Tim Blair

Has the daft bint noticed that 3 out of 4 US servicemen and their families say they're voting for Bush?

And where are the articles about Kerry shooting a plastic goose?

>I further predict that serving
>a plastic turkey

Not plastic.

>to soldiers in Iraq for a
>Thanksgiving news clip and
>landing on an aircraft carrier
>dressed up like a pilot

He IS a pilot.

>under a banner made by the
>White House that said Mission
>Accomplished

I've heard that the crew of the carrier came up with the banner. Since I can't confirm that, I won't press it. Too bad professional reporters can't do the same.

>didn't quite convince the
>troops that Bush has their best
>interests at heart.

As Richard said, overwhelming military support for Bush.

Wow. Out of four assertions, she scores three definite and one probable error. She gets paid for this?

"While Bush may not care that so many of our young people are being killed for no good reason, soldiers in Iraq do. Many have begun to openly question not only their mission, but also the motives of the leaders who sent them there in the first place."

She forgot to tell the troops that.

Quickly now,

who can wrtite a song adapting "Eleanor Rigby" to "Evelyn Pringle"?

If people like Evelyn Pringle ever bothered to pick up a soldier's memoir and read it, she may learn that grousing and bitching and complaining are a soldier's right and ritual.

No matter how noble the cause, the actual soldier's life is always difficult and tedious when it isn't terrifying.

Has she never heard a colleague in the newsroom complain? But journalists generally tough it out and believe in what they're doing.

Jebus! How sheltered can an 'investigative reporter' be? And if the soldiers are voting for Kerry, why are Democrats like Gov. Rendell (Pennsylvannia) trying to block their ballots?

Evelyn Pringle picks up a theme from the web where delusionals scheme

Lives in a dream

Writes her own story, repeating a lie that was told by so many before

Who is it for?

All the plastic turkeys
Where do they all come from?

All the plastic turkeys
Where do they all belong?

You know, for once and all, I would like to absolutely forbid ANYONE from mentioning the ##$)$@ing plastic turkey... unless they have eaten at least three holiday meals in a military dining hall... preferably as a member of the military.

SGT Mom — I've eaten rubber chicken at regimental dinings-in, does that count?

i don't know tim. what you've labled the birth of an internet myth is a much tighter logical progression than anything michael moore's ever done; almost euclidian in structure, really.

If people like Evelyn Pringle ever bothered to pick up a soldier's memoir and read it, she may learn that grousing and bitching and complaining are a soldier's right and ritual.

Bingo. I was in GW I and bitched endlessly. But I never blamed the CinC, I bitched to my platoon Sgt whose job it was to make sure I had the goods to carry out my job. People who know NOTHING about the military should keep their freaking traps shut.

I guess the US military is voting 4 to 1 for Bush because they haven't been enlightened by Eleanor Pringle yet. Oh, and they've been duped by the lies of the Rove operators called Swift Vets. Yeah, that's it.....

Richard...just barely. It all depends on how rowdy the event got, after the speeches. Food fights, aircraft landings, games of dead bug all count heavily on the credibility scale...its how you know everyone had a good time.

Tommy Franks has said that he was the one who said the banner should say “Mission Accomplished”—he thought that it would encourage allies to help out in the rebuilding.

I’d always assumed it was addressed to the ship’s crew & that it was supposed to represent American sentiment about the crew & other crews like it returning to the USA after the completion of major combat operations.

As for the plastic turkey, it is the deathless Quetzalcoatl of dinner ornaments. Evelyn Pringle is merely the latest of its zombies. Bow down before the Plucked Serpent of G.O.B.B.L.E.

SGT Mom — Well, I've rolled up my mess-dress sleeves before I chugged the punchbowl...

OK, Richard, a point for sartorial awareness--- you count.
So, is rubber chicken tastier than plastic turkey?

In the Navy we say a bithcin' sailor is a happy sailor. It's when they're quiet that you should start worrying.

As for the banner...

Whenever a Carrier returns to port, there's always some kind of huge banner with a message like "Honey, I'm Home" It's more for the friends and family on the pier than for the crew themselves.

The Parachute Riggers have a large workshop where they... rig parachutes. When they're not doing that, though, they do other big sewing/tailoring jobs. I've long suspected they're the ones who made the huge "Mission Accomplished" banner. The ship after all had accomplished her mission.

Just like the turkey, Pres. Bush's flight gear, the military voting Republican, you can't explain this to people who have never been in the military and have an axe to grind. They don't want to get it.

If you like plastic turkey and rubber chicken, you should hoist a pint of grog at your next dining-in. It may or may not put hair on your chest, but it almost certainly will leave hair (among other things wrung from a swab) on your tongue.

Dave S nailed it.

How could Mz. Pringle possibly have failed to notice that the sailors and Marines on the USS Abraham Lincoln, and the troops in Iraq, were absolutely overjoyed to see the President? Did she actually watch the broadcast of his visits?

Or could it be that she's just another lying-sack-of-shit lefty?

By the way, Mz. Pringle, the US military is polling 3-to-1 Bush over Kerry. I just hope their ballots get counted this time around.

SGT Mom — Depends on how generous they've been with the wine list....

I think my point has been made... you really have to have been in the military, or closely assocated, to really understand a lot of things about this whole military/plastic turkey/mission accomplished thing. I hitched a ride on a P-3 Orion, returning from Misawa AB to Moffit Field--- they swiped a broom from the mama-san's cupboard in the BOQ, and hung it out one of the windows as they taxied up to the hangar where everyone was waiting. It meant that they had done their job and they were home... I don't think they meant to imply that there wasn't a Russian sub anywere in the whole damned Pacific Ocean.Just that they were home, and had done their job.

A Sideways View

"While Bush may not care that so many of our young people are being killed for no good reason, soldiers in Iraq do. Many have begun to openly question not only their mission, but also the motives of the leaders who sent them there in the first place."

Name six. Ms Pringle

Alex Hoffman, say something here, don't just post a link to your own blog. Contribute to the conversation here. I'm not running a free links list; if you want to advertise pay Tim for space on the sidebar.

I am surprised that no one caught this at the end of Pringle's article: (though I suppose that would mean that one had to actually read the whole thing--which I can hardly blame people for not doing)
Only One Last Point

I need to get this off my chest. To anybody listening, if I'm ever close to Bush and he tries saying we're in Iraq because Kerry voted to go to war, keep me away from him, because I have this urge, no its worse than an urge, I have this compulsion to kick his teeth right down his lying throat.

Kerry bears absolutely no responsibility for the disaster in Iraq that has caused thousands of soldiers to be killed or injured, and only God knows how many innocent Iraqis slaughtered, and I'm sick and tired of Bush saying that he does.

So the Senator's vote doesn't imply any sort of responsibility? Interesting world the lady lives in, where legislators are not responisble for their votes. I wonder how, then, she can hold the President responsible for any of his decisions.

Is the threat of assault against the person of the President something the Secret Service should know about?

Eric -- Possibly. I'm not sure the Secret Service would do much about it, from the context. And the fact that she's a, ummmmmm, "journalist" gives her some protection, I think.

But worry not. If she's ever in the same room with President Bush, and acts on her rhetoric (unlikely, she sounds like a paper tiger), 6 husky Secret Service agents (who are NOT paper tigers) will lock her butt down but good, and hustle her out of the room to nearest cellblock for further processing.

Okay, that's it: the next person to quote someone without using some sort of demarcation to show it's a quote -- such as quotation marks (they are like this: "quoted stuff"), or html tags to make italics or blockquoting will have their comment DELETED.

I tried, AH, I did. Pringle's text was supposed to be italicized, but I must of screwed up the HTML. (That's what I get for not previewing).

Eric, blogs are a little idiosyncratic like that. You need to make sure you have no blank lines in the text you copy.