Here's to next year's Founders Day, back home with glass in hand.

Dressed as ‘zombie soldiers’ killed in combat, ‘ghosts of war victims,’ witches and healthcare fairies, members of Code Pink menacingly paraded in front of a captive audience of children one block from the White House, who waited along the sidewalk in front of Decatur House just off Lafayette Park for a Halloween party hosted by President Obama.

Last Saturday, the President hosted several hundred military families for trick or treating. Also invited were children of White House staff and about 2000 children from eleven D.C. area elementary schools.

In a press release published at their website, key Obama ally Code Pink – a group co-founded by one of Obama’s top funders Jodie Evans, announced they were targeting military families for what can only be called psychological abuse by conducting a macabre protest of the war in Afghanistan as the families waited in line to enter the White House grounds.

The crazy-cat ladies of war protesting have done so much weird shit over the years, they're really nothing more than a freak show stage act. Since President Bush left office and Iraq has been largely pacified, they've grown increasingly irrelevant -- which makes them do increasingly silly stuff to grab the occasional headline. I would say keep on ignoring them, if I didn't think their desperation for attention would eventually drive those idiots to start protesting soldiers' military funerals a la the Westboro Baptist Church. So I'll keep paying attention, if for no other reason than to point, laugh, and thank God that war protesting is a self-defeating business.

Wherever you gather, by the tens or by the thousands, best wishes to all of you, and may the Good Lord bring you home safe and sound, bearing your shields and wreathed with the laurels of victory.

As an army psychiatrist treating soldiers returning from Iraq and Afghanistan, Major Nidal Malik Hasan had a front row seat on the brutal toll of war. It is too early to know exactly what may have triggered his murderous shooting rampage Thursday at Fort Hood — Hasan is accused of killing 12 people and wounding 32 others before he was wounded by a police officer — but it is not uncommon for therapists treating soldiers with Post Trumatic Stress Disorder (P.T.S.D.) to be swept up in a patient's displays of war-related paranoia, helplessness and fury.

vs. veteran JR Salzman, who lost a limb in combat --

[You] don’t get PTSD from sitting on your ass around Walter Reed. Not only is it not possible to “catch” secondhand PTSD, but it is not that kind of a place. I would know, I was a patient there for nine months. The place is simply not that stressful or chaotic. When I was there my PTSD got better, not worse. And I would be willing to bet my dog tags that I saw far more wounded Soldiers than shit bag major did during our overlapping time there in 2007. I regularly visited Ward 57 to give advice to the new wounded. Other Soldiers and amputees did it for me when I was there so I considered my visits “paying it forward”. I had daily physical and occupational therapy. I regularly partook in activities in and out of Walter Reed with present and past wounded Soldiers. To say that this guy got PTSD from being stationed at Walter Reed is an absolute fucking farce. The people who are making this shit up have never set foot on Walter Reed, let alone met a soldier with PTSD.

Hotel Tango -- the indispensable Lex

I had originally been looking at an XCR in 6.8mm, but when I saw this one, I realized that in 7.62x39 it fit the bill better, because I already have assloads of ammo for it, and we *know* that the round will do the deed. I cannot wait to get my hands on it.

Also, this too is a must-read, found by way of MMM's Buzzworthy column. The links in this article are worthy of bookmarking, and the Steyn-isms are, as usual, priceless.

Read and heed!

Our condolences go out to his family, and to his Brother Rats.

At least five VMI grads there too-- 82, two 91s, 94 and 89. Of course, we will all get together next week for Founders Day, and I'll have pics for that.

Also -- big thanks to Sekimori Design. They do good work.