All Hank, all the time.

[Spanky]

Originally posted by Cletus Miller
Ignoring that the complaints are apparently coming mostly from senior officers, because the governement is paying them to reenlist? From the article:

"So far this year, the Army has doled out an average bonus of $14,000, to eligible soldiers, for a total of $610 million in extra payments.

'The bonuses have a lot to do with it, along with a feeling of accomplishment that comes with doing their mission,' said Army spokesman Henry Minitrez."

They could have given out triple the bonuses they are giving out now during Vietnam, and there still is no way they would have gotten these type of retention rates.

In addition, if it is such a hopeless quagmire why are they getting that "feeling of accomplishment that comes with doing their mission".

[Gattigap]

Originally posted by Spanky
If people in the military are so convinced that the administration has screwed up in Iraq, that Iraq is a senseless war, and we have no chance of succeeding - why are they all reenlisting.

http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories...08-30-16-43-14

Because we're lowering the standards for admission. Duh.

link

• Col. Peter Mansoor commands the Army-Marine Counterinsurgency Center at Fort Leavenworth, Kan. The story quotes him thus:
  
  ``The challenge is to train the force not what to think, but how to think. Counterinsurgency is a thinking soldier's war. It is graduate-level stuff. There is public relations, civil affairs, information operations. It is not easy.''
  
  To read Bender's story is to be reminded -- and to be grateful -- that the Army has a corps of super-bright young officers who know how to read a scoreboard. Unfortunately, they're not in charge yet.
  
  Also this month, David Wood of the Baltimore Sun reported, ``At a time when the Defense Department is calling for the `best and the brightest' to fight today's tricky and unconventional wars, the Army is quietly signing up thousands of low-scoring recruits, who historically have performed less well, in order to meet its recruiting goals.''
  
  Let's see . . . one of the lessons of the past three years is that we're going to need smarter soldiers. So let's lower the standards.
  
  Wood reported that by the time the federal fiscal year ends Sept. 30, the Army will have signed up 3,200 ``Category IV'' recruits, kids who scored below the 31st percentile on the Armed Forces Qualifications Test given to all recruits. Just two years ago, only 500 ``Category IV'' recruits were allowed to sign up.
  
  College kids are not beating a path to recruiting offices. Nor are young people with the technical or trade skills needed in the job market. The Iraq war has made recruiters' jobs a lot more difficult. Despite enlistment bonuses and other perks, if the Army had not lowered its standards, it would have missed its goal of recruiting 80,000 new soldiers this year.
  
  If you add this year's 3,200 Category IV recruits to the 2,900 who signed up last year, it means that for the next three years the Army will field two brigades' worth of soldiers who finished in the bottom 30 percent of all those taking the test.

[Spanky]

Originally posted by Gattigap
Because we're lowering the standards for admission. Duh.

How does lowering the standards help reenlistment? I understand how it would help push up new enlistees? Duh?

[Gattigap]

Originally posted by Spanky
How does lowering the standards help reenlistment? I understand how it would help push up new enlistees? Duh?

Oh, my bad. We're all cool because they've met their retention goals. Never mind.

[Penske_Account]

Originally posted by Gattigap
Oh, my bad. We're all cool because they've met their retention goals. Never mind.

I sense a hatred for America and freedom in your post...why?

[Spanky]

Originally posted by Gattigap
Oh, my bad. We're all cool because they've met their retention goals. Never mind.

:violin:


I know that wasn't really appropriate. I just wanted to use it again because I think it is cool.

[ltl/fb]

Originally posted by Spanky
In addition, if it is such a hopeless quagmire why are they getting that "feeling of accomplishment that comes with doing their mission".

An ARMY SPOKESMAN was the one who said that they are getting a "feeling of accomplishment that comes with doing their mission." WTF? That's like Paris Hilton's spokesman saying "Paris deeply regrets her friend Brandon's statements about firecrotch. Paris admires Lindsay very much and has called to express her dismay at Brandon's actions, and to assure Lindsay that she in no way shares his feelings."

Do you get, like, gulliblER (if that is possible) late at night?

[Spanky]

Originally posted by ltl/fb


Do you get, like, gulliblER (if that is possible) late at night?

No I am always very gullible. Ask Slave.

[Cletus Miller]

Originally posted by ltl/fb
An ARMY SPOKESMAN was the one who said that they are getting a "feeling of accomplishment that comes with doing their mission." WTF?

In fairness, "doing" a mission is similar to a "sucessful" test. And the re-enlistees are mostly enlisted personnel.

[Hank Chinaski]

• Series of 22 Bombs Explode in Thailand
  
  BANGKOK, Thailand — At least 22 bombs exploded almost simultaneously Thursday inside commercial banks in southern Thailand, killing two people and injuring 28 in a region bloodied by a Muslim insurgency, police said.
  
  The homemade bombs, which were triggered by mobile phone signals, were placed in garbage bins, at newspaper stands and near seats where customers wait for service in the banks in Yala province, said Maj. Gen. Paithoon Choochaiya who heads the provincial force.
  
  Authorities said that two suspects had been seized.
  
  
  A review of close-circuit video showed that some of the explosives were planted by women, police said.
  
  The army chief in the south, Lt. Gen. Ongkorn Thongprasom, said some of the apparently small devices were hidden in women's handbags or secreted into thick books carried by teenagers dressed in student uniforms.
  
  "We received some intelligence reports, but we did not anticipate it would happen inside banks, especially on the last day of the month. We don't believe they are that cruel," Ongkorn said. Banks are normally crowded at month's end with customers withdrawing funds from their deposited salary checks.

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,211428,00.html

I don't know about you Wonk, but it sounds like the governement is limiting its investigation to Muslims. We both know that's not wise. I've emailed the Thai embassy and suggested they look at UK/US tourists- so hopefully all bases will be covered.

[Penske_Account]

Originally posted by Hank Chinaski


http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,211428,00.html

I don't know about you Wonk, but it sounds like the governement is limiting its investigation to Muslims. We both know that's not wise. I've emailed the Thai embassy and suggested they look at UK/US tourists- so hopefully all bases will be covered.

Most helpful indeed. I think another example that backs Wonk up is the recent resolution to the Jon-Bennet Ramsey case. Spanky, being quick to jump to simplistic cause and effect solutions would have said the killer actually needed to be present at the crime scene to have committed (or been involved in the crime), thus, wholly overlooking the potential class of subjects such as John-Mark-David Karr. Wonk, like Mary Lacey, takes the broad totality of the possibilities in....

[Penske_Account]

Originally posted by Penske_Account
Most helpful indeed. I think another example that backs Wonk up is the recent resolution to the Jon-Bennet Ramsey case. Spanky, being quick to jump to simplistic cause and effect solutions would have said the killer actually needed to be present at the crime scene to have committed (or been involved in the crime), thus, wholly overlooking the potential class of subjects such as John-Mark-David Karr. Wonk, like Mary Lacey, takes the broad totality of the possibilities in....

eta: was JMDK wearing a Pink shirt with those hi-waisters?

[Penske_Account]

After months of generic polling numbers by Gallup and others showing the GOP lagged far behind the Democrats by a seemingly insurmountable nine to 10 points, the titanic political battle for control of Congress is virtually dead even.

My optimisticism that the ideological irrevelancy of the Democrat party being exposed, once again, at the polls, is heartened by this news. Spending a week away from the faux-intellectual eliticism of the cut-and-run maternalistic-big-brother-nanny-staters who control the blue city-state of my residence, and during such week being out in the heartland, amongst the average Joes and Josefinas of the real America, I was reminded of what makes this country great....

....Hatred for the enemy, love of G-d, guns, cheap cigarettes, roadside adult entertainment shacks and monstrous trucks! (not necessarily in that order.

[Mmmm, Burger (C.J.)]

Originally posted by Penske_Account
After months of generic polling numbers by Gallup and others showing the GOP lagged far behind the Democrats by a seemingly insurmountable nine to 10 points, the titanic political battle for control of Congress is virtually dead even.

My optimisticism that the ideological irrevelancy of the Democrat party being exposed, once again, at the polls, is heartened by this news. Spending a week away from the faux-intellectual eliticism of the cut-and-run maternalistic-big-brother-nanny-staters who control the blue city-state of my residence, and during such week being out in the heartland, amongst the average Joes and Josefinas of the real America, I was reminded of what makes this country great....

....Hatred for the enemy, love of G-d, guns, cheap cigarettes, roadside adult entertainment shacks and monstrous trucks! (not necessarily in that order.

I've never understood the value or relevance of national polls to local elections. What are the polls in the contested races?

[Penske_Account]

Originally posted by Mmmm, Burger (C.J.)
I've never understood the value or relevance of national polls to local elections. What are the polls in the contested races?

Doesnt a little known double secret codicil of the preemption doctrine apply here?