H&I* Fires 21 JUN 06

Open post for those with something to share, updated through the day. New, complete posts come in below this one. Note: If trackbacking, please acknowledge this post in your post. That's only polite. You're advertising here, we should get an ad at your place...

[Gollum here, tongue raw, still in Castle Purgatory. Bleech. Steel don't taste to good, even if it is stainless.]

The disconnect by the NYT editorial staff is astounding. Instead of actually contemplating the merit of claims that giving play to all the negative makes things worse what needs to be done is for more negative to be contemplated? Really. If taking castor oil is giving you the chits the cure is more castor oil, right?

The NYT seems to claim that a single telegram somehow is more important or encompassing in view than the collection of similar communiqués from boots on the ground or in the field reportage from the likes of Mike Yon or this from TCS to the contrary. There’s nothing like circular (jerk) logic where you already know the outcome and only pick facts that get you there, now is it? Looking at all the evidence doesn’t count as much as looking at the ‘right’ evidence, now does it? Forming a narrative based on the total view couldn’t possiblely be more responsible and objective than highlighting the ‘right’ evidence, now could it?

No, missives from people From On High matter, so long as it’s negative, while everything else is just ‘triumphalism’.

GOG continues to search for a master (I’m serious. GOG has no master, only herdsmen trying to influence its direction.) Which narrative (Because at this point that’s all they really seem to be, narratives.) will become the main one? It does matter in the end which one takes root. The outcome, any outcome, is still not inevitable in Iraq and GWOT. Fertile ground still exists between the ears.
Back to cleaning the Portcullis(bleech).
ry

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Interesting article in the WaPo about PTSD in veterans from other wars and the effect of images and politics associated with Iraq. - FbL

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WTF, over.

Ah. This is WTF. -The Armorer

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I hate using H&I Fire's to push my own agenda, but in this case I'll make an exception. I know everyone is still probably tapped out from the Valour drive, but if anyone has a couple of extra bucks, my Sister in Law could really use it

Seems yesterday morning, her house caught on fire. She left the hospital yesterday afternoon with snoke inhalation, however everything they own was destroyed and 2 of their pets killed in the fire.

So I'm blegging for donations via my site or anything I can get my hands on. Meanwhile my home has become communication central for the family.
-BloodSpite

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How does a newly-minted 6'7" Merchant Marine celebrate his graduation after six years at the Merchant Marine Academy? Well, first he hugs the Academy commandant. Then... well, I don't think this was what the CinC had in mind, haha! More pictures from the graduation here (scroll down). - FbL

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Here's some troops who may not be voting for Diana Irey. -The Armorer

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Just in case anyone is wondering what an active sailor(no Maggs, you can't take him home) is thinking about the whole DPRK missile test flap, you might want to take a gander at what FNDF has to say.
Standard-3 may not be enough to knock an ICBM out of the sky, but we know the ABMD bit to AEGIS really does work (Unlike the ground based system out in Alaska).
ry
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Confederate Yankee - watching UNC-Chapel Hill so you don't have to.

Fuzzybear - looks like the Happy Grad made HuffPoster Chris Durang *more* depressed that anyone could want to hug the Prez. Take some more Prozac, Chris.

Woo-hoo! Read CDR Salamander's bit at Milblogs. -The Armorer

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I am *sooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo* jealous. I never get conspiracy-trolls! And howcum the a$$hats who will f*ck with my wife will simply *never* come over here so's I kin puncheminnaface? -The Armorer

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*A term of art from the artillery. Harassment and Interdiction Fires.

Back in the day, when you could just kill people and break things without a note from a lawyer, they were pre-planned, but to the enemy, random, fires at known gathering points, road junctions, Main Supply Routes, assembly areas, etc - to keep the bad guy nervous that the world around him might start exploding at any minute.

Not really relevant to today's operating environment, right? But, it *is*

The UAVs we fly over Afghanistan and Pakistan looking for targets of opportunity are a form of H&I fires, if you really want to parse it finely. We just have better sensors and fire control now.

I call the post that because it's random things posted by me and people I've given posting privileges to that particular topic. It's also an open trackback, so if (Don Surber uses it this way a lot) someone has a post they're proud of, but it really isn't either Castle kind of stuff, or topical to a particular post, I've basically given blanket permission to use that post for that purpose. Another term of art that might be appropriate is "Free Fire Zone".