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

Category: Support the troops

  • One hero’s story

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    I got this email a little while ago;

    Sorry to send this sad note that Marine PFC. Jack Lucas, USMC is in the hospital with cancer. He is 80 years old.

    PFC Lucas is the youngest ever recipient of the Medal of Honor. At 17 years old, he earned the Medal on Iwo Jima in February 1945. Imagine what a Marine had to do, amongst all those many heroes, to earn “The Medal.”

    There is a web site, http:/www.forrestgeneral.com go to “e-mail a patient” and they ask for your name, phone number, and e-mail address. It also requires his room number. It is room 4421 This is probably to weed out the whackos. It would be great and very easy, easy to send the Marine Corps hero a note.

    Semper Fidelis,

    XXX XXX, Retired Marine

    Well, it piqued my curiosity. What does one Marine do to stand out from among the thousands of Marines on Iwo Jima? Luckily, PFC Lucas was never shy about telling his story. From the Quantico Sentry, the amazing story of a fourteen year old who lied about his age to become a Marine;

    “When I heard the news of the attacks on Pearl Harbor, a cold chill ran down me. To think that something like that could happen to my country,” Lucas could not describe his feelings as he pictured the day from 65 years ago as if it were yesterday. ‘‘I became obsessed. As of that day, I was going to fight for my country. I wasn’t really thinking about age requirements and that wasn’t going to stop me.”

    Despite his mother’s disproval, he forged his consent papers and had his stepfather lie for him so he could become a Marine.

    […]

    Lucas was working at Pearl Harbor at age 17 when Marine units were loading ships to head to the front lines. So determined to fight, he stowed away on one of the ships and was on his way to the forward edge of the battle field. He told a whole story explaining how he survived aboard the ship without being discovered, but he turned himself in after 29 days at sea to avoid being declared a deserter.

    The National World War II Museum quotes his Medal of Honor Citation;

    Jack Lucas received the Medal of Honor “For conspicuous gallantry and intrepidity at the risk of his life above and beyond the call of duty while serving with the 1st Battalion, 26th Marines, 5th Marine Division, during action against enemy Japanese forces on Iwo Jima… While creeping through a treacherous, twisting ravine which ran in close proximity to a fluid and uncertain frontline on D-plus-1 day, Pfc. Lucas and three other men were suddenly ambushed by a hostile patrol which savagely attacked with rifle fire and grenades. Quick to act when the lives of the small group were endangered by two grenades which landed directly in front of them, Pfc. Lucas unhesitatingly hurled himself over his comrades upon one grenade and pulled the other under him, absorbing the whole blasting forces of the explosions in his own body in order to shield his companions from the concussion and murderous flying fragments. By his inspiring action and valiant spirit of self-sacrifice, he not only protected his comrades from certain injury or possible death but also enabled them to rout the Japanese patrol and continue the advance. His exceptionally courageous initiative and loyalty reflect the highest credit upon Pfc. Lucas and the U.S. Naval Service. “

    MSNBC described his injuries;

    Lucas suffered more than 200 wounds from head-to-toe and was saved by dozens of surgeries. He was awarded the Congressional Medal of Honor for his heroic action at the age of 17, the youngest recipient of that honor since the Civil War.

    He is one of 27 American soldiers who were awarded the Medal of Honor during 45 days of fighting on Iwo Jima.

    Wikipedia has a little bit more of his life after saving his comrades;

    He was evacuated to the hospital ship Samaritan, and then treated at various field hospitals prior to his arrival in San Francisco, California on 28 March 1945. He eventually underwent 21 surgeries. To this day, there are still about 200 pieces of metal, some the size of 22 caliber bullets, still left in Lucas — which set off airport medal detectors.[2]

    The mark of desertion was removed from his record in August of that year while he was a patient at the U.S. Naval Hospital at Charleston, South Carolina. He was discharged from the Marine Corps Reserve because of disability resulting from his wounds on 18 September 1945, following his reappointment to the rank of Private First Class.

    In addition to the Medal of Honor, PFC Lucas was awarded the Purple Heart; Presidential Unit Citation; Asiatic-Pacific Campaign Medal with one bronze star; American Campaign Medal and the World War II Victory Medal.

    I’m richer because I took the time to know Jacklyn Harrell Lucas. Take a moment to send him an email at the hospital link above in the quoted email

  • Martial bling

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    I read this at The Sniper, who got it from Curt at Flopping Aces who had the guts to read the LA Times in which some gumball named Mathew DeBord criticizes General Petreaus for wearing too many medals and badges.

    That’s a lot of martial bling, especially for an officer who hadn’t seen combat until five years ago. Unfortunately, brazen preening and “ribbon creep” among the Army’s modern-day upper crust have trumped the time-honored military virtues of humility, duty and personal reserve.

    Think about any of the generals you’ve seen in recent years — Norman Schwarzkopf, Barry McCaffrey, Wesley Clark (all now retired) and others — and the image you’ll conjure no doubt includes a chest full of shimmering decorations. In Petraeus’ case, most of them don’t represent actual military action as much as they do the general’s devotion to the institution of the U.S. Army and vice versa. According to an annotated photograph produced by the Times of London last year, the majority of ribbons on Petraeus’ impressive “rack” were earned for various flavors of distinguished service. As brave as he may be and as meritorious in general, is all that ostentation the best way to present the situation in Iraq to an increasingly war-skeptical public?

    Let me tell you, you smoldering ignorant turd, why the good General wears all of that stuff; because he earned it – and because somewhere there’s a sergeant major who knows he earned it and will verbally stomp a mud hole in the good general’s behind if he doesn’t see the general wearing each and every one of those badges and medals.

    There’s an Army Regulation that says he should wear them all – it’s called an AR 670-1 “Wear and Appearance of Army Uniform and Insignia”. Everything has a special place on the uniform – but I wouldn’t expect some half-witted goofball who can only find a job at the LA Times to know that, or bother even doing a Google search for some basic information.

    Which badges should he remove, DeBord? The Ranger Tab he got for 9 weeks of functioning as a combat leader under the most miserable conditions the Army can inflict? Or maybe his Master Parachutist wings? Maybe the German Parachutist wings? Or maybe all of the other stuff he earned and your stupid civilian ass couldn’t accomplish in a lifetime?

    If this what criticism of the war has come down to, maybe it’s time for all ya’all civilians to just leave the country. You’re really starting to grate on the rest of us’ nerves. No. Really.

  • Rockefeller & the rot at the center of the Democrat Party

    We’ve all heard and read about the idiot comment Jay “Silverspoon” Rockefeller in an interview in one of his local papers. Here’s a refresher from the New York Times;

    In an interview in his home state, West Virginia, on Monday, Mr. Rockefeller, a Democrat, told The Charleston Gazette that Mr. McCain, the presumptive Republican nominee, could not relate to the everyday concerns of people on issues like health care.

    According to the article, Mr. Rockefeller said: “McCain was a fighter pilot, who dropped laser-guided missiles from 35,000 feet. He was long gone when they hit. What happened when they get to the ground? He doesn’t know. You have to care about the lives of people. McCain never gets into those issues.”

    The Times reports that Rockefeller has apologized and McCain has accepted;

    “I have deep respect for John McCain’s honorable and noble service to our country,” Mr. Rockefeller said in a statement. “I made an inaccurate and wrong analogy and I have extended my sincere apology to him. While we differ a great deal on policy issues, I profoundly respect and appreciate his dedication to our country, and I regret my very poor choice of words.”

    Later in the day, Mr. Rockefeller’s office issued an updated statement, saying Mr. McCain had graciously accepted the apology and the two had sat together privately during a vote in the Senate in the afternoon.

    Well, that’s all well and good. Senator McCain should accept his apology – that’s what gentlemen do in these times when it’s not quite fashionable to fire flintlock pistols at 20 paces at each other. But that doesn’t mean it’s over – not by a long shot. Rockefeller who has never had an uncomfortable day in his entire life, is indicative of the rot at the center of the Democrat Party and the political neo-new-Left as a whole.

    The Nation in an uncredited response on behalf of Rockefeller (who apparently has a serious lack of gonads to back up his charge) writes, after establishing their anonymous credentials by establishing that the writer grew up (as it were) in an Air Force family (whatever that means or counts);

    The campaign’s answer to criticism from McCain’s fellow senator was not to unleash the candidate and have him talk about his service in a thoughtful manner. It was to send a rather too frequently over-the-top supporter to launch a silly, bombastic attack on one of the presumptive Republican presidential nominee’s fellow senators.

    “Senator Rockefeller’s statement is an insult to all the men and women who are serving or have served in America’s military,” said Lt. Col. Orson Swindle, USMC (Ret.), a longtime McCain ally. “Had Senator Rockefeller served himself, he would appreciate and understand that most who have been to war emerge with a much deeper concern for humanity than they otherwise might. If he knew what he was talking about, he would know that John McCain wasn’t dropping laser-guided missiles at 35,000 feet in 1967.”

    The jab at the end is appropriate, but the rest of the statement a load of embarrassingly cheap political spin.

    Um, how is it “embarassingly cheap political spin” to say that warriors “emerge with a much deeper concern for humanity”? I know it to be the truest part of the whole statement. But it’s been my experience that the Left always attacks that which hurts them most – so this nameless writer from the Nation understands that it’s imperative to strike at a comment that makes McCain appear more deeply and personally involved in the decision to take human lives than, say Barack Obama, whose only tussle with such moral dilemmas involved emptying a mousetrap while keeping his fingers clean.

    The Left has already shown us what they think of human life – they defend the murder of the inconvenient, either pre-birth life, or the ill. Their record on human life includes a weeks-long bombing campaign against the Serbian people, conducted over 15,000 feet. I’m sure there are no records available for the numbers of Serbs killed by that bombing campaign.

    Rockefeller could have made the same statement in relation to John Kerry, who had occasion to fire the .50 caliber machine into the dense jungle from his swiftboat, not knowing what the 1/2 inch bullets were hitting. But, I’m pretty sure Rockefeller wouldn’t say about Kerry what he said about McCain.

    Democrats claim all of this experience by osmosis from being from Air Force families, or having a neighbor who had a cousin who knew someone who went to war in Nicaragua in the 1920s – but they never have personal experience. Knowing someone who wore a uniform once gives them instant moral authority in a discussion, they suppose.

    Nope. It doesn’t work that way, The Nation’s brave anonymous writer.

    I’m not saying that military experience gives me any moral authority in a discussion about the political application of force, but then, I’ve never said it does.

    Bullshit walks.

    UPDATE: I forgot to credit 509thBob for tipping me off to this. Love them tips.

  • Vets for Freedom Rally for troops

    About 480 veterans of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan assembled beginning at 8:30 this morning just across the street from the Senate wing of the Capitol. The temperature was about 45 degrees – global warming had struck. In their sand colored polo shirts, emblazoned across their broad chests with “Vets for Freedom”, they renewed old friendships and established new ones.

    There was a blogger or two there, too – most visible was the guy who’s hard to recognize without his cap;

    They were joined by some luminaries of the Senate;

    (Senator Lieberman slapped me on the back after I took this picture)

    And honest-to-goodness war heroes (SSG David Bellavia pictured);

    Pete Hegseth started the speechifying;

    [youtube UuTN2_y3MZE nolink]

    SSG Bellavia followed Hegseth;

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    Senator McCain addressed the veterans;

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    Then it was Senator Lieberman’s turn;

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    Each Senator took their turn (Uncle Jimbo from Blackfive asked me “Is there anyone left in the Senate or are they all out here?”) Including the only member of the Senate who actually served as a soldier in Iraq, Lindsey Graham (it’s a good thing Crotchety Old Bastard wasn’t there);

    Sam Johnson (R-TX), former POW (thanks to Punditarian for IDing him for me), took his hat off to the vets assembled this morning;

    Congressman Zach Wamp quoted John Stuart Mill;

    “War is an ugly thing, but not the ugliest of things. The decayed and degraded state of moral and patriotic feeling which thinks that nothing is worth war is much worse. The person who has nothing for which he is willing to fight, nothing which is more important than his own personal safety, is a miserable creature and has no chance of being free unless made and kept so by the exertions of better men than himself.”

    Jeff Sessions spoke about victory being imperative in Iraq;

    LTC Steve Russell addressed what Americans can do to support the efforts in the war.

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    The media actually showed up for this rally, to their credit;

    They actually seemed interested in what the veterans had to say (notice Uncle Jimbo doing another interview in the upper right corner of this picture – or maybe he’s doing another Free Fly);

    Speeches over, interviews concluded, these veterans set out on one more mission – to tell the Senate how much this war means to America.

    These veterans are the polar-opposite of the folks I met at IVAW last month. There was not a selfish bone in the crowd. They fought for their country and their families and now they’re fighting for their friends who can’t speak for themselves. They battled the odds, they battled the uncivilized enemy and now they battle doubt and emotional knee-jerk politicians.

    While I was working on this blog post, the stark comparison between the ideological sides was illustrated for me when (on my TV) some Leftist goober jumped up during General Petreaus’ testimony and shouted “Bring them home!” as he was dragged from the room and pink anti-war signs blocked the cameras. Where would those imbeciles be without a war to protest?

    And I found a new drinking buddy;

    Welcome readers and thank you, bloggers from Blackfive, Gateway Pundit, Little Green Footballs, The Jawa Report, Civilian Irregular Information Defense Group, 9-11 Families, Infidels Are Cool, Dusseldorf Blog, Buttle’s World and (last, but certainly not least) Baldilocks.

    UPDATED for Identifying speakers – I need a secretary, Thus Spake Ortner won’t last forever.

  • Vets take the Hill Tuesday

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    More than 400 veterans of the Afghanistan and Iraq operations are expected descend on the Capitol offices tomorrow morning. According to my buddy Thus Spake Ortner, from The Sniper and Veterans for Freedom, the schedule looks like this;

     

    Morning Preparation at the Sheraton National Hotel

    PLAN TO ARRIVE AT THE COMMONWEALTH BALLROOM BY 5:15 AM!

    PLEASE BE SEATED BY 5:30 AM SO WE CAN BEGIN PROMPTLY

    Location: Commonwealth Ballroom, Main Floor

    0530: Welcome and Introduction, Executive Director Pete Hegseth
    0545: Agenda for the Day, National Field Director Joel Arends
    0555: Congressional Meeting Overview, Legislative Director Josh Grodin

    * Continental Breakfast Served *
    0605: Communications Strategy, Communications Director Adam Fife

    0615: Q & A with Executive Director Pete Hegseth

    Guest Speakers:

    0625: Georgetown Men’s Basketball Head Coach: John Thompson III
    0640: Former Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, General Richard Myers, USAF (Ret.)
    0700: Final Remarks, Pete Hegseth
    0705: Load buses and depart for Capitol Hill

    0745: Arrive at Union Station/VFF Rally Point (Union Station Theater)

    * Please KEEP your bags on your bus until after the 8:30 event is over *

    0800: Walk to Upper Senate Park (2 blocks away)

    Capitol Hill

    0830: Vets for Freedom Capitol Hill Media Event with Senate & House members

    Attendees:

    Senators: McCain, Lieberman, Graham, Barrasso, Bond, Coburn, Inhofe, Isakson, Roberts, Sessions

    Members: Burgess, Johnson, King, McCotter, Poe, Reichert, Wamp, Whittman, Diaz- Balart, Wilson, Hayes

    Proposed Timeline:

    0830 – Pete Hegseth opening remarks, introduces David Bellavia

    0833 – David Bellavia makes brief remarks, introduces Senator McCain

    0835 – Senator McCain remarks

    0850 – Senator McCain concludes participation in VOTH

    0850 – Senator Lieberman remarks

    0852 – Senator Graham remarks

    0854 – Senator Inhofe remarks

    0856 – Senate Leadership remarks (TBD)

    0858 – Senator Bond remarks

    0900 – Congressman Marshall remarks

    0905 – Congressman Sam Johnson remarks

    0907 – House Leadership remarks (TBD)

    0910 – Marcus Luttrell concluding remarks, introduces Steve Russell

    0915 – Steve Russell concluding remarks

    0920 – Press Availability concludes

    1000: Vets arrive on Capitol Hill for full day of meetings

    * At any time during the day, and preferably before 12noon, vets can return to the VFF Rally Point (Union Station Theater) for free lunch and to unload bags from the bus *

    1700: Meetings complete

    I’m hooking up with them at Union Station with my trusty camera to get all of the pictures and videos I can for you. If you’re in the area, won’t you take a coupla hours off from work to join in?

    The Boston Herald warns that Code Pink plans to be there for General Petreaus’ testimony;

    Pegged to the fifth anniversary of Saddam Hussein’s fall, Congress is set for the latest progress report Tuesday and Wednesday by Army Gen. David Petraeus and U.S. Ambassador to Iraq Ryan Crocker. The hearings will draw overflow crowds, innumerable cameras and kibitzers galore.

    The last time Petraeus and Crocker testified, in September, three tiara-wearing protesters from Code Pink shouted until police escorted them from the hearing room. The anti-war activists will be back.

    “Yes,” Code Pink spokeswoman Dana Balicki said Friday, “we will be there, (and) I know other (peace) groups who will be in attendance.”

    Also in attendance will be Iraq Veterans Against the War, a group that wants the United States to withdraw from Iraq immediately.

    Vets for Freedom brings a markedly different message, representing what the organization calls the “trigger-pulling class.” As it did in September, when some 250 veterans flocked to Capitol Hill, Vets for Freedom is again trying to stiffen the congressional spine.

    It’ll be nice to spend time with the “trigger-pulling class” for a change.

  • Yon’s “Moment of Truth in Iraq”; my impressions

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    I just had mine delivered yesterday. Needless to say, I’m reading instead of blogging today – it’s pretty hard to put down. So get yours today while you’re waiting for Spring (and General Petraeus) to get here. I ordered mine months ago, but it’s been worth the wait.

    UPDATE: After having been subjected to the company of the liars, cowards and whiners (including snot-slinging, medal tossing drama queens) of the Iraq Veterans Against War, the Veterans for Peace,  the Vietnam Veterans Against the War, it was a pleasure to spend a day with the soldiers and Marines that Michael Yon met and was privileged  to watch doing their jobs. You know, the troops that the media aren’t particularly interested in.

    If you’re a regular reader of Michael Yon’s blog, you might recognize some of the stories and some of the people – but there are stories I don’t recall reading.

    Yon claims that his book is about the new “Greatest Generation” and they truly are as he describes them. The folks who are working so hard and sacrificing greatly to help us win. Yon’s greatest generation stand in stark contrast to the misfits and crybabies of IVAW who hog the cameras here in the US for purely selfish reasons.

    The book is also an indictment of the US media. They’ve been droning on and on about IEDs, the “grim milestone” watch, the temporary setbacks – and barely a word about the men and women who are doing the heavy lifting. Yon is just one man, but he’s brought more real stories about the real war back from Iraq than the entire media combined.

    When you buy this book, not only are you getting an inscribed book, you’re helping to keep Yon on the job and helping to insure we’ll continue to get the truth about the miracle workers we’ve sent into Iraq.

    Oh, and you’ll be sticking a finger in the eye of every nay-saying clown who call themselves “anti-war”.

  • “Shining” on Congress

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     Apparently, Nancy Pelosi doesn’t want to hear the truth. According to Politico, she has warned General Petraeus that when he briefs Congress this week, she doesn’t want him to  put a shine on recent events in Basra;

    House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) warned Army Gen. David Petraeus and Ambassador Ryan Crocker on Thursday not to “put a shine on recent events” in Iraq when they testify before Congress next week.

    “I hope we don’t hear any glorification of what happened in Basra,” said Pelosi, referring to a recent military offensive against Shiite militants in the city led by the Iraqi government and supported by U.S. forces.

    Although powerful Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr agreed to a ceasefire after six days of fighting, Pelosi wondered why the U.S. was caught off guard by the offensive and questioned how the ceasefire was achieved, saying the terms were “probably dictated from Iran.”

    “We have to know the real ground truths of what is happening there, not put a shine on events because of a resolution that looks less violent when in fact it has been dictated by al-Sadr, who can grant or withhold that call for violence,” Pelosi said.

    Now, I don’t know what that means unless she’s hinting that she just doesn’t want to hear the truth. Try as I might, I can’t out-write the staff of the Investors’ Business Daily in responding to Pelosi;

    “Glorification?” Heaven forfend we should glorify “what happened in Basra.” Our troops fought bravely, performing superbly the job assigned them by their own government — including you, Madam Speaker. But we shouldn’t “glorify” them.

    We’re not talking about a mere policy dispute here. There are lots of legitimate policy disputes, even about war. This is about the open contempt some members of one major party seem to hold for our men and women in uniform. It’s one thing to oppose a war, another to more or less openly root for us to lose it.

    Well, we have some real bad news for Ms. Pelosi. Seems a new National Intelligence Estimate is out. And it says what she fears most: The situation in Iraq is much improved. We’re winning.

    The New York Times quotes Pelosi in one of her Stalinesque double-speak moments;

    “I’m a big proponent of the First Amendment,” House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said. “But I would hope that as we set the stage for General Petraeus’s appearance before the committee, it is by shining a bright light of truth and a mirror on what he has to say and see how that is consistent with our greater national security goals.”

    Um, what does giving a briefing to Congress have to do with the First Amendment? The man is telling Pelosi what is happening in Iraq, not making a speech about political motivations.  I’d like to see her use the same standard for her own staff and her fellow Democrats in Congress when “shining a bright light of truth”.

    The Wall Street Journal highlights the differences between the Republicans and Democrats in the Presidential campaign;

     “Overall, it’s a remarkable success — overall with significant challenges ahead,” Mr. McCain told The Associated Press recently as he predicted what Mr. Petraeus will say about the troop-increase strategy and what he says he believes himself — even though the year of the buildup was the bloodiest yet for U.S. troops.

    Mrs. Clinton and Mr. Obama offer a sharp contrast to the Republican nominee-in-waiting.

    “It is time to end this war as quickly and responsibly as possible,” Mrs. Clinton said last month. She argued that the current strategy hasn’t accomplished its goals because Iraqis have not reached a political reconciliation.

    Mr. Obama also wants a quick end to the war and said Friday, “We still don’t have a good answer to the question posed by Sen. (John) Warner the last time Gen. Petraeus appeared: How has this effort in Iraq made us safer and how do we expect it will make us safer in the long run?”

    Mr. Obama said Mr. Bush and Mr. McCain have been “trumpeting improvements from a horrific situation to a simply unsustainable and intolerable situation.”

    The actual truth is; the Democrats are already taking big hits because of their ill-considered comments over the last five years and they’re rightly concerned that it will only get worse. Since they’ve hitched their wagon to the likes of the retarded ranks of Code Pink and the IVAW (who, by the way, don’t really want the war to end either), Democrats have painted themselves into a corner they can’t escape – except by lying to the American people, and now Pelosi wants General Petreaus to lie to Democrats.

    And the media is out taking preemptive potshots at  President Bush and General Petraeus to blunt the inevitable blow Petreaus will deal Congress this week, like this in the Washington Post today;

     Others see Bush’s reliance on Petraeus as part of a larger pattern. “It is part of Bush’s overall management style — to cede responsibility to a lower level and not look carefully at critical issues himself,” said Kenneth Adelman, a Reagan-era official who has parted company with such longtime friends as Rumsfeld and Vice President Cheney over the war.

    The old “Bush is an idiot” line. Well, we’ll just see, won’t we?

    Veterans for Freedom will be in the North Senate Park at 9:30 Tuesday morning – and so will I.

  • WaPo makes local killing about the war

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    McQueen/Smith

    In an article about one room mate killing killing the other, the Washington Post couldn’t help but make the story about the war against terror. the article entitled “Ex-Ranger Convicted of Killing Roommate“, the murder had nothing to do with the killer being an ex-Ranger;

    A former Army Ranger was found guilty of second-degree murder yesterday in the slaying of a fellow Ranger who died of a gunshot wound in their Gaithersburg apartment in 2006.

    After deliberating for six hours, a Montgomery County Circuit Court jury rejected Gary Smith’s claim that his roommate, Michael McQueen II, shot himself while the men were alone in their apartment.

    “This man got exactly what he deserved,” Michael McQueen, McQueen’s father, said of Smith after the verdict was returned. “We’re very, very, very relieved.”

    The defense and prosecution theories of the case pointed to mental struggles faced by many veterans returning from Iraq and Afghanistan. In extremes cases, veterans have harmed others or themselves.

    First of all, since no mention of their unit is in the article, I can’t make the determination whether either or both were truly Rangers – it’s been my experience that almost everyone who was ever in the Army claims to be a Ranger. No one was ever a cook or a clerk – it’s one big Ranger unit.

    Secondly, there was no need to mention that either were Rangers or even veterans. They probably could have just as truthfully titled the article “Ex-grocery clerk convicted of killing roommate”. The thing the media and the public in general forget is that veterans come from our general population – not from some farm where the government creates super-soldiers. Some guys are screwed up before they join, but most veterans are just everyday folks who look at what they had to do as a job and we move on when our time’s up.

    But the media likes to make more out of the rare cases of irrational conduct than actually exists.