War's Wrenching Counterpoint to Quints' Arrival (washingtonpost.com)

Sgt. Horton:

Thanks to everyone who sent me this morning's story from the Washington Post. Turns out he's in Bethesda, which is only a couple of hours from here. Maybe I'll drop in to see the fellow next week, if the National Naval Medical Center allows visitors. Does anyone know?

War's Wrenching Counterpoint to Quints' Arrival (washingtonpost.com)

Sgt. Horton:

Thanks to everyone who sent me this morning's story from the Washington Post. Turns out he's in Bethesda, which is only a couple of hours from here. Maybe I'll drop in to see the fellow next week, if the National Naval Medical Center allows visitors. Does anyone know?

The Command Post - 2004 Presidential Election

Really, His Senate Record Means Nothing At All:

Yet again we are being told by the Kerry campaign to please ignore the last two decades of his career:

When asked to reconcile all that she had said about Kerry's purported positive views on space with a voting record wherein he repeatedly voted to cut or cancel various NASA activities including the ISS, Garver noted that she was not all that concerned about this - and that one should not consider Kerry�s Senate voting record as being indicative of how Kerry would view NASA as President.

Come on, now. How the man has voted for two decades says nothing whatsoever about his opinions on the military, intelligence,and now space policy? Just what is the role of a Senator's vote, then?

Marine Corps Times - News - More News

A Troubling Note to An Earlier Story:

Marine Sgt. Joshua Horton, the Marine who deployed just in advance of the birth of quintuplets, is back in the USA. Sadly, it's because he was seriously hurt:

A Marine sergeant who was seriously injured in Iraq just days before his wife gave birth to quintuplets has been told about the new babies, a Marine spokesman said Wednesday. 'His mom and sisters met with him today. He's been able to talk to doctors and he knows he?s a dad five times over now,' said Maj. Rick Coates, a spokesman for Sgt. Joshua Horton's Chicago-based unit, the 2nd Battalion 24th Marine Regiment. The couple has two other children.

Coates said Horton, 28, was concerned about the babies who all weighed less than two pounds when they were born premature Monday in a Naperville, Ill., hospital. But he said Horton talked to his wife, Taunacy, who reassured him that the babies were in good health. The babies remained in critical but stable condition Wednesday, according to Edward Hospital.

Sgt. Horton himself is also in critical but stable condition. Grim's Hall sends our best. Thanks to Janie from Seattle for dropping a note to me about it. If anyone hears more, including especially ways to help out, let me know.

MOOSE CREEK PUBLISHING

AuthentiSEAL:

I've just realized, while looking at the AuthentiSEAL webpage, that the book about their exploits uncovering fake SEALs was written by an old friend of mine. Steve Robinson, known to me as "Tiny," is not only a former SEAL and investigator of false claims to military glory. He's also a blacksmith, the first Westerner ever to be admitted into the Russian Hammerman's guild, and also a member of the ancient Scottish Hammerman's guild.

Since Tiny has posted a few pictures of himself on the website, I thought I'd give you one that was a bit more recent. Here is Tiny at the Grandfather Mountain Scottish Highland Games, wearing his "Clan McTablecloth" tartan greatkilt.

Mystery Surrounds Kerry's Navy Discharge - October 13, 2004 - The New York Sun

Kerry Dishonorably Discharged?

You've probably seen the The New York Sun piece explaining why it is likely that Kerry was dishonorably discharged from the Navy. This is a well-researched story, founded in exactly the kind of details about military procedure that usually escapes the journalist community.

Is the author right? Perhaps. I know that the director of AuthentiSEAL has been looking into just this question for quite a while. I've gotten the chain email started by Mr. Nash several times, though I haven't published it because it contained questions but no answers. The Sun piece is different -- it's got some hard facts:

According to the secretary of the Navy's document, the "authority of reference" this board was using in considering Mr. Kerry's record was "Title 10, U.S. Code Section 1162 and 1163. "This section refers to the grounds for involuntary separation from the service. What was being reviewed, then, was Mr. Kerry's involuntary separation from the service. And it couldn't have been an honorable discharge, or there would have been no point in any review at all....

There are a number of categories of discharges besides honorable. There are general discharges, medical discharges, bad conduct discharges, as well as other than honorable and dishonorable discharges. There is one odd coincidence that gives some weight to the possibility that Mr. Kerry was dishonorably discharged. Mr. Kerry has claimed that he lost his medal certificates and that is why he asked that they be reissued. But when a dishonorable discharge is issued, all pay benefits, and allowances, and all medals and honors are revoked as well. And five months after Mr. Kerry joined the U.S. Senate in 1985, on one single day, June 4, all of Mr. Kerry's medals were reissued.

All that is reasonable -- as is the presumption that a Naval Officer who secretly met with the Viet Cong leadership and negotiated a peace treaty with them might not have been honorably discharged. Indeed, one would expect that the least that he would face would be a dishonorable discharge. That Kerry did so is not disputed by anyone, so far as I know, and his work on "The People's Peace Treaty" is a matter of public record.

Will this story get enough legs to impress itself into the public mind between now and 2 November? I hope so, if it's true. A man who violated his oath as a Naval officer ought not to be trusted to keep his oath as President.

This is a point made recently by BlackFive, discussing LtCol Khan's recent removal from command. "For example, look at the comments surrounding the posts here about Marine LtCol Khan who may very well be facing a dead end career because he won't fight his removal from command...he won't fight BECAUSE IT WOULD COST THE MARINE CORPS TOO MUCH. LtCol Khan doesn't want to cause a stir while Marines are fighting overseas. "

How that contrasts with a man who went out of his way to undermine the cause for which his fellow sailors were fighting. How it contrasts with a man who went out of his way to cause a stir ('If we chain crippled vets to the White House fence, will you cover it?'). Then there was that Senate testimony of 1971, in which another Mr. Khan was invoked by John Kerry, who said he was the model for the military's behavior.

Kerry's not out of the woods with military men, not yet. The stories about his bad behavior hurt him in August, but there has been a respite since then. Yet now, with only a few weeks to go, there is a last chance to make Americans aware of Kerry's dishonorable actions, and unfitness to serve in any high or respected office.

Carter may have pardoned him, but we have not.

Japan Today - News - China reportedly moves over 30,000 troops near N Korean border - Japan's Leading International News Network

Another "Drill"?

The People's Liberation Army has reportedly deployed 30,000 soldiers on the DPRK border. The report does not make clear whether these are part of the 150,000 deployed in the region, which include heavy armor and artillery, or if they are an additional 30,000 troops.

BostonHerald.com - International News: Japan struggles to define new patriotism untainted by wartime debacle

'If You Say "Patriotism," It Sounds like Extremism.'

The Japanese are sorting out the answer to a familiar problem:

Six decades after the end of World War II, patriotism is making a comeback in Japan. In classrooms, barracks and the corridors of power, the Japanese are extolling the virtues of national strength and pride with greater freedom and enthusiasm than at any time since their defeat in 1945.

The revival - accelerated by the groundbreaking dispatch of troops to Iraq earlier this year - is wearing away the ground rules established in the postwar years, when Japan renounced militarism, and patriotism was tainted with the horrors of war.

Nowadays, Japan's most cherished postwar principles are being challenged by a series of firsts: first deployment in a combat zone; first serious political debate about amending the pacifist constitution; first prime minister to make an annual official practice of visiting the Yasukuni Shrine. Another first looks imminent: a partial lifting of Japan's ban on arms exports.

Japan has been moving in this direction for years. I recall back in 2000, while I was living in China, the Japanese budgeted for an aircraft carrier. The Chinese press went nuts. "Why should a self defense force need an aircraft carrier?" they asked, reasonably enough. Aircraft carriers are about power projection.

The Chinese remember World War II very differently from anyone else. The Chinese I talked to about it all called it "The War of Japanese Imperialist Aggression," which indeed is how it must have looked from Manchuria. A renewed strength in Japan is troubling to the Chinese, but they hate more any renewed Japanese patriotism -- that is, not just strength but the belief in your country's rightness that encourages strength's use.

Yet it is not healthy to be ashamed of your heritage. It is necessary to be able to recognize where your parents -- or countrymen -- have gone wrong, and where they have fallen from the ideals you would want upheld. At the same time, you have to be able to recognize and honor the good that they did. To do otherwise is to believe that you come from poisoned earth. It darkens your understanding, and it weakens your ability to defend the right in the future.

Germany suffers from the same problem as Ms. Yoko Takaoka, wife of an SDF man and someone who wants to be proud of what her country is doing in the world today. But...

'Patriotism? If you say that, it reminds me of the old army. It sounds like extremism,' she said as her toddler daughter gazed up at an imposing Cobra attack helicopter at the army base display.

Southerners, at least, understand the difficulty of sorting out the problems of history. Most Southerners have a Confederate soldiers in the family tree. Many of the South's recognizable symbols and much of its heritage are impossible to separate from those four years in the 1860s. You can't travel through the South without crossing battlefields, which is not true in other parts of the country. Indeed, this little town where work has brought me for this year changed hands 67 times during the Civil War.

Bold and remarkable things were done by men in grey, brave and wonderous things. They fought with passion, with brilliance, and with honor. They won the praise of their foes at every turn. And yet, and yet...

They fought for good reasons, but also for bad ones -- including one particular evil. The Union soldiers (many Southerners, including me, have ancestors from both sides of the war) fought brutally, with far less art, and finally were able to find victory only through the most astonishing cruelty, and the complete rejection of the laws of war and the rules of chivalry. General Sherman trained Col. Custer, and they together did worse things in the South than in the Black Hills. In the wake of the war, Sherman proposed literal genocide: slaughtering former Confederates, and distributing the land of the South to the Union army's soldiers as compensation for fighting in the war.

Yes, the Union also fought for many reasons, some bad, and one very good, bright and shining.

So it is with sympathy that I read these reports from Japan, where the folk are dealing with hard questions, and feeling guilty about feeling proud. It is necessary to learn to be proud of the good, without forgetting the bad. It is necessary, in other words, to learn to forgive your ancestors: to recognize their flaws, their failings, and even their crimes, but to love them anyway.

That love of home, ancestor, and country is the very definition of patriotism. I understand how the Japanese, as others, can stand at the start of the road back to patriotism and wonder at it. Patriotism might indeed sound extreme, looking at the long road with its ditches full of waste and ruin, crime and cruelty.

Yet, in the end, patriotism proves to be a kind of health. As with other loves that forgive, it sets you free: free to honor the past, and to work for better in the future.

Gulf Daily News

The Nobel Peace Prize:

Another of the great tragedies of internationalism, although not of the magnitude of the U.N., is the Nobel Prize for Peace. This year's winner is spreading goodwill even today:

Kenyan ecologist Wangari Maathai, the first African woman to win the Nobel Peace Prize, yesterday reiterated her claim that the Aids virus was a deliberately created biological agent.

"Some say that AIDS came from the monkeys, and I doubt that because we have been living with monkeys (since) time immemorial, others say it was a curse from God, but I say it cannot be that.

"Us black people are dying more than any other people in this planet," Maathai told a press conference in Nairobi a day after winning the prize for her work in human rights and reversing deforestation across Africa.

Conspiracy

"It's true that there are some people who create agents to wipe out other people. If there were no such people, we could have not have invaded Iraq," she said.

"We invaded Iraq because we believed that Saddam Hussein had made, or was in the process of creating agents of biological warfare," said Maathai, also Kenyan deputy environment and natural resources minister, who has gained a reputation as a fearless speaker.

"In fact it (the HIV virus) is created by a scientist for biological warfare," she added.

"Why has there been so much secrecy about Aids? When you ask where did the virus come from, it raises a lot of flags. That makes me suspicious," Maathai added.

Maathai thereby joins the Yasser Arafat wing of the Nobel Peace Prize winners, along with Jimmy Carter, Kofi Annan, and the United Nations itself.

It wasn't always this way. Once, the Nobel Prize for Peace was -- as, indeed, was the UN -- an honorable organization. Theodore Roosevelt won the Nobel Prize for Peace, and the Red Cross, Woodrow Wilson -- a misguided and highly overestimated man, but an honest idealist -- Martin Luther King, Jr., and other worthies.

It began to go bad when it began being used to advance "internationalism" instead of peace. This happened in the early 1970s. First Will Brandt was awarded the prize for "embodying a new attitude toward Eastern Europe," that is to say, an attitude that embraced Communists; in 1973, Henry Kissinger and Le Duc Tho won it jointly for negotiating an American withdrawal from Vietnam. As laughable as it is to have Kissinger awarded the prize, at least Kissinger held up his end of the bargain; Duc Tho's folks at once began plans for an invasion, which they undertook as soon as the US troops were clear.

Even since then there have been deserving winners -- Mother Theresa, Lech Walesa, Aung San Suu Kyi (still a prisoner in Burma/Myanmar) -- but as the years have passed, more and more bad actors have been granted the honor. Desmond Tutu, Mandela and De Klerk were all unworthy -- De Klerk, like Kissinger before him, most obviously so, and yet also like Kissinger, he did the most to keep his word. Arafat we mentioned, but he deserves mentioning again.

Unlike the UN, which has passed the point at which it ought to be saved even if it can be saved, the Nobel Prize might be renewed. Perhaps someday, we can hope, its panels and commissioners will stop trying to send messages to the world, and return to honoring those who already have.

Remarks by President Bush at Missourians for Matt Blunt and the Missouri Republican Party Breakfast

"Freedom is Powerful"

The President gave a great speech this morning. I'm going to include large excerpts of it, as it was a much longer speech and some of the best parts might get lost. What follows is a vision of foreign policy that I can wholeheartedly support, one I would be glad to fight for.

On today's elections:

There was voting time elsewhere in this world today. A marvelous thing is happening in Afghanistan. Freedom is powerful. Think about a society in which young girls couldn't go to school and their mothers were whipped in the public square. And today, they're holding a presidential election. The first person to vote in the presidential election, three years after the Taliban ruled that country with such barbarism, was a 19-year-old woman, an Afghan refugee, who fled her homeland during the civil war. Here's what she said: "I cannot explain my feelings, just how happy I am. I would never have thought I would be able to vote in this election." She's voting in this election because the United States of America believes that freedom is the Almighty God's gift to each man and woman in this world.

And today is an appropriate day for Americans to remember and thank the men and women of our Armed Forces who liberated Afghanistan.

The people of Australia voted today, as well. And I want to congratulate my good friend, Prime Minister John Howard, who won a great victory.... Because we led, because we acted, Afghanistan is fighting terror and holding a presidential election today; Pakistan is capturing terrorists; Saudi Arabia is making raids and arrests; Libya is dismantling its weapons programs; a army of a free Iraq is fighting for freedom, and more than three-quarters of al Qaeda's leaders and associates have been brought to justice.

On elections yet to come:

Over the next four years, we'll continue to spread freedom. And that's what's happening in Iraq. Last night I talked about the finance minister who came to see me. Let me recount some of that conversation I had with him. I thought it was really interesting and illustrative. He walks in full of confidence. He says, Mr. President, thank you for what you and your country have done for us, we're headed toward elections.

Think about that statement. A fellow shows up in the Oval Office of the President of the United States and says, we're headed for elections. For most of us, that doesn't sound like much. But for a person who used to live under the -- in a country that was ruled by a brutal tyrant, where there were torture rooms and mass graves, where people had no freedom at all, to say, "we're headed toward elections," is a powerful statement....

As an aside, you cannot lead a coalition in Iraq if you tell them, this is the wrong war at the wrong place at the wrong time. Imagine my opponent's grand idea of a global summit, and he walks in, and there are the leaders around the world, sitting there, waiting for the American President to speak. And he says, follow me into a great mistake. Nobody is going to follow. You must have optimism. You must believe in what you're doing if you expect to lead. And I believe in what we're doing in Iraq. And in January, Iraq will have elections, and that's important. You see, I believe in the power of liberty to transform societies.

On winning the peace:

But think about that for a minute. [Japan's Koizumi] and I are friends, and we're talking about different issues confronting the world. And the reason I say, think about it, is because it wasn't all that long ago that we were at war with Japan.

If you're 58 years old, like me, it seems like an eternity. But a lot of people in this country still remember that war. My dad does, Buck's brother. I'm sure you've got dads and grandads who fought against the Japanese. They were our sworn enemy.

And after we were victorious in World War II, Harry S. Truman, from the state of Missouri, believed that liberty could transform an enemy into an ally. And so did a lot of other citizens. Oh, there were some skeptics in those days, and you can understand why. We had just finished a war. A lot of people's lives had been hurt as a result of that war. A lot of Americans had lost a loved one. They weren't interested in worrying about Japan, they were interested in their own souls and their own hearts. I'm sure there was a lot of people here that said, it's just impossible for an enemy to become a friend.

But because my predecessor and other Americans believed in the power of liberty to transform societies, I sit at the table with Prime Minister Koizumi, talking about the peace we all want.

We'll get the job done in Iraq. Freedom is powerful. And when we succeed, an American President will be sitting down with a duly-elected leader of Iraq, talking about the peace that we all want, and we will have known, this generation of Americans will have known we have done our duty to our children and our grandchildren to leave behind a better world.

:: Xinhuanet - English ::

Afghan Elections:

The polls are now closed in Afghanistan, too, though counting will take a bit longer. Here's a look at the situation from a particularly unsympathetic souce, China's Xinhua News Service:

Around 10.5 million Afghan voters filed into some 22,000 polling stations across the country to elect their preferred leaders for the next five years.

Among extra tight security, voters, men and women alike, went to nearest balloting sites to cast their votes. In Kabul, the capital of the small Central Asian country, some people stood in queue around 6:30 AM outside mosques and schools where the ballot will take place. In a famous mosque frequented by Hazaras, the third largest ethnic minority group in the country, hundreds of men, many of them wearing traditional long robes and turbans, stand in the cold and dusty wind, waiting patiently for their turns to cast.

The security is especially tight, as the Taliban and their al Qaeda allies have threatened repeatedly to disrupt the polling with all means. A handful of taxis, police vehicles, buses and cars owned by foreign agencies went by the armed policemen and Afghan National Army soldiers.

In front of the Defense Ministry compound, a number of US special Operations soldiers, disguised as civilians, stand guard in their HUMVEEs.

Journalists from abroad and home struggled with some policemen in Kabul who barred them from getting inside the polling sites although according to the rule they are entitled to do so.

The weather turned nasty overnight. A sandstorm attacked
the capital, turning the city into a surrealistic scene in a sci-fi picture. Some Afghans said this is a bad omen for the whole nation,and they wonder what will happen during the day and after.

Some of the participants in the voting complained about the practice of applying indelible ink on their fingers, as the special ink will last for four or five days, making their easy targets for potential terrorist attacks.

All the same, no major attacks were carried out, thanks to Coalition security. Afghanistan is now a democracy. All may not be well, but it is a major step forward, and one in which the Afghans are well pleased.

The Iraqis, too, can take hope from this. What was done in Afghanistan with 17,000 Coalition troops can be done in Iraq with 170,000. The march to freedom carries on, in spite of her enemies. Congratulations to the Afghans. May Iraq soon join Afghanistan among the community of free nations.

Conservatives Sweep to Another Win in Australian National Elections

Australia's Elections:

From Voice of America

Australian Prime Minister John Howard has led his Liberal Party to a fourth consecutive win in parliamentary elections.

During the campaign, all indications were that this race would be extremely close. It has not worked out that way, with the conservative government now expected to significantly increase its parliamentary majority.

It appears that not everyone is happy with the results:

Democrat presidential contender John Forbes Kerry expressed displeasure at the Australian election outcome.

"This is the wrong election result, in the wrong place at the wrong time," Mr. Kerry said. "Think of the precedent this sets."

Why yes, that was the first thing I thought of.

BBC NEWS | South Asia | Huge Afghan poll attack 'foiled'

Afghan Elections:

Good job, lads:

A tanker carrying 40,000 litres of fuel and packed with explosives was intercepted on the eve of the country's first direct presidential elections.

I've been expecting an attack of that type on US soil for years. I'm sorry to see it's finally appeared, as others will learn even by a failed example.

The Media Drop: Indymedia UK server seizure: Is this not a story?

Indymedia Servers Seized:

The FBI has apparently gone after Indymedia. Just rumors for now, but it is suggested that it may be this is part of the investigation into their posting of RNC delegates' names, addresses, and hotel information.

Transatlantic Intelligencer

Trans-Int:

Transatlantic Intelligencer is a new blog recommended by long time reader S.D. It looks good. The intention is to explain Euro politics to Americans, and vice-versa. The primary focus, however, is on overcoming the language gaps to make Europe accessible. It aims...

...to counter the egregiously misleading reporting on European affairs in the most widely-cited - in effect, "mainstream" - media in the States. Such reporting - long on cliché-ridden generalizations, short on factual details, and displaying a remarkable ignorance of European history - has given rise to a number of myths about contemporary Europe and the state of transatlantic relations. One such myth, which is playing a major role in the current US presidential campaign, suggests, for instance, that "Europe" - seemingly as a whole - responded to the 9/11 terrorist attacks with a great outpouring of sympathy for the US and that this capital of sympathy has been successively squandered by the actions of the current American administration. This, so to say, "Legend of the Squandered Sympathy" is the subject of the long post that follows.

And, indeed, that post is worth a read.

A Counterintelligence Reader

CI Reader:

The classic work on CI, "A Counterintelligence Reader," is now online in all four volumes.

Marine In Iraq Expecting Quintuplets

Marine In Iraq Expecting Quintuplets!

Marine Reservist Josh Horton is deployed in Iraq. His wife (and veteran sailor) Traunacy Horton is due in six weeks with three daughters and two sons. This will increase the Horton brood to seven.

Congratulations are in order. My first thought, as a father myself: Josh is the only fellow in the Corps who will sleep better in Iraq than he would at home.

In Bill's World: A Post I Really Am Not Enjoying Writing

Bill Faith:

Fellow MilBlogger Bill Faith, a Vietnam Vet with troubles of his own, is trying to help his sister out while she fights off cancer. Drop by and hear the fellow out; maybe you can help him in one way or another.

The Kerry Spot on National Review Online

No, No: You're the Man, Eddie

NRO decides to join the Kerry campaign:

A truly nefarious saboteur might start sending those e-mails to the DNC's mailing list now.

Something like, "Edwards beat Cheney in the greatestest super-duper debate rout EVER! Kerry's victory is assured! Finally, on that glorious day, the Democratic Party will have its revenge, and we can finally round up those no-good evil Republicans and conservatives, and force them into re-education camps, and do away with those who oppose the NEW ORDER..."

Loyal readers responded:

Kerry Spot reader Jeremy has apparently already heard back from an Ohio paper. The Ohio paper's profanity-laden response:

You ******* moron. You're supposed to send out your dumb*** spin letters after the debate — not four hours before it starts. All you do is **** editors off with this ****. Do you understand how many of these things we get? Do you understand how easy they are to spot? I'm a life-long Democrat, but I'm so embarrassed by how **** dumb the minions of my party are. You guys are less street smart than those guys named Scooter who work for Bush. No wonder we keep getting our ***** kicked.

I have to wipe the tears of laughter away.

I've never been a loyal reader of the Kerry Spot, myself, but that will have to change. This Geraghty is a man after my own heart.

Yahoo! Mail - grimbeornr@yahoo.com

The VP Debate:

According to an email I just got, Terry McAuliffe would like you to vote in the following online polls after the VP debate:

CNN: http://www.cnn.com/
MSNBC: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/
Wall Street Journal: http://www.wsj.com/
LA Times: http://www.latimes.com/
Akron Beacon-Journal: http://www.ohio.com/
Minneapolis-St. Paul Star-Tribune: http://www.startribune.com/
Orlando Sentinel: http://www.orlandosentinel.com/
Philadelphia Inquirer: http://www.philly.com/
South Florida Sun-Sentinel: http://www.sun-sentinel.com/

Well, maybe not you.