And in this corner we have another internet tough guy…
I don’t know who “David Axe” is either, but he’s a big enough Moran that he deserves an honorary PHD from Harvard.
The tagline of his blog is “We go to war so you don’t have to” which ought to shock the shit out of the Palmetto State because Axe is in Columbia. He wrote a book about ROTC, a institution I am familiar with having taken ROTC in his home state. The reviews of said book were….not good.
Axe seems to have cherry-picked the cadets that he interviewed to back up his obvious anti-war and anti-Army bias. He for the most part bases his book the few cadets who failed, had doubts about the program, felt persecuted, were sub-standard, and or were not respected by the majority of the cadet battalion. I would not argue with wanting to present that side of the story if he had based his book on the majority of cadets. The majority of young men and women were there to learn how to be leaders so that they could simply go and serve their country.
and
As a current ROTC Professor of Military Science, I was very excited to learn that a book had been written about Army ROTC. I ordered a couple of copies and I and the staff read on, hoping to incorporate the book into our Freshman course. I will say that the book is at least written at the high school / college freshman level, so it has that going for it (and that it can be read in a couple of hours). Unfortunately, Axe does a woeful job in accurately portraying a “Year in the Life” of an ROTC program, and too often intersperses expletive-laden descriptors as color commentary, and throws in the occasional Political-Military opinion into the mix, disrupting the flow of the narrative and turning off many readers in mid-stream.
and
It was a very quick read, without any weighty intellectualism to slow me down as I tore through this nasty little book. Axe– a writer for the Village Voice, no less– finds a way to work his anti-war sentiment into every crevice of this book while simultaneously failing to accurately capture the spirit and motivation of the young men and women who are preparing to lead the next generation of American Soldiers.
Anyway, in his awesomely titled Calling Out the Blackfive Blog’s Extremist Rhetoric, Axe begins with:
Two years ago in D.C., I had drinks with two founding members of Blackfive, a popular conservative military blog. Jim Hanson, who goes by the handle “Uncle Jimbo” at the blog , pitched me his idea for a private, Internet-based intelligence organization that would use young freelance writers as field agents. With their journalism credentials as cover, the writers would gather data for use by U.S. government agencies.
It was, I said, the worst idea I’d heard in a long time.
I have no idea what was said at this meeting, but let’s assume for the sake of argument that everything Axe says here is true. Um, yeah, dude…. YOU WERE OUT DRINKING WITH JIMBO. If I had a $1 for every bad idea of Jimbos discussed in a bar, I would be on my yacht in Fijian waters enjoying a Mojito with the Olsen twins. Jimbo has more hair-brained schemes before 9am than most octogenarians have had in a life time. He’s Jimbo. The beauty is sticking around until he has a good one, and then pondering whether he isn’t (in fact) the long sought after Missing Link of Darwin.
When I mentioned the incident a second time, I got text messages from one of Hanson’s friends, warning me that Blackfive might be planning some kind of punitive action against me — what, they didn’t say. My response: “Bring it on.” After lots of near misses courtesy of Al Qaeda, the Taliban, Al Shabab and the Chadian army, I’m really itching for a stand-up fight.
Yeah man, I also heard they put out a hit on you. They probably posted and facebook’d it. They said they wanted to give you a purple nurple, and that Jimbo was then going to shave the WLF logo into your back hair.
I love the Bushesque “Bring it on.” I mean seriously, this is some brave shit. How many times do you need to go to liveleak and see a video of Jimbo beheading someone before you take it seriously? Oh wait, I’ve been with Jimbo to ANSWER rallies and seen him try to pick up chicks. The dude is the international man of love. My worst fear with Jimbo is I might get a man hug. And if they were going to “come after you” why would they discuss it with Deep Throat?
What a minute….Did this ri-tard just compare Blackfive to “Al Qaeda, the Taliban, Al Shabab and the Chadian army.” Holy shit man, as a steward of civic discourse, I think you owe it to tune it down about 50 notches. How many Blackfive authors need to be assassinated by people hopped up on your heated rhetoric before you become a faithful steward of truth, justice, mercy and neighborliness?
All this is to say, Blackfive is not just a tacky blog, it’s actually dangerous — the kind of forum that encourages violence and hatred. Don’t believe me? In a recent post discussing the U.S. national debt, Blackfive blogger “Crush” all but advocated the violent overthrow of the U.S. government.
Yeah, any day now we should be seeing miscreants wearing “Don’t be a DouChe” shirts marauding through the streets of our Capitol screaming “Viva la Blackfive!” and “Blackfive Ackbar” as they march with their pitchforks.
I think the only way to derail this crazy train is with a good defense. Make sure every street in DC has at least one Irish Pub advertising Guinness. Then brave sir Robin David Axe can call a J-Dam in on them.
Seriously, what’s in the water lately?
BWAHAHAHA: I just got an email from a birdie who was once with Axe on a boat, when he kept introducing himself thusly: “I am David Axe, foreign correspondent.”
David was late, pompous and condescending. Favorite Axe memory? After disdaining Dramamine/Bonine because he was a world traveller/foreign correspondent, Axe was dying and puking in the male blogger stateroom (they couldn’t handle troop berthing like me) right next to the wardroom. He was moaning about the smell of bacon cooking. Mmmmmdelicious bacon. I had extra while I smiled and listened to the pain.
I am TSO, internet provacateur, and I endorse this message.
Category: Politics
I heard they were putting him on double secret probation.
Likely, Axe was out of his element when dealing with UJ. Jimbo was more likely yanking the guy’s chain, seeing how many buttons he could push at one setting.
God forbid Axe ever goes on liberty with a bunch of airdales. A girly man from the VilVo would likely be comatose for a week.
But TSO, this ain’t something coming from a water-born disease. It’s more underhanded crap from Axelrod’s Zampolits. They’re running scared because they understand their power is about to disappear come November.
Now we know that B5 reached its pinnacle :o) You only get this kind of crap when you are really big :o) There is an old Russian fable about an elephant and a teacup terrier called Moska. Moska is yapping its tiny head off at an elephant who could not even see the tiny yapper and continues on its way. However, Moska’s fellow teacup terriers are all in awe: Moska must be strong and brave since she is barking up an elephant.
And yeah, drinking with Jimbo?? I guess it takes a girl to tell a guy to take anything a guy tells you at the bar with a huge grain of salt LOL
Now I’m going to have to find where my wife put my Don’t be a Dou-Che shirt and head for downtown Seattle
Can I pre-order a Blackfive Akbar shirt from RangerUp? ‘Cause I want one!
Heh. Apparently he has been schooled UJ style. I guess he hasn’t seen all of Uncle j’s videos wherein he makes the idiots look like, um, idiots!!
Olga, that quote is going up in my favorite quotes section, as is CV’s bit above. ROFTL!
Ah tormenting the queasy. Takes me back to my days on a cruiser giving the nubs on their first underway a hard time.
“Pass the mustard the jello is bland”. “Aren’t you going to eat the fat? Pass it over.” And trying to make the throttleman in EOS blow chunks by standing in front of his viewing window and swaying back and forth.
Me thinks that the marching orders have gone out, since both Pimp and Ho Degree and now sooper trooper Axe say the exact same thing in regards to what Crush wrote. I’ll be waiting patiently for sooper motor pool trooper to say the same thing.
I’m a little disappointed that Jimbo didn’t try to recruit me into his League of Extraordinary Spies in the Traveling Yellow Pants.
That must’ve been when he was convinced I was dying.
Nucsnipe–I guarantee that on a boat we’d have this guy in the fetal position and crying uncontrollably before the end of the maneuvering watch.
Wait…what? You aren’t dying Jonn?
The only reason I have been posting here is because of what the Make a Wish Foundation said was your dying request.
Screw this, Good Day Sir!
Just don’t tell Matt.
too late…
NH We saved the tough stuff for the terminally stupid. I remember walking into my berthing one day and seeing the berthing P.O. (known to us as Howie the Duck) mummified in duct tape, leaned in the corner wearing a sign “Gear adrift this Mother-bleeper”
OK, I’m in Columbia, 13 years now matter of fact, and I can say without doudt, I have never heard of this asshat. If he is here, he must be such a little meaningless fish that none of us right wing extremist retired military types have noticed his chirping. Seriously, who is this guy LOL.
Of course that was before they changed the meaning of Hazing from educational to demeaning.
Damn, didn’t know I was going to need the waterproof mascara today, laughed til I cried.
No shit, there I wuz…..David Axe, Foriegn correspondant and international man of mystery trying to show Uncle Jimbo how to pretend to be a journalist whilst gathering data for the Bushitlercheney regime…….
What a freakin’ wanker…..I’m dying for Uncle J’s smackdown…
I think Jimbo is too busy working. I talked to him briefly yesterday about something unrelated, but today he’s been in radio silence. Honestly, I don’t think he cares either way, I just didn’t think this shit deserved a total pass.
NucSnipe,
heh… we used to get the nuggets airsick. We’d stand around them in heavy weather puffing on cigars while the aircraft rocked and rolled.
The best one though was to heat up a small can of beef vegetable soup and dump it into an airsick bag and close the top. Then I’d start acting like I was getting sick, and finally grab for the bag, open it up and pretend to hurl into it. When done, I’d set it on the console with the top open so the fumes could waft out.
If that didn’t work, then the sure-fire method was to grab the bag, sniff at it, then tilt it up and take a swig. the nugget would usually hurl before he could get to the head or grab a bag. 🙂
Honestly, I don’t think he cares either way
Probably not, I’m just starting to laugh in anticipation…. In deference to Uncle J I probably should refered to him as a “wanking device”….
Nuc–try a dependents cruise where one of the guy’s father-in-law was some self-proclaimed crusty/salty bastard, telling us how it was in the “real” Navy and how he NEVER ONCE got sick.
Typically this triggers a Pavlovian response in submariners, somewhat akin to walking up to said submariner and making a response that starts with (or is in entirety), “No balls…”
Long story short, transiting out, most of the group including COF (crusty old fart) on mess decks. A-ganger number one stumbles in, looking ill, and “barfs” a mouthful of succotash on the table in front of COF. A-ganger number two squeals with delight, grabs a spoon, and starts eating. COF lost it right there.
Captain was NOT amused when he found out. Neither were many of the dependents, but some thought it was fuckin hilarious.
[…] UPDATE: This Ain’t Hell takes a couple of swings as well. […]
OT- That was priceless…I have tears in my eyes from laughter!!
Can just hear Uncle J calling someone a “wanker” with that midwest accent!!
From the anti-war side, I’ll note three things.
1) I have not read this book and do not plan to.
2) Soldiers and pre-soldiers are not monolithic. They have all sorts of different ideas. People cherry pick from both sides all the time.
3) I, too, have gone drinking around Uncle Jimbo. I vaguely remember some harebrained schemes, but not in any detail, because, well, I was drinking too. I think I also had some harebrained schemes. But I defend that this does not make him a nefarious mastermind. And I have no political reason to defend him. TSO just happens to be right on this one.
The book sucked azz. Drinkin’ with Jimbo would be more fun even if he were passed-out. Soldiers… well, there’re lots of ’em (even the dorks who couldn’t pass AIT but still claim to be “black ops” somewhere “secret”).
Just tell the Dinks getting queasy at PD to sit in the mess decks and gaze at the bug juice sloshing back and forth… And baaack and forth… to “fight off sea sickness”, then stand clear. LOL.