Be Careful of What You Wish For at No Man’s Blog

RE a Michelle Malkin post of this morning entitled “Putting freedom above football”. With gushing enthusiasm, Ms. Malkin opens her post with this dandy topic sentence:

The Baltimore Sun publishes a deeply inspiring story about a young college football player who puts service first. Wow. (Emphasis added by Effluent.)

Wow, indeed. But need we remind Ms. Malkin that Terps guard Donnie Woods is not the first young man in America to express an interest in joining the military to serve his country? The name of another young man comes immediately to my mind. In this case, the name that comes to mind is Ricky Stanford—an outstanding individual by any standard, but one whose name is virtually unknown outside of the restricted surroundings of Casa Grande, Arizona. Ricky Stanford is my son’s best friend. Not only did Ricky express an interest in joining the post-9/11 military, he actually did it. Without fanfare. He joined the U.S. Army shortly after 9/11 and became a Ranger, serving first in Afghanistan and then in Iraq. He was discharged after fulfilling his three-year service obligation, only to be recalled to active duty to help train newly enlisted soldiers in regular line infantry units. He served yet another tour in Iraq before coming home (unscathed) again. Hopefully for the last time.

But this is only part of my story. You see, during his first enlistment, Ricky served in the same Ranger battalion as one Kevin Tillman. And as some of you might know, Kevin is the brother of fallen Ranger Pat Tillman, former standout ASU linebacker and rookie safety for the Arizona Cardinals. Eight months after 9/11, Pat Tillman turned down a contract offer of $3.6 million from the Cardinals to enlist in the U.S. Army. Like his brother—and like my Ricky Stanford—he became a Ranger. Unlike Ricky and Kevin, however, Pat Tillman didn’t come home unscathed. He was killed by friendly fire in Afghanistan. From Wikipedia:

[After enlistment and deployment to the Middle East] Tillman was subsequently redeployed to Afghanistan, where, on April 22, 2004, he was killed in action by friendly fire while on patrol. His unit, according to the Army, was attacked in an apparent ambush on a road outside of the village of Sperah about twenty-five miles (forty km) southwest of Khost, near the Pakistan border. An Afghan militia soldier was killed, and two other Rangers were injured as well. The U.S. Department of Defense concluded that Pat Tillman’s death was due to friendly fire aggravated by the intensity of the firefight. It was later learned that, in fact, no hostile forces were involved in the firefight and that two allied groups fired on each other in confusion over an exploded mine or remote controlled bomb. U.S. Army Special Operations Command, however, initially claimed that there was an exchange with hostile forces. A later investigation conducted by Brigadier General Jones found that the Army was slow to correct the story of a hostile exchange of fire after learning that it was false. (Emphasis added by Effluent.)

Understandably, Pat’s untimely death has had a distinct affect on his brother’s attitude. (War has a nasty habit of doing that to its participants.) Kevin Tillman has subsequently become a vocal critic of the war. In an October post in No Man’s Blog, I suggested that “Kevin Tillman Has the Right to Talk”. The intent of the post was to point readers (if there were any), to Truthdig and a revealing essay penned by Kevin himself. In the earlier post I included a link to the Truthdig article (but not the Tillman text itself). This time I intend to post the complete text of the document. At the end of the post. But first things first….

It’s clear that Michelle Malkin has carved out a successful market niche (read: empire) by pandering to the conservative sensibilities of American right wingers and certain U.S. servicemen and women. She seems particularly proud of her affiliation with sources in the U.S. military and with a variety of milbloggers (particularly of the deployed kind). In reading the biographical information that is available on Ms. Malkin, however, I get the distinct impression that she has never been personally bitten by the urge to enlist and serve her nation. Instead, she seems quite happy to benefit from her blogging and webcasting activities on Michelle Malkin and Hot Air. Or from her frequent appearances as a conservative strategist/analyst (whatever that means) on a variety of news programs. Or as a stand-in “spin-stopper” on The O’Reilly Factor….

A review of the Wikipedia entry on Ms. Malkin reveals that she was born in 1970. Therefore, at 36 years of age, she’s still young enough to enlist in the U.S. Army herself. And given the self-professed depth of her patriotic fervor, I think she should seriously consider doing just that: she should temporarily renounce the lucrative benefits of her civilian career to join the military (à la Pat Tillman) and prove, by example, her fidelity to the cause of American military men and women. Unless, of course, she’s of the joining-the-military-is-a-laudable-thing-to-do-as-long-as-it’s-not-me ilk.

In an echo of the (ersatz?) patriotic sentiment Ms. Malkin expressed this morning in regard to young Donnie Woods: Wow! What a concept!

Ricky Stanford joined. Pat Tillman joined. Kevin Tillman joined. Even I enlisted—when Ms. Malkin was only six years old. I stayed in for twenty years. Man up, Michelle. Do the right thing. It’s your turn.

As promised, here’s the full text of the Kevin Tillman essay. Please understand that these are not my sentiments. They’re his. Nevertheless, young Tillman has earned the right to speak his mind:

After Pat’s Birthday

It is Pat’s birthday on November 6, and elections are the day after. It gets me thinking about a conversation I had with Pat before we joined the military. He spoke about the risks with signing the papers. How once we committed, we were at the mercy of the American leadership and the American people. How we could be thrown in a direction not of our volition. How fighting as a soldier would leave us without a voice…until we got out.

Much has happened since we handed over our voice:

Somehow we were sent to invade a nation because it was a direct threat to the American people, or to the world, or harbored terrorists, or was involved in the September 11 attacks, or received weapons-grade uranium from Niger, or had mobile weapons labs, or WMD, or had a need to be liberated, or we needed to establish a democracy, or stop an insurgency, or stop a civil war we created that can’t be called a civil war even though it is. Something like that.

Somehow our elected leaders were subverting international law and humanity by setting up secret prisons around the world, secretly kidnapping people, secretly holding them indefinitely, secretly not charging them with anything, secretly torturing them. Somehow that overt policy of torture became the fault of a few “bad apples” in the military.

Somehow back at home, support for the soldiers meant having a five-year-old kindergartner scribble a picture with crayons and send it overseas, or slapping stickers on cars, or lobbying Congress for an extra pad in a helmet. It’s interesting that a soldier on his third or fourth tour should care about a drawing from a five-year-old; or a faded sticker on a car as his friends die around him; or an extra pad in a helmet, as if it will protect him when an IED throws his vehicle 50 feet into the air as his body comes apart and his skin melts to the seat.

Somehow the more soldiers that die, the more legitimate the illegal invasion becomes.
Somehow American leadership, whose only credit is lying to its people and illegally invading a nation, has been allowed to steal the courage, virtue and honor of its soldiers on the ground.
Somehow those afraid to fight an illegal invasion decades ago are allowed to send soldiers to die for an illegal invasion they started.
Somehow faking character, virtue and strength is tolerated.
Somehow profiting from tragedy and horror is tolerated.
Somehow the death of tens, if not hundreds, of thousands of people is tolerated.
Somehow subversion of the Bill of Rights and The Constitution is tolerated.
Somehow suspension of Habeas Corpus is supposed to keep this country safe.
Somehow torture is tolerated.
Somehow lying is tolerated.
Somehow reason is being discarded for faith, dogma, and nonsense.
Somehow American leadership managed to create a more dangerous world.
Somehow a narrative is more important than reality.
Somehow America has become a country that projects everything that it is not and condemns everything that it is.
Somehow the most reasonable, trusted and respected country in the world has become one of the most irrational, belligerent, feared, and distrusted countries in the world.
Somehow being politically informed, diligent, and skeptical has been replaced by apathy through active ignorance.
Somehow the same incompetent, narcissistic, virtueless, vacuous, malicious criminals are still in charge of this country.Somehow this is tolerated.
Somehow nobody is accountable for this.

In a democracy, the policy of the leaders is the policy of the people. So don’t be shocked when our grandkids bury much of this generation as traitors to the nation, to the world and to humanity. Most likely, they will come to know that “somehow” was nurtured by fear, insecurity and indifference, leaving the country vulnerable to unchecked, unchallenged parasites.

Luckily this country is still a democracy. People still have a voice. People still can take action. It can start after Pat’s birthday.

Brother and Friend of Pat Tillman,

Kevin Tillman

Again, Kevin Tillman has earned the right to talk. The entire Tillman family has sacrificed much for this country. That’s more than can be said for some. Here are pictures of Pat Tillman as both an ASU linebacker and a U.S. Army Ranger:

Pat Tillman

And here’s a picture of Pat and Kevin Tillman together in Saudi Arabia prior to the onset of Operation Iraqi Freedom:

The Tillman Brothers

Pat Tillman was a hero. Kevin Tillman and Ricky Stanford are heroes. I’m pretty sure that all three of them would tell Ms. Malkin that some things aren’t worth gushing about. And as admirable as Donnie Woods’ aspirations are, he should try to remember that there’s such a thing as the law of unintended consequences. And he should be reminded that sometimes you should be careful of what you wish for.

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