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Actor Gordon Scott has died at the age of 80. A former bodybuilder best known as the star of a series of mid-to-late 50s Tarzan films, he will always be remembered hereabouts as super secret agent “Bart Fargo” in the Mystery Science Theater 3000 classic, Danger: Death Ray!
Army Squeezes Soldier Blogs, Maybe To Death
The U.S. Army has ordered soldiers to stop posting to blogs or sending personal e-mail messages, without first clearing the content with a superior officer, Wired News has learned. The directive, issued April 19, is the sharpest restriction on troops’ online activities since the start of the Iraq war. And it could mean the end of military blogs, observers say.
Military officials have been wrestling for years with how to handle troops who publish blogs. Officers have weighed the need for wartime discretion against the opportunities for the public to personally connect with some of the most effective advocates for the operations in Afghanistan and Iraq — the troops themselves. The secret-keepers have generally won the argument, and the once-permissive atmosphere has slowly grown more tightly regulated. Soldier-bloggers have dropped offline as a result.
The new rules (.pdf) obtained by Wired News require a commander be consulted before every blog update.
Army Regulation 530–1: Operations Security (OPSEC) (.pdf) restricts more than just blogs, however. Previous editions of the rules asked Army personnel to “consult with their immediate supervisor” before posting a document “that might contain sensitive and/or critical information in a public forum.” The new version, in contrast, requires “an OPSEC review prior to publishing” anything — from “web log (blog) postings” to comments on internet message boards, from resumes to letters home. (My emphasis)
Failure to do so, the document adds, could result in a court-martial, or “administrative, disciplinary, contractual, or criminal action.”
Some people might point out that soldiers’ letters were censored in World War I and II. But the practice was discontinued by the early months of the Korean conflict, and letters by service personnel in Vietnam were not screened at all. Of course, the unfettered flow of information from the battlefield can hasten the public’s disillusionment with an already unpopular foreign war, and you might expect certain La-Z-Boy Leonides in the blogsphere to trumpet this change. But even some bloggers who support the Iraq war are dismayed by this blackout.
The revised regulation were first released by Wired News blogger Noah Shachtman, and his report on the serious crackdown on soldiers’ writings is stirring the blogosphere into an uproar.
The Bottom-Line to the this bad piece of regulation: The soldiers who will attempt to fly under the radar and post negative items about the military, mission, and commanders will continue to do so under the new regs. The soldiers who’ve been playing ball the last few years, the vast, VAST, majority will be reduced. In my mind, this reg will accomplish the exact opposite of its intent. The good guys are restricted and the bad continue on…
Operational Security is of paramount importance. But we are losing the Information War on all fronts. Fanatic-like adherence to OPSEC will do us little good if we lose the few honest voices that tell the truth about The Long War.
Setting aside the question of whether soldiers who report painful truths about the situation in Iraq are “bad guys”, you can’t really argue with the military’s concerns about operational security. Except that, according to Iraqslogger:
In what could be considered a failure of information security, the complete text of the US Army’s new operational security regulations was posted on the Internet today.
Even more ironically, the first “major revision” listed designates “For Official Use Only”–a phrase found in bold on the front cover–”as the standard marking for all unclassified products that meet one or more of the exemptions of the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA), and which if released to the public, could cause harm to Army operations or personnel.”
The new regulation currently causing controversy requires soldiers to consult with superiors before posting any comment on a blog, and one has to wonder if this new reign on soldiers’ speech sparked one to share the document.
The impracticality (not to mention inhumanity) of the regulation, and the incompetent way it was introduced aside, who thinks this measure is designed to keep the truth about conditions in Iraq away from:
This guy…
Or this guy?
Apparently somebody at YouTube actually sat down and watched an Atlas Shrugs vlog, because they’ve tugged on some Playtex rubber gloves, delicately picked up her latest offering with a pair of ice tongs, and regretfully returned it to her.
There are several reasons why YouTube may have declined Pam’s video. One possibility is that she appears to have surgically removed the face of Jennifer Lopez, and is prancing around the house with it stapled to her head. Another possible objection is the content, which we can infer from her next choice of video host: liveleak. Now, I’m no expert, but if that’s not a site featuring cam girls performing golden showers, then there’s probably quite a few computer-literate men in diapers cuing up complaints to the Better Business Bureau right about now.
But the scariest thing is the caveat regarding her last hosting option: “videoegg (problem with the egg is a five minute max).”
That does seem unreasonable. How could anyone possibly be expected to deliver an exhaustive analysis of the geo-strategic ramifications of Congressional infringement upon the Article II prerogatives of the Unitary Executive and get through all 8 verses of “My Humps” in five minutes?
I mean come on, people! She’s a tigress, sure, but she’s still just one woman! Well, one woman and part of another woman’s face.
Noted right wing historiofabulist and rawhide thong enthusiast Victor Davis “We Who Are About To Watch You Die From A Comfortable Distance Salute You!” Hanson digs up a famous (albeit false) quote proving that the Viet Minh were about to throw in the towel and open an Indian-style casino until Jane Fonda donned a red ao dai and flounced around on the Mike Douglas Show. And that all that is keeping the terrorists and insurgents going in their hopeless struggle against American military might is Harry Reid’s habit of sitting sullenly at his desk in the Senate, draped in a burka.
This sounds a trifle pat, but I personally am in no position to argue with a man who knows so much about history that he can actually make up his own. Fortunately, Doghouse Riley is:
So now read the official al Qaida response to Sen. Harry Reid’s declaration that the war is lost:
Or, y’know what? Better yet. Don’t.
Who issues the al-Qaeda response to US political news, anyway (gotta admit, though: that “official” is a sweet seeing-eye double with men in scoring position) ? This Parson Weems of Military History styles himself an expert. I’d like to hear one example, just one fucking example, of an insurgency, guerilla movement, partisan faction, or side in a civil conflict, other than one fighting against a pet project of the American Right, which based its strategic plan on the enemy’s internal politics, headline writers, or anti-war movements. Just one, from any time in recorded history. It sure didn’t matter to the Vietnamese whether the French occupiers were Vichy or Gaulist. The Zionists fought Labour or Tory; so did the Irish, so did half-a-dozen other colonized peoples. Israel’s various enemies have fought on regardless of what line was taken against them.
Alternately, name me the insurgency that has simply given up in the face of cold-eyed resolve that booked no domestic criticism. Partisans operated against the Nazi occupier in every country despite a backing back home in the Fatherland that approached statistical unanimity. Insurgents are insurgents because they’re 1) aggrieved enough to fight and 2) weak enough that they can’t employ conventional forces. They already fucking know those things.
And by the way, only 15% of Americans can identify Harry Reid. It’s hard to imagine they’re sitting around the wireless in the Pakistani badlands waiting for the man to give ‘em a pep talk, but if they are maybe they need to check in with Gallup more often.
As the kids say, Read the whole thing. (Although technically, I suppose, that would be r33d teh h0l thg.