The Undefeated 44

Political Animal:

Finally, here is a great way to celebrate Black History Month.

This is a list of The Undefeated 44, a collection of dreamers and doers, noisy geniuses and quiet innovators, record-breakers and symbols of pride and aspiration…

This is not a list of The Greatest African-Americans of All Time or The Most Influential Blacks in History. Or even The Dopest Brothers and Sisters Who Matter Most This Week. It is a list — fervently debated among our staff, chiseled and refined — of 44 blacks who shook up the world or at least their corner of it. We recognize that this is not a complete list of jaw-dropping black achievers; we know that such a list would never run out of names. Why limit ours to 44? It’s an homage to the first African-American president, whose own stunning accomplishment was something our mothers and grandfathers and great-grandmothers never thought they’d see in their lifetimes.

Real Courage

This is the kind of courage it's going to take to stop the orange menace and his hate-mongering hordes.

Charlie Pierce:

The other (hero who died this week) was Larry Colburn, who was flying in a helicopter over a village in Vietnam called My Lai on the morning of March 16, 1968.

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Larry Colburn was 18 years old, manning a gun on a helicopter, when he heard his pilot, Hugh Thompson, tell the crew that, down on the ground, American soldiers were massacring non-combatants, including women and children, and that he, Thompson, was going to do something about it. Per The New York Times:

"Mr. Thompson was just beside himself," Mr. Colburn recalled in an interview in 2010 for the PBS program "The American Experience." "He got on the radio and just said, 'This isn't right, these are civilians, there's people killing civilians down here.' And that's when he decided to intervene. He said, 'We've got to do something about this, are you with me?' And we said, 'Yes.' " Mr. Thompson confronted the officer in command of the rampaging platoon, Lt. William L. Calley, but was rebuffed. He then positioned the helicopter between the troops and the surviving villagers and faced off against another lieutenant. Mr. Thompson ordered Mr. Colburn to fire his M-60 machine gun at any soldiers who tried to inflict further harm. "Y'all cover me!" Mr. Thompson was quoted as saying. "If these bastards open up on me or these people, you open up on them. Promise me!"

"You got it boss," Mr. Colburn replied. "Consider it done." Mr. Thompson, Mr. Colburn and Glenn Andreotta, the copter's crew chief, found about 10 villagers cowering in a makeshift bomb shelter and coaxed them out, then had them flown to safety by two Huey gunships. They found an 8-year-old boy clinging to his mother's corpse in an irrigation ditch and plucked him by the back of his shirt and delivered him to a nun in a nearby hospital.

To me, this always has been one of the more astonishing displays of courage of which I've ever heard, and I heard about it the way everyone else did, years later, because the Army did its best to cover the whole thing up and to slander the reputations of the helicopter crew involved. (Needless to say, the Nixon Administration was particularly venal in this regard.) Were we a truly vibrant and evolved republic, Larry Colburn's funeral would be on national television. Children would read about him in school. There would be memorials on the National Mall and at West Point.

Colin Kaepernick Deserves a Medal

The Muhammed Ali Speaking Patriotic And Racial Truth to Power Medal.  With Telling Jingoistic NFL Greedheads to Fuck Off and Die Cluster.

Think Progress:

On Saturday night, San Francisco 49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick remained seated as the national anthem was played during the team’s preseason game against the Green Bay Packers.

“I am not going to stand up to show pride in a flag for a country that oppresses black people and people of color,” the 28-year-old told reporters after the game.

His action — or, rather, inaction — sent shockwaves throughout the NFL community. In the past 48 hours, Kaepernick has been called “unappreciative” and “ignorant” by former NFL players; others, including a former teammate of his, have said that he was disrespecting the military and being downright unpatriotic.

And in a league that has extremely close ties with the military and nationalism, there are few things worse than being perceived as anti-American.

But while Kaepernick might not be displaying the one-size-fits-all patriotism that the NFL likes to heavily promote, he is showing patriotism nonetheless.

“I have great respect for the men and women that have fought for this country. I have family, I have friends that have gone and fought for this country,” Kaepernick told reporters on Sunday. “And they fight for freedom, they fight for the people, they fight for liberty and justice, for everyone.”

Kaepernick’s desire is for liberty and justice to be applied uniformly to all American citizens. He is willing to lose his job and lose endorsements in order to speak up for those that he does not feel are getting a fair shake in his country. That is his version of patriotism.

Compare that to the NFL, which treats patriotism as a brand.

Last year, it was revealed that the Department of Defense had paid NFL teams $6.1 million between 2012–2015 for military tributes at games, including the field-sized American flags, flyovers, and fireworks. (The NFL announced in May that it was returning $724,000 of that.)

While the league stages and heavily promotes military family reunions without providing full context, it also fines players, such as former Carolina Panther Josh Norman, for wearing patriotic cleats that do not fit into the NFL’s very strict uniform guidelines.

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All in all, Kaepernick fits the official definition of patriot — “a person who regards himself or herself as a defender, especially of individual rights, against presumed interference by the federal government” — far more than than the NFL does.

“This stand wasn’t for me. This stand wasn’t because I feel like I’m being put down in any kind of way,” Kaepernick said. “This is because I’m seeing things happen to people that don’t have a voice, people that don’t have a platform to talk and have their voices heard, and effect change. So I’m in the position where I can do that and I’m going to do that for people that can’t.”

Of course, that doesn’t mean that Kaepernick hasn’t experienced racism. On Sunday he spoke about helping a friend move, only to have cops come and point guns at him and another black friend, assuming they were intruders. When he was named the starting quarterback for the 49ers, there wasracially-charged criticism of his tattoos and leadership skills.

But Kaepernick knows that compared to most, he has it good. He sat during the national anthem because black Americans are 2.5 times as likely as white Americans to be shot and killed by the police. Unarmed black Americans are five times as likely as unarmed white Americans to be shot and killed by police. And far too often, there is no punishment for police officers committing these murders.

Kaepernick might not have a spot on an NFL roster for much longer — there are rumors that the 49ers will release him for “football reasons” — but as long as he has a platform, he plans to follow in the footsteps of athlete activists before him, most notably Muhammad Ali.

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For his part, Kaepernick plans to continue to sit during the national anthem until he sees significant progress.

“This country stands for freedom, liberty, justice for all, and it’s not happening for all right now,” Kaepernick said. “To me this is something that has to change, and when there’s significant change and I feels like that flag represents what it’s supposed to represent and this country is representing people the way it’s supposed to, I’ll stand.”

You know who is the most fanatic about making empty jingoistic gestures like standing for the anthem and saluting the flag?  Traitors, that's who.  Spies. Terrorists.  Because they know that pretending patriotism is the easiest thing in the world, and will guarantee them a pass from suspicion.

The Can't-Top-This Speeches from Philly

Seriously. After Rev. Barber brought the house down, I thought that was a speech for the ages. Democrats will be able to use that one forever.

Then Khizr Khan took the floor.  And flattened Donald Traitor with two sentences.

Watch them both.

And keep this one handy to show to those ridiculous "Democrats" who say they just can't vote for Hillary because they hate her so much.  What the fuck is wrong with them?

Choosing Brave and Smart Over Scared and Stupid

Ever notice how real heroes are never the ones screaming "OMG we're all gonna die!"

Digby:

I've been aghast at the panic stricken bellowing coming from mainstream US media in the wake of Paris and needless to say, Fox News has been worse than most.  But once in awhile someone surprises you. Here's Fox's Shep Smith:

In the face of terror, will we panic or be calm and deliberative in approach?” Smith asked in a 90-second monologue. “Confronted with those who want to change our way of life, will we abandon our freedoms and the rights granted to us by the creator, or will we welcome huddled masses, yearning to breathe free? Will we take extreme measures to fundamentally alter who and what we are?” 

“Our shining city on a hill is vulnerable,” he continued. “We’ve always known that. If we change it to accommodate the savages, have they won? And what then would be left to protect? We profess to stand as an example for all the world. Our unique experiment in freedom, tolerance, openness, and equality, is our gift to societies and peoples everywhere. Come, join us. Enjoy a chance at the American dream.” 

He concluded, “Today we mourn but we cannot allow ourselves to become like those who want to destroy us. We cannot resort to tactics of the barbarians. We must fight for what we believe in and who we are. Guard our freedoms faithfully for the generations to follow. And we must not let the rhetoric of potential and political extremists among us lead us to self-destruction. When there’s panic, we show resolve. When there’s calm for extremism, we resist. We are America. We must lead.”

Guns Are For Cowards

Real American heroes don't need them.

TPM:

A 75-year-old Army veteran who fought off a knife-wielding man who was threatening to kill children at an Illinois library says training he received nearly five decades ago helped him in the scuffle.

James Vernon was teaching a chess class with 16 children at Morton Public Library when authorities say 19-year-old Dustin Brown entered the room with two knives. According to a court affidavit, Brown told police afterward that he "failed in his mission to kill everyone."

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Vernon, a retired Caterpillar Inc. employee, told the newspaper he remembered the knife-fight training the Army had given him. Despite his cuts, Vernon contended he won his "90 seconds of combat" with Brown, "but I felt like I lost the war." He suffered two cut arteries and a tendon in his left hand as he blocked Brown's knife swipe.

He said he first tried to calm Brown and deflect his attention from the children attending his class.
"I tried to talk to him. I tried to settle him down," he said. "I didn't, but I did deflect his attention" from the children "and calmed him a bit. I asked him if he was from Morton, did he go to high school. I asked what his problem was. He said his life sucks."

Vernon said the man backed away as he got closer to him, but he was able to put himself between Brown and the room's door, with the children hiding under the tables behind him.

"I gave them the cue to get the heck out of there, and, boy, they did that!" Vernon said. "Quick, like rabbits."

The Abortion Angel

Divine Irony:

pro-choice-or-no-voice:

webbgirl34:

thebigsisteryouneveraskedfor:

Gisella Perl was forced to work as a doctor in Auschwitz concentration camp during the holocaust.
She was ordered to report ever pregnant women do the physician Dr. Josef Mengele, who would then use the women for cruel experiments (e.g. vivisections) before killing them.
She saved hundreds of women by performing abortions on them before their pregnancy was discovered, without having access to basic medical supplies. She became known as the “Angel of Auschwitz”.
After being rescued from Bergen-Belsen concentration camp she tried to commit suicide, but survived, recovered and kept working as a gynecologist, delivering more than 3000 babies.

I want to nail this to the forehead of every anti-abortionist who uses the word “Holocaust” when talking about legal abortions.

Out of the Ashes (free online streaming) is a movie based on Gisella Perl coming to America and having to share her story with immigration officials about what happened in Auschwitz, even delving into why she performed abortions and how. It’s really an amazing movie and I highly recommend it.

↵ Originally from thebigsisteryouneveraskedfor

↵ Reblogged from bluejewofzsouchmuhn

Honor Those Who Said No to Torture

If we don't prosecute and imprison the torturers and the ones who planned, justified and excused it, then at the very least let us honor those who refused to torture.

Jon Weiner at The Nation:

Hidden in the Senate torture report are stories of some heroes—people inside the CIA who from the beginning said torture was wrong, who tried to stop it, who refused to participate. There were also some outside the CIA, in the military and the FBI, who risked careers and reputations by resisting—and who sometimes paid a heavy price. They should be thanked and honored.

But President Obama hasn’t mentioned them. Instead, he praised the CIA officials who presided over the torture regime as “patriots.”

We should “celebrate the ones who stood up for what was right,” says David Luban of the Georgetown University law school, author of Torture, Power and Law. Jane Mayer of The New Yorker, author of the definitive book on Bush administration torture, The Dark Side, calls them “the real torture patriots.”

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The heroes in the torture report include Ali Soufan, former FBI agent and interrogator of terrorists who, according to Lawrence Wright in The Looming Tower, came closer than anyone to preventing the 9/11 attacks. Soufan has argued publicly against torture and in favor of “rapport-building” as the best technique to get information from suspects. The CIA heavily censored his memoir The Black Banners in what Wright called an effort “to punish a critic and to obscure history.” He was featured in a Frontline documentary made by Martin Smith and James Gilmore.

Another hero: Alberto Mora. As general counsel of the Navy in 2004, Jane Mayer reported, he tried to stop the torture program. He told his superiors at the Pentagon that the Bush torture policy violated the Geneva Conventions’ prohibition of torture and “outrages upon personal dignity, in particular humiliating and degrading treatment.” He described the Bush program as “unlawful” and “dangerous,” and warned that the torturers could face criminal prosecution. He was featured in the documentary Taxi to the Dark Side by Alex Gibney (which won the Best Documentary Oscar in 2007).

Some of the heroes were ordinary soldiers, like Sgt. Joe Darby, who first revealed the Abu Ghraib abuses. As a result,” Luban points out, he “had to live under armed protection for six months.” Others were high officials, like Philip Zelikow, an adviser to Condoleezza Rice, who, Luban reports, wrote an “anti-torture memo” that the White House “attempted to destroy.”

And there was Ian Fishback, an army captain who reported that his own unit was abusing Iraqi prisoners. Eventually he wrote an open letter to Senator John McCain, asking, “Do we sacrifice our ideals in order to preserve security?” His answer: “I would rather die fighting than give up even the smallest part of the idea that is ‘America.’ ”

Finally we have the case of Guantaánamo prosecutor Lt. Col. Darrel Vandeveld, who refused to prosecute a teenager who had been abused in US detention in Afghanistan and Guantánamo. For that decision, Jameel Jaffer and Larry Siems report, Vandeveld was “barred from the prosecutors’ office, confined to his residence and threatened with dismissal from the Army.”

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The ACLU has set up a web page with a petition to President Obama to “honor those who said no to torture.”

And make sure everyone knows that waterboarding was the least of it and the CIA wasn't alone.

Digby:

I think people don't realize how much anal rape was going on. It wasn't just those "high value" detainees and it didn't happen just a couple of times.

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Folks, they were raping these prisoners and they knew they were raping these prisoners. It wasn't just the CIA, it was the Pentagon too.

"Heroes" Is Not A Compliment

If you've ever met a recipient of the Medal of Honor (don't you dare call them "winners"; it's not the fucking lottery), you know that they forcefully reject the label "hero."

When they say, "I'm not a hero, anybody in the same situation would have done the same thing," they're not being disingenuous.  They mean it.

So stop saying it.

From Firedoglake:

- Calling soldiers as “heroes” dehumanizes them. It ignores what they faced and will continue to face.

Weak and Cowardly Is As Weak and Cowardly Does

I hope Digby will forgive me for posting this in full

Some of the stuff I'm reading on twitter and elsewhere about Private Manning's change from Bradley to Chelsea is just depressing Honestly, I do not understand why people care so much about this stuff. She's a human being. That's all anyone needs to know. If she sees herself as a woman, then that's what she is. Human beings own their own bodies and their identities. Period.

I can't help but be reminded of this, when I read all this stuff today about what a cowardly weirdo Chelsea Manning is:

Monday, June 03, 2013

 
Here's a truly heroic Navy SEAL

Now this is an amazing story:

The 2011 repeal of “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” ended the military’s official policy of discriminating against gays and lesbians in the armed services, but a ban on transgender service members remains in place, meaning that trans men and women are still barred from serving.

But some advocates say that may change, or may come closer than ever before to changing, with the release of a new memoir from a former Navy SEAL. Kristen Beck (formerly Chris Beck) was a SEAL for 20 years — and member of SEAL Team 6, the unit that killed Osama bin Laden — before retiring, coming out as transgender and beginning her transition from male to female in 2011.

And with all the ugliness in the world one could expect a huge backlash, especially among her former colleagues in the military. And there may be some.

But it isn't across the board:

Soon, the responses from SEALs stationed all around the world suddenly started pouring in: “Brother, I am with you … being a SEAL is hard, this looks harder. Peace” * “I can’t say I understand the decision but I respect the courage. Peace and happiness be upon you…Jim” * ” … I just wanted to drop you a note and tell you that Kris has all the support and respect from me that Chris had … and quite possibly more. While I’m definitely surprised, I’m also in amazement at the strength you possess and the courage necessary to combat the strangers and ‘friends’ that I’m guessing have reared their ugly heads prior to and since your announcement. …”

I can only say hooyah! to that.

This woman is the same person who was member of Seal Team 6. Whatever "he" could do, she can do. Maybe this will make the military --- hell, everybody --- stop and think a little bit about gender roles and how essentially meaningless they really are.

Good for Kristen. She's a real hero.

I admire Manning for a lot of reasons and this is up there. Anyone who says she's weak and cowardly is an idiot.

And She Didn't Even Have a Taser

From Firedoglake:

In Decatur, GA a remarkable woman, an unarmed school clerk, convinced a would-be mass killer of school children to disarm and allow himself to be arrested.

More details here.

Meanwhile, the stupid prevails in Arkansas.

Annie-Rose Strasser at Think Progress:

A school in Arkansas wants any potential shooters to know: Its teachers are armed, and ready for a showdown.

Since the Arkansas Christian Academy is a private school, it is not subject to the rules for public schools in the state that prevent teachers from carrying firearms. To that end, the school has between one and seven staff members carrying a weapon on any given day, according to Pastor Perry Black, who this week posted signs that say “Staff is armed and trained. Any attempt to harm children will be met with deadly force.”

Ten Ways Bradley Manning Changed the World

The verdict of history is usually derogatory.  From the distance of decades, deeds and people that seemed honorable or even heroic at the time are usually revealed to have been corrupt, craven and contemptible.

Far more rare is the reverse case: people condemned and vilified in their day revealed by history as heroic.

My only hope for long life is to see Ronald Reagan acknowledged as the former and Bradley Manning as the latter.

Juan Cole at Nation of Change:

Bradley Manning will be sentenced today, having been found guilty of 20 counts on Tuesday, including espionage (despite the lack of evidence for intent to spy and the lack of evidence that his leaking ever did any real harm). Whatever one thinks of Manning’s actions, that we deserved to know some of what he revealed and that his revelations changed the world are undeniable.

1. Manning revealed the Collateral Murder video of a helicopter attack in Iraq on mostly unarmed non-combatants (though some of those struck may have been armed), including two Reuters journalists, whose cameras were taken for weapons, and children. The army maintains that the video does not show wrongdoing, but the killing of unarmed journalists is a war crime, and the callousness of video gives an idea of what was going on in Iraq during the years of the US occupation. When the Bush administration asked the Iraqi parliament for permission to keep a base in the country, the parliamentarians said, absolutely not. The US military was forced to withdraw from Iraq by Dec. 31, 2011.

2. Manning revealed the full extent of the corruption of Tunisian dictator Zine El Abidin Ben Ali, adding fuel to the youth protest movement of late 2010, which translated the relevant US cables into Arabic. Manning contributed to the outbreak of powerful youth movements demanding more democratic governance in the Arab world.


3. Manning revealed to the US and Yemeni publics the secret drone war that Washington was waging in that country. That the cables show then dictator Ali Abdallah Saleh acquiescing in the US strikes on his country probably played into the movement to remove him as president, which succeeded in early 2012.

4. He revealed that then Secretary of State Hillary Clinton ordered US diplomats to spy on their United Nations counterparts. The UN spy requests included cables that “demanded detailed intelligence on the UN leadership including forensic detail about their communications systems, including passwords and personal encryption keys,” foreshadowing later revelations of extensive US spying on even allies like Germany via the NSA.

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6. Revealed that Afghanistan government corruption is “overwhelming”. This degree of corruption, which has shaken the whole banking system and caused US funds to be massively misused, is still a factor in our decision of whether to stay in Afghanistan in some capacity after December 2014. The US public is in a better position to judge the issue with these documents available.

7. Manning revealed the degree of authoritarianism and corruption of the Egyptian government of Hosni Mubarak, which was subsequently swept away.
 
Read the whole thing.

Your Newest Unsung Heroes

From Pass The Doucheys:

Marcus Bachman must be twisting in his shorts at this……. news is emerging out of Norway of a heroic lesbian couple who not only rescued Utoya campers by boat during Anders Breivik’s rampage, they returned to the island FOUR TIMES to spirit away terrified campers. Via JoeMyGod and Just Out:

Hege Dalen and her partner Toril Hansen were eating supper in the camping area opposite Utoya [sic.] island when they started hearing gunshots and screaming….

Dalen and Hansen drove their boat to the island, and fished out of the water people who were in shock and young people who were injured and transported them ashore. Every now and then bullets almost hit the boat.

Since they couldn’t fit everyone into the boat all at once, they returned to the island four times. They might have saved as much as forty people from the clutches of the killer.

Cue the right-wing homophobes and conspiracy theorist nutbags to start screaming that the story is a plant for the gay Sharia agenda in 5..4..3..2..1.

Liberals celebrate as genuine heroes all those who risk or sacrifice themselves to save others.

From Hero to Un-Person

If you're looking for a role model to teach your children that good citizenship means protest and dissent rather than obedience; that one person can make a difference, and that you don't have to be born white, male or middle-class to become a genuine hero, you'd be hard put to find a better one than Dolores Huerta.

American history books used to hold her up to third graders as an example of good citizenship, but no more.

In 1988, when she was 58 years old and already a national treasure, she was demonstrating peacefully against the platform of George H.W. Bush when she attacked and severely beaten, nearly to death by out of control San Francisco policemen who gave the 58 year old women several broken ribs and a ruptured spleen. This week another kind of violence was perpetrated against Dolores. People For The American Way alerted their community about it:

The Texas State Board of Education voted to adopt new curriculum standards, which uses the state’s education system to push a conservative political agenda. Among the changes the board agreed to were resolutions adding the study of Right Wing movements to the curriculum, and pushing strongly conservative viewpoints on issues ranging from the United Nations to Social Security and Medicare benefits.

In a 6-9 vote, the Board rejected a proposal to restore labor and civil rights leader and People For the American Way board member Dolores Huerta to the elementary school curriculum. Huerta was previously taught as an example of good citizenship in third grade history classes, but was removed from the curriculum in January.

Michael B. Keegan, President of People For the American Way, issued the following statement:

“The Texas Board of Education’s decision to remove Dolores Huerta from the state’s curriculum standards, while adding divisive Right Wing figures such as Newt Gingrich and Phyllis Schlafly is an insult to the millions of Americans whose lives Huerta has improved, and detrimental to the education of children in Texas and throughout the United States.

“The state’s previous curriculum included Huerta because she has played an important role in our nation’s history. Erasing her from the curriculum not only denigrates her work; it belittles the invaluable contributions of generations of minority activists. That’s unacceptable and a disservice to Texas students.

“Dolores Huerta is a hero for all Americans who value a fair and just society and she shouldn’t be removed from our history. In her decades of work as a labor organizer and civil rights leader, she has helped millions of workers gain a voice at the bargaining table in order to earn fair wages; she has worked to ensure that people of all races and ethnicities are treated equally under the law; and she has been a role model for women in leadership.

“The removal of an important figure like Dolores Huerta from the Social Studies curriculum is emblematic of the School Board’s decision to force politics into the classroom.”

Who is your hero?

SJ has a provocative post on heroes, wondering if it is even possible to name a living individual as a personal hero.

While it may be “jaded” to say: “there are no heroes,” it is certainly false to say so.

A more appropriate question to ask is may be: -Where have they gone?
In this age where entertainers, celebrities, professional athletes and political demagogues so easily capture our imaginations; our attention once held by accomplished persons, scholars, civic leaders, inventors, artists, writers, doctors, healers, and yes Presidents, -where are those individuals we would call heroes without embarrassment, qualification or excuses?

Who can I name without feeling like some silly thoughtless flatterer in search of someone to worship?

-And that’s the real truth isn’t it?

It feels weak, even juvenile to name someone a hero today. Perhaps, in our modern insistence on sober equanimity and self-reliance we just can’t afford them anymore.

Read the whole thing.

I don't have an answer, but I can offer these thoughts:

The reason it seems that we don't have heroes like our parents or grandparents did is that today, potential heroes can't hide their feet of clay like they could 50 or even 20 years ago. The moment someone in our 24-hour-news culture steps forward, she is stripped naked, every blemish exposed. Difficult to maintain a heroic posture throughout that.

Relatedly, the speed of information today means that today's hero disappears in the shadows of tomorrow's hero, who is long forgotten by the time we're praising next week's hero. New York State Senator Diane Savino was my hero for the superb speech she gave in favor of marriage equality, but then U.S. Senator Bernie Sanders, I-VT, became my hero for standing up in the Senate and demanding radical health care reform.

Who is your hero?

Real Heroes Don't Brag

It's a truism among veterans that those who did the most talk the least. There are exceptions, of course, but here's the point: If John McCain were not a celebrity, but just a new guy telling war stories in a VFW bar, the bragging he did Thursday night would have been taken by other veterans as typical bullshit from a wished-he'd-been-there.

At TPM Cafe, M.J. Rosenberg puts it perfectly.

You would never know it from the media coverage but John McCain is not one of America's greatest war heroes. He is a former POW who survived, heroically. He deserves to be honored for that heroism.

But one thing distinguishes McCain from other war heroes, the kind whose heroism changes history rather than their life stories.

America's two greatest war heroes were Ulysses Grant and Dwight Eisenhower. Grant saved the union. And Ike saved civilization.

And neither one ever bragged about their experience. (Can you imagine Ike smacking down Adlai Stevenson by saying that while Adlai ran a nice medium-sized state, he was the Supreme Allied Commander who ran D-Day, defeated Hitler, and liberated Europe?).

Impossible. Like Grant, Eisenhower did not brag.

Read the whole thing.

Cross-posted at BlueGrassRoots.