Tag Archives: Iraq War

military news

RIP, Dick Cheney

I once thought Walter Mondale rewrote the vice-presidential book on service to the nation when he served for four years in the Carter administration.

Then came Al Gore, who was VP for eight years serving alongside Bill Clinton. Gore, too, added his mark on the vice presidency.

And then along came Dick Cheney. Republican presidential nominee George W. Bush tasked Chene with finding a suitable VP in 2000. Cheney, a senior campaign aide for the Texas governor, looked around and I guess he came up empty. So, Bush chose Cheney to run with him. They won the 2000 contest by the tiniest margin imaginable, then got re-elected in 2004 … after lying to Americans about intelligence data that said Saddam Hussein possessed weapons of mass destruction and then starting a fresh war against Iraq in Mach 2003.

Cheney died this week at age 84. And, yes, he has rewritten the entire book on serving as No. 2 in a presidential adminisration. He was a force for good at times. I am reluctant to say the “good Cheney” was present 100% of the time. He led the misinformation flow that suggested Saddam had those WMD. The war cost us thousands of American lives. Yes, we did capture the Iraqi dictator and he was executed almost immediately the Iraqi justice officials.

Cheney, though, never backed down from his statements about the WMD. I fear that misleading trail will taint his legacy forever.

However, he did join his daughter, former U.S. Rep. Liz Cheney, in rebuking the MAGA cult that shores up Donald Trump. I salute him, and his daughter, for standing firm and tall against the Trump effort to turn our democracy into an oligarchy.

Cheney did serve well over the course of many years. He was a Wyoming congressman; he served as White House chief of staff for President Ford; he served as defense secretary for President George H.W. Bush and was at the DoD helm during the Persian Gulf War of 1990-91.

He was strong in his belief in what he thought was right. I only wish his belief could have led him a different direction. He’s gone now. Dick Cheney gave all he had. It was plenty.

military news

Do you really support this moron?

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Memo to my MAGA friends, acquaintances and those I see with bumper stickers on their pickups ….

Do you really and truly want to support an individual who has labeled those of us who have worn our country’s military uniform “suckers” and “losers”?

The former POTUS launched an unhinged, incompetent rant against judges, legal foes, jurors and the very judicial system as his way of paying tribute to those who died in service to the country. Memorial Day is a special day for the former Moron in Chief.

He denigrated the late Sen. John McCain’s service during the Vietnam War because he “got caught” and spent all those years as a POW. He has smeared the character of a Gold Star Family whose son died an Army hero in the Iraq War. He once told his former fixer/lawyer Michael Cohen that those who went to war in Vietnam were “stupid.”

Here he is. He is competing for the presidency yet again. How does the MAGA movement, comprising individuals I will presume support those who fight for our country, react to their hero’s rants? They give him an unfettered pass.

I have to ask: Does he speak for you, or does he speak only for himself?

I know the answer. He speaks for the cult followers. The good news as I interpret it is that the cult base isn’t growing. It well could be shrinking. Distressing, though, is that their volume remains full-throated.

I will go to my grave wondering how in the world the MAGA movement can possibly support an individual who is incapable of paying appropriate tribute to those who serve our great country.

I mean, to “make America great” requires a faithful commitment to public service.

Donald Trump

Mind-boggling revisiting of issues

It simply boggles my noggin that the media have begun revisiting the issues that turned so many Americans off about Donald Trump when he ran for POTUS the first time.

Take his utter disdain for those who served this nation in uniform, who went to war to defend Americans, who were captured by the enemy or those who died in service to the country.

The issue has returned to the front burner in the wake of revelations that Trump said that retired Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Mark Milley should be “executed” for committing an act of “treason.”

Can this clown, Trump, be any more despicable than that? Oh, probably.

Milley told an interviewer that he served this country while wearing an Army uniform for more than 44 years. He said Trump’s attack on him was in reality an attack on all the men and women who serve. He is too much of a gentleman to respond specifically to the idiocy that poured out of Trump’s mouth.

This latest example simply adds to the litany of insults he has heaped on those of us who served our nation in uniform. He called the late Sen. John McCain a “loser” because he was captured by the enemy after being shot down during the Vietnam War. He denigrated a Gold Star family whose son died in combat in Iraq.

Trump has never served “the public” in any capacity — even while sitting in the Oval Office for four years. So, for this guy to denigrate a decorated Army general by suggesting he should be executed for treason simply goes beyond all that is sane.

Donald Trump has lost his mind.

national news

If only he hadn’t lied

This makes me so mad I could just spit. Dick Cheney came to his daughter’s defense with a stellar argument that called Donald John Trump a “coward” who “lies to his supporters.”

The former vice president of the United States said a “real man” wouldn’t lie the way Trump does.

Of course he is right! IĀ would be leading the cheers for the former VP who served for two terms during George W. Bush’s presidency, except for this little thing. Dick Cheney also is a liar.

I don’t say this with any sort of cavalier attitude. I want the former veep’s ad to sway voters to his daughter’s corner as she battles for re-election to the U.S. House seat that her father occupied before taking on the job of White House chief of staff for President Ford.

Dick Cheney, though, spooned up a major dose of snake oil when George W. Bush became president. He persuaded the president that Iraq possessed weapons of mass destruction, chemicals that it would use against us. He also told us that Saddam Hussein — the late Iraqi dictator — played a role in the 9/11 attacks on Washington and New York City. Neither allegation was true.

We went to war with Iraq in March 2003 and lost nearly 5,000 American lives in the process. And for what purpose? To retaliate for lies conveyed by the then-vice president and others within the Bush administration.

This is the kind of thing that sticks to people’s backsides. It’s indelible. No matter how much Dick Cheney might pretend to be a man of high honor and integrity — who tells the truth all the time — we cannot deny that he lied about WMD and the culprits behind 9/11.

I just wish Liz Cheney could have found another ally to launch this attack on Donald Trump.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

national news

What about Dick Cheney?

Liz Cheney is getting some ridiculous pushback from those on the far right of her Republican Party over her condemnation of Donald Trump’s inciting of the 1/6 insurrection.

I cannot allow that resistance to go unchallenged.

The Wyoming GOP congresswoman is now being held responsible in some circles for the lies her father, former Vice President Dick Cheney, told the nation about weapons of mass destruction that allegedly were possessed by the late Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein.

Let me be crystal clear on this.

Liz Cheney was a grown woman when her father pitched the notion that Saddam Hussein possessed WMD, which he and the George W. Bush administration used to justify the invasion of Iraq. She did not serve in the administration. Her father did. Therefore, she bears no responsibility for the lies that Dick Cheney fomented about WMD.

For those who now challenge Liz Cheney’s credibility in voting to impeach Donald Trump and for serving on the 1/6 House select committee is a classic case of “what about-ism” run amok.

Indeed, does it occur to anyone that perhaps Liz Cheney learned something from the deception that her father perpetrated on the nation in the lead-up to the Iraq War? Might that have served as a “teachable moment” to the VP’s daughter to tell the truth were she ever to seek and hold public office?

This nonsense that Rep. Cheney should be held to account for the actions of a family member is utter rubbish.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

International news

Bush’s ‘gaffe’ was no gaffe

George W. Bush spoke an unintended truth the other day that raised eyebrows all across the nation, not to mention in the room at the Bush Presidential Library and Museum in Dallas.

The 43rd president was trying to make the case against Vladimir Putin’s decision to invade Ukraine. Then he said this:

“In contrast, Russian elections are rigged. Political opponents are imprisoned or otherwise eliminated from participating in the electoral process. The result is an absence of checks and balances in Russia and the decision of one man to launch a wholly unjustified and brutal invasion of Iraq. I mean of Ukraine.”

As another former Texas governor, Rick Perry, once said: Oops.

I cannot possibly suggest that President Bush intended to make that statement. However, he did tell the truth. The invasion of Iraq in March 2003 was based on “false intelligence,” and that’s being generous. It well might have been that the Bush team knew all along that the late Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein did not possess weapons of mass destruction.

Whatever the case, I suggest the former president draft a statement aimed at telling the loved ones of those who died during the Iraq War that he didn’t really mean what he said this week in Dallas.

Then again, would that be truth?

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

International news

Biden ‘speaks his mind’?

Michael Kinsley, the liberal columnist and one-time TV commentator, once famously quipped that a ā€œgaffeā€ occurs when a politician ā€œspeaks his mind.ā€

So it is, then, that President Biden well might have been speaking his own mind when during a speech in Poland he said that Russian strongman Vladimir Putin ā€œcannot remain in power.ā€

Oops, Mr. President. Youā€™ve just spoken against U.S. policy, which supposedly forbids any effort to bring about ā€œregime changeā€ in a foreign government. Oh, but wait! Didnā€™t we do that when we went to war in Afghanistan after 9/11 and then went to war in Iraq less than two years later while hunting down Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein?

Both those efforts resulted in regime change. The Taliban, though, are back in power in Afghanistan; Saddam Hussein is dead, having been hanged for his crimes against humanity.

The White House is trying to take back what President Biden said, that our aim isnā€™t to remove Putin from office even as we condemn him for launching his illegal, immoral and illogical invasion of Ukraine.

I am not going to sweat much about what the president said. He was telling us what he thinksĀ oughtĀ to happen, not necessarily predicting that itĀ willĀ happen.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

military news

Yes on new Mall memorial!

Maggie Hassan and Joni Ernst are providing proof that U.S. senators from opposing political parties can work toward a common goal.

Hassan, a New Hampshire Democrat, and Ernst, an Iowa Republican (who also served in combat in Afghanistan), have teamed up to push toward construction of a new memorial on the D.C. Mall to honor the men and women who fought and sacrificed during our nation’s longest war.

I applaud their effort and hope that the new memorial can be built sooner rather than later.

There once was a time when I thought the Mall had enough memorials on it. Then the Afghan War came to an end earlier this year when President Biden ordered our troops off the battlefield. The fallout from that decision has been fierce. However, that does not diminish the need to honor the heroism displayed there for 20 years.

President Bush sent our troops into battle after 9/11. Then he expanded that fight into Iraq, which — candidly — was a mistake. However, more than 7,000 Americans died in the Iraq War.

The Mall already has a lot of memorials. The World War II, Korean War, Vietnam War memorials all are worth seeing. So is the MLK Jr. memorial, along with those built to honor Presidents Lincoln, Jefferson and Washington.

Our nation’s longest war produced plenty of heroism, sacrifice, tragedy and triumph. It needs to be memorialized on the National Mall.

Thank you, Sens. Ernst and Hassan, for pushing this issue forward.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

national news

Service ‘not in vain’

A critical point I sought to make in an earlier blog post needs to be buttressed a bit given the criticism that continues to pour in over the U.S. military withdrawal from Afghanistan.

U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Gen. Mark Milley has informed us what many of us already knew. Which was that the service of the men and women in Afghanistan and Iraq “was not in vain.”

Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said this about our withdrawal from the field of battle: “We have just concluded the largest air evacuation of civilians in American history. It was heroic. It was historic.”

To say these individuals “died in vain” is to slather a hideous insult over the heroism many of them displayed. I am one proud American veteran who will not sit still while others suggest that the service performed in Iraq and Afghanistan was flushed away, that it was all for naught.

No one ā€˜dies in vainā€™ fighting for oneā€™s country | High Plains Blogger

The men and women of our armed forces followed lawful orders from the top of the chain of command. They served through four commanders in chief. They fought hard and they fought with valor. Some of them received our nation’s highest military commendations, including the Medal of Honor. Do we dare suggest that these recipients performed their heroic acts “in vain”? Or that their comrades died in vain?

“Your service mattered, and it was not in vain,” Gen. Milley said. “We will continue to evacuate American citizens under the leadership of the Department of State as this mission has now transitioned from a military mission to a diplomatic mission.”

And so the mission continues, but in a different form.

I participated for a time in a war that didn’t end well for the United States of America. The Vietnam War ended with chaos, confusion and panic. Yes, there were those who said the 58,000 Americans who died in that war perished “in vain.” They, too, were as wrong as they could be.

Their service mattered as well. As did those who served in Afghanistan and Iraq. They all have earned our nation’s gratitude.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

military news

Blowhard treads where he shouldn’t go

By JOHN KANELIS / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

Tucker Carlson is a right-wing gasbag who quite often bloviates on matters of which he knows nothing.

I’m a bit late entering this kerfuffle, but Carlson has waded into a thicket that has drawn deserved scorn from military veterans.

The Fox News blowhard had the stones to say the other day that women who serve in the military downgrade the quality of the nation’s fighting force. He had the very bad taste to suggest that pregnant women in particular are a detriment to this nation’s readiness.

Whoa! Dude, you stepped in it.

You see, Carlson never has served a single nanosecond in the nation’s military. Thus, he has no actual knowledge of the military culture, let alone the value that all our men and women bring to the defense of the nation.

Career military officers and non-commissioned officers alike have slammed Carlson for his remarks. I want to join them in that rebuke.

I need to stipulate that I served at a time — from 1968 to 1970 — before women became integrated fully into all the military occupational specialties that the Army offers. However, I do retain some familiarity with the culture that drives the military. I have no doubt as to the readiness of our nation’s armed forces, which are the most formidable on Planet Earth; and, yes, the women who serve contribute to our nation’s readiness.

And I speak with personal knowledge that a dear member of my family, a woman who served with valor and honor in combat in Iraq and Afghanistan, is every bit as capable as any man with whom she served in the United States Army.

Tucker Carlson would do well to examine his own qualifications before he pontificates on matters with which he has no experience.