Mande Wilkes: Weapons Grade Stupid at FitsNews

I first heard of FitsNews in connection with Governor Haley's candidacy and all of the controversy about her relationships. The blog strikes me as a tabloid that is high on salacious details and full of snark. Unfortunately, it's also low on ideas and thought. I don't go there, but I occasionally see links to it on other blogs that I frequent.

Anyway, I came across an article with a premise so condescending and petty, it has to be written by one of those girls who's gotten by on their looks. Ms. Wilkes must be a little self-conscious about the fact that she's a ditzy airhead, because apparently, she's decided to try and sound "smart" by running down the military.

She kicks off her dung-heap of a column by recounting the military's "scandals" (Burning the Korans; peeing on corpses; the soldier who is accused of mass murder; and the photos of the bodies with smiling troops) in Afghanistan, and she draws this conclusion:

U.S. officials have predictably denounced these acts as “reprehensible”, while at the same time insisting this behavior is “isolated.” Isolated how, exactly? Four scandals in four months is hardly isolated or even sporadic. At this point, it’s almost a pattern. Denying the increasing predictability of these events – blindly insisting these scandals are isolated rather than repeated – pushes aside the more interesting question.

Ok, so she disagrees that these events are isolated, and she says it's "almost a pattern". I think almost a pattern is code for "not a pattern".

First of all, it's not "four scandals in four months". Ms. Wilkes must have missed the day in kindergarten where they learn the calendar, but the photos of the troops posing with the dead suicide bombers was from two years ago. For Ms. Wilkes, who is math-challenged, that would be 2010.

Perhaps Ms. Wilkes would be surprised to learn that Alexander the Great conquered Persia. However, just because she heard about it today that doesn't mean Alexander the Great crossed the Hellespont last week.

Calendars: they're hard.

Anyway, Ms. Wilkes wants to dig into the tough questions: Why are are troops so insensitive?

I guess it's not enough for Ms. Wilkes that we have the best fighting force in the entire world. We have people who go halfway around the globe, are subjected to some of the most horrible conditions imaginable,  and the vast majority of them carry out the mission with honor and without complaint. Now, she would like every single person in the United States Military to be well-mannered and from good breeding. Here are her words:

It used to be that everybody who was anybody enlisted in the military. Nowadays, everybody who’s nobody serves – a natural consequence of incentivizing service with signing bonuses, comped education, and plush pensions.

Rather than the symbol of nobility it once was, military service has become almost a scarlet letter of sorts – signifying an individual of lesser resources, breeding, or ambition.

I'm a fair guy, and I'm trying to see her point of view, but I can't get my head that far up my ass.

This is just an asinine statement from someone who considers themselves superior to our armed forces. Everybodies and Nobodies? This is the Army, not a Cotillion.  I guess the "sombodies" decide to get boob jobs and run for Congress? Good luck with that, you idiot.

There are hundreds of reasons that folks join the United States military. Some people decide that they want to go to college (or graduate school), and join the military to pay for it. Does this somehow make them less qualified to serve? Just because your mommy and daddy had a trust fund set up for your college education and your boob job doesn't make the poor kid less qualified to serve in the military. Who paid for your college and law school, Ms. Wilkes?

Ms. Wilkes seems to think that joining the military is an indication of no "ambition". I would argue that it exactly the opposite. You have to be a fairly ambitious person to join the military. It's the ultimate meritocracy. The people who get the job done are recognized and promoted. The military doesn't care whether you're a woman, man, white, black, purple, orange. If you get the job done, you advance. There are also great careers that are available to folks who learn technical skills in the military.

I guess we should re-instate the draft and pull Ms. Wilkes' candy-ass into the Army, so she can give everyone lessons in battlefield manners. But hey, this is America, you can be whatever you want, even if you're an absolute failure. Ms. Wilkes is a shining example of how much you can fail:

Mande Wilkes can't pass the bar exam, so she decided to get a boob job and become an internet troll. I guess God didn't love you enough to make you pretty and smart.