#Shutdown doesn't stop WWII veterans from visiting their memorial [UPDATED]

Visiting WWII veterans were confronted with
barricades at the WWII Memorial...but not for long.

There's plenty of room for debate on the merits of this government shutdown, but I'm glad to see that reasonable people are agreeing that our active duty military and veterans shouldn't be harmed. The House unanimously passed a bill to protect military pay that President Obama signed yesterday, Veterans Administration health care functions will continue, among other measures.

Then there's this delightful story...

A group of WWII veterans from Mississippi visiting the WWII Memorial in Washington, D.C. as part of an Honor Flight trip decided they were going to visit their memorial, government shutdown or no. From the Twitter feed of Stars and Stripes reporter Leo Shane:

Opposition to Syria intervention inspires FreedomWorks to change long-standing policy

Forward? Or For War? Is this the new "red line"?

As POLITICO reported yesterday, conservative organization FreedomWorks had taken the unusual step of publicly opposing the congressional resolution authorizing the use of military force in Syria, and would consider it a "key vote" in its next round of congressional scorecards.

I say "unusual" step because before now, FreedomWorks has maintained a strict policy of staying out of foreign policy issues. It's a risk for political organizations to venture into new philosophical territory, because they build relationships with supporters, stakeholders, and donors based on their areas of expertise and influence, and they may endanger those relationships if the organization takes on new issues and their supporters don't agree with them. 

To Those Who Serve

To those who serve in our nation's armed forces - to those who serve now and to those who have served in the past - and to the families who support them...

Thank you. 

We are free because of your strengths and your sacrifices. We set aside Memorial Day to remember, but every day we are grateful.

Semper Lentum (101 uses for duct tape, brought to you by the Marines)

Here's a little something fun for your Tuesday afternoon.

A friend sent me a link with "101 uses" for duct tape that was posted on the Marine Corps Times website:

101 uses for 100-mph tape 

Rubio-sponsored amendment to protect military voting rights passes unanimously

Senator Marco Rubio's office just sent out a press release, touting an amendment he co-sponsored with Senator Roy Blunt (R-MO) to the NDAA bill that is designed to streamline the process for getting absentee ballots to military personnel deployed overseas. The amendment passed the Senate unanimously. 

This is the type of issue that should be a no-brainer: the men and women who are literally putting their lives on the line to protect our country should have their rights to vote protected as well. 

This ad may ruffle some feathers...

...especially up here in Massachusetts.

Click below to see why...

Allen West plays a darn good game of chess

Politics is a chess game.

Having a winning campaign strategy means not just planning your next move, but anticipating what your opponent's moves will be in response. The more accurately you can predict - or, better yet, influence - your opponent's actions, the more likely you are to win.

I don't know if Allen West plays chess in real life, but he's running his reelection campaign like a Grandmaster.

Allen West calls Obama a "lamb standing before lions"

I've made no secret of my admiration for Florida Congressman Allen West, and his tough, no-nonsense way of speaking...

...and West has made no secret of his disapproval of President Obama's foreign policy strategies.

In a Facebook post this afternoon, West posted a blistering critique in response to Obama's visit to Fort Bliss earlier today:

Steve Oelrich changes his story again, explanation still lacking

Say what?

Third time apparently isn't the charm for Steve Oelrich. His third attempt to explain his military eligibility has left us with just as many unanswered questions as the first two.

As I wrote last week, the Oelrich campaign issued a press release claiming that an injury he received in the line of duty as a police officer was the reason he was ineligible for the draft, but publicly available documents show that the eligibility-ending injury actually happened years before his law enforcement career began. 

The story got even stranger when the campaign reacted by deleting the press release and replacing it with a new one (back-dated to the date of the original release) as if nothing had ever happened. 

Then, last weekend, the Florida Times-Union ran a story about the controversy, and Oelrich's response raises even more questions:

Oelrich campaign reacts to my post...sort of...

I think I smell smoke...

Last week, the Steve Oelrich for Congress campaign sent out a press release expressing outrage at a mailer sent by one of his primary opponents, Cliff Stearns, in which he claimed that the reason he was ineligible for military service was because of injuries he received during his law enforcement career.

However, as I noted in a post last week, publicly available documents show that the injury that made Oelrich ineligible for military service happened in a hunting accident when he was a teenager, before he was a police officer.

I'm hoping Steve Oelrich can explain this

Are Steve Oelrich's pants on fire?

An alert reader forwarded me some intriguing information about a dispute between two of the candidates in the Republican Congressional primary in Florida's Third District, and I'm posting it here, hoping that State Senator Steve Oelrich has a good explanation for what seems, at first glance, to be a blatant and cynical distortion of the truth, if not a flat out lie.

Here's the background:

Romney's Full Speech to VFW Convention [VIDEO]

Mitt Romney gave what, in my opinion, was one of his best speeches of the campaign so far, at the Veterans of Foreign Wars Convention yesterday. Here it is, in its entirety, for you to enjoy:

Once a Soldier...

...ALWAYS a Soldier... 

The Price of Freedom

Meet Landon Carpenter...

Happy Veteran's Day

In honor of Veteran's Day today, I wanted to share a quick story with you from my trip to D.C. last week.

After our conference ended, we headed back to our hotel and there were a lot of people in military dress uniforms walking around. It turned out that there was a big gala honoring veterans that evening, and it was a really special group of veterans.

"It's your right...but..."

 
'Nuff said.

David Limbaugh: May 2012 Be a Referendum on Obama's Perverse Vision for America

David Limbaugh has an excellent blog that you should be reading anyway, but this week it's a don't miss:

David Limbaugh | May 2012 Be a Referendum on Obama's Perverse Vision for America

It's clear that Obama's re-election strategy is to demonize conservatives and his Republican opponents as extremists, "small," intolerant and morally deficient. That's a safer course, I suppose, than running on his miserable record.

Keith Olbermann calls me "improbable"...huh?!

Just when I think liberal media bias has reached the apex of insanity, I find something like this...

Keith Olbermann, who was too ridiculous for even MSNBC to tolerate, recently landed at Al Gore's internet television venture "Current TV." As expected, the move to an online audience hasn't toned down Olby's foaming-at-the-mouth liberal ranting.

This weekend, I got a tip on Twitter (thank you, @aipolitics) that Olbermann had mentioned me last week as part of his tiresome segment naming various people conservatives as "The Worst Person in the World." Unlike Olbermann, I know how to use Google (more on that in a minute), and easily found the video (relevant section starts at about the two-minute mark):

Some additional notes on the booing...

After the presidential debate on Thursday night, I wrote a late night post about what I had personally witnessed regarding a few individuals who booed after a gay soldier's question to the candidates. The post got a lot of very passionate responses and has more comments than any other post on this blog.

I received criticism from those who felt I didn't condemn the booing strongly enough and from those who did not believe my depiction of what happened. As to the first issue, my apologies. As I mentioned at the beginning of the post, it was very late at night and my goal was to just write and publish my observations about the booing at the debate, not take the time to discuss broader issues.

So let me be clear: I absolutely, positively do not support booing a soldier for asking an honest question, period. I absolutely, positively do not support booing a gay man for asking an honest question, period. I strongly believe that the few individuals who booed were awful, classless, jerks. They were an embarrassment to my state, my Republican party, and all the wonderful people who worked so hard to plan the Presidency 5 events this week, and they should be ashamed of themselves.

And, for the record, I stated my opinion about DADT back in June 2010:

The Truth About the Booing at the Debate

It's after 3:00 am and I have to get up early for another fun-packed day tomorrow (CPAC FLORIDA!) but I want to put this on the record now about an incident that happened at tonight's Republican debate. It's important that the truth is shared, because I have already seen liberal bloggers and some people on Twitter completely distorting what happened.

The debate included video questions that were submitted on YouTube, and one came from a soldier serving in Iraq who is gay and asked about the candidates' opinions on don't ask don't tell. There was audible booing after his question...however, please note that it was not the crowd booing. It was only one or two people.

I was at the debate, in the audience on the right hand side about halfway back (here's my tweet of the video screen that was right in front of us). The person who booed was just a few rows in front of us. The booing got an immediate and angry reaction from nearly everyone sitting around him, who hissed and shushed at him. Lots of loud gasps, "Shhhh!" "No!" "Shut up, you idiot!" etc.

My tweet right after it happened:

FTR that was ONLY 1 or 2 people who booed at the gay soldier's question & LOTS of people shushed at him. #FloridaP5 #gopdebate #sayfieFri Sep 23 02:17:55 via UberSocial for BlackBerrySarah Rumpf
rumpfshaker