21 & STUPID.

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Elitism and Class, hippies, military, millennials, race and culture, Religion, snowflakes, Veterans

Unified Patriots by Vassar Bushmills

Every college kid remembers when he turned 21 because it was the day he could use his own drivers’ license to get into the Boom-Boom Room.

That was in the first semester of my sophomore year, 1966.

There were a lot of laws, even ancient ones, that were in place then that are no longer valid.

I’m sure you’ve heard the axiom, attributed to Churchill, “If you are not a liberal at 20, you have no heart. If you are not Conservative by 40, you have no brain”.

Now Sir Winston was aiming that at English public school boys, their version of Ivy Leaguers, and not at working class people. But American working class people did have a similar version of the same theme. Class distinctions were not the same in America, for children of working class people did go to college.

Of course this was what always distinguished Americans from the rest of the world. Even our noblest thinkers, educators and business successes had a coal miner, welder or dirt farmer in their family tree, unlike the English.

When I went off to college my dad simply warned me I’d act stupid for awhile, “so be careful”. But he wasn’t afraid of me slipping into the Boom Boom Room on a fake ID. When he turned 21 he was on a troop ship headed for North Africa, my pregnant mom back in Cincinnati at her sister’s house to wait out the war. Unlike Churchill’s class, he was more fearful that I’d fall prey to “ideas” that swam deep around college campuses, and become a Democrat, or worse, a liberal. He knew I’d bump into that sort at college, but hoped that I would reject what they taught, so that after college, I’d find a nice girl, get a job, start a family, and vote for the Barry Goldwater of my choice.

That was how it had always been once maturity, duty, and responsibility settled it, the same thing Churchill was talking about.

In 1964 we all looked the same on campus. You couldn’t tell an engineer or pre-med student from an English or poly-sci major[…]

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Wenching on the DMZ; the Owner’s Manual

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Korea, Michael Avenatti, military, Prostitution, race and culture, Stormy Daniels, Veterans, Veterans' Tales

Veterans’ Tales by Vassar Bushmills

Stormy Daniels brings to mind the ancient and universal definition of “wench”, a woman of low repute one would not like to be seen with in public.

Politics aside, she’s made public a side of life few Americans, unless born on the wrong side of the tracks know very little about. Still, it seems every American soldier, as far back as the Civil War, when the term “camp follower” became synonymous with off-duty recreation for soldiers, and were a fixture outside the gates of every American military post since Pershing, had knowledge denied to the rest of the American population.

It was also known as “wenching”, a very pedestrian sport among the world’s lower classes since feudal times, a sport even the buck private could save up for at least one Friday night a month at Ft Benning, Georgia in 1941.

Upper class men and the nobility did not “go chasing women”, having their own version of the sport, at least since Henry II of England in the 12^th Century. Royals created their own set of rules designed entirely to keep up appearances.

The DMZ

In 1974 it was my good fortune to be part of an advance team sent to Korea by our three-star general, to survey the brothels around Oijongbo near the DMZ. Yep, The bars. The cook’s tour, as the guests of the Korean Business Women’s Assn and several House Madams[…]

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Is the Red-White-and-Blue Line Dying Out: a Conversation for Veterans

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live free or die, love of country, military, patriotism, Veterans, Veterans' Tales

Unified Patriots by Vassar Bushmills

Posted slightly different at our Veterans site, VeteransTales.org, where I invite you to read and join the conversation.)

My father was a WWII veteran, leaving college as a freshman after Pearl Harbor, enlisting, embarking for North Africa about the same time his daughter, my sister, was born, and not coming home to see his daughter until just before VE Day. He liked to brag, after he’d had a few, that I was born nine months to the day after he came home.

Everything I knew about my dad’s service in North Africa, Sicily and Italy, I heard from my grandfather. I got the sense, confirmed by years traveling around the world, that that was how a lot of lessons were passed down. Grandparents tell the stories while Pop is out working his butt off, in my dad’s case, making up for lost time.

It was Granddad who told me stories about the Arabs and the flies in Tunisia, and the heat, only he wasn’t around to tell my younger brother. So I passed those stories onto him. That’s how legends and culture have been passed on since the Indians first came here. But neither Grandad nor my dad would tell me anything about Anzio or Monte Casino, which taught me another lesson, that men who have seen dark things rarely like to talk about them. To just anyone.

My dad was the Commander of the nearby VFW until one night a member sat at a table, slowly pulled out a pistol and calmly blew his brains out. I couldn’t have been more than 6. Then when I was in my 20s Dad took me to an American Legion Hall at the country seat, 25 miles away, but just to see if their local ping pong champion could beat him. He couldn’t. He told me then that was the first Legion Hall he’s been in since ’45. The clientele “were different” he said, a notion I never understood until the local newspaper editor and myself, both veterans, attempted to join a Legion Post in a dry county in Kentucky in the mid-80s. We were summarily attached to a Post in Louisville, 75 miles away.

In 1991 or thereabouts, after having written a patriotic op-ed favorable to the military in the liberal Cincinnati evening paper I was asked by a former American Legion national commander to give that same “speech” at a local Legion Hall dinner event. In the crowd of about 200, everyone just itching for the tables to be cleared, so the dancing could begin, I noticed all the young faces.

So, just to get a lay of the land, I asked if all the veterans would stand up and be recognized. Two old fellows at the back table stood up. My dad had just died a couple of months earlier, at age 70, so, realizing I had nothing unfoolish to say, I just folded up my Red-White-and Blue speech, stuck it inside my jacket pocket and tried to pretend I was Johnny Carson for five minutes, then gave the floor over to the dancing.

It was then I understood what my dad meant while leaving the Legion Hall at the county seat 20 years earlier[…]

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Merry Christmas to our service members, veterans, their families, friends and loved ones.

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Merry Christmas, military, Veterans

Merry Christmas to our service members, veterans, their families, friends and loved ones. 

Merry Christmas to the families of those who served, made the ultimate and are no longer here.

Thank you for your service. 

Thank you for your sacrifice.

God bless you this holiday season and always.

A Soldier’s Wish by The Clockwork Conservative

Let’s never forget those whose sacrifices make us free and able to celebrate and worship as we please in this holiday season as well as the rest of the year. Published in the Magic City Morning Star December 24, 2009, this work really captures the feeling.  Transcript is posted below the video.

This poem was written by an Australian Peacekeeping stationed overseas. His request, send this to as many people as you can.  Credit is due to all of the service men and women for our being able to celebrate Christmas.  Let’s try to pay a bit of what we owe to these heroes.

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from Prison to Hometown Parades, 40 Years of Evolution for Army Deserters

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Bowe Bergdahl, coverup, desertion, military, Obama Administration

 

Vasserbushmills via Grumpy Opinions

For some reason I’ve had several experiences in my life with deserters, one intimately, so I know something of the law on this subject. Or thought I did.

My first encounter was when I was 9, and we were told to report to the town square in our Little League uniforms for a parade. 1954 I think. The parade was for a returning POW from Korea, and the whole town showed up; the high school marching band, the local miner’s union with their banners, Lions Club and even one of the church (we only had one) ladies’ groups. The town was about a mile long, and we marched the length of it, the returning hero in the back seat of a nice open convertible. At the end of town the parade just broke up and we all walked home, except for the guest of honor, who was taken about another mile to a secluded country club…where I think, most of the town believed he was to be feasted. Only, my dad told me, there was a troop of MP’s waiting here, where they took this soldier away. Dad said he’d been a deserter and collaborator with the commies in the camps. A snitch. Even 9 year olds understood that.

My second encounter was more intimate, in 1974, when Pres Ford announced his amnesty program for all the draft dodgers, which to the military also meant a more lenient attitude toward deserters who would come in on their own. One kid from Florida had turned himself in Australia, where he had spent two years. He was moved to an administrative holding company in Hawaii, and charged with desertion, at that time facing 20 years in Leavenworth and a Dishonorable Discharge (DD). He requested me as his defense counsel, and I flew out to Ft Shafter from Tokyo to meet him….

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POLL: U S Military Prefers Romney over Obama 2 to 1

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Election 2012, military, Mitt Romney, obama, Vote

Pursuant to a poll taken by Military Times, sixty-six percent of the men and women who serve in the U. S. military polled indicated that if the election were held today, they would cast their vote for Mitt Romney while only 26% would cast their vote for Barack Obama.

Image courtesy of Army Times.

In the words of James Carville, “It’s the economy stupid.”

It is not military issues that concerns the men and women serving in our military most but the economy.

Forty-eight percent those serving in the military that support Mitt Romney are more concerned with the economy compared to 23% of those in the military who support Barack Obama.  A compilation of both groups indicated that 41% of those serving in the military feel that the economy is the most important issue today.

The candidate’s character ranked second.

Image courtesy of Army Times.

When asked “which candidate do you believe has your best interests at heart,” 55% of those polled said Mitt Romney while only 24% of those polled said that Barack Obama had their best interests at heart.

Image courtesy of Army Times.

When asked “which candidate do you believe is sincere about his stated policy positions,” 49% voted Romney compared to 24%, Obama, 16% and 9% voted “both.”

Image courtesy of Army Times.

Finally, when asked, “How will you cast your vote,” 43% of those polled indicated that they will be voting in person while the remaining 57% said that they will vote by absentee ballot.

Image courtesy of Army Times.

These polls are bad news for Obama all around.

SOURCE:  Military Times Poll: Romney bests Obama, 2-1