thedrifter
12-11-04, 06:56 AM
First A Slave, Now A Moron
December 10, 2004
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
by Bob Newman
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Did you know that a newspaper columnist is an expert at everything?
Yup. Once you get into print on a regularly scheduled basis, you automatically become a veritable wellspring of wisdom and knowledge, akin to the oracle at Delphi. The thing is, Pythia was notorious for doling out cryptic responses, perhaps which meant she didn’t know what she was babbling about. But the Greeks came en masse anyway, delivering gold to the charlatan wench in exchange for highly questionable intelligence on this, that and the other thing.
Denver Post columnist Reggie Rivers, a former pro football player and noted leftist, is Pythialike in his approach to issuing what he euphemistically peddles as facts and truth. In one of his rants, Reg said US military personnel are slaves, albeit volunteer slaves. (No contradiction there. Nah.) Now the prejudiced pundit says in his latest prattle that military personnel are morons.
Writing about Abu Ghraib, Rivers, who has never been in the military, said, “As a group, soldiers are not improvisers.” He says soldiers can’t improvise because they are trained to obey orders, not to think independently or act on their own. Reggie, in his telling naďveté and world-class arrogance, truly believes military personnel are automatons who, in their stupidity, robotically do whatever they are told to do regardless of an order’s legality.
Reg, if that’s so, how do lower-ranking soldiers become the higher-ranking soldiers who give the orders? And when football players practice plays and then carry out a play called for by the quarterback, is that not obeying orders?
Reggie, did you argue with your quarterback in the huddle? Or did you follow his orders?
In the real world, military men and women are the most adept improvisers on the planet. They have to be to stay alive and kill a very clever enemy in prodigious numbers. And when left unsupervised and poorly trained by weak leaders, which happens from time to time, young military people will absolutely, positively come up with spectacularly stupid ideas.
This was obviously the case at Abu Ghraib, but Reggie is desperate for you to believe that the evil Republicans and their henchmen (vile generals who love the very idea of torture) made a handful of immature soldiers (a miniscule fraction of the whole) do stupid things to some terrorists.
And you should believe Reg because, after all, he played football.
My column next week will be on the intricacies of rushing plays used during the Super Bowl. I know a lot about tactics in professional football, of course, because, although I have never played pro football, I was a blueberry raker in Maine back in the 1960s and I am currently a newspaper columnist.
Bias and arrogance oftentimes lead to lazy journalism and a twisted need to insult those willing to fight for your rights when you never were. This misdirected anger and loathing for the men and women who have the guts to risk their lives so that others might live is indicative of a mind poisoned by hate.
The irony is that soldiers, sailors, airmen and Marines (all mindless dolts to Reggie) are willing to die for Reggie’s right to insult them. This is an act Reggie will never duplicate, for self-sacrifice is as foreign a concept to him as freedom is to Saddam Hussein.
Despite these facts, I have no doubt Reggie will sleep well tonight. Consumed by the fires of his own self-importance, he will continue to hock his particularly ugly brand of bigotry.
But, you know what? It’s OK for him to do that, because the morons in the military will die hideous deaths to ensure that right is never taken away from him.
Bob Newman
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Bob Newman, a decorated, retired US Marine, is host of the “Gunny Bob Show” on Newsradio 850 KOA in Denver, and host of “Inhuman Newman’s Anger-Management Hour” on 630 KHOW, also in Denver. His “Global Positioning Statement,” a daily insider’s update on the war on terror, is carried by various Clear Channel radio stations from coast to coast. A ground-combat veteran, he is the director of international security & counterterrorism services for The GeoScope Group and is the military science & terrorism columnist for The Denver Daily News. He can be reached at bobnewman@clearchannel.com.
Ellie
December 10, 2004
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
by Bob Newman
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Did you know that a newspaper columnist is an expert at everything?
Yup. Once you get into print on a regularly scheduled basis, you automatically become a veritable wellspring of wisdom and knowledge, akin to the oracle at Delphi. The thing is, Pythia was notorious for doling out cryptic responses, perhaps which meant she didn’t know what she was babbling about. But the Greeks came en masse anyway, delivering gold to the charlatan wench in exchange for highly questionable intelligence on this, that and the other thing.
Denver Post columnist Reggie Rivers, a former pro football player and noted leftist, is Pythialike in his approach to issuing what he euphemistically peddles as facts and truth. In one of his rants, Reg said US military personnel are slaves, albeit volunteer slaves. (No contradiction there. Nah.) Now the prejudiced pundit says in his latest prattle that military personnel are morons.
Writing about Abu Ghraib, Rivers, who has never been in the military, said, “As a group, soldiers are not improvisers.” He says soldiers can’t improvise because they are trained to obey orders, not to think independently or act on their own. Reggie, in his telling naďveté and world-class arrogance, truly believes military personnel are automatons who, in their stupidity, robotically do whatever they are told to do regardless of an order’s legality.
Reg, if that’s so, how do lower-ranking soldiers become the higher-ranking soldiers who give the orders? And when football players practice plays and then carry out a play called for by the quarterback, is that not obeying orders?
Reggie, did you argue with your quarterback in the huddle? Or did you follow his orders?
In the real world, military men and women are the most adept improvisers on the planet. They have to be to stay alive and kill a very clever enemy in prodigious numbers. And when left unsupervised and poorly trained by weak leaders, which happens from time to time, young military people will absolutely, positively come up with spectacularly stupid ideas.
This was obviously the case at Abu Ghraib, but Reggie is desperate for you to believe that the evil Republicans and their henchmen (vile generals who love the very idea of torture) made a handful of immature soldiers (a miniscule fraction of the whole) do stupid things to some terrorists.
And you should believe Reg because, after all, he played football.
My column next week will be on the intricacies of rushing plays used during the Super Bowl. I know a lot about tactics in professional football, of course, because, although I have never played pro football, I was a blueberry raker in Maine back in the 1960s and I am currently a newspaper columnist.
Bias and arrogance oftentimes lead to lazy journalism and a twisted need to insult those willing to fight for your rights when you never were. This misdirected anger and loathing for the men and women who have the guts to risk their lives so that others might live is indicative of a mind poisoned by hate.
The irony is that soldiers, sailors, airmen and Marines (all mindless dolts to Reggie) are willing to die for Reggie’s right to insult them. This is an act Reggie will never duplicate, for self-sacrifice is as foreign a concept to him as freedom is to Saddam Hussein.
Despite these facts, I have no doubt Reggie will sleep well tonight. Consumed by the fires of his own self-importance, he will continue to hock his particularly ugly brand of bigotry.
But, you know what? It’s OK for him to do that, because the morons in the military will die hideous deaths to ensure that right is never taken away from him.
Bob Newman
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Bob Newman, a decorated, retired US Marine, is host of the “Gunny Bob Show” on Newsradio 850 KOA in Denver, and host of “Inhuman Newman’s Anger-Management Hour” on 630 KHOW, also in Denver. His “Global Positioning Statement,” a daily insider’s update on the war on terror, is carried by various Clear Channel radio stations from coast to coast. A ground-combat veteran, he is the director of international security & counterterrorism services for The GeoScope Group and is the military science & terrorism columnist for The Denver Daily News. He can be reached at bobnewman@clearchannel.com.
Ellie