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

Category: Media

  • Phony SEAL pastor in PA fools media

    Penn Live went out to get the story on local SEALs after the bin Laden assassination last week, and unfortunately for them, they did an interview with a local pastor who had been claiming for years that he had been a SEAL during the Vietnam War. Today they admit their mistake, but they don’t take responsibility for their error;

    The Patriot-News regularly interviews veterans to tell their stories. We do not regularly ask those we interview for proof of their service, believing these men and women would not lie and dishonor those who have fought bravely defending our country. Unfortunately, this time we were deceived, and we will discuss steps to try and ensure that it does not happen again.

    An honorable person has no reason to lie, however a dishonorable person will lie every time they’re asked a question. A real veteran has no problem proving their claims, as I’ve done countless times without being asked usually.

    PennLive still has the initial article up with the disclaimer. But if they had done their due diligence in the first place, they wouldn’t have to admit to their failures. They had to be told by their readers that Moats had lied to them.

    So what do they do? They write an article about the phonies and how hard it is for phonies to ply their trade in the age of the internet;

    The FBI estimates that for every true Navy SEAL, there are 300 impostors.

    One was on the “Dr. Phil” TV show in March, claiming that being a SEAL ruined his life. Another is on death row in Florida. Actress Halle Berry was stalked by a phony SEAL. An impostor named Charlie Andrews has an upcoming reality show about jousting.

    If it’s so hard for phonies, why aren’t journalists doing their job and asking for some proof?

    In Moats’ case, [TAH buddy, Don) Shipley knew hours after the story was published — before the newspaper was aware — that this was another case of fraud.

    “They’re weird. They have a mental problem, it’s as simple as that,” Shipley said. “They’re not quite right. … A long, long time ago, I’m sure there were a lot of guys who claimed to be in Valley Forge with George Washington. This is the new thing.”

    Why did Shipley know before the journalist? Because Don does his job. I’m still waiting for a journalist to ask me why one State which has 15 DoD-recognized POWs living there is paying POW benefits to more than 600 to the tune of $36k/year.

  • The View hags: Call the 2012 election today

    The military and political geniuses at The View have already declared Obama the winner of the 2012 election based on the events in Afghanistan this weekend. Watching these hags, you’d think Obama himself had fast-roped into that compound and Biden was holding the rope for him;

    Ya know that’s what Republicans thought after the Gulf War, too. They hardly tried to beat Clinton and election results proved that. The killing of bin Laden didn’t create even one new job in the US (although it did wonders for advancement in al Qaeda), the price of gas hasn’t dropped a penny.

    I was accused of being “political” in the my first post of the day, but not even close compared to these hacks.

    Thanks to ROS for the link.

  • NY Times notices milbloggers

    There’s an actual print story in the New York Times this morning about the Milblog conference this weekend. They feature interviews with The Sniper, who in my opinion, deserves the title “Milblog” much more than we do. You may discover some things you don’t know about The Sniper.

    I know NYTimes interviewed TSO, but i don’t see any quotes…that makes me wonder what he said. But at least they threw us a link.

    We met Jeff Schogol from the Stars and Stripes, too, so I’m expecting an article from them, too today.

  • Army gives tour of Manning’s new digs

    In an attempt to preclude criticism of Bradley Manning’s new accommodations at Fort Leavenworth, the Army conducted a tour for the press (USA Today link);

    The Fort Leavenworth prison, which opened late last year, was built near the U.S. Disciplinary Barracks, the military’s maximum-security prison for inmates sentenced to at least five years confinement, including those sentenced to death.

    About 150 inmates are at the medium-security prison, Collins said, including others awaiting military trial. The prison is the northern edge of the fort, which is also home to the Army’s Command and General Staff College.

    Manning was transferred to Fort Leavenworth amid international criticism about the 23-year-old’s treatment during his detention in the Washington area. At Quantico, Manning was held in maximum security in a single-occupancy cell and was allowed to wear only a suicide-proof smock to bed each night.

    Yeah, it doesn’t really matter if Manning was being kept at a country club with a fully furnished luxury apartment complete with cabana boys. Hasn’t the Army seen the signs? They say “Free Bradley Manning” not “Keep Bradley Manning in luxury”. Trying to get ahead of the criticism is futile.

    Speaking of Bradley Manning, our buddy, Jim Hanson, talked with IVAW’s Adam Kokesh about Manning last night on Russia TV. Hanson comes in at about 8 minutes into this video;

    Jimbo showed amazing restraint – I think about the time the fat hippie called the US military “the biggest disgrace”, i would have jabbed a pencil in his forehead.

  • Say what McCord?

    Recently a short film was released for a film festival in New York called “Incident in New Baghdad.” A short film about “Collateral Murder” video. While I have huge doubts when the producer, James Spione says that this is not a anti-military film. But what gets my attention is a sudden change in tone from Ethan McCord according to a article by military.com. The same one that has been reported about here many time.

    After the video was released in April of 2010, McCord – by then out of the Army – wrote a public letter of apology to those injured or who lost family members in the attack. McCord told Military.com at the time that the fault lay more with loose rules of engagement than with the Soldiers.

    He also criticized the video because it was presented out of context and failed to show what was happening elsewhere on the ground that might explain why the Apache crew responded as it did.

    “I was upset when the … video came out. I felt they [Wikileaks] were attacking the wrong people,” he told Military.com. McCord was assigned to Bravo Company, 2nd Battalion, 16th Regiment. The Apaches belonged to the 227th Aviation Regiment.

    Really that is totally different from what you said here.

    Asked if the Collateral Damage video put soldiers in harms way, (as the Pentagon claimed), without hesitation, McCord said, “That video release did not put anyone in harm’s way.”

    McCord attended the VFP Convention to give the video context:

    “What that video shows is not special in any way because it shows a daily occurrence in Iraq.

    “We’re killing innocent people daily in Iraq.

    “Killing children daily.

    “Women daily

    You mean innocent people with RPGs?

    While the video released by Wikileaks left open the question of whether or not the only “weapon” present was a camera carried by a Reuters photographer, the film documents that an AK-47 and an RPG were found at the scene of the initial attack – although Spione is quick to point out that the Apache crew did spot actual weapons before they fired onto the street from the skies above.

    In an interview in the movie, McCord also recalls seeing an RPG near the bodies when he reached the scene.

    “I enlarged the part [of the video] where you can see the weapons,” Spione said. Still photos taken by Soldiers at the time also show the weapons, he said.

  • Ezra Klein needs drug treatment

    Ezra Klein in today’s Washington Post presents his case that President Obama is really a moderate republican of the 1990s;

    We’ve obsessed over every answer except the right one: President Obama, if you look closely at his positions, is a moderate Republican of the early 1990s. And the Republican Party he’s facing has abandoned many of its best ideas in its effort to oppose him.

    If you put aside the emergency measures required by the financial crisis, three major policy ideas have dominated American politics in recent years: a plan that uses an individual mandate and tax subsidies to achieve near-universal health care; a cap-and-trade plan that attempts to raise the prices of environmental pollutants to better account for their costs; and bringing tax rates up from their Bush-era lows as part of a bid to reduce the deficit. In each case, the position that Obama and the Democrats have staked out is the very position that moderate Republicans have staked out before.

    First, Ezra, in case you didn’t notice, the moderate Republicans of the early 1990s lost most of their elections. Secondly, those intrusive, debt increases that you want to set aside to prove your point are the main reasons Republicans oppose him. Thirdly, I haven’t heard one Republican call for universal health care like the Obama model, nor have any Republicans called for cap and trade, nor even tax hikes.

    So, I think the Post should mandate a urinalysis for Klein so we can find out WTF he’s smoking these days in order to arrive at those intellectually vacant conclusions and we should all get free pipe-full.

  • Insomnia cure due in June

    Sorry, but I can’t think of anything more boring than Keith Olbermann unless it’s Keith Olbermann brought to you by Al Gore’s network Current TV;

    Cable network Current TV says Keith Olbermann will return to the air on June 20.

    Current said Tuesday the title of the weeknight news-commentary hour will be “Countdown with Keith Olbermann.” “Countdown” was the name of the program Olbermann hosted on MSNBC until his heated departure from that network in January.

    Less than a month later, he signed with Current TV, the public affairs channel launched in 2005 by former Vice President Al Gore and Joel Hyatt.

    The article mentions that Current is available in 60 million households but doesn’t mention how many of those households actually watch any of it. Well, whatever that number is, I’m sure it’s commensurate with Olbermann’s audience.

  • How’s that pump price feel?

    In my travels over the last few weeks, i saw gas at $4.65 near San Francisco, it was over $4 in DC last week and then topped $4 in my rural West Virginia town yesterday. So how’s it feel? Bet I can make it feel worse. The EPA denied air permits to Shell for drilling off of Alaska’s northern coast according to a Fox News article sent to us by ROS;

    Shell has spent five years and nearly $4 billion dollars on plans to explore for oil in the Beaufort and Chukchi Seas. The leases alone cost $2.2 billion. Shell Vice President Pete Slaiby says obtaining similar air permits for a drilling operation in the Gulf of Mexico would take about 45 days. He’s especially frustrated over the appeal board’s suggestion that the Arctic drill would somehow be hazardous for the people who live in the area. “We think the issues were really not major,” Slaiby said, “and clearly not impactful for the communities we work in.”

    The closest village to where Shell proposed to drill is Kaktovik, Alaska. It is one of the most remote places in the United States. According to the latest census, the population is 245 and nearly all of the residents are Alaska natives. The village, which is 1 square mile, sits right along the shores of the Beaufort Sea, 70 miles away from the proposed off-shore drill site.

    That cost us 27 billion barrels of oil not to mention the pain we already feel at the pump.

    Of course we all know that just the losses suffered by Shell in this failed attempt will be passed along to us consumers.

    In the meantime, the media is slavishly deflecting blame from Obama as discussed by Ace of Spades.

    Ron Futtrell at Big Journalism notices the media’s disconnect with their consumers…or rather the lack thereof.

    Julia Seymour at Newsbusters notices that they blame everyone except Obama;

    Instead of asking whether Obama’s anti-oil policies could be increasing the cost of gas, the networks blamed other factors such as Mideast turmoil or the “money game” played by speculators. Certainly, the turmoil in Libya, Egypt and surrounding nations has increased worries about oil production and can influence the price. But the networks also should have looked for explanations much closer to home, like Obama’s many regulatory actions taken against the oil industry.

    Scott Witlock at Newsbusters watched George Stephanopolis chastise you for your “gripes” and making Obama’s life difficult;

    Good Morning America’s George Stephanopoulos on Monday described the country’s “gas gripes” over rising fuel costs, spinning, “Soaring prices lead to new pain for the President as big oil gets ready to report record profits.”

    The former Democratic operative turned journalist tried to put the best face on Barack Obama’s growing problems: “And, Jake, these gas prices are also knocking down President Obama’s poll numbers, which is why he’s out there nearly every day addressing this problem.”

    Addressing the problem IS the problem. Instead of yapping like a constipated Yorky, our president needs to solve the problem and throw open the floodgates of developers and drillers to solve not only the fuel problem, but take a chunk out of the unemployment rate, too.