The Old Colonel’s reaction to the Marine Lieutenant Colonel who resigned because he didn’t like the Commander-in-Chief’s Afghanistan Withdrawal Decision

 

Marine says he’ll resign after being relieved of command for calling out leaders on Afghanistan

Stuart Scheller posted a Facebook video saying senior leaders failed in Afghanistan. Within a day, he was relieved of command. - The Washington Post

Seems Marine Lt. Col. Stuart Scheller, who was relieved of command after a video of him criticizing senior U.S. officials for what he perceived to be “failures” in Afghanistan went viral, said on Sunday/29 August that he will be quitting the Marine Corps after 17 years.

“I am not saying we can take back what has been done; all I asked for was accountability,” he said, adding that he could have remained silent for three more years to reach the 20 years of service required for full pension, but that he opted to speak out instead.

Schaller went on to say: “I don’t want a single dollar. I don’t want any money from the VA … That the money should go to senior officers who will need it more than I do…. When I am done with what I am about to do, you all are going to need the jobs and the security … I want to say this very strongly… I have been fighting for 17 years. I am willing to throw it all away to say to my senior leaders: I demand accountability.”

 

Of course he followed this comment: “I am forfeiting my retirement, all entitlements. I don’t want a single dollar” by advertising his wife’s Pay Pal account for donations which calls into question his sincerity about “forfeiting all entitlements.” (as of 3 October, the account has collected over $2 Million)

 

Regardless, here was my well received comment in the Washington Post comments section for this article:

Military leaders give their best Military advice to the Commander-in-Chief/The President but it’s the CinC where the buck stops and he alone makes the final decision. If every Military leader resigned every time their recommendations were not followed, Pentagon E-Ring office doors would need to be replaced with revolving doors. Can you imagine the chaos that would create. Military leaders are sworn to obey the lawful orders of those appointed over them. 

When any Military member, regardless of rank, repeatedly disobeys a lawful direct order from a superior, the only remaining option is for the superior to sign a confinement order. That is what happened here and rightly so.  Lt Col Scheller had his own "Get Out of Jail Card" and he elected to exercise it after he had gotten the press he wanted by agreeing to refrain from any additional unlawful conduct.  Now that charges have been preferred and a Special Court Martial ordered, it appears the Marine Corps has offered him the option to "Resign for the Good of the Service in Lieu of Court Martial" but this almost always comes with a Discharge Under Other then Honorable Conditions which results in the loss of most Veterans' Benefits. Although Scheller publicly stated he didn't want any retirement or VA benefits, it now seems he is willing to resign but demands an Honorable Discharge, something the Marines are not willing to give someone resigning in lieu of court martial. It sets a bad precedent.

As for the the reason for Lt Col Scheller's insubordination, it is well known inside the “Building” that both The SecDef/GEN Austin and SecDef Esper as well as CJCS GEN Milley all strongly advised against the 2500 troop ceiling and giving up Bagram (Army) Airfield but both Trump and Biden rejected that advice and issued the lawful order to draw down to 2500 boots on the ground.

Remember, it was President Trump as the CinC that made the initial decision to draw down the troop strength to 2500. Anyone that has been on Bagram (Army) Airfield or BAF knows how big the perimeter is and even if we were to shrink it to just the inner perimeter (leave out the new area where the prison is) it would still take an Army Division to secure it and its two 10,000+ foot active runways with aprons.  It used to take me over an hour to run around just the inner perimeter. By making that drawdown decision, Trump in effect made the decision to abandon BAF.

Given the restraints of a 2500 troop strength the alternatives were try to provide an inadequate defense at BAF or withdraw to Kabul and protect the Military side of the Kabul Airport and the Military area around the US Embassy. The Military leaders correctly elected to withdraw to Kabul. This is a dilemma obviously beyond the grasp of a mere Marine Lieutenant Colonel training battalion commander who obviously has no respect for the chain of command. The Marine Corps and the entire Military is better off without this Officer.

WaPo Bromance with Dem Virginia Governor Candidate Terry "The Grifter" McAuliffe Is Over-the-Top

 

Dems: McAuliffe win shows 'roadmap' for beating Youngkin

By Sarah Rankin | AP  June 9, 2021 at 7:44 p.m. EDT

https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/mcauliffe-win-sets-up-virginia-clash-with-outsider-youngkin/2021/06/09/b6f112c8-c8df-11eb-8708-64991f2acf28_story.html?commentID=290d4fec-ede6-49b0-addd-e9c705e43854

It’s hard to tell if this Washington Post (WaPo) article is a news or an opinion piece? With the way WaPo Liberal columnists masquerading as reporters sneak their opinions into articles, it’s impossible to distinguish which is which and especially with the way the WaPo is fawning over Terry as their pick to be the next Virginia Governor. Why doesn't the WaPo even mention in any of their coverage anything about McAuliffe’s GreenTech scam illegally selling Chinese billionaires immigration US Visas as part of his sham GreenTech scheme? His Republican opponent, Glenn Younkin, spent 30 building businesses while McAuliffe's business experience was in a scam that would have made Bernie Madoff blush.

McAuliffe and his sham GreenTech Automotive (now bankrupt and out of business) were investigated by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission for Visa fraud when McAuliffe attempted to gain tax credits from the Virginia Economic Development Partnership (VEDP), the state’s business recruitment agency, to build GreenTech Automotive's factory in Virginia. He refused to supply VEDP with proper documentation of their business strategy and investors, which caused the VEDP to decline economic incentives for GreenTech Automotive. McAuliffe later falsely claimed during his gubernatorial run that VEDP was uncooperative and uninterested in GreenTech Automotive. 

In 2017, McAuliffe was sued for defrauding investors at GreenTech Automotive with the firm declaring bankruptcy in 2018. McAuliffe gave 32 wealthy Chinese nationals EB-5 visas in exchange for $560,000 investments into GreenTech Automotive, which exceeded the Department of Homeland Security's determined quota for GreenTech Automotive.

To be fair, shouldn’t the WaPo mention this in any of their glowing and positive articles about their darling, Terry “the Grifter” McAuliffe? Also, McAuliffe should have to report all WaPo Virginia election articles to the FEC as “in Kind” campaign donations.

Biden's Afghanistan Abandonment -- The Obama-Biden Iraq Abandonment 2.0

 

Hostage advocates concerned by US pullout from Afghanistan

By Eric Tucker | AP June 9, 2021 at 1:54 p.m. EDT

https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/hostage-advocates-concerned-by-us-pullout-from-afghanistan/2021/06/09/d6ac911a-c8d9-11eb-8708-64991f2acf28_story.html?commentID=d62894e6-e07c-49bd-9d47-c2be5505178d

This Washington Post (WaPo)  article includes this passage: “The departure of all U.S. special operations forces from Afghanistan will make counterterrorism operations, including the collecting of intelligence on al-Qaida and other extremist groups, more difficult. The administration hopes to be able to compensate through the military’s wide geographic reach, which has only expanded with the advent of armed drones and other technologies. The administration has said it will retain a U.S. Embassy presence, but that will become more difficult if the military’s departure leads to a collapse of Afghan governance.”

 

Several recent WaPo articles have been very supportive of the Biden Afghanistan Abandonment while attempting to insulate Biden from the inevitable blame for the Afghan Government collapse and eventual reentry of US Troops similar to the Biden-Obama Iraq fiasco. The WaPo is doing this by misrepresenting the deal that the Trump administration ultimately signed with the Taliban in February 2020.   Although the Trump deal called for all U.S. troops to leave Afghanistan by May 2021, the withdrawal was dependent on conditions on the ground at the time so it is arguable that a pull out never would have happened.

Anyone that believes President Biden has a clue what he’s doing with his precipitous abandonment of Afghanistan should listen to the 2 June 21 C-SPAN interview with former Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta and LTG (Ret) H.R. McMaster when they labeled Biden Ignorant.

https://www.c-span.org/video/?512248-1/leon-panetta-hr-mcmaster-discuss-us-troop-withdrawal-afghanistan

Both agreed Biden’s recent presentation to Troops at JB Langley-Eustis was “misleading and disgraceful.” They ridiculed Biden’s Afghanistan plan as non-existent and his understanding of the situation as naive. This should scare all Americans.

We’ve been in Afghanistan for 20 years and have fewer killed then ONE month of losses in Vietnam. Hardly “huge.”  We are now negotiating with adjacent countries for basing rights to continue our operations in country from “over the horizon” when we have developed Bagram Airfield (BAF) with two 10,000 foot active runways capable of handling any aircraft flying and excellent accommodations for 20,000+ troops.  Keeping a small 2,000 residual force in Afghanistan would be the low cost solution to “keeping a lid” on the place.  It appears Biden learned nothing from the Biden-Obama desertion of Iraq only to have to reintroduce troops again. According to Panetta & McMaster, Biden is on track for a repeat.

Replacing BAF with “Over-the-Horizon” capabilities is a myth. Contrary to “Bug Out” Biden’s “Over-the-Horizon” comments we have NO UAV platforms or bases capable of sustaining an “Over/the-Horizon” campaign.  Doha to Bagram is 1500 miles and an Air Force MQ-1B Predator or an Army MQ-1C Gray Eagle cruising speed is <200 MPH so just to get “on station” with ~450 lbs of ordnance is a 15 hour round trip. If we still controlled BAF problem solved.

USAF Prepares for Over-the-Horizon Operations After Afghanistan Withdrawal

https://www.airforcemag.com/usaf-afghanistan-withdrawal-over-the-horizon-operations-funding/?utm_source=Sailthru&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=EBB%206.9.21&utm_term=Editorial%20-%20Early%20Bird%20Brief

I would add, look at BAF’s location in relation to Iran in case we ever had to conduct operations against them.  Maintaining a small presence and control of Bagram would be the “low cost” smart thing to do but no one has ever accuse Biden of being smart.

Washington Post Opinion: The way forward on containing Iran’s nuclear ambitions

 

Opinion by Bob Menendez & Lindsey Graham June 3, 2021 at 10:33 a.m. EDT

Bob Menendez, a Democrat, represents New Jersey in the U.S. Senate and serves as chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. Lindsey Graham, a Republican, represents South Carolina in the U.S. Senate.

Senator Melendez (D-NJ) and Senator Graham (R-SC) were right to oppose the original JCPOA and advising caution in going into any new agreement that must be much more comprehensive and enforceable. Everyone should read their sage advice and follow it going forward – Especially President Biden.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2021/06/03/menendez-graham-iran-nuclear-ambitions/

Also, any new agreement needs to be in the form of a treaty that needs to be ratified by the Senate.

 Remember, the Biden-Obama was duped by Iran last time and both the US CENTCOM commander and out commander in Afghanistan as well as US Intelligence acknowledge it was Iran and NOT Russia that was paying a bounty to kill US Troops in Afghanistan. As a matter of fact, Iran was using the Billions of dollars the Biden-Obama Administration gave them to pay the bounties which is why troops call it the “Biden Bounty.”

US intelligence indicates Iran paid bounties to Taliban for targeting American troops in Afghanistan

https://www.cnn.com/2020/08/17/politics/iran-taliban-bounties-us-intelligence/index.html

 Afghanistan war: US spies doubt reports of Russian 'bounties' for troops

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-56775660

 U.S. commander: Intel still hasn't established Russia paid Taliban 'bounties' to kill U.S. troops

"It just has not been proved to a level of certainty that satisfies me," Gen. Frank McKenzie told NBC News. McKenzie oversees U.S. troops in Afghanistan.

https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/national-security/u-s-commander-intel-still-hasn-t-established-russia-paid-n1240020

How serious can plagiarism be? We just elected a President with an extensive history of it!

 

Opinion: Bob Caslen is more than his worst mistake

 

Opinion by Kathleen Parker Columnist May 14, 2021 at 6:49 p.m. EDT

 

It’s well-known by now that Bob Caslen, the suddenly former president of the University of South Carolina, resigned this week following a commencement address that he, well, flubbed pretty badly.

 

He welcomed the graduates as the new alumni of the “University of California.” Ouch.

More important, he plagiarized.

 

FULL ARTICLE BELOW

_________________________________________________________________________

 

How serious can plagiarism be? We just elected a President with an extensive history of it. LTG Caslen was just following the example of his Commander-in-Chief.

Syracuse University Law School had Joe repeat his whole first-year after initially flunking him out for copying at least five pages from a published law review article.

In 2008, then-Sen. Biden copied an entire paragraph from a Time magazine story on then-newly elected President Lee Myung-Bak of South Korea and used it for a speech, without attribution. Biden even had the stolen language read into an official congressional resolution in February 2008.

Biden's problem with copying the work of others is so widespread that in 2019 the Biden campaign released a climate plan using exactly the same language as outside left-wing groups, without attribution and that barely made news.

Maureen Dowd reported Biden's most egregious offense of plagiarism that happened during a debate at the Iowa State Fair on 23 August 1987 this way: "Biden had been lifting entire lines of his stock stump speech from Britain’s then-Labor Party leader, Neil Kinnock, who was campaigning for prime minister across the pond. He [Biden] lifted Mr. Kinnock's closing speech with phrases, gestures and lyrical Welsh syntax intact for his own closing speech. Biden didn’t just steal Kinnock’s political rhetoric, he appropriated his life story, including a coal mining grandfather. This was worse than it looked: Kinnock’s Welsh grandfather did work in the mines. Biden’s, although he lived in Pennsylvania coal country, sold cars."

When our Country's "Plagiarizer-in-Chief" is our President, how can we criticize others like LTG Caslen for just following his example?

Unlike my Commander-in-Chief, I will confess that I plagiarized most of this comment from various articles published in several sources, and without attribution.

_________________________________________________________________________

Opinion: Bob Caslen is more than his worst mistake

Opinion by Kathleen Parker Columnist May 14, 2021 at 6:49 p.m. EDT

 

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/bob-caslen-south-carolina-commencement-resignation/2021/05/14/bc5ecc1e-b4d5-11eb-a980-a60af976ed44_story.html?commentID=52ea8abb-3f60-4b63-a549-0f5dc97d7e50

 

It’s well-known by now that Bob Caslen, the suddenly former president of the University of South Carolina, resigned this week following a commencement address that he, well, flubbed pretty badly.

 

He welcomed the graduates as the new alumni of the “University of California.” Ouch.

 

More important, he plagiarized.

 

When someone within stage-whispering distance reminded Caslen where he was, he quickly corrected himself, saying “Carolina,” but not “South Carolina.”

 

Then, with an embarrassed chuckle, he said to the audience of graduates, “I owe you push-ups.”

 

Caslen, you see, is a push-up kind of guy, a career military man who regularly invited students to join him at the gym, where he put himself — and those who showed up — through a grueling workout.

 

His plagiarism consisted of two paragraphs he borrowed without attribution from another commencement address by, of all people, retired Adm. William H. McRaven, possibly the best-known military man in the United States, who planned the takedown of Osama bin Laden. Caslen was deeply apologetic, saying he added the words at the last minute and “failed to cite” him.

 

It’s not the worst crime in the world — but it is certainly less than ideal if you happen to be the president of a university where academic rules apply. Among those rules: Do not crib from another’s work without credit.

 

Caslen’s resignation, after almost two years as president, was an unfortunate end to a job he probably never should have been offered — or accepted.

 

A retired U.S. Army general and former superintendent of the U.S. Military Academy at West Point, Caslen’s candidacy was met with protests by students who objected to his suggestion, in a stream-of-consciousness talk, that sexual assault and binge drinking go hand-in-hand. Caslen failed to put a period at the end of one sentence before beginning another, making it sound like he was blaming victims.

 

Caslen wasn’t a first choice for the University of South Carolina’s board of trustees, either. He was approved after a nudge from Republican Gov. Henry McMaster, who is also a board member. That bit of pressure earned the school an inquiry from the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools Commission on Colleges.

Sen Cotton Right to Ask About the Wuhan Lab. Once Again, Washington Post Blows a Story but Isn’t Man Enough to Issue a Correction

Senator Tom Cotton (R-AR) Was Correct to Ask a Question About the Possibility the COVID-19 Virus Originated in a Wuhan Lab

I recall a hack Washington Post (WaPo) writer masquerading as a reporter named Paulina Firozi ridiculing (or rather vilifying) Arkansas Senator Tom Cotton for just saying: “We don’t know where it originated, and we have to get to the bottom of that .... We also know that just a few miles away from that food market is China’s only biosafety level 4 super laboratory that researches human infectious diseases…. Now, we don’t have evidence that this disease originated there, but because of China’s duplicity and dishonesty from the beginning, we need to at least ask the question to see what the evidence says .... And China right now is not giving any evidence on that question at all.”

Here is the Link to that Firozi Article but I have appended it below.

WaPo 17 Feb 20 Headline (Byline Paulina Firozi) : Headline Tom Cotton keeps repeating a coronavirus conspiracy theory that was already debunked

 https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2020/02/16/tom-cotton-coronavirus-conspiracy/

Now in the past week the WaPo has run these several articles (Links Below the Firozi Article) stating EXACTLY what Senator Cotton suggested over a year ago! I’ll be watching the WaPo corrections section for the WaPo apology/correction and but I doubt the WaPo is “man enough” to apologize to Senator Cotton.

The media called the ‘lab leak’ story a ‘conspiracy theory.’ Now it’s prompted corrections — and serious new reporting

https://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/media/the-media-called-the-lab-leak-story-a-conspiracy-theory-now-its-prompted-corrections--and-serious-new-reporting/2021/06/10/c93972e6-c7b2-11eb-a11b-6c6191ccd599_story.html

WaPo FACT CHECKER Glenn Kessler

Timeline: How the Wuhan lab-leak theory suddenly became credible

https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2021/05/25/timeline-how-wuhan-lab-leak-theory-suddenly-became-credible/

Washington Post quietly edits 2020 report that had branded Covid-19 origin from a Wuhan lab as ‘debunked conspiracy theory’

https://www.opindia.com/2021/06/washington-post-corrects-2020-report-tom-cotton-covid-19-emerging-wuhan-lab-debunked-conspiracy-theory/amp/

As of 25 January 2025, only eight Intelligence Community agencies have investigated the origins of COVID-19 and four, CIA, DIA, DOE and FBI favor the likely origin is a Wuhan Laboratory leak.

More confirmation: Democracy Dies in Darkness and the WaPo is Turning Out the Lights.

Again in 2020, Washington DC Has Another Decade Record Breaking Number of Murders Breaking the Record Set Just Last Year

It’s another January in our Nation’s Capital and it’s time for the Old Colonel to once again analyze the 2020 homicide statistics. At the beginning of every new year the Washington Post (WaPo) publishes the homicide statistics for Washington, DC and the surrounding adjacent Maryland and Virginia suburbs. Using the WaPo data and the Census Bureau 2020 population numbers, the Old Colonel calculates the homicide rates for DC and the adjacent Maryland and Virginia jurisdictions and does a quick analysis of his own. This table displays the 2020 results:

Of course the WaPo also does its own analysis and you can read theirs at:

Homicides in D.C. hit 16-year high; shootings also have spiked https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/public-safety/homicides-rise-washington/2020/12/31/59dd659e-3953-11eb-bc68-96af0daae728_story.html 

The 198 homicides in 2020 makes it the deadliest year in DC since 2004. It’s a 236% increase in homicides over the 2012 number (84) and 171% jump over just three years ago (116) in 2017. Also, more than 920 people were shot in DC in 2020, a 64 percent increase from just three years ago.

The stats once again clearly demonstrated that any WaPo reader so naïve as to believes the myth that onerous gun laws yield safer communities need look no further than these WaPo stats to be disabused of that fantasy. The FACT is a DC resident, where firearms are virtually impossible to own, is over 17 times more likely to be a homicide victim then one of us Gun Tottin Virginians in the adjacent suburbs who is fortunate enough to live in a state where gun ownership for self-protection is almost unrestricted. Even a Marylander, with very restrictive gun laws, is 4.65 times less likely to be a homicide victim than a DC resident; much better than DC but a Marylander is still 3.68 times more likely to be a homicide victim than one of us Virginia Gun Totters!

This above graphic clearly shows the breathtaking disparity in homicide rates among the adjacent Virginia suburbs and the DC or Maryland jurisdictions that not only don’t have the death penalty but where criminals have little chance of being confronted by a law abiding citizen who just might just have a gun of their own. Of course, now that both Houses of the Virginia Legislature and the Offices of Governor Lieutenant Governor and Attorney General are controlled by Liberal “criminal coddling” Democrats who would rather protect murderers then murder victims, there is a movement afoot to abolish the Death Penalty and turn Virginia into another DC.

Contributing to the DC problem is their model for “punishing” criminals as embodied in the DC Youth Rehabilitation Act which routinely puts youthful murderers back on the street in record time. Now the DC Council wants to “fix” the act to treat street thugs up to age 25 instead of the present 22 as “misunderstood” kids that didn’t really mean to commit murder with a firearm so they should be released on their own recognizance until they have killed at least three people. Then, in the unlikely event they are even caught or ever prosecuted, they should be “rehabilitated” for a couple of years in a group home and then released back into the general population to put into practice what they learned in “rehab.”

Another recent WaPo article noted that only about half of the DC homicides are even solved and that 60% of DC homicide offenders caught had a previous gun arrest and were either out on “no cash” bail or on probation for a gun offense. Also, the vast majority of homicide victims are Black males.

So what was the DC Council’s immediate solution to the problem? They stripped $15 million from the $500 million police budget which will reduce the size of the 3,700-member department. Another “woke” DC Council initiative which recently passed provides for the early release of hundreds of violent gun offenders. The DC Police Union assesses this “enlightened” piece of legislation “has sent us back two decades in reducing homicides.”

Obviously, DC officials don’t care much about a bunch of street thugs killing each other but what’s intolerable is they should care about the number of innocent bystanders caught in the crossfire. This is obviously a marksmanship training problem so they should amend the law so instead of the present DC “catch and release” policy for perpetrators of gun violence, they should be required to complete a shooting course to improve their aim during “rehab” so they only hit the other thugs they are aiming at. 

In conclusion, the statistics clearly demonstrate that contrary to liberal rhetoric, it is an “inconvenient truth” that “guns actually do make us safer.” Ask any citizen who has been directed to “shelter in place” because a crazed killer was loose in their neighborhood how they feel about owning a gun and I’ll bet the overwhelming majority wished they had one. Could it be that homicidal maniacs would much rather commit their crimes in jurisdictions like DC and Maryland without the death penalty and are not so anxious to attack law-abiding Virginia citizens as they might be "packing heat?" Seems that’s what the Homicide Numbers tell us!

Added - 2121 DC-VA-MD Comparison Table