Trump’s Purple Heart

| August 2, 2016

Trump Purple Heart

Apparently, the media is working overtime to avoid talking about the candidates and the issues, rather they’re all wrapped up in trying to paint the Democrats as the more patriotic candidates. That’s a fruitless endeavor. Anyway, ABC News wants to talk about Donald Trump’s military service. To segue into the subject, someone gave Trump their Purple Heart and, typically, Trump can’t just say “thanks”;

Speaking at a rally in Ashburn, Virginia, the GOP presidential nominee said that a man approached him and handed him his purple heart.

“He said that’s my real purple heart — I have such confidence in you. And, I said, ‘Man that’s like, that’s like big stuff.’ I always wanted to get the purple heart. This was much easier,” Trump said.

I don’t have a Purple Heart – the closest I got was bashing my face on the Bradley’s Integrated Sight Unit when my fighting vehicle hit an anti-personnel mine at 73 Easting in Iraq in 1991 – I got a bloody nose. That was my only combat wound.

If someone were to offer me their Purple Heart like someone did to Donald Trump, I’d have to turn the offer down. I have oodles of medals that have citations which describe in detail what I did to earn them – but the Purple Heart is unique that it only recounts that the recipient was wounded (or killed) and the date it happened. Only the recipient knows the details, like the POW Medal, that makes those two awards intensely personal and beyond the understanding of anyone else who sees it or touches it.

Obviously, that’s what Trump should have done instead of using it in a speech so ABC News couldn’t use it as an excuse to bring up questions about his draft deferment – which we already talked about in May.

Funny how ABC news can’t think up an excuse to talk about Hillary’s attempt to join the Marine Corps.

Category: Politics

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Vic

What else would an insane narcissist do but accept an unearned Purple Heart?

“I always wanted to get the purple heart.” – That Smoking Gun article from a few years back eviscerated that notion.

sgt. vaarkman 27-48th TFW

Trump needs to learn how to zip it
Trump should’ve politely not accepted the medal and like he should’ve done with the Kahn thing…just said nothing
his mouth is going to hand this election to Hillary since the media is in adoration of the Clintons and always giving a pass where he won’t get a pass, in these times evil has become good and the good has become evil unfortunately

FatCircles0311

Then the headline would have been “Trump disrespects wounded veteran! Eats babies!”

Doesn’t matter what he does, our corrupt Democratic party controlled media will spin it. As for your comments about him learning to stop talking, that is just poor on your part. You’ve been conditioned so much that you’d rather someone not speak because it might offend of be spun to make the person look bad. That’s basically you admitting to submission of political correct censorship.

Congrats!

Yef

Wow. Right between the eyes.
And I wholeheartedly agree with your analysis of how the media treats anything the Trumpminator does or says.

sgt. vaarkman 27-48th TFW

I disagree with you FatCircles0311, this is bait and distracts from the true issues, which are the economy, defense,race relation restoration, immigration, defeating the grab of our 2nd amendment rights etc etc and exposing that criminal Clinton pac for what they really are.
Too many Americans have swallowed the PC koolaide and this sets them off on a tangent of anti Trump rhetoric.
These recent comments have them off on his draft status & lack of military service, while they conveniently ignore their liberal icons lack of such, its all getting old already
Its better to pick your fights on something of substance and remain silent on the faints from your opposition….kapiche

Silentium Est Aureum

Vark, Trump could walk across the Potomac, and the WAPO headline the next day would be, “TRUMP CAN’T SWIM!!!”

desert

You are now quoting the Bible….”evil will become good and good will become evil”!

B Woodman

I think only those who have served, or have been close to those that served, would fully understand the significance of being given an unearned military medal or award. So for this, I’m willing to cut The Donald some slack, and hope that someone in his campaign inner circle has the background and experience to explain it to him.

SFC D

Pretty much had the same reaction.

Zero Ponsdorf

Ditto.

Yef

Yes. I think it was a way for that veteran to put pressure on Trump to do the right thing when he gets elected. “Dude, i trust you so much, i am gonna give you my PH, because I KNOW you are not going to let me down”.

2/17 Air Cav

Trump could have served but didn’t. Wide Load could have served but didn’t. So, we’re left with…

“Had a bad ear”

“Did not”

“Did too!”

“Not…not….not…not…not…not…”

Too…too..too…too…too…too… and you have a fat ass!”

Martinjmpr

I’ve made it pretty clear on this blog that I’m no fan of Trump but I would say that it’s pretty clear from what has been going on in this election that “the rules” as we understand them in politics, simply don’t apply to Trump. By “rules” I mean the “conventional wisdom” that guides what candidates can/can’t/must/mustn’t do in order to survive politically, which groups they’re not allowed to criticize and which asses they’re required to smooch. Trump has made numerous “gaffes” and outrageous statements that would have sunk any “regular” candidate – and yet he still stands, by all accounts his standing in the polls lies within the margin of error. IOW it’s a dead heat. I think part of the reason for this is that Trump, for all his failings (which are numerous) has basically unmasked the biased media for what they are. By nitpicking and magnifying every minor indiscretion or misstatement of the Republican candidate while hiding, justifying or explaining every mistake made by the D candidate the mass media shows itself to be fully “in the tank” for Hillary – and when Trump calls them on it, it effectively disarms their criticism of him. The “conventional wisdom” for R candidates up to this point has always been “sure, the media’s biased, but what are you gonna do? That’s just the world we live in” and for the R candidate to try and speak carefully to avoid making any costly “mistakes” for which he would have to grovel and apologize later. Which of course just makes the R candidate look weak, mealy-mouthed and with no charisma or flair. Trump, for all his dumb stunts, has thrown that old script away and been unapologetically “Trump”: Bombastic and cocksure and pugnacious. He doesn’t apologize to the media or do the little “I misspoke” dance when they demand it of them – he throws it right back in their smug little faces and they simply don’t know what to do because they’ve never been treated that way by anyone running for president. I still can’t see myself pulling the lever… Read more »

B Woodman

Well, if you want to see if he’ll actually win, VOTE FOR HIM!

Hondo

It’s still a free country, so do what you like. Just remember: refusing to choose (by staying home or casting a protest vote for a non-viable candidate) is in itself a choice. And the effect of that choice is to help the viable candidate you detest most.

W2

What if you detest both of them at the same level and don’t want either one to lead the free world because both are unfit? A third party vote or a write in is the only way to flip off the system. trump and clinton are the system.

Tallywhagger

Secession. It was the right thing then. It’s the right thing now. America has been taken hostage by a renegade federal government.

If democracy can’t fix it. Maybe we need to fix democracy. There is no unity in a country where citizens of less populated states have to suffer the abuses of places like California, Florida or, sometimes, Texas.

Perry Gaskill

Look at it this way: If all the nitwits in California weren’t here, they’d still be places like where you are. Do you want us to send them home?

Tallywhagger

Massachusetts is already well supplied. But don’t let that slow things down, these socialists will welcome humanity that even California wouldn’t tolerate. If there is such a thing.

Got any Injun’s to wanna get rid of?

Chris

Vote third party, and hope enough of us do that at least one important state goes that way. The election goes to the House, and perhaps something resembling sanity prevails.

Yef

Go ahead dude, vote for Hitlary. Don’t come crying back asking for forgiveness from future American generations when s/he finish what the community organizer in chief started.

You know what? I am gonna change that statement. FUCK any mothefucker whose action or inaction leads to a Hitlary Clinton administration and the destruction of my children’s FUTURE!

I took me 4 years to come to America, really really hard, to start a life in freedom, for now a little pussy like you to steal my future and my childrens future. It is fuckin personal.

Trump might not be that good, but he is a gazillion times better than the communist bitch of Benghazi.

Celtic Thunder

You said it better than I could. Thanks!

MustangCryppie

“The Communist Bitch of Benghazi”

I like that. It kind of trips over the tongue.

Well done.

valerie

Here’s part of the answer. Trump’s statements are just not all that outrageous.
Trump: American Muslim Soldier Who Died In Iraq Is A ‘Hero’
http://eheadlines.com/trump-american-muslim-soldier-who-died-in-iraq-is-a-hero/

“Captain Humayun Khan was a hero to our country and we should honor all who have made the ultimate sacrifice to keep our country safe. The real problem here are the radical Islamic terrorists who killed him, and the efforts of these radicals to enter our country to do us further harm. Given the state of the world today, we have to know everything about those looking to enter our country, and given the state of chaos in some of these countries, that is impossible.”

Responding to Khizr Khan, who spoke at the Democratic National Convention where he criticized Trump, the Republican nominee said, “While I feel deeply for the loss of his son, Mr. Khan who has never met me, has no right to stand in front of millions of people and claim I have never read the Constitution, (which is false) and say many other inaccurate things. If I become President, I will make America safe again.”

“Further, Hillary Clinton should be held accountable for her central role in destabilizing the Middle East. She voted to send the United States to war against Iraq, helped lead the disastrous withdrawal of American troops years later that created the vacuum allowing the rise of ISIS, and has never met a regime change she didn’t like (which have all been disasters) – not to mention her invasion of Libya and her abandonment of American personnel in Benghazi. The loss of these lives in Libya is directly traceable to Clinton, but their families’ testimonials were rejected by the media,” Trump said.

Graybeard

I may be seeing this differently, but were a someone to offer me their Purple Heart as a sign of confidence in me (somewhere near the same chances of a snowball in a Texas August) I would take it as a way of their saying that they dedicate their sacrifice to my support.
That is I would hear them saying “What I gave, what I risked in defense of this country, I did so that someone like you could do his part to make it better.”
I would also take it as a responsibility to live up to the sacrifice of men like that.
I also read Trump’s “I always wanted to get the Purple Heart” as a way of saying “I want to be the kind of man who is willing to make the sacrifice.”

Obviously, I don’t know what Trump’s true thoughts or feelings are – shoot I don’t always know what my true thoughts or feelings are. But there is an alternate explanation for what the giver meant, and what Trump understands from the gift. Maybe, just maybe, it is not the thought of stealing valor, but accepting the responsibility for men of valor.

Mickey GSM

Well said Sir

Winkle Bomb

Times it’s okay to accept a Purple Heart:

1. You’ve been wounded in combat.
2. You’re eating a bowl of Lucky Charms.

John D

Anybody have one they got for shooting themselves in the foot they could send him?

B Woodman

Ask sKerry if he could find one of his. Oh. . . . wait. . ..

Claw

Old Ferret Face got a PH for “shell fragment in eye.”

The Donald can have that one.

B Woodman

I was also remembering that sKerry threw all his medals etc over the Red Shed fence.

rgr769

I thought Lurch’s PH’s for the following claimed injuries:
First: A small wire fragment from an M79 round fired w/in burst range by one of the men on his small boat when there was no enemy fire.
Second: Rice from an effort by RF’s or PF’s to blow up a rice cache. Kerry was hit by rice fragments from he C4 explosion.
Third: Kerry’s Swift boat was hit by RPG fire in an ambush and the concussion or the sudden acceleration by the coxswain caused him to fall against a bulkhead or railing and severely bruise an arm.

Claw

Actually old Ferret Face has another PH that can be given to the Donald.

The shell fragment PH was the second. The first PH came when he was dipping (really tapping) Hot Lips during a “dance” and threw his back out.

So really it’s a choice as to which PH means the most.

One was for dipping and the other for cracking. Your call, Donald.

Bill R.

Trump is an ass and Hillary is a criminal. Truth is, there is no way in hell I could even consider voting for a party that actually booed a Medal of Honor recipient. That leaves me with voting for an ass or going third party, which would have the effect of voting for a criminal.

Chip

Jonn interesting remarks. I remember we evacuated a position because we were going to take some incoming artillery. In the process of doing so I poked myself beside my right eye cutting myself. I still have a small scar. I also cut myself when I got caught in some concertina wire. I never thought once about a Purple heart and I would not have accepted one if offered.

Slick Goodlin

Sounds like a set-up ambush like religious book scammers used to do in airports. They walk up and hand you something and you instinctively take it.

Once you have it in your hand they’ve got you.

If you give try to give it back or keep it they can use your reaction to their own ends.

David

Always wanted a Purple Heart? Seriously? Admittedly I was a Cold War schmuck, but I always thought the best idea was to avoid getting a Purple Heart.

Every time he opens his mouth he makes voting against Hillary harder and harder…. damned if I’ll vote for her but it just makes my stomach churn to contemplate voting for him. Oh, for a DECENT candidate.

Tallywhagger

It’s no consolation but it might make it easier to think of voting “for” Trump as a rebuke to the RNC rather than just voting against The Butcher of Benghazi.

He’s not an insider.
He’s never held elected office.
The globalists hate him.
He thwarted Jeb!
He’s old enough that a second term probably would not happen.
He may have some strong opinions about some of the creepyass Justices on the Supreme Court.
He seems to have a lot of enthusiasm for FIRING ineffective people.
And, finally, Hillary.

Unclean as it all seems, the only rationalization I can find to pull a handle for him is in the context of rebuking the RNC AND Paul Ryan.

Tallywhagger

How long was Dan Rather in the Marine Corps?

And then we have the infamous fool of fools:
“I gave back, I can’t remember, six, seven, eight, nine medals,” Kerry said in an interview on a Washington, D.C., news program on WRC-TV called Viewpoints on Nov. 6, 1971, according to a tape obtained by ABCNEWS.

Throughout his presidential campaign, Kerry has denied that he threw away any of his medals during an anti-war protest in April 1971.

Calling it a “phony controversy” instigated by the Republican party, Kerry said on Good Morning America today that he has always accurately said what took place. “I threw my ribbons. I didn’t have my medals. It is very simple.”

He also said he — and the military — didn’t make a distinction between medals and ribbons. “We threw away the symbols of what our country gave us for what we had gone through,” he said.

And in an interview with ABCNEWS’ Peter Jennings last December, he said it was a “myth.”

But Kerry told a much different story on Viewpoints. Asked about the anti-war veterans who threw their medals away, Kerry said “they decided to give them back to their country.”

Kerry was asked if he gave back the Bronze Star, Silver Star and three Purple Hearts he was awarded for combat duty as a Navy lieutenant in Vietnam. “Well, and above that, [I] gave back the others,” he said.

The statement directly contradicts Kerry’s most recent claims on the disputed subject to the Los Angeles Times last Friday. “I never ever implied that I did it, ” Kerry told the newspaper, responding to the question of whether he threw away his medals in protest.

“I’m proud of my medals. I always was proud of them,” he told Jennings in December, adding that he had only thrown away his “ribbons” and the medals of two other veterans who could not attend the protest.

rgr769

Still telling lies; after all these years. My favorite is his 1968 Xmas secret squirrel mission into Cambodia to infiltrate a mysterious CIA agent, on secret orders from not yet President Nixon. Whether it was ’68 or ’69, at that time only MACSOG had authority to run any cross-border op, not the CIA, per John Plaster’s book. Also, no sane operator would want to be infilled on a river by large noisy swift boat. Most of his many Vietnam related lies are carefully documented in Lt O’Neil’s book which came to be known as the specious term “swiftboating.”

2/17 Air Cav

“President Obama said today that Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump is ‘unfit to serve as president.’ In a press conference with Singapore’s prime minister, Obama added that Trump has shown he is not up to the task, in light of his handle on foreign affairs and his comments on military families.” Source: ABC News

A sitting US president holds a press conference while in a foreign country on official business and, in the presence of that foreign country’s prime minister, declares the possible next president of the United States to be unfit to serve as president? And what comments did Trump make about “military families?”

Did Rod Serling write this shit?

Tallywhagger

I’m sure that the prime minister of Singapore knows what an asshole he’s dealing with… it seems that everyone, except the socialist democrats, know.

Any mention of Obama hooking up with Erdogan? Now there is leadership that Obama can admire.

FatCircles0311

Again another non issue portrayed as an issue by a corrupt media hell bent on campaigning against the man.

Lostcause

This is self inflicted and it is a bit of an issue. It speaks to fitness for office.

If Hillary were to talk about a purple heart given to her by a supporter and make the comment’s Trump made your head would have an aneurysm.

FatCircles0311

ok miss Cleo.

Bnmarkos

I’ve always viewed it as if you want to give away your medals or ribbons for support of someone, political or otherwise that’s on you. Personally I’d never accept a medal I didn’t earn. I honestly don’t think Trump understands the significance and sacrifice of the PH.

Story time…. So many years ago when I was a kid, my friends and I found some thrown out items in a box on the street where I lived. Within this box of random stuff, encyclopedias and other assorted junk, I found someone’s PH. I brought it home and showed my dad. After a thorough and angry interrogation by my father he made me put it back in the box on the street. Being that he knew what it was and the personal sacrifice that someone had made for it, he was he told me I should never want a PH. Being 8 or 9 at the time I did not know the significance of that medal. 20 some years later I received one myself in Afghanistan . When I last visited my father before he passed, he reminded me, I told you you didn’t want one of those.

HT3 '83-'87

Hillary as a Marine?

Yeah, yeah, yeah…I’m calling bullshit on this story. My friend’s half-brother got a Marines t-shirt back in the 80’s when you could mail in a post card that came out of an issue of ‘Sports Illustrated’. You filled out your name, age, and address then dropped it in the mail…no emails, or websites back then kiddies…real lick-the-stamp-put-in-the-mailbox stuff. A couple of weeks go by and you get some USMC pamphlets and a red-and-gold shirt. This guy wore this shirt everywhere…to school, to the arcade (???) and probably slept in it too. He told everyone, and I mean anyone who would listen about how badass the Marines were and he’d soon be making them even ‘Badder!’ Fast forward about 5 years and he’s working at Pizza Hut and smoking weed with high schoolers…and not a Marine…ever. His half-brother told he never went to the recruiter’s office…his sorry ass just wore that shirt till it just about disintegrated. In closing, I think this jerkoff was closer to being a Marine then Hillary ever was.

Grimmy

http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2016/jan/27/hillary-clinton-loves-idea-obama-supreme-court/

Hillary Clinton ‘loves’ the idea of appointing Obama to Supreme Court

Mickey GSM

now that is something to definitely cry and hollow about.

gitarcarver

Does anyone but me want to see how this was said?

I mean, I can see someone handing him a Purple Heart, him accepting it and then making a joke in saying “I always wanted to get a Purple Heart, but this was much easier” and then laughing with the veteran over the obvious silliness of the statement.

Maybe it’s just me – a non-Trump supporter – but context matters and I would want to hear the entire conversation before passing any type of judgment or comment on it. I work with active duty service men and women and I am always surprised at their “dark humor” when it comes to being wounded.

If the vet was not offended, then perhaps we should not be either.

Grimmy

Funny aint it?

Folk who know, for a certainty, that the msm lies threw its teeth, either out of idiocy or malicious intent whenever it covers anything they’re actually familiar with, will drop to their knees to wrap their lips around the msm spigot to suck down and swallow whatever’s pumped into them without critical thought one.

And they wonder why they’re constantly punked by the press and politicals.

This medal bullshit is just another example of a media storm purposely created out of nothing to stir up the stupid and unthinking.

Hondo

But that wouldn’t fit the MSM’s agenda, gitarcarver. So they’ll play it the way they want to – facts be damned.

DefendUSA

Trump reacted the only way he knows how. And you cannot fault the owner of the purple heart for giving it up.
Look, I “only” have my service ribbon, GCM and and an ArComm. If I felt strongly and I had a Purple Heart, I just might do what that guy did.
Trump is in a no win situation…and even though I am not a Trump fan, I get tired of the bashing for every.single. thing. he does or says. #neverHRC

valerie

Trump has made no pretense that he was wounded in combat.

Daisy Cutter

Khan wants Trump to return Purple Heart.

http://www.cnn.com/2016/08/02/politics/khizr-khan-donald-trump-purple-heart/index.html

I think it was a no win situation for Trump when he was presented the medal. Should have politely refused with “It was an incredibly thoughtful gesture, but I simply cannot accept something so personal.”

ChipNASA

Does it make any difference it was a replica?

Yes? No?

Who knows.

My feeling, it takes away from the controversy a tad. but I know TAH can argue it either way.

http://www.latimes.com/nation/politics/trailguide/la-na-trailguide-updates-donald-trump-thanks-supporter-who-gave-1470152086-htmlstory.html

2/17 Air Cav

The more the left and its media whores engages in this feeding frenzy over Kahn and anything and everything anti-Trump, the more I am looking forward to voting for him. I’m guessing I’m not the only one being pushed by these maniacs not to hold my nose Trump when I cast my ballot for him and Pence.

SSG D

Please let the butt hurt begin as well as the raping of me, because I know it will occur, even though I’m a fellow veteran with 19+ years in. Please check out the link below.

SSG D
Tallywhagger

I love KFC and Popeye’s but my favorite was probably Roy Rogers’ version. I use a fork to eat chicken and pizza… I just don’t like having greasy fingers if I don’t have to.

Spaghetti, fried chicken, watermelon, there are probably a bunch of foods out there that are easier to eat around people you are comfortable being with. Dammit-all-to-hell, watermelon is supposed to have seeds and spitting them is fun. Not quite as refined as shelling peanuts and dropping the shells on the floor.

Now boiled shrimp is finger food. Steamed crabs is finger food. Corn on the cob is… for folks with good teeth!

SFC D

Seriously? I’m supposed to get worked up over this?

2/17 Air Cav

Yes, this is what the left concerns itself with. We’re paying ransom to foreign terrorists states and doing who knows what in Iraq, Afghanistan, and Syria. H. Wide Load Clinton rakes in millions and millions for talking to foreign states and corporations while proclaiming she’s a progressive. The POTUS is badmouthing a presidential nominee to a foreign head of state. A series of crimes committed by Clinton is buried by an AG who deferred her decision making to the FBI Director. All of this and so much more and what’s hot is that Trump likes KFC and eats fried chicken with a fork. All in favor of armed rebellion, keep your opinion quiet.

rgr769

Amen, 2/17. But you are preaching to the choir. LIV’s are probably lapping up the KFC thing and ignorant of every thing that’s important.