From the Truman National Security Project, a video featuring testimony from veterans of Iraq and Afghanistan especially, questioning whether Mitt Romney has what it takes to be Commander-in-Chief of the U.S. armed forces:
The Truman Project’s blog lays out the case for President Obama’s election with respect to his initiatives on behalf of veterans. As much as I would prefer to see those positive achievements emphasized, campaigns don’t really allow much time for careful, thoughtful explanation.
Will there be any effect from this advertisement? What do you think?
Reuters: “Swing state ad from hawkish Democrats hits Romney on foreign policy” – “There are more than 20 million American veterans, 15.8 million of whom cast ballots in the 2008 election cycle, according to the U.S. Census Bureau. Many veterans live in states key to Obama’s re-election, such as Ohio, where there are more than 900,000 veterans, according to Department of Veterans Affairs data.”
Mike Breen, North Hampton vet, speaks out with Truman Project; Seacoastonline; [From the article]: Contrast that with the “dead silence” at the Republican National Convention on the topic of the troops, and [New Hampshire Attorney General Phil McLaughlin] said the positions of the two candidates could not be more clear. “It’s as though (to Republicans) there were no Iraq. It’s as though there were no Afghanistan. It’s as though there were no veterans,” he said.
Spread the word; friends don't allow friends to repeat history.
President Barack Obama spoke at Fort Bliss, Texas, On August 31, 2012:
Description from the White House:
On the two-year anniversary of the end of our combat mission in Iraq, the President speak to troops at Fort Bliss, and discusses that part of ending wars responsibly demands standing by those who have served. August 31, 2012.
Years ago I feared that many of us learned the wrong lessons from Vietnam, or if we learned the right ones, we weren’t applying what we’d learned. This was a bit more important in the earlier days of our involvement in Afghanistan and Iraq. So I wrote about one of the lessons we needed to improve on: Honoring the people who serve, regardless our view on the entire engagement.
Someday, perhaps when I’m wiser, I’ll get back to that series on the lessons of Vietnam.
A lot of water flowed under the bridge since then. A lot of blood flowed, too.
We did better with our two latest engagements, as a nation, in honoring soldiers. For just one example, DFW Airport set up a special lounge for soldiers returning stateside, and dozens of organizations set up programs to get people out to welcome the soldiers from Iraq with an indoor parade of sorts — Girl Scouts, Boy Scouts, groups of retired veterans and other citizens, school social studies classes, and many more.
That still leaves us with the scab of our treatment of veterans from Vietnam. It’s been good to see cities and organizations make serious efforts to remember them specifically, as well as veterans of Korea-“The-Forgotten-War,” with soldiers and veterans of the modern conflicts. There is more we need to do, I’m sure.
I ran into this short video from Moments.org. I don’t know about the rest of that organization’s ministries, but this video got it right:
So, Wes, McClain, Kevin, Ben, Brenda, Steve, Pat, Al, Ken, Ray, David, Jeff and Jon, and all the rest of you who served, especially in or during Vietnam, consider this as one for you.
Not sure if you heard about the first army chaplain to have been killed since the 70s, but he was killed on Aug. 30th in Afghanistan. Several pastors I know knew him as a personal dear friend – a true American hero who loved God, loved the troops he served, and gave his life going above and beyond to be with them.
Guess who will be there protesting his funeral? Westboro Baptist Church – protesting the funeral of a Baptist chaplain! The only way it ties in to this discussion is the “should factor”, but I’m sorry – I just had to voice that this sort of stuff is so disgraceful and makes me so upset – especially when our soldiers are dying to give them the freedom to protest at their funerals! :-( For shame!
Here’s the news article:
kktv.com/military/headlines/102406419.html
At KKTV’s site the story is very short; here it is the complete article:
A controversial Baptist Church group from Kansas says they’ll be in Southern Colorado to protest at a funeral for an army chaplain who was killed in Afghanistan.
Captain Dale Goetz died August 30 in Afghanistan. He’s the first army chaplain to die in combat since 1970.
A funeral has been set for Thursday at Fort Carson, and that’s where the Westboro Baptist Church says they’ll be as well to protest.
Members of the church have repeatedly protested the acceptance of homosexuals by picketing at the funerals of fallen soldiers.
It’s very controversial move.
11 News is asking what do you think about the planned demonstration? We’d like to hear from you. Just comment on this story on the 11 news Facebook page or here on kktv.com.
He [Goetz] acknowledged that Muslim concerns over what they perceive as a degenerate Western culture can drive some Muslims toward terror. “As Americans we repudiate the practice of the terrorist,” he said. “Though I disagree with their practice, I do understand their complaints against western society.” Goetz wondered if Americans are devoted to something so much that they would willingly die for it. “Our love for freedom is worth dying for,” he concluded, “and many have gone before us to preserve this freedom.”
Early in the U.S. involvement in World War II Americans had to put up with those factions who had argued that the U.S. should intervene on Germany’s side in Europe. But I don’t recall that the pro-Germany groups kept up their protests much after Germany declared war on the U.S. In the long arc of the history of our wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, America’s longest-ever wars, does a sense of history and honor smack the crazies in Christian pulpits in the head to make them think?
Our Constitution’s strength proves itself over and over, as courts have ruled that Westboro Baptist has the right to make these protests. Their continued exercise of that right is a testament against the lack of a national education system and against the virtue of religion in the failure of common decency of the tiny band of protesters. Al Queada draws strength from the protests of the Westboro crew, and al Quaeda draws recruits from the actions of the Florida band who plans to burn scriptures.
Walt Kelly’s Pogo observed, “We has met the enemy, and he is us.”
Literally flying the flag -- Lt. Col. Chris Ashby sits in an F-16 Fighting Falcon and displays the U.S. flag before departing on a combat mission over Iraq, Jan. 29 from Balad Air Base, Iraq. Colonel Ashby is the 332nd Air Expeditionary Wing chief of Safety deployed from the 20th Fighter Wing, Shaw Air Force Base, S.C. (U. S. Air Force photo/Staff Sgt. Michael R. Holzworth)
Spread the word; friends don't allow friends to repeat history.
New evidence from former United States officials reveals that Osama bin Laden and other al-Qaeda leaders were able to skip Afghanistan for Pakistan unimpeded in the first weeks after September 11, 2001, as the George W Bush administration failed to plan to block their retreat.
Top administration officials instead gave priority to planning for war with Iraq, leaving the United States with not nearly enough troops or strategic airlift capacity to close the large number of possible exit routes through the Afghanistan-Pakistan border area where Bin Laden escaped in late 2001.
Because it had not been directed to plan for that contingency, the US military was also forced to turn down an offer from then Pakistani president Pervez Musharraf in late November 2001 to send 60,000 troops to intercept the al-Qaeda leaders.
Nuts. Who could ever have guessed that incompetence in the White House could so cripple our military, and ultimately, so cripple our nation?
Can we move inauguration day up to December 1? Please?
Spread the word; friends don't allow friends to repeat history.
Rick Noriega is a rising star, a good man who has served his nation and state well, in Iraq, in the Texas legislature, and now — he hopes — in the U.S. Senate.
The Pentagon is spending about $6 billion a month on the war in Iraq, or about $200 million a day, according to the CBO [Congressional Budget Office]. That is about the same as the gross domestic product of Nigeria.
George W. Bush was famously untravelled as a candidate for the U.S. Presidency. He had spent more time hanging out in bars just over the border in Juarez than hanging with diplomats anywhere. In 2000, conservatives found this lack of care about foreign nations, U.S. interventions, and foreign people to be “charming,” sort of a poke-in-the-eye to the Rhodes scholar-rich Democratic Party who worried about things like peace in Palestine and getting the North Koreans to agree to stop building nuclear devices (who could be afraid of a bad-hair guy like Kim Jong-Il anyway?).
That was then. Now they desperately have to find something about Barack Obama to complain about. Never mind that Obama has spent more time overseas and in Iraq than George W. Bush, still. While John McCain can get his information in a one-day, flack-jacketed, armored personnel-carrier tour of Iraq, Obama’s two days isn’t enough to please Glenn Reynolds at Instapundit nor Jim Geraghty at National Review Online.
Observation: Conservatives are really, really desperate to find mud on a nice guy; Reynolds and others really are losing badly on issues, to make so much of so little. Also, William F. Buckley has been dead for just over three months, and NR has already gone to hell, deteriorating to a barking-dog cutout of its former intellectual heft.
Spread the word; friends don't allow friends to repeat history.
One of the lessons of Vietnam is that we need to honor our soldiers who go to defend the nation, even when the wars may be of dubious origin. The dubious origins of war cannot be blamed on the soldiers, sailors and airmen who go to do their duty, and they are the ones who can redeem the nation from a disastrous foreign policy, if anyone can.
Love the serviceman, hate the war. Honor the soldier, work on the politicians to change the policy. It’s a workable arrangement that honors good people for doing noble service.
Remember: Memorial Day honors those who died in service to the country; Veterans Day honors the veterans who came back, having served. Armed Forces Day honors those who serve today.
Fly your flag today.
Spread the word; friends don't allow friends to repeat history.
A couple of weeks ago I attended the screening for the documentary. Just a refresher – it follows four vets from Iraq & their difficulties in readjusting to society. I think it will be a real eye opener for civilians. It will be aired on PBS this fall. Hop over to my blog – http://jbchristensen.wordpress.com for my post regarding the screening.
Spread the word; friends don't allow friends to repeat history.
The map of Baghdad, above, was found in a raid on an al Quaeda house in the past year. It details the organization of al Quaeda, especially with regard to shipping guns, ammunition and explosives into Baghdad.
Armed with this knowledge, U.S. forces set about severing each of the cells from each other, separating the pieces of the snake to kill the beast.
A map drawn by Al Qaeda in Iraq leader Abu Musab al-Zarqawi — who was killed last year by U.S. forces — turned up last December in an Al Qaeda safe house and essentially gave U.S. war planners insight into the terrorist group’s methods for moving explosives, fighters and money into Baghdad.
“The map essentially laid out how Al Qaeda controlled Baghdad. And they did it through four belts that surrounded the city, and these belts controlled access to the city for reinforcements and weapons and money,” said Maj. Gen. Bob Scales, a FOX News contributor who recently visited Iraq.
That’s what geographic knowledge can do. It can be the difference between peace and war, the difference between life and death.
Spread the word; friends don't allow friends to repeat history.
One of the lessons of Vietnam was that we need to honor and thank our soldiersespecially when they get sent to execute bad foreign policy. So, regardless your views on current conflicts, you could perform a service, with the help of Xerox, by sending a card, from here.
No cost. Try it.
Tip of the old scrub brush to Brother Dwight.
Spread the word; friends don't allow friends to repeat history.
Okay, not George Santayana himself. Not even Santayana’s Ghost™. It’s really Wiley, with “Non Sequitur.”
This is close to the perfect cartoon. It would have been timely during the American Revolutionary War, at times in England, at times in America. It would have been timely during periods of the Texas fight for independence. It would have been timely in the early part of the War Between the States, for the Union into 1862, for the Confederacy later. It’s perfect for the Phillipines uprising during the Teddy Roosevelt and Woodrow Wilson administrations. It fits Korea. It fits Vietnam. Some argue it fits Iraq.
Is this guy really a political cartoonist hiding on the funny pages?
Probably not — I could use this cartoon in a corporate presentation with good effect, and to the point. It’s a universal problem of human organizations.
Or, until that account is unsuspended by the forces supporting Donald Trump: Follow @FillmoreWhite, the account of the Millard Fillmore White House Library
Error: Please make sure the Twitter account is public.
Dead Link?
We've been soaking in the Bathtub for several months, long enough that some of the links we've used have gone to the Great Internet in the Sky.
If you find a dead link, please leave a comment to that post, and tell us what link has expired.
Thanks!
Retired teacher of law, economics, history, AP government, psychology and science. Former speechwriter, press guy and legislative aide in U.S. Senate. Former Department of Education. Former airline real estate, telecom towers, Big 6 (that old!) consultant. Lab and field research in air pollution control.
My blog, Millard Fillmore's Bathtub, is a continuing experiment to test how to use blogs to improve and speed up learning processes for students, perhaps by making some of the courses actually interesting. It is a blog for teachers, to see if we can use blogs. It is for people interested in social studies and social studies education, to see if we can learn to get it right. It's a blog for science fans, to promote good science and good science policy. It's a blog for people interested in good government and how to achieve it.
BS in Mass Communication, University of Utah
Graduate study in Rhetoric and Speech Communication, University of Arizona
JD from the National Law Center, George Washington University
Posted by Ed Darrell 
Millard Fillmore's Bathtub 