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

Category: Media

  • Two Cubas

    Don Surber found an article in the Telegraph about tortured prisoners in Cuba;

    Four dissidents released from Cuban prisons after 5 years of captivity showed their bruises and gave their testimony of the horrors they endured.

    The AP didn’t report on it. The NYT and Washington Post didn’t report on it. I don’t expect the major networks to report on it.

    Naw, the Washington Post carried a self-serving piece of garbage from two lawyers chasing ambulances in Gitmo instead;

    As you read this, we expect to be in Guantanamo, meeting with the man President Bush mentions when he talks about the intelligence gained and the lives saved because of “enhanced” interrogation techniques. We represent Saudi-born Abu Zubaydah in a legal effort to force the administration to show why he is being detained. And this week, with our first meeting, we begin the laborious task of sifting fact from fantasy. Yet we worry it may already be too late.

    We shouldn’t expect the Washington Post to worry about real human rights violations in that island prison, when two shysters can make up better stories to play to the ignorant and pliant readership of that rag.

    From the Telegraph story;

    Mr Castillo, 50, a journalist who wrote articles critical of the regime, told The Sunday Telegraph: “It was terrible. It was like being in a desert in which sometimes there is no water, there is no food, you are tortured and you are abused.

    “This was not torture in the textbook way with electric prods, but it was cruel and degrading. They would beat you for no reason even when you were in hospital.

    “At other times they would search you for no reason, stripping you bare and humiliating you. There was one particular commander at a jail in Santa Clara who seemed to take delight in handing out beatings to the prisoners.”

    Mr Castillo, who claims he was denied proper medical aid for diabetes and heart problems, added: “We are nothing more than a reflection of the human cost of the fight being waged by the Cuban people.”

    Compared to the horrors of Gitmo;

    …he has gone through quite an ordeal since his arrest in Pakistan in March 2002. Shuttled through CIA “black sites” around the world, he was subjected to a sustained course of interrogation designed to instill what a CIA training manual euphemistically calls “debility, dependence and dread.” Zubaydah’s world became freezing rooms alternating with sweltering cells. Screaming noise replaced by endless silence. Blinding light followed by dark, underground chambers. Hours confined in contorted positions.

    Mr. Castillo was beaten for writing his opinion, Zubudayah was alternately hot and cold for facilitating the death and injury of innocent people. So which does the Washington Post give column space? The one with a pair of free Washington lawyers.

  • Fact checking the fact checker

    ABC News is so Obama. So Obama that they’ll carry his water. That’s what happened today. Jack Tapper decided to investigate the story Obama spun last night in the debate about the infantry platoon leader who was apparently scrouging weaponry for his undermanned platoon in the local weapons bazaar.

    The Army captain, a West Point graduate, did a tour in a hot area of eastern Afghanistan from the Summer of 2003 through Spring 2004.

    Prior to deployment the Captain — then a Lieutenant — took command of a rifle platoon at Fort Drum. When he took command, the platoon had 39 members, but — in ones and twos — 15 members of the platoon were re-assigned to other units. He knows of 10 of those 15 for sure who went to Iraq, and he suspects the other five did as well.

    The platoon was sent to Afghanistan with 24 men.

    Obama made it sound as if these problems were all occurring today – not 4-5 years ago when we were still trying to figure out what kind of war this going to be.

    I’m guessing that understrength units in the 10th Division were brought up to strength before they deployed to Iraq by cross-loading units. It also means that this young lieutenant’s platoon wasn’t up to full strength, either – there’s no way he had a full strength platoon in an understregth unit. If this happened at all, to man all of the major weapons systems unit-wide, the Division G-1 probably moved people by specialty to where they were needed. Since the captain admitted that his platoon was only assigned four Humvees, 24 men was more than he can handle anyway. In the Army we call it task force management. Iraq and Afghanistan were two different wars each having different personnel requirements.

    At Fort Drum, in training, “we didn’t have access to heavy weapons or the ammunition for the weapons, or humvees to train before we deployed.”

    What ammunition?

    40 mm automatic grenade launcher ammunition for the MK-19, and ammunition for the .50 caliber M-2 machine gun (“50 cal.”)

    That’s hardly the “ammunition” shortage that Obama described is it? But there’s more;

    Also in Afghanistan they had issues getting parts for their MK-19s and their 50-cals. Getting parts or ammunition for their standard rifles was not a problem.

    “It was very difficult to get any parts in theater,” he says, “because parts are prioritized to the theater where they were needed most — so they were going to Iraq not Afghanistan.”

    “The purpose of going after the Taliban was not to get their weapons,” he said, but on occasion they used Taliban weapons. Sometimes AK-47s, and they also mounted a Soviet-model DShK (or “Dishka”) on one of their humvees instead of their 50 cal.

    Now they needed training time in Drum for the .50 cal M2 and the 40 mm, but they didn’t need any training time for a Soviet machinegun? Amazing troops.

    I can’t imagine there being supply problems in a 9,000-mile supply train. So the problem wasn’t with the weapons the troops needed to perform their daily missions, there weren’t ammo shortages and weapons shortages.

    I find it difficult to believe a responsible platoon sergeant would let his troops duct-tape a Soviet-era 12.7 mm (.51 cal) machinegun to their vehicle since no weapons mount would sufficiently and safely attach a foreign weapon to their Humvee.

    Oh, and up-armored Humvees weren’t even an issue for Afghanistan during this captain’s tour. Roadside bombs were strictly a problem in Iraq at the time.

    Of course, it’s all milbloggers’ fault;

    I might suggest those on the blogosphere upset about this story would be better suited directing their ire at those responsible for this problem, which is certainly not new. That is, if they actually care about the men and women bravely serving our country at home and abroad.

    Pound sand, goober. Just because you talked to some guy, that doesn’t make the story true. The ammo shortages and spare part shortages had been chronic problems in the military since before 1999 – so don’t give me your sanctimonious horseshit about caring for the troops. Why is it we’re hearing about five years later, where was your punk ass five years ago? One reason we’re hearing about it so much later might be because it’s false. Dumbass.

    Ace smells something fishy. Uncle Jimbo has General Obama “In the crosshairs”. Michael Goldfarb reports Congressional inquiries.

  • The memo CNN should have written

    Over at Babalu Blog, Henry “Conductor” Gomez writes the memo that CNN would have written to their producers (as opposed to the memo that CNN did write) if they’d been a legitimate news organization instead of a group of cheerleaders for every tinpot dictator with an axe to grind with the United States.

    Here’s a sample of “Bias, we don’t need no stinking bias“;

    * Although the Castro regime blames a lot of Cuba’s economic problems on the US embargo, that argument is countered by the argument that Cuba trades openly with almost every other country in the world including western industrialized democracies like Canada, the UK, France, and Spain and that the bulk of Cuba’s economic problems are due to CASTRO’s failed MARXIST economic polices. While some analysts say the US embargo was a benefit to Castro politically, something to blame problems on, most serious observers recognize that it is a weak excuse for Castro’s own failures. Note that despite the embargo, the United States is currently Cuba’s largest food supplier.

    Be sure to read the whole thing.

  • McCain’s MSM Honeymoon Ends

    capta60f10741c95435aab94ee1376d314b1mccain_lobbyist_2008_ohgh111.jpg

    Photo from AP

    Ya know, as soon as I saw the spaz-tards on CNBC laughing and chuckling over this supposed John McCain scandal, I knew it was some manufactured BS. Has anyone at the New York Times seen Cindy McCain, for pete’s sake? Who would cheat on her? Even some of their in-house staff lesbians could have twigged them to the absurdity of the story if they couldn’t find some straight guys to ask.

    But what clinched it for me was the Associated Press quote in the Washington Post story from McCain’s attorney;

    Robert Bennett, a Washington attorney representing McCain, said McCain’s staff provided the Times with “approximately 12 instances where Senator McCain took positions adverse to this lobbyist’s clients and her public relations firm’s clients,” but none of the examples were included in the paper’s story.

    “There is no evidence that John McCain ever breached the public trust and that is the issue and the only issue,” Bennett, who once represented former President Clinton, told NBC’s “Today” show on Thursday.

    So the Times just decided to disregard anything that might clear him – is Nifong one of their editors now? They’ve got Pamela Geller at Atlas Shrugs pretty upset;

    Are we supposed to get our bowels in an uproar over a suggested rumor with a colleague? The leftards can’t have it both ways. We had to live through an eight year Clinton presidency with a horndog …[a]nd yet the Democrats consistently maintained that it was personal and irrelevant, a veritable vast right wing conspiracy

    Michele Malkin warns McCain;

    If you lie down with MSM dogs, you wake up with stories like this.

    Brennan at the American Pundit asks;

    If this was a problem, why did The New York Times endorse McCain? Of course, we know the answer to that.

    Blue Crab Boulevard writes that McCain’s staff has declared war on the NY Times;

    McCain’s spokesmen are pounding right back on the morning news shows. They are hitting very hard, too. Oddly enough, this incident is quite likely to get many conservatives to rally around McCain. In that respect, the story is a massive backfire.

    I agree heartily. This may be the single incident that awakens many Republicans and Conservatives to the fact that this is really another battle in the “us” vs. “them” war. That they’ll stop at nothing to discredit us and any attack against one of “ours” must be answered in kind. We all remember what happened in the 1992 election when we just sat back and let “them” have at President Bush because we didn’t think he was conservative enough for us.

    If nothing else, it may temper some of the criticism of McCain from “our” side.

    Then again, that might have been the NY Times’ intention in the first place.

    Ow, my head hurts.

  • Washington Post latest anti-Army tear

    First let me clarify that I certainly support our women in uniform – my close friendship with fellow author on this blog and 30-year Army combat veteran GI Jane demonstrates that. However, Washington Post’s latest attack on the military establishment is so petty it doesn’t belong on the front of today’s edition. In “Short Maternity Leaves, Long Deployments“, Ann Scott Tyson writes;

    Many female soldiers hoping to start families face the prospect of missing most of their child’s first year. The Army grants six weeks of maternity leave before a new mother must return to her job or training, and four months until she can be sent to a war zone. The Marine Corps and Navy allow from six months to a year before a new mother must deploy.

    The wars in Iraq and Afghanistan have placed severe strains on the Army, including longer deployments in which soldiers serve 15 months in the war zone, followed by 12 months at home. Under that system, a woman who wishes to have a child and remain with her unit must conceive soon after returning home so she can give birth, recover and prepare for her next overseas tour.

    It seems to me that a responsible pair of parents wouldn’t want to bring their child into a situation which risks the absence of one or both parents for extended periods of time.

    The constraints on reproduction, child-rearing and family are a key factor leading many female soldiers to quit the Army, and have discouraged many civilian women from considering enlistment, according to Army officials. Surveys show that time away from families, because of long, frequent deployments, is the top reason for soldiers to leave the Army. The willingness of women to serve in the military has dropped faster than that of men in recent years, from a high of 10 percent among 16- to 21-year-olds in November 2003 to 4 percent last July, according to periodic youth surveys on “propensity to serve” conducted for the Army.

    Well, it looks like American women have found a solution to their dilemma – they get out or they don’t join. SO why is this a front page story? I’m so sure that aren’t millions of women waiting to join the military if only they’d extend the maternity leave to, say, five years like the Post seems to suggest is reasonable.

    …said Maj. Gen. Gale Pollock, deputy Army surgeon general for force management.

    “We need to look at the fact that many women want to serve but they also want to be mothers,” Pollock said. “It’s a medical issue, it’s a mental health issue. Your ability to bond with your children is . . . very important.”

    Pollock said last summer that she had proposed that the Army double the time women are exempt from deployment from four to eight months, noting that she would prefer 12 months. “That addresses the need for breast-feeding that is important for health, and also allows for optimal bonding time,” she said.

    So far, Army policy remains unchanged, spokeswoman Cynthia Vaughan said this month. Senior Army officials declined requests to explain the reasoning behind the current policy.

    Other services grant longer exemptions, and all have generally shorter deployments: The Navy exemption is 12 months, and the Marine Corps’s is six months, and deployments average seven months for both. The Air Force has a four-month exemption, but its deployments average only four to six months.

    Well, since all of the services have different policies according to their force needs in theater, the Army arrived at their policy logically. But, if a woman wants to serve in the military she has an array of choices, doesn’t she? She certainly doesn’t need the Washington Post reporter with her a the recruiting station to help her.

  • John McCain, Vietnam veteran

    Remember the 2004 election? Remember how the words “John Kerry, who served in Vietnam,…” were tied together so often that we began to believe he’d changed his name to include the brief biography. He saluted the Democrat convention to wild cheers (a recruit-style salute that would have been corrected by a drill sergeant with memorable adjectives the first day of basic training). We were treated to endless broadcasts of his carefully-scripted recreation of his heroics for which he had carried a movie camera to Vietnam specifically to film.

    Well, we all know that was to contrast Kerry’s service to National Guard pilot George W. Bush – to make it seem as if John Kerry had some special gift for defending our country. It turns out that he only had a gift for gaming the military’s system and got out of a 12-month tour in three months so he could rush into his political career. So his three months in Vietnam were worthy of mentioning every time his name was mentioned. In fact, his ultimate downfall came around because he depended so heavily on his three-month stint. And he refused to sign his Form 180.
    John McCain, according to his website lists his awards;

    His naval honors include the Silver Star, Bronze Star, Legion of Merit, Purple Heart, and the Distinguished Flying Cross..

    He also has a world-famous career as a POW for nearly six years, which gets mentioned very little. A Yahoo search turned up more anti-McCain links discrediting his service than honoring it. The only news stories mentioning the link of McCain to the Vietnam war are in relation to his argument with Castro’s corpse.

    So why isn’t the media harping on McCain’s service, which certainly trumps Kerry’s three months Barack Obama’s lack of service and Hillary’s attempt to join the Marines (in a totally fictional account) when she was rejected for being a girl.

    And then on top of it, Cuffy Meigs (h/t American Pundit) finds that McCain’s sons are currently serving in the war against terror, his youngest a grunt Lance Corporal just returned from Iraq. And that John McCain makes unpublicized visits to the homes of military families. Neptunus Lex gives up updates on another McCain progeny racking up demerits at Annapolis. If John Kerry had sired similar siblings, we’d have been treated to “film at 11” every night.

    So how can the media continue to inflict this facade of neutrality in politics on the American public without violent retribution?

  • Why is Arkin still at the WaPo?

    Of course we all remember William Arkin‘s “These soldiers should be grateful that the American public, which by all polls overwhelmingly disapproves of the Iraq war and the President’s handling of it, do still offer their support to them, and their respect”. And his follow up “I can see, in the military blogs and in the comments of those who have written about my posts last week, that those who refer to themselves as Vietnam veterans still yearn for the recognition and thanks that they believe they haven’t received. There is no question that Vietnam is still an open wound for them, and that they therefore only recognize the worth of fellow veterans, of those who have been through exactly the same experience.” As well as his lamentation at not being invited to the MilBlog convention last year.

    Well, catching up on stuff, I made my daily trip over The Weekly Standard blog and found this jewel by John Noonan on William Arkin’s latest attempt at being a national security expert at the Washington Post “Getting the Military Out of The Nuclear Business”

    Now my favorite part. After incorrectly interpreting the report, and drawing a false conclusion based on what seems to be little or no research, Arkin decides that nukes either need to be handed over to the Department of Energy (which retains non-military control of nuclear weapons) or outsourced:

    Last August’s incident demonstrated that all the systems of security and control can break down because the nuclear weapons themselves are routinely mated with military equipment–particularly in the case of bombers and nuclear fighters–that is otherwise and regularly used to fight in Iraq and Afghanistan. It is a system made for ultimate failure and one that will always challenge operators to maintain expertise on two very different “planes.” Perhaps it is time to give the missile force and the nuclear weapons back to the Department of Energy (the successor to the old AEC) or, God forbid, “contract” out the day-to-day maintenance to corporate experts.

    I was unaware that the DoE had nuclear delivery capabilities. And I’d love to know which contractor would receive the fat nuclear weapons contract. Blackwater perhaps?

    The true problem, the one the Air Force can’t address, is that the nation doesn’t really want to invest in a cadre of dedicated nuclear weapons experts in uniform anymore. Some see that as a crisis; I see it as an opportunity to get the military even more out of the nuclear business.

    I’m not sure what polling data Arkin is referencing when he decided to speak for the entire country, but I do know that I’d rather have military nuclear professionals (who have a spotless, 60+ year record of accident-free nuclear handling) responsible for these weapons than some corporation or government agency that has no idea how to actually employ them.

    Can you imagine Department of Energy civilians being in charge of our nuclear weapons? The same kind of civilians that can’t find that package you shipped through the post office last year. The same Department of Energy that just a dozen years ago thought that having different levels of security access affected their employees’ self-esteem.

    So why does the Washington Post continue to employ this goober? Other than the fact that he sticks to the WaPo’s line that the military is bad and government bureaucrats have all of the correct answers all of the time, he’s completely useless. His military background is limited to driving up to the Berlin Wall a few times (probably under heavy supervision), and he doesn’t bother to check his facts (as Noonan demonstrates with a few phone calls).

    Well, this post guarantees me another year’s worth of hits from Vermont as Arkin googles his name.

  • We need an Economics curriculum

    The Washington Post stunningly announces on Page One this morning that they don’t understand economics under the headline “Fed’s Rate Cuts Bring No Relief For Consumers’ Credit Card Bills”;

    The Federal Reserve’s dramatic rate cuts were expected to make it cheaper for consumers to use credit cards. But credit card interest rates remain high and in many cases have even climbed.

    Well, credit cards aren’t a reflection of lending rates – it’s a retail business. Credit card users are welcome to shop their credit card business and dump high interest credit cards for lower rates.

    The increases have perplexed customers such as Richard Davis, an insurance agent who lives in Fairfax County who said the annual percentage rate on his Chase Business Visa card went from 8 percent to 24 percent in December, three months after the Fed’s first rate cut. “That just floored me,” he said.

    If I were Richard Davis, an insurance agent, no less, and I made a stupid remark like that in public, I should expect my clients to bail out of the financial services I’ve provided them. Credit rates increase when people don’t make their payments, the whole lending crisis happened because people stopped making payments on their credit. So guess what – that impacts the whole lending market, not just mortgage companies. Well, at least the Washington Post went into that after their terrorizing headline;

    Banks have reported steep write-offs related to the mortgage mess, and their stock prices have plummeted. “Credit cards historically have been a very profitable segment for the banking industry, so what they’re doing is trying to squeeze customers as much as they can, particularly for accounts they don’t see as profitable or as high risk,” said Curtis Arnold, founder of CardRatings.com, an independent consumer resource on credit cards.

    But it’s not the lenders’ fault, as the Washington Post implies; it’s the whole credit market. What the Washington Post doesn’t recognize is that borrowers are free to shop their good credit around for a better rate.

    And of course, it’s not really a crisis until the Democrats tell us it is;

    On Thursday, Rep. Carolyn B. Maloney (D-N.Y.), chairman of the House financial institutions and consumer credit subcommittee, introduced the Credit Cardholders’ Bill of Rights Act of 2008, which would, among other things, restrict fees and rate changes that companies could impose.

    Sen. Carl M. Levin (D-Mich.), chairman of the Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations, has proposed a similar bill. He said in an interview that Congress will keep an eye on how card issuers react to the changes in the federal funds rate, which the Fed controls. “The credit cards raise the rates when they go up. They should go down when interest rates go down,” he said.

    We don’t need Congressional intervention, we need an education system that explains simple economics to students so they don’t get their pointy little heads into something from which they can’t recover.