Free Republic

awesome photos! I went over to that thread and added some more pictures to it! I was surprised I could still find them in our files haha

Oh...shoot. looking at the picture again, i was mistaken about the shirt! that’s not a MAF shirt - whoops!

how that i look, i think the guy in the gray sweater is David Bellavia... I got the back of his head in the picture of Mel and Debbie haha

lets take a little walk down memory lane someone help me identify the pics of people who I forgot...sorry it was a long time ago :)

Pete Hegseth Uncle Jimbo





Debbie and Melanie

The Lt. Col. himself, with one of our MAF shirts

Miss Debbie Lee with Uncle Jimbo in the back

Again, Mr. Russell



Still have my Russell Brigade T-Shirt!

Mel lookin stunning as always

Deb and Mel at the podium

Thanks Dr Zoo!

Here is more, courtesy of our friends at Red State who were kind enough to publish this on our behalf with more rebuttal of Kim Barker’s false narrative

http://www.redstate.com/2014/08/11/moving-america-forward-responds-propublica-allegations/

I would point you guys to the particularly nasty tactic she employs where she reaches out to people and tries to poison our relationships with them... Walter Reed, the 1st Marines, etc.

She is using her job as a “journalist” to give herself credibility... if a code pink person called up walter reed and said blah blah blah why are you working with these conservatives, they would laugh in her face, but because Barker says “im a reporter” they become scared and start distancing themselves from MAF. pretty shameful behavior from this “journalist” IMHO

http://www.redstate.com/2014/08/11/moving-america-forward-responds-propublica-allegations/

I remember that meeting! We did a little press conference with Mr. Russell in some hotel I think. I still have some pictures of it somewhere. I also still have my authentic brown “Russell Brigade” t-shirt (it fits a little bit tight these days though lol)

also IIRC we had Uncle Jimbo from Blackfive on-hand that day! It was great fun!

No funds were diverted from their intended purpose. there are a ton of outrageous claims in the article, so if you have a specific one you want me to address, i need a little more specificity than that.

thank you for the kind words Smooth - yes we are prepared to answer every question YOU have for us because we know you guys are fair and can think with your heads... but as far as replying directly to Kim Barker or Pro Publica we have no plans to respond directly to them. they are not worth our time or effort

Dead

Thank you for your questions - we spend about 30% on overhead and 60% on postage and items for the care packages. The overhead includes everything from advertising, staff, rent, bills, travel costs, and storage. Care packages and the items in them take an enormous amount of room and we need a large space to fit all the stuff for the volunteers and give them room to actually work and pack the boxes up. Then we need some space to store them temporarily before they can get shipped. Also bear in mind that 30% encompasses the cost of producing Troopathon every year, which is an enormous and expensive event. We hire professional directors and sound and stage crew, and they all work for bare minimum so I feel we are lucky to get away with only 30% overhead costs. This is just as efficient as many of the other non-profits out there.

On the subject of photos - yes we use stock photos and stuff gathered from all around the web, but we have NEVER misrepresented them as our own or claimed that we took them on our own. There may be some individuals who make that link in their own mind, but I think the vast majority of intelligent people will read our emails and realize that we simply use the images to support the story and give the reader a feel for what they are reading about. Most of the stories we post about are directly quoted from news articles and we always include the name and date of the article. Most of the time we use the same image from the news articles too but sometimes I will go google a different picture if I don’t like the one that Fox or NBC used.

Never did we claim that another image was evidence of our own operations. the only time we explicitly state that an image was “us” were in images of our own volunteers packing or shipping boxes, or images of our own staff in Iraq, for example.

On the issue of the wounded soldier - this was one incident and yes we used it. It’s very simple...we saw an article published from a well known news source (i don’t remember specifically if it was Fox or someone else) that was written about a soldier who was disabled but still risked his own life to help a family whose car had run off the road during a snow storm. We showcased it in an email to simply say look here is a great example of one of our troops who is still a hero even after he’s sacrificed so much. we NEVER implied that the soldier in question had endorsed our group.

We never said anything about him that wasn’t already publicly published by the news. Nevertheless the family was upset about it and we pulled the article off our website at their request. We did this out of compassion for the family but not because we felt we had done anything wrong. All we did was bring attention to a story that was already published and available for everyone to read. I do not see how that impeaches our reputation as an organization.

Hey Free Republic, this is Danny Gonzalez with Move America Forward. I have been a member of the site for a long long time but I admit I don’t post often enough :)

Longtime free republic people will remember us from way back when we did our bus tours. We are good friends with, and have personally met many Freepers all across the country.

I want to tell you all that these allegations are completely untrue and misconstrued by Kim Barker and Pro Publica. She is a far left wing hack and she did this attack piece as her last letter before leaving the publication to begin a new job at the New York Times.

She has attacked MAF in previous articles as well as the Tea Party movement. I wanted to reach out to you guys and make sure that you know we have nothing to hide and I want to answer all your concerns and questions.

Thanks for posting this up Syncro!

Well I know it has been a couple of days since the City Council meeting, but I just wanted to share two things Also many thanks go SYNCRO for showing up that night and doing some taping for us, it felt much better not having to be there all alone!

VIDEO WITH NEWS CLIPS AND CLIPS FROM CITY COUNCIL MEETING

DETAILED ACCOUNT OF NIGHTS EVENTS WRITTEN BY MAF BLOGGER DANNY

Excerpt from the loooooong blog post 

"After I sat down, the Council members resumed discussion amongst themselves. Everyone in the crowd seemed pretty confident that they had a consensus. Then it was councilmember Linda Miao who offered a substitute resolution that would effectively put off final judgment until the administration changes their policy about resettlement of GITMO detainees.

 Thanks to the Republicans taking over the house, it’s currently illegal for US dollars to be spent for the transportation of any GITMO detainees to US soil, either for incarceration or to be released. So Linda Miao’s substitution would have put off the resolution until that changes (which will probably be never) unfortunately, when the council took a vote on this measure, it failed.

Right after that, Councilman Darryl Moore moved to previous question – meaning vote on whether or not to invited GITMO detainees to come to Berkeley.  

Four voted yes. Four abstained, and one voted no. That’s one vote shy of what they needed, so the resolution failed.

Now, when the clerk said the resolution failed, I started clapping wildly, and I think most of the people in the room were not paying much attention and just assuming that the council would naturally pass the resolution, so when I started clapping, I think everyone thought the resolution had passed, because everyone else started clapping and cheering too!

This was really funny, there you have this room full of liberals all clapping for a resolution that just failed the floor vote ;) someone else in the audience realized this and corrected everyone and when they realized that their precious GITMO resolution had just gone down in flames, they were pissed!

People were groaning out loud, shouting about war crimes and torture or whatever, mostly they were just pissed, and some wanted to take their frustration out on me, which was actually a lot of fun because it gave me even more of a sense of “yes, I did this to you people. Be mad at me, because I just beat you.”

Well I know it has been a couple of days since the City Council meeting, but I just wanted to share two things Also many thanks go SYNCRO for showing up that night and doing some taping for us, it felt much better not having to be there all alone!

VIDEO WITH NEWS CLIPS AND CLIPS FROM CITY COUNCIL MEETING

DETAILED ACCOUNT OF NIGHTS EVENTS WRITTEN BY MAF BLOGGER DANNY

Excerpt from the loooooong blog post 

"After I sat down, the Council members resumed discussion amongst themselves. Everyone in the crowd seemed pretty confident that they had a consensus. Then it was councilmember Linda Miao who offered a substitute resolution that would effectively put off final judgment until the administration changes their policy about resettlement of GITMO detainees.

 Thanks to the Republicans taking over the house, it’s currently illegal for US dollars to be spent for the transportation of any GITMO detainees to US soil, either for incarceration or to be released. So Linda Miao’s substitution would have put off the resolution until that changes (which will probably be never) unfortunately, when the council took a vote on this measure, it failed.

Right after that, Councilman Darryl Moore moved to previous question – meaning vote on whether or not to invited GITMO detainees to come to Berkeley.  

Four voted yes. Four abstained, and one voted no. That’s one vote shy of what they needed, so the resolution failed.

Now, when the clerk said the resolution failed, I started clapping wildly, and I think most of the people in the room were not paying much attention and just assuming that the council would naturally pass the resolution, so when I started clapping, I think everyone thought the resolution had passed, because everyone else started clapping and cheering too!

This was really funny, there you have this room full of liberals all clapping for a resolution that just failed the floor vote ;) someone else in the audience realized this and corrected everyone and when they realized that their precious GITMO resolution had just gone down in flames, they were pissed!

People were groaning out loud, shouting about war crimes and torture or whatever, mostly they were just pissed, and some wanted to take their frustration out on me, which was actually a lot of fun because it gave me even more of a sense of “yes, I did this to you people. Be mad at me, because I just beat you.”

More Rally info and map available here:
http://www.mafpac.org/index.php/mafpac/ny13_2010

WHO Debbie Lee, Gold Star Mom || Ben Smith, Fmr. Navy SEAL || Michael Grimm, Candidate for Congress

WHAT Veterans and Military Families Supporting Our Troops and Michael Grimm for Congress

WHEN Thursday, September 2nd, 2010 at 10:00 AM

WHERE Michael Grimm Campaign Headquarters
2381 Hylan Blvd,
Staten Island, NY 10306

hey guys any updates on what the status is with this? I have seen many posts from people saying they called but have not heard anything back about what happened

Thanks to Moonbattery Blog for posting this. From www.moonbattery.com

War on Terror Is Officially Over Great news — if you're a terrorist: the War on Terror is officially over. I wish I could say the same for terror's war on us.

From the Washington Times article also linked from Moonbattery

It's official. The U.S. is no longer engaged in a "war on terrorism." Neither is it fighting "jihadists" or in a "global war." President Obama's top homeland security and counterterrorism official took all three terms off the table of acceptable words inside the White House during a speech Thursday at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, a Washington think tank. "The President does not describe this as a 'war on terrorism,'" said John Brennan, head of the White House homeland security office, who outlined a "new way of seeing" the fight against terrorism.

I think this just makes America look weak, fractured and petty. We don't want to use the same words as the last administration, but that doesn't make the conflict go away, the Jihadists are still real no matter what you call them... it's maddening that they are pushing these terms out in favor of what they percieve to be more correct. Obama thinks he is just so smart and so correct. For Example his spokesman

"Mr. Brennan lamented "inflammatory rhetoric, hyperbole, and intellectual narrowness" surrounding the national security debate and said Mr. Obama has views that are "nuanced, not simplistic; practical, not ideological."

So if ANYONE thinks a terrorists should be called a terrorist, see "the conflict formerly known as the war on terror" as us-vs-them, or tries to relate their goals with their religious views AT ALL ...you are simply bigoted, narrow minded, closed off, stupid, a simpleton, a brute, a reactionary.

This really pisses me off. it's pure arrogance, but i can't imagine how our troops would feel.

How would it feel to be struggling in a difficult situation, out in the middle east, it's hot, its dusty and sandy, you haven't seen your family for 18 months because you've been deployed, your friends and yourself are in the line of fire every day, being shot at, seeing your friends, brothers who have trained and bled with you, protected you, and then seeing them get blown up, seeing innocent Iraqis that you work with and have gotten to know and then seeing them get blown up or murdered because they talked to you.

But despite the loss and the sacrifice you overcame, you completed your mission and brought peace...but it took over 6 years (and counting) of hard work sweat and bloodshed. And now after all that, it turns out that what you have been fighting for, the war you have been fighting and dying for, is deemed "INFLAMMATORY, NARROW MINDED"

What is Obama saying to our troops...you fools, you idiots, you risked your lives for a stupid meaningless phrase that accomplished nothing

it's not fair

he can't take this war away from our troops, it's not right, we won't stand for that