Where in the world was Lindsay Graham?
Thu, 04 Oct '07
"This Is Fun."
If you had just moments to live, what would you do? What would you say?
It's the latter question that haunts both NTSB investigators probing the crash of a Blackwater USA CASA C-212 in Afghanistan, and Congressional investigators looking into accusations that the private North Carolina firm is a renegade operation in both Iraq and Afghanistan.
"I swear to God, they wouldn't pay me if they knew how much fun this was," said Noel English, pilot of the doomed CASA flight operated by Presidential Airways, a Blackwater affiliate, as he zig-zagged through canyons in November, 2004. He was quoted by CNN.
"You're an X-wing fighter Star Wars man," his equally-doomed co-pilot Loren Hammer replied, referring to the 1977 film "Star Wars."
"You're [expletive] right. This is fun," English agreed....
"This Is Fun."
If you had just moments to live, what would you do? What would you say?
It's the latter question that haunts both NTSB investigators probing the crash of a Blackwater USA CASA C-212 in Afghanistan, and Congressional investigators looking into accusations that the private North Carolina firm is a renegade operation in both Iraq and Afghanistan.
"I swear to God, they wouldn't pay me if they knew how much fun this was," said Noel English, pilot of the doomed CASA flight operated by Presidential Airways, a Blackwater affiliate, as he zig-zagged through canyons in November, 2004. He was quoted by CNN.
"You're an X-wing fighter Star Wars man," his equally-doomed co-pilot Loren Hammer replied, referring to the 1977 film "Star Wars."
"You're [expletive] right. This is fun," English agreed....
September 3, 2006
...An Air Force Reserve colonel, Graham served more than six years' active duty as a military lawyer, most of it in Europe, before joining Congress in 1995. Since then, he's sat as a judge on the Air Force Court of Appeals and pulled other Reserve duty. His eight-day trip to Afghanistan, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates was his first foreign assignment as a reservist....
I found it oddly interesting that Lindsay Graham would be freshly back from Baghdad while serving in the capacity as 'on active duty' reserve lawyer in the U.S. military following the indictiment of Blackwater, USA. He confirmed his status this trip to Iraq on a talk show this past weekend, where he complained about Retired General Sanchez comments:
BLITZER: You just came back from Iraq, Senator Graham. You were on active duty as a reserve lawyer in the U.S. military (click here) and you've been a big defender of this so-called surge strategy, saying the signs are positive, that it seems to be working right now, it just needs more time. He says it's not working. I wonder if you want to respond to that.
GRAHAM: I would like to by putting it in context that I was also one of the biggest critics of the old strategy that General Sanchez and others implemented. I cannot tell you how many times I directly asked General Sanchez, "Do we have enough troops to do the job here?"
Abu Ghraib happened on his watch. There were 600 people in the prison in August. By October there were 6,000. We obviously did not have enough people on the ground for years in Iraq. The security situation deteriorated....
Let's see.
The USA military, Republican House or Senate, never held anyone higher in rank than a pregnant private for the inhumane conditions at Abu Ghraib, but, NOW Lindsey Graham wants to point a finger at a Retired General which he at one timed back in every way; with bumbling the entire battlefield in Iraq. Isn't that just like a Republican?
I would like some military oversight in the matter of Senator Graham, realizing privacy always plays a roll in such things, as to his activities in Baghdad, Iraq during this visit. Did he actually do the work of representing American Service Personnel or was this to insure the Blackwater Indictment wouldn't reach the President and Vice? I want oversight to the role of Senator Graham in his capacity with the military while serving in his Reserve status.
Graham (R-SC), Yea
If Graham didn't believe in 'the mission' so staunchly, then how can he criticize Retired General Sanchez?
Now, when the USA legislature is considering the further funding for Iraq, what exactly are they funding? More genocide?
Editorials Stop funding mercenaries (click here)
October 14, 2007 Max Boot's column on mercenaries euphemistically called them "contractors" in the headline (Oct. 7) and said they don't deserve a deluge of criticism.
Well, how about the leaders who have given rise to them? An article by Richard Lardner of The Associated Press published the same day shows how in 2001, Blackwater got no U.S. government money, and in 2006, it got $593.6 million. In the course of the Iraq war, it has gotten more than $1 billion of taxpayer funds.
This is disgusting.
Why do we have a military if more than 1 billion American taxpayer dollars need to go to mercenaries?
And these mercenaries have been involved with multiple atrocities, alleged or otherwise. These mercenaries are agents of we, the people, citizens of the United States.
To my knowledge, they were never used in any significant way in the history of the United States. Why now?
Because we are fighting a dirty war for oil that is premised on lies and deceit. Americans are increasingly opposed to this war, and our young people refuse to enlist. Mr. Boot says this system of using mercenaries allows military personnel to engage in pacification efforts.
So while the uniformed soldiers try to win hearts and minds, the mercenaries go on killing rampages of civilians when they feel threatened.
This system is another of the immoralities perpetrated in our name by the Bush administration and its war-profiteering supporter, Erik Prince of Blackwater.
Congress should demand an end to American taxpayer-paid private armies, mercenaries.
This is war-profiteering of the most sordid, immoral kind.
Edward Ferreira
New Sharon
October 14, 2007 Max Boot's column on mercenaries euphemistically called them "contractors" in the headline (Oct. 7) and said they don't deserve a deluge of criticism.
Well, how about the leaders who have given rise to them? An article by Richard Lardner of The Associated Press published the same day shows how in 2001, Blackwater got no U.S. government money, and in 2006, it got $593.6 million. In the course of the Iraq war, it has gotten more than $1 billion of taxpayer funds.
This is disgusting.
Why do we have a military if more than 1 billion American taxpayer dollars need to go to mercenaries?
And these mercenaries have been involved with multiple atrocities, alleged or otherwise. These mercenaries are agents of we, the people, citizens of the United States.
To my knowledge, they were never used in any significant way in the history of the United States. Why now?
Because we are fighting a dirty war for oil that is premised on lies and deceit. Americans are increasingly opposed to this war, and our young people refuse to enlist. Mr. Boot says this system of using mercenaries allows military personnel to engage in pacification efforts.
So while the uniformed soldiers try to win hearts and minds, the mercenaries go on killing rampages of civilians when they feel threatened.
This system is another of the immoralities perpetrated in our name by the Bush administration and its war-profiteering supporter, Erik Prince of Blackwater.
Congress should demand an end to American taxpayer-paid private armies, mercenaries.
This is war-profiteering of the most sordid, immoral kind.
Edward Ferreira
New Sharon
