Issue link: https://www.epageflip.net/i/498829
GregStevens,Publisher Chip Thompson, Editor EDITORIALBOARD How to have your say: Letters must be signed and provide the writer's home street address and home phone number. Anonymous letters, open letters to others, pen names and petition-style letters will not be allowed. Letters should be typed and no more than two double-spaced pages or 500words. When several letters address the same issue, a cross section will be published. Email: editor@ redbluffdailynews.com Fax: 530-527-9251 Mail to: P.O. Box 220, 545 Diamond Ave., Red Bluff, CA 96080 Facebook: Leave comments at FACEBOOK.COM/ RBDAILYNEWS Twitter: Follow and send tweets to @REDBLUFFNEWS By Jason Stanford Shouldwomenserveincom- bat? Right now the military is answering that question with a final verdict scheduled to come down from Defense Sec- retary Ashton Carter in Janu- ary 2016. This will inevitably become a political question— and thus particularly useless in producing a satisfactory an- swer—but until then it's use- ful to understand that the mil- itary sees this question differ- ently than you and I do. It's too easy for me, a polit- ically minded civilian whose military experience is limited to paintball and Boy Scouts, to see the question of women in combat through a fairness lens. When I look at this, I see women following in the foot- steps of African-American and LGBT troops as the latest gen- eration to achieve equal op- portunity in the military. But someone with a mili- tary mindset doesn't care what is fair, only what is best for the mission. That finally came clear to me when I asked my friend Kyle Dearing, a Marine who served in the Al Anbar province of Iraq in 2006, for his opinion of women serving in combat. "Honestly, if they can do the job as well as their male counterparts, I have no prob- lem with it. None at all," he said. And all that seems fair, but that's when he peeled back the curtain on his perspective. "If their inclusion involves re- ducing standards so that they can participate, it's no lon- ger about what's good for the Corps, it's about what's good for females. The individual doesn't matter in the service, the mission is the only prior- ity." A new book coming out this week indicates that the mil- itary is in the process of ac- cepting the obvious: Some women are perfect for com- bat and in fact add another layer of effectiveness. "Ashley's War" by Gayle Tzemach Lem- mon tells the story the women of the Cultural Support Team. These were women trained for combat and assigned to spe- cial ops teams in Afghanistan. Sending an all-male combat force into a country with sex- ist attitudes towards women limited our military's effec- tiveness. It was considered cul- turally rude for our male sol- diers to talk to local women, but they knew what was going on in their villages. We needed our women to talk to their women to get that intelligence without offending the hearts and minds of the locals. Before the special ops guys created the CMT program, many military units were fig- uring this out on their own. A friend of mine who served in the Army infantry told me that they just took nurses on their missions. Female interpreters were particularly prized be- cause male insurgents never considered that they were intelligent and sometimes openly implicated themselves in bombings. Next stop, Gitmo. But as far as the military admitting what it was doing, Cultural Support Teams were the beginning. Pick up "Ash- ley's War." It's a great read and a compelling account of what the head of the Army Special Operations Command, Lieu- tenant General John Mulhol- land, called "a new chapter in the role of women soldiers in the United States Army." It's hard to finish the book without seeing through the military's eyes how the women of the CMT made our spe- cial ops teams more effective at catching the bad guys and avoiding trouble. Whether or not it was fair seemed irrel- evant. This only worked be- cause they served the mission. Considered from that point of view, it's even harder to ar- gue that women should not be allowed to try out for combat units. The results will be neces- sarily mixed. A two-and-a-half yearlong experiment with the Marine Corps Infantry Officer Course ended without a sin- gle female graduate. But pre- liminary results at the Army's Ranger School in Georgia were so encouraging that this last weekend women began formal training alongside the men. Until the Secretary of De- fense makes his final decision early next year, any gradu- ates of Ranger School who happen to be women won't be able to serve in the Rangers with their male graduates, regardless of how they may help the mission. In the end, that and not the arbitrary criteria of gender should be the only answer to a question that we've been asking for far too long. JasonStanfordisaregular contributor to the Austin American-Statesman, a Democratic consultant and a Truman National Security Project partner. You can email him at stanford@oppresearch. com and follow him on Twitter @JasStanford. Commentary 'Ashley's War' and women in combat roles Cartoonist's take The revolting, even re- markable, story of the postal, or USPS, worker who flew a "gyro-copter" onto the White House lawn jus- tifiably drew sub- stantial cover- age in the main- stream news (MSN). It's a re- volting breech that, for crass political purposes, potentially put "the people's house" in danger of damage, disrupted and inconvenienced secu- rity personnel (who therefore were unavailable to respond to threats elsewhere), and caused consternation and fear among tourists. There was a remark- able aspect to the whole epi- sode considering the advance notice given by the pilot and the shear gall of his violation of restricted airspace. Since the postal worker wanted to send a message of protest over the "Citizens United v. FEC" Supreme Court decision that greatly expanded the financial resources used in political campaigns, we can use this criminal act of an ideolog- ical fanatic to make some ob- servations. First, the news cov- erage downplayed the issue of campaign financing as his mo- tivation. One only has to substi- tute membership in a conserva- tive group like the Tea Party or Americans for Prosperity, and change the issue to illegal im- migration, for instance, to en- vision the firestorm of indigna- tion that would have consumed the self-reverential talking heads of MSN. The usual political suspects on the Democrat left would have decried the incivility, ex- tremism and inhumanity of conservatives. They would have insisted that Republi- cans state their disapproval of not only the incident but also the issue behind the criminal breach of White House space. It would have been used to the maximum, crass, politi- cal detriment of Republicans in general; superficial cover- age would have shed heat, not light, on the underlying is- sue of illegal immigration; the narrative favored by the liberal political/media elite would have prevailed in sup- port of Obama's executive am- nesty edicts. Instead, we have a left-wing, union, anti-free speech par- tisan engaged in a danger- ous stunt in service to his (and the progressive Democrat par- ty's) obsession with eliminat- ing funding for their political enemies. That is at the core of obsessive leftist animus for the Citizens United decision that declared money spent by any entity—corporations, unions, political action committees or individual citizens—to be an expression of Constitutionally protected speech. It should be a noncontro- versial stand for anyone who thinks about the reality of po- litical campaigns being an ex- pression of the most basic of freedoms: choosing the can- didates that will represent us in the executive or legislative chambers of the land. Pam- phleteering and other modes of stirring up anti-British, pro- independence sentiment in the American Colonies depended on someone's, or some group's, financial resources to write, print and distribute said ma- terials. When Democrats think they own an issue and have no fear of political retribution, they sometimes drop their veneer of reasonableness and civil- ity to advance utterly offen- sive legislative ideas. They re- cently—before voters had the good sense to put Republi- cans in charge of the Sen- ate—proposed the Udall (Con- stitutional) Amendment put- ting the federal government in charge of regulating, control- ling, restricting or eliminating money spent in political cam- paigns. More money is spent on pet food than on political races; however, to those who have the overwhelming advantage of incumbency and govern- mental machinery to boost their reelection efforts, money spent trying to unseat them is, by definition, uniquely cor- rupting to our representa- tive democracy. The "Citizens United" Supreme Court rul- ing has so enervated the anti- free speech, fanatical left that Obama, in a State of the Union speech, lied about the decision so blatantly—lied to the faces of the Supreme Court justices seated in front of him—that Justice Alito was seen mouthing the words "Not true" in a silent rebuke to the President. Reliable media water-car- riers were quick to jump on and castigate Alito for vio- lating the event's decorum. They gave scant, if any, atten- tion to the far greater offense of Obama's bald-faced fabri- cation told to the seated Jus- tices, Senators, Congressional representatives, dignitaries and American viewers. Per- haps the flying postal union guy was a nut; perhaps he was just following the leftist "ends justifies the means" method of advocacy. One man's nut is sometimes another's advocate. A larger point involves the monumental hypocrisy of those on the left whining about con- servative/business/corporate money going to Republicans while such money is dwarfed by the massive amounts that come from unions, wealthy en- tertainers and progressive fat cats like George Soros. The Liberals' Koch (brothers) ob- session blinds them to the massive left wing money ma- chine (i.e. Democracy Alliance, etc). Hillary 's campaign plans to spend up to $2.5 billion; barely a chirp emits from those who rail against conservative PAC money. Interestingly, the Citizens United case came about be- cause a nonprofit corpora- tion, named Citizens United, wanted to broadcast the anti- Clinton "Hillary: The Movie" within 30 days of the 2008 Democratic primaries. The Court struck down the Mc- Cain-Feingold restrictions that prohibited such politi- cal spending by corporations, even nonprofits. We now be- hold Hillary Clinton embark- ing on a campaign rife with phoniness (i.e. fake Twit- ter and Facebook follow- ers) and staged conversations with "regular" people, most of whom are Democrat opera- tives or contributors. We can be thankful that those op- posing her will not have the heavy regulatory hand of mon- etary restrictions keeping cit- izens, "United" or not, from having individual or collective say about her machinations. Don Polson has called Red Bluff home since 1988. He can be reached by e-mail at donplsn@yahoo.com. The way I see it Going 'postal' over political dollars Until the Secretary of Defense makes his final decision early next year, any graduates of Ranger School who happen to be women won't be able to serve in the Rangers with their male graduates, regardless of how they may help the mission. Sounding off A look at what readers are saying in comments on our website and on social media. The split is partisan, not inclusive, has no financial plan, hates the environment, liberals. We will go from the 5th largest economy to the poorest State in the union. You think the North State is bad now, wait until these fanatics get a hold of it. Pat Johnston: On the formation of an anti- Jefferson State political action committee Yeah, well, too little too late. Should have done it sooner. I'm for separation. Don't trust your moves now which are reaction- ary. I don't believe for a second that this is not partisan. You don't get my vote ever. Kelly Walen: On the formation of an anti- Jefferson State political action committee Don Polson StateandNational Assemblyman James Galla- gher, 150 Amber Grove Drive, Ste. 154, Chico 95973, 530 895- 4217, http://ad03.asmrc.org/ Senator Jim Nielsen, 2634 Forest Ave., Ste. 110, Chico 95928, 530 879-7424, senator. nielsen@senate.ca.gov Governor Jerry Brown, State Capital Building, Sacramento 95814, 916 445-2841, fax 916 558-3160, governor@governor. ca.gov U.S. Representative Doug La- Malfa, 507 Cannon House Of- fice Building, Washington D.C. 20515, 202 225-3076 U.S. Senator Dianne Fein- stein, One Post St., Ste. 2450, San Francisco 94104, 415 393- 0707, fax 415 393-0710 U.S. Senator Barbara Boxer, 1700 Montgomery St., San Fran- cisco 94111, 510 286-8537, fax 202 224-0454 Local Tehama County Supervisors, 527-4655 District 1, Steve Chamblin, Ext. 3015 District 2, Candy Carlson, Ext. 3014 District 3, Dennis Garton, Ext. 3017 District 4, Bob Williams, Ext. 3018 District 5, Burt Bundy, Ext. 3016 YOUR OFFICIALS OPINION » redbluffdailynews.com Tuesday, April 21, 2015 » MORE AT FACEBOOK.COM/RBDAILYNEWS AND TWITTER.COM/REDBLUFFNEWS A6