The Mercenary’s Cookbook

I never understood why the military would be so concerned with limiting what soldiers can access on the Internet. This is what led to the crackdown on military web used called “Web 2.0″:

This winter, the Air Force, as the Pentagon’s point agency for “cyberwarfare,” banned access from official networks to many blogs, declaring that they weren’t “established, reputable media.” The Air Force didn’t seem concerned that international jihadists had long ago latched onto websites as cheap, effective tools for sharing ideas. Indeed, the Air Force’s ban was part of a widening military crackdown on the so-called “Web 2.0.” Mostly, Website-banning Pentagon officials were worried that U.S. troops might inadvertently release secret information on the Internet.

The flip side of this is that the military can also prevent Americans from finding out things about the war. Sgt. Scott Thomas Beauchamp became the target for many pro-war pundits for his accounts in The New Republic, when they were thought to have painted too grim a picture of the daily life of soldiers, thus demonstrating how naive people like Malkin really are — Beauchamp’s stories were tame compared to many I’ve heard.

However, a case can be made to limit what information people outside the military can get. What soldiers post on their blogs might give away, hower inadvertantly, information that could be used by insurgents and the like. We aren’t fighting a Superpower, where keeping our military budget secret made sense - what can an Afghani sitting in a cave do with that? So the old excuses for government secrecy and lack of accountability do not hold up as well as they did when we were facing down another SuperPower. What you don’t want is for terrorists to figure out troop movements, scope out targets, or study tactics.

Yet, by limiting access, you also limit the ability to share information, which has been hampering the military, who has fallen far behind terrorist groups who have become quite Internet savvy.

In a three part series in the Washington Independent by David Axe, we learn that the Army’s solution is a MySpace that has people sign up and limit who gets access to their posts:

The military MySpace – call it “MilSpace” – would eventually include the previously mentioned blogging function, allowing officers to develop and share ideas and tactics without necessarily having to work through the military’s lumbering, labyrinthine and strictly hierarchical chain of command. MilSpace and its blogs are part of a network of online discussion forums, created by the Center for Company-Level Leaders, that Lt. Col. Tony Burgess, Kimball’s boss, called a “virtual front porch” for hosting soldiers’ conversations.

The forums have their roots in the late 1990s, when they were a private project overseen by several young officers. In 2002 the Army officially sanctioned the forums. After months of work, the MilSpace addition went live in January this year, and the blogging function launched in late April. With each successive new feature, this “virtual front porch” has gained new users, new admirers in the senior ranks and a more prominent position in the Army’s emerging Internet strategy. “I would definitely characterize it [the Mil-Space blogs] as a success,” Kimball told The Washington Independent. “Anecdotally, conversations are more vibrant than they’ve ever been.”

 Lest you take too much heart, Part II, shows that where the army has taken steps forward, the Coast Guard and Navy have shown us how not to utilize the web:

The Coast Guard problem is one that a senior official described when addressing alleged inaccuracies in online news reports about the service’s over-budget shipbuilding program. “We are encountering an interesting phenomenon in the ‘blogosphere,’” Rear Adm. Gary Blore said in a Mar. 11 news conference. “A blog can be anything you want it to be,”

The next day, events unfolded that resulted in the Coast Guard publishing a faked first-hand account of an at-sea rescue on its official “Coast Guard Journal” blog.

That particular blog had been a centerpiece of a new Internet campaign by the nation’s fifth military service. In fact, Capt. Jim McPherson, the Coast Guard’s top public affairs officer, cited this blog in February, asserting his service was ahead of the pack when it came to the military services embracing the Internet.

So, factual accounts are shut down, fictional accounts promoted, while terrorist groups have been exploiting the freedom of the Internet at every opportunity.  One day, our government may simply have to accept, as China is finding out, that there is no Green Zone in cyberspace.

They made a big deal out of Barrack Obama not wearing a tie like President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad . Yet, were you aware of the Bill Clinton/Ayatollah Khamenei connection? Look very carefully at what book the Supreme Leader of Iran is purchasing in this picture:

 That would be a copy of Bill Clinton’s auotobiography, My Life. Is this the closest thing to pornography in Iran an oblique passing reference to Monical Lewinski?

We’ve heard a lot about the housing bubble, and how it’s dragging down an already slowing economy. What you probably didn’t know - or rather, you did, but most anybody else doesn’t - is that foreclosures have hit military towns the hardest:

In the midst of the worst surge in mortgage defaults in seven decades, foreclosures in U.S. towns where soldiers live are increasing at a pace almost four times the national average, according to data compiled by research firm RealtyTrac Inc. in Irvine, California. As military families like the VerSteeghs signed up for the initial lower rates and easier terms of subprime mortgages, the number of people taking out Veterans Administration loans fell to the lowest in at least 12 years.

“We’ve never faced a situation like this, not in the Vietnam War, World War II, or the Korean War, where so many military are in danger of losing their homes,” said Paul Sullivan, executive director of Veterans for Common Sense, a Washington-based advocacy group started in 2002 by Iraq and Afghanistan War veterans. “No one asked them for their credit score when we asked them to fight for us.”

Foreclosures in towns around military bases, including Norfolk, Virginia, have increased 217 percent in the first quarter compared to last year because military families, who are often on the move, were an easy target of the predatory subprime lending. So families can find their loved ones being sent on extended tours, only to return to bankruptcy or homelessness.

Fortunately, the bipartisan Casey-Isakson Bill is being floated to give military families some breathing room: 

This legislation would specifically amend the Servicemembers Civil Relief law in the following ways:

 

1. For all servicemembers who incur a serious illness or injury during their military service, the foreclosure grace period provided in current law would be extended from 90 days to one year.
2. A servicemember who, within one year after completing their military service, files a claim with the Secretary of Veterans Affairs shall be protected from foreclosure throughout the application process and until 30 days after their claim is adjudicated.
3. “Serious injury or illness” is defined as rendering the servicemember medically unfit to perform the duties of their rank.

Another bill that would seem to be a no-brainer is the one floated by former Assistant to the Reagan’s Secretary of Defense and current Democratic Senator Jim Webb to extend educational benefits for our returning veterans who have already gone way beyond what anyone could have reasonably expected in the call of duty. Seeing an obvious opportunity in an election year, the Bill has already gotten the support of Presidential hopefuls Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton, and Senator John Warner (R-VA). Who would oppose such a thing? Remarkably, the greatest remaining Iraq War hawks, George Bush and John McCain. (McCain managed not to be present for the final vote). The reasoning being that too much generosity might harm retention if soldiers have something to look forward to when they move on to civilian life.

Seen in the same light, I suppose foreclosure can be a net positive as well. It’s hard to leave when you’re guaranteed to have a tarp over your head.

What could the overly-spunky, more-than-occasionally annoying Rachael Ray, host of twenty-minute meals, have to do with national security? No, it’s not because she’s good with a knife. We’ll give you a hint: see if you can spot the “hate-couture” in this photo:

A few months after doughnuts became a presidential campaign issue, they stood at the center of a storm created by right-leaning bloggers. This was a story about “donuts and dumb celebrities” who were “mainstreaming terrorism” to make a buck, asserted Little Green Footballs and Michele Malkin. And Atlas Shrugs revised a bell-ringing catchphrase thusly: “TIME TO MAKE THE JIHAD!”

Suddenly, Dunkin’ Donuts was accused of promoting terrorism, thanks to the wardrobe choices of Rachael Ray, its celebrity spokesman, during an online advertisement. According to the bloggers, she had decided to embrace “hate couture” by wearing a keffiyeh, a scarf popular in the Arab world and preferred by Yasir Arafat and other Palestinian militants during their rise in the West Bank and Gaza.

Now, Dunkin’ Donuts has pulled the ads. Not since the Little Mermaid video cover was found to have palaces shaped like phalluses have our impressionable children been this safe.

We believe there is a far greater threat to our National Security. Watch, if you dare:

  Does that skirt look like anyone’s headscarf that we know?

The West, long since written off as red state, is looking more blue all the time. It is central to Obama’s strategy for rewriting the political map, by putting traditionally red states in play to offset losses in Florida or Ohio, which have traumatized Democrats in recent elections. Central to such a strategy is Colorado, which is why the Dems are holding their Convention here. Though the state’s wilderness has always attracted a strange mixture of hunters, survivalists and hippie environmentalists, Colorado has a huge influx of people who offset some traditionally libertarian elements.

So, the cosmopolitan city centers, mixed with rural voters more receptive to the populist message, make the West possible Ground Zero of 2008.

Helping matters in Ohio and Colorado is the fact that the major players in the Republican Party in these states are suffering from multiple investigations, corruption and sex.

Today demonstrated just how much the state of the state has changed. Today, during a speech, McCain was shouted down by protestors chanting “Endless War!”
 

One doubts the Democratic Convention can hope to come close to the disarray of 1968, when you not only had a war, but assassinations seemed commonplace. But there are definitely some Democratic activists around to make this hostile territory for Republicans.

It turns out the historic search for the wreckage of the Titanic is more like something out of a Clive Cussler novel. It turns out, Dr. Bob Ballard’s discovery of the Titanic was actually cover for a top secret mission to inspect the nearby wreckage of nuclear submarines, the USS Thresher and USS Scorpion. The Thresher sank after a high-pressure pipe blew, causing the sub to lose power. The Scorpion, however, was thought to have perhaps been sunk by the Soviets:

[T]he USS Scorpion disappeared in 1968 amid speculation that it was sunk by Soviet forces.

Dr Ballard mapped both submarine wrecks using his newly developed underwater robot craft. He concluded that the most likely cause of the Scorpion’s destruction was being hit by a rogue torpedo it had fired itself.

Dr. Ballard also studied the nuclear reactors to see if they posed any environmental risk - a real question since the U.S. was considering sinking reactors at sea as a way to cut the nuclear fleet to comply with Salt II in the 80s.

This is amazing. It appears the nearly 4500 deaths in Iraq and Afghanistan to date could, quite literally, be only half of the story. Shortly after the release of a RAND study showing the rate of PTSD and depression in returning veterans, Thomas Insel, director of the National Institute of Mental Health, the government’s top psychiatric research group said because these veterans are unlikely to seek help, or have access to the appropriate health care, the rate of suidicides could outpace combate fatalities:

Exactly how many vets have taken their lives isn’t known for sure — and that lack of good data is part of the problem.

But CBS News, in a months-long investigation last year, uncovered what it called a “suicide epidemic” among vets: At least 6,256 veterans committed suicide in 2005 alone — an average of 17 a day. Vets overall were more than twice as likely as the general population to take their lives. Among young veterans ages 20 to 24, the rate was nearly four times that of the nonmilitary public.

Another estimate is that 1,000 veterans a month are attempting suicide.

What is the government doing about this? Covering it up:

At heated hearings this week, the chairman of the House Veterans Affairs Committee, Rep. Bob Filner, D-Calif., charged that the Department of Veterans Affairs is either ignoring the extent of the veteran suicide problem or covering it up. Not only news organizations but also members of Congress trying to get data on veteran suicides have encountered bureaucratic resistance.

Support the war, not the troops.

I think what we can take away from these results is that Obama is feminine, Hillary is masculine and feminists are to blame for my lonely, dateless existence.

Democrats are divided.