Gen. Eric Shinseki To Be Named as Head of the VA
By Heather Sunday Dec 07, 2008 11:00am
UPDATED: Obama just made the announcement. New video now available.
According to the Washington Post, Gen. Eric Shinseki will be named as Barack Obama's selection to head the Department of Veterans Affairs. A little payback perhaps for the treatment of Shinseki by the Bush administration and them firing him for telling the truth about troop levels in Iraq? Or a reward for his honesty by Obama?
From Feb. 25, 2003:
SEN. LEVIN: General Shinseki, could you give us some idea as to the magnitude of the Army's force requirement for an occupation of Iraq following a successful completion of the war?
GEN. SHINSEKI: In specific numbers, I would have to rely on combatant commanders' exact requirements. But I think --
SEN. LEVIN: How about a range?
GEN. SHINSEKI: I would say that what's been mobilized to this point -- something on the order of several hundred thousand soldiers are probably, you know, a figure that would be required. We're talking about posthostilities control over a piece of geography that's fairly significant, with the kinds of ethnic tensions that could lead to other problems. And so it takes a significant ground-force presence.
And more from the documentary No End in Sight:
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King of Virginia?
I think this is an inspired pick. Shinseki was right about Iraq and a little rubbing Rumsfeld, and Chenmey's noses in it warms my heart a bit. He was wounded in Vietnam and knows a lot about the needs of vets. He knows PTSD is REAL. He'll do a great job.
I agree. He was prescient about what would be needed in Iraq, and time has borne out the correctness of his judgment.
This is an absolutely superior choice--someone in whom wounded vets can have confidence because he spoke up on their behalf before.
can pay off. He was truthful in his assessment (and correct), stuck to his guns. Left when he saw that he was being ignored and it was going to be a disaster. I think this is a great pick.
Good for our vets. Good for the country. And good for Obama -- with this appointment, he just swayed thousands of otherwise-ambivalent veterans over to his camp.
yeah and good for the warmongers who approve of his obamas new victims from afganistan!
Your messages would be more effective if they were grammatical, and displayed an intelligent thought process. Please try again, if you like.
who gives a flying fuck what a scab wants , CHARLIE DONT SURF KILGORE!
I love the smell of napalm in the morning ...
But more to the point, Gen. Shinseki is such an excellent choice. The poetic justice of it is inspiring. Take THAT, Bushco. Heh.
So Obama is already sworn into office?
Oh, you're projecting and predicting the future in your own little crystal ball.... I see...
dont need no crystal ball sonny i listen to what he says ,maby some of you dolts might listen yourself , 20,000 more troops for the war machine in afganistan says obummer, !
It shoves a turd right under GWB's nose. Shinseki was right in his assessment of Iraq, bush was ..... Well, bush was the idiot he is.
A lot has been asked of many of our troops, want to ask one? you can find them living in small camps under freeways in many states.
This is an inspired pick.
President Obama keeps making the right choices. I think we will be okay. It will take time..but IIt's looking positive
Who better to know about vets than the people that made them disabled?
Gen. Shinseki is also an amputee, from when he served in vietnam and was also "retired" by Bush for bucking against Rumsfeld.
He is a good choice.
Do you always make comments when uninformed?
whether he's disabled or not is irrelevant. He is still one of the leaders of the military and thus trickle up theories prove he's as responsible for military getting wounded or killed as whichever president demands it.
Dude, please stop posting. Your argumentation is facile, over-broad and based on the most cliche'd generalizations. You are harming your own points with your idiocy. Please just stop.
I usually agree with your comments, but I fail to see how Shinseki is responsible for getting our vets wounded. Had bushco taken some of his advice--or all of it, as he was against the war--perhaps there would have been no wounded vets, at least in Iraq.
Shinseki himself is a wounded veteran of Vietnam. So he knows about the system. And in the past, he's sounded a lot more like someone who actually gives a damn about the people he leads than some of these guys.
This is a good pick. Tammy Duckworth was the person I was hoping for, but maybe we'll get to see her in the Senate, replacing Obama.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Llgunu-FlX4
I aqree with the first part of your assessment, however, you are jumping the gun on Duckworth. She has not paid any political dues for this postion, this is a huge position to fill. And Shinseki has had a very long, honorable career in service. There was an excellent display on this man at the U.S. Army museum at Waikiki Beach when I visited there in 2006, complete with pics, uniforms, maps of where he served, etc.., he actually grew up on the Big Island and served his country all over the world, from Vietnam to present, in many leadership and command positions. His wisdom on Iraq and treatment by the neocons only makes it sweeter
Shinseki wanted to make the operation less conflict-ridden and provide for the safety and protection for the troops and rummsfeld forced him out.
Paul Reikoff must be smiling.
I think this is my favorite pick so far. Rumsfeld must be trying to keep his fu*king old head from exploding.
I would hope Obama will restore all the jobs lost by "decenter s" in the government, you know anybody that was telling the truth and do their jobs based on facts got fired. I would hope all the fascist yes men will find themselves in court for treason against the people of the united states. Of coarse after all the judges jobs get restored to pre-fascist America status.
I have been noticing some you-tube videos with low resources like the clip from No End in Sight, I can't watch it, there is no bandwidth for that video. This sites bandwidth dropped down from 1.2 meg to .3 now.
I am thinking the local Comcast here is restricting what I can see........I also think You-Tube is doing the same.
beautiful!
be taken away from the military industrial complex by praising military generals. Fact of the matter is, just like all other high ranking military, he got there through political connections and some kind of ass kissing. Everyday military men and women are rarely elevated to the position of general. He disagreed with Rumsfeld, that makes him a hero? I think not.
Don't you find it ironic that General Powell, former chair of the Joint Chiefs, was actually the DOVE of Bushco's war cabinet when Powell was Secretary of State? While Bush, the AWOL coke-sniffing malingerer, and the rest of his draft-dodging crew, were the HAWKS?
The Bushco fools rushed in, while a prudently cautious military was saying "your plan is goofy." General Shinseki spoke truth to power, paid the consequenses, and has now taken the unenviable job of cleaning up one of Bushco's messes. I do find that heroic.
that he was against the Iraq invasion. He argued the number of soldiers. That makes him heroic?
I look forward to seeing what Gen Shinseki does.
Shinseki played the game to get promoted. His observation of the obvious: hundreds of thousands to pacify the invaded is viewed as opposition.
And "traumatic brain injury"? The gall! In the same sentence, no less!!!
Help me out: did Bush ever utter the words "post-traumatic stress disorder"? I'm not asking about his ability to pronounce complicated words, but about his ability to face reality. I would not be surprised if there is no public record of him saying those words.
But back to the present: a great choice. I hope that President Obama's very first action in office will be to rescind the executive order that prevents the media from showing coffins of soldiers being repatriated.
Nice. A big, subtle "fuck you" to Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz. I approve.
Having served under this soldier's command in 1983, It was very obvious he had the respect of every soldier he came in contact with. He is one of my hero's of current day soldiers and I always will remember his desire to make every soldier as good as he could be. PE Obama has made a superb choice. There will never be a leader more loyal and dedicated. Way to go General! No revenge, just perfection! Veterans are in good hands now. Hoorah!
Just think....no more horse breeders heading FEMA. Hopefully no more disgraces in the treatment of our Veterans, who have earned our respect and gratitude from here on till the end of time.
What other president gave a rat's ass about standing by those who served on our behalf as much as President-elect Obama has already demonstrated? NONE!!
I think this country is in for a real shake up. Go Obama. Don't slow down, don't look back. Just keep your nose clean and do what is right for this once great nation. Make us proud!
Just think....no more horse breeders heading FEMA. Hopefully no more disgraces in the treatment of our Veterans, who have earned our respect and gratitude from here on till the end of time.
What other president gave a rat's ass about standing by those who served on our behalf as much as President-elect Obama has already demonstrated? NONE!!
I think this country is in for a real shake up. Go Obama. Don't slow down, don't look back. Just keep your nose clean and do what is right for this once great nation. Make us proud!
GEN(Ret) Shinseki was hardly an ass kisser. He was a hard wroking, quiet leader. He was well respected by his superior, his peers and the men and women he lead for many years.
He began, well before Rumsfeld, a transformation of the US Army which paid dividends in Afghanistan in 2001-2002 (subsequent failures the results of resources pulled away from there). When the other service chiefs were quietly going along to get along with GEN Meyers and SECY Rumsfeld, Shinseki was the ONLY service chief who spoke out. He KNEW going into that committee hearing that he was ending his career, but he did it anyway because he knew it was the right thing to do. Anyone who has read COBRA 2 or FIASCO will know that all along he was pushing for greater numbers for OIF to prevent the total colapse which we saw happen after April 03.
He lived the VA system and is one of only 8 Viet Nam amputees who stayed on active duty. He will provide great leadership and vision to the second largest department of the executive branch.
Our veterans are in good hands with this selection.
IN YOUR FACES DICK AND GEORGE.
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