Bergdahl’s lawyers; how did this boob get in the Army, anyway?
According to Military.com, lawyers have switched gears from him leaving his post to report his platoon’s leadership for malfeasance to wondering how the Army allowed him to enlist in the first place;
[Eugene Fidell, Bergdahl’s lead lawyer] said that “given the circumstances surrounding Sgt. Bergdahl’s entry-level separation from the U.S. Coast Guard, the Army’s subsequent decision to enlist him with a waiver was improvident.”
Bergdahl was discharged from the Coast Guard in 2006 after only 26 days in basic training, reportedly because of his psychological state. In his letter, Fidell described Bergdahl as “naïve and at times unrealistic.”
Bergdahl joined the Army in 2008 at the height of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. In that same year, the Army War College reported that as many as one in five recruits was allowed to enlist with a waiver for health or other reasons, including arrest records.
The Washington Post last June, citing a senior Army official, reported that the Army was aware of Bergdahl’s previous administrative discharge from the Coast Guard when he joined.
Well, 2008 wasn’t “at the height of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan”. The surge in Iraq had ended…quite successfully, I might add. “Naïve and at times unrealistic” doesn’t disqualify recruits, unless there’s something new. I’m sure that it wouldn’t require a waiver, though. The lawyers are just grasping at straws now, and they look pretty funny doing it. Before he was Bergdah’s lawyer, Fidell was advocating that Bergdahl shouldn’t be punished at all, you know, despite the fact that US troops died looking for his criminal ass.
Category: Dumbass Bullshit
Rush calls the Rose Garden the Bergdahl Garden now.
He should call it Traitors’ Garden. That then encompasses uno hoo.
I need to thank all the brothers and sisters who served our country. My POW SSGT JAMES M. RAY has not yet come home. My granddaughter will carry on my cause and keep Jimmy in Websites until he comes home or she passes Jimmy to her child.
My health sucks, so I was thinking of going out to Arlington to put copies of my file, ten worn out bracelets and a wreath on my friends marker. I only know Jimmy by love, keeping him in my thoughts and wearing his bracelet since 1968. Would it be RUDE for me to do this since I never served. If you say don’t do it…no worries I will pass it as planned. I don’t want to piss off the very people who fought to keep us safe. God Bless America….Reb
Someone on Facebook commented that next, Bergdahl’s lawyers will tell us that he was kidnapped by aliens or an Afghan Sasquatch and turned over to the Haqqani.
Dude! I’m laughing so hard, tears are rolling down my face! The story itself is funny enough, but the Afghanistan Sasquatch comment pretty much put me over the edge, and now I’m giggling madly and can’t stop! Dammit! LMAO
Not much of a defense since the Afghan dragons ate the last Sasquatch before the Russians invaded.
Nah, the last Afghani sasquatch died of starvation looking for a goat that hadn’t been violated.
All the Afghan goats that haven’t been violated yet are females, and thus an infidel.
soooooo …. Jonn, paint us a word picture of an Afghani sasquatch … like Nicki I am having a hard time seeing the keyboard for the tears and typing for the shaking as I snicker.
Barney! That’s next, Barney! Or Bart. It could be Bart.
Damn, he’s given you a photo of one above – it’s right next to Bergdahl. What more do you want? (smile)
I posted a pic on the Facebook page that sums up what’s up, all I’m going to say is it’s last name is Jane Lol…..
sorry John, but those are low-land yeti’s not Sasquatch as Sasquatch are only native to North America 😉
John, Pvt Slovak was executed by firing squad for running away from the front lines. In his written statement that nailed his ass HE SAID HE WOULD KEEP RUNNING AWAY…Bergdahl walked away from his post. Played soccer with murderers. He is a TRAITOR AND SHOULD GET EXACTLY WHAT SLOVAK GOT. TRAITOR IS A TRAITOR….ELEVEN BULLETS, ONE BLANK. READY AIM LATER LOSER
The rope is still on standby.
Funny. I was discussing this with a neighbor two days ago and he brought this up and I predicted this would be a major part of his defense.
Looks like that panned out
Naive and unrealistic? Every 18 -19 year old kid that signs up for any service is naive and unrealistic at times. The reality sets in about the time the sneakers hit the yellow footprints. He got in in the first place by passing standardized mental and physical tests, and apparently by lying. Naive and unrealistic at times sounds like he could fill in for many in the current administration. Maybe when he gets out of the brig there will be a job for him in the DNC. He deserves to be shot.
This falls into the gigglesnort category.
Seriously, are these marones actually getting a paycheck for doing this? Cheech and Chong in Army green. Who knew? Tell them to stop it before they hurt themselves.
Afghan sasquatch – now that’s creative, and funny. He probably was kidnapped by aliens – from Didymoon.
I was naive and unrealistic until my first fire fight. The Marine Corps trained me to deal with reality quite well.
I’d like to see Fidell’s DD214. Three years coast guard and all during Vietnam…
What’s next, are his lawers going to claim he was abducted by an alien UFO? This gets crazier every day, I wonder how B. Hussein 0bama & Company will try to hide & spin this, they can’t blame Bush for this mess, and no matter what they say, they can’t hide the fact that US Personnel were wounded and killed trying to recover him, Bergdahl needs to answer for that!
All things aside, it appears the Coasties got this one right.
“Naive and at times unrealistic” = “Served with honor and distinction”.
I heard that the reason he left camp was to meet up with Elaine Ricci so that his could pick up an urgent delivery of Red Hat software from Elaine Ricci.
So now it’s the Army’s fault for enlisting him. Nice.
Let’s go even farther back and blame his dad for knocking up his mom.
This “Excuse of the Week” thing is getting old fast. But it’s also indicative of today’s culture of failing to accept responsibility for one’s own actions. Kinda sad actually.
Now hang the little bastard!
No it is the recruiters fault. Ever since 1972 when I was recruited I had thought that more recruiters should have been sent to jail. This should be a good reason to line a couple up and shoot them. Maybe just for some balance the line-up could be something like:
Recruiter—Lawer—Random Poser—Bergdahl—Another Poser—Lawer—Recruiter
(Oops, I thunk that I missed speel Lawyer)
On the other side there is a lot of USCG people high-fiving themselves for their 2006 decision.
Highly Theoretical Situation:
The time is June/July, 2008.
New Recruiter, in his first month of TTE(Training and Transitional Evaluation) Program after graduating from Recruiter’s school, is assigned to the Hailey, ID area station.
The new recruiter is “rolling a doughnut” for the month and needs some help.
The station commander slides Bergdahl to the new recruiter to get his feet wet and to build up his confidence.
Bergdahl makes it through MEPS and actually ships.
Everybody gives a big sigh of relief and life goes on.
As I said, highly theoretical, but possible.
Recruiter’s fault: No. Station Commander now regretting his actions: Maybe.
I don’t have the googlefu or the knowledge of the sources to discern actual fact from msm type fact so if someone more better at it than me might take a look…
Interesting stuff going around about Bergdahl’s daddy, a book deal and conversations between Bergdahl and his daddy prior to the event under the spotlight.
The general gist is that Daddy Bergdahl and his baby boy had worked up a scheme to play the ultimate in astro-turf. Baby boy joins up with the army, plays at being all hard chargy, then becomes all sad and disenchanted by bad things Americans are doing so he runs off and joins the enemy, because the enemy are actually the good guys all along.
So, if that’s true, even in part or piece, then Daddy Bergdahl should swing beside his son.
His mom is quite a fox. Much better than a goat.
Beauty is as beauty does. She’s the mother of a traitor. ‘Nuff said.
I’m guessing he probably needed a waiver of the previous USCG discharge, which was probably an entry level separation? The waiver request should have references and other documents of support, as to why he was qualified for an enlistment and should be granted a waiver. Agree his lawyers are grasping at straws.
The media quickly reports that approved waivers increased during the surge, but not detailing the documentation required for the waiver, waiting periods, or that non-waiverable criteria were (and are) in AR 601-210. Big Army may change enlistment criteria, but they don’t ‘open the floodgates’ and start letting everyone in because they’re missing accession numbers. They just tweak things a bit. 🙂
Recruits being naive and unrealistic is what we have drill instructors for; and after initial training, if any still remains, that’s what NCO’s are for. Unfortunately, as many here can attest, with some young troops, like Bergdahl, who was apparently raised a flower child, such idealism is so deeply embedded as to be stubbornly resistant to total extraction.
As someone mentioned above, firefights do help the process, but even that experience is not enough for some.
As for his lawyers we all can see they’re just throwing every kind of shit against the wall and praying that something will stick. And they’re doing it now so that if they can find something that resonates with the public, they will then have time to build a defense around it.
Personally, I think Jonn may have found it:
Afsquatch…
The problem is you can only weed out what you are told to weed out… My unit in Germany we had AIT fails coming to us in our RSS… Some of these people could barely walk without braking in to a sweat our platoon Sargent would march us by there barracks every morning to show us what the Army was turning in to Lol
Bowe Bergdahl: So I jump ship in Paktika Province and I make my way over to Pakistan, and I get on as a looper at a course run by the Haqqani Network.
Eugene Fidell: A looper?
Bowe Bergdahl: A looper, you know, a caddy, a looper, a jock. So, I tell them I’m a pro jock, and who do you think they give me? The Osama Bin Laden, himself. Twelfth son of a goat fucker. The flowing beard, the disgusting smell, bald… striking. So, I’m on the first tee with him. I give him the driver. He hauls off and whacks one – big hitter, the Lama – long, into a ten-thousand foot crevasse, right at the base of this glacier. Do you know what the Osama says? Gunga galunga… gunga, gunga-lagunga. So we finish the eighteenth and he’s gonna stiff me. And I say, “Hey, Osama, hey, how about a little something, you know, for the effort, you know.” And he says, “Oh, uh, there won’t be any money, but when you are released, in the White House Rose Garden, you will receive an Army Achievement Medal.” So I got that goin’ for me, which is nice.
“Gunga galunga… gunga, gunga-lagunga” is an ancient arabic curse in tribal dialect. It can be loosely translated as “may you have gophers on your putting greens.”
Another thought: If Bergdahl was unqualified to serve, he is most certainly unqualified to be wearing those sergeant’s stripes and earning E-5 pay.
Let’s strip ’em off, reduce his pay and let him go before the court as the worthless PFC he really is.
Fuck that, greensleeve his little ass.
The problem with the waivers, IMO, Begins with when the liberals get into office and cut the military to the bone every time. Then when TSHTF, the standards have to be lowered to fill the ranks up quickly. Then when we lower the standards and get trash that would never have been in before, we end up with events like Haditha, Abu Garib, higher instances of rape, AWOL and drugs, etc.etc.
I have been in since 1987. I have lived through RIF with the fall of the Soviet Union, then again with Clinton and now with this administration. I know some of you have seen it happen more than I have. You would think that all “smart” politicos would be able to figure it out to. It is a vicious cycle and they are the ones peddling it.
“Too”
Yes Lol…. When will Uncle Sam become Pro-Active. Instead of Re-Active… The answer in short is Never Lol….. You are right about a few things here and that is the standed is going south. The Bar keeps dropping every year
Being naïve, immature, and/or unrealistic explains the behavior of many folks of all ages but hardly excuses anything. As with all the other silly things we’ve heard from the defense, so what? But do keep them coming. Always good for a laugh, and proof that there is simply no justification for his actions. In other words, he has no defense.
Point of order for our honored community of TAH! Has anybody else noticed Birdturd has two good conduct medals? That’s six years of not %ucking up. And who signed off for the Awards?
The ENTIRE second GC falls in the time when he was hanging out with the Tally. The original award included two of the years he was searching for an O-7 to complain to.
I think he was awarded both because he had no adverse actions taken during those timeframes, pending yes, taken no.
“The medal is awarded to any active-duty enlisted member of the United States military who completes three consecutive years of “honorable and faithful service”. Such service implies that a standard enlistment was completed without any non-judicial punishment, disciplinary infractions, or court martial offenses.”
First was 2008-11, second was 11-14.
Immediate commander, but since he was, umm, somewhere else, I am not sure what CoC he fell under.
His Chain of Command was a computer generated awards program that had no adverse UCMJ actions/data entries entered for his standard name line.
In this case, no bad juju entries equal two GCM’s awarded.
And the new SECDEF wants to lower standards even further in order to “improve quality”?!
I wish I was making that up.
How long until he sues for gender reassignment surgery?
Let them de-nut him, CGL. Small price to pay for ensuring that part of the family tree dies at the roots.
I concur, he needs to be a dead-end branch on his family tree.
A better approach might be that rescinding DADT confused him so thoroughly that it totally boggled his mind. Like, totally, dude.
Bergdahl has NO excuse!
After all, because of my adolescence spent locked up in state mental hospitals with violent psychotic criminals, NOBODY wanted me, and the United States Marine Corps AND the United States Army recruiters BOTH turned me down.
I only got in because I wrote to the President of the United States, Lyndon Baines Johnson, seeking to be reclassified from “IV-F” (i.e., unfit for military service) or “I-Y” (i.e., only in national emergency) to “I-A” (fit for military service) and then went to my local Draft Board to volunteer to be drafted.
Volunteering for the Draft automatically put me at the top of the list, and since the United States Army, being the senior service, gets first pick of draftees, that automatically put me in the United States Army, where, incompetent idiot that I was, I somehow miraculously still managed to serve honorably, see the elephant, get decorated, and see the World.
I reckon other guys in the United States Army, and even Heavenly Father, were looking out for my welfare.
So, I hope Bergdahl doesn’t ruin it for other guys like me, who need that opportunity to redeem themselves after enduring all those years of shame, abuse, terror, and Hell on Earth.
Oh, yes, let’s not forget good ol’ Audie Murphy, the greatest hero of all in the Second World War, who, just like me (but not for the same reason), was rejected by the United States Marine Corps, and thus, became a soldier in the United States Army.
How many other similar stories are out there?
I got a similar story, been serving honorably since 81 (with a couple year break). US Army, and US Marine Corps would not have me because of my record. the US Navy said,”But there’s a place within each ship that legends fail to teach,
Within the shell, deep down in Hell, where legend cannot reach. It’s down below the water-line, and takes a living toll—…”
I feel fortunate to have been waivered, and allowed to serve. Sometimes I just feel like a big fraud, and it forces me to be painfully honest all the time. My biggest fault.
Congratulations on overcoming all of the negative obstacles and successfully accomplishing your mission!
You, indeed, have truly vindicated yourself and served with honor, going where others would not go, and doing what others would not do.
Thank you!
Likewise Sir, and thank you.
As I approach the final days of my life, and look back at the years gone by, I marvel that I’m a free man, and that I’m still alive.
Knowing of my own embarrassing and shameful personal weakness, ignorance, and incompetence, I truly wonder how I managed to last this long?
I’ve come to the conclusion that it must have been the Hand of Almighty God, as well as the kind help of others, that has blessed me so much.
But, that raises other troubling questions.
Why me?
What about the other guys who, like me, were locked up forever, with no hope, living in constant mental terror EVERY hour of every day and night, with electric shock treatments, mind altering drugs, physical assaults by other patients, and abuse by staff?
Why was I so blessed, and not them?
I know for a fact, far better than anyone, that I did NOT deserve the blessings that have been poured out upon me.
Oh, but I’m sooooo grateful, and if ONLY I could do SOMETHING to make it all worthwhile!
And so, the struggle continues.
[…] HT: TAH […]
Its the lawyers job to try to get his idiot acquitted…they will try anything. I was a bailiff at a high profile child molestation trial a few years back. The guilty party had been raping all three of his daughters…I had to sit through the whole fucking thing and hear everything. The defense threw a couple of the most improbable theories out, all in an effort to cast doubt in the mind of the jury…I expect no less from Bergdahls lawyer.