A little reminder for those who think that Sarah Palin is fit to run the VA. This is how badly she screwed up health programs here in Alaska.

(I had almost forgotten this so thank you to all of you who reminded me.)

Right after Palin quit as Governor, a story broke over at ADN (Now removed) which revealed that she had seriously neglected a program to help elderly Alaskans so badly that it had to be taken over by the Federal Government.

Here is the post I wrote about it back in July 2009: 

State programs intended to help disabled and elderly Alaskans with daily life -- taking a bath, eating dinner, getting to the bathroom -- are so poorly managed, the state cannot assure the health and well-being of the people they are supposed to serve, a new federal review found. 

The situation is so bad the federal government has forbidden the state to sign up new people until the state makes necessary improvements. 

No other state in the nation is under such a moratorium, according to a spokeswoman for the federal Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services. 

In the meantime, frail and vulnerable Alaskans who desperately need the help are struggling. One elderly woman is stuck in a nursing home, for lack of care at home. Another woman, suffering from chronic pain and fatigue, said she's so weak, she often can't even pop dinner into the microwave. 

A particularly alarming finding concerns deaths of adults in the programs. In one 2 1/2 year stretch, 227 adults already getting services died while waiting for a nurse to reassess their needs. Another 27 died waiting for their initial assessment, to see if they qualified for help.

When the Feds took it over they managed to fix it right away, but of course not in time to save those 200+ lives.

So if Sarah Palin cannot even manage to run a small program to help the elderly in a sparsely populated state like Alaska, how could she possibly be able to run the whole VA?

(For those who are interested here is Mudflats take on that story, and Shannyn Moore talking to Keith Olbermann about it.)

While we are on the topic of veteran soldiers it should also be noted that when Palin was governor a soldier named Jeremy Morlock wrote her a letter, which she ignored completely: 

Web mail from: Mr. Jeremy Morlock 
address: 2 bn 1st inf reg bct Ft. Lewis WA 98433 
706-662-7266 

MESSAGE: Mrs. Sarah Palin rnrnSarah I wish I knew of a better way of getting in contact with you and I know your busy having a whole state to run but, I was writing because I had a question to ask. I guess I'll start off by letting you know where im at with things, being in the Army as an lower enslisted man its hard to get things done, I've been looking in to a regulation we have called a 'compassionate reassignment (AR 614-100).' It stipulates under certian circumstances a soldier can request to move duty stations to help care for family in need . I know you have known my family for some time and I think of you all as friends and you know my mother is now taking care of all the girls by herself while trying to keep a job. I'm not asking for pity for my family or myself, I'm just asking if there is anything you could do to help me with my process of getting home to Alaska to help. My direct chain of comand (team, squad leader) have been trying there best to help with out causeing! problems for them selves but, the fact is that my Unit is not really supporting me and trying to coax me to stay. I appreciate your time in reading this and any help you can offer.rnrn sincerely,rnPFC Morlock, Jeremyrn2/1 INF 5 SBCT

Later Morlock would plead guilty to killing innocent Afghan citizens for sport and posing next to their dead bodies.

They even made a documentary about it.

Could Sarah Palin have prevented this tragedy by personally responding to that letter? A letter that came to her from one of her children's friends?

We'll never know, because she did nothing.

The same nothing that she did to protect those 200+ elderly Alaskans.

And the same nothing she will do if she is appointed Secretary of the VA. 

I don't think that the Rolling Stone review of American Sniper is going to make the conservatives very happy.

Courtesy of Rolling Stone: 

The really dangerous part of this film is that it turns into a referendum on the character of a single soldier. It's an unwinnable argument in either direction. We end up talking about Chris Kyle and his dilemmas, and not about the Rumsfelds and Cheneys and other officials up the chain who put Kyle and his high-powered rifle on rooftops in Iraq and asked him to shoot women and children. 

They're the real villains in this movie, but the controversy has mostly been over just how much of a "hero" Chris Kyle really was. One Academy member wondered to a reporter if Kyle (who in real life was killed by a fellow troubled vet in an eerie commentary on the violence in our society that might have made a more interesting movie) was a "psychopath." Michael Moore absorbed a ton of criticism when he tweeted that "My uncle [was] killed by sniper in WW2. We were taught snipers were cowards …" 

And plenty of other commentators, comparing Kyle's book (where he remorselessly brags about killing "savages") to the film (where he is portrayed as a more rounded figure who struggled, if not verbally then at least visually, with the nature of his work), have pointed out that real-life Kyle was kind of a dick compared to movie-Kyle. 

(The most disturbing passage in the book to me was the one where Kyle talked about being competitive with other snipers, and how when one in particular began to threaten his "legendary" number, Kyle "all of the sudden" seemed to have "every stinkin' bad guy in the city running across my scope." As in, wink wink, my luck suddenly changed when the sniper-race got close, get it? It's super-ugly stuff). 

The thing is, it always looks bad when you criticize a soldier for doing what he's told. It's equally dangerous to be seduced by the pathos and drama of the individual solider's experience, because most wars are about something much larger than that, too. 

Deifying a man who made sure to kill more people in order to protect his reputation as the most lethal sniper in the military. Just things conservatives do.

However to be serious if you actively engage in a contest where each point on the scoreboard signifies the end of a human life, you, in no way, deserve to wear the mantle of hero.

From all I can tell Kyle was a psychopath who found a legally supported, and celebrated, outlet for his murderous instincts.

Is anybody else having Jeremy Morlock flashbacks?

Cause I am.

Sergeant in charge of Afghan "Kill Team" gets life in prison for abusing his leadership position.

Staff Sgt. Calvin Gibbs

Courtesy of The News Tribune:

A Joint Base Lewis-McChord sergeant will spend the rest of his life in jail for abusing his leadership position and persuading junior soldiers to join him in plots to murder Afghan civilians in combat-like engagements last year. 

Staff Sgt. Calvin Gibbs’ conviction Thursday affirms the Army’s depiction of him as a cold-blooded murderer who called Afghans “dirty savages” and openly cut fingers from corpses to bind his collaborators into a rogue “kill team.” 

He was found guilty of 15 criminal charges, including three murders. The murders carry a minimum sentence of life in prison. 

Gibbs appeared shocked as the jury forewoman read the verdict. His wife, Chelsy, sobbed. A sentencing session is under way in which Gibbs could win the possibility of parole. 

Gibbs, 26, fought the charges, arguing he was framed by pot smoking junior soldiers who shifted blame to him for their crimes in exchange for lighter punishment from the Army. He insisted he thought the killings took place in legitimate combat in enemy territory. 

But Gibbs couldn’t overcome layered testimony from his platoon mates. A five-soldier jury panel made up of three officers and two senior noncommissioned officers did not buy his defense.

As I am sure many of you remember this is the same group of murderers which included Wasilla resident, and Track Palin hockey pal, Jeremy Morlock, who was sentenced to 24 years in prison after pleading guilty this last March.

These crimes are a terrible black mark on the United States, and its military, and I hope that this sentence will signal to the people of the world that we do not condone this type of abhorrent behavior even in a time of war. (Even illegal wars.)

However we also must realize that this may be the direct result of the Bush administration dramatically lowering the standards for military recruitment in a desperate attempt to meet recruitment goals and to keep young American bodies feeding the ravenous appetite for blood in Iraq.

I would like to believe that in a different time Morlock, with his history of violence and substance abuse,  would never have been accepted into the military.  The same should hold true of Gibbs, but because the military was fighting two wars and stretched well beyond its capabilities standards were lowered to allow just about anybody with a pulse to take up arms and represent this country in an environment where they were face to face with unspeakable horror, and where their grasp on their humanity was challenged at every turn. And this is the unfortunate result.

Sadly for the innocent Afghans who were targeted by this "kill team" there was nobody responsible enough to keep these deeply flawed men in check, and they were allowed to act as cold blooded assassins instead of soldiers.

I have little doubt that this incident, like Abu Ghraib before it, is only a small sampling of the atrocities committed on behalf of the United States in Afghanistan and Iraq.

I only wish I could believe that America would learn its lesson and NEVER send our citizens to foreign lands to kill their people on behalf of the military industrial complex. But I once fooled myself into believing that after Vietnam, and I am no longer nearly so naive. 

The Anchorage Daily News links to my Jeremy Morlock story, and undoubtedly earns their place on Sarah Palin's enemies list. Update!

Courtesy of ADN:

Jeremy Morlock, the Washington-based soldier from Wasilla who has pleaded guilty to the murder of Afghan civilians, once sought help from then-Gov. Sarah Palin in getting an Army assignment closer to home. But Morlock, whose family was reportedly acquainted with the Palins, got only an electronically generated email response from the governor's office. Morlock's request was among the huge release of Palin emails last week and was first reported on by Alaska blogger Jesse Griffin.

Well since we know Palin is back in Alaska right now, if any Wasillians are frightened out of their slumber by a banshee like scream, or the sound of canned goods striking refrigerator doors, they will know who to blame.

Sorry?

P.S. This gets even better as it appears that it was the News Tribune in Tacoma that first linked to my post.

Gee I wonder who might follow up on it next?

Update: The Seattle Times is now weighing in as well.  You know folks I think this story might just have legs.

Sarah Palin ignored Jeremy Morlock's plea to be brought home from overseas under a "compassionate reassignment." Update!

Here is the e-mail that Morlock sent to his Governor, and family friend, on August 23, 2007:

Web mail from: Mr. Jeremy Morlock
address: 2 bn 1st inf reg bct Ft. Lewis WA 98433
706-662-7266

MESSAGE:

Mrs. Sarah Palin rnrnSarah I wish I knew of a better way of getting in contact with you and I know your busy having a whole state to run but, I was writing because I had a question to ask. I guess I'll start off by letting you know where im at with things, being in the Army as an lower enslisted man its hard to get things done, I've been looking in to a regulation we have called a 'compassionate reassignment (AR 614-100).' It stipulates under certian circumstances a soldier can request to move duty stations to help care for family in need . I know you have known my family for some time and I think of you all as friends and you know my mother is now taking care of all the girls by herself while trying to keep a job. I'm not asking for pity for my family or myself, I'm just asking if there is anything you could do to help me with my process of getting home to Alaska to help. My direct chain of comand (team, squad leader) have been trying there best to help with out causeing! problems for them selves but, the fact is that my Unit is not really supporting me and trying to coax me to stay. I appreciate your time in reading this and any help you can offer.rnrn sincerely,rnPFC Morlock, Jeremyrn2/1 INF 5 SBCT

morlock-93@hotmail.com

This was the response Track's good friend, and son of Todd's schoolmate received from the Governor's office.

From: Governor Sarah Palin (GOV sponsored) [governor@alaska.gov]
Sent : Friday, August 24, 2007 8:30 AM

To: morlock 93@hotmail.com

Subject : RE: Military_and_Veterans_Affairs
Thank you for writing to Alaska Governor Sarah Palin. The concerns, opinions, and/or information you have sent are important and valuable to the Governor. Although she is unable to respond to each and every email herself, your message has been received and is being reviewed by the appropriate staff person in this office who can best address your need, suggestion, or comment.

We all know what happened to Jeremy Morlock after that brush off from Palin's office. 

Just imagine how his life might have been changed if only the mother of his sister's best friends would have taken the time to listen to his plea. And you know she really could have helped him, after all she had little trouble keeping her son Track out of harm's way during HIS time in the military.

Update: Nobody is making excuses for what Jeremy Morlock did, he has to take responsibility for his own actions. But this young man entered the military to impress his father who then died in a boating accident in July of 2007.  A month later, while still grieving that loss,and after hearing from his mother how difficult things were for the family, he reached  out to his best friend's mother, who happened to be the Governor of his state, and asked for help getting back home to help them.

And for those efforts he did not even receive a personal response from the woman who he believed was a personal friend to his family

Somebody suggested that the Morlocks and Palins are still friends, but that is not true.  Yes the girls are still friends with Bristol and Willow, but the mother has absolutely no use for Sarah and Todd.

After all it was THEIR house that Willow broke into back in December 2009, and after the Palins refused to pay for the damages, and then arranged for their daughter and her friends to get off while throwing the rest of the kids to the wolves, that pretty much severed any ties between the parents.

In fact Jeremy's mother, Audrey Morlock, has been doing every thing she can to hold her family together with absolutely NO help from her "friends" the Palins.

NOW do you understand how disgusting it was that Palin did nothing to respond to this young man's pleas for help?

Is Sarah Palin TRYING to get the United States attacked by terrorists?

The White House has just announced that they will NOT be releasing the pictures of Osama Bin Laden's body, which if course is exactly the kind of intelligent and sensitive decision wee might expect from our President and his administration.

From this idiot's Twitter account:

What purpose would it serve to show the world the bloodied lifeless body of Osama Bin Laden?

Does this idiot NOT understand that doing so might very well enrage some currently ambivalent terrorists, and inspire them to launch an attack against our country?  Or to do the same in Egypt?  Or even Israel?

Oh, I guess I forgot that where Sarah comes from you always treat what you kill like nothing more than a trophy.

Don't you?

Rolling Stone Magazine writes in graphic detail about the crimes of Jeremy Morlock and the men of Bravo Company.

Cpl. Jeremy Morlock with Staff Sgt. David Bram

From Rolling Stone:

The poppy plants were still low to the ground at that time of year. The two soldiers, Cpl. Jeremy Morlock and Pfc. Andrew Holmes, saw a young farmer who was working by himself among the spiky shoots. Off in the distance, a few other soldiers stood sentry. But the farmer was the only Afghan in sight. With no one around to witness, the timing was right. And just like that, they picked him for execution.

He was a smooth-faced kid, about 15 years old. Not much younger than they were: Morlock was 21, Holmes was 19. His name, they would later learn, was Gul Mudin, a common name in Afghanistan.

He was wearing a little cap and a Western-style green jacket. He held nothing in his hand that could be interpreted as a weapon, not even a shovel. The expression on his face was welcoming. "He was not a threat," Morlock later confessed.

Morlock and Holmes called to him in Pashto as he walked toward them, ordering him to stop. The boy did as he was told. He stood still.

The soldiers knelt down behind a mud-brick wall. Then Morlock tossed a grenade toward Mudin, using the wall as cover. As the grenade exploded, he and Holmes opened fire, shooting the boy repeatedly at close range with an M4 carbine and a machine gun.

Mudin buckled, went down face first onto the ground. His cap toppled off. A pool of blood congealed by his head.

The loud retort of the guns echoed all around the sleepy farming village. The sound of such unexpected gunfire typically triggers an emergency response in other soldiers, sending them into full battle mode. Yet when the shots rang out, some soldiers didn't seem especially alarmed, even when the radio began to squawk. It was Morlock, agitated, screaming that he had come under attack. On a nearby hill, Spc. Adam Winfield turned to his friend, Pfc. Ashton Moore, and explained that it probably wasn't a real combat situation. It was more likely a staged killing, he said – a plan the guys had hatched to take out an unarmed Afghan without getting caught.

This article is very in depth and NOT for the faint of heart. However it is a must read for those who want to REALLY understand what this once angry young hockey player from Wasilla, Alaska participated in while representing our country overseas.

For those who have come here to defend Jeremy Morlock in the past, while claiming how misunderstood he is, your task will become substantially more difficult after people read exactly what went on in Afghanistan.

Before the military found itself short of troops in Afghanistan and Iraq, Morlock was the kind of bad-news kid whom the Army might have passed on. He grew up not far from Sarah Palin in Wasilla, Alaska; his sister hung out with Bristol, and Morlock played hockey against Track. In those days, he was constantly in trouble: getting drunk and into fights, driving without a license, leaving the scene of a serious car accident. Even after he joined the Army, Morlock continued to get into trouble. In 2009, a month before he deployed to Afghanistan, he was charged with disorderly conduct after burning his wife with a cigarette. After he arrived in Afghanistan, he did any drug he could get his hands on: opium, hash, Ambien, amitriptyline, flexeril, phenergan, codeine, trazodone.

Morlock does NOT come off as a hesitant participant here, but rather a cold blooded killer who callously treated the Afghans he killed as big game trophies rather than human beings.

Then, in a break with protocol, the soldiers began taking photographs of themselves celebrating their kill. Holding a cigarette rakishly in one hand, Holmes posed for the camera with Mudin's bloody and half-naked corpse, grabbing the boy's head by the hair as if it were a trophy deer. Morlock made sure to get a similar memento.

The article contains many more horrible, heartrending details, including the fact that this "kill team" operated out in the open and did nothing to hide their activities.  As well as the fact that they were not the only ones conducting these "staged killings" and that the Army is complicit in a massive cover-up.

A mother's anguish. Jeremy Morlock's mother blames the military for her son's crimes against innocent Afghanistan citizens.

Accused killer Jeremy Morlock plead guilty to three counts of murder, one count of conspiracy to commit assault and battery and one count of illegal drug use, and was sentenced to twenty four years in prison.

Morlock has claimed that he was suffering from injury to his brain and under the influence of his unit's "crazy" sergeant, who he says was the ringleader of the group, and the one who planned the murders of innocent civilians.

His mother however believes the answer is a little more conspiratorial.

From the Mat-Su Frontiersman:

“They (the military)  don’t back these guys, they don’t care if they die or don’t die,” she said. “They turn their backs as quick as they can. It’s not only his unit (involved in criminal activity), there’s all kinds of (stuff) going on over there.”

She said the military knew or should have known about what was happening and could have intervened. She also believes her son and the other soldiers were doing what they were ordered to by superior officers.

“You know, he followed orders,” Audrey Morlock said. “It’s just like he followed orders on the (Houston High) hockey team. If (the coach) told him to go check, even if it meant going in the penalty box, he’d go in the penalty box for the team.”

As much as I empathize with Mrs. Morlock's pain and feelings of disbelief at the things her son has now admitted to having done in Afghanistan, surely she understands the difference between playing rough at a hockey coach's insistence and engaging in the following activities:

Entering 11 guilty pleas to various charges ranging from assaulting a fellow soldier who squealed on him to murdering three men who'd done him no harm, Army Spc. Jeremy Morlock this morning became the first of five accused Joint Base Lewis-McChord Stryker soldiers to admit killing civilians in Afghanistan, thought to be the most serious war crimes yet in that 10-year war.

I seriously doubt that the higher ups wanted Jeremy and his fellow soldiers to murder civilians, and following orders is no excuse for killing an innocent human being.

And certainly no excuse to then stand over that victim like a proud hunter over a recently killed elk.

(Beware graphic image blow!)

As much as I want to give Jeremy, and his mother, the benefit of the doubt, there is NO way that this can simply be blamed on war fatigue or the desire to be a good soldier. Not this.

What factors turn a young hockey player from Wasilla into a cold blooded killer?

The other day I was sent a link from politics.gather.com which asked the following question concerning the horrible pictures of Jeremy Morlock and his fellow soldiers posing with murdered civilians in Afghanistan:

Posing with a dead afghan is bad enough. Posing like a hunter with a trophy kill is another thing entirely. Is it the result of hunter/killer philosophies of a trophy kills like those symbolized by conservatives like Sarah Palin? Or is it a sign of the insanity brought on by the horrors of war?

In my opinion the question deserves an answer.

Like many Alaskans Jeremy Morlock grew up hunting. But not everybody who engages in those activities does it for the same reasons.

Quite a few Alaskans hunt simply to fill their freezers with food, and do not take a great deal of joy out of ending the life of a fellow creature.  They do not see it as sport, but rather necessity.

These hunters do not send the creatures head to the taxidermist for mounting on their wall, nor do they stop and have their picture taken with their kill, to show their friends what great and powerful hunters they are.

But then there are others for whom the kill satisfies a deep and profound desire to take the life of a creature they consider their inferior.  To stake their claim at the top of the food chain if you will.

For these individuals, killing is simply not enough.  They must celebrate the taking of that life, and glorify their skill as a hunter, by finding some way to share their victory with others.

Most soldiers over in Afghanistan and Iraq take lives because sometimes THAT is their job.  They also do not want to take a picture of their handiwork, or have any memento that reminds them of what they had to do in the theater of war.  They come home from  the battle fatigued and forever changed psychologically, with no sense of victory at the death they have dealt for the good old US of A.

Others however revel in the feeling of domination over a people who they see as their inferiors, who they may begin to see as less than human even.  How long does it take a person with this mindset to go from being a hunter of animals, to becoming a hunter of human beings?

(Beware! Graphic images below.)

Will any of the Palin family testify on Jeremy Morlock's behalf?

As many of you know all too well, one of the soldiers that is on trial for murdering helpless Afghans, is a Palin family friend.

Jeremy Morlock was a hockey buddy of Track's, and his mother's twin sister even dated Todd for several years back in Dillingham before they both moved to Wasilla. 

Morlock's court martial will begin Wednesday for his part in the murders, though he has taken a plea deal that will reduce his sentence and also make him the key witness against the other soldiers who participated.

His mother, and Palin family friend, is blaming the military for turning her son into a murderer:

Morlock's mother, in an interview with The Seattle Times, blames much of her son's plight on a failure of Army leaders to oversee the platoon's behavior and actions.

"I think the government is just playing these guys as scapegoats. The leaders dropped the ball. Who was watching over all this?" Audrey Morlock said.

I am certainly not going to suggest that Jeremy was a killer before he went into the military, but I do know that he had some difficulties controlling his anger and possibly some substance abuse issues as well. Which should not come as a surprise considering he is the product of his environment.

Apparently to help create sympathy for Jeremy the defense is calling in some character witnesses from Wasilla to stand up in court and provide testimony on his behalf.

During the court-martial's sentencing phase, the defense is expected to bring to the stand Alaskans who can offer a different perspective on Morlock.

As mentioned before Track was a very close friend to Jeremy when they were kids so it is certainly possible that he would be called as a character witness, and Jeremy's sister April Morlock is still extremely close to Bristol, so the eldest Palin daughter would be a viable candidate to call as well. I would imagine that Todd also might be on that list, since it seems he often handled the bulk of the parenting duties.

And of course there is one other.

Hockey also was Morlock's passion. He played for years on a tight-knit youth team that included a childhood friend, Track Palin, son of former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, who volunteered as team manager.

Now if it were me, and I had the opportunity to call the ex-Governor of Alaska to testify on my client's behalf, I would not hesitate to do so.  I cannot guarantee that has occurred to Morlock's defense team but, if they are worth a damn, it has to have at least crossed their minds.

However the question is how hard would Sarah Palin work to keep herself, and her family, as far away from this embarrassing spectacle as possible?

Especially after images like this have recently turned up on the internet, of Jeremy taking joy in the death of another human being. (Beware image below is quite graphic!)

Sarah Palin's whole bullshit mythology is wrapped around her image as a hockey mom from a small town, who is a huge supporter of the military, and a defender of Bush's decision to invade both Iraq and Afghanistan.

How damaging would it be to her credibility, and her image, if she  had to appear on the witness stand to testify that a man who did what Jeremy Morlock has admitted doing, was just a regular kid from her small town (The town in fact she was once the mayor of.), who she drove to and from hockey practice, and who engaged in these atrocities while participating in a war that SHE supported?

Doesn't exactly match Palin's version of the quaint small town life that she has been painting these last two and a half years now does it?

No I have to imagine that the Grizzled Mama wants to stay as far away from this horrible incident as humanly possible.  And that goes for her family as well. However if she were asked by the defense team, and she turns them down, would we ever know?

Well I for one would certainly like to. Wouldn't you?