Kirk: 'I command the war room in the Pentagon'

[danarhea]

Richard Blumenthal's claim to have served in Vietnam has put a spotlight on politicians' discussions of their military service, and I'm pointed to a pretty dramatic boast from Rep. Mark Kirk, the U.S. Naval Reserve officer running for Senate in Illinois.


“In my role in the military, I command the war room in the Pentagon," Kirk told a gathering of experts on U.S.-Chinese relations last May (at 4:18 in the video above).

There seems to be an epidemic among Democrats of claiming bragging rights that they don't really have. We now have a Democratic candidate who, although he does have military intelligence experience, embellishes it by saying that he commands the war room at the Pentagon. LOL.

What will we have next? I know - A Democratic candidate who claims to have invented war? Actually, I am sure that, after November, there may be a Democrat or two who will take credit for Republcans beating them..... Nah - They will blame their loss on Republicans distorting their distortions. LMAO.

Article is here.

Seriously, though, I think he is about to start bragging that he defeated the Klingon Empire. :mrgreen:

 

[winston53660]

There seems to be an epidemic among Democrats of claiming bragging rights that they don't really have. We now have a Democratic candidate who, although he does have military intelligence experience, embellishes it by saying that he commands the war room at the Pentagon. LOL.

What will we have next? I know - A Democratic candidate who claims to have invented war? Actually, I am sure that, after November, there may be a Democrat or two who will take credit for Republcans beating them..... Nah - They will blame their loss on Republicans distorting their distortions. LMAO.

Article is here.

Seriously, though, I think he is about to start bragging that he defeated the Klingon Empire. :mrgreen:

I bet Scientology is behind all this:mrgreen:

 

[spud_meister]

yeah, well, i defeated the armies of Genghis Kahn using nothing but a pair of safety scissors

 

[Slartibartfast]

Is it just me or is this thread ripe for startrek jokes?

 

[Redress]

Is it just me or is this thread ripe for startrek jokes?

I was expecting it to be a Star Trek joke.

 

[Zyphlin]

I'd rather have Denny Crane commanding my war room honestly than Kirk.

You can't negotiate with a man with mad cow

 

[Areopagitican]

Well, I command his mother.

 

[liblady]

Well, I command his mother.

that's not what it's called.

 

[Ockham]

It might be indicative of some desperation to retake the narrative and message leading up to November. Of course, this will backfire and be another Blumenthal joke all over again. Honesty really must be an alien concept to politicians.

 

[Alvin T. Grey]

Is it just me or is this thread ripe for startrek jokes?

There may be tribble ahead....

 

[Aunt Spiker]

There seems to be an epidemic among Democrats of claiming bragging rights that they don't really have. We now have a Democratic candidate who, although he does have military intelligence experience, embellishes it by saying that he commands the war room at the Pentagon. LOL.

What will we have next? I know - A Democratic candidate who claims to have invented war? Actually, I am sure that, after November, there may be a Democrat or two who will take credit for Republcans beating them..... Nah - They will blame their loss on Republicans distorting their distortions. LMAO.

Article is here.

Seriously, though, I think he is about to start bragging that he defeated the Klingon Empire. :mrgreen:

Sure he does - along with everyone else who has a job in the Pentagon.
They all command the activities in the war room.

Or cater to it, or run the errands, or report the statistics.

*salute*

 

[donsutherland1]

My guess is that such exaggeration merely reflects what has increasingly been occurring in society at large for quite some time. When it comes to providing information, there is a growing tendency/demand to keep things ever shorter. That context is ideal for exaggeration.

For example, if one examines resumes of prospective employees, one finds a lot of action verbs (consistent with the cookie cutter advice of career services professionals). Quite commonplace is the claim, "I boosted profits by X%." On the surface, that's a concise statement that gets to the point of the value an individual brought.

On closer inspection, it isn't. It is concise, but actually it more often than not clouds over the actual role an individual played in a given firm. It lacks context, some of which can be vital.

Almost always, organizational outcomes are not the result of dictates of a single superhuman who devises the plans, makes the decisions, and implements the measures necessary to reach a given outcome. Therefore, more accurate would be a statement "I contributed to the planning and implementation of a program that led to an X% increase in profits over the past X years."

Unfortunately, even as that statement is much more realistic, it is not as concise as the earlier one. Also, implicit is the idea that others contributed to the effort and share credit for the outcome. In other words, the outcome was not a solo effort. But that's the reality of organizations. Unless one is a sole proprietor, organizational effort is a function of multiple efforts. Team work is pervasive at all levels. But when one is seeking a new position, there is a temptation to avoid sharing credit, even when credit is also due to others.

Potentially even worse from the standpoint of the interviewee is the prospect that he or she might be asked to explain how he or she contributed to the effort, possibly even how he or she worked with others to achieve an outcome. In a "one-minute" world dominated by soundbites, articulating anything to some level of detail can be intimidating for those who are unprepared to do so.

In any case, I don't believe it is suprising at all that larger societal trends have further diluted the political process. The two cases might be among the more notable ones, but on close inspection political literature/claims tends to be skewed toward exaggeration.

 

[Deuce]

He was doing it to impress Chinese women. Can you honestly say you wouldn't have done the same?

 

[alms]

There seems to be an epidemic among Democrats of claiming bragging rights that they don't really have. We now have a Democratic candidate who, although he does have military intelligence experience, embellishes it by saying that he commands the war room at the Pentagon.

Danarhea,

Mark Kirk is a Republican.

 

[washunut]

What will we have next? I know - A Democratic candidate who claims to have invented war? .

:mrgreen:

We all know that war was invented by Al Gore!

 

[BWG]

Danarhea,

Mark Kirk is a Republican.

LOL......That certainly stopped this thread short of the 17 pages on Blumenthal.

 

[RightinNYC]

I was wondering why there were no threads on this over the past couple days.

FWIW, this particular embellishment isn't that bad.

Kirk's post puts him "in charge of the intelligence section of the alert center -- the information 'war room'" -- and is responsible for contacting the [Director of Intelligence] when necessary," his campaign said.

Kirk "is regularly called upon to brief the JCS Vice Chairman or Director of Operations," the campaign said.

So he runs the intelligence war room at the Pentagon, not the entire war room. It's a bit of a stretch, but not particularly troublesome.

The stuff about "naval officer of the year" is a bit more dubious.

 

[Deuce]

We all know that war was invented by Al Gore!

Man that guy is a jerk. He invented global warming too! He's the reason the earth is getting warmer!

This overstating-military-service things seems prevalent lately. That lady in AZ supporting the immigration bill got called "Hitler's Daughter" or something. (which is absurd hyperbole but that's a different discussion) She responded by saying something about being very upset that she was being called that when her father "died fighting the Nazi's."

He worked in an ammunition factory and died of lung cancer... 11 years after the war ended. I mean, yeah he helped the war effort and that's commendable, but "died fighting the Nazi's" is clearly misrepresenting that situation. In this day and age, did she think people wouldn't figure that out?