« Previous · Home · Next »
THIS JUST IN: "MILBLOGGERS" HAVE SOMETHING TO SAY
By Lt Col P
From today's WaPo comes a David Ignatius piece on milbloggers, "Their Christmas At War." It's a stab at showing how the troops are dealing with holidays in a war zone, as told through milblogs. Being a charitable sort, I'll file this under "a good effort" and "backhanded compliments."
He begins with a nod to our good friend and oberbloggenfuhrer BlackFive, and mentions several other sites as well as milblogging.com. But he never seems to get what they're talking about. "Misery may love company," he writes, "but in the military, it keeps its mouth shut." Actually, no it doesn't. Throughout history the soldier's only right has been to complain, and he does it in a variety of ways. But he doesn't always complain; sometimes he pokes fun at his predicament. I suppose you have to be there-- or have been there--to understand. He continues:
"This holiday season, America is struggling through a searing national debate about Iraq. The horror of the war feels immediate, even to people who've never been near Baghdad, but less so the humanity of the thousands of American soldiers who are serving there. That's part of the Iraq disconnect: The war dominates our political life, but the men and women in the midst of it often are nearly invisible. We see them in thumbnail photos in group obituaries but not as real, living people."
WHAT?? You might see them that way, but the normal parts of the country, where these men and women come from, see them and hear them quite clearly. And you can get to know them a little more through milblogs, which you seem to have just discovered. You need to get out of the office, Dave. Get out of the office, say, and into an embed position somewhere out in Al-Anbar or up in Mosul. You'll meet plenty of real, living people.
Finally, one more thing boils me. He refers to a young man who died saving his fellow soldiers as, "falling on a grenade that was thrown into his truck." In the next sentence the man's platoon sergeant provides the real story, but Ignatius is too obtuse to realize his error. The soldier didn't fall on the grenade, he threw himself on it. Big difference, Dave.
Something tells me, though, that this is all falling on deaf ears.
TrackBack
TrackBack URL for this entry:
http://op-for.com/mt/mt-tb.cgi/668
Listed below are links to weblogs that reference THIS JUST IN: "MILBLOGGERS" HAVE SOMETHING TO SAY:
» The Faces Behind The War from Villainous Company
Four a.m. It's cold and dark outside my small home in the woods in western Maryland. The slap of the newspaper hitting the driveway briefly jolts me awake as I blearily stare at the monitor. Behind my office chair, a... [Read More]
Comments
The war dominates our political life, but the men and women in the midst of it often are nearly invisible. We see them in thumbnail photos in group obituaries but not as real, living people."
You need to get out too, Col. This is the standard attitude of the MSM/Coastal elites. They see them as thumbnails and not people because there is no chance their children are amongst them.
Mrs Davis:
I live in Northern VA. They're everywhere around me.
LtCol P
"Something tells me, though, that this is all falling on deaf ears."
No, it isn't.
Deaf ears are throwing themselves upon it.
"The war dominates our political life, but the men and women in the midst of it often are nearly invisible."
In normal parts of the country we hold parades for their safe return and honor processions for their return home under more tragic circumstances - all the while people like David Ignatius and his ilk jeer at us and spit on our men and women in uniform.
Unreal.
Post a comment
Potential comment conditions listed here. Oh, and you may use basic HTML for formatting.
The stench of the intellectually inbred. They provide zero benefit or value by their efforts.
Soft persons, less than men, not quite women. No wonder they don't understand anything of importance.