Farewell. The Flying Pig Has Left The Building.

Steve Hynd, August 16, 2012

After four years on the Typepad site, eight years total blogging, Newshoggers is closing it's doors today. We've been coasting the last year or so, with many of us moving on to bigger projects (Hey, Eric!) or simply running out of blogging enthusiasm, and it's time to give the old flying pig a rest.

We've done okay over those eight years, although never being quite PC enough to gain wider acceptance from the partisan "party right or wrong" crowds. We like to think we moved political conversations a little, on the ever-present wish to rush to war with Iran, on the need for a real Left that isn't licking corporatist Dem boots every cycle, on America's foreign misadventures in Afghanistan and Iraq. We like to think we made a small difference while writing under that flying pig banner. We did pretty good for a bunch with no ties to big-party apparatuses or think tanks.

Those eight years of blogging will still exist. Because we're ending this typepad account, we've been archiving the typepad blog here. And the original blogger archive is still here. There will still be new content from the old 'hoggers crew too. Ron writes for The Moderate Voice, I post at The Agonist and Eric Martin's lucid foreign policy thoughts can be read at Democracy Arsenal.

I'd like to thank all our regular commenters, readers and the other bloggers who regularly linked to our posts over the years to agree or disagree. You all made writing for 'hoggers an amazingly fun and stimulating experience.

Thank you very much.

Note: This is an archive copy of Newshoggers. Most of the pictures are gone but the words are all here. There may be some occasional new content, John may do some posts and Ron will cross post some of his contributions to The Moderate Voice so check back.


----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Wednesday, July 14, 2010

No hollowing, no sirree

By Dave Anderson:

The New York Times has an article on the dangers of a US brigade returning home from Iraq.  Fifteen percent of the brigade was either brought up on charges or kicked out of the Army when it returned to garrison at Fort Bliss in Texas.  

As part of a housecleaning, Colonel Newell dismissed more than 150 soldiers from the Army and brought formal disciplinary charges against more than 10 percent of the brigade�s 3,500 troops. In one company, 39 of 150 soldiers were court-martialed.

Yep, absolutely no sign of hollowing or the impact of relaxing recruiting standards to meet numbers, none at all.  That is especially critical as US counter-insurgency doctrine relies on having highly disciplined soldiers in every interaction with the targeted civilian population.  No problem at all [/snark/

Posted by at
Labels: ,

1 comment:

  1. James BrownJuly 14, 2010 at 5:46 AM

    The other sad part of the equation is that people with pre-existing mental health issues are more predisposed to develop problems with PTSD. Military service can be difficult for anybody, but some people just ain't cut out for the military.

    ReplyDelete

Subscribe to: Post Comments (Atom)