Dehesa Valley Gazette

Miss a Gazette? Catch up here

DEHESA VALLEY GAZETTE

Published periodically from San Diego, CA

(The Official BUT UNAUTHORIZED Organ Of Mayor Jimmy Valentine)

WEDNESDAY MAY 8th, 2013

A VETERAN IS SOMEONE WHO, AT ONE POINT IN HIS (HER) LIFE, WROTE A CHECK MADE PAYABLE TO AMERICA FOR AN AMOUNT OF…”UP TO AND INCLUDING…MY LIFE”

http://www.dehesavalleygazette.com

Or Email: jimmyv@dehesavalleygazette.com

Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/kogojimmyv?ref=tn_tnmn

WHO TELLS YOUR LAWMAKER HOW TO VOTE?

(well it ain’t y’all)

** I don’t think folks in Congress get enough love and certainly not much sympathy. It really is a tough job. Much changed from old days. Usta be that a “representative,” or senator went to DC to speak on behalf of his/her constituents. One ran on a platform that appealed to voters and then you took their interests to the capital.

How quaint today. Now before a lawmaker votes he/she has to check the voter manuals. How does Grover Norquist require you to vote? Does your vote pass muster with the NRA. Best see what Heritage Foundation wants you to do. To be safe have an aide check in with the US Chamber of Commerce to see how they require you to vote.

No jest. A wrong vote affects your “score,” with major league influencers. Piss off Grover and he’ll spend money to “primary,” you in the next campaign. Anger the NRA and your grade gets downgraded and you’ll quickly see mega million ads in your district supporting a guy named Carl A. Winchester. You can’t afford a bad score from anyone….Aipac, FAIR, NRL,

How about your voters back home? Well screw them. You think any of those fools have resources to “primary,” you? …hold on, Jim DeMint is on the phone.

MUTTERINGS

**I’m a fan of Eric Shinseki. He is the Secretary of Veterans Affairs since 2009. A four star U.S. Army General retired, he served combat (in actual combat) tours in Vietnam and was wounded in theatre. He holds the Bronze Star with V device and two oak leaf clusters as well as Purple Heart.

Hard to find a person more qualified to fight for Veterans than a combat wounded Vet flag officer.

That said, it really is pretty much a thankless job these days. You run a monster organization with hundreds of medical facilities, thousands of healthcare professionals and more thousands worker bees who struggle to keep up with a growing flood of benefit requests using an antiquated paper based system that creates chaos and complications.

As you stumble to keep up with backlog of applications for service and disability payments the system keeps producing more applicants. New Vets stream out of the Iraq/Afghan wars. Recognition of new allowable combat related ailments from previous wars such as Agent Orange in Vietnam creates thousands more cases that clog the pipeline.

Meanwhile the VA continues to urge and encourage Vets to sign up for benefits. I attend meetings with Veterans groups where the VA will attend to remind us that we should be directing Vets to the VA to sign up, inquire about benefits and then apply. Knowing the backlog that astounds me but also indicates that the VA knows its mission and remains dedicated despite the burden of claims.

My Congressman, Duncan Hunter has called for Eric Shinseki to resign blaming him for the backlog and a failure to bring the claims to completion. Duncan‘s urging is not to be taken lightly. He is a U.S. Marine who has served combat tours himself in both Iraq and Afghanistan. But Duncan is wrong.

To my mind there is no one better to continue as VA head than Shinseki. We certainly don’t need a new face to begin a learning curve. A new boss will not eliminate the backlog simply by being a new boss. I’m convinced Shinseki is on the right track. Others agree. If this matter is of interest to you please read this:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/mobileweb/craig-newmark/veterans-disability-claim_b_2992824.html

And bear in mind please that most Veterans Service Organizations stand with Shinseki. The newest VSO which represents many of the newest applicants for benefits, the Iraq-Afghanistan Veterans of America (IAVA) are the lone VSO group calling for Shinseki’s head, giving the impression that their members should go to the head of the line or otherwise be given special consideration. Every Vet should be given special consideration.

http://www.military.com/daily-news/2013/03/21/battles-erupt-amid-calls-for-va-resignations.html

The VA is an easy target. It’s massive. Every screw up carries extra headline emotion because we’re talking about folks who put their lives on the line for us. We learn of every WTF story out of the VA but seldom hear the millions of good stories from Vets who are served by the VA day in and day out.

Duncan is my congressman. I vote for him. I respect and like him very much. I’d much prefer that he call for a meeting with Shinseki and ask what he can do to help rather than calling for his head. I’m just guessing that congress would be a welcome partner and acting on behalf of our Vets might give the lawmakers a bit of polish on their tarnished public image.

**I often banter with friends about politics. Rather easy to provoke discussion and often heated chat. It’s kinda fun. But I’ve learned to be cautious. Some folks take this stuff deadly serious.

A recent case in point is the matter of Benghazi where four Americans died in a terror attack on our consulate, including our ambassador to Libya J. Christopher Stevens. It has been a while since the topic has been broached on rightwing radio, blogs or TV. But there has been resurgence. Petitions are flying on the net encouraging new congressional hearings. Radio has joined the fray anew.

What be up with this? From the onset I never could understand the story. Four Americans were killed in a very dangerous place on earth. By terrorists. A concerted attack on Americans. No American life lost is to be taken lightly. We send our men and women into harm’s way every day….in uniform and in business suit. We mourn the loss of every life.

I rode with the Patriot Guard Riders to escort Navy Seal Tyrone S. Woods as he returned to San Diego and his final rest at Fort Rosecrans National Cemetery. He died a hero along wide his fellow Seal Glen Doherty.

But while I mourned I failed to fathom a conspiracy on the part of my government. I’ve tried but failed. But others have not failed. Something must be hidden. Somebody in our government is involved in something sinister.

When an associate sent me an email asking me to sign on to a petition to renew the conspiracy matter I responded lightly that the matter was way yesterday news and it wasn’t much news back then. Yikes.

Among the responses I received was this:

Yeah, Jimmy.

A violent attack on our Embassy (sovereign US Territory, just like your home in Dehesa) The torture/murder of 4 American citizens and desecration of their corpses.

A week of lies about what "triggered" the attack.

7 months later and nothing but refusals by the administration to release any information on what actually happened, what was NOT done, and why.

Congressional oversight committees can't even get the names of survivors so they can be called to testify.

A couple of supposed survivors were discovered, and refused to talk, claiming they'd been threatened if they did. (We can't even find out how true this is.)

Just stonewall and ignore it and hope that everyone will just forget about it.

And you agree with that?

Suppose it was you that was murdered, how would Noreen feel about forgetting it ???? Do you think she could forget? I don't.

Now I’m not an expert on this kinda stuff but I have followed the story from the onset. I also know how to Google. You might read this accounting and see if it fits the charges leveled by my friend:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2012_Benghazi_attack

Or if you are inclined to find scary things under your bed, even at your advanced age then you’ll enjoy the interim report just released by a handful of GOP House Committee:

http://www.speaker.gov/report/benghazi-interim-report

This week Congressman Darrell Issa will hold more Benghazi hearings. New claims will be made and new headlines printed. But at days end the result will be the same. Four Americans are dead, killed in a combat zone halfway around the world. Volunteers who put their lives in harm’s way for us. How many times has that story been told since 2001?

http://www.navytimes.com/article/20130507/NEWS/305070004/Diplomat-U-S-team-stopped-from-going-Benghazi

I think I’ll mostly avoid prompting my friends to discuss Benghazi in the days to come.

** Syria occupies a bit of my daily verses these days. I’m praying we stay the hell out of there. Tales of the use of weaponized chemicals by somebody over there takes us a step closer to stupid. Half of the rebels fighting the Assad regime are Islamic terrorists and calls for U.S. intervention might amount to the U.S. arming Osama Bin Laden during the Russian invasion there decades ago.

Many of the usual suspects are already calling for U.S. military action. I’m guessing talk show hosts among them.

I’m on board with U.S. involvement in Syria, providing that we send the lawmakers and talk show hosts who advocate involvement. They can be our “special forces.” General Rush Limbaugh. Colonel Saun Hannity. Private Roger Hedgecock. Admiral John McCain. Quick training at Camp Pendleton. Air drop into Libya and I’m guessing “mission accomplished,” in a week or less.

Don’t you just love an all-volunteer military?

**I didn’t know squat about Dr. Ben Carson until just recently as he became the newest darling of the politically doomed. (Read Sara Palin, Michelle Bachman, Allan West etc). The couple of times I saw or heard him I was impressed. Soft spoken, non-flammatory, rational, intelligent and accomplished. I took some hope that perhaps the rightwing had a hero worthy of worship.

But then Dr. Ben revealed that he has spent way too much time listening to crazed radio talkers or at least attempting to appeal to that dwindling audience. Dr. Ben suggested that same sex marriage will lead to folks “going alter” with pets or young children.

Backlash was immediate and the good doctor jumped to say sorry. But crazy is hard to hide. Course we haven’t had a crazy president since Nixon so perhaps we are due?

**You heard it here first….Hedgecock to be featured in new realty show, “The Talking Dead.” The plot is simple, a radio talk show host continues to talk even after his audience has gone to reward.

**You like me….why are we still sending National Guard troops into combat? Insufficient regular forces?

http://www.kpbs.org/news/2013/apr/01/california-natl-guard-san-diego-afghanistan/

**The “Go Bagless,” campaign is over at my local Albertsons in Alpine. Recall I told ya about the effort months ago. No more plastic or paper bags for groceries. Bring your own re-usable or buy one at the store. Otherwise stuff just gets tossed in your cart.

Well, not exactly….soon after the launch clerks started giving you boxes to cart your groceries to the car…boxes from product on the shelves. As time went on the boxes gave way to paper bags and now we’re back to “paper or plastic?”.

I tried to be a Boy Scout but I kept forgetting my re-usable bags, leaving them in the house after unloading groceries. So I’d buy a couple more. I think I have 20 re-usable bags. Most used once, on the day of their purchase.

I wonder how long it will take for those bags to decompose in the landfill?

** Recent issue found us discussing a resurgence interest in “tin foil hats.” The hats protect us from radio waves, liberal arguments and even space invaders. The hats always sold well among a certain populace but there has been a tidal wave of renewed interest in tin foil with the advent of drones. My radio tells me that I might be targeted for elimination by a drone even as I sip my latte at Starbucks here in El Cajon. (Obama keeps a list of potential drone targeted Americans).

And so I jest in previous issue, only to be confronted some days later by word that drone protection has advanced well beyond the tin foil lined “gimmie cap.” What is it that they say on talk radio? “You can’t make this stuff up.”

http://ahprojects.com/projects/stealth-wear

** Local TV gripes.

We need a cable channel devoted exclusively to hiway accidents. That way my local TV news station would not be inclined to lead every newscast with live on the scene reports of colliding cars.

Breaking news. Consultants have obviously told news managers that using the term gives the impression that your news team is actually “breaking,” news. Often the breaking news happened several hours ago (as we first reported on XX News at 5am) and every other station is also at the scene of the water main break or fleeing car termination site. Break this!!

We’ll tell you the other half of the story tonight at 11. Instead of reporting the entire story in a single newscast stations have been consulted to cut the story in half. Tell the first half at 6pm and the second half at 11pm. (Tonight at 11 we’ll tell you why these two women were murdered). Which leaves most of us with half a story since we’re not inclined to watch a 11pm repeat of the 6pm newscast even if the late news tells us the second half of the story.

I do applaud local news coverage of local military and Veterans events/issues. All of the network and independent stations devote resources to such stories.

And credit where due for those times when the local stations do devote time and energy to “breaking news,” that requires a modicum of investigative effort. If we had an all accident cable channel there might be more time for such enterprise reporting, ya think?

** I think I ponder politics a bit too much. Which is why a cartoon in the New Yorker prompted a political response….the cartoon features a mouse standing outside the mouse hole in the wall pointing a gun at a very large cat. The cat dialogue bubble reads: “ Let’s see…..six rounds, nine lives….do the math.”

For the life of me I’m not sure why the mouse reminds me of the GOP while the cat represents the democrats. (census figures maybe?).

** As a public service we’ll keep a listing of fact check sources on the DVG so you can fast click and determine if you are being made brunt of bull. Keep your radio talkshow host honest:

www.factcheck.org

www.politifact.com

www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/fact-checker

www.urbanlegends.about.com

www.snopes.com

www.votesmart.org

** Thanks to KUSI-TV we have a very easy way for you to get to know Homefront San Diego and the great work all our volunteers do daily for military families in San Diego County. A local charity worthy of your consideration. We spend every penny of your donation on military families…no overhead, no salaries, no office expenses and no well-dressed top executives who lunch well….take a look at us please and remember us when you decide you want to help our low ranked military Hero families:

: http://www.kusi.com/video?clipId=8080996&autostart=true

**Emails, we get emails: (note please: I do not edit emails and I want to allow as much response as possible so some of the items are a tad long but I find all of them interesting and worthy and hope you will as well)

Hello Jimmy

Always great to hear from you.

Keep up the good work, and keep in touch, Jimmy.

Marine

Joe V

3:35 PM (2 hours ago)

to me, Jimmy

I’m not sure if Iraq was freed ….but Cheney and Halliburton made billions … and it doubled our national debt … 5 trillion down the tubes … I hope the American people are not so gullible next time …

we need to cool it with the war crap … unless we are threatened….and since we have all the bombs in the world and the largest mil budget on the planet….we should now turn to more productive enterprise …

Jimmy,

I don’t listen to Rush, and I don’t read the New York Times, so I guess you can call me a “LIV”. However, in your discussion, and reference to Rush, about the effect on business by Obamacare, I remember the supporters saying many times, that Obamacare was going to be a good thing for people and business. You note that the Times says, “the bakery owner indicates she might instead “outsource,” some of it operations, turning some current employees into contractors…or the bakery might reduce some of its product line (it currently produces 200 different items a day) to reduce the least profitable items or restrict its customer routes eliminating the least profitable of those.” In my judgment, turning some current employees into independent contractors ain’t a good thing for employees. It suddenly makes them responsible for their own healthcare with no subsidies, (which many people think is the way it should be anyway). I guess that’s better than getting fired, but still a very negative impact on the person and certainly not a good thing. Also, to have to reduce the product line, or the routes due to the costs incurred by the rising employee healthcare costs is also not a good thing.

Rush might have taken liberties, but the point should be how Obamacare is impacting people and business. It may not destroy small business, but it sure as hell is going to be a negative impact on both.

Len


Jimmy:

The sequester is hurting the wrong folks. Border Patrol Agents are getting a 40% cut in pay and or overtime while our President and Congress are handing out hundreds of million of dollars to foreign nations. As usual, our President and Congress can't say no to handouts of Public Money to most all foreign nations (friends and non friends alike). They can not bring themselves to secure our wide open Southern Border. A good friend of mine was within gunshot hearing distance of the murder of Border Patrol Agent Robert Rosas on the night of his murder by Border crossing illegals. The Border area where Agent Rosas was murdered is still wide open today for anyone to cross with ease, as is most of the East County Border area. I once did Border Watch activities with the Campo Minutemen (years past, during the time of and before the Agent Rosas murder), but, most of the Border Watcher's have gone on to doing other things (Tea Party activities,etc.). Activities closer to home. The high cost of gas and the distance involved with many of the North County Minutemen and women caused many to get involved in more local activities. For me, I still commute to the Campo area three days per week (140 miles each round trip), but, instead of watching the wide open Border (I'll let the Border Patrol do that), I have decided to do the job that the Border Patrol and others do not do. That job is to clean up the "littered lined" invasion trails, road crossings, load up and drop off areas. Starting the clean up project from the Border Road leading to I-8 (most all invasion trails lead from the Border to I-, where, the illegal's and or drug smuggler's catch their rides to their US destinations. In addition to cleaning up the invasion trails, we also make minor repairs to damaged range fencing from the Border Road to I-8. The work never ends! The trails, road crossings continue to get re-littered, and, the range fencing continue to get cut and or damaged as about ad quick as we are able to clean and make fence repairs. Since I (and a couple of volunteers), have started this clean up & fence repairs (6 years ago), we have removed over 85,000 pounds of litter from Public Lands (about 1,000+ pounds per month). It's sad that our President and both Houses of Congress seem to be bent on pandering to illegal's (with some sort of amnesty), for folks that have entered and stayed in our Country illegally. Refusing to enforce our Immigration Laws. Focusing more on control and regulations of guns for law abiding legal US Citizens. Since all the talk of amnesty (Immigration Reform), by Congress and the White House, along with cut backs on Border Patrol Agents, the number of illegal crossing of our Border in the San Diego area has increased. It has been reported by the Border Patrol that the increas has happened at our "most secured" area of the Border (Imperial Beach sector), and, I'm sure, has increased in our East County area where the Border is wide open (for anyone to cross at will). I say - Congress, start cutting foreign aid and secure our wide open Southern Border, now! Congress, it's called providing National Security! Congress, roll out the "razor wire" (at least eight feet high and eight feet wide!), from San Diego, to Brownsville! Now it's time get off the dang computer and hit the trail, for, they ain't going home,and, they certainly ain't staying home! Wake up America, you too Congress! Jimmy, I bid you a good day. Dan

Jimmy,

4500 died in this Afgan war on our side. 3400 of them were Regular Army. The rest Marines, Air Force, and Navy. In Vietnam, my war, 60000 died. 45000 were Regular Army. 8500 were Air Men, the rest were Marines and other forces. But all I hear about in this town is the Marines and Navy............. What about the Fucking Army who shed more blood than all the rest combined? My welcome home at San Fran. was ripe tomatoes and eggs leaving the gate after parts of 4 years in country. My Father said lets get a drink but before us going out to the local bar ask me to take off my Uniform first to avoid a fight. He was a 30 year veteren. I did not and there was blood in the Arizona bar.

The war in Afgan was a side show. Anyone who had read history in the CIA knew we would never win. But it made for a great adventure for those in the Military. War is an adventure for many. I am tired of reading your bleeding heart outlook of war. Mankind likes war. Always has and always will........... Riding a bike is not war. You are not a warrior.

The history of man demands it is necessary to just let both side fight until one side bleeds to death. This is the way of man. It is the way the Middle East will end. Soon.

Your are old. And not a General. So find something to do that old men do.........Jack whiskey is good for you........Drink plenty and forget. Roger won. It was war. He is an anal ass hole. But he won.

Paddy

**Love Ya Bye!!

HOMEFRONT SAN DIEGO – 760-392-1551

http://www.homefrontsandiego.org/

GOD BLESS AMERICA

WE REMEMBER SEPTEMBER 11, 2001

STAND TALL FOR TRADITIONAL MARRIAGE - FIGHT ON!!

STILL WORK TO DO TO SAVE OUR CROSS…KEEP POWDER DRY

ORGANIZATIONS & INDIVIDUALS SUPPORTED BY THE DEHESA VALLEY GAZETTE

Homefront San Diego

http://www.homefrontsandiego.org/

North County Warrior Support