Wednesday, November 01, 2006
Kerry's a Candyass Douchebag
I can't believe this crap. Seriously, its apparently all the rage to bash Kerry for his comments about US soldiers, or rather, the US Army sometimes being the occupation of last resort. Hey folks, it is!! Jee-zus Christmas. OK, yes we all know someone who has joined up for the most altruistic and patriotic of reasons. But here's the rub, the US military has simply run out of those folks. That's one reason why recruiting is down. Well, that and the all-volunteer army has some benefits, like education you couldn't otherwise afford--but that tends to dry up when you realize that to get those bennies you'll have to pull a few tours in our own self-created hell-on-earth that is Iraq.
Let's just look at West Virignia's most famous and infamous Iraq War vets, Jessica Lynch and Lynndie England. I think one sentence in England's bio says it all, "England joined the Army Reserve in Cumberland in 2001 while she was a junior at Frankfort High School near Short Gap, to escape from a night job in a chicken-processing factory in Moorefield and to earn money so she could go to college to become a storm chaser."
So if one is poor, undereducated, and has very few if any other opportunities to try to shed a miserable backwater or inner-city existence for at least a fleeting chance at another life, the military just might be your only career move. Is there really any argument with that?
OK, now let's look at Iraq in particular. Since 2001 there are numerous reports, official and anecdotal, of the lowering standards the US military has been forced to employ to keep up the number of recruits needed. A comprehensive list can be found here. Lets look at three categories:
Dummies- Brad Knickerbocker of the Christian Science Monitor noted, "The Army has had to recruit more soldiers from the 'lowest acceptable' category based on test scores, education levels, personal background, and other indicators of ability." Even Undersecretary of Defense Chu admitted in July that almost 40% of all military recruits scored in the bottom half of the Armed Forces' own aptitude test.
Crazies- Last year, the New York Times reported that two Ohio recruiters were quick to sign up a recruit "fresh from a three-week commitment in a psychiatric ward even after the man's parents told them he had bipolar disorder -- a diagnosis that would disqualify him." After senior officers found out, the mentally ill man's enlistment was canceled, but in "[i]nterviews with more than two dozen recruiters in 10 states," the Times heard others talk of "concealing mental-health histories and police records," among other illicit practices.
Criminals- In February of this year, the Baltimore Sun wrote that there was "a significant increase in the number of recruits with what the Army terms 'serious criminal misconduct' in their background" -- a category that included: "aggravated assault, robbery, vehicular manslaughter, receiving stolen property and making terrorist threats." From 2004 to 2005, the number of those recruits had spiked by over 54%, while alcohol and illegal drug waivers, reversing a four-year downward trend, increased by over 13%.
And the poster child for all of the above was Steven Green. He was the fresh-faced young American liberator high-school dropout who planned the rape of a 14 year-old Iraqi girl who caught his eye (hey, I'm sure dressed in that headscarf and long robe she was just askin' for it), who killed her parents and 5 year old sister, then gang-raped the girl with his pals, shot her in the face when he was done, then finally set her on fire to destroy the house and crime scene. Green "had been "a high-school dropout from a broken home who enlisted to get some direction in his life, yet was sent home early because of an 'anti-social personality disorder.'" Recently, Eli Flyer, a former Pentagon senior military analyst and specialist on "the relationship between military recruiting and military misconduct" told Harper's Magazine that Green had actually "enlisted with a moral waiver for at least two drug- or alcohol-related offenses. He committed a third alcohol-related offense just before enlistment, which led to jail time, though this offense may not have been known to the Army when he enlisted."
And Kerry should apologize?!
Maybe Bush and Cheney should apologize for making our military a dumping ground for the less savory in our society just to provide IED-fodder for convoy runs and patrols in Al Anbar Province. Its these people who are giving our military a black-eye--they shouldn't be there and wouldn't be under any other circumstances. Maybe the corporate-run government should apologize for limiting educational and future options for so many middle- and lower-income Americans that the military is their only option, even during a futile and bloody war with no end in sight.
But no, instead of defending the very, very defensible (at least with a bit of explanation) Kerry gets into some lame "I blew a Bush joke" shtick instead of laying bare the truth. What a pussy.
I can't believe this crap. Seriously, its apparently all the rage to bash Kerry for his comments about US soldiers, or rather, the US Army sometimes being the occupation of last resort. Hey folks, it is!! Jee-zus Christmas. OK, yes we all know someone who has joined up for the most altruistic and patriotic of reasons. But here's the rub, the US military has simply run out of those folks. That's one reason why recruiting is down. Well, that and the all-volunteer army has some benefits, like education you couldn't otherwise afford--but that tends to dry up when you realize that to get those bennies you'll have to pull a few tours in our own self-created hell-on-earth that is Iraq.
Let's just look at West Virignia's most famous and infamous Iraq War vets, Jessica Lynch and Lynndie England. I think one sentence in England's bio says it all, "England joined the Army Reserve in Cumberland in 2001 while she was a junior at Frankfort High School near Short Gap, to escape from a night job in a chicken-processing factory in Moorefield and to earn money so she could go to college to become a storm chaser."
So if one is poor, undereducated, and has very few if any other opportunities to try to shed a miserable backwater or inner-city existence for at least a fleeting chance at another life, the military just might be your only career move. Is there really any argument with that?
OK, now let's look at Iraq in particular. Since 2001 there are numerous reports, official and anecdotal, of the lowering standards the US military has been forced to employ to keep up the number of recruits needed. A comprehensive list can be found here. Lets look at three categories:
Dummies- Brad Knickerbocker of the Christian Science Monitor noted, "The Army has had to recruit more soldiers from the 'lowest acceptable' category based on test scores, education levels, personal background, and other indicators of ability." Even Undersecretary of Defense Chu admitted in July that almost 40% of all military recruits scored in the bottom half of the Armed Forces' own aptitude test.
Crazies- Last year, the New York Times reported that two Ohio recruiters were quick to sign up a recruit "fresh from a three-week commitment in a psychiatric ward even after the man's parents told them he had bipolar disorder -- a diagnosis that would disqualify him." After senior officers found out, the mentally ill man's enlistment was canceled, but in "[i]nterviews with more than two dozen recruiters in 10 states," the Times heard others talk of "concealing mental-health histories and police records," among other illicit practices.
Criminals- In February of this year, the Baltimore Sun wrote that there was "a significant increase in the number of recruits with what the Army terms 'serious criminal misconduct' in their background" -- a category that included: "aggravated assault, robbery, vehicular manslaughter, receiving stolen property and making terrorist threats." From 2004 to 2005, the number of those recruits had spiked by over 54%, while alcohol and illegal drug waivers, reversing a four-year downward trend, increased by over 13%.
And the poster child for all of the above was Steven Green. He was the fresh-faced young American liberator high-school dropout who planned the rape of a 14 year-old Iraqi girl who caught his eye (hey, I'm sure dressed in that headscarf and long robe she was just askin' for it), who killed her parents and 5 year old sister, then gang-raped the girl with his pals, shot her in the face when he was done, then finally set her on fire to destroy the house and crime scene. Green "had been "a high-school dropout from a broken home who enlisted to get some direction in his life, yet was sent home early because of an 'anti-social personality disorder.'" Recently, Eli Flyer, a former Pentagon senior military analyst and specialist on "the relationship between military recruiting and military misconduct" told Harper's Magazine that Green had actually "enlisted with a moral waiver for at least two drug- or alcohol-related offenses. He committed a third alcohol-related offense just before enlistment, which led to jail time, though this offense may not have been known to the Army when he enlisted."
And Kerry should apologize?!
Maybe Bush and Cheney should apologize for making our military a dumping ground for the less savory in our society just to provide IED-fodder for convoy runs and patrols in Al Anbar Province. Its these people who are giving our military a black-eye--they shouldn't be there and wouldn't be under any other circumstances. Maybe the corporate-run government should apologize for limiting educational and future options for so many middle- and lower-income Americans that the military is their only option, even during a futile and bloody war with no end in sight.
But no, instead of defending the very, very defensible (at least with a bit of explanation) Kerry gets into some lame "I blew a Bush joke" shtick instead of laying bare the truth. What a pussy.
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