In another blatant attempt to bring back the "good old days" of the Vietnam War protests, an Iraq vet is returning his medals. Well - kinda... He's mailing his medals to Donald Rumsfeld because Rummy was responsible for this guy getting deployed...
Josh Gaines, 27, plans to mail the Global War on Terrorism Expeditionary Medal and National Defense Service Medal to former Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld. He said he will do so during a protest scheduled for Wednesday in Madison.
Gaines said he is returning the medals awarded when he left active duty in 2005 to Rumsfeld because he is “the man responsible for my tour.” He said he would likely send them to the Hoover Institution at Stanford University, where Rumsfeld was recently hired to be a visiting fellow.
Back on Sept 22, the protest was touted as a march up the streets to the State Capital in Madison with Gaines turning his medals over to Gov. Jim Doyle. Along with his comrades in Students for a Democratic Society, an offshot of Movement for a Democratic Society (which is really a grey haired version of the SDS movement from the Vietnam Days), Gaines will be calling for something really big...
Protesters will be calling for the de-federalization of the Wisconsin National Guard. Organizers believe it is in the best interest of the country that the National Guard remain in the U.S.A. for use in disaster relief and border control.
But hold on - does this vet have a grudge against the military?
Gaines said he was given an “other than honorable” discharge after failing a drug test. He said he started smoking marijuana after he returned from Iraq to help him eat and sleep after he had trouble doing either for months.
Notice that little bit of relevant information is stuffed down at the bottom of the article in the Army Times, while others failed to mention this fact at all.
Jeff Emanuel is embedded in Iraq and noted the following little tidbit... (you really need to read his whole post on this)
The big point here, though, is that those are the automatic medals. Virtually every single serviceman who deploys to Iraq and conducts themselves with a modicum of professionalism while there (in other words, who is not such an utter dirtbag that they are simply awaiting the proper paperwork to be administratively removed from the Army) receives another award for their tour. Depending on what they did, that could range from an Army Commendation Medal to a Bronze Star Medal with Valor, or could be any one of several other things. Either Mr. Gibbons is holding out on his liberal friends (and holding back gifts from his good friend Rummy), or he was such a poor soldier in Iraq that he received no award for his entire tour -- just the automatic medals, which recognize no award-deserving achievement whatsoever.
The 15 minute clock is already at 14 for Josh Gaines...
Jeff Emanuel said it best...
A pothead who was so poor at his job that he received no award for service in Iraq, and who was kicked out of the Army for drugs. At least John Kerry had awards -- Silver Star, Bronze Star -- to throw back. This publicity hound has nothing.
The Left really thinks that this is what the US military is made of.
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