Investigative Reporting

The question has been asked and it shall be answered, whatever happened to dear ole Shane?

Well, if some of your remember last week came that story about an incident during the Anti-War march between a grieving father and some folks from the Gathering of Eagles Pro-War group that is consisted mainly of vets. When it came out thousands descended upon the GoE forums and hilarity ensued.

You had the usual trolls, bashing GoE, screaming, cursing, basically not being courteous in another person's home. Many were baned, posts were deleted, and terms like moonbats, trolls and the like were thrown around. A few of us were courteous, not surprising that we were all vets. We began having intelligent dialog, polite discourse, with a few of them. So for the last few days I have been engaged in what could be described as investigative reporting.

You see I have been in bedded within the GoE forums for the majority of my work day since this began. Throwing ideas off of people, putting up with old nutjobs from Vietnam, but finding a few good people to have discussion with. Sure, I had to educate some folks, like the lady who thought that Sherman's march to the sea freed the slaves. When I corrected her somehow it became Washington who freed the slaves. There are those who just naturally assume that I'm some liberal blowhard and so don't listen to anything I have to say.

These folks go blah blah blah commie pinko traitor treason and I more or less ignore them. I shouldn't be too surprised that the biggest offenders of this have been men in their 60s who served during Vietnam. There are also a few forty year old women who believe the same and it would make an interesting scientific study as to what makes a person go batshit crazy at those ages.

I did manage to find a few people who were willing to talk, to inform each other, and I would like to think learn from what someone else has to say. I won't go so far as to call the group good people, but there are good people within the group.

Though I think this experiment is coming to an end, the intelligent discourse is becoming few and far between the douchbaggery and I need to get back to reporting for each and every one of you out there that come to here wisdom from the top of the mountain.

My Latest Post to the GoE

In an attempt to engage in intelligent discourse with the Gathering of Eagles I have spent the better part of the last day on their message board. There are some intelligent board members, and those who still where the Faux News produced blinders. In an attempt to see their view on Iraq, I produced my ideas on how to fix the problem and I give it to you now.
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I figured I'd start a discussion since most would just go to the lies thread to be "moonbats" and be vulgar in another man's home and I would really love to get ideas and responses from some of you. You may not agree with me, and this is only my opinion, but the plan in Iraq is flawed. Deaths continue to go up and where in a way it is nice to them kill each other instead of us, this has to stop as well.

I have read many times here in the last day how we are America, how great we are, and this is true. The problem right now is we don't look that great, we look like the class bully. You all think the only solution is military action, which is true in some cases but I don't believe it is true anymore in Iraq, if it ever truly was. There were a lot of claims about WHY we invaded but I still believe in two of them; to get Iraq's intell (which was the best in the middle east) and to create a military base in the middle east so that we were capable of striking terrorists at a moments notice. Honestly, I don't have any problem with either of these; they are good solid strategy especially in the region.

For me the problem is in a few different areas, starting with not giving our troops the right equipment for the job. If we saved a billion or two and not given them to the companies, we could have had better body armor and better vehicles. They've been attempting to get Buffalos and Cougars over there for years and the Pentagon drug their feet and waited till really pushing it last year. I can't begin to imagine how many lives those vehicles would have saved. I'm sorry, I don't buy the you go to war with the Army you have rhetoric they could have easily spent the extra money to get these made and shipped but they didn't.

The second issue is the amount of foreign business we gave control over things in Iraq. Haliburtion built I don't know how many things over there and some are already condemned or never actually finished. What we need to do is give that money to the Iraqis, get them involved in the actual process of rebuilding their country. Having them work is one thing, but if they work for Iraqi companies it also puts money back into the region. Maybe it's only my common sense, but people fight harder for things they built themselves then something they were given. We need the Iraqis to be more self reliant and I'm not talking about the do nothing political machine they have. The people themselves need to be kept occupied. It's hard to be an "insurgent" when you spend 8 hours a day building a school.

Thirdly with this initiated we need to redeploy the troops to more strategic positions. We need to send at the least 50,000 to Afghanistan to continue to fight the Taliban and find OBL. You kill a snake by cutting off its head, yet we haven't cut off their head. Figure out the way they fund things and stop it, find the leaders and eliminate them. At the same time we need to bring these folks up to "civilized society" and teach them about freedom. We have to remember all these folks know their entire life is religious government, they know nothing of freedom of press, religion, women's rights and so on and so on. The troops in Iraq that are left should be reduced to 50,000 period. It may seem like a steep drop off, but they should be focused on protecting critical areas and border patrol. Most of the insurgents are coming from Iran, Syria and Jordan. It's tough to sneak across the border when snipers are lined up along the border just waiting for someone to sneak across.

We also need some teaching at home for those of you who see islamofacism as the entire Muslim religion, it isn't. The easiest way I can explain this is comparing it to Christianity so I'm sorry if I offend anyone. Within Christianity there are many sects and branches from Catholics to Baptists to Mormons to Presbyterians and so on and so on. Islam is the same way, hell Sunni and Shia are the both Muslim but two different sects. If all Muslims were terrorists why are we allies with other middle eastern countries? Are you telling me Muhammad Ali is a terrorist? Just attempt to remember that some terrorists are Muslims but not all Muslims are terrorists. Think about it like this, Westboro Baptist Church are Christians but for you Christians do they speak for you?

I look forward to everyone's response and remember, just because they attack us in Iraq doesn't make that person a terrorist. We have invaded their home, some are merely fighting for their country where they see a foreign invader; wouldn't we do the same?