December 06, 2007 05:18 PM
Military families have little use for Bush, Iraq policy
Last week, at the debate for Republican presidential candidates, Rep. Duncan Hunter (R-Calif.) made the ridiculous claim that U.S. troops and their families are, by their very nature, conservative. “[M]ost Americans, most kids who leave that — that breakfast table and go and serve in the military and make that corporate decision with their family — most of them are conservatives.”
That certainly fits in with the conventional wisdom. We've all heard the narrative -- there's a tie between the Republican Party and the military. The troops and their families prefer the GOP to Democrats.
Fortunately, that's just not true.
what am i suppose to say to this, the US military has been abused my this administration, it just makes me want to cry :(
Hey little sparta--Mean kitty song
My family let me decide for myself..and I love them for it.
and
even less
use for Bush
heh...
Duncan Hunter happens to be a tool. I'll be a great day for America when that scumbag is out of Congress.
The only thing conservative about Duncan Hunter is that he is conservatively two bricks shy of a full load. What a delusional hack---in other words poster boy for Republican incompetence.
Gee who woulda thunk... Waging war over bullshit, getting tens of thousands of Americans killed pointlessly, millions from multiple countries including America maimed and/or left homeless or exiled, neverending stoploss orders putting lives on hold with no end in sight, trampling the bill of rights and constitution and deployments and redeployments of decent people serving ad nuseum along with enriching certain select companies and industries might piss military families off...along with everyone else paying attention....Who'da thunk it......JD
Just because a family is military doesn't mean it is stupid. Hell, just about everyone in our country sees what bush has done to our military and it's a horrid shame. He has used them, abused them and then ignored their needs. And he said the other day that he's feeling pretty good these days. He shouldn't be.
Steve, I found it ridiculous too. thanks for bringing this up. but not many people noticed or talked about it in the liberal blogs. so I thought liberals were ok with that statement. But I know it is not true. There are lot of liberals who serve in the army.
BOLD
FACED.
LIE!!!!
Oh, Puh-lee-ze!! My nephew is a Naval aviator, currently on duty in Bahrain. He and the rest of our family is very-very-very far from espousing the values of so-called "conservatives." Really, who knows what that term means today??! Conservative. Liberal. Tory. Whig. Republican. Democrat. All of thees labels have ceased to have meaning, except as an excuse to hurl epithets at those with whom you disagree.
In my family, which by the way has no label (cons or lib), we are patriots. We try to live our lives according to moral principles, serving our family and our neighbors, working hard to provide for and set good examples for our children. I have not noticed anyone in either party who has done that for quite a while - certainly not any "conservative" Republicans. All I see are HYPOCRITES, those who lie and deceive while they stuff their pockets and watch al millions suffer. Shame on all of them!
A few months back a woman in my Church announced her son had been called up and was going to Iraq.
She wasn't happy she was in tears.
She asked that we pray for his safe return.
Nothing like a good dose of being in the military during a Bush administration to bring a military man to their senses. I learned during the first gulf war and I haven't changed my mind since. Fuck Bush!
That is INCREDIBLE!
It means, by Scumbag Rush Limbaugh's metric, 60% of our military consists of "phony soldiers".
Cobalt60 @ 13:
Limbaugh will say that the 3,000 dead should be counted as in favor of Republicans.
There are a few conservatives around me now, but many of them hate Bu$hit too.
The reason why they state for us that we're conservative is because they gona change our votes for us too. Maybe that's why some Republicans want to build up the number of troops, because we're all conservative. NOT!
You know what, I am a little bit conservative... to save what's left of my frickin' benefits!
We love getting screwed by the GOP, so you know they got our vote. :P
One of my former students commanded a support and supply group in Iraq. He and his troops often found themselves standing around providing guard duty for expensive civilian contractors who pulled in top dollar to provide services for which my friend and his troops had been trained. He has a decidedly jaundiced view of the Bush administration and those elements of it which treat the Iraq war as an opportunity to siphon tons of money into the pockets of Bush-connected corporations.
[Link]
Maybe now with all the disdain for what their President has got them into but also, in the military, they really look to him as"The-Commander-In-Chief" more. They have no respect for him as a leader. They see through him as a DUD.
Typically however, the USA is about God & Flag and that is Conservative country.
Wars mean jobs, jobs make people happy, even if it is at the cost of lives.
To have a job in the military is one thing but how can anyone be pissed off at losing their job making bombs. What a complicated existence that must be.
Bush is a sociopath with little regard for human life, in particular the lives of the families of military personnel that have sacrificed so much for W's hubris.
Behold W's War Elves:
http://www.elfyourself.com/?id=1212620650
I just retired from the Air Force. My last two years were spent in Germany. Our American television was provided by American Forces Network, which rebroadcasts regular programing from the states. There are nine tv channels which includes one news channel, ESPN and the other network channels along with several radio channels. My point is that the one news channel is almost exclusively FOX news during the hours when people are home and not at work. The radio channels features Rush Limbaugh and other right wing talk shows during the same time period. It is this total immersion of right wing view points that influences so many military to believe what they are constantly fed over the airwaves. Get a balanced viewpoint and facts not spin and the military will switch even more than they are doing now.
Gekke @ 1:
hey mods cab you replace the url on the kitty kitty song i posted, turns out there is a much better one:) the original one :)
The Mean Kitty Song
Breakfast table?
Corporate decision?
pissed off patricia @ 7:
Why not?
He's the classic narcissist psychopath. It's all about him (Dubya). If 10,000 innocent people die so that he and his aristocratic cronies can make a buck; well, their not Bushies, so what's the big deal? Right? After all, were just talking little people.
This is truly how this little piece of shit looks at the world. Him and vice president Satan too.
Isn't it true? The GOP are the saviours of America. Dems are dirty f*cking hippies, that smoke pot, hate America, corrupt its youth, and run from responsibilty or danger. They're corrupt Hollywood types: limousine-liberals that want to murder babies and violate your chidren. Or have I been watching too much TV? ;)
The best line in the comments section was, "How many deployments does it take to make a liberal?"
The military can be considered Bush's last hard core base. It now appears that The Empire cannot take for granted their support. Perhaps this means that the soldiers and their families are finally beginning to think for themselves. As I was returning from the freeway yesterday, I noticed a couple of young National Guard soldiers making sure that no one went onto the freeway heading south, because that part of the highway had been flooded due to the heavy rains here in the Pacific Northwest. As I came to a stop at the Stop sign, I yelled out to them that I thought the National Guard were all in Iraq. One of them came over to my car and said that he would heading out to Iraq in June. I told him that he doesn't belong over there, he and the other members of his unit need to stay here so they can take care of the natural disasters that happen in this country. As I was leaving to head into town, I told him that, despite what the government and the military wishes for him to believe, he has the right to question the government during a time of war. The best that he could do was to give me an embarrassed smile. The hope is that I was able to at least let him ponder what I had told him and that he might realize that, contrary to what the military drills into him, that he is not a robot and that he can arrive at an independent decision on his own.
Um, yea - "corporate decision"??? Dumb or just a highly revealing Freudian slip? You decide!
On the other hand....U.S. civil servants seem to love the little fucker.
The military has outsourced so many jobs to civilians that could be done to done by the military for far less.
Where I work we have so many GS-13s and above that they piss and moan over reserved parking spots. When there weren't enough for the civilians who felt they deserved a reserved spot, they took the Sailor of the Year and Sailor of the Quarter spots.
I'm a U.S. civil servant myself and I was ashamed and appalled. The upside is that when I said something about it, I got a free frosty glass of STFU.
We (me and a few Navy chiefs) got one of the spots back however.
Anyway, the point being, a lot of civil servants seem to have forgotten that the second word in their job is "SERVANT," as in to serve.
We're not all like that, but I work with at least a dozen of them.
This adminastration has destroyed our reputation, looted the treasury, trashed the constitution and demolished our military. I feel for these poor families. The only way to correct this, is to start impeachment hearings. The fact that nobody is being held responsible is disturbing.
"...and make that corporate decision with their family_"
WTF? What is that supposed to mean? Corporate decision? How revealing.
most of our military are conservatives
Yeah, that must be why most people who run for office after serving in the military run as Democrats or Independants.
"...ridiculous claim that U.S. troops and their families are, by their very nature, conservative...Fortunately, that’s just not true."
I thought as much when I heard O'Reilly say the same damn thing when interviewing Gen. Kerr the other night (as in the conservative troops don't approve of your being a gay, General). O'Reilly and Hunter just can't help themselves when it comes to lying.
Careful with those conclusions. There's a difference between "disgusted with Bush" and "not conservative".
Perhaps these military families remember hearing the words of the late great Dave Cline, long time member of the VVAW [Vietnam Veterans Against the War] who was featured in the documentary Sir! No Sir!, past president of Veterans for Peace and one of the giants of the anti-war movement, as he led veterans' groups marching in parades across the country while chanting in cadence:
"Hey Hey Uncle Sam
We Remember Viet Nam
We Don't Want Your Iraq War
Peace Is What We're Marching For"
"If They Tell You To Go
There Is Something You Should Know
They Wave The Flag When You Attack
When You Come Home They Turn Their Back"
"Bush and Cheney Talk That Talk
But We Know They're Chicken Hawks
If They Think They're So Damn Right
Let Bush and Cheney Go To Fight"
Bring It On Home- 1, 2, 3, 4
"The troops and their families prefer the GOP to Democrats."
Riiiiight... and the tooth fairy goes around putting quarters under pillows.
Freya @ 31:
Yeah that caught my eye too. I don't remember my decision to join the Army as being any way corporate nor my family having anything to do with my decision. To war profiteers everything is corporate I guess.
Edwin @ 25:
Actually, maybe not enough TV. There was a cool show on the History Channel this past week called "Hippies."
Yea, hippies were anti-establishment and pot-smokers but the reason we can actually post something on the web was the result of hippie types who invented the internet and guys like Steve Jobs who jump started the PC market. Alot of technical innovative products were the brainchild of hippies. Hippies are also responsible for the "back to nature movement" which spawned organizations that help protect the environment.
So alot of the Conservative blogs better watch it. They wouldn't be able to post their nonsense if it wasn't for us hippies and liberals.
There was a traffic study done on conservatives and liberals. In a traffic jam conservatives tended to stay put while liberals thought of alternative routes. In other words liberals think outside the box. They are more innovative and creative.
This country would be back in the stone age if it was left up to the conservatives. They are very narrow minded.
Sorry but the truth is the military is by and large a GOP-supporting machine. George Bush could tell them to kill their elderly mothers and they would do it because he says gittin and pickin and gonna. so they think he's one of them instead of the bludblood new englander that he of course is. Quit trying to say "it's just not true" that the military is not overwhelmingly republican, even minorities and women. I served and I can tell you its true. hard to be anything but a Bush bootlicker, for fear of getting turned down on a promo etc. Thats the reality.
Bush destroyed the VA and more soldiers have died during his presidency than Clinton, Bush 41, Reagan and Carter combined and gets "pro military" billing from the beltway bumpkins
All kinds of places you can go with this one. Maybe it's time to shed the corporate viewpoint.
Hmmmm....
cor·po·rate
adj.
-Formed into a corporation; incorporated: the corporate companies of industrial America.
-Of or relating to a corporation: corporate assets; corporate culture.
United or combined into one body; collective: made a corporate effort to finish the job.
-Of or relating to a corporative government or political system.
[Latin corporātus, past participle of corporāre, to make into a body, from corpus, corpor-, body.]
As a current member of the Armed Forces, sadly I have to agree with Biff.
It is embarrasing to admit I am a flaming liberal at the office, (I work for the Army too). The Voting Assistance Program takes on new life during election cycles and we are all "encouraged" to vote. With many of the zombies meandering about the halls totally oblivious to the "monarchy" that America has become, I have my Constitution posted in my office and remind all that we exist to serve America. Blind devotion to these murdering, theiving, lying and cheating neocons must stop. Dennis Kucinich, our last great hope for world peace. bea
U.S. troops are by their very nature hired killers and thugs! They took their jobs to be trained to kill people for their fascist bosses (US government).
They are morally bankrupt and should be imprisoned as dangers to humanity. When some moron utters "support the troops" they are giving their blessing to these murdering sociopaths and are accessories to murder. When I hear how bad the injured soldiers are treated by the VA, I think that is their reward for agreeing to accept a paycheck in return for causing human suffering. I hope that eventually Blackwater totally takes over the hired killing job from the US armed forces, and then they can keep increasing the cost of murder until America will no longer support it.
Must not be talking about my family. My grandfather served. My dad served. My FIL served. My husband serves (note the present tense). I was in ROTC and going to serve, but was discharged during drawdown.
I don't note myself being particularly conservative. In fact, the longer Bush is president, the longer that Republicans use and abuse the military, mouthing support while cutting veterans funding and perpetrating crimes like what happened at Walter Reed, the less conservative the military gets. Military people are PISSED OFF at the Republicans.
And Underground Pirate, when you don't know whence you speak, your mouth is best used for chewing so have a piece of beef jerky--a good long chew--sit down and shut up.
Why stretch the poll to make a case that isn’t there?
The families disapprove of Bush because “he aint a winner”
Military families are, by and large, conservatives who favor winning.
Scott Ritter pointed this out recently: The decline in approval for the war reflects public dissatisfaction with losing, not warfare. If the campaign had fared better, Bush would be sailing in those same polls. Those same families would root for the next victorious campaign.
Of course, Ritter was correct (and ignored) again.
Those of us who were against this from the get go are still in an antiwar minority.
Vonnegut summed it up. “Poot teet weet.”
Underground Pirate @ 43:
Excuse me????? My husband retired from the USAF and he is somewhere to the left of Kucinich. My dad served in Korea and was a lifelong democrat. I know of only one current service member who is a Bush-loving GOPer. He's also a misogynistic racist gun loving asshole. Please take your spew elsewhere.
"The troops and their families prefer the GOP to Democrats."
i'm pretty sure they also prefer living to dying
my father was in Iraq. my 2nd cousin is sent to be shipped over there soon. and i can tell you that no matter how much they personally don't care for politics and just go and do their jobs, the pain that it has inflicted on my family has turned many of us into staunch anti-war protesters. aka, not conservatives.
From what I read about our leadership, most didn't serve in our military and for the most part were draft dodgers.
I would guess most of the military are liberals, like John Kerry and many other Democrats.
Have any of these people realized that every time they got excused from their military obligation, another poor sole down the list went in their place. Yup Bill O', some patriot stood up and was counted, while you and Rush found other reasons for your life in the USA.
Been there and done that!
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