Promises, Promises

Mark Gisleson - with whom I've unaccountably agreed to debate via email - left this comment in a thread that started late last week.

Heard this one before?

Got an email today from a reader in a town where the military stores much of their records. Buzz is that they have plenty of Kerry records they're ready to release that have been kept locked up tight.

So along with Kerry's economic plan, his actual plan for the smarter and more sensitive War on Terror, the whereabouts of those 135,000 "moderate moslem" troops that will relieve the US military in Iraq, the identities of the phalanx of foreign leaders that are endorsing him for the election, and those hyperdrive designs from Roswell, we're waiting on "plenty" of "locked up tight" records?

I bet we are. In the same way that Joe Farah is waiting for the records to prove that Bill Clinton really did knowingly caused AIDS-infected blood from Arkansas prisons to donors in Canada in exchange for money to cover up Vince Foster's murder, or whatever it was.

Yes, it certainly is possible that the Navy is sitting on a pile of records that completely back up Kerry's story, and do indeed prove that the SEALS and CIA, desperate to infiltrate agents and firearms into neutral Cambodia, eschewed proven, reliable and genuinely covert methods of infiltration (helicopters, parachutes, and good ol' hiking through the jungle) and sought out a hotshot ninety-day-wonder Yalie JayGee driving a boat with a silhouette like a Winnebago and a noise signature like a Monster Truck, to infiltrate a narrow, easily-interdicted river crossing into contested territory on a completely illegal and extraordilarily sensitive mission.

Of course it's possible! And I'm sure that mysterious email from the "reader" in the "town where military records are stored" is a perfectly reliable source.

No, really! I grew up in a city through which nuclear weapons routinely transited; I have a pal who swears he could build one in his garage. Maybe they should get together.

But just to be safe, I'll await the release of this huge, steaming dump of documents. Any ol' time now. (By the way, Mark - what is this "town" where the military "stores much of its records?" Just the name of the town. For reference sake. You can supply that, right?)

Alternate explanation follows: As the wheels start to come off the Kerry campaign, watch for more of this sort of stuff, the new round of Black Helicopter rumors, only from the left; records hidden, exoneration denied. These will be the Hanging Chads of the 2004 election, if Kerry loses: "Halliburton conspired with the Navy via Bush's old cronies to block the release of double-dog-secret photos that show Kerry and VC the Wonder Dog picking microfilm from Prince Sihanouk's stool as Khmer Rouge ninjas stood mere inches away". It'll be the foul wind beneath the wings of the tinfoil hat brigade until 2008.

Mitch, I hope it bothers you to know that I'm looking forward to their release even more than you are.

Bother me?

I find it mildly yet satisfyingly confirmatory.

I've worked with military records for over fifteen years, helping vets make the transition to civilian employment, and I've got a pretty good idea of what they've been sitting on.

Now, to the best of my knowledge, Mark Gisleson runs a resume-writing service. An honorable trade, that - I've written many a resume for others myself, and it's a significant test of the writer's craft.

But to claim that taking information from a guy's DD214 to write a resume makes one an insider on Defense Department illegal covert operations would be like me claiming the flatulence I got from my last round of gas-station burritos and cheap beer makes me an expert on greenhouse gases. The relationship is tangential, and the exaggeration is Clavinesque.

Or is Mark Gisleson claiming that he, longtime anti-war activist, has had access to highly-classified material? Perhaps he's helped Operation Phoenix SOG operators assume new identities? Perhaps he's an expert in helping highly-sensitive national intelligence assets find jobs in the private sector?

I'm not laughing. Anything is possible. Although some substantiation would go a long way.

You see, I also work with a few former Cambodian refugees, and most of our documentation on that war has been kept under lock and key for over thirty years.

Again with the illogical extension. I work with some Jewish guys. That alone gives me no additional insight into the Nuremburg Laws.

For those of you from outside the Twin Cities - it's hard to go to the grocery store without "working with Cambodian refugees" and their descendants. Cambodians, Lao, Vietnamese and especially H'mong are fixtures in local society. Does writing a resume for some them give one any extra insight into whether John Kerry is lying or not?

I can be convinced, but it might take...I dunno, proof?

You're not going to be one bit happy when those records come out. Not a bit.

Mark Gisleson - DOD insider and clairvoyant.

Show me the paperwork. That, or stand by for pre-boarding on the next black helicopter.

Posted by Mitch at August 31, 2004 06:50 AM | TrackBack