Penn's praise for spy heroine [Sean-the-Yawn]

Hollywood actor-director and Oscar nominee Sean Penn last night paid tribute to GCHQ whistleblower Katharine Gun, describing her as 'a hero of the human spirit'.

Gun will stand trial later this year for leaking a top-secret memo showing that US spies requested British help in an illegal operation to spy on the UN Security Council in the run-up to war last year.

She next appears in court at the Old Bailey on 25 February and is pleading not guilty. She is likely to argue that her action was necessary to save the lives of Iraqi civilians and British service personnel.

Penn, who is nominated in the best actor category of tonight's Bafta awards, for his role in the Clint Eastwood film Mystic River, said: 'It was a decision of conscience in a world where nobody celebrates that. She will go down in history as a hero of the human spirit. I urge the whole world to angle their eyes in the direction of that courtroom.'

Penn was one of a number of prominent Americans, including black civil rights activist Jesse Jackson, who signed up earlier this year to support Gun's campaign. The campaign is being headed by Daniel Ellsberg, the celebrated whistleblower whose leak of the 'Pentagon Papers' revealed details of US involvement in Vietnam. The campaign has now attracted the support of Penn's fellow stars Martin Sheen and Danny Glover, the feminist writer Gloria Steinem and Vietnam veteran Ron Kovic, whose life story was made into the film Born on the Fourth of July, starring Tom Cruise.

Penn added: 'It is incumbent on the people of Britain to support her in this. What she did took an enormous personal cost.'

The campaign was last week joined by members of the US Congress, who released an open letter to Tony Blair in support of Gun.

The Congressional letter was signed by House Judiciary Committee ranking member John Conyers Jr from Michigan. It was initiated by Dennis J. Kucinich from Ohio and also signed by Raul M. Grijalva from Arizona, Janice D. Schakowsky from Illinois and Lynn C. Woolsey from California.

It reads: 'We cannot conceive of a scenario in which Ms Gun's actions would present a national security threat to the United States ... A democracy must protect the whistleblower from reprisal.'

Vietnam veteran Ron Kovic, whose life story was made into the film Born on the Fourth of July, starring Tom Cruise.

My eye it was.

A few Facts about Born on the Fourth of July (the book and movie):

The movie shows a high school coach screaming "kill!" at his athletes. The scene never happened, and it isn't even in Kovic's book (which is itself full of lies). The "kill!" scene was fabricated by that stickler for accuracy, Oliver Stone, and they had to change the coach's name to forestall a lawsuit.
The movie shows Kovic getting a wound and going ape, getting hit again and paralyzed in an orgy of valour. Er... not exactly. Kovic got the first, mild wound, and was lying on the ground congratulating himself on being able to go home a hero, when the second bullet found him (this version is in his book).
Far from the naive kid portrayed in the book and movie, Kovic was on his second combat tour in Vietnam.
He had killed a bunch of NVA in the first tour (12/65-1/67). He was recommended for the Bronze Star w/V for this. (He received the Navy Commendation Medal).
Kovic came home safe from that first 13-month tour, then volunteered to go back. In fact, he wrote letters up the chain of command begging to be sent back to Vietnam. "I participated in 22 long-range patrols deep within VC territory," said one such letter. "My country calls me again. I am willing to give my country 100% ... and then some."
Kovic was on a one year guaranteed stabilization when he volunteered to go back. Which is to say, that unless he specifically requested, he could not be sent back to Vietnam at that point... he requested.
It didn't turn out the way he liked, and only then did he become an embittered -- and mendacious -- protester.
The movie and the book suggest that Kovic killed another Marine (PFC Wilson), and then was yelled at by his CO for trying to confess. Kovic did indeed tell his CO that he thought he had killed Wilson -- but the CO investigated, and determined that Kovic didn't actually harm Wilson.
In his Hollywood version, Kovic visits the Wilson family in Venus, GA to confess killing their son (which remember, he knew in real life from the CO he hadn't done -- as opposed to the yelling CO in the film). There are a couple of problems with this. One: there is no Venus, GA. (search for it at that Postal Service link). Two: when finally pressed on how he visited people in a nonexistent place, Kovic admitted he hadn't: the scene is a dream sequence. Uh-huh.
In the movie, Kovic is struck speechless by a "flashback" at a Fourth of July fesival. Never happened. He wasn't asked to speak (which he admits in the book).
The movie and the book have him beaten by cops at a Syractuse U protest, with Abbie Hoffman. Never happened. Kovic wasn't there; nor was Hoffman, a miserable excuse for a human being who died by his own hand, but typical of the dreck admired by Stone and Kovic.
Finally, there is the beating delivered by "fascist pigs," as Kovic calls police, at the 1972 Republican convention. All I am going to say about this is, while the Left tries very hard to hang the war on Nixon, the war was handed to him by LBJ, who inherited it, and his horrible foreign policy team, from the Left's Saint John Kennedy. Both of Kovic's combat tours, and his horrible wounds, were received on Lyndon Baines Johnson's watch. But he and Stone blame Nixon. Irrational.

Every one of these facts is documented. Most of them are on pages 395-398 of Stolen Valor by Burkett and Whitley.

It's horrible that Kovic was crippled, but it is his choice to be embittered. It is his choice to insult everyone from his high school coaches to the US Marine Corps to the dead, to the many veterans who still salute the flag.

If you examine the stories of all Kerry's VVA/VVAW pals, you will find this pattern over and over. Actually, Kerry and Kovic were important to the VVAW, because they were rare combat veterans, and most VVAW founders were not veterans at all.

I have yet to find an authentic combat vet telling a true story in all their Winter Soldier bullshit.

d.o.l.

Criminal Number 18F

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