June 6, 2008 By CJ
Posted in Military News, Top Posts, Uncategorized
A lot of people think that I’m a “Republican hack” or an “agent of Bush” or whatever because of my views. The fact is that I really can’t be classified. I like to think that I’m a realist, not a Republican or Democrat. I’m not registered under either party (technically, I’m a Libertarian).
I tend to look at things from a Soldier’s perspective. I joined the military to make my country stronger and protect my fellow citizens. So, naturally, I’m going to side with people whom I think are going to meet those goals. About a week ago, I attempted to compare the two G.I. Bills that are competing in Congress. From the limited information I was able to gather, I deduced that the McCain bill was better. While it is in some ways, I’ve been able to compare the two side by side and have changed my mind. Now that I have all the information, I think the Webb bill is actually better, though it has its faults. I’m not afraid to admit that I was wrong. Now, I need to convince you why. Warning: what follows is my inner nerd coming out again as I actually read through each bill and compared them to each other.
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June 4, 2008 By CJ
Posted in Life in the Military, Top Posts
5. We don’t serve lobster tails and caviar at military dining facilities.
4. The Army beret reminds her too much of Monica Lewinsky.
3. She’s been offered the coveted position of being the first female Secretary of Defense (God help us!).
2. It would take longer than eight years to remodel the Pentagon.
1. Pant suits don’t come in digital camouflage.
For the final five reasons Hillary Clinton won’t be Commander In Chief, visit A Soldier’s Perspective.
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June 1, 2008 By CJ
Posted in Life in the Military, Top Posts, Top Posts - My Post
I wrote a little about my experiences flying TO DC earlier. It was a very frustrating experience. However, on the way back, things weren’t so bad.
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May 26, 2008 By CJ
Posted in Life in the Military, Top Posts
You know, I’m getting a little fed up with 9/11 being used as an excuse for idiotic policies and behavior. Not long ago, when I was stationed in the DC area, I took my father in law to the Pentagon with me. I wanted to show him where the plane hit the building and the memorial they had inside. My FIL is a retired Army Sergeant First Class and an outstanding patriot in the true sense of the word. He served his country with honor and allowed me to marry his daughter – the most beautiful woman in the world, by the way! (okay, maybe that counts against him) What does he get for that sacrifice? They wouldn’t let him into the Pentagon!! The reason? 9/11!! Since 9/11, they don’t allow retirees - with military identification by the way - into the Pentagon. Now tell me: what part did an honorably retired SFC play in the 9/11 attacks? I’m sure there are some trolls lurking on the site that probably think he knew all along what was going to happen and didn’t prevent it so he shouldn’t be allowed in the Pentagon, but that’s just crazy talk. Straighten out your tinfoil hat and go here.
Well, I’m back in the DC area for a few days on TDY and again heard the most absurd thing being blamed on 9/11. While on the Charlotte/Baltimore leg of a US Airways flight, I overheard a stewardess flight attendant talking to another passenger. Keep in mind that this passenger most likely paid a few hundred dollars for the square foot of personal space called her seat next to the window. The lady in seat 13F was asking the flight attendant her name. She gave the passenger her first name and the passenger asked for her last name as well. Apparently, something happened before I got on the plane that I was missing.
A few people were upset because they had packed their kitchen sinks in their baggage and all the overhead bins were full. The bags didn’t fit under the seats in front of them and had to be checked under the plane. One guy wasn’t having it. He wouldn’t deplane and wouldn’t allow them to check his bags. Instead he complained that he “didn’t trust these people” with his bags. I contemplated violently shoving his nose into his brain, but thought better about it as I had a mission to complete that didn’t involve a trial. They gave him a choice to deplane or check his bag. He didn’t want to do either. A huge US Airways employee convinced the man to choose one of the two. Needless to say, he didn’t leave the plane. There was a lot of murmuring as people were generally irritated because they should have to the right to carry their kitchen sink with them if they want. Damn anyone else’s right to share the limited space available in the plane for personal items.!!
Anyway, the flight attendant told the lady she couldn’t give her last name. “Why not?” asked the passenger. “We’re just not allowed to give it out since 9/11.” WHAT?!?! Are you freaking kidding me? This reminds me of an issue I recently had with one of my Soldiers. He is having trouble with the military’s payroll deductions to pay his child support through the state of Alabama. I won’t get into details, but the lady at the Alabama child support services (or whatever socialist name it has) was very rude because he “wasn’t paying his child support” when in fact he was but the state was all jacked up.
You see, the military pays its employees either once a month or twice on the first and fifteenth. However, on holidays or when the first and fifteenth fall on a Sunday, paychecks are sent out the preceding Friday. So, if the first falls on a weekend, that Soldier will be paid on the 30th or earlier depending on the holiday. So, May’s child support payment was paid on the 1st since it fell on a Thursday, but June’s payment will go out on May 30th since June 1st falls on a Sunday. Well the state of Alabama doesn’t look at that second payment as June’s payment. They look at it as an extra payment for May since it was in the same month!! So, instead of applying it to his monthly required payment, they apply it to back child support and charge interest for a missed payment. INSANE!! Well, instead of working this through, the Alabama rep is rude and when my Soldier asked for her last name she refused to give it. Don’t worry, I took care of that problem and hopefully that lady is responsible for jobless claims going up last month.
Exactly where is the threat with last names being used on a flight? If it’s such a risk, why do I have to wear a uniform with my last name plastered all over it? When I wear my PC hat, my last name is on that as well. Does that make me a target? Maybe I should get a new nametag made that just says CJ and tell people that I can’t give them my last name because of 9/11. While I’m at it, because of 9/11 I don’t even want them to look at me. I may get scared and think they’re about to plow a plane into my grill!
Rest assured, I’ll be making a phone call to US Airways to inquire about this “policy” they seem to have on their flights. How exactly do I complain when I don’t know the individuals name? I mean, at least have a policy where the flight attendants have alias names so they don’t sound so pathetic about why they can’t give their real last names. They can use that cool Star Wars name generator to come up with unique and personal names!! It’s bad enough that these morons are taking my tax money in the form of subsidies because they can’t manage themselves adequately, charge me $25 for a second bag ($15 for the FIRST bag if you’re on American Airlines), charge me for meals, won’t give me a full can of Diet Coke, and stick me in these claustrophobic seats between the heaviest, smelliest people possible (actually, this flight wasn’t so bad; I got a middle seat and they were decent people). Now they won’t tell me their last names?!
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By CJ
Posted in Life in the Military, Military News, Top Posts
There are two G.I. Bills that have been snaking their ways through Congress. This is actually a good thing as we’re finally working to fix something created decades ago. Since I’m on the email lists of veterans organizations from Vets For Freedom to Iraq Veterans Against the War, I’ve heard all sides of the story as they fight to get one or the other passed. I’d like to educate you all about what these competing bills provide since they will be used as political capital on both sides of the aisle.
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May 18, 2008 By CJ
Posted in Guest Blogger, Life in the Military, Top Posts
When I joined the Army in 1995, I joined as an enlisted Soldier. My father retired at the top of the enlisted ladder, hanging up his cap as a Command Master Chief in the Navy. As long as I’ve been in, I’ve been pushed, shoved, prodded, and encouraged to go either the Warrant Officer or Commissioned Officer route. I could have done so - and succeeded. But, I didn’t. And I don’t think that’s so bad.
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May 14, 2008 By CJ
Posted in Life in the Military, Top Posts
This was published in our local base newspaper and I think it paints a great picture of what our spouses put up with when we’re deployed. It’s from a wife named Nikki and was written to her mother. Her mom says she talks with her several times a week to see “how she is doing,” and of course always gets the same answer: “Oh, I’m doing OK, and so are the kids.” Then, the other day, Nikki sent her mom this letter and told her “’Just a little something I would share with you all…’– Love, Nikki.”
“I’m the one you walk past in Wal-Mart smelling a man’s brand of deodorant and buying the same brand of shower gel. I’m trying to remember his smell. I’m the one that sprays his cologne on his pillow so it seems like he is by me when I go to sleep.
“I’m the one you see in the back of the church, a tear running down my face as the congregation prays for our country and our troops. He’s one of them. “I’m the one you beep at for sitting at a green light. I was looking at the flag blowing in the breeze at the corner gas station and thinking of all it means to me, to him, and to our life together.
“I’m the one with a trunk full of flat rate boxes and customs forms, I know my local postal workers by name. The package I send him makes him seem close to me.
“I’m the one that has silly superstitions like wearing the same necklace throughout the deployment because he gave it to me and I will not take it off or change it. I’ll wear it every day until he comes back home.
“I’m the one you walk past as I completely fall apart and lose it because I left my cell phone at home. You might think ‘it’s just a phone,’ but it’s the life line of my marriage and it was his day to call.
“I’m the one you have labeled as quiet or reserved, the one who is never really part of anything, you don’t know I wear the faraway look because my heart boarded the plane with his.
“I’m the one that hears ‘tell him I say thanks, that I’m praying for him’ at least once a day, and I always tell him for you, but I can’t help but think, who prays for me as I continue to do my best to serve him.
“I’m the one that nods right along as you say that you understand or that it’s better now with the Internet. I know that it is, but what you don’t know is that nothing will ever replace the joy of receiving a letter or that the webcams and instant messenger just remind me of all the million little things about him that I love and miss.
“I’m the one that is so used to saying I’m fine, to being numb, to missing him, that I can’t remember any other way to be. I wonder at times if the ‘fine’ he tells me is the same ‘fine’ that I seem to be these days.
“I’m the one that hates Friday and Saturday nights because if he was home we would have the option to go do something… whether it was a movie or dinner or even just stay home and have family night and watch a good movie with the kids.
“I’m the one that eats out more often because it’s just not the same to cook for me and the kids…. He enjoyed home cooked meals…. And I enjoyed how much we enjoyed dinner and sitting at the table all together.
“I’m the one that is as strong and patriotic as the hero I married, not because I stand on the frontlines but because I stay behind stoking the homefires for months on end with a quiet resolve not unlike the one that personifies him.
“I’m the one that tells an ACU teddy bear or the moon good night, that I love you, because it makes me feel less lonely and because I hope he somehow hears or feels it.
“I’m the one that turns the porch light on at sunset to light his way back home, to me, to our life together, to the love and the good times we once shared.
“I’m the one that will see a white bus full of Soldiers or empty and start to cry… because it’s that same bus that took him away from me and I wish he was on there to come home to me.
“I’m the wife of an American Soldier; I’m the hope that lives within him after storm clouded days. The freedom from war that gives wings to his heart, may they reach across the miles and bind our hearts together against all that we must face in this world.”
Susan K. Edmunds
Proud mother/mother-in-law
and retired staff sergeant
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May 9, 2008 By CJ
Posted in Life in the Military, Top Posts, Top Posts - My Post, Top Posts - Shared
The Berzerkeleys are at it again. In a recent editorial in the Berkeley Daily Planet former Berzerkeley Councilmember Mark McDonald slanders military recruiters and leaders. He presents three fallacies that I’d like to correct him on.
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May 8, 2008 By CJ
Posted in Military News, News, Top Posts
Iraq Veterans Against the War are trying again. Only this time, they better really bring it. Winter Soldier is going for Round 3 in trying to influence the public about the supposed “travesties” taking place in Iraq. Only this time, we’ll be paying even more attention to what they say UNDER OATH about the “failure of troop surge”, according to their press release.
WHAT: Winter Soldier on the Hill
WHO: Iraq Veterans Against the War (IVAW) & The Congressional Progressive Caucus
WHEN: May 15, 2008, 9:30am-12:30pm
WHERE: 2261 Rayburn House Office Building
WHY: To present eyewitness accounts of the Iraq occupation to Congress.
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May 5, 2008 By CJ
Posted in Top Posts
You know, I get tired of hearing about how much this war is costing us. I believe the going figure right now is about $600 billion since 2003. While not a small number by any calculation, let’s look at some other numbers for context.
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