Of course, most of you know that I volunteered to cover the IVAW’s Winter Soldier II “hearings” next month. Well, apparently some of the members of IVAW are a little worried about that. I sent them my DD214 (redacted, of course) and they’ve pretty much ignored my application to blog their event. Until now.<\/p>\n
I received this email (I don’t usually post email I receive, but this one graphically illustrates the types that IVAW attracts) from this IVAW member named Jonathan DeWald;<\/p>\n
Hey bro,<\/p>\n
You know why I was a Sergeant after ten years? Blasting a loud-mouthed E7 in the mouth when I was a promotable Staff Sergeant. He had the same sour, b****y look you do in your DA photo… where you’re also an E7! What an amazing coincidence. Another sassy senior NCO stepping into my sector of fire. Anyway, luckily for me, everyone else in all of V Corps hated that fat pogue as well and I got off with just an Article 15. And my disability comp gets paid at the E6 rate!<\/p>\n
You’ll be providing “security escorts” to Gathering of Chickenshits members “counter-demonstrating” at IVAW events like Winter Soldier II? That’s a laugh. In response to your statement on Robin the Man-Thing’s page (I really had no idea she was considered a woman. I thought she was a dude with man-***s.), any “encounter” between us will go down however the **** I see fit.<\/p>\n
Though I truly do hope to see you and every other Gaggle**** of ****birds member in DC next March, I must advise you Winter Soldier is being held at a private college. The campus police have already been instructed to arrest any of you dip****s who attempt to trespass. I personally thought we had room to accommodate all 17 members of GoE, but with 100 vets testifying, another 700 in attendance, 100 members of the national and international media, an as-yet undetermined number of Iraqi and Afghan civilians (man, the government’s making it hard to get the travel visas!) and perhaps another 100 scholars, legislators and other guests, we simply have no room for you!<\/p>\n
But I’ll be at my favorite DC haunts every night I’m there: Hawk and Dove, Sign of the Whale and every bar in Adams Morgan. Come on in and see me. Unless you’re afraid to mouth off to me when there are no cameras or cops around to protect your b**** ass.<\/p>\n
At ease,<\/p>\n
Jon<\/p>\n
—
\nKEEP IT NECRO.<\/p><\/blockquote>\nWhatever that “keep it necro” means unless he’s threatening to kill me or something.<\/p>\n
But, I got that at about 5:30 this morning (Zulu). Apparently he felt the need to address my offer to Robin at Chickenhawk Express<\/a> to escort her to the IVAW “hearings” after he threatened her physically.<\/p>\n
Keeping in mind that the name of the organization is “Iraq<\/strong> Veterans Against the War”, I checked out Mr DeWald’s profile at IVAW<\/a>;<\/p>\n
Branch of service:<\/strong> United States Army (USA)
\nUnit:<\/strong> Rakkasan Regiment, 101st Airborne \/ 1st Tank, 2nd ID
\nRank: <\/strong>Sergeant (Retired)
\nHome:<\/strong> Milwaukee, Wisconsin
\nServed in:<\/strong> Fort McCoy, Wisconsin, USA: Fort Campbell, Kentucky, USA; Fort Polk, Louisiana; USA; Camp Casey, Republic of Korea; Babenhausen Kaserne, Federal Republic of Germany; Novy Mir Garrison, Sul\u00c4\u2122cin, Republic of Poland; Walter Reed Army Medical Center, Washington, DC, USA.<\/p><\/blockquote>\nNo mention of Iraq at all, well, unless they moved it to Poland and didn’t tell anyone. So I guess he’s just another wannabe phony soldier. As Thus Spake Ortner mentioned in his post at The Sniper<\/a>, even Jessie MacBeth qualified for membership in the IVAW with his 42 days at the CCF barracks in Fort Benning.<\/p>\n
I may be stepping outside my area of expertise here, but I’ve never heard of “1st tank” outside of the Marine Corps. I know they have a 1st Tank Battalion at 29 Palms, but I’m not aware of any Army unit, anywhere called the “1st Tank” – the Army calls them armor battalions. And I’m not sure what an infantryman would be doing in an armor battalion unless he was working at a pogue staff job.<\/p>\n
Now, Mr. DeWald claims to be an Infantryman – but I only see three possible duty stations for an infantryman in his list. Campbell, Polk and Camp Casey. And eight duty stations in ten years (and he doesn’t mention basic or AIT stations). That’s a lot! Unless he’s counting the places he visited or trained.<\/p>\n
But back to DeWald’s email. He mentions disability comp “paid at an E-6 rate”. Now I get a disability check from the VA and I don’t get an E-grade rate. I get a flat percentage rating – the VA doesn’t care what a disabled veteran’s pay grade was, it pays everyone the same. Now, it’s possible that he’s talking about his Army retired pay (if he’s retired for medical reasons) and it’s impossible to retire at an “E-6 rate”. The Army computes retirement pay on your last three months’ pay on active duty – not on pay grade information. So I don’t know what this fellow is talking about.<\/p>\n
I’m assuming that DeWald is referring to the photo of me in uniform on my “About” page. But, as most career soldiers know, it’s not a DA photo. A DA photo is a full length shot of the whole uniform and it’s black-and-white (or at least it was the last time I took one). So I guess there’s something else this “retired” E-5 doesn’t know about military service.<\/p>\n
I’m not a member of the Gathering of Eagles, even though I fully support their activities. And if DeWald had ever been to a Gathering of Eagles, there are a few more than 17 members. There were thousands at their first counterprotest last March 17th and numbers have grown since. I know it bothers the Left and the IVAW that they are outnumbered, so the disingenuously deflate the numbers of their opponents.<\/p>\n
DeWald, though has a real hard-on for the GOE folks. He wrote about them at the IVAW site<\/a>;<\/p>\n
Have you heard of these guys? Man, they blow my mind! I’ve never seen so much patriotism confined to one website: http:\/\/gatheringofeagles.org\/. How do they contain all that kick-ass patriotism with such a small amount of bandwidth? I thought I was a patriot: driving my Ford all drunk, getting tattoos of naked chicks, beer mugs, bald eagles and Confederate battle flags, and then these guys come along and BOOM! I get to see, first-hand, what a real bad-ass American looks like. I thought I was supposed to go to the gym and get all muscular. Nope! To judge from the physiques and pr\u00c3\u00aat-\u00c3 -porter<\/em> attire of the Eagles, all I need is regular access to a buffet and some straight-leg Wranglers to attain that patriotic chic<\/em>.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
Well, that’s some real mature stuff, ain’t it? It’s real apparent that DeWald has some real “daddy issues” that he needs to deal with before he goes out in public.<\/p>\n
Well, after that first email, I replied to DeWald that he should step back and take a deep breath before he gets himself in trouble for what he’s writing to people. His reply;<\/p>\n
My man,<\/p>\n
I’ve taken a step back. I’ve breathed deeply. And I’ve never met a loudmouthed conservative\/Republican\/fascist whose ass I couldn’t kick in under 30 seconds. The challenge still stands, tough guy. If you or any of those other ****ing corny sham “patriots” want to double down on your laughable bull**** threats, I’m available. I told you where to find me in DC come March. You know where my boxing club is in Milwaukee.<\/p>\n
I really hope one of you pogues comes after me. I haven’t beaten the **** out of somebody in the street and outside of the ring in awhile. I especially hope; no, I pray that one of you ***heads pulls a weapon on me. Make it a good one, though, and not some bull**** like a Taurus or an M9. I really want a Springfield XD in .40 cal.<\/p>\n
Thanks dude,<\/p>\n
Jon<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
Now, I never threatened him (except that I did threaten to expose him as a poser unless he got himself under control – which is what I’m doing here), but all of a sudden he has visions of me pulling a gun on him (hand guns are illegal for everybody in DC, so I figure he’ll be in the wrong place if he’s hoping for a confrontation involving firearms).<\/p>\n
So I guess this is IVAW’s way of trying to tell me that I won’t be blogging their Winter Soldier II “hearings”, since I’m the one DeWald chose to start sending emails. Pretty cowardly, actually. But predictable. IVAW attracts some pretty unsavory people. They have the Jesse MacBeth saga – the Pink Power Ranger, they have Adam Kokesh – the gun smuggler, and now this illiterate psychopath. Not to mention all of the other phony soldiers who’ve forced me to expose them as posers and sociopathic liars.<\/p>\n