I don’t know what’s wrong with the people being polled in Connecticut.Clearly, Richard Blumenthal has been lying about his military service for years and yet, a week after the discovery, CT voters seem to be supporting him 56% to 31%.over the Republican candidate.
I’ve quoted several CT veterans over the last week who claim that Blumenthal has been a great supporter of veterans in CT, yet I’ve been unable to find a single instance where he did that in performing his duties as an attorney general, Sure he gave wonderful speeches (during which he usually lied about his service) but beyond that, he hasn’t done a single thing for veterans.
Of course, the real Vietnam Veteran, Rob Simmons dropped out of the race – real veterans in CT should be ashamed if their sole reason for supporting phony Blumenthal is his veteran status and his nebulous support for veterans..
Well, last week, while the Blumenthal disgrace headed every news source, every milblog, every military professional journal, one voice was oddly absent. That was the voice of Jon Soltz, chairman and founder of VoteVets. Politico explained why Soltz was silent;
A spokesman for the left-leaning VoteVets group said Jon Soltz, the group’s chairman, was unavailable for comment on the matter because he’s on active duty and isn’t allowed to talk about politics.
Like TSO said yesterday in an email to me, we can all assume that Soltz was at his annual training (AT) with his reserve unit last week. But then this morning I see he took time out of his busy life to threaten Republicans just yesterday.
Last week he couldn’t comment because he was on active duty. he suddenly doesn’t have that problem this week. Funny how that works, ain’t it?
At about 2:15 into the video, Soltz drags out VoteVets old charge of Republicans voting against body armor for the troops…again. TSO dealt with that last year with a link to Fact Check.org.
A new ad claims Republican Sen. George Allen of Virginia “voted against giving our troops” modern body armor. He did no such thing. The ad cites a vote on an appropriations amendment that had nothing whatever to do with body armor.
The ad also claims troops were sent to Iraq with flak vests “left over from the Vietnam war,” another falsehood. The ad actually shows an improved vest that wasn’t available until the 1980’s.
So Soltz wants to drag that tired old crap out again, I guess we’re fine with that.
But does anyone think that the reason Soltz didn’t comment on Blumenthal really has to do with his AT at this point? And since when has Soltz’ status in the military ever affected him expressing his opinion? Soltz and the other cumbubbles at VoteVets haven’t even mentioned Blumenthal – just like they never mentioned phony Marine Rick Duncan/Strandlof when he was found to have never served yet made political ads with VoteVets money saying Duncan did serve.
How does VoteVets serve Iraq/Aghanistan veterans with mealy-mouth, double-dealing about “clean energy”, with constant crybaby yammering about Don’t Ask Don’t Tell, when they’re always talking about social justice issues that really don’t have anything to do with veterans?
And where was Soltz’ outrage when Democrats were trying to end the war in Iraq while the troops were deployed by cutting off ALL money to them?
Doug Sterner sent us this link from the Deseret News last night about orin hatch’s proposed bill that would add an amendment to the so-called Stolen Valor Law which would make it illegal to claim that an individual served in the armed services in combat.
The Stolen Valor Act makes it illegal to falsely wear military decorations and medals. In proposing his amendment, Hatch said, “It is a crime to dishonor the sacrifice of so many by falsely representing combat service for the purposes of self-promotion or benefit. My amendment would deter those who would falsely prop themselves up in order to appear worthy of the award and title of ‘combat veteran.’
Of course, the solution to Congress is always more legislation – when you’re a hammer, everything looks like a nail. I happen to agree with Mr. Sterner in this instance – we don’t need a law to make speech criminal, we need to build a national database. The availability of information coupled with the access that already exists would put an end to all of the phonies.
A braggart in a bar would have his lies capped when his military record can be checked on the spot from a cell phone. people like Blumenthal would think twice if their service records were available while he was giving his campaign speech. Military.com used to have such a database in rudimentary form but they’ve let it deteriorate over the past year or so.
All that isneeded is the money from Congress, and we can avoid all of the legal wrangling that a bill to curb 1st Amendment speech would cause.
Mr Sterner tells me he’s back before Congress with HR 666 (you can see the bill at the search function here) a bill which would require the services and the Department of Homeland Security, the Transportation Department, and the merchant marines to establish a database;
`(c) Public Availability- The Military Valor Roll of Honor shall be a searchable database and available for public inspection.’.
I’ve been doing my best to keep the Blumenthal story alive, but I thought I’d have to skip it today, running out of ammo. Thank goodness for Joe Biden, God love him;
“I didn’t serve in Vietnam. I don’t want to make a Blumenthal mistake here,” he said according to a pool report. “Our attorney general from Connecticut, God love him.”
Later he said “I have a bad habit of saying exactly what I think.”
Blumenthal became the brunt of Republican criticism after The New York Times reported he misstated his service record during the Vietnam War on several occasions.
Of course, saying what he thinks has never been a problem for Biden since he never thinks.
The article goes on to detail Blumenthal’s deferments and Reserve service. Odd, but they don’t take the opportunity to count Biden’s draft deferments during the Vietnam war (the answer is five – same as Cheney – the difference being that Cheney’s deferments all came before ground combat operations in Vietnam) while Biden was studying to be the smartest man in the world whose IQ is probably higher than yours.
Late last month I wrote about James A. Becker who was living the high life in Ecuador on his lies about an incredible military career. Doug Sterner sent us a link to MarineCorpTimes.com that reports that the final chapter of Becker’s life is being written.
NCIS opened its case after Gaddis sent his alert through embassy channels.
“NCIS is looking into allegations made,” said spokesman Ed Buice. “The first step in any such query is getting to ground truth of what has actually been said by whom, in what context and for what possible purpose, and determining whether those statements being made actually broke any laws.”
Another spectacular take-down by the folks at POW Net;
Becker has been listed in the POW Network’s phonies index since 2006 when Mary Schantag, the organization’s co-founder, received an e-mail from a Navy veteran in Punta Gorda, Fla., claiming that Becker was passing himself off as a retired four-star Marine general and POW escapee.
Suman and some of his retired military friends contacted Schantag. Through a Freedom of Information Act request with the National Personnel Records Center in St. Louis, Mo., she discovered Becker had no military record.
Schantag reported Becker to the FBI in 2006 and reported him again following the reports contained in Gaddis’ e-mail from Ecuador.
The above-pictured person is a member of the Marine Corps League Post in Hardware City, Connecticut. The folks at POW Net have been trying to identify her and asked for our help. If you scroll down the page at POW Net, you’ll see that members of the MCL are real defensive about her and they say that she is the first female Marine helicopter pilot.
Well, that’s not true – the first female Marine helicopter pilot was (then Captain, now Lieutenant Colonel) Sarah Deal in 1995. The woman in the picture has Vietnam service medals – more than two decades before Sarah Deal earned her wings.
The folks in Hardware City seem reluctant to clear this up, so we’re more than willing to do it ourselves, but we need your help getting a name.
This is a video of the talk that Matthis is giving to our school-age children as part of his anti-recruiting efforts entitled “We Are Not Your Children”. As I demonstrated yesterday, Matthis never deployed to war, but in this video (at about 2:15) the video introduces him as an “Iraq War Veteran” – you may want to remove sharp objects from your reach as you watch this;
The purpose of this whole (long-winded) speech is to convince Americans to stop supporting Matthis’ “brothers and sisters” in the military. He claims he’s less of a man because of what the military took from him – he’s less of a man because he continues to lie about his service.
There are rumors I’ve heard that there are a few members of IVAW who plan to leave the organization because of this video, so watch the video while you still can – the leadership of IVAW tends to cover up their missteps than deal with them.
“He said he was in Vietnam in combat missions and more recently he said that he had been part of the bombing run in Tora Bora to try to find Osama Bin Laden,” Shillingburg said.
Tullis also said he worked with Oliver North in Nicaragua. He told 10News he was on covert missions and testified against powerful people, which made him a target for persecution.
Turns out he was a supply sergeant. He was wearing an Air Force Cross, a Silver Star and a Purple Heart among a veritable English garden of color.
Tullis warned 10News that his mission and life would be in jeopardy if the story was reported.
His email said, “… you are going to get me killed, and I have the right to bear arms under the 2nd Amendment to protect myself so that doesn’t happen.”
Damned Viet Cong are still after him – I saw that movie. No, wait, not the Viet Cong, a San Diego Real Estate agent is out to get him…same thing as the Viet Cong, I guess. You can see more of Tullis at POW Net – Mary led the charge against him, as usual.
Tullis was just one of the phonies that Doug Sterner told us who’ll be outed this week. Stand by.
