To: Various
From: Sgt. Mom
Re: A Surfeit of Crow

1. What a deliciously rich week this has been, as regards legacy media meltdowns! I can barely keep up with it all. Every time I repair to the kitchen for another bowl of popcorn,( lightly salted with schadenfreude) there is another development. At this point it looks rather like the stateroom scene in the Marx Brothers “Night at the Opera”. It’s as if everyone wants their fifteen minutes of infamy all at once.

2. Ted Rall has flexed his buns and squeezed out another offensive turd of a cartoon, alleging the extreme stupidity of those who join the military and claiming (if I can read his lettering correctly) that every one of them killed raises the overall IQ of the United States. To which I have two reactions: One – someone still publishes Ted Rall? And two: He hasn’t met too many military people lately, has he? A fair percentage of them do attend college, one way or the other – the conventional indicia, for what that is worth. Regardless, I’d bet most of them could draw better drunk than Ted Rall can sober.

3. A formerly obscure reporter for McClatchy Newspapers decides to be a total d**k to a soldier guarding an entry point to the Green Zone in Baghdad, and play the “Do you know who I am?” card? Note to Mr. Bobby Calvan – this gambit is only really effective if the public easily recognizes your face, or in Brittny Spears’ case, your nether regions. Mr. Calvan then compounds this bad judgment by lovingly detailing the incident on his blog, in an account which fairly oozes with faux-macho bravado and self-regard. He is promptly slammed with nearly two hundred comments unanimously pointing out with varying degrees of wit, exactly what kind of d**k he is. As was the phrase at Mount Gleason Junior High School, “he was chopped down so low he could play Sea Hunt in a loogie”.Such a beat-down is rare and to be cherished; and although Mr. Calvan took down the whole post and the comment string, it was saved and replicated by others for the delectation and amusement of us all.

4. Hollywood’s current string of anti-war movies are tanking like the Titanic… all except possibly “The Kingdom”, AKA “CSI-Riyadh”. Well then, what did you guys expect – as I pointed out here “No, we will not line up and plunk down our movie ticket dollars to have our country slimed, our military family members defamed and our efforts to fight terrorists belittled, and all the glowing reviews from your media buds will not make us toddle down to the multiplex to watch your damned movie. At least the Hollywierd ‘tards can comfort themselves with the thought of how well their anti-war wankfests will play on foreign movie screens. And all their media syncophants will coo and ahh and tell them how brave they are, speaking “trooth to power”! Apparently none of these “creative geniuses”* paid attention to the guy from www.boxofficemojo.com who pointed out “…audiences seek out movies for inspiration, for laughter and to be moved.” Yes, the audiences in flyover country America have indeed figured out that the yellow stuff pissing down on us from the cinematic clouds is not rain. You want to make movies for the overseas audience? Be my guest – everyone needs a hobby. But it looks like American audiences outside your little circle have a better use for their time and money than indulging you in yours.

5. And the wall of denial regarding Baghdad Diarist and Hemmingway wanna-be Scott Thomas Beauchamp finally crumbled, spectacularly! To quote P.J. O’Rourke – just desserts! Just hors d’ oeuvres! A just main course of crow! Practically every veteran or serving military member took one look at the infamous posting (once their attention had been drawn to it) and thought – “Gee, that doesn’t sound quite right…” Young Pvt. Beauchamp may survive the debacle relatively unscathed, but it doesn’t look like gullible editor Franklin Foer will for long. Frankie, Frankie, Frankie – it’s not the crime; it’s the cover-up, as I am sure anyone who recalls Watergate could tell you. Jeeze, I’ll bet he falls for Nigerian spam emails asking for his bank account number. Some people are just too damn gullible to be in the news business!

Thank you all for providing this rich vein of amusement. I can hardly wait for next week.

Sincerely,

Sgt Mom

* viciously skeptical quote marks