Comments | kat_chan: American priorities are, once again, in the right place

kat_chan

American priorities are, once again, in the right place

Mar 19, 2006 22:14

http://www.guardian.co.uk/print/0,,329433567-110878,00.htmlRead more... )

military, stupidity

Comments 11

egyptian_spider March 20 2006, 03:22:13 UTC

Whee. Nice to know that they have their priorities straight.

Don't they have other things to do?

kat_chan March 20 2006, 06:45:37 UTC

There is this really tall, like 6'6" or so, Arab guy who's hiding out in Pakistan. I hear that there are people who would like to drag him before a tribunal, and the US is supposed to be looking for him. But I guess not as hard as they're looking for guys who ditched the Corps nearly 40 years ago.

egyptian_spider March 20 2006, 06:47:39 UTC

And aren't there other people that they need to find too?? Not to mention a Civil War brewing??

Hm. Maybe they're hoping to get these people to join the army?

kat_chan March 20 2006, 06:51:19 UTC

Force them to fulfill their obligation or spend 10 years in the brig. Never mind that with some of these guys being around 60 years old, 10 years in the brig for desertion means they'll probably never see the outside again.

And, as I said, the more unstable things are over there, the longer they can use "terrorism" and "homeland security" as election-year buzzwords.

Thread 5

chaptal March 20 2006, 04:07:14 UTC

They should be looking for Osama instead of the deserters.

Didn't Carter pardon the deserters, or was that something else?

kat_chan March 20 2006, 06:47:55 UTC

Carter did pardon the deserters. I think that the argument in this case would go that "the pardon only extends to civilian law. This is a violation of the UCMJ, and the presidential pardon powers don't apply."

And you're right, they should be looking for Osama. But if they caught him, the GOP wouldn't have the terrorist boogeyman looming out there, making "terrorism" and "homeland security" profitable election-year buzzwords.

kelli217 March 20 2006, 15:30:39 UTC

As Commander in Chief at the time he issued the pardon, it damn well DOES apply to the UCMJ as well.

kat_chan March 20 2006, 15:59:32 UTC

I'm just saying that they'll try to use that argument to persuade a gullible/ignorant public that they have the right to pursue these deserters, not that the rationale is correct.

Also, the other distinction that they'll like try to make in parsing the language is that Carter only pardoned those that fled to Canada to dodge the draft, while these guys were already in the service and deserted. I'm not sure how well that argument would hold up, either. The fact that the Corps is the only branch that has reopened these cases demonstrates to me that most of the military does see Carter's pardon as having basically settled the matter.

With the possibility of more long-term deployments and even a draft looming, I think that the Pentagon is happy that one of the branches is out there going after these Vietnam deserters, making them an example to anyone who may get ideas about desertion or draft dodging this time around.

thenodrin April 5 2006, 20:31:44 UTC

So, this guy who is a Canadian citizen was just crossing the border to go to a family function, and he's detained for desertian over 20 years ago.

And yet, Randy Orton was court martialed for deserting in 2002, and he only served 38 days in military prison and just last weekend was headlining WrestleMania?

What, did Allen Abney not have enough billionaire friends to help him?

Theno

kat_chan April 6 2006, 23:23:35 UTC

And apparently Mr. Orton can't keep his dirty thoughts to himself backstage. Maybe he should have been caught up in a harassment scandal in the military, as well.

But, you know, I think that some of the old guard in this administration, the folks who were part of the Nixon and Ford Adminstrations (Rummy, Cheney, et. al.) are still fighting Vietnam. Especially with their insistance that Iraq is different.