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"Phony Soldiers"

Via the Out Of Iraq Blogger Caucus, Alex, a "phony soldier", at his site Army of Dude. A great post. Make sure you read it.

This is an Open Thread.

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    Building a Casus Belli... I mean a base. (5.00 / 2) (#1)
    by Edger on Sat Sep 29, 2007 at 11:40:59 AM EST
    'Combat Outpost Shocker:'
    The US military is building a base in Iraq just five miles from the border with Iran to prevent cross-border arms smuggling. The base, called "Combat Outpost Shocker," will be manned by 200 soldiers, along with agents from the US Border Patrol, and will monitor truck traffic and cellphone conversations among Shi'ite pilgrims.

    "Obviously, [the Iranians] probably won't be very happy about it," Col. Mark Mueller, the commander of the border transition team, told ABC News.



    Hot pursuit (5.00 / 1) (#2)
    by Big Tent Democrat on Sat Sep 29, 2007 at 11:42:48 AM EST
    :::Desperately::: Seeking Salvation (none / 0) (#3)
    by Edger on Sat Sep 29, 2007 at 11:44:51 AM EST
    Yup, and it is going to be a Shocker (5.00 / 1) (#16)
    by Militarytracy on Sun Sep 30, 2007 at 04:54:40 AM EST
    for some when Iran gets bombed back to the stone age before Bush/Cheney leave office.  Outpost Combat Shocker is simply a carrot hoping to be attacked by a couple of supposedly Iranian someones and then it will become Base Shocker, a mopping up point and one of many staging areas for the fireworks show!  Will they call that bombing the Shocker and Awer?  Maybe the Real Shocker will be when some of those Americans who have been crossing from Afghanistan into Iran covertly for the past year and a half dressed up in local garb help to inspire an attack on Outpost Combat Shocker.  Cheney did once tell the entire world that there were Iraqi tanks lined up on the Saudi border preparing to attack when he was afraid they weren't going to let him have the first Gulf War, there isn't any lie too big for that ____!

    Parent
    Intense linkage. Thank you. (5.00 / 2) (#4)
    by oculus on Sat Sep 29, 2007 at 12:08:27 PM EST


    Thanks for the (5.00 / 3) (#8)
    by tnthorpe on Sat Sep 29, 2007 at 02:17:16 PM EST
    link. Very powerful.

    When I was a kid of about 9 or 10 my older cousin Robbie was killed in Vietnam. He was 10 years older than me, which meant that I idolized him and he didn't have much time for me. I remember when he signed up and was going to be sent off to fight, the atmosphere in my aunt and uncle's house was so tense. When he was killed, it was a tragedy that ripped the family apart.

    When I hear about a wingnut like Limbaugh calling any soldier phony, it sickens me. Limbaugh and his ilk like to make a stink condemning those who condemn the war, as it's a way to turn attention from the disaster that the war is.

    All that matters is to end the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Bring the troops home now!  Hold accountable those who send them to fight without enough support (whether material or strategic), engage in private sector profiteering, and use the war for their own politically expedient ends, whether Dem or Rep.

    Parent

    Amazing (5.00 / 1) (#5)
    by squeaky on Sat Sep 29, 2007 at 12:29:41 PM EST
    Clearly Red America is all that exists, the rest of the world is a figment of everyone else's phony imagination. It is all done with photoshop, mirrors are a quaint anachronism.

    Runaway (Spending) Train (5.00 / 1) (#6)
    by Edger on Sat Sep 29, 2007 at 12:48:45 PM EST
    The New York Times, Friday 28 September 2007:
    If, as he says, President Bush is going to start withdrawing troops from Iraq, why on earth does he need vastly more money from Congress to wage war? The staggering, ever escalating numbers tell the real story: As long as it's up to Mr. Bush, the American presence in Iraq will be endless and ever more costly, diverting resources from other national priorities that are being ignored or shortchanged.

    The administration showed its cards on Wednesday when it asked Congress for an additional $42.3 billion in "emergency" funding for Iraq and Afghanistan. This comes on top of the original 2008 spending request, which was made before Mr. Bush announced his so-called "new strategy" of partial withdrawal. It would bring the 2008 war bill to nearly $190 billion, the largest single-year total for the wars and an increase of 15 percent from 2007.
    ...
    Congress must dissect this request carefully, find out why Mr. Bush suddenly needed to ask for the extra money and use the chance to reshape the failed strategy in Iraq. In other words, lawmakers should join Democrat Robert C. Byrd, chairman of the Senate Appropriations Committee, in pledging there will be "no more blank checks for Iraq."



    There was ONE holdout Senator (none / 0) (#18)
    by Edger on Sun Sep 30, 2007 at 02:12:38 PM EST
    The move was backed by every senator who cast a vote, save one.

    Wisconsin Senator Russ Feingold, the maverick Democrat who has led the fight to end the war and bring U.S. troops home from Iraq, was on the losing end of the 94-1 vote. (The five senators who did not vote, all presidential candidates who are more involved in campaigning than governing, were Democrats Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama and Joe Biden and Republicans John McCain and Sam Brownback.)



    Parent
    What a (none / 0) (#19)
    by Edger on Sun Sep 30, 2007 at 05:21:11 PM EST
    "Phony Senator" Feingold is.....

    Parent
    guys like rush just hate it when (5.00 / 3) (#11)
    by cpinva on Sat Sep 29, 2007 at 05:47:33 PM EST
    they're "quoted out of context", by using the entire transcript. just another attempt by the liberal media to "smear" him, with his own words.

    but really, aside from the fact that he's an embarrasment, who cares what rush says? his "2 million" listeners? maybe, maybe not. again, so what? my guess is they vote in the same % as the rest of the country, and are probably concentrated in areas that are republican strongholds. as such, they have little, if any effect on elections.

    rush does it for money. right now, he's laughing all the way to the bank, because he's gotten millions in free publicity out of this.

    you want to get rid of clods like him from the airwaves? ignore him, and boycott his sponsors.

    He's only a 3 percenter, anyway... (5.00 / 1) (#12)
    by Edger on Sat Sep 29, 2007 at 06:11:14 PM EST
    Good One!!! (5.00 / 1) (#14)
    by squeaky on Sun Sep 30, 2007 at 12:23:26 AM EST
     guys like rush just hate it when they're "quoted out of context", by using the entire transcript. just another attempt by the liberal media to "smear" him, with his own words.


    Parent
    With a Hat Tip to (5.00 / 1) (#13)
    by Edger on Sat Sep 29, 2007 at 10:11:21 PM EST
    Libby @ The Newhoggers  for this...

    The Nation, Friday, September 28/07:

    The Senate agreed on Thursday to increase the federal debt limit by $850 billion -- from $8.965 trillion to $9.815 trillion -- and then proceeded to approve a stop-gap spending bill that gives the Bush White House at least $9 billion in new funding for its war in Iraq.

    Additionally, the administration has been given emergency authority to tap further into a $70 billion "bridge fund" to provide new infusions of money for the occupation while the Congress works on appropriations bills for the Department of Defense and other agencies.

    Translation: Under the guise of a stop-gap spending bill that is simply supposed to keep the government running until a long-delayed appropriations process is completed -- probably in November -- the Congress has just approved a massive increase in war funding.



    it is those who have never served who (5.00 / 1) (#15)
    by Michael Gass on Sun Sep 30, 2007 at 01:13:40 AM EST
    are the first to yell patriotism... phoney soldier... etc...

    There is a reason that overseas military absentee ballots were lost; those who serve are the first to decry war.

    They have SEEN it... firsthand.

    Dude will be okay (5.00 / 1) (#17)
    by Militarytracy on Sun Sep 30, 2007 at 04:56:31 AM EST
    dealing with them.  They only show their true colors and nature and nothing they fire at him can kill him.

    Gee, we're not the world's police. Call the U.N. (none / 0) (#9)
    by diogenes on Sat Sep 29, 2007 at 02:54:22 PM EST
    BANGKOK, Thailand - Watching soldiers firing their guns and beating die-hard protesters with clubs in the streets of Myanmar, a distraught man shouted, "Bloodbath again! Bloodbath again! Why don't the Americans come and help us?"  (From AP today)

    Good (none / 0) (#10)
    by Edger on Sat Sep 29, 2007 at 03:00:34 PM EST
    Another Phony Soldier (none / 0) (#20)
    by squeaky on Fri Oct 05, 2007 at 05:28:22 PM EST
    Is outed, permanently.  
    Ciara Durkin was home on leave last month and expressed a concern to her family in Quincy: If something happens to me in Afghanistan, don't let it go without an investigation.

    Durkin, 30, a specialist with a Massachusetts National Guard finance battalion, was found dead last week near a church at the Bagram Airfield in Afghanistan. She had been shot once in the head, the Army says.

    Fiona Canavan, Durkin's older sister, said today that when her sister was home three weeks ago, she told family members that she had come across some things that concerned her and had raised objections to others at the base.

    ``She was in the finance unit and she said, `I discovered some things I don't like and I made some enemies because of it.' Then she said, in her light-hearted way, `If anything happens to me, you guys make sure it gets investigated,"' Canavan said. ``But at the time we thought it was said more as a joke."[..]

    Canavan said that her sister was openly gay, but that the family had no specific reasons to think that had anything to do with her death.

    Soooo sad that this is business as usual.

    Link (none / 0) (#21)
    by squeaky on Fri Oct 05, 2007 at 05:29:13 PM EST