Trump's VP pick accused his rival of having dodged a deployment to Iraq, and of engaging in "stolen valor garbage"
What actually is Stolen Valor?
www.afba.com
Vance is trying to steal Walz actual earned Valor. Walz is a 24 year Command Sergeant Major. The highest rank enlisted can achieve. Vance was a non-commissioned officer, rank of Corporal, below Sergeant. Walz served America longer and with more impact than Vance did, and not by a little. Walz was a tireless advocate for veterans and military families as a Congressman.
Vance did not see combat while in Iraq as a combat correspondent.
Vance is running with Trump who has been nasty and hateful to those that serve and served in our Armed forces, and to their families.
This is attempted swift boating for a new decade. Same party that attacked John Kerry and then let Bush off the hook. Nothing but hypocrites, to their core.
www.theguardian.com"&text=Now%20a%20US%20senator%20from,he%20did%20not%20experience%20combat.
What pisses me off the most, though, is that Vance thought this was a good thing to do. To attack another that served faithfully and fully for decades and to try and get some gain from it. Vance is a total scum bag.
The point being that the members of his unit when he left, well before the Unit was called up say that he had always been interested in politics and they congratulated him on his career move.
What are people supposed to do?
Walz in 2007 on CSPAN said he was deployed in Operation Enduring Freedom. He was never deployed.
There's a video of when he was running for gov, that shoots holes in this (ignore tweeter, just looked for the video).
x.com
Again there is video evidence of CNN as well.
I said Walz was a bad choice the morning he was selected, he's going to be a horrible choice dragging down the Harris campaign.
"stationed at Vicenza, Italy."
This has been confirmed not part of operations in Iraq or any deployment in support of IRaq.
To clarify, according to records, regulations and the Public Affairs Office of the Minnesota National Guard, Tim Walz did serve as a Command Sergeant Major (CSM) and is permitted to claim that he served in that capacity. However, he did not retire as a CSM because he did not meet the educational requirements to retain that rank.
While he can legitimately state that he served as a CSM, he is not a "Retired CSM" but rather a "Retired Master Sergeant" (MSG). Therefore, it is not a case of Stolen Valor, although he should not be claiming to have retired at a rank he no longer holds.
x.com
To answer everyone's questions about the video being shared. Governor Tim Walz's service record indicates that he did not deploy to a combat zone. Instead, he was stationed in Italy to support combat operations. While all Soldiers carry an M4/M16 rifle during training, qualifications, and other exercises, there is no evidence to suggest that he "carried a weapon of war in war" as stated in the video.
x.com
From a mate:
November 02, 2018 at 6:00 PM
Paid letter: The Truth About Tim Walz
Tim Walz has embellished and selectively omitted facts and circumstances of his military career for years.
We, retired Command Sergeants Major of the Minnesota National Guard, feel it is our duty and responsibility to bring forth the truth as we know it concerning his service record. So, we have put together a timeline of his service post 9/11. To the best of our knowledge, this information is completely true, having been verified by all those who served in positions with first hand knowledge of the facts and circumstances of his service and departure from the Minnesota National Guard. Many of the dates and time frames are from his official discharge document and the reduction order reducing him to Master Sergeant.
www.wctrib.com
It is no surprise that the Trump campaign is running this so-called stolen valour campaign aganst Walz because the guy who was responsible for swiftboating John Kerry, Chris LaCivita, is now running the Trump campaign:
Trump 2024 campaign seeks to recruit man who smeared John Kerrywww.theguardian.com
Ex-president eyeing Chris LaCivita, whose 2004 Swift Boat campaign questioned Kerry's Vietnam war record
As he prepares a possible new presidential campaign, Donald Trump is seeking to recruit an operative who was behind a group which famously questioned the Vietnam war record of the 2004 Democratic nominee, John Kerry, the Washington Post reported.
The operative who ran Swift Boat Veterans for Truth, Chris LaCivita, worked for one Trump-aligned political action committee during the 2020 election and now runs another.
If you are thinking so many of Trump's attack lines in this campaign sound familiar, you'd be right:
nymag.com
A longtime brawler and veteran of Republican politics, including the infamous Swift Boat Veterans for Truth campaign against John Kerry in 2004, today LaCivita is officially senior adviser to Donald Trump's presidential campaign--but he is really the de facto co-campaign manager along with Susie Wiles.
J.D. Vance's Stolen Valor' Claim Against Tim Walz Is Total B.S.www.rollingstone.com
Vance also accused Walz of feigning a record in active combat: "[Walz] said " and he was making a point about gun control " he said, we shouldn't allow weapons that I used in war, to be on America's streets.' Well, I wonder, Tim Walz, when you ever in war?"
The senator actually misquoted Walz in his screed. In the clip Vance was referencing, Walz says that he "carried" weapons in war, not "used." Given that Operation Enduring Freedom was a part of the post-9/11 War on Terror, and that Walz was deployed to Italy under it--and likely had a service weapon--the claim that he is engaging in "stolen valor" holds little water.
Vance spoke on Wednesday as if he served more honorably than Walz, noting that he went to Iraq "I did it, I did what they asked me to do and I did it honorably," he said The senator was deployed for six months in Iraq as a combat correspondent in 2005 as part of the Marines' Public Affairs office. He-- like Walz--never engaged in active combat and has stated that he was "lucky to escape any real fighting," during his deployment.
In 2018, Al Bonnifield, who served under Walz in the Guard, told MPR News that Walz "talked with us for quite a while on that subject [of retiring]. He weighed that decision to run for Congress very heavy. He loved the military, he loved the Guard, he loved the soldiers he worked with."
Walz told the outlet that "once you're in, it's hard to retire. Of my 40 years or 41 years, I had been in the military 24 of them. It was just what you did ... So that transition period was just a challenge."
"I know that there are certainly folks that did far more than I did. I know that," Walz added. "I willingly say that I got far more out of the military than they got out of me, from the GI Bill to leadership opportunities to everything else."
Twenty-four years of service is nothing to sneeze at, and Vance is running alongside a known draft dodger who has repeatedly disparaged veterans and Gold Star families. If Vance wants to critique a man's honor, he should start with his running mate.
The The - This Is the Day (1983)
www.youtube.com
Lyrics excerpt ...
...
Well you didn't wake up this morning
'Cause you didn't go to bed
You were watching the whites of your eyes turn red
The calendar on your wall
Is ticking the days off
You've been reading some old letters
You smile and think how much you've changed
All the money in the world
Couldn't buy back those days
...
Back when i was loading all of my CDs and vinyl albums into a media database ( jriver.com ) I went with the rule that the leading "The" of groups would be dropped.
So, "Who" and not "The Who" in the database. That all worked well until Mr Matt Johnson came along with the great "The The."
What was I to do?
I made an exception, the "The" is dropped for groups, except for "The The."
Wow, I'm now in a happy place.
And, if i may say...
You were watching the whites of your eyes turn red
They don't write lyrics like that anymore.
Brutal facts :
Just in: A Video from 2009 shows a veteran confronting Tim Walz's staff over claims that he served in Afghanistan. The veteran said Walz could go to jail for violating the Stolen Valor Act of 2006 for claiming to have served in Afghanistan when he didn't
x.com
Oh my
It looks like Tim Walz may also have used stolen valor claims to falsely receive retirement pay he wasn't entitled to
x.com
Brutal .. he's really gotta get out in front of this.
Just in case you wanna besmirch Vances position in the military, like LyinYav, and TonyImGoneRoma ... .
USMC Major Megan McClung was also a Marine public affairs officer. She was killed by an IED in Anbar, Iraq. She wasn't kicking down doors, either. She is buried in Section 60 at Arlington.
Shame on you.
x.com
@#Z56 ... I give you facts, you are emotionally involved. ...
Your current alias provides links to Mr Musk's site that seems to encourage hate speech and misinformation.
So, how does your current alias justify that phlegm as fact?
Or maybe, just maybe, your current alias is so embedded in the world of MAGA alternative facts that it has not a clue what an actual fact (reality) is?
Alternative facts
en.wikipedia.org
... "Alternative facts" was a phrase used by U.S. Counselor to the President Kellyanne Conway during a Meet the Press interview on January 22, 2017, in which she defended White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer's false statement about the attendance numbers of Donald Trump's inauguration as President of the United States. When pressed during the interview with Chuck Todd to explain why Spicer would "utter a provable falsehood", Conway stated that Spicer was giving "alternative facts". Todd responded, "Look, alternative facts are not facts. They're falsehoods."[1]
Conway's use of the phrase "alternative facts" for demonstrable falsehoods was widely mocked on social media and sharply criticized by journalists and media organizations, including Dan Rather, Jill Abramson, and the Public Relations Society of America. The phrase was extensively described as Orwellian, particularly in reference to the term doublethink. Within four days of the interview, sales of George Orwell's novel Nineteen Eighty-Four had increased 95-fold, which The New York Times and others attributed to Conway's use of the phrase, making it the number-one bestseller on Amazon.com.[2] ...
Tim Walz is not the first time that JD Vance has played this pathetic and unpatriotic game.
It turns out that two years ago he tried to smear the reputation of retired Army General Barry McCaffrey.
Walz suffered hearing loss due to his service, but Republicans don't think he served honorably. It's precisely because he served honorably that the GOP is trying to Swift boat him:
Walz did suffer health consequences from all those howitzer cannon booms. U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs records supplied by Walz after MPR News inquired about the scope and timing of the damage show he filed a claim for bilateral hearing loss and tinnitus with the agency in 2013.www.mprnews.org
In a benefits application, Walz spoke of blasts that "would knock us down and after firing I had ringing in my ears" and hearing loss that progressively worsened during his 21 years in the field artillery unit.
In late 2002, he was ordered to appear before a medical retention board about the hearing impairment. After waiting for a decision for months, he was given clearance to serve out the remaining years of his final six-year enlistment.
Medical records show that in 2005 Walz underwent stapedectomy surgery, a procedure in which damaged bones inside the ear are replaced with a prosthesis. He said it has improved his hearing.
By the time Walz left the military, he achieved the rank of command sergeant major, one of the top ranks for an enlisted soldier. Personnel file records show that he was reduced in rank months after retiring, leaving him as a master sergeant for benefits purposes.
Capt. Holly Rockow, a public affairs officer for the Minnesota National Guard, said it is legitimate for Walz to say he served as a command sergeant major. She said the rank changed because Walz retired before completing coursework at the U.S. Army Sergeants Major Academy along with other requirements associated with his promotion.
As command sergeant major, Walz holds the distinction as the highest-elected enlisted member ever to serve in Congress, a point of pride colleagues sometimes brought up at Capitol Hill hearings.
You obviously don't give a ---- about lies and liars. You are hilariously blind of you think you do.
@#200 ... Will Democrats ever stop lying as their primary tool to win elections? ...
Have you listened to fmr Pres Trump's recent press conference from Mar-A-Lago?
I mean really.
FACT FOCUS: A look at claims made by Trump at news conference
apnews.com
... In his first news conference since Vice President Kamala Harris became the Democratic nominee for president, former President Donald Trump said he would debate her on Sept. 10 and pushed for two more debates. The Republican presidential nominee spoke for more than an hour, discussing a number of issues facing the country and then taking questions from reporters. He made a number of false and misleading claims. Many of them have been made before. ...
So... your comment is just another example of the GOP accusing others of what they do?
A fun tune from a somewhat obscure 1990 album ...
Chet Atkins and Mark Knopfler - There'll Be Some Changes Made
www.youtube.com
Two guitar greats having musical fun together.
Happy stuff.
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