Mitt Romney Fondly Recalls French Vacations and the marvelous, REFRESHING lack of Viet Cong gunfire

[pinboy3niner]

(This is a cross-post of Amerigo Vespucci's post in GD.)

FUCK YOU, you cowardly piece of shit.

Mitt Romney Fondly Recalls French Vacations, Anticipates More

The Huffington Post | By Arthur Delaney Posted: 04/23/2012 1:52 pm Updated: 04/23/2012 4:20 pm



http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/04/23/mitt-romney-france-trips_n_1446328.html

During a press conference in Pennsylvania on Monday, Republican presidential hopeful Mitt Romney gushed about vacations in France and said he looked forward to visiting again.

"I have a lot memories of France," Romney said in response to a reporter's question. "The best memories were with my wife on vacations from time to time in France. The last vacation we had there, walking around the city of Paris and walking not just the Champs-Élysées but also over to the Jardin of Luxembourg and around the city -- one of the most magnificent cities in the world. And I look forward to occasional vacations again in such a beautiful place."

Romney previously told the National Review that a president shouldn't take "elaborate vacations" in response to a question about the spending scandal at the General Services Administration.

"The example starts at the top," Romney said. "People have to see that the president is not taking elaborate vacations and spending in a way that is inconsistent with the state of the overall economy and the state of the American family." Starting in 1966, Romney spent 30 months in France as a Mormon missionary.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/1002821630

[opihimoimoi]

1. Mitt is unfitt.....he is a 1 %er

[pinboy3niner]

2. More than that--he advocates war and others serving and dying--but not him or his sons

He fits to a T the definition of a chickenhawk.

[exboyfil]

3. A debate question for him

should be as follows:
"You protested individuals who protested the Vietnam War, but you yourself took every advantage for deferment from the draft. Does not these two positions make you hypocritical?

[Mponti]

6. real question is...

Is a draft dodger qualified to be commander in chief?

[Godot51]

4. Never Been to France

I've never been to France
but I've seen the elephant
and watched the monsoons dance
on the muddy water
churning in the PBR's wake.
I've listened to the cant of the CPO's rant
but I've never been to France,
I'd like to have had the chance.

I've never been to France
but I've ridden the tornado
and watched the bullets dance
through the muddy water
churning in the PBR's wake.
I came in bravado through Laredo
but I've never been to France,
and I never had the chance.

I've never been to France
but I've seen beaucoup grunts fall
and watched them do the death dance
in the muddy water
churning in the PBR's wake.
I let engines stall but now they're on the wall,
and they never got to France,
though I'm sure they'd have liked the chance.

[zbdent]

7. I've never been to me ....

[CRK7376]

19. Great poetry

emerges from every war. This one says it all. Thanks guys. For me its that RPG whoosh and sound of incoming 122s.
Afghanistan '02-'03

[Victor_c3]

22. Art is a great outlet for the intense emotions war and combat bring about

It's a challenge that most veterans aren't up to, but I feel it is a combat veteran's responsibility to spread the word of how shitty war is - and art is a great way to do that.

I know I didn't feel any overwhelming sense of patriotism or glory while I was deployed in Iraq in 2004. The general population needs to be constantly reminded of the horrors of war, not immages and propaganda of how glorious it is. People like George W. Bush and Romney who say that they feel cheated out of the opportunity to fight in a war and miss out on the "glorry" (I wish I could find the quotes, especially from George W. [I believe he was giving a speach to the 82nd Airborne Division before they were getting ready to deploy]) are dangerous.

Here is an alarming statistic: the ratio of civilians killed to Soldiers killed in wars in the 20th century is 10:1 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Civilian_casualty_ratio)

[era veteran]

20. Are you the author and may I post this elsewhere.

I'm in a Facebook group, Army Brotherhood of Tankers...
Only a few of us there are liberals.
I would give credit.
Thanks R

[The Wizard]

5. Here's something Mitt never heard

5-2 this is 3 niner. We have movement in the treeline. Coordinates, I shackle, Mike Oscar Whiskey, Papa Uniform Delta.
Add 100, right 5 zero.

[pinboy3niner]

10. Fire for effect

It's not the first thing you'd think of, but probably my most important skill as a platoon leader, and the thing that earned me the most respect, was map reading. We never got lost, even out in the triple canopy, and I could call in arty on a dime (we never had an FO with us).

To grunts, having effective fire support in combat--and and being able to get the birds in fast when you need to be extracted in a hurry--is pretty important.

Thanks for the flashback, Wiz. And welcome home, brother!

[The Wizard]

11. Makes me feel

like being 20 again. Crazy as is sounds. I saw 1:05 on a clock and spent half the night thinking about cannon fire.

[pinboy3niner]

13. Sounds like time for a radio check

But when you're sitting out there on ambush, you don't talk. Just break squelch twice.

I turned 21 on a mountain in the A Shau Valley on a night that I was sure we'd be overrun and I was going to die.

Somehow we made it, and we're still here. Pretty amazing, isn't it, brother?

[The Wizard]

15. 3 niner - this is five 2

radio check, over

[zbdent]

8. but ... but ... but ...

France? Wasn't there some intense hatred of all things "French" not that long ago?

Look for the "liberally-biased media" to push some intense amnesia ...

[Historic NY]

9. We went from freedom fries to Mitt & fromage

[permatex]

12. What a POS

while guys like us were ducking hostile fire from the VC and NVA, he was in France enjoying the good life.
What a slap at the VN Vets. He's not even qual. to command a Boy Scout troop much less America's Armed Forces.

U.S. Navy Corpsman
1st BN 26th Marines
RVN 1968-1969

[pinboy3niner]

14. Doc, I'm still in touch with my medic from VN

He found me after 20 years--and he told me he still has the letter I wrote him after being medevac'd to an Army hospital in the States, with my PS: "Your bedside manner sucks!"

Today, Doc works for the VA--in prosthetics. I don't know how in hell he does it, after VN.

[permatex]

16. I am still in touch with some of the Marines I had the honor to serve with.

Last edited Mon Jul 2, 2012, 12:04 AM - Edit history (1)

I arrived in country in early Jan. of 68 and was assigned to the 1st BN 26th Marines at Khe Sanh. Late Jan. all hell broke loose and I was up to my ass treating wounded Marines. I didn't have time to really make buddies with them but I took it hard everytime I lost one. Was wounded in the early stages of the siege, took a piece of shrapnel in the right leg but kept on going, what choice did I really have?

Anyway, after I got back to the world, I finished my enlistment, became a Paramedic and spent the next 30 years doing what I did in VN.
I knew alot of Paramedics who were former Navy Corpsman in VN. Once a Corpsman, always a Corpsman.

[pinboy3niner]

17. We also were in I Corps, but a little farther South than you

We were in Thua Tien province, operating mainly from Hue/Phu Bai out into the A Shau Valley. iirc, we were up against elements of the 24th or25th NVA Divis8on.

We did get up in your neck of the woods in Dec. '69, when an NVA regiment crossed the Z on a mission to attack the city of Quang Tri. We were told that the enemy got into terrain that our Army unit up there, the 5th Mech, couldn't get into--so they wanted an airmobile battalion to find and fix them.

We spent maybe 4 or 5 days up there, culminating in an all-night battle against the NVA regiment. For our victory, they sent us ice cream, lol. My platoon had cached our rucks and moved up the valley during the night. We hadn't eaten in 36 hours and, after having to dig out NVA body parts from their blown bunkers, they were sending us syrupy sweet ice cream to eat out of our steel pots.

[permatex]

18. To this day whenever I hear a loud bang

I still cringe and think of the arty and morter rounds thrown at us.

As far as I'm concerned, Mittens has no credibility with me, while mine and your friends and comrades were fighting and dying, he was living in relative safety. He could have enlisted and served but he took the, in my opinion, cowards way out.
Fuck him.

[Victor_c3]

21. I totally get the ice cream story

I'm a new guy on this forum, but I really enjoyed your comments on this thread.

I served as an Infantry Platoon Leader for 13 months in Iraq and I really get everything that you said. Even when I was in Iraq I wondered what the point of the war was (and the Soldiers in my platoon openly stated how stupid the war was to them too). However, like it sounds like you did, I busted my ass and gave the Army and my fellow Soldiers everything I had. For an example of a "real" leader we need to look at the lower officer ranks and mid level NCOs (Staff Sergeants and Sergeant First Class) in the combat arms sections of our Army. Real leaders don't look like people like Willard "Mitten(s)" Romney who never actually had to face real adversity.

Your ice cream story sounds a lot like what happened to me after my first firefight. After the firefight (which maybe lasted 5-10 minutes at most and resulted in 6 enemy dead and 2 enemy wounded, we had to recover the dead and I never felt so terrible in my life. I just felt completely ashamed of what I had just done. Seeing what my weapons did to people for the first time was a very traumatic event to me. We stuffed the dead into body bags and tied them to the outside of our armored vehicles like you would deer after a hunt and bring them back to our base. There was no way I was actually going to put a dead Iraqi in one of my vehicles. Dead bodies are nasty (I'll spare the description and details unless someone really wants to know). It was as awfull as it sounds.

We got back to our base and the cooks who were attached to my company took it upon themselves to make us a "victory" feast of BBQ ribs. I've never felt so ashamed of anything I ever did in my life and here I was being rewarded with BBQ ribs for it!

[WooWooWoo]

23. i don't think you should feel ashamed

any meal you get following a combat mission where nobody on your left or right got killed is a good meal.

[glacierbay]

24. You don't need to explain anything to those of us here

I saw my share of torn apart bodies, friend and foe, in Vietnam.
Welcome home brother Vet.