Happy As Kings

Jade Helm 15

I had a blog post on my to-do list about the insanity in Texas concerning the military exercise Jade Helm 15. The combination of misinformation, paranoia, and provocation is staggering.

Garden-variety people-who-like-to-scare-themselves are one thing, but to have a governor sic the state guard on the United States military, and then to have a senator and a member of the House of Representatives responding as if the studied provocation of the people-who-like-to-scare-themselves is a legitimate event about which to be concerned (thus validating the fears), is irresponsible. The people in charge (elected officials) are supposed to have some statesmanlike qualities, not encourage fringe fears.

Luckily for me, I don't have to rack my brain for cool, calm, low-key point-by-point explanations. Jim Wright of Stonekettle Station wrote a response to the stoked lunacy that is scathingly hilarious, and five-shots-in-the-center-of-the-bullseye accurate. 

 Jade Helm: The Insanity that Ate Texas  

Look, maybe you haven't noticed, but we in the military are often called upon to operate in foreign lands, particularly in urban and suburban environments. How in the hell do you think we train for that? What? You think it’s just fucking magic? We get by on our charm and wholesome American looks? Do you have any idea what it takes to do what we do? Coordination, communication, navigation, talking to civilians, security, just finding your way around in a strange city, and a thousand other mundane things you've never thought of. How in the hell do you think we learn that?

You can't exactly send troops to Tehran to practice you know – well, you can, but it’s bound to get you talked about, especially that part involving, you know, military invasion of a foreign country. So we do it here, in our country, where we can concentrate on the skills necessary without being shot at - except given the rise in paranoid droolers here at home, maybe it would be easier to do it in a hostile foreign land. These days, Baghdad is far more sane and friendly than whatever the fuck is going on down there in Texas.

Honest to God, what the hell is wrong with you people?

 

But don't take my word for it, go on over there. Read the entire brilliant take-down of the alleged "patriots" who tell soldiers -- those service members they're always thanking for their service -- that they don't want them there at all (after 1:35).

Military children are Brats, not CHAMPS

The Brat heritage of growing up as the child of a military service member is not decided by people who've had nothing to do with military life, and especially not by people who are monetizing the identity. 

The background is that a young woman was moved by the situation of military children with whom she worked. She wanted to do something to "bridge the cultural divide" between Brats-who-are-still young, and the civilian world.  She did this through writing a book that started out as something along the lines of "The Little Brats" but which changed to "The Little CHAMPS," with CHAMPS being the acronym for "child heroes attached to military personnel."  Apparently, the organizations approached to support the effort didn't like the word "Brats." (although we Brats like it just fine) She, and her mother, have promoted the book through USO tours overseas and through various agencies that agreed to support CHAMPS.

I can't address the motives for all this activity concerning military kids.  I assume it is well-meant, but other than raising awareness in the communities in which military kids wind up, I don't know that the community in general needs that much "help."  Yes, kids whose parents are deployed can use understanding, but the "edu-taining" should be directed at the adults in the lives of the kids, maybe perhaps teachers in civilian communities.

A very sour note in the enterprise is calling today's young Brats "heroes."  We Brats don't see ourselves as heroes, those people were our parents.  Don't give the kids the burden of stolen valor.  We weren't the heroes, we knew it, and we were just fine with that.  It's up to the grownups to manage that part, not the kids.

Otherwise, don't medicalize our heritage by acting as if we're abnormal.  From a Brat point of view, our way of life is normal.  All the rest of the country may think it's unique, off-beat, something to be adjusted to, but, to us, your way is what's strange.

I look at my youngest granddaughter, 10 months old, and I think about how I and my kids (all Brats) had all moved at least once by the time we were her age (for me it was 3 times).  My oldest grandson, 15, has lived in the same house his entire life -- how weird is that?  By the time I was his age, I'd had 9 different bedrooms in three different countries.  His dad bested me by the age of 3 (difference between Air Force and Army), by having as many bedrooms as I'd had by 15 -- only two countries, though, but way more states.  All my friends were the same way -- and so were the friends of my kids.

"When I was a kid" during the Cold War, I wondered (when I bothered to think about it) who paid civilians.  

• I wondered who issued them their houses.
• Where did they get their ID cards?
• What was the deal with sales tax?
• Where were their service clubs?  
• How could they tell who were officers and who were enlisted at their community swimming pools?  
• How did they stand living in one place so long?  
• Wasn't it boring having all your friends and neighbors be from the same place? 

Living at a distance from American civilians wasn't much different from living in another country -- for young kids, aspects of both kinds of cultures are foreign, and that's normal.  For us, normal culture was a military culture.  The subcultures of the various services were like different accents with each service having its own lingo and way of doing things, but understandable from a military perspective: go where you're told to go, don't get your dad in trouble by causing mischief and getting the MPs, APs, SPs or whatever other Ps there are, called on you, and when you hear To The Colors at 1700 hours (5pm), stop and face the music (or the flag if it's in view). We all knew this stuff.

As an adult who has, at the age of 64, now lived in one place as long as my grandson, I can see some benefits of no longer being a nomad. It's not as bad as I thought although the lifestyle's blunt edge of seeing the same people for years has been sharpened by the periodic addition of new people to the family -- grandkids are great.

The bottom line for those of us who care (not everyone's invested -- bell curves and all that) is to leave our heritage to us.  Our younger compatriots are not a population to be used for gain. They are the latest generation of our way of life. If schools and communities want to know how to make them feel welcome, look into Third Culture Kids. 

 

Additional information:

• Brats Without Borders 
• Bob Hollicker on Military Brats audio interview
• 25 Signs You Grew Up as a Military Brat I had no idea bowling was such a Brat thing
• Brats Stolen Valor/Stolen Identity Facebook group 
• We’re Military “Brats,” Not Heroes, Champs, Little Soldiers, or Fledglings 
• Operation Footlocker 

 

Military bases open their doors to home-schoolers

An article on military homeschooling popped up, so of course I had to read it.  It's an interesting article, but one that follows the pattern of most mainstream articles about homeschooling:  cautious observation but without any endorsement.

Military Bases Open Their Doors to Homeschoolers 

Military families move on average nearly every three years. The transition can be tough for children, and home schooling can make it easier, advocates say. The children don't have to adjust to a new teacher or worry that they're behind because the new school's curriculum is different.

 

Other points in the article are how it seems that only certain people can, or should, homeschool, how military homeschooling has only recently become acceptable, and how homeschooling may make deployment stress worse.

No, homeschooling isn't for every military family. Neither is bowling, or riding motorcycles, or cheeseburgers. Preferences vary across populations, as do results of schooling styles. Whether homeschooling's "long-term social and academic effects" are positive or negative can be weighed against overall developments such as the increase in the need for remedial courses in basic studies for freshman college students. Interested readers can Google "homeschool college acceptance" for a range of results on whether college admissions staffs see homeschooled graduates as good candidates for their schools.

As for the impression that homeschooling among military families is a recently-acceptable development, some parents homeschooled on military installations (and "on the economy" in USAREUR) from the late 1980s on. There were ups and downs, but overall the situation was fairly stable and parents were supported by local homeschooling groups.

It's good that more installations support the children who are homeschooled as well as those who are schooled. I know that I appreciated the work in the mid-1990s of the Heidelberg Youth Center when the staff developed an exceptional art program featuring museum tours and lessons in sculpting and drawing.

Concerning stress during deployment, it's a good bet that the deployment caused the stress (going by all the YouTube videos of children-in-school being surprised by a returning parent) and not the homeschooling. Parents in online support groups say that they are better able to help their children weather the separation because the parents can control when to forge ahead with new material or slow down to 'go with the flow' of the child's emotions.

 

Priests threatened with arrest if they minister to military during shutdown

Regarding a report by a website named The Daily Caller (among many).

Priests threatened with arrest if they minister to military during shutdown

“With the government shutdown, many [government service] and contract priests who minister to Catholics on military bases worldwide are not permitted to work – not even to volunteer,” wrote John Schlageter, the general counsel for the Archdiocese for the Military Services USA, in an op-ed this week. “During the shutdown, it is illegal for them to minister on base and they risk being arrested if they attempt to do so.”

Catholic priests have been in short supply for the military for some time. When my twins were baptized in 1981 in Munich, the priest was a contractor. Part of the problem of the lack of priests was because of decreased vocations, and part of it was a "main line denomination" decrease in the number of priests and pastors choosing to be military chaplains in the wake of the war in Vietnam.

The "arrest" part might be entering a controlled area during the shutdown when access might be severely restricted to control any misbehavior on the parts of people who aren't happy about the shutdown of the government by the House of Representatives' refusal to govern.  The members of Congress grandstanding over this issue can solve the problem easily -- do their jobs and govern instead of having a tantrum.

The restriction against "ministering" probably has to do with the legal ramifications of the contracts.

When I was a new employee in the military community civilian personnel office in Fulda, Germany in the mid-1970s, I was the only American in the office. The office was new to administering the personnel actions of American civilian workers in the community and the three people already in the office were Germans who administered the civilian personnel side for the German employees. German employees of the American Army far outnumbered American employees because of treaty agreements, for continuity reasons, and because there were no American workers to be plumbers, electricians, maintenance people, or fill many other jobs.

Anyhow, I was a GS-3, and as a probationary employee I wasn't supposed to work unsupervised. The wrinkle was, German and American holidays.  As an American employee I would be working on German holidays while my German supervisors would be at home, holidaying.

To try to solve the problem, I volunteered to work on American holidays when my immediate supervisors were at work, and to take off on German holidays while they were off.  The problem with my solution was that would mess with the needs of the American employees, and it was illegal, as in against existing pay regulations.

My American boss (in a community 50 miles away -- we were a satellite office) worked it out by having me call her on the telephone at regular intervals throughout the day (a solution that seemed to last only for the first German holiday). The contracts with the priests probably have similar regulatory restrictions.

I'm guessing the restriction on ministering would apply only to services held in chapels on military installations. Catholic service members are free to attend any Catholic church and the contractors are free to celebrate mass in their home church.

This has nothing to do with the First Amendment and seems to have everything to do with members of Congress making a mess and trying to fix it by special exception "bandages" whenever someone they favor is inconvenienced or the "bandage" would make a good Tweet.

 

Update:

The law governing whether employees can "volunteer" their services is the Antideficiency Act.  This law was not passed to deal with the current government shutdown (has any law been passed recently?), but is from 1884 (according to Wikipedia).  Yes, eighteen-eighty-four.  

According to the Antideficiency page at the GAO site, 

The Antideficiency Act prohibits federal employees from

• making or authorizing an expenditure from, or creating or authorizing an obligation under, any appropriation or fund in excess of the amount available in the appropriation or fund unless authorized by law. 31 U.S.C. § 1341(a)(1)(A). 
• involving the government in any obligation to pay money before funds have been appropriated for that purpose, unless otherwise allowed by law. 31 U.S.C. § 1341(a)(1)(B). 
• accepting voluntary services for the United States, or employing personal services not authorized by law, except in cases of emergency involving the safety of human life or the protection of property. 31 U.S.C. § 1342. 
• making obligations or expenditures in excess of an apportionment or reapportionment, or in excess of the amount permitted by agency regulations. 31 U.S.C. § 1517(a).

You'd think that lawmakers would know something about the laws they're tinkering with.

Alleged Benghazigate

I’ve been watching the Benghazi-attack rumor mill ramp itself up into a political cyclone of hysteria. Most of us of a certain age have probably seen the “surgical strike” imagery from Desert Storm.  Jet pilots were able, twenty years ago, to send smart bombs into buildings to destroy the enemy.  The military could put a metaphorical “man on the moon” then (a bomb through a window), so why couldn’t we do it in Benghazi?

A couple differences will set the stage:  The Desert Storm pilots were prepped.  The Desert Storm pilots were there.

 

To me, this political cyclone looks like a version of the “CSI effect” that plagues jury trial:  people think that “the military” can routinely work TV magic by arriving someplace moments after an inciting incident.  That’s fiction.  “The military” does not keep units on permanent alert supported by aircraft revving their engines on the flight line with Harrier/Cobra/Concorde capabilities, and equipped with bad-guy profiling software-guided smart bullets.  An effective response takes planning and that’s probably what was going on.

Another peeve-y caveat:  There is no “the military.”  “The military” is composed of branches of the service, with specific duties and particular units.  One unit must talk to another unit, whether the “unit” I the Department of State, the Pentagon, or a special response unit.  Details have to be confirmed and evaluated to avoid the pitfalls of the childhood game of “Telephone” in which the sentence the first person speaks isn’t the sentence the last person hears.  We need the information to be timely, accurate and specific.  Rushing into a situation, if you’re close enough to actually rush in, usually winds up with more mistakes than solutions.  Ask any mother who tries to intervene in a sibling argument.

Some of the questions I’ve seen floating loose on teh Intertoobz are answered by a reporter in this article I read in this morning’s Kansas City Star:  Questions and some answers about attack on U.S. consulate in Libya

An article I found while researching information for this blog post is also informative:  Pentagon on Benghazi Troop Movements: ‘Swift Action’ on Night of Attack 

From my own perspective of a lifetime in and around military installations, other clarifications are:

• The closest American military installation to Benghazi, Libya is at Sigonella in Italy. Sigonella has no suited and booted instant response team with an airplane waiting on the runway with its engines running. 
• Units on standby alert need something to be standing by for.  It can be argued that “’they’ should have known,” but threats are continual. Someone, somewhere is always pissed off at the U.S. Just as cortisol in a living body damages that body, keeping units on permanent standby alert “just in case” brings on a feeling similar to that caused by the “little boy who cried wolf.”
• The American public isn’t too fond of “fraud, waste and abuse” (to quote ubiquitous signs around the military installations where I spent most of my life).  With reason, bloated DoD funding is a favorite target for cutting expenses so having “just in case” troops twiddling their thumbs waiting for something to come of worldwide threats would be sure to be an effective use of taxpayer money. 
• Troops don’t magically materialize from a place of perpetual readiness to the place that needs defending. It takes time for responders to get from Point A to Point B, to include travel time from where the individuals are to a collection point, travel time from the collection point to an airport, flight time to the area of operations, and travel time from the receiving airport to the target destination.  No, they don’t have to deal with the TSA, but it all still takes time.
• Four hundred miles straight distance flying time from Sigonella to Benghazi doesn’t include the time for a response team to get from Rota, Spain to Sigonella. Special response teams are wonderful, but they aren’t supermen and they don’t have capes.
• We don’t want hair-trigger responses in an international situation.  Libya did not attack the embassy and we should be very careful in retaliating against … whom?  The city of Benghazi?  A mob in the streets? Al Quaeda?  A responding unit needs to know against whom they are fighting and figuring out who this is takes time.
• Fighter jets “popping a sonic boom” over a city of over 600,000 people (a suggestion I saw from a publication I subscribed to before the Republican party went off the rails) would probably result in damage greater than any assistance and would affect those already under attack. The much-maligned “collateral damage” of previous conflicts would have drawn censure for whoever ordered the strike.
• For those advocating a heavily-armed response, haven’t you noticed a problem with invading other countries?  Have you really not noticed?

 

In conclusion, my condolences to the families of the slain Americans.  Chris Stevens. Sean Smith. Tyrone Woods. Glen Doherty.  I’m so sorry the attackers took your family members from you.

The US Army is Doomed

This weekend, all I seem to be thinking about is sex.  It's enough to make the children blush.

In my online travels, I ran across this blog post (with the same subject line) concerning the use by the Army of empathy bellies for soldiers learning how to run PT for pregnant soldiers and soldiers who are new mothers.  The writer is truly gobsmacked.

I left a reply, but don't see it.  Either it is being held for moderation or the blog ate it.  I don't like to waste thinking or typing, so here is my reply:   

From the blog:  I know this sounds harsh, but if a woman is pregnant, why wouldn't they be honorably discharged, given some form of severance and sent on their way, or given the ability to transfer to a non combat role, but only if there are spots open for them.

She wouldn't be discharged because it's against the law to fire women for pregnancy, which is a temporary condition despite its long-term effect. Mothers aren't the only ones to experience this effect (parenthood) as many fathers stay with their children until the kids grow up.

Aside from that, DoD made the decision to allow pregnant women and mothers to remain on active duty when the draft ended in the 1970s and the Army shifted to all volunteers. 

• The Women's Army Corps, 1945 - 1978, p. 264: "A week later, however, Secretary Froehlke, faced with reports projecting that the elimination of the draft would leave the Army unable to maintain a minimum of thirteen active duty divisions after FY 1974, called upon the Army staff for a plan that would achieve the speediest and largest supportable increase in the WAC."
• The U.S. Army's Transition to the All-Volunteer Force, 1968-1974, p. 192: "[LTC Jack] Butler believed that an expansion of the WAC in order to substitute enlisted women for men required no justification; the need was self-evident." 

As for the empathy bellies, it is a cost-effective measure to have instructors understand the limits of what a troop with a physical condition can tolerate.  These women have received expensive training and may be very good at their jobs.  To flush them from the system for pregnancy is a waste of your tax dollars and would leave their co-workers playing catch-up.  For the women to be injured from unsuitable physical training and possibly be medically discharged would result in a similar financial loss for the Army.  For a woman to be injured and lose a baby would be a tragedy.

The argument for women in the military not to bear children until they complete whatever term it is that they intend to complete is also a form of discrimination given that older mothers tend to have more complications with pregnancy.  Enlisting at 20, waiting twenty years to retire, and then start a family has a woman waiting until 40 to become pregnant. Also, no one asks men to refrain from becoming fathers because they are in the military. The services do not discharge single fathers although they, like single mothers, must have a plan for care of the child/ren in case of an emergency. In fact, it would seem that the military encourages parenthood/family life by providing family quarters and dependent travel, among other family support mechanisms.

To correct a misperception at the blog, no woman, with or without a 1-year old, would be sent "into combat," much less any pregnant woman.  During pregnancy a woman who is a soldier would have what is called a "profile" limiting the kind of work she can do, just as any soldier who is unable to complete his or her duties because of a temporary condition. Yes, women have been killed in combat situations but only because the battlefield can be anywhere. These women were not "in combat" although combat came to them.

American military as a socialist entity

The local headline of Nicholas Kristof's column today in the Kansas City Star, gave me a laugh:  The Socialist U.S. Military System Works -- Hoo-ah!  I came to the same conclusion decades ago, not that the realization was anything spectacular, or public, it was merely an ironic realization, before the collapse of communism, and in the kitchen of the government quarters where our family lived.  The microcosm in which I lived was, short of being Spartans or 1st century Christians, the epitome of what my husband was actively working against.  Given our social group, I didn't bring up this viewpoint much in polite company.  (and yes, I supported my husband in his work -- realizing an -ismic irony didn't negate the reality of the opposition's intent)

I don't know that the military model is one that 'society' should emulate as a way of sustaining us all, but invoking socialism and communism as dread -isms, in and of themselves, holds as much truth as saying that pure free-market capitalism, unconstrained by any liberal practices, is the way to go.

Religious Civil Rights: Why Have the Washington Times and the Air Force Academy Savaged Them?

 Last week, a Washington Times editorial, "Air Force witchcraft," tried denigrating adherents of earth-centered religions by referencing a timely quote from Julius Caesar.

The religions of the barbaric tribes of Europe faded away as the Roman conquest brought civilization to the region. ... "They have likenesses of immense size, the limbs of which are composed of wicker, that they fill with living men," wrote Julius Caesar, describing a Druid ceremony. "After these are set on fire, the men inside perish in the flames."

 This appeal to ancient authority prompts me to rhetorically ask whether adherents of Christianity ever committed atrocities -- perhaps inquisitions, or religious wars, or genocide of civilizations new-to-Europeans? (I suppose Jewish atrocities are the ones in the Tanakh/Old Testament in which the Israelites wiped out neighboring tribes) Some might say, "Those things happened long ago. They don't happen now."  Children in Nigeria disagree. 

Another inaccuracy in the Times editorial is the statement:

All of the actual Wiccans and Druids died out hundreds of years ago.

 The thrown-together thinking behind the "actual" sentence is shown by the anachronistic mixing of Druids and Wiccans.  Druids were iron-age Celts; Wicca is a modern development; witches in the popular conception -- since the word is one synonym for Wiccan -- are, to my mind, mythological along with sorceresses and wizards.  In the here and now, some people do call themselves Druids, but as these neo-Druids are building websites and sending out home study courses, they've hardly died out.

 Another indicator of sloppy thinking by the article's writer is by referring to "actual Wiccans and Druids."  What is an "actual" Wiccan, or an "actual" Druid?  Would an "actual" Druid's physical existence be biologically equivalent to the body of a believer of a mainstream religion, or is there a difference between "actual" people and those who merely believe?  To me, the labeling of Wiccans and Druids as "actual" indicates the writer thinks that genetic Harry Potteresque wizards exist(ed), which brings up a pretty theological question:  Since most religions gain members by thoughtful teaching/conversion, do "actual" members of a religious group have their religion in their DNA?  If that were true, wouldn't an identifiable DNA marker for a specific religion lend more legitimacy to the status of "actual" believers?  (possibly? [see final paragraph])

 Metaphysics aside, how are secular authorities supposed to treat religion?  Should only the adherents of large-group religions be respected?  If that is how things should be, should secular authorities ignore minority-religions, or perhaps ban them? What is an appropriate secular treatment of group members with religious beliefs?

 Again from the Times article:

This is a space cadets can use to perform rituals if they happen to be witches, warlocks and tree-worshipers. ...

The Air Force is not alone in pandering.

 I'll overlook the Freudian "space cadets," although it gave me a laugh, but "pandering" is impossible to misconstrue.  One definition of pander is to receive special treatment. In a modern, tolerant country is it "pandering" to allow people to worship as they choose? 

The Times writer continues with the special treatment theme:

These neo-Pagan worshippers now have a federally supplied space they can call their own in the hills of Colorado Springs, Colo.

Why not?  The famous Air Force Academy Cadet Chapel is also "federally supplied," so why can't the minority-belief worshippers have a space in the hills?  Who is injured by either facility?

In the United States, practicing your religion is not a privilege, it's a right.  Which brings me to USAF Academy grad, Mikey Weinstein:

Religious Civil Rights: Why Have the Washington Times and the Air Force Academy Savaged Them?, 9 May 2011, Truthout

Shame, shame, shame on the Times for failing to recognize that, while the First Commandment might indeed say that "you cannot have any other Gods but Me," the First Amendment's clarion call is quite simply, "Oh yes you can!"

 The "clarion call" is echoed in the booklet, "Religious Requirements and Practices of Certain Selected Groups" published by the U.S. Army.  (link to text: here)

 The United States is not a theocracy.  The Constitution (the one the cadets will swear to uphold when they become Air Force officers) says so.  What Julius Caesar thought, is of no civic consequence.

TV program irritation: drunk GIs shooting tracers

This time it's CSI's new episode, "Take my life, please!" -- such a disappointment from this program.

Setup:  CSIs examining a bad-man victim who had been shot over 100 times.  Sarah says something like, "X-number were blackened and thought maybe it was GSR, but they were singed."  Ray replies that the burns could have been caused by tracer rounds, then adds that when he was a kid his dad and his Army buddies "would get drunk and fire tracer rounds on the base" and tell him they were fireworks.

Note to television writers:  if you don't know anything about a subject -- leave it out.

#1:  Army installations are not bases and an Army brat would know that.  An Army brat says "on post," not "on base."  The Army installations are forts, or posts, or camps, or depots, or proving grounds, or arsenals, or barracks, or presidios.  But unless they are co-located with another service, Army installations are not bases.

#2:  Ammunition is controlled.  Weapons are controlled.  During weapons training, casings are counted afterward.  People may own their own weapons, but they don't shoot them off near children, and they damn sure don't put tracer rounds in them, even if the tracer ammunition would fit.  Were Ray's dad & buddies supposed to be firing machine guns "on base?"  Yeah, that's believable.

#3:  Unless you were out on a firing range or at an overseas "rod and gun club," firing a weapon "on base" would bring down a wrath so fast, your head wouldn't have time to spin.  All the servicemembers know the sound of gunfire, and if it was in the housing area, you'd have MPs showing up pretty damn fast.  Ray's dad & his dad's Army buddies would have shot off weapons once -- and then it would be the stockade.

Portraying servicemembers as drunk wildmen is a popular movie and television sport, but it's stupid.  It doesn't do our servicemembers or veterans any favors, and it perpetuates silly misperceptions.  In the six decades of my life, five of which have been spent at some point in military quarters, I can remember seeing one weapon other than those carried by military police or guards.  There may have been others, but that is the only one I remember. That one was a friend's father's hunting rifle in South Dakota.  It was deer season.  The deer was there, too.

Television writers, when you write nonsense you not only show your ignorance, but you shatter the suspension of disbelief, make people pause the DVR, reboot the laptop, and wind up with puny blog posts just looking for a search engine to find them.  Way to build a fan "base."

Reply to Oath Keepers post

For reasons beyond my knowledge, the comments section at the previous post would not accept this comment from me.  Because of that, it's going here.

1.  I acknowledged my authorship via the links.  In my comments, I spoke in 1^st person singular, and then provided links back to the blog.  If readers had bothered to follow the URLs, both the blog, and my authorship, would have been evident.  (my mother is out of the hospital, but care continues of course; thank you for your consideration)

 

2.  One does not pick and choose within the oath of office and say, “I will follow this part, but not that one.”  The oath requires protection and defence of the Constitution, and obeying the President of the United States and superior officers according to regulations and the UCMJ.  I did not claim that the officer oath included obeying the President, although apparently this is included in the oath National Guard officers take.

 

3.  The flag section of AR 670-1 begins on PDF-page 263/reg. page 240.

28–18. Wear of full-color U.S. flag cloth replica

 

4.  Unauthorized articles are unauthorized whether they are patches manufactured to resemble military patches in “subdued colors,” my co-worker’s red socks, your pink muumuu or an official item the wearer is not entitled to wear.  Intent is irrelevant.  Color is irrelevant.  The item is irrelevant.  Unauthorized is unauthorized.

 

5.  Encouraging soldiers, again, to pick and choose, and select which orders to follow does put unit morale at risk, as well as careers.   Whether the recommendation to pick and choose comes from a Yale graduate or from someone else is immaterial.  SAEDA doesn’t care who recommends the picking and choosing.

AR 381-12 Subversion and Espionage Directed Against the U.S. Army 
3–1. SAEDA incidents
i. Active attempts to encourage military or civilian employees to violate laws, disobey lawful orders or regulations, or disrupt military activities (subversion).
k. Participation by Army personnel in activities advocating or teaching the overthrow of the United States by force or violence or seeking to alter the form of Government by unconstitutional means (sedition).

 

6.  Comments are now moderated because I tired of the back & forth 'tennis game' with no progress.  If readers care to comment further on my opinions on this topic, they may do so at their own blogs.