The Guardian and the Times take up the White Man’s Burden

Looking at these stories I can’t help but think of this poem:

Take up the White Man’s burden–
Send forth the best ye breed–
Go bind your sons to exile
To serve your captives’ need;
To wait in heavy harness,
On fluttered folk and wild–
Your new-caught, sullen peoples,
Half-devil and half-child. Kipling 1899

What else can one think when you see headlines like this:

NYT:

Afghans Avenge Florida Koran Burning, Killing 12

Think about what that headline implies, AVENGE. Words mean things. AVENGE suggest a just retaliation for an act. This suggests that the New York Times finds their acts a legitimate response to the burning of a Koran.

Over at the Guardian they actually have a poll asking who is responsible for these actions and as of this moment 9:44 a.m. EST 46% of the respondents blame the killings on Terry Jones.

I don’t have a lot of respect for Jones but I wonder, would those same people who blame him for the killings blame the “artist” who put up the painting of Christ/Palin and Christ/monkey up if he was attacked by a violent Christian Cult?

What’s the bottom line, both the Times, and the Guardian have concluded that we can’t expect better from the people and those who are busy blaming Jones for these murders consider the Afghans inferiors “half devil and half child”. We CAN’T expect civilized behavior from such people.

How is such an attitude by these papers any different that Kipling’s?

I’m not outraged over the burning of the Koran, I’m outraged at the murder of innocent people and the Fatwa against an US citizen for free speech, and if you consider yourself civilized you should too.

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Both are serving but in different places

You might recall I reported quite a bit on Katherine Jenerette when she was running in a crowded Republican Primary.

As you know by now Tim Scott won that primary and is now one of two black republicans

Captain Katherine Jenerette and Congressman Tim Scott

serving in congress. Katherine Jenerette however is also serving, at a different location:

Scott was on his way to Baltimore-Washington International Airport to see ooff 35 troops to Afghanistan. Most of the men and women are from Arizona, California and Oregon, but two were from South Carolina, Capt. Katherine Jenerette of North Myrtle Beach and Sgt. 1st Class Marticia Maxie of North Charleston.

The country is lucky to have both of these fine Americans serving them and on a personal level Katherine stay safe.

“If anyone was a victim of “psy-ops” here, it was Michael Hastings.”

When Morning Joe went long with Rolling Stone great Military expose four days ago I said this:

WOW that’s absolutely positively…ordinary

Today at Hotair Bruce McQuain tells why Rolling Stone gathered no moss.

Hastings apparently took the word of LTC Michael Holmes as the premise and theme of his article. In fact he sets it up with a quote from Holmes:

“My job in psy-ops is to play with people’s heads, to get the enemy to behave the way we want them to behave,” says Lt. Colonel Michael Holmes, the leader of the IO unit, who received an official reprimand after bucking orders. “I’m prohibited from doing that to our own people. When you ask me to try to use these skills on senators and congressman, you’re crossing a line.”

Except LTC Holmes job wasn’t “in psy-ops” (Psychological Operations) nor is LTC Holmes trained in PsyOps. That is a very specific Military Occupational Specialty (MOS) that requires school training. The place in which PsyOps is taught is the John F. Kennedy Special Warfare Center and School at Ft. Bragg, NC. According to Special Operations Command, the Special Warfare School has never heard of LTC Michael Holmes.

His conclusion?

In short Hastings was gulled by Holmes. If anyone was a victim of “psy-ops” here, it was Michael Hastings. His lack of knowledge about the command plus an apparent desire to put another general officer notch in his journalistic belt left him open to a sob story from a disgruntled officer that may have sounded good to him, but appears to have little or no basis in fact. A story from an officer who had already been reprimanded for making a false official statement.

Go and read the whole thing. Joe Scarborough? Better luck next time, will be interested in how you will report on this stories crash and burn. As for Rolling Stone…I suggest you stick to Bieber manina.

This is called “lobbying”

Morning Joe was breathless today reporting that the well-known bastion of journalistic mud-racking on government issues Rolling Stone magazine is reporting that our troops were using “psi-ops” against US senators.

Joe breathlessly reported this as a turning point, Norah O’Donnell subbing for Mika talked about it breathlessly and then when the panel started talking about it, the one person who had actually read the article, found very little there there:

So I figured I’d take a look at rolling stone, to see what that pillar of serious news had to say.

In between their world-class coverage of Justin Bieber Superboy and their big exclusive on The Return of Bevis and Butthead to MTV I found the military story and what a story it is.

The U.S. Army illegally ordered a team of soldiers specializing in “psychological operations” to manipulate visiting American senators into providing more troops and funding for the war

WOAH! sounds nasty! No wonder they hate soldiers at Columbia. Did they bug their hotels looking for dirt, plant hot blonds to snooze them and take pictures? Maybe they waterboarded or drugged them? What nefarious methods did Rolling Stone uncover that the Evil US army used against senators:

According to Holmes, who attended at least a dozen meetings with Caldwell to discuss the operation, the general wanted the IO unit to do the kind of seemingly innocuous work usually delegated to the two dozen members of his public affairs staff: compiling detailed profiles of the VIPs, including their voting records, their likes and dislikes, and their “hot-button issues.” In one email to Holmes, Caldwell’s staff also wanted to know how to shape the general’s presentations to the visiting dignitaries, and how best to “refine our messaging.” emphasis mine

…WOW that’s absolutely positively…ordinary, but I’m sure that it gets worse because in the very next paragraph it says:

According to Holmes, the general wanted the IO team to provide a “deeper analysis of pressure points we could use to leverage the delegation for more funds.” The general’s chief of staff also asked Holmes how Caldwell could secretly manipulate the U.S. lawmakers without their knowledge. “How do we get these guys to give us more people?” he demanded. “What do I have to plant inside their heads?”

Wow he wants to find pressure point, he want to plant stuff inside their heads, boy this sounds a lot like…..lobbying.

But it’s not like Holmes the source for this story had a grudge. After all any soldier could be the subject of an Ar 15-6 investigation. And I’m sure many Colonials and their female Majors under them get reprimands over an “inappropriate relationship”. After all Rolling Stone covers stuff like this all the time and married or no they understand that as Holmes wrote: “Gimmee a break a man has needs you know.”

So this is the breathless story that Morning Joe started the show with and Norah O’Donnell in their first hour. It flew like a lead balloon and made such an impact that they followed up with their 2nd hour to go long with the crank call to Gov Walker before trying once again to sell this story as the template for the anti-war left, this time without Jamie Rubin who had popped their bubble in the first hour as MSNBC runs with the story.

The real problem lately has been reports out of Afghanistan have been encouraging and the agenda of the left when it comes to Afghanistan is the opposite of Reagan’s “We win they lose”.

One of the people who I ran into CPAC was the young lady who last year worked for Joe Scarborough who had given me the high compliment of saying I was tough but fair on him. When she greeted me I mentioned that I was even harder on him lately, she approved and it was suggested that he was more concerned these days with being accepted by the cocktail set.

When I talk about Morning Joe these days I’m often teased that I follow it because so few people watch it. The more I see of it lately the more that critique seems justified.