its own expense a defense force that is exempt from being drafted into the Armed Forces of the United States. See 32 U.S.C. § 109(c). As long as that provision remains in effect, there is no basis for an argument that the federal statutory scheme deprives Minnesota of any constitutional entitlement to a separate militia of its own.

    So they have no legs to stand on. But, it’s just the idea….

  • Fact Checking for Mother Jones

    Someone sent me an article from Mother Jones entitled “Zip it, Soldier” which celebrates the bravery of the IVAW members who go against the grain of the military. Of course, they include two of our favorites, Army Sergeant and Adam Kokesh both of whom visit here from time to time.

    The author, Justine Sharrock, goes on proudly about Adam Kokesh and the way he stood up for his right to wear the uniform at protests a few years back. She also claims that Kokesh wasn’t under the jurisdiction of the UCMJ – although he had a valid military ID card in his pocket at the time. Sharrock, also fails to recognize that one reason Kokesh was called before an administrative board was because of the profanity he used in the email in response to the notification of the investigation against him.

    But what made me dredge all of this ancient history up was Sharrock’s last paragraph in which she wrote;

    [Kokesh] testified before Congress last May about his experience and has participated in numerous IVAW events—in uniform.

    Like he was brave for continuing to wear his uniform even in front of Congress. Well, unfortunately for Ms. Sharrock, me and my camera were at the testimony, too;
    DSC_0015
    What military uniform is that?

    Other protests she might have been talking about;
    Ron Paul 060
    Shoe Bush 033
    DSC_0091
    Oh – a hat. That must be what she’s talking about. He wore his hat without fear. At least she didn’t call him Sergeant Kokesh.

  • Gee, ya think?

    This headline caught my eye while I was checking my email;

    Why do you think President Bush called them part of the axis of evil? What do you think they’ve been doing the last several years? Capturing British sailors, supplying the insurgency against US troops in Iraq? Are we supposed to believe it just started this weekend?

    The guy who sat next to me in the turret of our Bradley through the Gulf War sent me this article from Fox News;

    Iran can develop a nuclear weapon within a year and has ready access to enough fissile material to produce up to 50 nuclear weapons, according to a panel of current and former U.S. officials advising the Obama administration.

    William Schneider, Jr., chairman of the Defense Science Board and a former under secretary of state in the Reagan administration, offered those estimates Wednesday during a news conference announcing the release of a new “Presidential Task Force” report on Iran by the Washington Institute for Near East Policy.

    So are we going to continue to subordinate our foreign policy to the whims of those hags at Code Pink and IVAW? Or are we going to act like grown ups?

  • Joshua Casteel; Another IVAW rocket surgeon

    Meet Joshua Casteel, just another disingenuous IVAW member. Here’s his profile at IVAW;

    He’s also been to the Vatican to convince the Pope to urge soldiers to become conscientious objectors;

    In his profile at IVAW, he tries to make you think he’s an officer with this line;

    Joshua Casteel first enlisted in the US Army Reserves at the age of 17, received an appointment to the US Military Academy at West Point at 18, but at 25 was honorably discharged from Active Duty as a conscientious objector.

    (more…)