Latest Posts

It’s just not on

A sergeant in Iraq phones his wife and spills the beans on the rotten Army sending him on a dangerous mission. Left wing fools pick up on it and try and turn the word of a recalcitrant into an indictment of the US. Lets turn the clock back and put it into perspective. It’s 1970 and by some weird time warp I have a mobile phone in Vietnam. I’ve received my orders to take a patrol into the ‘Light Green’ looking for the ever elusive ‘Charlie’ and I don’t like it one little bit. So on the eve of the patrol I phone my wife back home in Brisbane.
“G’day Sweetheart..Yeah. I still love you..OK, social shit over. Just wait till you hear what’s been going on over here. You wouldn’t believe what the bastards have got me doing now, Joan. Tomorrow I have to patrol the ‘Light Green’. I told you last call that there’s minefields down there and we don’t know exactly where they are. I mean, how’s that for totally ignoring Work Place Health and Safety. On top of that we’re being inserted by APCs and everyone knows they’re way over on service schedules due to, and how?s this for a piss-weak excuse, the exigencies of war. Just because we’re fighting a war here, we’ve had a lot of contacts this week and the 2nd Cavalry Regiment drivers haven’t slept, they think they can get away without servicing the vehicles.
Warming up to the theme I remember other unbelievable indictments of the Army. vconv.jpg I mean, hulloooo..where’s the armour plating?
I’m getting sick of this shit. Only last week I had to do a convoy protection run and the Land Rover didn’t even have armour plating…like it was a convertible..no roof..no sides. One tropical downpour and we’d all be soaked not to mention the obvious problems associated with being ambushed. I mean, I might have been shot.
selfandmobile.gif I sent this photo to Joan and when she saw it she thought of phoning the press. She told me later that just one look at the dark shadows under my eyes clearly meant I was doing too many ambush patrols. Just not on! (You can just see the Nokia down by the butt of my M16) Yeah, well, we all know that?s bullshit. If it had have happened I wouldn’t have led the patrol anywhere. I’d be in hospital recovering from the beating my Sergeant gave me and contemplating a post-military career. And rightly so. Well, I think rightly so, but guys over at Road to Surfdom seem to think that similar behaviour in Iraq by a platoon of logisticians is symptomatic of all that is wrong with the evil empire that is the US.
This is an unbelievable indictment of the Bush adminsitration:
says Tim Dunlop who has obviously learnt how to upload to his web site from Neptune or somewhere else out there because he is sure as shit can’t be from any planet I know Read the initiating article here and then check in at The road to Surfdom Be sure to read the comments.

Divide and Conquer

The Washington Post reports local insurgents terrorists are getting sick of the foreign terrorists and psychopaths coming in from all over the Moslem world to help keep Iraq in the 12th century.
Local insurgents in the city of Fallujah are turning against the foreign fighters who have been their allies in the rebellion that has held the U.S. military at bay in parts of Iraq’s Sunni Muslim heartland, according to Fallujah residents, insurgent leaders and Iraqi and U.S. officials.
To paraphrase one of Murphy’s Combat Laws, never share a foxhole with someone who is braver more psychopathic than yourself..it only leads to arty and F-16 strikes.
Relations are deteriorating as local fighters negotiate to avoid a U.S.-led military offensive against Fallujah, while foreign fighters press to attack Americans and their Iraqi supporters. The disputes have spilled over into harsh words and sporadic violence, with Fallujans killing at least five foreign Arabs in recent weeks, according to witnesses.
Good stuff. Another step in the right direction They heap particular contempt on Abu Musab Zarqawi, the Jordanian whose Monotheism and Jihad group has asserted responsibility for many of the deadliest attacks across Iraq, including videotaped beheadings.
“He is mentally deranged, has distorted the image of the resistance and defamed it. I believe his end is near,” Abu Abdalla Dulaimy, military commander of the First Army of Mohammad, said
First Army of Mohammad…a bit presumptuous, don’t you think. I bet the previous generations of terrorists are pissed off with Dulaim claiming to be the first. I mean to say, what about all their beheading, amputations, infanticide and otherwise uncivilized behaviour…doesn’t that count? Oh, and Dulaimy, your end is near as well. Animals.

Balanced Media

The hide of some people. Fancy letting an anti-Kerry TV show onto the networks. The Washington Post carries this article that reminds us all of the lack of balance in the media.
Now Sinclair’s decision to order its 62 stations to carry a movie attacking Kerry’s Vietnam record is drawing political fire — not least from the Democratic National Committee, which plans to file a federal complaint today accusing the company of election-law violations. “Sinclair’s owners aren’t interested in news, they’re interested in pro-Bush propaganda,” said DNC Chairman Terry McAuliffe, whose complaint will accuse the firm of making an in-kind contribution to the Bush campaign.
Australia’s ABC and SBS have anti-Bush documentaries and talk shows several times a week and I’m sure it’s the same in the US. Michael Moore even markets his documentaries as movies and yet a TV network in the States gets hammered for scheduling an opposing view. It works too. A lot of people I know think Bush is the pits but when questioned, they all get their news from the mainstream media. SBS and ABC set the scene and the commercials are only interested in 5 second bites so Bush’s abilities or otherwise are never debated. Kidnapping and suicide car bombers are good for 6:00 pm news. Instant gratification…no substance…no balance. Sinclair’s TV network even had the temerity to send a VP (no less) to Iraq to find some good news as none seemed to be getting through the left wing censors.
Earlier this year, Sinclair sent a vice president who has called John F. Kerry a liar to Iraq to find good news stories that it said were being overlooked by the biased liberal press.
Mind you, they could have saved heaps by subscribing to Chrenkoff. His latest Good News from Iraq Part 12 tends to put some balance into the debate. Talking of Chrenkoff. he is reading from my Library. He quotes Mark W Woodruff’s “Unheralded Victory: Who won the Vietnam War?” and says;
…Highly recommended for history and military buffs, this book makes it painfully clear that the American forces, together with South Vietnamese army and other allies have convincingly won every military engagement of the war, from 1965 to the American withdrawal in 1973, in the process almost completely destroying Viet Cong and inflicting staggering casualties on the North Vietnamese Army. Vietnam War, sadly, is another example of conflict won militarily but lost politically.
The example of Woodruffs book is relevant in Iraq today. I haven’t been to Iraq but I was in Vietnam and I can assure you that the Media snatched defeat from the jaws of victory in such a stunnung manner that for years even I believed it. I don’t now and daily, I see the same tactics being used in Iraq. Readers, some times the truth is hard to find but it is out there. Go look for it.

Keith Miller out for 84

The use of the word ‘Heroes’ to describe sporting achievers has long been a gripe of mine as all my heroes risked their lives to save others, like the Grandmother in the post below Well here’s one that’s hero and sporting achiever of note. Keith Miller, WW2 pilot and test cricketer, often considered second only to Bradman has died at 84. He was once ask how he handled the pressure of playing cricket.
Pressure? I’ll tell you what pressure is. Pressure is a Messerschmitt up your arse, playing cricket is not.
My kind of man.

Courage

An amazing story of courage from North Queensland where a 60 year old woman took on a 4 metre, 350 k croc by jumping on it’s back and wrestling until the beast cried ‘uncle’ and let go of the 34 year old man in it’s jaws. It’d would make a good Mother-n-Law joke but it’s no joke and I for one would be honoured to shake her hand. In this article in the Queensland’s Courier Mail the gutsy woman is identified as Grandmother, Mrs Sorohan. Way to go Lady. I bet the grand kids do what you tell ’em now.

Sharpen the Knives

I see that Mark Langley..Lothar..Lathing..oh, you know, that guy who come second on Saturday night is taking a while to get some messages left on his answering machine by voters. Simon Crean’s position as Treasury spokesman is under threat. I can’t imagine why. I only saw him on TV once during the election and that was on Saturday night. He looked bloody terrible but I guess the facial muscle work needed to form the words “We wuz robbed” in a two second endless loop didn’t offer up his best profile. All sentences that have ‘Simon Crean’ in them also seem to have ‘his replacement’ or ..in line to take over from Crean’ as well. Except these two.
Mr Latham yesterday defenced the performance of his Treasury spokesman I don’t have any concerns on the way Mr Crean did his job.
Well, you bloody well should have. As a further disincentive to ever vote for Mark Whats-his-name, Gough Whitlam, in a rash moment when he believed anyone in Australia actually cared about his opinion, backed Mark again.
FORMER Labor prime minister Gough Whitlam — one of Mark Latham’s leading mentors — said yesterday he was disappointed with the election outcome but still held hope for the future. “The major issues, health and education, will still be around in three or six years,” Mr Whitlam, who held the Opposition Leader’s seat of Werriwa for 26 years, said at the launch of son Nicholas’s memoir, Still Standing. “There will be fewer trees in Tasmania and more muck in the Murray, but there is still hope.”
Or was that “There will be fewer ALP seats in Tasmania and more muck in Caucus, but there is still hope I hope Gough is still around at the next election so he can at last do something for Australia and support Mark Whats-his-face so hundreds of thousands more voters will turn away. ..Gough Whitlam — one of Mark Latham’s leading mentors How many Coalition votes did that statement create, I wonder.

Who’s stupid?

Interesting point from Glen Reynolds at Instapundit. There is little copy on the Howard victory in the US as it doesn’t meet the “Does it make Bush look bad/stupid” criteria. Who’s smart and who’s stupid. The journalists who always put a negative spin on events or the public that repeatedly ignores them. Bush will win in the states and the media will still be calling him stupid and subsequently, the electorate, stupid as well for voting for him.

Very Happy John

Thank God. The country is safe for another three years. Looks like 86 Coalition to 58 Labour seats in the Reps and maybe even a majority in the Senate. A majority in the Senate would get Bob Brown off TV and the less oxygen he gets the better off the country will be. howard.jpg Crean, Beasley and Bob Mullins are all calling “We wuz robbed by the BIG LIE (they mean the interest rates ad) If Latham has any sense of leadership he needs to accept that the voter believes that the ALP are poor on economic management and do something about it. He needs to throw the “we wuz robbed” line into the dustbin with it’s equally sour grapes partner “the voters are stupid. Once again they have ignored our brilliance” Mullins raves on about how Howard couldn’t get one, not one, economic professional to agree that interest rates would rise under Labour. You’re most probably right, Bob, but irrelevant. I don’t need a PHD to remind me of Labour’s fiscal irresponsibility, I can always look it up. It’s recorded for everyone to see. and the chances are interest rates would rise more under Labour than under the Coalition. It’s believable. No, PHD’s didn’t back Howard, but the people did. There was simply too much rebutting every utterance from Howard as “A LIE! He lied about WMDs..he didn’t actually lie. Everyone from both sides of the debate believed there were WMDs. The fact that Saddam got rid of them doesn’t make it A LIE. He lied about Latham’s time at Liverpool…He didn’t actually lie. Latham’s time at Liverpool is recorded. You can read about it!. The fact that Latham says its A LIE doesn’t make it so. The luvvies over at Backdoor are in the middle of an orgy of disbelief, shattered dreams of a socialist Australia and are all mulling around in stark amazement at the stupidity of the voter.
I don’t understand. What does this say about our country? I feel ill. Posted by Dave
and,
How come our feelings were sooo wrong,Why is it that people seemed to coninue to trust the rodent even though he lied all the way to the end. Posted by MickM
Because he didn’t lie all the way to the end…in fact he didn’t lie at all. If you think he did MickM then you have the problem…you deal with it. Tired now…..need sleep…..Country safe…stand down.

Stats

Top 20 countries reading my website. 1. au (Australia) 2. com (Commercial) 3. net (Network) 4. (no entry) 5. edu (Educational) 6. nl (Netherlands) 7. il (Israel) 8. mil (USA Military) 9. gov (USA Government) 10. uk (United Kingdom) 11. cn (China) 12. sa (Saudi Arabia) 13. org (Non-Profit Organizations) 14. ca (Canada) 15. be (Belgium) 16. jp (Japan) 17. fr (France) 18. th (Thailand) 19. us (United States) 20. no (Norway) 12. sa (Saudi Arabia) Jesus Christ! Golly Gosh! I hope they don’t mind me putting down on terrorists. Hey Saudi Guy…don’t…..read….archives. Stop panicking…could be a good guy. If the Saudi guy would leave a comment and calm me down. Something like “I hate Terrorists too” would do. Hang on, it’s most probably an expat. That’s it. Now I remember..a lot of guys from a regiment I was once in, live and work over there. Whatever…leave a comment..please.

Anything but politics

I have included a weather link on the right bar so people can be better aware of the reason I live in Brisbane. A sub-tropical city on the east coast of Australia the only issue about weather is will tomorrow be like paradise or just perfect. However, each winter, the temperature does drop to single figure celcius for about two weeks and when it does the family get nervous and/or just wait for me to start ranting about moving to Cairns, a tropical city a thousand miles north of here and definitely Tropical. Why do kids roll their eyes like that? Old soldiers prefer warmer climes. Something to do with osteoarthritis – a medical term for aches and pains associated with years of sleeping on the ground in not-so-warm climates. pool.gif So you can all feel sorry for me I have included a picture of the view from my home office. This nice little set-up is fiercely guarded by Holly, the Golden Retriever on sentry duty half hidden behind the chair. I feel so secure. The patio roof sheeting (the shiny stuf at the top of the pic) is insulated with 50mm of a foam not unlike cold-room material. The cold room insulation has been modified in Queensland to try and tame the power of the sun. Last Christmas the temperature was 10 degrees celcius less under the patio than out in the sun and it was still mid 30s under. For those who live in snow-bound climates like northern Europe, and some of my readers do, you may find it hard to believe, but in December and January the pool is too hot to swim in and we have to provide shade over the pool to cool the water down. rainbow.jpg If I get bored at home I can always tavel about 90 minutes north and arrive at the southern end of this shitty little beach. From the point, one can drive south (towards the top left hand corner in the pic) along an almost deserted beach (50 to 100 m wide at low tide) for about 60 km. Fish, swim, camp, drink or just sit there and get overwhelmed by the beauty of it all. Count my blessings…feel better now.
1 188 189 190 191 192 228