Thursday, February 15, 2007

Here Ya Go!

In yesterday's mailbox came a comment from Mark (thanks for getting me unstuck) where he called me "worse then (sic) O'Reily and Hannity". I don't know about that, after all Hannity and O'Reilly reach an audience of millions, and I only reach a couple of hundred people a week. Not only that, I do this for free, while O'Reilly and Hannity makes millions doing what they do, essentially acting as propagandists.
Now, when I do make a blunder (which has happened), I will be the first to admit my mistake. So when I posted the other day about a soldier who had to pay back his enlistment bonus, Mark challenged me on it, as the soldier had never seen combat. He also said:
Give me one example of a disabled combat soldier who was made to pay recuopment on his/her bonus and I will retract.

I give you Kevin Stonestreet, Purple Heart recipient, a combat veteran discharged with PTSD who was ordered to payback part of his signing bonus. Then I kept looking and found this story of another wounded vet who was injured in Iraq who was required to payback his signing bonus. He ended up living out of his car when the Army reported him to credit agencies as having bad debts.
So there you have it, not one but two examples. (Actually, there was over ten pages of stories, but I stopped when I realized My Name Is Earl and The Office were on). But I'm not asking for a retraction, instead could you please shovel your danged driveway?

17 comments:

Anonymous said...

I retract, it is disgusting, and I plan to write everyone who will listen about it.

Anonymous said...

But I'm not asking for a retraction, instead could you please shovel your danged driveway?

That was the lawn you backed into, I was looking at the tire tracks this morning, laughing a bit, but to myself.

navyswan said...
This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
azgoddess said...

thanks for the verification -- though not needed for me...

still it is so sad -- it's sickening...i've been talking it up to everyone i know

Bryan said...

I just stumbled across your blog and it intrigues me. Let me share what I have noticed:
- The author seems to get all his information from the web. It is my experience that everything on the world wide web is completely and 100% accurate, so kudos to you on your crack investigative skills.
- You all apparently sit around in front of your computers all day bitching and moaning about the problems of the world to like minded individuals. I may be wrong, but sitting in a dark room typing your complaints while trying not to spill Diet Coke on your keyboard isn't doing much to change the world. John Lennon would not approve.
- None of you seem to have done much to change the world for the better. Surfing the internet and forwarding the unsubstantiated claims you find there to some inane blog is not going to leave your mark on society.
I have been to war and I have seen the good and the bad. The whole time I was over there I didn't see anyone who was on a fact-finding mission with the intent to publish the results on their blog. I guess my big point is don't be too quick to bitch about foreign policy when the only information you have on the subject you happened to read on the internet.
If this problem of bonus recoupment is so prevalent, why haven’t any of these people gained more media attention. I mean, don't get me wrong, this blog is quite the political powerhouse, but I am pretty sure if there were 10 PAGES of soldiers who had this problem John Kerry, John Edwards, Barack Obama or some other such liberal democrat would have used it as a hot button issue to grab some headlines. By now Michael Moore would have made an Oscar-nominated film about it. As for Navyswan....
Come on! Don't tell just enough of the story to make your point and leave out the rest. Not even the Navy orders their enlisted members to Commissioning programs. Your husband not only had to volunteer for that position, he had to work pretty hard to get it. Along the way he received a briefing letting him know he would lose his bonus. He took the commissioning because he wanted the things in life being an officer could give his family. Better quarters, better retirement and MORE MONEY every month. He knew he would lose his bonus before he took the program. If he told you different you have one of two situations on your hand:
A) Your husband lied to you and you should spend more time dealing with your relationship and less time on the internet.
B) Your husband did not know better and is a dunderhead, in which case he will not earn his commission and you will end up getting your bonus anyway.
I am pretty sure it is the former and he would be embarrassed to know you were whining about his chosen profession to everybody who would listen to you.
Take action people! For crying out loud, if you have a bitch do something about it! Volunteer to campaign for a legislator who shares your views. Christ, if you have to, go protest somewhere. If you are so worried about the combat wounded veterans, go volunteer at a VA hospital. Or, you can continue to whine and cry to other people who will also do nothing. I'm sure that is the way JFK and MLK would do it.
I will leave you with this:

War is an ugly thing, but not the ugliest of things. The decayed and degraded state of moral and patriotic feeling which thinks that nothing is worth war is much worse. The person who has nothing for which he is willing to fight, nothing which is more important than his own personal safety, is a miserable creature and has no chance of being free unless made and kept so by the exertions of better men than himself.
--John Stewart Mill--

navyswan said...
This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
Bryan said...

I am truly sorry, I didn't realize this was a private web blog. I thought the purpose of the comments section was to encourage dialogue. Navyswan decided to post her problems with the service that was providing her husband with a living for the world wide web to see and when she is called on it says "it's none of your damn business".
Sorry to break in on your little whine session. One thing before I sign out. When you are done bitching about everything that is wrong with the world while providing nothing but criticism, try to find some little, tiny way to change things. Nowhere have any of you come up with anything but complaints. Take an HONEST look in the mirror and ask yourself - "What am I DOING?" Not what am I writing, what am I complaining about, what am I watching on T.V. What am I actively and positively DOING? If you have any answer at all to that question, good for you. Drive on. If you don't, please make something happen. If you think sitting around with complaints without solutions is O.K., you are pathetic and will always be pathetic.

One more quick note. Navyswan, what is the difference in base pay between the enlisted rank your husband held and the officer rank he is holding now? Don't share with any of us. It's none of our damn business. That is one reason he lost a PERCENTAGE of his bonus. Good luck and even if you don't support the military that supports you, I hope your husband is not in harms way, and if he is, he stays safe.

sumo said...

Ooopsie...there we go again...

Lew Scannon said...

Of course bryan must think the world is perfect that's why on his blog he tells his adventures of being the proud owner of things and how amazed he was to find out underneath all his things he actually had a hallways closet! Bryan says he "stumbled" across this blog, what a coincidence that we would have two military recruiters responding here, and both from West Michigan!bryan's idea of making the world a better place is sending young Americans to their death in a war that is both illegal and unnecessary, way to go! I'm sure there's no blood on your hands, and if there was, you'd absolve your conscience by drinking.
Many of us do participate in activities outside of our web postings, and have written our congresspeople, unfortunately, our congresspeople do not respond to us, especially in West Michigan where the Republicans have a lock on representation.
In bryan's perfect world, we shouldn't spend time passing information overlooked or downplayed by the media because they're too busy giving us the latest on Anna Nicole, or Britney's shaved head and other body parts, or crazy lady astronauts in adult pampers, we should write about our material posessions and how wonderful it is to have things purchased with blood money from the corpocracy, because that's what people find compelling enough to want to read about. I'm sure bryan's not the least bit upset to find us disseminating information that might cut into his chances of receiving a blood money bonus for every soul he sends into the Hell that is Iraq, or that are badly needed for the surge into Iran. he doesn't think potential cannon fodder needs to know that if they are injured before their enlistment is up they'll lose their bonus, be discharged from Walter Reed before their wounds have been fully healed (they need the bedspace and need to save money to pay the defense contractors who are getting rich beyond even bryan's wildest dreams), and being chraged for meals while being treated as an outpatient there.
In the meantime, we should shut up and wait for people like Michael Moore or John Kerry to tell us to become upset about an issue, because being commoner's have no right to speak out in the new world order of the corpocracy.

Bryan said...

Bravo!
Now that's the way to do it people! Lew went out, did a little research, put some coherent thoughts together, and gave a scathing reply. That is some thoughtful dialogue.
Lew and I don't agree on, well, anything, but he went ahead and got up early this morning, put in a little time and came up with something that was a little better than "Life's not fair, mind your own damn business."
Now, I must say, I think Lew is a little off his nut with the blood money comments but I can tell he is very passionate about his cause.
I, too and VERY passionate about my views on current foreign affairs. In many ways Lew and I are very similar. But in one way we are very different. I have left my family, friends and home 11 times in 16 years in support of what I truly thought was right. And while I know it was a great sacrifice to take twenty or thirty minutes out of your busy engineering career to write your impotent congressperson, you can probably do more. Good start, though. Run with it.
Hope you found my blog mildly entertaining.

navyswan said...

Please delete anything that says Navy,and/or husband, and/or military that has been written. Please delete it. If you really want to do something for a military person, do this. It is not worth the risk to have this info here. Please delete it, please.
thanks

Lew Scannon said...

There you go navyswan, all deleted.

navyswan said...

Thanks,
I try to stay anonymous for a reason.

Anonymous said...

In all fairness Kevin, Bryan is one of my favorite people in Michigan. If you spent ten minutes on his blog you would see that he is not only a great writer, but a whole person.
I know you hate us for what we do, but in the case of Bryan, I suggest you back the fuck up. You don’t know him like you know me. You know little if nothing of his story, and will probably be better off that way.
Remember that time I told you I was going to call a plumber? Well that was him.
He’s a great guy, treat him like that…and read his blog, as he can actually write a sentence.
I've said enough.

sumo said...

They just cannot give it up Lew...eh? OMG!...my word verification was "ifukgd"...and I do!

Lew Scannon said...

Yeah, bryan's a regular Erma Bombeck. I suggest you back the fuck up, marky. You were the one who asked for one example of soldiers who had to pay back enlistment bonuses due to injuries sustained in Iraq. I merely provided you with two. I really don't care what you do for a living, and actually would prefer to have an all volunteer army opposed to a military draft, and actually did not participate in a protest that the anti-war group I belong to held at the army recruitment center at Celebration plaza a couple weeks ago.
Do you really want me to open up the whole "plumber" can of worms? I don't think so. I've moved on and perhaps you should move along, too.

Anonymous said...

Fair enough Lew, this is your house. I will leave.