Posted on 02/18/2016 7:08:40 AM PST by MarvinStinson
HAILEY, Idaho -- It was the third text message from the unfamiliar number -- the one that made direct reference to Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl -- that frightened Sherry Horton. It was written in nearly unintelligible gibberish, but its tone was unmistakably menacing.
Ms. Horton had reason to be fearful: Hailey is the hometown of the American soldier who was vilified as a deserter and possibly even a traitor days after his release from Taliban captivity in May 2014 in a prisoner swap.
Here in Hailey, death threats soon followed -- hundreds of calls to the Chamber of Commerce and to businesses owned by people who had most visibly supported Sergeant Bergdahl, including the wine bar that Ms. Horton partly owns. The town canceled plans for a public celebration after a hostile biker gang and angry veterans' groups threatened to disrupt it. A crude bomb filled with black powder was left outside a local business.
"We were put through the worst of it," said Ms. Horton, who taught Sergeant Bergdahl ballet and remains close with the soldier. "And it's not over for us, that's pretty freaking clear."
Such is the transformation of this small town down the road from Sun Valley in the Northern Rockies, where yellow ribbons were once wrapped around trees along Main Street and "Bring Bowe Home" stickers were plastered on car bumpers. The ribbons and stickers are mostly gone, and the five years that Hailey stood behind its hometown kid when he was held by the Taliban have given way to a distrust of outsiders and a bitterness about the hostile tenor of American politics.
There is a "mob mentality that's been created and is being created," said Lawrence Schoen, the commissioner of Blaine County, where Hailey is.
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
Oh, PLEASE!
If I were Bergdahl, I would be working hard for a Democrat/Socialist/Islamist victory in November. The military brass will have new directives regarding traitors with a Trump or Cruz or Rubio victory.
Oldplayer
People in town have heard Donald J. Trump, a Republican presidential candidate, regularly call Sergeant Bergdahl “a dirty, rotten traitor” who should be executed or simply pushed from an airplane without a parachute.
The valley that surrounds Hailey is a relatively affluent and liberal sliver in a deeply conservative state, which added to the sense of being under siege in the immediate aftermath of Sergeant Bergdahl’s release.
“There’s some really ignorant people who live some places in the West,” said Fritz Haemmerle, the mayor. “They’re very right wing, they’re very militant, they’re very uninformed and they’re people with guns and with an attitude.”
There is also far more ambivalence about Sergeant Bergdahl, who now faces a court-martial and a possible life sentence on charges of desertion and endangering troops stemming from his decision to leave his outpost in 2009, a move that led to his capture by the Taliban.
Sergeant Bergdahl, who is now 29, is not believed to have visited Hailey since his return to the United States. His only public comments have been featured in a podcast, Serial, whose second season is focused on his case. In it, Sergeant Bergdahl said he walked off his outpost in hopes of hiking to a larger base about 18 miles away to tell a general about what he considered the dangerous incompetence of his commanding officers.
Sergeant Bergdahl told the same story to Army investigators, who found it credible. Lt. Gen. Kenneth R. Dahl, the lead investigator, said at a preliminary hearing in September that Sergeant Bergdahl “had delusional expectations for his deployment. The general also said there was no evidence that Sergeant Bergdahl, who identified with John Galt, the hero in Ayn Rand’s novel “Atlas Shrugged,” intended to desert or that any soldiers had been killed while searching for him.
The brunt of the threats in Hailey were borne by a small group of women who had led the campaign to free Sergeant Bergdahl. Some knew him because “he danced with their daughters,” said Ms. Horton, the ballet teacher, who also let Sergeant Bergdahl live at her house during stretches of his teenage years when his family life was strained.
*snip*
Where is the article?
Is the author any relation to Julius and Ethel Rosenberg?
Bergdahl is a traitor who deserted on the field of battle, which explains why so many decent Americans call him a traitor and a deserter. As for the alleged crude bomb, I assume it was planted by the left, not by patriotic Americans. Like so many of the events they use to justify their whining and their pretense that they are the victims, the claimed bomb seems too ineffective and too convenient to be real. Liberals disgust me.
Bergdahl himself is a scumbag. But threats against the people in the tiw who supported him while he was missing are pretty scummy too.
Thanks for catching that.
Thanks for catching that.
Ha...no wonder they kept him all those years...
a)...to teach burka ballet
b)....to instruct the ISIS on a more elegant way of beheading
c)...all of the above.
Long After Bergdahl's Release, His Hometown Is Still Under Siege
How do you suppose it got changed like that?
I sob for the soldiers who lost their lives having to look for this POS.
Typical behavior by the “Progessives” at the “NY SlIMES.
“
When every member of your unit says you deserted, then it will be hard for the administration to show that he did not desert.
If I deserted, what would I come up with as a story after I was caught?
“I was leaving to ____________” (fill in the blank)
Any defense after the fact has to begin something like that.
I suppose a real nutcase would say, “I was asleep in my bag and a team of special ops Taliban seized me and took me to _______________________”
The NY TIMES paints allies of the traitor Bergdahl as “victims.”
Standard, tired, easily recognizable action out of the lefty playbook.
They do that withe poor, “victimized”
blacks—Wannabee thug Trayvon Martin, 292 lb. 6’4” criminal Michael Brown
False “rape” stories by the lefty rag Rolling Stone, the fake Duke rape crap (while ignoring Bill “Pantless” Clinton’s long history)
Constant sob stories for the poor, victimized muslims from CAIR and the media—especially just after muslim mass murders like San Bernadino, Fort Hood, Paris.
Endless stories about poor, victimized homosexuals—even though it is known that they kill each other constantly in fits of jealous rage.
“b)....to instruct the ISIS on a more elegant way of beheading”
That would be quite nice, if one of those most peaceful people hand me kneeling, head bowed, ready for the axe, I’d certainly want to hear the music and watch all the precision steps, knowing the final whack will be beautiful and gracious.
Family members would certainly feel better too.
Regarding the subject at hand: Bergdahl is a scumbag, you do not leave your post, if your leaders are incompetent, then write a congressman, contact the IG, go to the press.
This clod had to know fellow soldiers would be risking their lives while looking for someone missing. And walking 18 miles in a war zone to see a general? Please, if he did not desert, then he is the one that is incompetent.
I think a precision ballet should be preformed by his beheader!!!
And it sounds like a lot of them live in Hailey!
“They’re very right wing, they’re very militant, they’re very uninformed and they’re people with guns and with an attitude.”
That’s the voice of the enemy, who will vote Democratic this year.
It is almost holy writ in the military that you trust the guys who are there, the “boots on the ground”.
Every single one of them says he deserted.
They have no reason to lie.
Let’s rent Bergdahl , AND HIS LEFT WING, PONYTAILED FATHER a condo at ISIS headquarters. We won’t have to pay long.
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