Peg Mullen & The General

Norman Schwarzkopv passed away yesterday.  We all know him as the larger than life General who commanded Desert Storm, the successful effort to remove Iraq from Kuwait in 1991.  I will always remember him for his turn of phrase reworking of the term BS..."Bovine Scatology"...now, that is the stuff speakers (and writers) only dream of inventing.  Well, OK, maybe he stole it from the unknown...that's OK, I do it all the time!

I was raised in the military and served for 3 years in the USMC.  Like "Stormin Norman"  I served in Vietnam,  Thus, I didn't describe him as "larger than life" lightly.  Military officers don't automatically impress me, altho I do realize the difficulties, both in terms of merit and politics, involved in getting that star on your collar.  Many yearn, few are fulfilled.  But Senator McCain's dad, a Navy Admiral, drank beer and played poker at our kitchen table...and like my Dad, he drank too many...not helpful at a poker game...LOL!

Schwarzkopf not only achieved those stars, he met up with the dream shared with most officers...the command of a war.  He not only executed his plan well, he sold himself even better.  Folks don't reach that level in any profession without an ability to both bully and schmooze, and  Schwarzkopf did both flawlessly as he had most of his career: indeed, it was his genetic predisposition... his father was the Commander of the New Jersey State Police, known for his belligerence and public relations.  But when Stormin Norman ran into an otherwise ordinary woman, Peg Mullen,  that persona was stopped in its tracks....she wasn't buying!

Peg was an "ordinary"  Iowa farm wife, the mother of Michael Mullen who died in Vietnam in 1970.  Schwarzkopf was his Battalion Commander and a Lieutenant Colonel at the time.  He sent off the obligatory form letter and forgot about it.  Peg Mullen, hearing stories from others Michael served with, realized that the events as described in that letter were the aforementioned bovine scatology and she proceeded to terrorize the Army brass and Schwarzkopv in particular to find the truth.  Her quest led to an award winning portrayal of her by Carole Burnett in the 1979 TV movie "Friendly Fire"....that was followed by her 1995 memoir, titled with attitude..."Unfriendly Fire" reviewed here:

http://www.vietnamgear.com/Article.aspx?Art=58

Michael was not killed by enemy fire, but by a stupid and common mistake.  Artillery shells fired over their position had not allowed for a tree line overhead...the shrapnel & debris resultant killed Michael and 2 others.  It is a command mistake....the guy on the ground who supplies the "coordinates" and the "Fire Direction" officer....both ignored that tree line tho it was clearly delineated on the maps we used to mark targets.  How do I know?  I spent 20 months doing exactly that job....a forward observer for artillery, air strikes, even Naval guns occasionally.  The built in redundancy of 2 responsible folks, officers or not, in different places, giving the "Fire" command was either ignored or both couldn't read an effen map....it's that simple.

But the Army bureaucracy couldn't admit that...and Schwarzkopf tried to cool the fires in Peg Mullen during numerous meetings....no way....Mission Fail!  Peg rips "Stormin Norman" into an asshole in her memoir, and Schwarzkopv, in his book, described those meetings as among the most difficult assignments of his career.

So Norm...you might be waiting for your meeting with St. Peter...I assume that will go well.  But inside those golden gates I imagine an Iowa farm wife is waiting...still waiting for, as Joe Friday says, "just the facts"...Time to come clean!

May Norman Schwarzkopv, Peg and Michael Mullen RIP...may their families find peace...may we all.

A CALL TO ACTION

A call to YOU, a cry for help, an appeal to that which is Right and Good and Beautiful within you and within us all.

    We come together in families, in tribes, in communities, as nations and create governments endowing them with power for one primary reason.  We as a species have come together since the dawn of Mankind for this one fundamental purpose, for OUR SAFETY and SECURITY.

    Above all else we demand that our governments provide us with safe and secure environments.   When our government fails in that responsibility, as it has in the case of rampant gun violence, we must come together and force our government to be responsible.  When you look in your heart, when you feel in your heart, is it not clear that we must take action now?   Will you turn your face away from and harden your heart toward the grieving families of those twenty beautiful, innocent and needlessly dead children?  

    With a heavy heart, a tired soul and now dry eyes I ask you to join me in this struggle for our safety.  I need your help, children all across our nation need your help.  Will you act?  I mean real political action, not just making a donation or writing a letter to the editor but helping to organize like minded people.   Only by organizing like minded people can we mobilize a force strong enough to demand the real change needed to give us the safety that is our right.

 Here is a peek at what we are up against.

  "For gun rights groups, 2012 was the most active election cycle since 2000. They contributed a total of $3 million to candidates.  By contrast, gun control groups contributed less in this election cycle than in any cycle as far back as OpenSecrets has data (1990) -- again, through mid-October. After campaign spending peaked in 2000 with $581,000, politicians only saw $4,000 from gun control groups this year."  From: http://www.opensecrets.org/news/2012/12/gun-control.html

    The above dollars are really only a small fraction of what has and what will be spent by our opposition.  The most public group, our main opposition is the NRA.  They are a formidable force with an impressive record of lobbying victories.  While we on the other hand are currently lacking any group enabled to lobby on our behalf.  A clearer case of David vs Goliath would be hard to find.  We however have a tangible advantage,  we stand on the moral high ground.  Our cause is just, our position advocating for the safety of our children is unassailable.   In this just cause we stand bathed in the light of that which is right and good and beautiful.

    The following gun control measures are the absolute minimum that our government must enact to fulfill the compact that demands our children be protected.

1. All gun purchases must be preceded by a comprehensive background check.  All means all, if Bob wants to sell his neighbor Mary a single shot .410 for Grouse hunting Mary will have to have a background check.
2. All gun owners must be licensed.
3. All guns currently in private ownership must be registered within 1 year.  For those unwilling or unable to become licensed there will be an amnesty for anyone turning in guns within that 1 year period.  The government will provide tax deductions equal to the fair market value of the guns turned in.
4. Anyone convicted of a violent crime shall forfeit their right to own a gun.
5. A two tier licensing system must be established.   With much stricter requirements for semi-automatic guns.  
6. Ammunition clips must hold no more than 6 rounds.   (If the minimum is 10 it would be easy to tape two clips together so that 20 rounds would be immediately available for a mass murdering mad man.)
7. The penalties for illegal gun sales and purchases must be severe enough to provide a real deterrent.  
8. Penalties for those gun owners who are found to be negligent in safely securing their guns must be severe enough for real deterrence.

    When the NRA and other 2nd Amendment gun rights groups see our 8 point plan they will scream about their rights being violated.   I say to them, are you insane?  How can anyone with heart to feel and a mind to think say that your right to own a gun comes before the right if this child to live?
    To drive this point regarding rights home I must point at Habeas Corpus.   Since our Nation put security before our civil rights with the first passage of the Patriot Act the defense of the 2nd Amendment as sacred has been shown to have a foul stench.  Even today we as a Nation have, by default if not consciously, sacrificed our right of Habeas Corpus for real if not imagined security.
 http://www.nytimes.com/2012/12/19/us/politics/congressional-committee-is-said-to-drop-ban-on-indefinite-detention-of-citizens.html?_r=0

    For our cause to succeed we must harness all the help  we can.  Our greatest allies can and should be religious leaders throughout our Nation.  We must ask them to help us in this just cause.  If we fail to act history shall judge us.  Just as slavery has left a stain upon our Nations soul so too will our collective soul be stained if we good people refuse to stand for what is self evidently morally right. 

For those of you who know me you know that I am a liberal who un-apologetically supports the strictest interpretation of the 2nd Amendment.  The above call to action is what I would be working for if I did not support the 2nd Amendment as I do.  That said I would respect and honor anyone fighting for the just cause as described above.

J. K1  Cash

Is the NRA the KKK?

In a word....NO...altho the two infamous groups may very well share mailing lists.  The National Rifle Association does not emphasize the blatant racism so necessary to the KKK, but according to this African American sports journalist, the results of their policies would certainly be in alignment with the hooded knuckle draggers of the Klan...Jason Whitlock sums up the recent controversy here:

http://msn.foxsports.com/nfl/story/jason-whitlock-jovan-belcher-murder-suicide-NRA-KKK-analogy-gun-control-partisan-kansas-city-chiefs-tragedy-120612

You can read the actual column which ignited the recent controversy on his FoxSports.com site, but he summarized it above.  This led to Bob Costas quoting Whitlock on a Sunday Night Football half time mini-torial here:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uOi7If0zW9s

That's it....a comment on a tragedy....an NFL player took the life of the mother of his 3 month old infant and then took his own life in front of his coach.  Would either have happened if Belcher hadn't had a hand gun?  Who knows, but he did....and it did happen.  In any event, it certainly was news worthy enough to merit comment on the NFL's most watched weekly game by a HOF broadcaster.

OH...wait...not according to the right wing blather.  Talk radio went nuts, as did FauxNews....funny, the same media company that employs Jason Whitlock on another venue.  Costas had ruined the football viewing experience with his "anti-gun hysteria...."  did anybody here hysterics in the 90 seconds above?  All the usual suspects chimed in, demanding an apology.  Some have claimed they got one, including a pro-gun poster here.  Really?

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/early-lead/wp/2012/12/04/bob-costas-calls-jovan-belcher-commentary-a-mistake/

I ask my cyber friend Resquer...where is the apology?  If anything it was for not saying enough:

“My mistake is I left it open for too much miscommunication,” Costas said in a lengthy interview on “The Dan Patrick Show.” The 90-second weekly spot, he said, doesn’t offer enough time in which to adequately discuss the issue of “the football culture, the gun culture, domestic violence.”

But the media abuse continued, along with the usual death threats from the batfuck fringe....so Costas appeared on numerous cable outlets to explain, 1st with Lawrence O'Donnell on MSNBC  and then with Bill O'Reilly on FauxNews, which as O'Reilly constantly trumpets, is the most viewed news program on cable:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Goesfw7R9vk

So let's put this in perspective.  O'Reilly, in his usual attempts to rile up his right wing audience, had been claiming he was gonna rip Costas apart, and that Whitlock was "hiding under his desk" rather than appear on his stupid program and put up with O'Reilly's idiocy.  IMO, the host shows just that in his claims about what he would have done if he had been in that Aurora theater.  First, he never would have been there and he certainly doesn't walk around packing a pistol.  He has security, necessary because part of his routine is to antagonize as many folks as possible.

Did Costas appear in apologetic supplication?  HELL NO!!!  If anything O'reilly, a refugee from a tabloid, First Edition, spent ten minutes kissing ass, as well he should....Costas has covered and broadcast 9 Olympics and who knows how many other major sports events.....Super Bowls, World Series, etc?  Events which have 10,20,50 times the audience of O'Reilly's hour on FauxNews....gimme a break!

It's simple.  The NRA is not the Klan....it is just another arm of the Republicrites, like FauxNews!  They seek to elect Republicrites and lately they haven't done very well.  No longer does the NRA generate fear among candidates...and obviously they instill even less such terror in either Costas or Jason Whitlock.  Both simply did what my theme song suggests:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yB-BBVQLnxI