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IRONED MIKE
Niagara-based media titan Mike Hudson—mentioned earlier here, here, and here—presents his military credentials:
As a veteran, (U.S. Army 1974-76 and currently a member of the Veterans of Foreign Wars) there’s nothing I hate worse than seeing the Armed Forces of this country used so badly by the chicken hawks currently in charge of foreign policy here.
Mike’s claims were subsequently checked by Dave Surls and Bruce Rheinstein. It seems Mighty Mike didn’t serve from 1974-76, but only for a few months in 1975:
I can’t remember what the final blowout was about, but we decided to break up the band in May, 1975.
I joined the Army then, and spent that summer shooting automatic weapons and marching around the friendly confines of Ft. Knox, Kentucky. Jesus it was hot. And they were always yelling at me. After about six months I was granted a reprieve and sent home.
That would be the foreign war Mike is a veteran of: the famous War of Being Yelled at in Kentucky. Confusingly, having claimed he was granted a “reprieve”, Hudson also says he left the Army:
It was a little surprising to get a letter—as many here did—from the Department of Veterans Affairs, an outfit I hadn’t heard from since leaving the Army back in 1975.
Get your story straight, son. Learn the difference between reality and fantasy.
I suspected b.s. two days ago along the lines of “methinks the pussy doth protest too much”. [BTW, is that line from Shakespeare’s Jesse Macbeth, oops, I mean the “Nottish Play”?]
Posted by andycanuck on 2006 12 17 at 12:32 PM • permalinkAfter about six months I was granted a reprieve and sent home.
Huh? “granted a reprieve”? Sounds like Hudson felt like he was under a death sentence. So much for playing the veteran’s card, Mikey.
In fact, I’d guess that if anyone was “granted a reprieve” it was his instructors, who went through the nutroll to get him discharged before the end of his enlistment. This is not an easy task, especially back in the 1970’s, when the Army was having recruiting and retention problems. The bureaucracy tended to view every potential early discharge as a personal insult, and treated them accordingly.
Posted by The_Real_JeffS on 2006 12 17 at 12:50 PM • permalinkHe’s not eligible (pdf) for membership in the VFW. He’d have to have a campaign medal.
There’s a bootcamp in Fort Knox. The Army doesn’t give reprieves. You can wash out of bootcamp, or if make it past there and into advanced training, you can get out on “failure to adapt.” Up until you complete advanced training and they pin on the “I Got A Job” ribbon, you’re just a trainee, not a soldier, and it’s not hard to get out.
Donna, I’d go for washing out of advance training. In 1975, getting rid of dirtbag soldiers was nigh impossible. Administratively, anywho, courtmartials were still a slam dunk. The military has changed since then in that regards, and for the better.
Posted by The_Real_JeffS on 2006 12 17 at 02:27 PM • permalinkQuite a bit different than today, Donna. Seriously different, in fact. Be glad you didn’t have to deal with it…..all of the first sergeants were dancing with joy when the “General Discharge” was first put into place (as I remember, “general discharge” first came out in the early 1980s).
So the fact that Hudson was booted out after 6 months in 1975 tells me he was a major loser, the sort that were labeled “Joe Shit, The Ragman”.
Posted by The_Real_JeffS on 2006 12 17 at 03:07 PM • permalinkDamn! I am way late to this party. Help me get up to speed:
“Journalist” reports falsehood as fact;
“Journalist” is outed by Tim;
“Journalist” is upset when facts get in the way of his alternative reality;
“Journalist” threatens Tim physically;
“Journalist” insults allies;
“Jounalist,” now on the defensive, resorts to time proven liberal talking points:
-Bush stole the election: check
-Bush lied and people died: check
-There were never WMD’s: check
-We RUSHED to war: check
-“I own a gun, and therefore you must give me my neocon bonofides”: check
-If you’re not fighting, you’re a “chickenhawk”: check
-Because he “served” he has “absolute moral authority” to determine foreign policy: check
-The US is just around the corner from fascism, up to and including gulags: checkLast but not certainly least: if you’re a friend of the US you must by necessity be evil as well.
Oh, and I gather that this “newspaper” he is an “editor” of is a free rag and that Niagra Falls sucks (aplogies to the other 99.9% of Niagra Fallians).
Is that about right, folks?
Posted by Kathy from Austin on 2006 12 17 at 04:25 PM • permalink#18 General Discharges have been around for a long time, both under honorable and other than honorable conditions.
I didn’t enlist until three years after Iron Mike’s brief hitch, but the late ‘70s was the period of the hollow Army. Drill Sergeants would do just about anything to make their quota (remember the movie Private Benjamin?), and people who should have washed out were passed through Basic because officers were rated on the failure rate.
After being passed through Basic, if you failed in AIT they just moved you to a different school—stevedore and quartermaster were typical.
The two quick ways out both typically led to a General Discharge. They were to declare you were a homosexual or repeated drug offenses. And drugs were common on most military installations before mandatory drug testing began in late ‘79.
There was even a druggie profile - hair parted in the middle, aviator shades, Cool cigarettes, and grape soda were give-aways. There were several homosexuals in my unit, everyone knew who they were, but the only one who got discharged turned himself in. Drug use was the easiest and most common way out of the service.
In any event, they didn’t just give you a “reprieve” after 6 months.
Posted by Bruce Rheinstein on 2006 12 17 at 04:40 PM • permalink#20 Yep. That’s about it Kathy. There were also some bits about UFOs and secret weapons blowing up the electricity grid and being a war hero and stuff like that but you’ve pretty much got it summed up.
Also, with some luck, we’re all going to be bad mouthed in the Niagara Falls Reporter today. I can’t wait. I’m hoping to be quoted.
Damnit. The last bastion of credibility in newspapers, the weekly, is now a laughingstock thanks to Iron Mike.
Thanks pal. Maybe next time don’t be braggin’ up your “journalisitc” credentials. Save the rest of us desperately trying to maintain some relevance the embarassment.
Of course, at a newspaper with something called subscribers, accuracy and truth mean something. Not like Iron Mike’s rag, which is delivered from the publisher to the bird cage whether the reader wants it or not.
It can have the affect of putting heavy breather editors under the impression that people actually read what they write.
geoff: My money says he won’t link to this site. Since his claims of a plastic turkey, his military service and his being a member of the VFW have been debunked he would be exposed for what he is. I sincerely hope he does link. However, I’m not sure it would exactly enhance his career to be proven a liar and generally been the butt of a joke. And did I mention being a caricature? You notice he has gone very, very silent since Dave and Bruce let him have it.
Posted by Kathy from Austin on 2006 12 17 at 05:24 PM • permalink#25 My money says he won’t link to this site
There go Tim’s chances for a Niagara Falls Reporter-lanch! He’ll probably have to put out the tip jar for the italics-fund again. ;(
Posted by Bruce Rheinstein on 2006 12 17 at 05:30 PM • permalinkAfter a brief but frank email exchange, I’ve apparently made it to the top of Mike’s shitlist. Yay me!
Hey Mikey, if you’re listening, I’ll pay for a one way flight for you from Niagara to Roma, Queensland, where you can stand in the public bar at the Empire Hotel at tell the locals your thoughts about their country.
Fascinating thread. Detective work by Dave Surls and Bruce Rheinstein worthy of Paco, PI [yes, I know you said it was easy ;) ].
In the other thread I could almost see your eyes widen when Hudson made that claim, the heads tilt back, noses testing the air, already detecting that faint waft of bullshit emanating from the screen.
At first I wondered if the poor man had been banned again (has he?). I’m assuming not, that he’s just run back with his tail between his legs. Silly man. He clearly did NOT know which blog he was on!
Good on ‘ya Murph! I’d say that’s a place of some honor! BTW, I’d pitch in on that plane ticket but you’ll have to promise me to film the locals
beating the shit out ofinteracting with Mikey.Posted by Kathy from Austin on 2006 12 17 at 05:38 PM • permalinkPS to Mike Hudson (Notachickenhawk!)
You do not actually “have a blog” devoted to you. What you are is the current laughingstock of this blog. If you can’t come up with some fresh material, this blog will soon tire of you. I am tired of you already.
The original charge “Mind numbed repeater (an apparent believer) of the false “Plasic Turkey” calumny. Stands proven. This was plenty to make you the deserving butt of jokes.
I know that if you ever respond again, which I doubt, since your apparent lies about your military record, you will no doubt move the goalposts from “No WMD found” to “No stockpiles of WMD found”, there I move it for you.
#28- im only a couple of gaia raping driving hours from roma - would be happy to pitch in-can bring a video camera to capture the sport.
when is hudson’s funniest column ever due?- can’t wait
Posted by eeniemeenie on 2006 12 17 at 07:25 PM • permalinkHowever, I’m not sure it would exactly enhance his career to be proven a liar and generally been the butt of a joke.
He “edits” an alt weekly. Being a liar and a joke is almost a requirement.
Posted by Rob Crawford on 2006 12 17 at 07:25 PM • permalinkfamous War of Being Yelled at in Kentucky.
Like the Whiskey Rebellion and the Blackhawk War, the War of Being Yelled At in Kentucky is a minor episode in U.S. history that has been blown completely out of proportion. It started in a home for elderly military retirees located in Louisville, when one Guthrie Lipfinger (USMC, Ret.), who was hard of hearing, asked one Norville Eubanks (USN, Ret.), who was also hard of hearing, if he wanted a chaw of tobacco, and Norville misunderstood, thinking that Guthrie had called him a slab-sided swab. The other old coots in the home - all of whom apparently had hearing disabilities - took sides depending on their branch of service, and pretty soon hostilities became general: flying bedpans, wheelchairs ramming into dessert trays, everybody yelling, nobody hearing. Very quickly, the retirement home’s informal security squad - consisting of retired MP’s - came in and subdued the combatants with nerf bats. Hudson probably never got near the action.
But paco! The Niagra Falls Bugle reported this as a major conflict! “I was there!” said their reporter.
I was also impressed that they managed to link the War of being Yelled at in Kentucky to the sighting of some actual UFOs in the area.
Posted by Stop Continental Drift! on 2006 12 17 at 09:51 PM • permalinkYou assholes are besmirching a Kiss Army veteran. Over a 1000 tours of duty and they didn’t get no damn parade. To this day people still spit on him.
Posted by Infidel Tiger on 2006 12 17 at 09:54 PM • permalink“...famous War of Being Yelled at in Kentucky.” And you are okay with that, yelling at troops? Jeez. What’s next, training them to shoot at people?
And I suspect, #40, that said reporter was merely reporting from the balcony of the Louisville Embassy Suites. You can’t take a chance getting too close to all the action!
#37 calumnist- hope the folks at the oed pick up on that- a very useful addition to the language
Posted by eeniemeenie on 2006 12 17 at 10:23 PM • permalink”...famous War of Being Yelled at in Kentucky.”
Also known as my commute to work.
Posted by Rob Crawford on 2006 12 17 at 10:50 PM • permalinkYou know, I bet I can guess just about exactly how Mike’s column is going to run tomorrow:
“Looks like I touched a nerve downunder, where men are men and sheep are nervous. Tim Blair, an Australian blogger, saw fit to instruct an American newspaperman - i.e., yours truly - on the appropriate protocol for criticising an American president. I replied, thusly: ” Blah, blah, blah.
That’s when all hell broke loose. Tim’s attack-wallabies bared their little teeth in the comments section and began to savagely nibble at my ankles . . . blah, blah, blah.”
Mighty Mike will then commence to extract quotes and provide responses, which he has been crafting with loving care and brow-furrowing mental labor, for the past several days. Hilarity ensues among the Niagara Falls locals, who, giddy with mirth (and several pints of unfiltered Sterno), fall into the river and go over the falls, sans barrel. End of story.
Finding out that Mikey lied about his military record has not altered my level of respect for the man. Not one little bit.
Posted by Infidel Tiger on 2006 12 17 at 11:24 PM • permalinkMurph: that’s the self-defensive tactics of white boys who want to be thought of as “cool” and have lost on all other fronts. When he says “peace out” you know you’ve won.
Posted by Andrea Harris, Administrator on 2006 12 18 at 06:27 AM • permalinkHe’s right you know. We can’t be 100% certain that the turkey wasn’t plastic. We have in the propositions favor that the New York Times said it wasn’t.
We also can’t be 100 percent certain that a giant sea octopus hasn’t attacked the Queen Mary in the past five minutes. Talk about setting the bar low.
Youse guys ever watch CSI? Danny B was a guest star/corpse spouting the looniest moonbat shit, and appearing to enjoy every moment.
I suspect Bonaduce relishes every moment he gets to work, no matter what it is.
And Kentucky is very hot and sticky humid in the summers.
Posted by rightwingprof on 2006 12 18 at 04:19 PM • permalinkIron Mike’s columns are a little embarrasing. Tim, we need a new laughingstock. Making fun of the speds on the short bus is no passtime for thinking people.
I would attack his column, were it not for the fact that it is a pointless recitiation of moonbat guano.
Apparently, he doesn’t need to get his facts straight because he is so morally superior.
#58 I’m disappointed. If the best Mikey can do is dis Aussies because of Gallipoli he really does deserve to be writing for an alt-weekly birdcage liner.
He should be grateful. This is the most publicity he’s had since he wrote that he hopes Rush Limbaugh “dies from cancer of the balls.”
Somewhere in a run-down city in upstate New York is a 50-something former punker screaming “look at me, look at me” as life passes him by.
Posted by Bruce Rheinstein on 2006 12 18 at 05:42 PM • permalinkhudson calls blair humourless in his funniest column ever
maybe americans really dont get irony
Posted by eeniemeenie on 2006 12 18 at 06:06 PM • permalinkmaybe
americans50-something former punkers really dont get ironyThat’s more accurate, eeniemeenie.
;-D
Posted by The_Real_JeffS on 2006 12 18 at 06:48 PM • permalink# 48 paco
You know, I bet I can guess just about exactly how Mike’s column is going to run tomorrow:
“Looks like I touched a nerve downunder, where men are men and sheep are nervous. Tim Blair, an Australian blogger, saw fit to instruct an American newspaperman - i.e., yours truly - on the appropriate protocol for criticising an American president. I replied, thusly: “ Blah, blah, blah.
That’s when all hell broke loose. Tim’s attack-wallabies bared their little teeth in the comments section and began to savagely nibble at my ankles . . . blah, blah, blah.”
#25 Kathy
geoff: My money says he won’t link to this site. Since his claims of a plastic turkey, his military service and his being a member of the VFW have been debunked he would be exposed for what he is. I sincerely hope he does link. However, I’m not sure it would exactly enhance his career to be proven a liar and generally been the butt of a joke. And did I mention being a caricature?
Spot on guys. Here’s the gutless little toe rag’s
most hiliarious article ever.
“Hi,” he wrote. “I just wanted to call your attention to the fact that your reporter, Mike Hudson, is being made fun of by an Australian blowhard, Tim Blair.”Simple and succinct was our man Kevin.
Having never heard of this Tim Blair fellow, I did a quick Google search. Blair’s a humorless right-winger who would like to be his country’s answer to Rush Limbaugh. He could probably even pull it off if anyone actually cared about what Australians think.
Why would an Australian even be interested? I wondered. I’ve always thought of Australia as a country that produces dumb, talentless blondes like Kylie Minogue, Kiki Dee, Olivia Newton-John and Paul Hogan. The few talented ones—Mel Gibson and Rolf Harris and the late Steve Irwin spring to mind—tend to be crazier than outhouse rats. The only political Australian I ever remember was Helen Reddy, who was always going on about how she was woman and we ought to hear her roar.
Who knew they had a right wing in Australia? Do they have a left wing? I wrote this Blair fellow at his Web site and posted a reply to his poorly written column to set things straight.
And so on.
No link of course.Perhaps we should supply it to his advertisers
Do you think that Germaine Greer is pissed off for having been left off of Mikey’s list and that only Helen Reddy made it to the ‘political’ list?
Posted by andycanuck on 2006 12 18 at 08:20 PM • permalinkOh yes! We got ourselves another Margo Kingston!
(Why do I get the distinct impression that Hudson performed virtually no research on Tim Blair and Australia? The subject of a column. This is a journalist? Oh puleeze.)
Posted by wronwright on 2006 12 18 at 08:32 PM • permalinkreal-jeffs, i don’t watch much tv but when i do frasier and the simpsons are staples- both of which display a fine sense of irony
i find people who spout the old cliche about americans not getting irony do so to reassure themselves of their own superiority and wouldn’t recognise irony if it bit them on the bum
ironic really
Posted by eeniemeenie on 2006 12 18 at 11:06 PM • permalinkmoptop,
that could well do the trick- but how to administer it to the subject in the most painful and invasive manner?
those stupid, ignorant swipes at the aussie defence force from this drug addled dipstick had me seeing red this morning
Posted by eeniemeenie on 2006 12 18 at 11:27 PM • permalink“...famous War of Being Yelled at in Kentucky.”
Hey, don’t laugh. A couple of guys got their feelings hurt in this bloody set-to.
Posted by Dave Surls on 2006 12 19 at 01:53 AM • permalinkIt was a little surprising to get a letter—as many here did—from the Department of Veterans Affairs, an outfit I hadn’t heard from since leaving the Army back in 1975.
Of course, he could not have heard from the Department of Veterans Affairs in 1975, because the Department of Veterans Affairs didn’t exist until 1989. He might have heard from the Veterans Administration in 1975, being the Department’s predecessor agency.
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Ah, the poor guy. He’s been drinking too much Love Canal Juice, Tim.