A Sign of Gratitude

A reminder: when you see a member of our armed forces or a veteran, take the time to express your gratitude for their service. It can be a simple gesture, but let them know it comes from the bottom of your heart.



Learn more at The Gratitude Campaign.

Kentucky Guards the Border

The Associated Press reported last week that the governor of Kentucky has agreed to send a contingent of the Kentucky National Guard to help patrol the southern border.

Kentucky will send up to 650 National Guard troops to patrol the U.S. border with Mexico under an agreement signed by Gov. Ernie Fletcher.

Fletcher said the soldiers could be deployed by July under a memorandum of agreement with several other states.

Fletcher said the troops will not be permanently used for immigration patrols. "It will be on a rotational basis for a short period of time — maybe for several weeks," Fletcher said. "Then they'd come back and we'd have another group go down."

There is no word yet on whether the Guard troops being deployed will include canine units utilizing the state's prized breed of hunting dogs.

American Confidence Remains High

Patriot from A Soldier's Perspective points us to the latest Gallup poll results, which show that American confidence in our military is still riding high:

The 2006 Gallup poll results on public confidence are in and the military is again at the top of the list.

Seventy-three percent of Americans polled from June 1-4, 2006, said they have a "great deal" or "quite a lot" of confidence in the military, according to Gallup poll writer Lydia Saad. [snip]

The military surpassed the police and organized religion, the next highest ranking organizations, by 15 percent. The police and organized religion are the only other institutions rated in the poll that earned a high confidence rating from Americans, according to Saad.

This in spite of the almost endless haranguing by the American media and certain members of Congress and the almost daily depiction of the U.S. military as cold-blooded murderers.

And speaking of Congress, you might wonder just how well that august body performed in this public confidence poll.

Congress earned a confidence rating of 19 percent, while big business earned a confidence rating of 18 percent. In the 2005 poll, Congress and big business were tied at 22 percent.

I would be curious to see just how well certain media outlets fared, especially in light of the latest New York Times treachery.

A Time for Heroes

Thanks to Lone Star Times editor David Benzion for pointing out this excellent special publication of Stars and Stripes honoring U.S. military heroes and their extreme valor in the war on terror:

For more than four years now, American soldiers, sailors, airmen and Marines have been fighting the war on terror. While politicians and pundits argue the merits and demerits of strategy and prosecution, the military man or woman has been slugging it out, every day, with a foe who is often unseen. [snip]

In this special section, Stars and Stripes ... looks at the deeds that have earned medals of valor for the servicemembers profiled in these stories. Those included stand as surrogates for the thousands of others so recognized.

There are more than twenty servicemen and women featured, and each story is an intriguing look in to the hearts and minds of those heroes who are daily giving their all to shield us from harm. Please take the time to read — and make sure you have time to spend, because once you start reading it is very hard to stop.

Memorial Day

In this place where valor sleeps, we are reminded why America has always gone to war reluctantly: because we know the costs of war.
—Pres. George W. Bush at Arlington Cemetery, May 29, 2006

Race for the Borders

I still do not think the president's plans for Guardsmen on the southern border — defined as "supportive roles only" — is nearly comprehensive enough, but I must admit I am impressed with the swiftness with which the implementation has begun.

The first wave of about 800 National Guard soldiers will head to the U.S-Mexico border as early as next week, including planners and leadership personnel who will stay longer than the planned 21-day missions, the National Guard chief told lawmakers Wednesday.

Lt. Gen. Steven Blum said 200 soldiers are preparing to go to the four border states — California, Texas, Arizona and New Mexico — around June 1. He said the initial troops will be part of a longer-term force of project managers who will stay on the job over time to provide continuity in the new border program.

Homeland Security officials again stated that the Guardsmen will be armed for personal defense, but that they "would not do significant law enforcement duties"; rather, their supportive role would be to provide "engineering, road and fence building, transportation, logistics and surveillance and reconnaissance" for Border Patrol agents. I trust, however, that they their deployment orders would allow them to "defend themselves" if encountering any armed Mexican military incursions.

UPDATE: Paul McHale, assistant secretary of defense for homeland defense, gave the following report to members of the House Armed Services Committee today:

"This limited, temporary deployment will not adversely affect operational readiness or DoD's ability to conduct the global war on terrorism, nor hinder the National Guard's ability or capacity to aid their states in the event of a natural disaster or other emergency," Paul McHale, assistant secretary of defense for homeland defense, said in his prepared remarks. The maximum 6,000 National Guard members to support the mission represent just 2 percent of the Guard force, Blum noted. That number, even when added to the 71,000 National Guard members currently deployed in support of the war on terror, "still leaves a pretty robust inventory of over 350,000 citizen soldiers" to respond to hurricanes and other natural disasters, he said.

McHale told committee members the border-security mission will track closely with the counternarcotics mission the National Guard has been conducting along the southwest border for more than two decades. "The difference is the size of the force, and the commitment of resources will be far greater than anything we have done in the past," he said.