The Lying Piece of Shit

How anyone with family members who are veterans or active-duty military can support this disgusting excuse for a human being - much less a commander in chief - is beyond me.

Josh Marshall:

Military missions go wrong. It is always the President's responsibility. But that doesn't mean it's the President's fault. President Trump has displayed an uncanny refusal to take any responsibility for what happened in this raid, even going so far as to all but deny that he even authorized it. As he said yesterday morning: “This was a mission that was started before I got here. This was something they wanted to do. They came to see me, they explained what they wanted to do ― the generals ― who are very respected, my generals are the most respected that we’ve had in many decades, I believe. And they lost Ryan."

This is a moment when we'll see how just how earnest the press is about holding the President to account. This 'presidential' moment was the most shameless kind of exploitation and it would seem a straight up lie.

Number 82

Specialist Kevin J. Graham, 27, of Benton, Kentucky, died September 26 in Kandahar, Afghanistan, of wounds suffered when a insurgents attacked his vehicle with an improvised explosive device.

A western Kentucky pastor says a soldier who died when a roadside bomb hit his vehicle in Afghanistan believed he was doing his life's work in the Army.

The Rev. Jonathan Goodman told The Paducah Sun that 27-year-old Spc. Kevin J. Graham of Benton was honored to serve his country.

Graham died Saturday in Kandahar of wounds suffered in the attack by insurgents. He was assigned to the 1st Battalion, 17th Infantry Regiment, 5th Stryker Brigade Combat Team, 2nd Infantry Division at Fort Lewis, Wash.

Goodman says Graham joined the Army in 2007, was married in Washington and had a stepson. The pastor says Graham's parents brought reports of their son to church often and that members of the church would pray for him.

The newspaper said Graham's parents, Dan and Sandy Graham, live near Fairdealing and were at Dover Air Force Base in Delaware on Monday when their son's body was returned to the United States. Graham has three older brothers.

Graham was an indirect-fire infantryman, was on his first deployment. He joined the Army in July 2007 and reported to Fort Lewis that December.

As of Monday, Sept. 28, at least 773 Americans have died in the AfPak clusterfuck, for no reason any rational person can discern.

Sixty-Seven and Counting

Private First Class Sammie E. Phillips, 19, of Vine Grove, Kentucky, was killed on Monday, September 10, when his vehicle overturned while conducting a traffic control mission on a highway near Rustamiyah, Iraq. Phillips was assigned to Battery B, 2nd Battalion, 138th Field Artillery, Kentucky Army National Guard, based in Carlisle, Ky.

PFC Sammie Phillips is the third Kentucky National Guard member to die in Iraq or Afghanistan in the last two weeks.

PFC Sammie Phillips is the 67th Kentuckian to die while serving in the U.S. Armed Forces in Iraq or Afghanistan.

PFC Sammie Phillips is a homicide victim
.
The perpetrator of this cold-blooded, pre-meditated murder is George Walker Bush, a 61-year-old Caucasian male with a long history of using family money and influence to skate on felony charges.

Impeachment, my ass.

Nothing short of indictment on 3,759 charges of first-degree murder will do.

The Surge Hits Kentucky in the Gut

57. Specialist William G. Bowling, 24, of Beattyville, Kentucky. He died 1 APR 07 in Baghdad, Iraq, when an improvised explosive device detonated near hisvehicle during combat operations. He was assigned to the 2nd Brigade Special Troops Battalion,2nd Brigade Combat Team, 10th Mountain Division, Fort Drum, New York.

There it is. The latest entry - posted just about an hour ago - in the list of Kentucky's sons and daughters killed while serving in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Kentucky's 57th casualty since the first, in November 2003. It's been 10 weeks since the 56th, on January 17.

Specialist William G. Bowling. Twenty-four years old. From Beattyville, Kentucky, where he was no doubt born and raised.

Beattyville is the county seat of Lee County, in the mountains of Eastern Kentucky.

This week, the mountain forests are sprinkled with the purple of flowering Redbud trees, set off by surrounding white blooms of Dogwoods. When the wind blows, the Dogwood blooms swirl and fall like snowflakes.

Lee County nestles on the western edge of one of the poorest regions in the country, and consistently scores in the lowest 10 of Kentucky's 120 counties on just about every measure - employment, education, economic opportunity.

For all I know, Specialist Bowling comes from a well-off family. For all I know, he chose the Army out of a sense of duty and patriotism, rather than lack of alternatives. For all I know, he was following in the footsteps of his father and grandfathers.

But whether Specialist Bowling was rich or poor, blessed with alternatives or seeking an escape, I know this much:

Kentucky has lost 57 William Bowlings too many.

Beattyville couldn't afford to lose him.

He didn't deserve to die.

Do me a favor. Take a few minutes to find the web page of your state's Department of Veterans Affairs. It probably has a link to the list of your neighbors who have died in Iraq and Afghanistan. Read it. Slowly.

Whatever is the last number on the list, write your Congressional Representatives and Senators and demand they make sure that that entry is the last.