Category: Veterans in politics

I got a call from our buddy, David Bellavia, this morning who told me about the problems he’s having in his campaign for New York’s 27th Congressional District. The bad stuff we talked about is better explained at Blackfive. Bellavia’s Republican opponent is trying to drag the Warrior Legacy Foundation into the campaign accusing them of funneling campaign cash to Bellavia. That’s a mighty slimy charge against a veteran and a veterans’ charity on Memorial Day weekend. But Chris Collins wouldn’t know much about veterans.

Collins graduated from high school in 1968 at the peak of the draft for the Vietnam War, but his rich daddy did what most rich daddies did back then – sent their kids off to college to get a college deferment. There weren’t grants and loans like there are today, so only the rich could afford to send their kids to college and avoid the draft.

Collins went to North Carolina State University. In 1969, NCSU was the site of one of the largest protests in the country against the Vietnam War;

On October 15, 1969, activists across the nation took part in one such rally. With an estimated two million participants, the Moratorium to End the War in Vietnam remains one of the largest demonstrations in American history. Students and faculty at North Carolina State University took part, devoting the entire day to Vietnam-related protests, exhibits, discussions, and classroom activities.

How much you want to bet that Chris Collins was in the middle of that protest? It would seem hard to avoid, wouldn’t it? Especially with all of those hairy-legged hippie chicks giving it away.

Collins is trying to derail Bellavia’s campaign because a few days ago, Bellavia brought up the fact that Collins supported one of New York Mayor Bloomberg’s anti-gun scams when Collins was county executive in Niagara County. Collins says that he didn’t realize what Bloomberg’s little band of gun grabbers was really trying to do, but honestly, who doesn’t know what Bloomberg’s stance is on private gun ownership? Collins says he quit Bloomberg’s group after two weeks, when he “discovered” Bloomberg’s ulterior motives. But how many of you would join anything Bloomberg initiated in relation to guns? I mean seriously.

And who would believe a draft dodger anyway?

David Bellavia has my unwavering support in the upcoming elections and the draft dodger has the promise that I’ll throat punch him at my next opportunity.

I know, I know, there are those among you veterans who can’t find it in your hearts to feel any love for senior NCO’s, especially first sergeants and sergeant majors. Actually, I never felt much warmth towards first sergeants either, because if they saw you idle for a single moment, they’d find a working detail for you. Sergeant majors, on the other hand, tended to be a bit more discriminatory in the way they wielded their exponentially greater power. I say this with some inside knowledge because after a first enlistment as a mouthy screw-up, never rising above E-4, I got my act together on my second enlistment and played by Army regs: I soldiered. I really did, knuckling down and getting serious about being a contributing member of the unit. It paid off in spades with TDY to Army schools, special assignments and rapid promotions to positions of responsibility. I became a battalion staff Chemical, Biological and Radiological warfare NCO, a CBR NCO. This, mind you, in spite of the fact that the only “D” I ever made in high school was in chemistry. Ah well, that is the United States Army way, is it not?

But back to the point: my position on the battalion staff gave me my first opportunity to watch a sergeant major in action. It became quickly apparent to me that the guy who really ran this battalion was that hard-nosed, crusty old (he had to be all of forty) fart who reigned and roared from just outside the battalion commander’s office. I was both impressed and intrigued, so I closely watched how this managerial process operated. Later as the CBR NCO for an Airborne brigade at Fort Bragg, I watched the process as it functioned at an even higher level. What became apparent to me was that sergeant majors were a force unto themselves, with an old-boy network that bridged the world. That was 1967 when the war in Vietnam was really getting hot; my sergeant major and my colonel both urged me to go to OCS. Thinking about it, I preferred a future as a wheeling-dealing sergeant major someday rather than as a dead Second Louie in ‘Nam. However I finally opted to be a G.I. Bill student and finish my degree, a move which parlayed into a pharmaceutical marketing career in the military market for the next thirty years where I had many opportunities to observe the special skills of these remarkable E-9 creatures of every service.

So why bring up all this? Because America now has some of these Army and Marine sergeant majors, Navy master chiefs and Air Force chief master sergeants, all pay grade E-9, who want to apply their formidable managerial skills to the operation of our totally screwed-up federal government. They believe they have the managerial savvy to go into Congress and displace some of those effete lawyers and show this nation what can happen when management is taken out of the hands of the congressional officer corps and given to some hard-nosed but fair military professionals who truly know how to manage. I believe they are right.

One of these candidates is Jim Kuiken, who’s running for a congressional seat in South Texas. Jim is a retired Marine Corps sergeant major with a personnel file for anyone to envy. He’s Force Recon, a term that immediately grabs respect from those in the inner circles of the military. For those of you reading this with no military knowledge, Force Recon are the select tough guys who parachute or swim in ahead of the landing or assault forces to provide commanders with vital knowledge of the developing battlefield. Once ashore, they operate behind the lines and engage the enemy where necessary, without all the air and artillery support available to more conventional units. That requires them to be extremely capable and self-sufficient. To become a leader of this elite force, Jim had to earn his Marine gold parachutists wings as well as a Navy diving badge, neither of which is awarded to the faint of heart or shirkers from danger. He served in combat in Iraq, earning his nation’s award for being wounded in battle, the Purple Heart. This is a South Texas congressional candidate with some cojónes mas grande, a qualification not readily apparent in the Texas Democratic congressman he seeks to replace.

Would this old soldier like to see a bunch of retired sergeant majors, master chiefs and chief master sergeants go into Congress to kick ass and take names? You bet your sweet butt I would. These are the managers and administrators who have kept our military operating on insufficient budgets and a shortages of manpower for decades. They know how to accomplish the impossible with the insufficient. Can they be ruthless? Yep, they sure as hell can and this is a nation begging for some ruthless, but well-intentioned, effective leadership. Can they stop all the stupid wasteful spending on inane government programs that our current congress won’t?

Well we won’t know that until we elect enough of them…
We need a bumper sticker that says, VOTE E-9.

Our buddy, David Bellavia is contemplating a run at New York’s 26th Congressional District seat again this election year. He’s formed an exploratory committee to decide whether he’s going to run or not. You aready know how I feel about Bellavia since I was up in his district collecting signatures for his candidacy last year. Anything you can do to help him this year would be appreciated.

The link above goes to his stand on the issues, and I think he’s probably on your side of the political spectrum. Give him a look and send words of encouragement.

Nucsnipe sent us a link yesterday about Cy Sun who won a contentious election last November for the office of mayor in his hometown of Pacific, Washington as a write-in candidate. Now it seems his opponents are trying to make questions about his military service and claims a reason to keep him from being in office;

Sun’s campaign literature said he earned a Purple Heart — a distinguished service medal — and an extremely rare Croix de Guerre, a French medal given to only a few Americans, including generals Patton and Eisenhower.

“(The claims) seemed outlandish. And somebody with the awards that he has claimed would be fairly well recognized in this state and in the veteran’s community. Nobody knows him,” said Hulsey.

Today we read that our buddy Doug Sterner is on the case;

Sun earned a Silver Star – the third-highest combat military decoration that can be awarded to a U.S. soldier – while serving in the Korean War, according to research by Doug Sterner, a curator for the Military Times Hall of Valor in Alexandria, Va.

The U.S. Army’s 2nd Infantry Division – Sun’s outfit – doesn’t list anyone with his name as a Silver Star recipient, Sterner pointed out, although he is listed by the Korean War Veterans Association.

Sterner’s database also shows a “Hebert Cy Sun” was awarded two Purple Hearts in Korea. Sun was wounded in action – Feb. 1, 1951, and Sept. 18, 1951, while he was with the Army’s 23rd Regiment of the 2nd Infantry Division.

Maybe we should all just keep our medals out of politics if they’re going to be used against us. Having said that, Sun should be working overtime to drag out the documents and quell the debate immediately. He claims that the paperwork is all boxed up, he should unbox it ASAP instead of making excuses. If you’re going to make your military service a matter of political debate, be ready to prove it.

I wrote about David Oh and Mike McCalister a few weeks ago. They’re both Republicans and they both made comments that were a little “iffy” about their military careers. They had both served with Special Forces units, but they weren’t school trained special forces officers.

David Oh was an 11-series infantry officer serving in an 18-series special forces officer slot. During Desert Storm he was activated with his Special Forces Detatchment, but he didn’t deploy. I don’t see where he did anything wrong in making claims that he served as a special forces officer because it looks like he did from where I sit.

McCalister was a colonel who worked at Special Operations Command at MacDill Air Force Base. McCalister said he was involved in some “black ops” – he probably was “involved” at some planning level, but not in an operational capacity.

Well, I’ve had some time to think about that first post, monitor some of the press and talk to TSO, and I’ve come to the conclusion that neither is really a case of Stolen Valor in my opinion. And the folks who are claiming that they are Stolen Valor are just using a wild stretch for their own political reasons.

Take McCalister, for example. I’ve emailed with Chuck Winn, McCalister’s main accuser and apparently the only member of the “Stolen Valor Task Force of Florida”. It seems that the SVTF’s only stolen valor research focuses on McCalister. it should be noted that Winn also opposed Marco Rubio’s campaign for the Senate in Florida last year while Winn worked for an opponent Republican.

Winn seemed just a little too eager to convince me that McCalister was embellishing his career. And the media seems real eager to take Winn’s word for it. Winn, it should be noted is also a veteran. He tells me that he had a 32-year career, 20 years on active duty which ended in 2000.

I’ll admit that McCalister has done some shady things, but not as shady as Winn makes it sound. Take for example this snippet from Tampa Bay Online;

…McCalister’s campaign website (http://mikemccalisterforsenate.com/) reported in response to criticism from Stolen Valor that he “served at the United States Special Operations Command … from September 1998 to September 2005.”

The service included time “as a Special Operations Action Officer” from September 1998 to September 1999; and as a research and analysis officer from September 1999 to September 2000, the website says.

McCalister then worked as assistant deputy chief in the Training, Doctrine and Education Division, Center for Operations, Plans and Policy from September 2000 to September 2005.

So he did work at SOCOM from 1998 to 2005…what’s their stupid point? Did he say that he worked as an operator? No he didn’t. Working at SOCOM is a pretty big deal, in my opinion. Some of our readers are colonels at SOCOM and I’m proud that they read us, and I’ve never asked them what they do…they work at SOCOM, isn’t that impressive enough?

In the beginning of the article, they make a specious claim that he “violated Army regulations” when he wore his uniform to a dinner;

On Feb. 16, GOP U.S. Senate candidate Mike McCalister, a retired Army National Guard and Reserves colonel, attended the Highlands County Republican Party Lincoln Day Dinner in full dress uniform.

That violated Army regulations, which allow former soldiers to wear uniforms on certain occasions but not to political events.

I think they’d have a tough time proving that his attendance at a dinner was in violation of the regs. Sure it was a Republican event, but it was also a “Lincoln Day dinner”. Not everything Republicans do as a group are political…they do social stuff, too. Unless McCalister was actually doing something like campaigning or endorsing a political issue, I don’t think it necessarily violates Army regulations.

I referenced Army regs in regards to Dan Choi’s clear violation of policies, but unless Winn is ready to call the Republicans an “extremist organization” I don’t think the regs would prohibit McCalister wearing his uniform to a dinner.

I don’t know, that’s my opinion. I’ve been a little tentative about writing in regards to this because I didn’t want to appear to favor Republicans, but I think I’d defend Democrats in the same position if I had to. But since no one ever heard of the Stolen valor Task Force before the McCalister campaign, I have to think they’re just bomb throwers tossed together to oppose McCalister.

I know you’ve all read about the email that Allen West sent to Debbie Wasserman-Schultz after Wasserman or Schultz or whatever personally attacked West on the floor of the House of Representatives and mischaracterized his stance on his elderly constituents. In response, West sent this email (from The Hill);

“Let me make myself perfectly clear, you want a personal fight, I am happy to oblige,” West wrote. “You are the most vile, unprofessional ,and despicable member of the US House of Representatives. If you have something to say to me, stop being a coward and say it to my face, otherwise, shut the heck up. Focus on your own congressional district!”

And he wasn’t done.

“From this time forward, understand that I shall defend myself forthright against your heinous characterless behavior,” West added. “You have proven repeatedly that you are not a Lady, therefore, shall not be afforded due respect from me!”

See, he was pretty mild – I’d have thrown in a few “you c…”. Anyway, yesterday on Fox Business News, West said he isn’t going to apologize;

…there are certain ways we talk in the military. I guess I haven’t learned the DC-insider talk.

Meaning all of that “my esteemed colleague” bullshit is just that. Well, of course, everyone is calling him a misogynist for daring to talk to a vaginal-American and calling her a liar. Even Dan Choi, the last person on the planet who should be talking about acceptable military conduct weighed in on Twitter (thanks to Brady);

Like Choi would recognize “what a true soldier” would do in any situation.

Yeah, I don’t think that Wasserman should hide her inability to mention the truth behind her sex. West didn’t say anything in that email that would indicate that he hates women in general. All of the girls should pull their claws back in and recognize that Wasserman or Schultz or whatever is just a vile person, no matter what she has between her legs. And if someone like Dan Choi is defending you, you must’ve done something wrong.