A Public Service Announcement from Technography

I read this earlier and laughed out loud. BS is a funny guy.

This is a Public Service Announcement brought to you by someone who is going stir crazy. Enjoy.
I have laughed at the soap and shampoo movement for years.I threw away my "Raspberry Banquet Basket of Love and Fruit with Apricot Scrub with Hawaiian Beach Breeze 2 days after a Tropical Storm" scent.
I junked my "Peach, Milk, Dandelion, and Fresh Mountain Floral Arrangement from Switzerland" Shampoo.
I stopped caring if my Shampoo was Orgasmic, Organic or erogenous.
Now, years after my revolt against the soap and shampoo companies of America....I am finally vindicated.

I, of course, will be hanging on to all the scented products I have..............but then.......it's ok for me.

February 27, 1942

DD-224 USS STEWART

Battle of the Java Sea.

A fabulously detailed post over at CDR. Salamander.

Whiskey Tango Foxtrot

Who deliberately joins the Navy just to sabotage our military?

Jonathan Hutto. "60 Minutes" aired his/their side without questioning anyone's motives and no airing of the other side and no context. Typical.

You must go to Greyhawk and read about the "Petition for Redress" and Hutto's part in it.

I first read about this over at Op-For, so go read John's take on it too.

The best thing to do is go here to the Victory Caucus and see what you can do to counteract this crap.
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So, you read all this and you followed all the links. You're thinking, "What else can I do?". OK, here's something else. Carla over at Some Soldier's Mom has posted a request for children's clothing to be sent to Iraq. Remember, there are many fronts in this war and there is a way for everyone to help. Murdoc's photo doesn't have to be true, we don't have to be "at the mall".

LTC Bruce P. Crandall

Today on the Pentagon Channel
1430 - Medal of Honor Ceremony: Commander in Chief George W. Bush presents the Congressional Medal of Honor to LTC Bruce P. Crandall (Ret.) for his heroic actions in the Battle of Ia Drang, while serving with A Company, 1, 229th Assault Helicopter Battalion, 1st Cavalry Division (Airmobile) in the Vietnam War. (Live)
Encore presentation at 1900

The Armorer, Barb and Army.mil have the details.

Remember

Iran is just a country that is trying to find it's own way, stand up for itself against the world bully......us. When the current Administration points out that Iran is being non-compliant............when the U.N. (those useless twits) announce passing deadlines.....it's nothing more than evil Bush-Cheney-Halliburton machinations. It's not as though Iran's neighbors sense any danger.

February 26, 1993

In 1993, a powerful bomb exploded in the parking garage below the twin towers of the World Trade Center in New York, killing six people and injuring more than 1,000 others.

Proof of Dr. Rice's statement........
"The terrorists were at war with us, but we were not yet at war with them."
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I pulled this up from the comments because this is a great line. Frankly, everything Shawmut writes is worth the read.
"The 1993 bombing of the underground levels of the WTC still shows that we had wake-up calls long before 9/11 but we continually pushed the snooze button."

It's Late

So just a few random thoughts. I was a super slacker today. I blew off the symposium today and had breakfast with Jen.

I caught two of yesterday's panels. Education and Entrepreneurship: Are Asia’s Top Minds Thinking Outside of the Box had Brian Klein, an excellent speaker. The panel on "New Asian Great Game" had several interesting speakers. I learned a lot. The thing that absolutely floored me was the chart showing per capita use of energy. The leader was.......you'll never guess..........even SB didn't get it(he guessed UAE)........Kuwait! WTF? So Southie ventured a guess that it's because of water desalination. SB guessed UAE because of their huge desalination plant at Jebel Ali. However, I could have done without the crack the German made. Hermann Scheer was discussing energy and when he got to the military aspect he made a remark to the effect that he wondered if we would be in Iraq if it were on land full of fruits and vegatables. Kiss my ass. The actual question is could Saddam have become the terror he was if Iraq was a land of fruits and vegatables. Whatever.....asshat.

I really didn't accomplish anything today. Joe came by to look at the front door and the saggy floor around it.......it will, of course, cost more than I have budgeted for it. I hate owning a home. I want to just pay rent somewhere and when something goes wrong, pick up the phone.

So Jen & I finished "The State Within". Overall, two thumbs up.

We recorded the Oscars and the news afterwards in case it ran long. That way we got to FF the commercials and stupid catagories. It ran so long we missed Best Picture. Oh well, the right movie won and that's what mattered. I love that Jack Nicholson announced it. It makes you wonder if Departed really did win or did he just say that. It would fit the whole theme if Frank Costello stole the Best Movie Oscar. Will Farrell gave due respect to the Dot Rat and Jen and I thought that was funny.

What the fuck was Meryl Streep wearing? She was up for an Oscar for her portrayal of arguably one of the most fashionalbe women on earth, Anna Wintour......and she wore something goofy. A brown shirt with orange beeds and a gray plastic looking thing. It looked like some sort of medical monitoring device.

Now I am listening to FoxNews Sunday. I love Bill Kristol.

John Foster Dulles

Born on this day in 1888, Dulles said;

The United Nations was not set up to be a reformatory. It was assumed that you would be good before you got in and not that being in would make you good.

Kinda makes you glad he's not around to see the nonsense that goes on there today.

A Temper Tantrum

Clearly, with all the briefings and meetings SECDEF Robert Gates has been to...........he's missed a really important one.

Next month, a certain someone is going to be in a certain middle eastern country, and will be completely out of comm.........unable to even call and sing Happy Birthday to me on the 20th.

HUMPH!

Happy Birthday Admiral Nimitz

Adm. Chester Nimitz, World War II commander of U.S. forces in the Pacific, was born in 1885.

Favorite quote.

"A ship is always referred to as "she" because it costs so much to keep one in paint and powder."

Friday TILIP

Gowher Rizvi spoke of "The Future of India". Interesting, good background for what was to come on other panels.

Next was Fighting the Tide: Responding to Pandemics
Pramit Mitra spoke of the AIDS Epidemic in India. It was not something I'd given a lot of thought to. He wants more attention paid to AIDS prevention and education because as India becomes more industrialized AIDS is spreading. However, I never get when the AIDS prevention people try to equate the attention paid or money allocated to their cause with other diseases. In this case Mitra was trying to say that AIDS was getting zero attention and a lot was being paid to polio and tuberculosis. But polio and tuberculosis are bigger problem in terms of contagion and incidence, they should get more money. Plus one of the advisors from Annapolis (there are more than a dozen Mids and Cadets and their faculty advisors attending) , who was clearly Indian corrected him. Mitra relented somewhat and conceeded there was a public education campaign, but he countered by saying it needed to be more. Well, of course, he's going to say that.
Then, came bird flu. The presenter Zongchao Peng. I understood ecery fifth word and his power point was not translated very well. Sorry, I am the Ugly American. I had a hard time staying awake. I believe his conclusion was that the US is doing a better job than China, but both countries were being held back by a natural tendency of human to look on the bright side.

Next panel was "China and India: Up-close and Personal". Now this was good! This was my favorite segment yesterday. Tarun Khanna was engaging, informative, smart and funny.

Then I dashed over to Grace's and raided her fridge, caused chaos.....the usual. There was one panel left at 7 pm.

Asia's Rising Giants: China and India
Favorite speaker.....duh.....Will Arnest, Midshipman, Third Year, United States Naval Academy. LOL, the kid did a good job, but no power point.........I thought the Navy was all about the Power Point?
Steven Weisman was smarmy and managed to slip in some nonsense about the Clinton impeachment proceedings avtually being about Republican displeasure with Clinton reaching out to China..........what?

Mount Suribachi

In 1945, six members of the 5th Division of the U.S. Marines planted a U.S. flag atop Mount Suribachi on the strategically important Pacific island of Iwo Jima at the end of one of World War II's bloodiest battles.

TILIP

Asia's Rising Giants: China and India The 2006-07 TILIP International Symposium Program

I missed tonight's lecture.......
"Empire As Culture", due to my prior obligation as designated driver for Girl's Night. However, I will be front and center for the rest of the weekend.

Friday's offerings.....................
"The Future of India"
"Fighting the Tide: Responding to Pandemics"
"China and India: Up-close and Personal"
"Asia's Rising Giants: China and India "

Jen & Steve Bonding

Last night while Jen & I were driving to BI Deaconess, Steve called. After a few minutes he asked who was the voice in the background (he knew it wasn't Jen). I said it was her GPS. He asked what kind and I replied "Whatever GPS is embedded in her nifty Bose system in her new Nissam Altima." "Nice" came the reply. "Wait" he said "Are you supposed to be the navigator?" "No" I said, "The GPS is, but Jennifer keeps second guessing it." "She should, it's just a machine, you are the navigator" This went on for a while. He takes Jennifer's side in everything.

This morning it was the other side of the coin. I was trying to express some dismay with something Steve said and Jen defended him to the hilt. She capped it off with this exchange. "You can't argue with how people feel" I told her. Jen put up her hands and said "Wait a minute, there's how everyone feels......and then there's you. You don't think like everyone else..........it's what makes you Maggie." Keep in mind...........my name is not really Maggie and the only time Jennifer uses it is to point out behaviour that she thinks is ridiculous.

So there they are, bonding, conspiring against me. Traitors.

Hey SB!

Is your forehead dirty?

I went up Bunker and got "real" ones myself. Father Mahoney was magnificent as always.

Political Courage

February 20, 1938

Anthony Eden resigned as Britain's foreign secretary to protest the "appeasement" policy of Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain toward Nazi Germany.

A New Guy Over At OPFOR

....and he's Navy! Of course, he's not SWO, but you can't have everything.

So, wanna weigh in on this SB?

Uniform Administrivia
by Bull Nav
After lurking around the blogosphere, reading, commenting, and occasionally emailing authors, I am now part of this great communications platform. My Brother Rat, LTCOL P, sent me an invite and John was kind enough to allow me a forum here. I will try to stay focused on Navy stuff, but I may digress (ever so slightly) into hunting, shooting, or perhaps NASCAR. Enjoy. Comment. I have thick skin.
Anyway...
I guess that too many Navy folks on IA assignments have not been following the rules when it comes to wearing the ACU, which Navy personnel are allowed to wear when attached to an Army unit. If that was not the case, then this NAVADMIN (http://www.npc.navy.mil/NR/rdonlyres/1B062B50-5D0C-4C74-A095-51DDC9946679/0/NAV07038.txt )would not have come out which explains what you can't wear on your (N)Army uniform. Essentially this means that you can't wear your warfare pin on the Army uniform, nor can you wear any of your patches from a past unit. Only what the Army permits can go onto the uniform.
If we are going to be in the Navy, then we should wear Navy uniforms. If in combat, this means the DCU or the BDU. If embedded with an Army unit, the Navy folks should still wear the Navy uniform because THEY ARE IN THE NAVY. There is a certain pride that comes with each of the service's uniforms (yes, even the Air Force blue uniform) and once you take that away, you are taking away a part of the individual's motivation. I did not join the (N)Army, I joined the Navy and I have always worn Navy uniforms. Do the Marines wear Army uniforms when they are working with Army folks? No.
Admittedly, the DCU is somewhat outdated and the ACU is more functional. Hell, it was designed to be functional in the current combat environment. Perhaps a compromise could be reached in which the Navy folks can personalize their ACU's with the proper insignia (i.e., US NAVY, warfare qualification pins, etc.). Yeah, I know we are all supposed to by "joint" and all but we are still separate services, with our own traditions and customs. The uniform should reflect that uniqueness.

Remember, despite my adoration for MG Rick Lynch, I am a Navy girl.

Hey SouthieBoy!

I've missed you!

Kisses..............Love, Maggie

February 19, 1945

From the New York Times on February 19, 1945.

U. S. Marines Storm Ashore on Iwo Island
LANDING EFFECTED
Nimitz Reports Invasion of Volcano Isle 750 Miles From Tokyo
Advanced Headquarters, Guam, Monday, Feb. 19 - American Marines, their path cleared by the most intensive neutralization campaign of the Pacific war, have landed on strategic little Iwo Island, one of the Volcano group, 750 statute miles south of Tokyo.
The landing was made this (Monday) morning. The Fourth and Fifth Marine Divisions made this first Marine Operation since the Palaus were invaded last September. [Lieut. Gen. Holland M. Smith, victor over the Japanese on Saipan, was in command of the Marines, The United Press said.]

Never Forgetting Easy Company

Jason at CounterColumn has a link to this great article about some little boys who "get it" better than many adults around them.

My wife and I recently watched as our three boys marched off to join Easy Company of the Army's 506th Parachute Infantry Regiment, 101st Airborne Division. Their stoic faces belied their youth — ages 8, 6 and 4 — as they faced the horrors of dropping into Normandy 1944 as part of their best friend's birthday party. There was plenty of action, of course, but nothing like what the parents would experience a few days later.

It appears that, as casualties and opposition rise with the Iraq war, even Liam Bowman's 8th birthday party can become fodder in our national debate. Outraged parents complained that we were perverting the minds of children by glorifying war. Yet, there is something to learn from war — as we found out later with a visit to a small Veterans of Foreign Wars hall in rural Maryland.
Read the whole article.