Sheep

The new movie Act of Valor comes out this weekend. Like Topgun, this movie is intended to be a propaganda piece that will increase enlistment in the Navy. (If you don’t believe it, click the link and read the article.) The Navy likes to make it appear as though everyone in the Navy is either a SEAL, an Electronics Technician, or an Officer. They try to gloss over the less glamorous facets like hull technicians, engineering department, and all of the dirty, nasty jobs that the majority of the crew has to perform in order to keep the ships running.

Go see the movie. I will. Just remember that the Naval Special Warfare Community is even smaller than the fighter pilot community, and both are very difficult to enter and have extremely high washout rates. The Navy gets you to enlist to be a pilot or a SEAL, and then makes sure that washout rates are near or over 90%. After all, very few people go into a recruiter’s office and sign up to chip and paint a ship for 4 years, but the job still needs to get done. The people who wash out of these programs are the ones who get stuck in these jobs, and they sometimes wash people out for the most minor reasons that they can think of.

In the early 80s, just before Top Gun came out, the Navy had a hard time getting the smart kids to join, because the Air Force was getting them all. (That is why Top Gun came out) When I was in boot camp, fully half of the recruits were there because of that movie (I was not) and stated that they wanted to become officers and eventually, pilots. Less than 1 in 1000 made officer, and less than 1 in 500 became pilots, and of those, the majority were helicopter and cargo plane pilots. Less than 1 in 100,000 enlisted recruits became fighter pilots.

So the Navy’s tool for getting the smart kids when I signed up was Nuclear Power School. A promise of E4 within months, E5 in less than 2 years, bonuses after the first year, and technical training were the draws. Of course, they glossed over the 70% washout rate. People were washed out for getting traffic tickets off base, being caught in the Enlisted Club after 10 pm, and drinking under age. They did all that they could to meet that 70% washout rate.

Four years later, the program was passing 75% of candidates, because the Navy had better ways to populate those crappy jobs.

So to sum it up, remember it is just a movie. Don’t sign up for the wrong reasons. Think about what you are getting yourself into.

In the wake of the Casey Anthony trial, millions of people who decided that she was guilty are incensed enough at the audacity of the jury in actually considering the evidence and acquitting her, that they are now attempting to craft a law that will ensure that she will not get away with this. Well, except that her trial is over, and this law would not apply to her case. Casey Anthony is the one person in this country that would not be affected by this law.

The law, dubbed “Caylee’s Law by its supporters, would make it a felony for a mother to fail to report the death of a child within an hour, or fail to report a child missing within 24 hours of the child’s disappearance. People who advocate for such a law are either ignorant of the Fifth Amendment’s self incrimination clause, or they are deliberately ignoring it. A parent forced to report child’s death or disappearance violates the parent’s Fifth amendment protection against self incrimination, in that if the parent was responsible for that death or disappearance, they are effectively testifying against him/herself by providing the time of death.One might as well pass a law requiring anyone who commits murder to confess to the crime.

“We cannot require perpetrators to turn themselves in, or incriminate themselves,” said Susan Rozelle, who teaches criminal law at Stetson University’s College of Law. “And that’s what this reporting standard could do.”
Richard Lubin, a West Palm Beach criminal defense lawyer, agreed the proposal creates constitutional issues.

The law totally ignores common sense. If a parent is willing to kill a child and then lie to investigators to conceal the crime, they are willing to break this new law and fail to report the crime. What this means is that the law is not being crafted, nor is it intended, to do anything except punish the behavior of the one person to whom it does not apply.

But in the wake of the Anthony case, Lubin said lawmakers could consider toughening penalties for lying to law enforcement — the misdemeanors Casey Anthony was found guilty of.
“In the federal system, if you lie to law enforcement, that’s a felony,” Lubin said. “Casey Anthony wouldn’t be getting out of jail this month, if lying was a felony.”

EDITED: The bill here in Florida makes it a second degree felony to lie to a cop that is investigating any possible felony involving your child punishable by 15 years in prison.

(2) A caregiver, as defined in s. 827.01, who knowingly and willfully gives false information to a law enforcement officer who is conducting a missing person investigation or a felony criminal investigation involving a minor child in his or her care with the intent to mislead the officer or impede the investigation commits a felony of the second degree, punishable as provided in s. 775.082, s. 775.083, or s. 775.084.

If a cop is investigating whether or not your child accessed your neighbor’s WiFi (that is a felony in Florida) and tell any lie to the cops, 15 years in the slammer. Do you think the cops will NEVER stretch such a law for use in a way that was not intended?