Iraq, Ron DeSantis' stolen valor

Starting with a documentary available on YOUTUBE.


Here's the description from YOUTUBE:

This powerful investigation into Shia clerics in some of Iraq's holiest shrines uncovers a network of exploitation of young women and girls, trapped into prostitution and pimped out by a religious elite. For the first time the clerics' secret sex trade has been captured on camera. Undercover filming and victim testimony reveal how they procure young women for male clients, and are prepared to conduct ‘pleasure marriages’ with children.


16,436 views since it went up yesterday.  The title is IRAQ'S SECRET SEX TRADE.  It's from 2019 and was a BBC production.


Now let's turn to stolen valor.  In Thursday night's "Philomena Cunk is hilarious, Ron DeSanits is just sad," Mike noted DeSantis used the debate on Wednesday to mislead viewers into believing he was a Navy Seal.  Ronald was not a Navy Seal.  FACTCHECK.ORG notes:


During the Aug. 23 debate, DeSantis said: “I learned in the military, I was assigned with U.S. Navy SEALs in Iraq, that you focus on the mission above all else, you can’t get distracted. So Republicans, we’ve got to look forward and we’ve got to make sure that we’re bringing the message that can win in November of 2024.”

Later, when asked whether there should be some required military service for everyone in the U.S., DeSantis responded: “I think it should be voluntary. I’m somebody that volunteered to serve, inspired by Sept. 11 and I deployed to Iraq alongside U.S. Navy SEALs in places like Fallujah, Ramadi, and it’s something that I think has taught me. You know, when you go in that type of environment, anything you have, your personal agenda, you check it at the door. You go there and it’s about focusing on the mission above all else and guys come together and they get it done.”

DeSantis earned his law degree from Harvard and then served in the Navy as a lawyer, or a JAG (Judge Advocate General). His military personnel records, obtained via a Freedom of Information Act request and posted online by journalist James LaPorta, show that he served on active duty from September 2005 to February 2010, and he was stationed in Iraq with Seal Team 1 from 2007 to 2008.

The Miami Herald in 2018 reported on DeSantis’ time in Iraq, saying he “arrived in the fall of 2007 as part of ‘the surge’ of nearly 30,000 U.S. troops, whose mission was to quell insurgencies that turned cities like Fallujah into bloody battle zones.” DeSantis was “a senior legal adviser to the SEAL who commanded Special Operations Task Force-West in Fallujah, Navy Capt. Dane Thorleifson.”


He was not a Navy Seal, he was a Jag. 

Apparently, he now feels that being an attorney was too 'weak' so he feels the need to mislead people into thinking he was a Navy Seal.


From Justin Rohrlich's report for THE DAILY BEAST:


“He was never a Navy SEAL,” Billy Allmon, a former member of SEAL Team 1, told The Daily Beast. “It’s a misleading statement.”

[. . .]

DeSantis’ squishy descriptions of his “SEAL” service can be equally irritating for American vets who served in other branches of the service. Former Rep. Adam Kinzinger (R-IL), a onetime Air Force pilot who continues to serve as a lieutenant colonel in the Air National Guard, said on Thursday that he has “had people tell me that DeSantis was a Navy SEAL.”

“It bothers me,” Kinzinger told The Daily Beast. “I deployed to support SEALs, Delta, etc, and never once have [I] tried to pretend I was one. And never once said I ‘deployed with the SEALs.’”

Reaction online to DeSantis’ SEAL story was swift, with radio host and former Navy pilot Kai Ryssdal tweeting, “I was on the Navy Staff at the Pentagon with a Navy SEAL. So I, too, am a Navy SEAL.”

“He was just a f**king Navy lawyer, never a SEAL,” former Navy officer Scott Mettler posted. “The SEALs were merely his clients.”



Some Twitter reaction to the lie. 










And let's note Paul Rudnick on Donald Trump's mugshot.





The following sites updated:



 

A Just Transition: Workforce Development and Jobs for a New Clean Economy

Bioneers Pulse – updates from the Bioneers Community

Bioneer, 

Although Labor Day is celebrated by many as merely a long weekend, it's important to look back on the long history of movements for fair labor practices, which continue today. Intense struggles for safe workplaces, worker-friendly policies, and fair wages are in fact in full swing right now, and we have even been seeing the weakening of child labor laws in many states.

The fight for fair labor intersects with many other social and environmental movements. Join us as we uncover the powerful connections between these movements and shed light on the shared vision of a just and equitable world and future for families and communities.

In this week's newsletter, we explore the parallels between the fight for climate justice and the modern-day struggles for fair labor policies, the creation of clean energy jobs, the need for child labor laws, and how to stay up-to-date with current labor actions.

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Saru Jayaraman – The Great Revolution: What A Worker Power Moment Can Mean for Climate Justice

Saru Jayaraman, President of One Fair Wage and Director of the Food Labor Research Center at UC Berkeley, co-founded the Restaurant Opportunities Center and launched One Fair Wage to end subminimum wages in the US. In her keynote presentation, Jayaraman speaks about her work organizing food service and other low-wage workers over the last 20 years and the incredible moment of historic worker revolt currently underway in the United States, one that could have enormous implications for both climate justice and for our democracy.

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A Just Transition: Workforce Development and Jobs for a New Clean Economy

We know that the climate imperative in front of us is to transition as rapidly and comprehensively as possible from a fossil fuel based economy to a global economic system that runs on clean energy. Among the thornier questions involved in this shift is how the bold new economic visions for this large-scale transformation can support working-class families whose livelihoods are currently tied to the fossil fuel-based economy.

“Just Transition,” is the phrase frequently invoked as the answer to this question. In this panel conversation, four leaders answer the question, “What does a Just Transition mean?” and outline the need for and progress toward proactive labor policies to ensure an equitable future for families and communities.

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Danny Kennedy – The Charging 20s

Danny Kennedy, entrepreneur and founder of New Energy Nexus,  has become one of the nation’s leading figures in clean-technology entrepreneurship and the capitalization of the transition to a “green” economy. In his keynote presentation, Danny delves into the race to the finish line of the transition away from fossil fuels and a plan to build out the full potential of clean energy — energy that is not just distributed, but decentralized in ownership and democratized in control.

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YES! Magazine – Pushing Back Against Loosening Child Labor Laws

Child labor is making headlines in the United States following a wave of Republican-led efforts to roll back protections in several states, most recently in Iowa. Proponents of the legislation claim that extending working hours for children, eliminating work permit requirements, and lowering the minimum age for teens to work in certain industries would reduce red tape and protect the rights of parents without putting children at risk. In this article, experts explore this deceptive narrative and the reality of child labor in the nation, which has been grim for decades and is only worsening.

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Through engaging courses and conversations led by some of the world's foremost movement leaders, Bioneers Learning and Community Conversations equip engaged citizens and professionals like you with the knowledge, tools, resources and networks to initiate or deepen your engagement, leading to real change in your life and community.

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