Just a fun-loving bunch, aren’t they?

From a Gold Star mom;

It was a nasty evil thing to do back during the Vietnam war. People would call families claiming to be the military and tell their son had been killed and the family would later find it was a lie. Mental and emotional abuse and torture of the worse kind. Well what once was old is new again… but still just as evil and heartless. Only this time the media is being compliant.

Calls are being made to families and the words no family with a soldier wants to hear are uttered ” We regret to inform you”… Only to find out their soldier is alive and well. It’s done to break morale and inflict injury on the families. Not only that but on our troops also. Now instead of our soldiers being able to completely focus on their mission they have the burden of worrying about something like this happening to their loved ones who are suppose to be safe at home.

She’s referring to this story via CBS News. Notice the headline.

Military Wrongly Told Dad Soldier-Son Died
(AP)  Military officials say they’re investigating why an upstate New York man was told his son had been killed in Afghanistan when the soldier was alive and well.

Ray Jasper of Niagara Falls says he was camping Sunday when he received a call on his cell phone from a woman who said she was a military liaison. He says the woman told him his son, Staff Sgt. Jesse Jasper, was killed in action Saturday.

The father says he later called military officials to get details of his son’s death and was told that his son is alive. Ray Jasper says the officials couldn’t explain the earlier call.

The father says his son called from Afghanistan and said he would talk to his commanding officers about the call reporting his death.

First, as anybody with a Google search capability could tell you, the military does not notify next of kin by phone.

From the US Army’s own guide (my bolding);

b.  The Army’s policy is to make personal notification to the primary next of kin (PNOK) and secondary next of kin (SNOK) of the deceased soldier within 4 hours after notification of the death.  Notification should take place during the hours from 0600 to 2200 local time unless otherwise directed.  The time limits established for notification may have to be adjusted due to distances involved or other conditions, such as adverse weather.  All attempts will be made to notify the PNOK first, if your efforts to contact the PNOK are unsuccessful, then contact the Casualty Area Command (CAC), immediately for guidance.

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Update: I have a brief op-ed on this topic in USA Today newspaper as the official “opposing view” to the paper’s editorial, “Our view on tobacco in the military: How to curb soldiers’ smoking.”

The Pentagon’s office of clinical and program policy is recommending a “phased-in ban” of tobacco product use in the military over the next twenty years, according to USA Today. The recommendation comes after a study by the anti-tobacco activist organization Institute of Medicine (IOM) found that the negative health effects of tobacco use “cost the Pentagon $846 million a year in medical care and lost productivity.” The report, which the DOD commissioned, also claimed “the Department of Veterans Affairs spends up to $6 billion in treatments for tobacco-related illnesses,” and says:

Given the critical need for a strong and healthy military, the harmful effects of tobacco use on military readiness, and the short- and long-term health and financial burden of tobacco use on military personnel, retirees, families, and veterans, the time has come for DoD and VA to assign high priority to tobacco con­trol.

According to USA Today:

Along with a phased-in ban, the report recommends requiring new officers and enlisted personnel to be tobacco-free, eliminating tobacco use on military installations, ships and aircraft, expanding treatment programs and eliminating the sale of tobacco on military property. “Any tobacco use while in uniform should be prohibited,” the study says.

Though she did not comment on the proposal to outright ban tobacco use by the military, Pentagon spokeswoman Cynthia Smith told USA Today that “the [DOD] supports a smoke-free military and believes it is achievable.”

This is unwise — and borderline ridiculous — for a number of reasons.

As American as Apple Pie

Tobacco use is as ingrained a part of military culture as battlefield discipline and, for better or worse, swearing. At least one in three servicemembers is a tobacco user of some sort, according to the IOM study. That number is, unsurprisingly, far higher among those who are actually engaged in combat operations.

There are few perks, and even fewer freedoms, associated with being a volunteer member of our armed forces. Long hours, harsh conditions, lengthy deployments far from home, and enemy fire are realities for these men and women who dedicate at least a portion of their lives to standing guard, on our behalf, on freedom’s frontier.

The ability to purchase tax-free goods on military installations is one of those perks, and many soldiers, sailors, airmen, and Marines choose to use what small income they receive in exchange for their service to purchase tobacco products.

It is already shameful that nineteen- and twenty-year-olds who are considered adult enough to lead men into combat as noncommissioned officers are legally unable to consume alcohol; whether these men and women consume cigarettes, cigars, and chewing tobacco because they help alleviate battlefield stressor because they simply enjoy consuming them, the ability to smoke a cigarette or “throw in a dip” is one which America’s servicemembers shouldn’t be begrudged.

Yes, tobacco has been proven to cause both short and long-term health problems – but are we really going to preach about the health benefits of their activities to Americans we pay (albeit poorly) to be shot at for a living?

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Monday, June 8th was the day Pvt. William Long was to ship out for his first duty station in Korea. Instead his journey ended at Arkansas State Veterans Cemetery, there buried with full military honors. He was 23 years old. He was a son and brother. He was a soldier.

Last week, Pvt. Long was killed in the line of duty, in service to his country. Outside the recruiting station where he was serving temporary duty in the Hometown Recruiter’s Assistance Program, Long and Pvt. Quinton I. Ezeagwula were attacked in a craven act of terrorism. Long is the first military member killed by Islamic terror on our shores since September 11th.

Pvt. Long’s funeral was held at Harlan Park Baptist Church in Conway, Arkansas. The service was private, attended by 200 or so family, friends, and fellow military members and veterans. Outside the church the Patriot Guard Riders lined the streets with motorcyles and flags, acting as a barrier between the service and would-be protesters. Gov. Mike Beebe and Rep. Vic Snyder were in attendance. Flags across the state were at half-mast.

Pvt. Long’s brother, Pfc. Triston Long, placed his unit’s insignia in the casket. “My brother taught me valuable lessons and made me the man I am today,” he said. “My commander said, ‘Make your brother one of us.’ I will miss my brother with all that I am, and I serve in honor of him.”

The family’s military tradition and dedication to service were praised by Long’s pastor, John Harrington. “No one is more military, no one is more patriotic than this family right here,” he said. “Military runs through their hearts and their blood.”

Daris Long, father and former Marine, stood behind his son’s casket wearing a red Marine Corps baseball cap and military medals on his chest and read aloud the letter he had planned to give his son on the day of his deployment. He spoke of duty, readiness, committment. “Your day only ends when you’ve done your duty,” he read with emotion. “You and your brother … are both heroes for having the moral courage to stand up when your country needs you most. You are in my hopes and my thoughts and my prayers. You are my son, you are my hero. I love you. Semper fidelis.”

Pvt. William Long did his duty. His day ends with honor. And we honor him.

President Obama sent a wreath to the Confederate memorial at Arlington cemetery during the memorial services to recognize the sacrifices and service of the members of our armed forces this week. It has been a tradition since Woodrow Wilson offered a wreath to memorialize Confederate dead at Arlington and a tradition that many on the American far left wanted to see ended. They have been disappointed.

But the president also started a new tradition, one that everyone should welcome and one that we should all hope is continued by every succeeding president that comes after Obama. President Obama also laid a wreath at the African-American Civil War Memorial at Vermont Avenue and U Street Northwest in Washington D.C.

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From the diaries by Erick

Every day, members of America’s military leave family and home to stand on the front lines to defend our freedom. To their surprise, these heroes must fight another battle: attempting to vote.

Each passing election highlights the difficulties for military personnel to cast ballots. Numerous obstacles prevent them from registering to vote, casting absentee ballots or voting at anywhere near the rate as their civilian counterparts.

Troops navigate a minefield of complexity, mail delays, indifference and errors, dampening their democratic voice and perhaps their democratic spirit.

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Don’t tell me about how Barack Obama is a “hero.” Watch this and see heroes.

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You’re traveling from a dimension of raucous applause to one curiously subdued, even tepid. It is a dimension not only of oorahs but one of mild clapping. A journey into a proud land of service and country, if you dare. The next stop up ahead, the Semper Fi zone.

Some presidents are welcome in the Semper Fi zone… others…. not so much.

Though the deepening economic crisis is certainly enough to fulfill most citizens’ worry quota for the year (if not longer), President Obama’s impotent flailing about on the economy shouldn’t be Americans’ only reason to be concerned about their president, a relatively young man who has shown no ability to succeed at any non-campaigning endeavor in his brief but highly publicized career. As noted here on RS before, the UK Telegraph recently quoted a source “close to members of Mr. Obama’s inner circle” as “express[ing] concern that [the President] ha[s] failed so far to ‘even fake an interest in foreign policy.’”

“Obama is overwhelmed,” the Telegraph quotes the source as saying. “There is a zero sum tension between his ability to attend to the economic issues and his ability to be a proactive sculptor of the national security agenda.”

With global threats like a near-nuclear Iran, an unstable and passive-aggressive North Korea, a once again expanding Russia, a quickly-fading counterterror ally in Pakistan, and unrelenting Islamist terrorism — just to name a few — present and growing, this is a very, very bad time to have a young, untested man who is reportedly “facing exhaustion over America’s economic crisis and is unable to focus on foreign affairs” sitting in the White House making decisions that literally affect the lives of people all around the globe.

It’s even worse time to have someone at the controls who is giving strong signals, through his response to that crisis, that his reaction to domestic crises will be to attempt to shoehorn reality into his dogmatic-leftist worldview, and to international crises will be to immediately assume a position of weakness and begin negotiating for “peace” from there (ask Pakistan how well that’s working out for them so far).

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…and it’s a NGO defense-oriented conservative think-tank that’s been calling for the conversion of American transportation to alternative fuels since at least 2003. Its chairman, retired military veteran James Martin, writes:

On behalf of NDCF supporters who proudly represent all branches of the military, it strikes me that Mr. Murphy’s writings at his alma mater, Harvard University, when he was editor of a university magazine, Perspective, do not jibe with the majority views of the people of the 20th Congressional District of New York.

Murphy apparently co-authored an editorial critical of the military and questioned its longstanding traditions and structure. In the same editorial, Murphy railed against having ROTC outposts on college campuses, “Bringing ROTC on campus is not the best way of helping the economically disadvantaged.” (Perspective, Summer 1989).

His attacks on our nation’s military demonstrate just how out-of-touch he is. This is the same District that was once served by the late Republican Congressman, Jerry Solomon.

First off, Jim Tedisco. Republican. Running for the seat. Doesn’t hate the military. Donate here.

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(H/T: Hot Air) That’s a serious question, because he signed his name to an article saying precisely that back in college. The quote goes:

The military not only discriminates on the basis of sexual preference, but on the basis of sex and race. Women are not allowed to serve in combat even if they are physically superior to males who do serve in combat. And, while there are not explicit rules discriminating against minorities, the Congressional Black Caucus has found that “racism has become institutionalized at all levels of the military. Black and other minority service men are victims of discrimination from the time that they enter the services until the time that they are discharged.” Will Harvard choose to ignore this discrimination?

Murphy went on to declare that military values - which he proceeded to get wrong, as only a liberal Democratic Ivy League student can - are directly contradictory to those of Harvard University, or at least the Harvard University of twenty years ago. I would like to say that Harvard’s grown up a little since then, but it’d be a lie. Still, I’d like to know: has Murphy?

Moe Lane

PS: Jazz Shaw has more; so does this site, even if they can’t get the name of the NRCC right. But one of their commenters noted that parts of this district were once Gerald Solomon’s (I think), so that works out. And, of course, see also Erick’s post on the subject.

PPS: Jim Tedisco. Republican. Running for the seat. Doesn’t hate the military. Donate here.

Crossposted to Moe Lane.

Late last night we asked “Is Obama preparing to cut the defense budget?” All we had to work with at the time were personal observations by some who had seen a Fox News report that the president had asked the Pentagon to slash defense spending by 10%. The story had not yet been posted on the FNC website at that late hour.

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