Representative Sanford Bishop
Someone asked us to check into the military background of Georgia’s 2d District representative to Congress, Sanford Bishop – that’s the district which contains Fort Benning, GA. Here is how the Congressman remembers his career;
Bishop graduated from Morehouse College in 1968 and from Emory University Law School in 1971. He served in the U.S. Army from 1969 to 1971; completed basic training at Fort Benning, Georgia, entered Advanced Reserve Officers Training, and received an Honorable Discharge in 1971.
According to his FOIA, he did 17 months in the Army Reserves from September 1969 – February 1971. He was discharged as a private E-1, so I’m guessing that he didn’t spend a lot of time around his reserve unit. The FOIA doesnt mention any basic training and I think Mr Sanford misremembers his time in basic training at Fort Benning. During the Vietnam War, infantry basic training was held at Fort Polk, Louisiana because of the similarity to the climate and terrain in Vietnam. Infantry basic training moved to Fort Benning in 1976 – well after the Congressman had been discharged.
I think Mr Sanford joined the Army while he was in law school to avoid the draft while he was in college. Like I said, it doesn’t look like he went to basic training like he claims, and we know he wasn’t commissioned in the Army ROTC program. No National Defense Service Medal – so no time on active duty for training.
I’m not calling this Stolen Valor – I’m only trying to maintain the historical memory of the period. By the way, Mr Bishop is the Ranking Democrat on the House Appropriations Subcommittee on Military Construction, Veterans Affairs, and Related Agencies, and the Co-Chair of the Congressional Military Family Caucus
Category: Congress sucks
Brian Williams will vouch for his service.
Another stellar member of the CBC
It certainly appears that Pvt Bishop likes to pimp out his military creds:
“Congressman Bishop served in the U.S. Army long before becoming a Congressman, so he fully understands the sacrifices that our troops, our veterans, and their families endure.”
http://www.sanfordbishop.com/issues/veterans/
Political double talk being what it is today will cover his ass…with some people. He and his lackeys will use the ole, “He does so much good for veterans everywhere it doesnt matter”.
Well, it does to me. To me he is little more than a valor parasite, building a career on embellished service of 17 months as a Private.
Phuk Ewe Sanford.
HEY NOW, he valiantly spent his 17 months in the academic jungles of a college campus sans even going to BCT, don’t that count for something? NAAAH, me either.
One look at the currently successful candidacy of one HRC would indicate immediately to anyone paying attention that the truth need not be spoken by a candidate or serving member of either party.
As a nation we’ve come to love our liars, as long as they have the correct letter after their name. That’s why democrats love their HRC, lies and all and why so many republicans love their liar Donald Trump.
If Trump was a stolen valor guy using his fake credentials to take money from people for classes we’d be calling for his head. He promoted a bullshit university that stole money from the people who could usually least afford to lose and nobody fucking cares…not one of his supporters will tell you he’s a rat bastard lying fuck for operating that shit university and offering degrees that weren’t worth a $0.35 copy at Kinkos….
So yeah liars are fine with us as politicians, we keep electing the same fucking liars over and over. Everybody always complains about Washington but nobody ever votes their own rat fucks out.
I’m starting to think the problem isn’t the liars, it’s our society’s inability to act with self-discipline to weed out our own liars and shitbags. As long as we lie to ourselves and claim it’s always the other side’s fault we can ignore the fact that our party is as much if not more to blame than the other party. That’s true whether you’re a dem or a repub.
^5
As I’ve said before, the fact that Trump is the lesser of two sacks of cockroach shit we have to choose from is a measure of how truly fucked we are, and a well-deserved indictment of the two-party system as it exists now.
I have to object to your characterization of re-electing the same f*cking liars over and over. Trump is trying to get elected for the first time.
One of the biggest problems in politics is that everyone gets their knickers twisted over the other guy being a lying bastard – but our rep is getting things done and helps out the ol’ home district (wink, wink, nudge, nudge.) Very few of us are willing to call out our own elected representatives as the rapacious avaricious thieving sellout liars that they are, so they keep getting reelected.
Right the down ticket liars was primarily my point, anyone thinking Donald Trump is a truth-teller however ought to take a good long look in the mirror and ask themselves what the fuck are they thinking….
Trump’s history is hardly one of honesty and gold standard character. The only thing more amazing to me than the concept the DNC chose HRC is that the republicans have someone they could crush on character and they choose Trump…there’s a level of irony that’s hard to not laugh at.
He is the Democratic Congressman for my area here in South GA. He has the district pretty much in his hip pocket. The last real competition to run against him was called a racist by Bishop, and Bishop of course won the election in a majority African-American community.
Sanford was so bad assed, he knew Rice Paddy Daddy…
I’ve got more time in the chow line than Rep. Sanford Bishop has in his entire military “career”.
Fucking Donkeycrat asshole…
Please do not engage in the use of threatening linguistics toward donkeys, burros, mules or hinnies. They are defenseless animals who have done nothing to deserve an offensive reference to posterior anatomy.
They are asking for a safe space now.
I’ll go sit in the corner for the rest of the day…
🙁
I like donkeys, mules, burros and hinnies… especially those that like taking it easy
Heehee!
On weekends I drive a tour bus at a wild animal safari, and when we come to the donkeys and burros I ask the folks on the bus, “How do you tell the difference?”
Nobody has a clue, and I don’t know either, but 40 years of BSing on stage leads me to …
“Size! Donkeys are larger, burros are smaller, and baby burros are called burritos!”
Groans from the riders.
“And I can taco ’bout that all day!”
By this point they’re ready to throw things at me.
Defenseless?!? Many Coyotes wish that that was so.
Good Gawd. Basic infantry training at Ft. Polk.
I would have volunteered to be on the first plane to Vietnam.
In a heartbeat.
No need to volunteer. Many folks got to do both. Back then, rumor had it that training at Polk was a guaranteed flight to Vietnam.
Sanford is doing something wrong. Although he has rec’d a state or federal paycheck as an office holder since 1977, he is one of the poorest members of Congress. I find that odd.
I bet you that he knows how to bring the “pork” home to the voters…
Well, some money is kept in mattresses. Some money is kept in freezers. And some money is put in a bank.
Or, perhaps like the former County Executive of Prince George’s County Maryland, in his wife’s underwear.
Fuck I’m seeing red this morning!!!
Just ask him to correct his ‘bio’ so that it reflects what he really did. Or else step down from the Armed Services committee.
Resign? You’re kidding right? Who resigns over lies these days? No democrats that’s for goddam sure…nah he’ll just say he had inadvertently mis-remembered his service.
He and Brian Williams were flying choppers in and out of danger regularly, so it’s going to be fine.
Providing cover as Hillary dodged that sniper fire. Did she tell you that she once talked to a Marine Corps Recruiter?
She was 18 and it was a blind recruiting call. She hung up on him after calling him a filthy baby killer and a capitalist sycophant. That’s the way I heard it, anyway.
Sgt Hack Stone: Good Morning, is Johnny home?
Mother Of America: Who is calling?
Sgt Hack Stone: This is Sgt Stone, Marine Corps Recruiter.
Mother Of America: Marine Corps! I saw Full Metal Jacket. You’re not doing that to my baby! (Hangs up phone)
True story. There was another time that I called a home, with a different scenario.
Sgt Hack Stone: Good morning, is Johnny home?
Mother ( Somewhat hesitantly): No, Johnny is not home.
Sgt Hack Stone: Do you know when Johnny will be home?
Mother: Johnny is dead. Who is this?
(Hack Stone says “Fuck” to himself mentally)
Hack Stone: This is Sgt Smith, Air Force Recruiter.
Then Hack Stone hangs up. Thank Buddha that this was in the days before Caller ID.
Sorry, I forgot to post the spew alert!
My bad.
Cocksucker.
**snicker**
I thought it (Infantry Basic) was primary held at Benning and secondary was at Polk and Ft McClennan (due to the terrain in the Central Highlands).
Most of the Vietnam guys I have met went through Benning.
Ft. McClellan.
Sorry.
Mrs. HMC went to Army boot at McClellan in 1970. We went there a few years back for a look-see. Pretty much an empty base, with many abandoned buildings. Some stuff going on but I don’t know what. Not many troops about. Mrs. HMC’s old barracks long gone. They were wooden.
It’s now an Army NG post. Most of the property was given to the city of Anniston and is now rented by the Govt. from the city ( go figure that one out)
Pelham Range is where most of the training is conducted, about 15min away from Ft. McClellan.
The only part of the old Ft McClellan left is the original part from WWII. Funny thing is that the old chapel is now the Class VI and AAFES shoppet.
The Army dumped a lot of money into Ft. Mac before moving out. Rumor has it that the state gave the Army a really hard time over the Anniston Chemical Demil Facility (ANCDF) so the Army said “fuck you-we’re moving the chemical and mmuppet schools somewhere else.”
Too bad. Only got snowed on once there, whereas Ft. Wood -it sucks.
Yeah, before shutting down, it was a very nice post. It also had one of the best golf courses in the Army ( it’s still there, but owned by the city now). When they closed the post, they killed the city of Anniston. So maybe that’s why they gave the property to them.
If any of you are ever in the area, about 4 miles north of the post is a sports bar names “Heroes”. Eat there. The food is GREAT and the beer is COLD.
Yeah, there were many multi-story, mostly modern buildings that are now boarded (as of a few years back). Looks to be a colossal government soup sandwich costing us a ton of bucks. There are lawsuits snaking their way through the courts, some seeking class action status, re the contaminated water. Mrs. HMC got a letter from a civilian a few years back re this. Waiting for the letter than will never come from the VA, naming certain presumptive medical issues secondary to being stationed there.
MacClellan was best known as the WAC Basic training center. I spent many nights running from the MPs there.
Word.
When did the Army officially retire the WAC/WAAC name? I know that the WAAC program was launched during WWII, and thought that it was retired following the end of the war. I have seen quite a few shows and movies filmed or set in the 1960s and 1970s that still referenced WACs. I just thought that it was lazy writing on their part.
1978.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Women%27s_Army_Corps
Believe it or not the last former member of the WAC retired only last year. That was CW5 Jeanne Pace. She joined in 1972, and retired with 43 years of active service.
https://www.armytimes.com/story/military/careers/army/2015/07/09/jeanne-pace-1st-cavalry-division-womens-army-corps/29922227/
The use of WAFs, WACs and WAVES as the names for women serving in those branches of the military ended in the late 1970s.
I did 16 weeks at Fort Polk, Basic & AIT together – same platoon, same drills.
A-3-1?
A-6-1 Best of the Proud Ones SERGEANT!!!
Wow.
I thought they had phased Polk out by then.
I knew about some guys going through it years past (Vietnam/Post-Vietnam). And as I referenced above, some dudes did AIT over in Alabama due to the hilly terrain.
Also know some guys that did it all at Benning from that era. I would imagine that a lot of it had to do with space availability and the unfortunate need of the Army to replace causalities.
Hey now – show the guy some love. I watched Animal House and saw how rough college ROTC can be…
Yeah, it is rough. My brother fainted in the chow line at Ft. Dix. I ragged him about it for a while. Good times.
“I watched Animal House and saw how rough college ROTC can be…”
In Faber ROTC, NOBODY liked Niedermeyer.
They liked him even less in “The Twilight Zone”
Not as much as John Landis didn’t like Vic Morrow.
What, too soon?
And don’t forget this little nugget from the 1994 AWB:
“A roll call on the legislation came to a dramatic conclusion when Rep. Andrew Jacobs, D-Ind., switched his vote to favor the ban and two Democrats expected to oppose the ban, freshman Rep. Sanford Bishop, D-Ga., and retiring Rep. Douglas Applegate, D-Ohio, voted for it, providing the margin for passage.”
Basic at Leonard Wood and AIT at fort Sam in 1967. Vietnam 1968, 91B20 so don’t know about the 11B’s.
If he joined up in 69 to avoid the draft, he needn’t have worried.
With a birth date of 4 Feb 1947 (per his bio), the number he drew in the big draft held on 2 Dec 69 for his age group, he would have drawn number 210.
The highest number actually called up and inducted from that group was 195.
He could have just skated/stayed in college with a deferment and not had to put in that grueling 17 months of inactive reserve time.
Sometimes you roll the dice and they turn up snake eyes.
Most likely that is why he seems to have dogged his actual time in and got out as an E-1 “what are they going to do to me… I’ll be 1H”
Aaaaaaa I have a question for everyone. My uncle Gary went to fort Benning for basic in 68-69
And he was a 11B did two tours in the jungle and left the service in 78, be has what looks like a year book from basic because I have it. and my uncle skip in his momentos he was a 11C or what ever they called mortar monkeys back then he when in. In 66 or 67 and retired in 95 or 96 he spent a lot of time at fort Ord and Lewis and in Panama after Vietnam and as a D.I. at Campbell and Benning
Am I missing something here about fort Polk being the only infantry training post ????
Skippy, I think (but could be wrong) the order of precedence (in numbers of troops trained/shipped) for posts during the Vietnam period who had a combined BCT/AIT for 11 series Infantry (except for 11E Armor Crewman) were:
1. Fort Polk
2. Fort Benning
3. Fort Lewis
4. Fort Ord
Just working from memory, mind you. I did not try to conduct any in-depth research before presenting my comment.
Thank you ?
what about Fort Dix ?
I knew guys who went to Dix during Vietnam, plenty of them were drafted from where I grew up in Jersey went there and then “Nam”
I did Basic at Ft. Lewis in late ’67 and AIT at Ft. Jackson in early ’68. Had orders to an MP company but ended up with 9th ID doin’ vacation cruises with the MRF. Sure didn’t seem like the Love Boat with Gopher and Isaac, but at least I didn’t have to do the really hard duty like Rep. Bishop. Damn, I’m such a wussy compared to him.
I know absolutely nothing about the Army Reserves or ROTC, but I’ll opine anyway and perhaps someone who knows will be able to confirm or correct my comments.
It seems to me that the released info shows that he was in the reserves for the period 69-71 and that the service was at Georgia State University.
I’m assuming he was ROTC for those two years but never received a commission. I’m also assuming that folks who went ROTC during that time would not actually go through basic or any Army courses with the exception of the ROTC training at Georgia State.
I would also have thought that in order to receive an ROTC commission, the individual would have to have 4 years in the program, and then they would get commissioned and sent to the appropriate US Army training schools.
This is from the ROTC program at Emory University “Enrolling in the Army ROTC Basic Course does NOT involve a commitment of service to the Army unless you have received an Army ROTC Scholarship.”
So I think that the Congressman is being a little disingenuous by claiming service in the Army – he was actually taking ROTC courses for 2 years with no commitment.
Movie Quotes – No Time for Sergeants (1958)
[reading from inductee questionnaire]
Ben Whitledge: You ever had R.O.T.C.?
Will Stockdale: No…, but Irvin did! Close to a year of it. He’s so ‘ornary I think he still might have a touch of it.
Ben Whitledge: No, Will. R.O.T.C. ain’t a disease, it’s trainin’… Reserve,Officer’s,
Training… ,uh… Corporation! And it don’t mean nothin’ unless you finish it!
He didn’t know then about the honor of being P.L.O.
More honor being a PLO than falsely claiming Honorary Chief Petty Officer.
He was in Army ROTC at Georgia State because Emory only had an AF ROTC program, which in 1969-70 was the subject of an anti-war movement to remove it from campus or eliminate it’s academic credit. If you are looking for a solid draft exemption, you want to go for one that’s a sure thing, not one for a program on the verge of being eliminated. Also, he did not complete the last semester of his ROTC courses, since he was “discharged” in February, 1971.
That is a shit eating grin right there.
I’m not sure the statement that all infantry basic was at Ft. Polk circa ’69 is accurate. At Ft. Ord, the drill was that everybody went through basic in one of the Basic Combat Training brigades up the hill from the main post. These were newish concrete three-story structures that each held a company of five platoons in open bays. During the course of eight-week basic, the Army would apparently use the results of initial aptitude testing or need to determine who among draftees, for example, got assigned which MOS.
Those assignments weren’t made known for many until the final week of basic, and those selected for infantry AIT were then moved further down the hill to older World War II era two-story wooden barracks. If you happened to be out marching around for training or to the ranges, an easy way to tell the difference between a BCT company and an infantry AIT one was that basic recruits had M-14s and no helmet covers. AIT was issued M-16s and camo covers.
Another way I happened to know this was because the Army had sent me from Ord to DLI in Monterey, and visited a couple of times with 11Bs who had been in my basic platoon.
The logic of dumping everything into Ft. Polk also seems like a stretch. Louisiana’s similarity to Vietnam would have applied mainly to the IV Corps delta region south of Saigon. Anything north of there was mostly either in a thin strip of coastal plain, or very hilly.
I went thru basic at good ‘ol Fort Dix, NJ in 69. What a shit hole! Then on to country club Fort Monmouth NJ, now that was a nice place, MOS31S30.
In 1972 I earned an 11B Infantry MOS without going to the Infantry Course Fort Benning.
I enlisted for Infantry with 101st Airborne Division, “Unit of Choice”, option. After Basic at Fort Ord , I went to Benning for Jump School, then went straight to the 101st.
In 1972 the 101st was reforming after returning from Vietnam. The Division created an, “in unit”, Infantry Course.
My trainers were all NCO’s of the recently inactivated 173rd Airborne Brigade.
After completion of the course we all became part of the newly formed 3rd Brigade, 101st Airborne.
Later, from time to time, I had to explain how I was Infantry and had never been to,
“The”, Infantry School.
I took an online, two-week branch/MOS transfer course (the Wyoming NG does not have shit on me)and got my MOS and blue cord that way.
I then did correspondence courses to earn my Tab.
Work smarter folks, not harder!
Having spent four years in ROTC and received a commission from that program in 1968, here is my take on the subject’s military “service.” While attending law school at Emory for three years, he decided to join advanced ROTC (normally the last two years of college) at Georgia State University. As I recall, in advanced ROTC they enrolled me in the Army Reserve as a private. I remember I was issued a reserve ID showing I was a PVT (E-1 or E-2). We were told that if we failed to complete the advanced program we could be ordered to active duty, but as a practical matter that rarely happened. People who dropped out in those last two years were merely discharged and subject to the draft. Some people joined ROTC specifically to avoid the draft because you were given the same military draft exemption as those serving in the reserve components. This was especially true when the student deferment was dropped.
I think he was taking ROTC while also attending law school, but dropped out during the second year of law school. I recall when I was commissioned, there was a guy with us who had just completed ROTC and commissioned, but was given a deferral for a year of going on active duty so he could complete his last year of law school, then go on active duty. I wonder whether this fellow (the politician) ever went to ROTC summer camp the summer of 1970, which was shorter, but the ROTC equivalent to basic training. He certainly never went to basic training. When you were nominally in the reserves for Advanced ROTC, you were not sent to basic training, which would have required being on active duty for at least 8 weeks.
rgr769: I’d guess you’re dead on target here with your assessment.
Thanks. I try to shoot straight, even if I was a lawer, as you guys call em. Hopefully’ I won’t be sued for defamation, even though I am not Hondo.
Also, his FOIA report should show the identity and location for his reserve unit if he actually served in one. The fact that the document only shows Georgia State tells me he was nominally enrolled in the Army Reserve, as I was, as part of his joining Avanced ROTC there. I think his bio is worded the way it is so that it sounds like he enlisted in a reserve unit and went through basic training, as opposed to merely being an ROTC dropout. I bet he cannot prove he went to either basic training or ROTC summer camp.
Basic training was conducted at several posts, as was Infantry AIT. I attended basic at Ft. Knox and AIT at Ft. Dix.
So he’s an accomplished LIAR, doesn’t make him special. So he’s a politician, doesn’t make him special. So the guy is an ego maniac, capable of looking the camera (or voters in person) dead on and CONvincing those watching that he is honest and sincere, doesn’t make him special. The American public is full of good-hearted folks with best of intentions and yet the most gullible of those in any country. We’ve had it so good for so long that we believe the overall competence and creation of all things important to life are the result of a highly superior intelligent population. Through generations we have seen our country most always persevere under the most difficult of times. Only the strong shall survive. Time after time we have finished the victor. Regrettably, we as a country can not separate genuine leaders from bullies and accomplished liars. That in spite of having more and more of the so-called leaders caught and self-exposed as unethical frauds. But in our blindness, we accept it as tiny insignificant embellished stories. Which has brought us to the current day when integrity-challenged individuals believe they can increase their chances of winning an election by LYING out the ass without fear of repercussion….no matter the gravity of being caught and exposed. It’s a flawed mentality of those seeking office, “So what if they find out the truth later after I have won the election? By that time I will be a member of a body who most all have been exposed as unethical cheaters and liars who will gladly stand behind me in support; for fear of any more digging in their past which would bring them ALL down to my level of a person void of character.” The current time of history-in-the-making is great for low-life liars and deceivers; especially for those of color. This is the day when one can scream “Racist” back at anyone for any reason and expect it to stand up to the most revealing exposure, regardless as to the depth of the fraud revealed. I personally have paid my dues and… Read more »
I once lived in Columbus GA and that was a blue spot on the map in a sea of red in each Presidential Election, thus as along as he’s a dumpyrat I think he’ll just keep getting reelected.
I just got a call from Mr Bishop’s opponent thanking us for getting this FOIA. He says he’s polling about a percentage point behind Bishop and this may put him over the top. Locals will want to support Greg Duke.
??????
Unless Duke gets a really dark tan before election day,,,he’LL loose. Trust me I live here.
The Acting Secretary of the Army just gave Private Bishop the highest award it can give to a civilian for steering lots of money their way. Private Bishop might be a bit of a jock-sniffer…
http://www.albanyherald.com/news/local/u-s-rep-sanford-bishop-is-awarded-the-army-distinguished/article_7aef791e-cc9d-596a-9db6-ac7c3709cd58.html
Interesting.