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 Greetings! You are reading an article from The Mudville Gazette. To reach the front page, with all the latest news and views, click the logo above or "main" below. Thanks for stopping by! August 23, 2005 Open PostBy Mrs GreyhawkThe Open Post is Mudville's message board for bloggers and others to post anything they want on topics not covered elsewhere in this site. Blog links and comments below are placed by the respective authors, and are not selected by The Mudville Gazette. Opinions expressed in the sites linked to this section are those of their authors only - and because this is an open forum should not be considered as endorsed or shared by the Mudville Gazette. We will delete any links or comments referencing or directing readers to obscene or illegal material. Please report any such items to greyhawk @ mudvillegazette.com. That said, please note that I fight for free speech (literally), and am not afraid of ideas. The exchange of such is the purpose of this daily feature. We encourage your participation. Posted by Mrs Greyhawk / August 23, 2005 8:30 PM | Permalink 36 TrackBacksI've ignored the big non-story that's been grabbing lots of headlines and blog commentary these days: the Cindy Sheehan brouhaha in Crawford. I've found the whole business to be about as interesting as an audio commentary by Carrot Top on the Alaskan... Read More The Knucklehead for today is Preacher Pat Robertson. Read More Televangelist Pat Robertson, who ignited controversy Monday by calling for the assasination of Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez, is reportedly preparing an apology for tomorrow’s 700 Club.... Read More Speaking of the friendship of these two extreme organizations….Michael Graham was fired for saying Islam is terrorist religion. Shouldn’t the ACLU be protecting his free speech, or do they only protect anti-American speech now? Beth accur... Read More As Ralph Peters notes in his NY Post column today, it’s been a while since we’ve heard the latest on Army recruitment numbers. In the spring, media coverage of recruitment shortfalls was everywhere. And now? Overall year to date, first-time enlis... Read More ...or "Why Anonymous Sources Are No Longer Appropriate", if you prefer. We are living in a time of revolution, but not of the variety that we're used to. For most of the twentieth century, when we thought of "revolution", it generally meant simply,... Read More When last I wrote, in my mind I was standing on the edge of a moment in history, sharing in the grief of mournful passing of the Lincoln sepulcher upon its rail-borne hearse. Thinking, rolling over in my mind the shock of the Great Man, taken so quickl... Read More New York is on the verge of a massive increase in surveillance in its subway system Read More Today's dose of NIF - News, Interesting & Funny ... Hoo Haa Tuesday (and what about that 180, Kerry?) Read More This may sound funny, but I often prefer the stress of being “in the box” to that of being home. Some of this may be because I have been a soldier since I turned seventeen. Allow me to elaborate... Read More Dianne Feinstein wouldn't be resorting to hyperbole, would she? Acording to an AP story She called the impending debate over Roberts' nomination a "big, big deal." "I don't think in the last couple of decades there has been a Supreme Court appointme... Read More A semi-weekly roundup of Good News from Iraq, from sources mainstream, international and alternative. Read More We call it "Classiness, All Around Us." Click to explore more WILLisms.com. In no particular order, WILLisms.com presents classiness from the blogosphere (100% more classy, this week only!): 1. Vietnam Syndrome- WunderKraut examines the Left's obsessio... Read More My Fellow Americans, I stand before you tonight because I feel a weakening in our public spirit. Read More I mentioned radio talk show host Chris Krok in this previous post and how we went to the VA Hospital together to visit Kyle. He asked me after that visit if I'd like to be on his show this Friday when he will also be having 2 soldiers on, one done with... Read More The Washington Post, and the rest of the media, want to think that Ayatollah-style Islamic Revolution will now be sweeping through Iraq. Read More Even accounting for CATO's predisposition to play down potential problems with China to play up business potentials, I agree with the authors. We're beginning to realize the very real limits to our influence and power, compared with our commitments. ... Read More After an idiotic attempt to sue Burger King over the mock 'band' Coq Roq failed to either win money in court, or yield greater record sales, the 'band' Slipknot decided to take on a new approach. Read More As many of you know, I've had the privilege of meeting many FreeRepublic members over the past month. A finer group of people would be hard to find. I've grown particularly fond of FReeper Bill Floyd's AARs on their weekly counter-demonstrations of Cod... Read More There are a number of stereotypes perpetuated on a regular basis that we are all familiar with. Some carry a negative connotation, others a positive one. You have heard them before. The Irish are drunken brawlers. The Germans can get Read More I've been seeing a lot of whining about the proposed Iraqi Constitution, and how it's so awful that they want to have some elements of Islam in their government. What's really getting to me and making me want to just spew venom is where I am seeing peo... Read More I was really ticked off when I learned that the National Geographic Channel’s two part, four hour special “Inside 9/11″ was not available on my wimpy TV cable service. Now the day after the August 21 & 22 event has passed, I fi... Read More Apparently this has just started making the email rounds, recently enough that I couldn't Google up a copy of it anywhere. Thank you Marsha Burks Megehee for a fine piece of writing and thank you Russ Vaughn for forwarding it Read More Apparently this has just started making the email rounds, recently enough that I couldn't Google up a copy of it anywhere. Thank you Marsha Burks Megehee for a fine piece of writing and thank you Russ Vaughn for forwarding it to me: The Folded Flag… His M Read More No one leaves his heart in San Francisco anymore for fear that it would turn into a chicken's liver. Read More Where will you be this September 11th? ... Read More Update: (08/23/05 10:38 PM CDT) I posted previously, and mentioned here, concerning worries about not hearing from Michael Yon. He informs me that he is double checking facts, and expects to post within 12 hours. Can't wait! * * * * * * * * * * * * ... Read More Before even having a chance to read Paul Krugman’s latest column “Don’t Prettify our History,” I read Patterico’s assessment of it so I knew that it would be a doozy, even for Krugman: If this were the only thing I had... Read More Via Blackfive there is great news that LTC Erik Kurilla, the CO of the 1/24 Inf. that Michael Yon is embedded with, has returned home and is in stable condition. Readers of Michael Yon have come to feel like they know this giant of a Commanding Officer... Read More Losing a tail rotor is one of the more scary emergencies you can have in a helicopter. Aviators train for it and all the the variations too. It can get stuck in various pitch positions, the tail rotor gearbox can fail or in a worst case, the tail rot... Read More A federal court has granted attorneys with the Alliance Defense Fund the right to intervene on behalf of Silver Ring Thing, an abstinence-based sex education program in danger of losing federal funding because of an ACLU lawsuit. Read More A master sergeant here got a whole lot more than milk during a recent trip to the supermarket. In fact, Master Sgt. John San Cartier, a special operations loadmaster instructor with the 58th Training Squadron, "got" a lottery ticket that ended up ... Read More I'd sure love to see this debate. Whenever I hear or see Huffington, Zsa Zsa Gabor comes to mind and no, that's not a compliment to Arianna. Although there wasn't anything wrong with Zsa Zsa, her type just brings top mind someone who is superficial a... Read More From US Newswire via Majikthise. ASHLAND, Ala., Aug. 11 /U.S. Newswire/ -- A lawsuit filed today alleges that Tyson Foods Inc. is responsible for maintaining a segregated bathroom and break room, reminiscent of the Jim Crow era, in its Ashland,... Read More When last I wrote, in my mind I was standing on the edge of a moment in history, sharing in the grief of mournful passing of the Lincoln sepulcher upon its rail-borne hearse. Thinking, rolling over in my mind the shock of the Great Man, taken so quickl... Read More 1 Comment |
November 26, 2010America@war [Greyhawk]
I think anyone who's ever pondered the "comment" option - once only available on blogs and bulletin boards, now ubiquitous on almost any web site - will appreciate this:
The so-called faculty of writing is not so much a faculty of writing as it is a faculty of thinking. When a man says, "I have an idea but I can't express it"; that man hasn't an idea but merely a vague feeling. If a man has a feeling of that kind, and will sit down for a half an hour and persistently try to put into writing what he feels, the probabilities are at least 90 percent that he will either be able to record it, or else realize that he has no idea at all. In either case, he will do himself a benefit. That's wisdom from the past, captured for posterity at the US Naval Institute, shared via the web on the institute's 137th anniversary. From their about page:
"The Naval Institute has three core activities," among them, History and Preservation: The Naval Institute also has recently introduced Americans at War, a living history of Americans at war in their own words and from their own experiences. These 90-second vignettes convey powerful stories of inspiration, pride, and patriotism. Take a look at the collection, and you'll see it's not limited to accounts from those who served on ships at sea, members of the other branches are well-represented. I'm fortunate to have met USNI's Mary Ripley, she's responsible for the institute's oral history program (and she's the daughter of the late John Ripley, whose story is told here). She also deserves much credit for their blog. ("We're not the Navy nor any government agency. Blog and comment freely.") We met at a milblog conference - Mary knew (and I would come to realize) that milbloggers are the 21st-century version of exactly what the US Naval Institute is all about. Once that light bulb came on in my head, I mentioned a vague idea for a project to her - milblogs as the 21st century oral history that they are. "Put that in writing," she said (of course - see first paragraph above!) - and here's part of the result. Shortly after the first tent was pitched by the American military in Iraq a wire was connected to a computer therein, and the internet was available to a generation of Americans at war - many of whom had grown up online. From that point on, at any given moment, somewhere in Iraq a Soldier, Sailor, Airman or Marine was at a keyboard sharing the events of his or her day with the folks back home. While most would simply fire off an email, others took advantage of the (then) relatively new online blogging platforms to post their thoughts and experiences for the entire world to see. The milblog was born - and from that moment to this stories detailing everything from the most mundane aspects of camp life to intense combat action (often described within hours of the event) have been available on the web... And et cetera - but since you're reading this on a milblog, you probably knew that. And you know that milblogs aren't just blogs written by troops at war, that many friends, family members, and supporters likewise documented their story of America at war online in near-real time, as those stories developed. The diversity in membership of that group is broad, the one thing we all have in common is the impulse to make sense of the seemingly senseless, and communicate the tale - for each of us that impulse was strong enough to overcome whatever barriers prevent the vast majority of people from doing the same. Everyone at some point has some vague idea they believe should be shared - we were the people who, from some combination of internal and external urging, found and spent those many half hours persistently trying to write it down. But where will all that be in another 137 years? Or five or ten, for that matter. That's something I've asked myself since at least 2004 - when I wrote this:
Membership in the ghost battalion has grown in the years since, and an ever growing majority of those abandoned-but-still-standing sites are vanishing. Have you checked out Lt Smash's site lately? How about Sgt Hook's? If you're a long-time milblog reader you know the first widely-read milblog from Operation Iraq Freedom and the first widely-read milblog from Afghanistan are both gone from the web. If you're a relative newcomer to this world you may never even have heard of them - or the dozens upon dozens of others who carried forth the standard they set down. If you have a vague notion that something should be done about that, (a notion I've heard expressed more than once...) then you and I and the good folks at the US Naval Institute are in agreement. Preserving the history documented by the milbloggers is just one of the goals of the milblog project, the once-vague idea that we're now making real. And it's a big idea, if I say so myself - too big to explain in one simple blog post, so stand by for more. Likewise, it's too big a task to be accomplished by just one person. So if you're a milblogger (and exactly what is a milblogger? is a topic for much further discussion on its own) I'm asking for your help. All I'll really need is just a little bit (maybe just one or two of those half hours...) of your time, and your willingness to tell the tale. We've already made history, it's time to save it. (More to follow...) Posted 4:02 PM | Permalink |
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The Mudville Gazette is the on-line voice of an American warrior and his wife who stands by him. They prefer to see peaceful change render force of arms unnecessary. Until that day they stand fast with those who struggle for freedom, strike for reason, and pray for a better tomorrow.
 
 
 Furthermore, I will occasionally use satire or parody herein. The bottom line: it's my house. I like having visitors to my house. I hope you are entertained. I fight for your right to free speech, and am thrilled when you exercise said rights here. Comments and e-mails are welcome, but all such communication is to be assumed to be 1)the original work of any who initiate said communication and 2)the property of the Mudville Gazette, with free use granted thereto for publication in electronic or written form. If you do NOT wish to have your message posted, write "CONFIDENTIAL" in the subject line of your email. Original content copyright © 2003 - 2011 by Greyhawk. Fair, not-for-profit use of said material by others is encouraged, as long as acknowledgement and credit is given, to include the url of the original source post. Other arrangements can be made as needed. Contact: greyhawk at mudvillegazette dot com  Tending Distant Far from hearth and home, watching What tales we'll tell When things grim Some distant sunset, vision fading Saluting fallen friends whose names - Greyhawk, Baghdad, December 2004 |
The story out of Canton, Ohio with 13% of the high school female population pregnant is astounding. Details, and my riff can be found here: http://rapidpolitics.com/blog/index.php?title=dateline_canton_ohio&more=1&c=1&tb=1&pb=1