Navigating Transitions: Insights from Military Veterans at VFW Post 3033

Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:01):
War is a paradox.
It has the power to bringnations together, to inspire
heroism and sacrifice and toforge bonds of camaraderie that
will span a lifetime, but italso has the power to tear
families apart, to shattercommunities and to leave scars
that will never fully heal.
And, for those who have served,the transition back to civilian

(00:24):
life can be one of the greatestchallenges they will ever face.
This is the typical life ofmilitary veterans, a world that
is both familiar and foreign tomost of us.
It is a world that is shaped byunique experiences, values and
traditions of the military, andby the sacrifices and struggles
of those who have served, butit's also a world that is

(00:45):
constantly changing, as newgenerations of veterans confront
new challenges and newopportunities.
Thank you for joining us atSoup Sandwich.
Dig your foxhole, heat up yourMRE and spend some time with us.

Speaker 2 (01:07):
Thanks for joining us here at Soup Sandwich.
My name is Brent Holbrook andI'm here with three post members
of VFW, post Number 3033.
I'm going to just do a roundrobin and, starting with Tim,
I'll let you go around andintroduce yourself.

Speaker 3 (01:22):
My name is Tim.
I'm the post commander of Post3333.
Army veteran, 20 years, serveda year in Iraq.

Speaker 4 (01:33):
My name is Charlie VFW, Post 3333 member.
I was in the United StatesMarines for four years, served
in Africa and Middle East, alongwith a couple other deployments
.
It's about it.

Speaker 5 (01:48):
And I'm Shem sexual chalk Thompson.
That's right.
I am the junior vice commanderof Post 3333, served 17 years.
Half of that was on active duty, the other half was in the
National Guard.

Speaker 2 (02:05):
Breaking the ice?
Huh With the sexual chocolate.

Speaker 5 (02:07):
The one and only.

Speaker 3 (02:09):
Here we go, it starts .

Speaker 2 (02:12):
By the end of this episode.
You're going to have to tellthat story because you started
it.

Speaker 3 (02:17):
You can just figure it out.

Speaker 2 (02:24):
Oh man, that was funny Sorry.

Speaker 4 (02:26):
You threw me off.
You threw me off there.

Speaker 2 (02:29):
Shit.

Speaker 4 (02:30):
Well, you know, probably a lot of people don't
realize right, we have a writersgroup through the VFW National
and our post has been great.
We have a great writers groupmembership made up of post
members, auxiliary members aswell as community members.
Right, support the military,police, fire, ems you know all
those first responders, right,and those support writers mean

(02:53):
so much because the writersgroups as a whole, you're an
activity of the post, right, andthere's three of us sitting at
the table Shem, tim and myself.
I am the president of thewriters group and Shem is the is
a Sergeant in Arms as well as aroad captain, and Tim's our
actual department director forthe state of Michigan, so he's
in charge of all the writersgroups, right, so he's he's held

(03:15):
responsible by the departmentcommander for the state of
Michigan to make sure that thewriters groups that are in the
state right are doing the thingsit's supposed to do.
And in our writers group and Iwill straight up brag them up
100% of the time I do it at thepost meetings, I'll do it in our
personal meetings, right, thatour group has, and our past
department commander, john, andour incoming now Ray, our

(03:38):
current now Ray, will absolutelydo the same thing, right?
So our writers group does somuch for camp.
Try to for kids.
It's a kids camp in the way go.
We head over there for a coupleof times for some long weekends
putting the dock you can'tclean up.
We're on the bicycles, wedonate games, we donate

(04:00):
sponsorships for kids to gothere so that their parents
don't have to pay because maybethey can't afford it.
Just just all kinds of greatstuff, right?
So there's all these differententities, right, that us former
military members now can getinvolved with, right?
That make us feel good.
You know what?
I mean and all these things areso important?
I don't think a lot of people,you know, they just see these
motorcycle guys ran down, randown the road and groups, right,

(04:22):
they have.
They have no idea, right?
You know, we're not all the,all the one percenters that are
out there ran crazier or doingthese things right, but it's
these average old.
Oh, oh, he got to bring up old.
Come on, I'm gonna say older,older, older retired veterans,
right, that are out there doingthese things.

(04:43):
And then and then our invitedparticipants right, which aren't
affiliated with the VFW eitherthrough the auxiliary or through
the membership aspect, right,they're just, you know, tom and
Jane, that live down the street.
You know that support themilitary that we allow to join
that group.
They're actually probably moreimportant to the group than the
auxiliary members.

Speaker 3 (05:04):
I agree that and the post members Absolutely.

Speaker 4 (05:07):
These people really have no skin in the game and
they do so much to help supportour cause and those other causes
that that we do.
It's incredible, man.
It's really incredible.

Speaker 2 (05:15):
Well, and on top of that, I would say you know
obviously the VFW and you knowsome of our.
You know I would call sisterorganizations like the American
Legion.
You know we're all about, we'reall about veterans, right, but
that's not just where it ends.
I would argue that you knowmost posts are out there for

(05:36):
their community to absolutelyyou know, and that's, that's
what we stand for.
We're there to help out and dowhat we can.
And you know activities such asthe Riders group you know they
do all kinds of fundraisingevents and that kind of thing To
exactly what you just explainedwas you know, you know fund
some of these, these camp costs,the scholarships for camp, and

(05:59):
you know, and that's just oneexample of the many, but you
know it's to be a staple of thecommunity and to help us, help
us all out.

Speaker 4 (06:08):
Well, for sure and you know when it, when it
actually comes down to it.
You know it's such a uniquegroup inside of a group, right,
where you know we're like yousay, we're a subgroup of the VFW
, we're what they call anactivity of the VFW, right so we
have to be sponsored andallowed by the VFW membership at
the post level to have thisgroup right.

(06:28):
So our duty is to support thepost right.
Right, support that that groupthat's helping support us, be it
we do breakfast a couple timesa month, we do 50-50s during
dark nights or other fundraisingthings, where we, through
January this year, through May,that group has donated over
$2,200 to different, differentthings.

(06:50):
It's cancer benefits at SpecialOlympics events.
Camp Traders is a huge one,right, because Don't forget VFW
National Home.

Speaker 2 (06:59):
Yeah, yeah and we will.

Speaker 4 (07:00):
Actually we're doing a fundraising with a raffle for
a bike giveaway that all of ourmemberships involved in, along
with the American Legion and alocal radio station here, 98.5,
with this custom bike builder,dean Myers.
Yeah, dean Myers, customs right, and it's going to be in closed

(07:21):
trailer.
That was donated.

Speaker 3 (07:22):
I don't, I don't.

Speaker 4 (07:25):
I want.
I think I know who it is, but Idon't want to say, in case it's
the wrong company, but it's a,it's a local to mid Michigan.
Yes manufacturer that makescustom trailers.
But anyways, it's going to bethis enclosed trailer along with
this custom motorcycle by DeanMyers where he deems only going
to recover basically hismaterial costs.

(07:46):
All of his labor costs is goingto be free, right.
And then any extra proceedsthat go on top of this, half of
half of those proceeds are goingto go to the American Legion
for their like they have like aChristmas for the kids kind of
kind of program where they buy,you know, gifts for
disadvantaged kids or whatever.

Speaker 3 (08:05):
Yeah, well, that's toys for time.
That's the marine.
Yeah, similar toys for talks.

Speaker 4 (08:11):
Yep, and then us, through our VFW and the writers
group, we're going to give.
Half of what we get is going togo to camp Trotter.
The other half is going to goto the National Home Cash for
Kittles program.
So the National Home is an EatRapids, michigan.
Right, they've got money to runthe different houses for
displaced veterans that thatneed to get a start, right,

(08:32):
that's what.
That's what the National Homedoes.

Speaker 2 (08:34):
I was just going to say, for those that are
listening that don't know whatthe National Home is, can you
explain?

Speaker 4 (08:41):
that Probably Tim knows that.
Let Tim explain it more than Ido.

Speaker 3 (08:46):
So the National Home for Children is a campus that if
you are a veteran that isdeployed and your spouse and
kids are struggling, they willtake you in and put your kids in
school and you can live thereand I don't believe there's any
cost for that.

(09:07):
There has been a gentleman.
He's in California now.
He called our post at one timeto join our post, even though he
lives in California, because Ibelieve during Vietnam his dad
was killed and shortlythereafter his mom was killed in

(09:29):
a car accident and they senthim to the National Home and
they raised him from three yearsold to graduated from high
school.

Speaker 5 (09:39):
I was going to say they're also for orphaned.

Speaker 3 (09:41):
Orphans yeah orphans.

Speaker 4 (09:44):
Or if you're a single parent, right.
Or a single parent.
Yeah, and you get deployed,then your kids can go to the
National Home while you're goneoverseas on your deployment six
months a year, whatever it is,and they'll help make sure that
your child is taken care of.

Speaker 3 (09:58):
Great organization, great organization.

Speaker 4 (10:01):
So where I was going with it is the other part of the
proceeds besides going to CampTrotter, right, they call it a
cash for kiddos program.
So the National Home has plentyof money to maintain the homes
and they feed the kids.
They do all the things right tomake sure that the kids are
taken care of.
What they lack is extra funds,for instance, to take them off

(10:22):
for ice cream or take them tothe movies or get McDonald's one
night, right, I mean, they havea big kitchen, they're fed
their three squares a day.
You know I mean great, right,right, but it's those extra
little things that they don'talways have the money for.
So the other part of theproceeds that the fundraiser
that the Ryers group is doing isgoing to go to that program,
right, so that these kids can,you know, they can run, they can

(10:44):
take them in the bus down theroad to get Taking the baseball
game.
Right, anyway, we're talking ourdonation for that portion of
the program probably close to$1000, and that $1000 can go a
long way for those kids, right,right, and with the home with
the National Home, the way it'sset up.

Speaker 3 (11:00):
it's an Eaton Rapids, michigan, and each state can
sponsor a home, like I think thenew one was California and
Nevada.
They pay for that home on thecampus.
Michigan has a home at one timethey had three, but now I think
they're down to one and the the, the VFW in Michigan, pays for

(11:23):
the operating costs of that homewhich is down in Onondaga,
michigan, eat Rapids.

Speaker 5 (11:29):
It's Eaton Rapids.
Is it Eaton Rapids?

Speaker 3 (11:31):
Yeah, just just down from Ryan's house, actually not
far from town.

Speaker 5 (11:33):
I always see a sign on 127 when I'm coming up and
it's in.
It says Onondaga, Michigan.

Speaker 3 (11:40):
Oh, but it's an Eaton Rapids.
It's just not far from Ryan.

Speaker 4 (11:43):
Yeah, it's probably one of those communities where
we all say Detroit, but thenthere's Sirling Heights and Dada
, Dada, right, but we all thinkof Detroit.
You know they got 19 suburbs orwhatever.
Well Eaton.
Rapids.

Speaker 3 (11:52):
Everything's Detroit to me.
Yeah, so I mean it's.
The campus is beautiful.
And then they do like Michigandays, Ohio, Michigan, Ohio, that
place down under they have a.
They call it Michigan days,where one day Michigan will cook
for Ohio and the next day Ohiowill cook for Michigan.

(12:14):
So they have that day and thenthey have a West Virginia day,
like West Virginia and Wisconsin, illinois.
So each state will come thereand they will.
They will support the camp andraise money.
That's what they do all yearRaise money and then give it to
the, give it to the nationalhome and they actually have a

(12:36):
really cool program and Tim andI rode down to it last year.

Speaker 4 (12:40):
This part of the Riders group.

Speaker 3 (12:43):
Well we'll get into the right home here in a minute.

Speaker 4 (12:47):
But what's really cool is you go down to the
campus and they have all theflags, right.
So when it's your day, all theposts, all the districts from
the state of Michigan show upand you post your flag in this
awesome.
I mean, I'm going to say just adisjustice by saying it's the
yard, it's like a flag area,right, it's beautiful monuments

(13:10):
and stuff there and everybodyposts their flags that they're
on the campus that day and youcan you can take a tour of the
campus and all the stuff.
But they do this awesome checkpresentation program, right, and
they do skits and sing songsand all these kind of different
things.
And each post or group thatcome in that want to donate a
check to the national home, theyform a line and they walk up

(13:33):
and okay, this is the check fromthis poster, this is a check
from this group.
So there's actually MarineRiders.
Yep, they showed up from theKalamazoo area somewhere,
somewhere, by.
Kalamazoo.
These guys rode up.
There were 10, 10 deep, 10, 12strong, right Just a bunch of
Marines that have their littleNC right.
You know their group, they rodeup and I think they you know

(13:55):
they they gave a nice size check.

Speaker 3 (13:57):
It was a thousand dollars.
Yeah, something like that, youknow.

Speaker 4 (13:59):
I mean.
So it's awesome there's allthese other groups that help
support that cause, because thenational home is so important.
You know, when you're lookingat being a parent being deployed
, being killed something youknow you know that your child's
going to be taken care of andthat the fact that the VFW does
this stuff is so important, youknow that's just.
It's pretty crazy.

Speaker 2 (14:18):
And that's let's talk about that for a minute,
because I was wondering if youwere going to go there because I
was wondering if you were goingto go.
If you're overseas right, yourmind has got to be in the game,
Absolutely 100%.
It is real life, it's as realas it gets.
And it's hard enough being overthere without your kid without

(14:42):
your kids, I should say but tobe over there constantly
worrying about them, you know,national home just fills that,
that, that spot of fear.

Speaker 4 (14:55):
Oh for sure it fills it fills a void as a parent to
know, right that you know you're, you're displaced, you're gone
and your child has theopportunity and a place that you
know they're going to be takencare of and not taken advantage
of, right, right.
Which is, which is huge.
I mean, that's got to be a hugerelief.
And, and you know, we all kindof served in a different era and

(15:16):
I was.
I was 98 to 2002.
So I was pre Iraq war, but Iwas, I was there, you know, and
for me, when I I was, I was inthe calling card day.
I had to call long distance mymy folks actually got a waiting
hundred number at their house soI could call a one hundred
number, punch in my pen numberand my parents phone ringing in

(15:38):
their house.
So that it so that it no.
Those are one nine hundredSorry.
No because so that way I didn'thave to go buy a $50 calling
card, right Cause, just to callmy parents.
My parents are, we want you tocall us whenever you get a
chance, right, Right, so theyhad, you know, so they paid, I
don't know, a hundred dollars amonth or whatever for me to have
this one eight hundred Number.
I could call in, punch, punchmy pen in and I could call it.

(16:00):
But with my wife when I wasgone she was in Virginia or she
was in California, right, my twoduty stations, so for her it
was tons of email and you had togo to internet cafe.
Yeah, back in the day, you know,and I had to pre-register for
my half hour, my hour, and itwas the crazy dial up and we're,
I mean, and my wife still hasin her Yahoo email.

(16:23):
She's got a folder, and I'm notkidding you, if it doesn't have
a thousand emails in it stillshe's printed them just in case,
right, yahoo gets rid of it.
She's printed them there in afolder all up in a filing
cabinet in the attic, rightshe's.
She's kept them all.
You know, she was like, youknow the things that we used to
argue about while you were gone.
I'm so sorry about you know,because it was like, hey, direct

(16:46):
deposit, hey, they should havedirect deposit.
Hey, I didn't get my BHA.
I didn't get this.
You know, and I'm and I'msitting in Bahrain, or what can
I do about it?
Yeah, so, or I was in guitar orsome some crazy place, Couldn't
, couldn't even check, you know,and I was like you know, and
she got the phone call.
You know I'm going to be gonefor 45 days or 60 days, and if
you don't hear from me, that's agood thing.

(17:07):
Yeah.
You know, and when I get back,so of course when I get back had
the opportunity to make anotherphone call to her, right.
But a 50 minute or $50 phonecard was about a 15 minute
conversation because it'sinternational overseas phone
calls, right, and we werescraping by.
You know she's at home with ourdaughter, there's back her and
she's in hot dogs.

(17:27):
You know, and Robin noodle,robin noodle, right, that was,
that was legit the way it wasand the stuff that we argued
about was so stupid, you know,and it was like it was those
distractions, like you're saying, you know.
Last thing, you want to worryabout your kids, right, or your
spouse or your girlfriend oryour parents or something dumb.
So the fact that the nationalhomes there to fill that void is
huge, right, it's absolutelyhuge.

Speaker 3 (17:49):
So there's something I want to hit on, because
Brenton has had this discussionwith me in time or two about the
younger generations, and Ithink that's a big lack of
interest in the VFW, becauseit's a preconceived notion that
it's a bunch of old people.
Yeah, why'd we?
Bring up the old thing again,damn it.

(18:10):
It's a bunch of old peoplesitting around drinking beer,
telling war stories.

Speaker 5 (18:15):
You know, that's what that generation was brought
upon.
Even when I was growing up, mymy perception of the VFW growing
up, because my grandfather wasa member of the VFW, he was
World War II.
Anytime I, when I was a kid,visited a post, it was a bunch
of old dogs I'm talking 60, 70,80 years old sitting around with

(18:36):
some whiskey and just talkingshit.
And it wasn't.
It wasn't my, it wasn't my cupof tea.
You know, as a young mangrowing up, I was into other
things.
That's just what thatgeneration did.
The one thing about our postit's full of a lot of young,
younger guys.
We, we tried to keep up withthe times and it's just.

(18:59):
You know, I visited a lot ofother posts throughout the
country and our posts probablyone or the other posts that has
a real, a real young membership.

Speaker 2 (19:09):
Yeah, we do.

Speaker 5 (19:11):
Not just a bunch of older vets like Vietnam era vets
, world War II era vets.
Now we're talking.
You know first golf war, oif.
You know Afghanistan.
You know my generation Right.

Speaker 4 (19:25):
Yeah, well, those are still veterans that served 20
years ago.
Hey, that's yeah.

Speaker 2 (19:30):
It's hard to think about that.

Speaker 3 (19:32):
But compared to veterans that served 50, 60
years ago, Well, even with ourpost, if you think about it, the
only real Vietnam vets that arereal active Terry and Sensio
the eagle, the greatest personI've ever met.
He saved so many lives.
It isn't funny that walkedthrough them doors and he was

(19:54):
that guy that said come here,you need help.
Terry and Sensio comes in, johnGoffnett, tom during the day,
and then Terry, the other Terry,the Colorado guy that had his
truck at bike night.
So, other than that, colindoesn't come in other than
meetings, terry Coons doesn'tcome in other than meetings, and

(20:17):
they're Vietnam veterans.
Terry Russell.

Speaker 5 (20:18):
But they're not real.
Terry Russell doesn't.

Speaker 3 (20:21):
They're not real alcoholics like we are, they're
still amateurs.
Is that what you're trying tosay?
Yeah, but yeah, and that's truewith Colin.
Colin used to drink a lot andnow he just prefers not to be
around.

Speaker 4 (20:32):
Right, right, which is understandable, I get it.

Speaker 3 (20:36):
But what I'm talking about is Brenton said that he's
been on some websites whereyounger members are like, yeah,
I won't ever join the VFWbecause of this.
And that yeah.
And I think what's important iswe got to get out there that
we're more than that.
Yeah, Do we like to sit around,drink some beers and talk about
the stuff that changed ourlives Actually, I mean it really

(20:57):
did and laugh about some of thedumb shit we did where we
probably should be dead?

Speaker 4 (21:01):
from yeah.

Speaker 3 (21:02):
You know, yeah, but we do more than that.
We do so much for the communityand the kids and that's
important for the VFW to pushthat out there to get people to
know that we take a yeah, andthose are things that people
don't know that we do.

Speaker 5 (21:19):
No, right, you know.

Speaker 2 (21:22):
They don't know until they get involved.

Speaker 5 (21:23):
Yep, and that goes back to our you know, our
Writers Group, our supportwriters.
You know we're getting they'renow.
Those are people that had noclue what the VFW was about,
other than their preconceivednotions Yep, and now they're
actually seeing and they're justby word of mouth, you know,
even though they got no skin inthe game like we do, like
Charlie says, now they'reputting that out there and it's

(21:47):
going to generate a following.

Speaker 4 (21:48):
It's going to generate Well, actually in our
post, Sean and Lisa right.
Mm-hmm.
Great support writers for usOutstanding.
They have a friend, craig,right, he was a member of the
Middleton VFW or Brickard RidgeVFW, ithaca, ithaca VFW.
Okay, I'm acquaintances withhim.

(22:08):
We're not as close as Sean andhim.
I mean, they went to schooltogether and everything right.
So those guys have been tight.
Craig and I are friends, right,I mean we don't hang out.
He listens to death metal andI'm not a death metal guy all
the time, right, so I mean, buthe actually joined our post.
He came in one night.
Transfer shot he startedhanging out.

Speaker 3 (22:27):
He was on a dart night.

Speaker 4 (22:28):
Straight up, transferred our post right
Mm-hmm, and I'm going to try toget him a little bit more
involved, but this time me orhim and his wife.
They go to three concerts aweek.

Speaker 3 (22:36):
Yeah.

Speaker 4 (22:38):
They're gone all the time, but I mean he'll be a good
member and he's my age or alittle bit younger, actually
Sean's age, so he's upper 40s,right.
But we got a lot of goodmembers, older members, the
Vietnam era members, the GulfWar members, right, like we got
Cappy that came in, cappy, right.
But we're getting that thoseolder members have.

(22:59):
They've paved a way for us.
They put their time and theyput their dues in to do what
they need to do.
Right, and they're taking abackseat a little bit right.
They're relinquishing control tothe younger guys to push us in
the next generation, which is sobig, right.
So you know, when you look atyour leadership and they're all

(23:20):
in their upper 70s or 80s, right.
That doesn't inspire a youngguy to want to come into the VFW
or the American Legion or theMVS or all these other
organizations, right, becauseit's going to be the good old
boys club that's going to beresistant to change, you know,
and that's tough.
But where it comes back to,we're getting those younger
members in right which are late30s to 40s, and that's a younger

(23:45):
member, which is unfortunate tosay Unfortunately, but there's
times that are different.
So, like my dad and mygrandfather, they owned a
business downtown here and theygot out of work, they went down
to the moose, which is a blockaway.
They had a couple beers andthen they went home, right Hard.
Generation of women, our wives,our girlfriends they're like no
, you got to be the kidsbaseball games.

(24:06):
No, you got to be home rightafter work.
No, you got to right.
So that's why you're not goingto see those younger members
until those kids are grown andgone, because you know, I can
count on my hand and I playedbaseball through high school and
I bet you, on one hand, I couldput how many times I saw my dad
in the stands.
Honestly, it wasn't because hedidn't want to be right.

(24:28):
I mean, he obviously could havebeen, but it was.
He went down to that club, tothe moose, because that's where
the business guys all went afterwork and that's where a lot of
business took place, right.
So now our wives or girlfriends, right, they're like no, you're
going to be involved with kids,fuck everything else, you're
going to be here.
You know what I mean.
We kind of cave to make peace.

(24:51):
Yeah, I was struggling for theword, so I definitely appreciate
the peace part of it Right.
You know, but yeah, I mean sothere's, there's been a shift in
the culture over time.

Speaker 2 (25:01):
Absolutely, I mean, there's no more 50s housewives
anymore right, Absolutely.
So and I would say, you knowand call me bold, because I have
sat here and watched on Redditr slash veterans and it seems
like almost every week there'ssomebody complaining about their
experience walking into a VFWor a Legion or an ambats.

Speaker 3 (25:27):
All right.
So we have an eagle, we have aneagle and his name is Terry and
sensio.
And that man, as I already said, great person.
You walk in there, he will walkup to you and he will say
welcome and he will buy you abeer.
He will sit and talk to you,whatever, He'll probably buy you
several beers.
If you will, yeah, and if that'syour thing and if it's your

(25:51):
thing and if not, he'll buy youa pop or he'll just sit down
there and talk to you and ourthing is.
Our motto is when the eagle'snot there, be the eagle, Be the
eagle.
Be that guy that walks up andsays, hey, how are you doing?
And it's hard for me becauseI'm very standoffish, I do
better now but I'm not that guythat's going to walk up to a

(26:12):
stranger and say, hey, what's up, how are you doing?

Speaker 4 (26:15):
I'm better than I used to be.
That must be in everything,because I always get the comment
as being a Marine.
Right, tim will be in theretalking to somebody or somebody
to be like hey man, this is Joe,he's a Marine, I'll walk right
up.
Hey brother, what's going on?
Man, give big bears, these guysare like man.
You guys are all crazy.

Speaker 3 (26:32):
And that's because of the camaraderie between Marines
and the size of the MarineCorps, for sure.

Speaker 4 (26:37):
We all tune it man.

Speaker 3 (26:39):
Army.
The Army's a bigger unit,bigger branch, but now our
people we served in combat with,we see them.
But you guys, the Marine Corpsdoes it with every Marine.
The Marine could be 900 yearsold and the other Marine could
be three and they're going to belike oh hello, how are you
doing?
And it's cool, and that's onething I respect about the Marine

(27:02):
Corps that camaraderie, thateverywhere you go you know if
that dude's a Marine and you'rehaving problems, he's going to
help you.

Speaker 4 (27:12):
He's going to show up , but we should be doing that in
general, as veterans, to eachother, to everyone.
You shouldn't just be one sidedright with the Marines.

Speaker 5 (27:20):
That's the same experience I've had.
I don't know about you, Tim.
You have me with yourgeneration, but with me Come on
man, you got more gray hair.

Speaker 3 (27:29):
That's why, he says that he's got gray hair too.

Speaker 2 (27:34):
The only hair he has is gray.

Speaker 5 (27:36):
That's be honest.
My tenure in the service andthe Army and all my tours and
combat.
I've always gotten that, nomatter where I've gone, whether
it be Marine, navy, army, airForce if you served and you know
they served, or did some timein the sandbox or whatever I've
always gotten that camaraderieand I think that was something

(27:59):
that was generated after 9-11,when our country was going
through some turmoil here athome and people were not
standing together and all of asudden, people are standing
together and that was somethingthat I was raised with.
You go to combat, you spillsome blood, sweat and tears in

(28:21):
the fucking sand and you comehome yes, you're going to be
fucked up, but those guys aroundyou, they had your back, just
like the camaraderie that youwere just talking about with the
Marines.
My second oldest, he's a Marine.
He understood that before heenlisted because that's
something I instilled in him.
That's something that I've gotno matter where I've gone.

(28:42):
I've had just one first time Iever met Charlie.
He knew I served, walked rightup to him.
What's up, brother, gave me abig hug.

Speaker 3 (28:50):
Well, no, I get that.
I'm talking about even in mybattalion, the 3rd Battalion,
126 Infantry.
Even during that in the earlydays I was a combat support
company.
I was in the Scouts.
We had mortars, scouts, Toes.
We weren't a line company, weweren't a headquarters company.

(29:13):
We were kind of an offshoot ofheadquarters but we'd get tasked
out to the line companiesbecause that's kind of how they
use us.
They took a scat team which Ihate the sound of that.
Sounds like a bad point, so theywould take a scout squad and a

(29:35):
tow squad and they'd farm us outto one of the line companies.
And then when you got there,you were on your own.
Sure, the first side would belike, hey, it's chow time, hey,
the shit is over here.
But other than that therewasn't a lot of interaction
between the line companies andcombat and the support companies

(29:59):
.
Even though most of the time thescout teams and the Toes they
were out in front of the linecompanies Because basically, we
went there.

Speaker 5 (30:07):
That might have been the rift between, like Sid, I'm
sorry to say it again, but yourgeneration and my generation.
When I was coming up throughthe ranks, I experienced the
same thing.
I belonged to, you know, when Icame off of active duty, went
right to a hotel unit Toessupport, you know.
But we got tasked out to do thesame thing, just like you were

(30:31):
just talking about.
But there was still.
When we got brought into thatfold, it didn't matter.
I was treated as one and thesame as everybody else.

Speaker 4 (30:39):
You're unequal right.

Speaker 3 (30:40):
Yep, I guess I'll say this as my time progressed
within and I grew in rank, youknow, squad leaders, team leader
, platoon sergeants then it waseasier because I learned the
other.
I learned who the other platoonsergeants were, the other squad

(31:01):
leaders, blah, blah, blah, blah, the NCO thing.
But early on it wasn't likethat.
Early on I served from 83 to2008.
So early on.

Speaker 5 (31:15):
it wasn't like that.
It was like that, just like youwere talking.
It was like that when I firstlistened, when I signed on a
dotted line in 1993, it wasright at the end of the first
golf war.
Yes, I experienced that samething.
What I'm getting at is, like Isaid, my generation.
I guess I felt that I was at thecusp of things when, when, when

(31:36):
doctor was changing, when theway soldiers or Marines, whoever
that's where we're, we're,we're transitioning to a new way
of life in the, in whateverservice you were in, we had to,
I had to adjust, I had to adjustfire, I had to adjust for the
change that was coming.
And, like I said, I was, Iexperienced what you were

(32:00):
talking about.
But I also expected people totreat me, my my brother, to
treat me the same, no matterwhere I was at, whether I was in
support or, you know, beingtasked out, and I didn't belong
to actually officially belong toa certain unit and I was a part
of something else.
But if I was working with you,I'm still there, I'm still you.

(32:20):
Treat me the same.
I'm going to treat you, youknow, with the same respect.
Yeah.

Speaker 4 (32:24):
See, that's weird, cause I was with a unit fast
company out of Norfolk, virginia, right, it's the fleet, and I
tear some security team company,and we had six patoons at at
first fast, right, so two werealways on a six month deployment
, possibly up to three dependson cause.
We had, like you know, naples,italy, there's Bahrain, there's
one in Japan, but there's also asecond fast company up in
Yorktown I think they've donesome combination stuff and I

(32:47):
think everybody's at Camp Allenin Virginia, right outside
Norfolk Naval base.
But anyways, so there would be,you know, three to maybe four
patoons from first fast there atthe barracks at any one time,
you know.
But there was actually sixlevels.
So if all six happened to bethere, right, everybody had
accommodation stuff.
I hardly knew any of the otherguys out of those other fast

(33:09):
teams, right, those otherpatoons, cause we deployed as a
25 man unit and that.
That that included our officersand our corpsmen, right.
So we had a patoon sorry,regular patoon size, right.
And then the, the, the officers, right.
So we're the only time I'd everget to hang around them, cause
we were always training.
We'd be, you know, up and downthat training where that's where

(33:32):
the seals train quite a bit ofthem, where we'd be down at
Chesapeake, where our school'sat, so there was all these
different facilities that thatwe had the opportunity to use.
So it was weird because we hadthis bar that sat right in
between us called the bunker.
That's some awesome pictures ofthe bunker, yep, and that thing
would be staffed by somecivilian would come in and it
would be like.
The VFW was like my firstexperience of like what a VFW

(33:53):
was, right, so we could drinkthere all night and it was like,
you know, dollar drafts orwhatever.
So it's crazy cheap.
But and then we'd have theseguys coming out of the woodwork,
right From all these otherpatoons, and you're like, oh man
, who are you?
Who are you, who are you, youknow?
So you kind of became friends.
But then we were deployed somuch right, so like I was only
with my unit eight, eight ornine days and I went to Africa.
When the embassy bombingshappened.

(34:14):
There was a, a patoon fromsecond fast.
They went to Dar es Salaam,tanzania, and then we went to
Nairobi, kenya, right, 98,august, seven, fifth, six,
something like that, and 98,right, we were gone.
We came, came back and therewas different guys there.
That other patoon that wasthere was gone.
So I maybe knew three guys outof that one, and now there was

(34:36):
fourth but it was back, andthird but it was gone, or
whatever you know.
So it was like you'reconstantly meeting all these new
people but your missions werealways the same but they were so
different because these guyswere trained in to go to here,
these guys are trained in to gothere, or whatever.
So it's just weird.
So I I never had the feelingwhere any of the units that I

(34:56):
was ever with I got attached tosomebody else.
Right, I got my squad, my unit,whatever got.

Speaker 3 (35:06):
You know you're so you're, so you're, so we're
organic.
Yeah, but then all the guy.

Speaker 4 (35:09):
But then I went out to the fleet Marine Force in 29
POMs, with their battalion,seven Marines, and we deployed,
as that entire company, you knowwhat I mean we all went the
whole right.
So and it was different becausethere was three companies in
that battalion, so we all went,and then we had a weapons
company where the toes, the 50cows, the fun stuff, the 60

(35:30):
million, meter mortars orwhatever.
They were right, because I thinkour guys are the best.
Yeah, right, because I thinkour guys had the 40.
Is it 40 millimeter, 32millimeter?
What are they?

Speaker 3 (35:40):
The small ones that the inventory, oh, the 60
million or the 60s.

Speaker 4 (35:43):
So it was the 60s, and then the big ones would be
the ones were the 88.
Okay used to be called, sothat's what it is, yeah so then
those guys were on the weaponscompany and I had a guy that
went through security force.
School was because it was onlya two year.
So my, actually my son, andrew,just unlisted right and that's
what he's trying to do is youcan actually enlist to go to
fast company, which you couldn'tback then.

(36:04):
There's still a lot ofrequirements that he asked to,
he asked to do right to be ableto do it.
His program won't open up,probably until October, so he's
enlisted in delayed entry forthe Marines.
So getting back to we weretalking earlier about the old
guys, so kind of my firstexperience, my grand, my
grandparents, live next door tous.
My parents build a house nextdoor to my grandparents, so as a
kid I used to run across theyard right and every couple of

(36:27):
years and my grandfather's WorldWar two guy right, so he was
island hopping all the wayacross.
I should land in on Okinawa,but there was probably back when
I was a kid, 1012 of them Rightstill alive.
They would show up to mygrandparents house and they'd be
parking motor homes and they'dbe staying in the house or

(36:48):
they'd get a hotel room orwhatever right, but they'd be
partying at my grandparentshouse when I was a kid and I
used to walk on the screen andporch the one night I said, I
know, as I bought about thehouse of my, my parents, these
are whole war dogs, man tellingstories, drinking whiskey you
can just get hammer drunk andthey came from Iowa, they came
from Tennessee, they came fromGeorgia, they came from, I mean,
all walks of life.

(37:08):
These guys and all the wivesobviously had something common,
right, which is cool.
That's what love about the VFW,right, like there's no way that
my wife right would ever beable to meet another member's
wife, right, and they kind of beable to form their own group.
So when it comes to membership,when your wife sees that you
know you're not just hanging outat the regular bar, right, this

(37:30):
is a place where you're hangingout with your brothers and then
they form a sisterhood Right,and they kind of get their own
little groups.
You know, as they get tohanging out or they get involved
in things, it's more acceptablefor you to go to the FW or to
be able to hang out at a bar orhang out at whatever where some
women nowadays don't really wantyou to be doing that stuff.
Right, you know they want you tobe home all the time and it's

(37:51):
like you know there's.
We all see that there's abigger cause than ourselves Out
there, but you know it's acontinuation of service?

Speaker 2 (38:01):
Well, for sure, absolutely, you know, I mean.
I mean, isn't the VFW is sloganthat our service didn't end?
Something like that, yeahveterans.

Speaker 3 (38:12):
we do more for veterans or something what it is
Right but our service.

Speaker 4 (38:16):
Nobody does more for that.

Speaker 3 (38:16):
Nobody does more veterans and, yes, it part of
that is we service our veteransand that's terrible, but but
that, yes, that's what it is welike.
For instance, talk aboutmembership and what.
What I would like to put out toany of the young people out

(38:38):
there that are still in college,because we've got a what is it?
Student vets of America, orsomething like that here at
Student Veterans of America.

Speaker 2 (38:49):
Okay To them.
I say that as a former vicepresident president.

Speaker 3 (38:54):
Okay, so Good, they should join the VFW because what
they don't understand is thenumbers of the VFW is coming
down so much and I know thisbecause I'm kind of involved at
department level and a littlebit at national level, and Our
membership speaks to Congress.
Okay, if we get below a millionmembers, congress don't really

(39:18):
listen to us anymore, becausewe're not that big, because
everybody knows politics.
They, whoever, whoever has thebiggest numbers and bitches the
most, they're going to get the.
They're going to get what theywant for sure, right.
So even if you are a studentand let's say, cmu will just
throw it out there and then youleave school and your job takes

(39:40):
you to California and you jointhe VFW.
There's VFW is everywhere.
You don't have to, you don'thave to do anything.
You can.
You can be a.
I'm trying to think when I'mtrying to, not in a post, not
not just be able to just be amember at large.
Yeah, member at large, you canbe a member of large, but but

(40:02):
that helps the VFW, the PAC,that that we got signed.
You know that was big.
That was big because now allthese people that that on ships
and and the burn pits and allthat bullshit when you got lung
problems, which most everybodydoes, it's?
I mean, I come back from Iraqnever having allergies in my

(40:22):
life and now, all of a sudden, Ihave to take all these stupid
pills, otherwise my head feelslike I'm going to explode
because I get stuffed up, rightthat's from the, the burn pits
and stuff.
Well, can we?

Speaker 2 (40:35):
can we talk about the PAC Dact for a minute?
And not just the PAC Dact, butjust?
You know, you were talkingabout membership being over a
million and you know, go back intime a little bit and the GI
bill which many of us use now Iguess I use mine right I use
mine.
That was what a complete resultof the hard work that you know

(41:02):
our service organizations areserving organizations did
American Legion DAV and that'sthe.

Speaker 3 (41:09):
FW because they joined and they said look it, we
need to take care of us.
We need to take care ofveterans, because they put their
ass on the line and they wrotea blank check saying that up to
and including my life, I willdefend this country.
Right, right, and they need toget something back for it.
But the only way we can do thatis have these young people join

(41:30):
Right and I'll.

Speaker 2 (41:32):
and because, on that note, I will say this, and I'll
say it boldly, that you know,and I'm confused, that some out
there are feeling betrayed, whyI don't understand.
That's the part that I don'tunderstand.
Again, watching our veterans onReddit, they're giving off

(41:54):
these notions that they feltbetrayed by walking in and
having one instance of a personthat wasn't nice to them, you
know, and then it, just it,poisons their, their mind about
what the VFW is about.

Speaker 4 (42:09):
Well, no, and it's wrong.
Well, it is because I couldwalk into a restaurant and the
waitress treats me terrible,doesn't give me the proper
service, has an attitude, hassomething going on, right, right
.
Does that mean the restaurantas a whole sucks?
no, it's terrible and I shouldnever go back, absolutely not.
So just because you walk inanywhere and someone's having a

(42:31):
bad day, right, doesn't doesn'tmean you should walk away
forever.
Exactly Now, if I I'll use therestaurant as the example, I'll
go in three, four times, and ifthe food sucks, I won't go back,
right, right, so I can be three, four days in a row, right, but
it might be this week, the nextweek, the next week, the next
week and over the course of amonth that the food sucks.
I probably won't go back rightor maybe I'll wait six months to

(42:52):
go back.
So just because you walk into aVFW, american Legion or Amvats,
right, and you get, you don'tget the experience that you
think you're gonna get the firsttime right doesn't mean you
don't go back right becausethere's so much that comes out
of walking through those doorseventually.
That's so fulfilling and so goodfor yourself because it's
you're around, your brothers oryour sisters that did a lot of

(43:16):
the same things as you are anexperience in life after being
in the military.
Right, right, those challenges,because those challenges happen
to us every day there's not a,there's not a much part of the
day that I don't think about.
A guy served with, or I foundout that you know he committed
suicide, and I'm like, god damnman, you know, you have all, you
have all these things right.
We, some of our members, justexperienced that within the last

(43:38):
three, four months.
Yeah right, you know you guys,you guys got a call and you know
, here they are getting togetherat the VFW because it was a guy
that they served with, right,and that wasn't a member of ours
, right, the.

Speaker 2 (43:50):
He lived in a different area but you know, our
members that served with themall got together and and worked
it out right, and let me walkback my statement, then, because
using that as an example, as asad example, but you know it is
the true example you know, now I, now that I think about it that
way, I can understand why somewould feel betrayed.

(44:12):
They've walked in, maybe maybethat was happening to them, and
so their mental health, their,their mind, at that moment in
time, when they walk throughthat door, hoping that somebody
on the other side is going tojust be there and, like we were
saying, you know, the Marinescoming together and giving each
other a nice big bear hug, maybethat's what they were hoping
for and they didn't get it, okay.

Speaker 3 (44:34):
But and I agree with you.
But if they didn't get it,don't quit exactly that's not
that's not what.
That's not what the UnitedStates military does.
We don't quit if we don't getit there.
In Michigan there's 248 posts.
If you can't find it inshepherd, come to Mount Pleasant
.
You can't find in MountPleasant, go to Claire.
Can't find in Claire, go toMidland.

(44:56):
You will find it.
You just got to look for it.
And yes, it sucks, because if Iseen somebody that came into my
post and one of my members didthat to them, I would article 9
their ass so fast.
It wouldn't even be funny,right because, we're there for
the brothers.
That's why Terry's so importantin that post, for sure, and what
Terry wants, terry gets.
Unfortunately, that's why wecall him the Eagle.

(45:18):
Yeah, I mean.

Speaker 4 (45:20):
Well, I'll give you a great example.
Right, and I love Traverse City, so I'll do a three-day
conference for work and I go toTraverse City we, we're up there
and I'll go to the Cherrylandpost, traverse City post.
Beautiful post, phenomenal post.
You got to buzz myself, youknow.
And they open the door.

(45:41):
I go in.
I made a comment how beautifultheir post is.
Canteen bartender, right, sheasked what do you want?
So I'll have a Miller lightdraft.
Okay, can I see your card?
Yep, no problem, sure, my VFWcard.
Right, it's club.
Get my beer.
Not one person, the old-timeresult.
At the end of the bar they alljust kind of look at me.
I sit down at the.

(46:02):
I'm at the other end of the bar, yeah, because I got, because I
got the VFW, stare rightthey're all who's this new guy
in my house, right?
well, I'm a VFW members, allit's my house too, right?
Yep, maybe I can't vote on yourfloor for whatever you guys
want to do, right, but this isstill.
I'm still welcome here, right,right, so I buy them all around,
right?

(46:22):
I kind of get the head nod, ayou know the finger wave like
thanks, kind of thing.
Not one of them comes down.
I go in the next day after mycops over, go on the next day,
right, do the same thing, right.
Finally, the third day I go inafter my last conference, I go
in same same bartender all threedays.
Finally, recognizes me,remembers me, right, and then

(46:45):
same people sit at the end ofthe bar there.
They're every day at four,whatever, right, right, you know
, they're the usuals.
Finally, the last day I get acouple of them come down.
Hey man, you know who are you.
It's great to meet you.
I'm glad you're coming in, butit takes time, right, it's
literally three consecutive days.
So it's literally the samepeople at the other end of the
bar that finally warmed up to me, right, right, and I wasn't

(47:09):
going to give up.
That's if.
If I'm going to go, I'm awayfrom my family up north.
If I'm going to go somewhere tohave a beer, I'm going to give
it to the VFW.
Right now, my legion member.
So the VFW doesn't have canteen.
I'm going to go with one ofthose, right, but VFW first for
me.
But you have to try, you haveto try, you have to try, you
have to try.
As much as it does suck, right,but I was going to watch you

(47:31):
those doors every day until theywarmed up to me eventually.
You know what I mean, becausethis is what we're supposed to
be doing now.
If those guys came down ourpost, I guarantee you they'd be
what they'd be.
Anyone came down here, the sortof casino to gamble.
They stopped in our post.
I guarantee you they would havegot the bear hugs, yep the
eagle would have met them at thedoor.
Yep, right, welcome.
Come on in right to have you.

Speaker 2 (47:51):
Thanks for coming and I think it's important to say,
obviously, that not all postsare like what we're saying is.

Speaker 4 (47:57):
You know, we're almost the anomaly sometimes
because, we travel around manand we are.
Our post is the anomaly, whichis great.

Speaker 5 (48:04):
I have another residence down in northern
Kentucky, just south ofCincinnati.
When I started looking for VFWdown there, didn't realize there
was one, two blocks from myhouse, so I had googled one of
the big ones.
It was an older post in Letoniawhich is right outside
Covington, kentucky, sits wayout off the beaten path.

(48:25):
No, if you weren't looking foryou would never know us there.
So I have found this place,drove back up in there,
beautiful, that sits back offthe Lickin River.
They have a huge pond that theyallow people to go fishing on.
So I walk in there andimmediately I walk.
As soon as I walk in Iimmediately the divide, that,
that stigma of oh, this is apost, this is a place, just a

(48:45):
bunch of World War, old WorldWar, two vets sitting around
getting drunk talk, telling warstories.
That was the, that was the vibeI got and I stood there and all
these guys, I mean I literallyI swear to God, I got the death
stare like who the fuck is thiswalking into our post?
Right, you know, and I'm likehey, and I introduced myself,

(49:08):
I'm, I told my member of the VFWpost chair in my pleasant and
really I sat down.
It's still nothing.
And I'm trying to, and I'mtrying to engage these guys like
, hey, I'm just like you, I'veserved in combat, I'm not just
just this, this youngergeneration that just don't give
a shit or anything.

(49:28):
I'm with you, I want to learnfrom you.
You have a.
These older guys have a wealthof knowledge, but I still was
getting that death stare likeproof, proof, proof to us that
you belong here.
So I, of course, I had to pullout my, my VFW card or my
membership card, and they werelike this is fake, because every
last one of them had the oldstyle metal card that they that

(49:50):
the VFW used to give out foryour life member.
You get a old metal I stamped, Imean it.
Nowadays they're laminated, butthey're looking at me like
they've never seen this before.
I'm like, no, I'm a member,this is what.
Look, if you want, if you gotmy check it.
Yeah, check it here's my.
Here's my membership number.
Check it right.
And that was the last time Iwent there, right, because the

(50:13):
vibe I got, the welcome I got,this is not what I was expected
and so I found.
About a week later I ended upfinding the one like said that
was two blocks from my house.
Happened be had had a largermembership when I walked in.

Speaker 4 (50:27):
Wonder why I'm not gonna get a good membership if
you treat people like that.

Speaker 5 (50:31):
When I walked in they , I had one guy come up to me to
see some here's beer.
Okay, thank you.
But I kind of still got that,that ostracization or whatever
you want to call it, from one ofthe older members at that post
and I'm like, hey, I, you know,I had to introduce myself.
And he's like, well, you wantto be a member here?

(50:51):
I'm like, well, no, I'm alreadya member at the at the VFW.
My pleasant, give me that beerback.
Well, I kind of got that vibetoo.
But it turns out, you know,they, they, I guess down to that
because it's an urbanenvironment, you know, in
Cincinnati, you know CincinnatiMetro area.
So they and the guy though the,the postal manager there at the
Ralph Ralph Fulton post, he wasso much like, yeah, we've had

(51:15):
to run off people that wouldthat come in.
We've had a lot of issues withpeople walking in, saying
they're this, saying they'rethat, pretty much stolen valor.
And in the past year at thatpoint it was like in the past
year.
I'm like nope, here's my,here's my membership card.
You can check out my D214 andI'm like, I'm like.
I'm not going to be here matterof fact, I went back out to my

(51:35):
vehicle.
I had a copy.
I had a copy.
My D214 in my in my truckbrought it back in here.

Speaker 2 (51:40):
I will prove to you, and soon as you see, nationally
welcome.
Yep, and I mean it's, it's, youknow we're, we're a club
environment, right, we're, we'rebased off of membership.
So obviously, proving youreligibility for that membership
is is one you know, you know, Iguess you know, for I guess

(52:03):
those posts that we're talkingabout, I mean, take this as a
warning, right, if you want newmembers, you have to be
welcoming to new membersabsolutely.
I mean to anybody.
You do not know who is going towalk in your post period and and
I'll say it again, I'll be thebold one and say this it could

(52:26):
be a female veteran.
Oh, absolutely that, and I know.
For us that's.
You know, we shrug ourshoulders and roll our eyes
because we have femalemembership.
But some of these old poststhat again, or is this
stereotypical?
You know from what I'm gettingfrom these reddit posts, the
stereotypical?
You know dark, you know smoky,smelling old buildings, just

(52:52):
filled with old vets sittingthere drinking.
You know it, you know it's,it's a.
Obviously it's been I don'tknow how long 40 years, 50 years
since women were allowed toserve in the military.
What is that?
Like?
The 70s, I think, is when thathappened.
But anyway, I digress point isis, you know, one member or one

(53:15):
person posted that she wasn'twelcomed.
She was, she was told that shewas expected to serve alongside
the auxiliary members, despitethe fact that she was, you know,
an actual member.
So well, that just.
And that's Wade, that's wayover to the top, but that's just

(53:35):
to say that what's happening atsome of these, some of these
places, you know and I'm nottrying to call anybody else
specifically because obviously Idon't know where this was all
taking place but you know,that's the kind of stuff that
some people are dealing with.
You know, and I don't know whatto say other than that well, I
can tell you this.

Speaker 3 (53:57):
Okay, I don't agree with the the process, but you
can refuse membership.
If a person is eligible, youcannot take that person.
If you choose not to, if thepost chooses not to, they cannot
.
They have the right not toaccept that eligibility.

Speaker 5 (54:16):
Well, that's why everything's done by vote.

Speaker 3 (54:18):
It is true because yeah, I mean every every time we
get someone that applies right,we have to vote on men at their
meeting, right so to seebasically what we need to do and
this is something for the postand for us to think about it we
need to have a membershipcommittee, which is three people
that go over the DD 214.
They discuss the person, maybefind out if the guys are armed

(54:40):
robber, whatever I mean it'salways that, that screening
process, yeah, and then theymake a recommendation and then
but right now we don't do thatwe basically say he's eligible,
let's go you want to know why?

Speaker 4 (54:52):
because we need the membership, because VFW pushes
membership.
Yep, it's quantity over quality.
Yep, when it comes tomembership, every year.
Right say, we have 200 membersthis year, we need to have 205
next year well, you know, and ifwe don't, we're not a hundred
percent right, so we're gonnatake any any swinging dick that
wash through the door and I can.
I can attest to it here.

Speaker 5 (55:14):
In the past five years our post here in my
pleasant.
We've accepted some peoplemaybe we should not have
accepted because it's causedproblems within within our ranks
with our brotherhood yeah, Iget you, you know, just because
they're eligible.
But, you know, maybe maybe weneed to be a little bit more
stringent on a screening processand I'm you know, I'm not

(55:35):
saying I'm I want to, you know,not accept every member, because
I love every veteran.
I love, you know, when somebodycomes in a post and they want
in it, you know, I want to beable to give somebody a place
that has served and has been inthe fucking mix, a place to come
to, a safe space.

(55:56):
Yeah, a safe space if theydon't have any other place to go
.
No matter what, I don't carewho you are.
If you you come home fucked upin combat and yeah, you're
fucked up maybe we can help you.
Maybe you're not a good fit forour post, but maybe this are,
you know, coming into our postwill be the spark to get you
somewhere, get you in the rightdirection, get yourself back so

(56:18):
let me ask you a question then.

Speaker 4 (56:19):
So you're your combat , that let's just say, right,
that comes back mm-hmm, and I'mgonna tell you that you're not a
good fit to come into our post.

Speaker 5 (56:28):
I would never say I'm not saying, I'm just
generalizing you apply.

Speaker 4 (56:30):
Yeah, I'm just generalizing you apply you have
all the criteria to meet formembership, mm-hmm, and the post
is no.
That membership tells you no,we're not gonna let you join.

Speaker 5 (56:41):
That's kind of fucked up as a sound right.
Well, that's.

Speaker 4 (56:43):
That's exactly what you're saying, I know that's not
.

Speaker 5 (56:45):
I was just generalizing.
That's not what I was.
I was getting at that's not, somy intent was no, I know I, you
know just through you, out ofthe box, that was it my
intention.
I decided you the other waydon't don't get it.

Speaker 4 (57:00):
You know six wheels to be talking about.
These are the things need to bebrought up.

Speaker 5 (57:04):
You know I would never.
To me personally, I would neverturn away, no matter how fucked
you are.
Never you are never, no matterwhat you're going through,
whatever, whatever's going on, Iwill never turn a veteran.

Speaker 4 (57:16):
So so that's why I don't think we need to have a
membership committee right,because if you meet the criteria
and you need to do 14, right,true then you should be eligible
for membership and I hate thefact that we could turn somebody
away that possibly needs yeahit was the joint yep and we're
pushed under membershipmembership membership membership

(57:36):
.

Speaker 5 (57:36):
That's why I say, that's why I say it's quantity
over quality, and that's why Isay, hey, I will never turn you
away, maybe even if you decidethat that person decides that,
hey, they're not a good fit forthis place.
But if we can give it, you knowwe can be the clarin we can be
that that, that, that spark toget them off there, whatever

(57:58):
funk that they're going throughor whatever it is.
We can be that inspiration.
Well, it all, it all it takesis one, one spark no, like that
fire.

Speaker 4 (58:06):
But what I'm saying is, the easiest way to put the
spark out is hey, I qualify tobe here, yep, and you're telling
me, no, I can't so any so theyhad the spark to come in and
actually fill the paperwork outand want to join, right, right,
and then they get told no, right, I mean, that's like, that's
like we ever said no.
Well, no I, but this is theconversation I have right is is

(58:30):
we only want to bring in thesepeople that are going to be a
benefit or these people that aregoing to be a bonus to the post
, right, but in the sameinstance, right, these people
that want to come in, we'regoing to say, yeah, maybe
another day, right, or you'renot a good fit for us.
So yeah, it's it's.

(58:50):
It's all these things that arethat are tough because we get
pushed membership.
So I think you know when it,when it comes down to it, I
think and I get what nationalwants to do with the VFW, I'm
sure, and that's the same, I'msure the American Legion is same
right.
All these organizations areprobably the same right you got

(59:11):
to have the million members.
You got to have the two millionmembers.
You got to have the ten millionmembers right to, that's your
voice that's your voice.
No, I get it right.
So then, can't be picky, so yeah, you really can't be picky
because if we have 200 membersthis year they're going to
require 205 next year, whichmeans we got to bring five in.
So next year we have 205 and Iwant to 15 the following year,

(59:33):
right.
So you can't be picky becauseyou get a 12 month calendar year
, right, and you've got greatpost commanders out there.
We have one here up in Harrison, right in our district 11,
scott Taylor Harrison post.
This dude is a hundred andsixty two percent.
I mean, he is blowing it out ofthe water, this dude, his

(59:55):
membership as a whole, because Ican't believe it's just him,
right, but he's got some magicformula.
I don't know what's in thewater in Harrison, michigan, but
he, this guy's got somethinggoing on that I was talking to
him, right, tim districtcommander.
I said I would make, I wouldmake him a membership guy.
He is in if that positiondoesn't exist.
I'm making it.
Make that thing exist yeah,because I don't know what he's

(01:00:17):
got going on.
I don't get it.
I mean I've only, in the threeyears I've been around, brought
in four or five people, probablythat's it.
He does that in a month ormaybe maybe maybe three weeks,
he does that in a month.
So what does that do doing?
I have no idea.
It's crazy, yeah that's.

Speaker 3 (01:00:39):
That's.
That's crazy.
There's another dude.
He's from Ann Harbour, the AnnHarbour post, and he's the top
recruiter in the state.
He brought in like 39 members.
But they're, they're in a.
They're in a situation wherethey can afford to do it because
they just pay for their theguy's membership where a lot of

(01:01:00):
posts can't do that.
But um he, he took callsremoving obstacles.
If you want somebody to come inand they have a, they have a
reason that they can't.
I can't afford it.

Speaker 4 (01:01:14):
The obstacle, pay for it well, for sure, and we have
like relief funds.
We have all these differentthings right, that we could do
that for people that arestruggling, because we want them
to come in, we want them tofeel accepted, we want them to
get the help they need, becauseyou get help from the same
people that chewed the sand.
Right, they're in the sandbox,or they were in the dirt, they
were in the jungle, they werewherever the hell they were at

(01:01:35):
right.
Those are the guys that you canlean on to ask the honest, true
questions to.
That are going to give you theno bullshit, true answer, if you
like it or not, thank you.
Sometimes I'm gonna say stopbeing a pussy yep, absolutely
right suck it up yep driveforward.
What you're complaining aboutis so small.
Remember the things that weused to bitch about?
That were 18, 19, 20 year oldkids.

(01:01:58):
Yeah, that we had to deal with,that were real problems.
And you're whining over a flattire.
You shut the fuck up, suck itup and move on.
That's, that's.
That's piddly bullshit, fix it.
You know, when we're 19, 20year old kids fighting for our
lives, gone 2000, 3000 milesaway from our families, our kids
, our parents, our sisters, ourbrothers, whatever right pulling

(01:02:21):
triggers?
That's real world problems.
Yep a flat life that's like aflat tire when you're 15 miles
outside of town is nothing, yep,right, but that's first rule
problems.
We had real world problems,yeah, and that was crazy.
I mean you started thinkingback of it, like I'm looking at
my son, 17 years old right,you've got one in now, right in
the Marines.

(01:02:41):
So you look at what they got todo and it's like, unfortunately
, my son takes a lot of bruntfor me because I'm a pretty
straight shooter guy, right, sir, usually don't sugarcoat much.
I do get called a politicianbecause I'll always see.
If I'm not in the fight, right,I'll listen to both sides and
deal my deal.
But when it comes to him, I'mlike, look, kid, this is the way

(01:03:03):
it's gonna be.
I did it.
So if I could do it, you can doit.
My grandfather told me the samething.
You're talking old salt dogfrom World War two, right?

Speaker 5 (01:03:11):
sir this dude's.

Speaker 4 (01:03:12):
Actually this is the bracelet my grandmother gave him
before he deployed for combatoverseas.
And his enlistment, right whenhe signed up because he actually
enlisted, rather gettingdrafted because he wanted to be
in the Marines yep, hisenlistment was duration and war
were to duration.
Oh wow, there was no EAS date.

(01:03:32):
Right, like you're doing afour-year deal and then you're
out, or you're doing a six-yearenlistment, you're out.
His said duration, so that warwent on for 22 years.
He's still be doing 22.
Yeah, you probably still be init if the Japanese didn't
surrender.
You know, I'm saying yeah, itwas legit, like it was to the
end of this bitch, regardless ofits six months or 16 years.

(01:03:54):
So that's a real world problem,right, and he hit like four or
five, six different islands,right going across and like say
he landed last one was ok, now,right, so, but yeah, it was.
It was that crazy.
That's a real world problem,you know.
But when our with our kids, youknow you chewed it.

(01:04:15):
Yes, sir right now he's doing it, so you probably don't get my
lot of slack either.

Speaker 5 (01:04:19):
You know my sons, especially my, my second older,
who's a Marine.
You know I was so hard on himas he was in what, as he was
coming up, and he could neverunderstand why I was so hard on
him and we it was it put it puta big strain on our relationship
.
So when he had came home, whenhe, when he graduated boot camp

(01:04:42):
and he came home, it was likeall that went away.
It was the same way with me andmy dad.
My dad was an asshole.
He was alcoholic, hard no,straight to the punch.
He's an old Vietnam guy.
He just didn't pull no punches.
You do this as a man growing up.
This is how you're gonnasurvive in this world.
That's how I was raised.

(01:05:03):
That's how I raised my son andI can remember and it almost
brought me to tears because itwas the same situation I was in
when I came home from boot camp.
When my son got home from bootcamp, he just looked at me.
There was no word said it, justI gave him a look, he gave me a
look, I nodded, he nodded andeverything else that he thought
went away and our relationshipbecame stronger and it was like

(01:05:27):
nothing is like we have the bestrelationship.
To this day, I talked to my son.
If not every day, every otherday, well, that's awesome the
same thing,with my dad.
You know, like said, growing upI had a real strange
relationship with my dad becauseof his issues from Vietnam, but
the way he raised me, he raisedme how to be a man's man.
He taught me how to survive inthis world that we're in today.

(01:05:50):
And when I came home from bootcamp, that's all he did.
He just shook his head at me,gave me a look, says now, yet,
which said now you understand,and I did.
At that moment in time, Iunderstood where I, where my
place was in this world, and thesame thing my son now
understands.

Speaker 4 (01:06:07):
And I can't wait for my, my boy, to get that right.
Yep, because he whines aboutdoing chores around the house,
right?
Now he's now he's enlistedright, so they so in the in.
They caught the Pooley program,right, so they've got him.
You know, once a month or onceevery three weeks, right, they
get together.
They PT right he's, he's a PTstudies.
Are you doing 18 pull-ups?

(01:06:28):
Right, he's running my he's bedoing more.
He's running a mile he's runninga mile, mile and a half, like
11 minutes, so he's definitelygot to get that up because it's
it's 18 minutes to get a hundredpoints right, 18 or less for
three miles, right, so he's,he's definitely got to work on
that how long does it take himto run a mile?
Mile and a half and like 11, 10, 10, 40 ish, 1050 ish, oh he

(01:06:49):
needs to be running.

Speaker 5 (01:06:50):
He needs to be running a minimum a seven minute
mile right, but he goes.

Speaker 4 (01:06:54):
The goal is 15 right now, so he goes.
I'm basically running on cruisecontrol yeah, he's not pushing
that he played soccer for the.

Speaker 3 (01:07:04):
Oh, I know that's all they did, yeah, so he used to
run about seven yeah, he used torun seven miles right in a
match, yeah right for 45 minutesalmost straight and then they
get their break and then another45 minutes straight, right, so
you'd run like seven, eightmiles in a match yep he'll.

Speaker 4 (01:07:20):
He'll be a 3t.
He'll be a 300 point PT kidcoming out right, which is
awesome.
I feel bad for my son-in-lawright that married my poor
daughter, so we had so we had,we, you know, we had her
daughter Rosina Marines, right.
So she lived in Virginia, out toCalifornia.
She was as little, you know,but she got raised probably at

(01:07:42):
my worst because I was fresh out, right, she was you know, for I
think when I got out, and thenyou know, all the way through
right until now, she graduatedcolleges where she met her
husband at, but I raised her tobe a hard-nosed bitch.
Take, I mean, I used to pick onher.
I would rag on her, she's moreof a dude than most dudes or

(01:08:04):
dudes.
So I, in my son-in-law's pretty, pretty big kid you know he's a
farm kid, you know but Iguarantee if she puts her foot
down, he ain't, he ain't gonnastep to the plate, he don't want
to swing the bat because heknows he's gonna get smoked
right, you know, and that'sthat's unfortunate that we've.
We've raised our kids I thinkmine.

(01:08:25):
Anyways, I'll speak to myselfwithout without the love that
probably a normal dad would givethem.
Just because of our pastexperiences and you know, and
that makes sense it does makesense.

Speaker 5 (01:08:35):
That makes perfect sense because we're GeneXus, you
know we're.
That's how we were raised.
We were raised by boomers.
We were raised to change whenthe times are changing and to
prepare our kids for the toughtimes.
Otherwise, because right now wegot what these Millennials

(01:08:56):
needs Gen Z's.
Now, whatever, whatevergeneration they're calling
that's coming up now.
They're soft to me, they'resoft as fuck and the, the world
itself don't give a fuck.
The world is hard.
If these kids don't realize,when they step away from home,
when, when they get kicked outthe nest and they have to adult

(01:09:17):
and they have to be grown,they're not gonna have the tools
to survive because this worldwould chew them up, spin them
out and roll right over and keepgoing yeah, no, no, no longer
is about your feelings, exactlyno that's a problem because now

Speaker 3 (01:09:31):
everything's about their feelings that's, that's
what we're saying there is nosafe space, man you walk into
the office to go to work.

Speaker 5 (01:09:38):
It's about performance, yeah, in production
, and I was raised to I don'tknow how many times this was
before that term, even that theterm fuck your feelings even
became popular.
My dad, was telling me this whenI was a child, back in the 80s
and 90s.
He would always tell me I don'tgive a fuck about how you feel.
This is how, this is how it'sgonna be.
You either suck it up and driveon and be something, or let

(01:10:00):
this world consume you and chewyou up, spit you out and you're
just gonna slay there and be alittle bitch.
That's the end in my dad, whatI was telling me.
That's not the type of man I'mtrying to raise.

Speaker 4 (01:10:08):
That's our core.
Right there it is.

Speaker 5 (01:10:12):
I mean people look at me, yeah, I'm a softy, I'm a
big, I'm a big love bull softy.
But I also get but, I, also gettaken as an asshole just
because I'm straightforward.

Speaker 4 (01:10:24):
Well, right, you see, and and that's one of the
character traits right, theMarine Corps and still denies,
I'm sure the army didn't youguys do.
Right is we had acronym calledJJ did tie, buckle, right and
each you told us JJ what what JJdid tie buckle okay, right so
14 leadership traits right inthe Marine Corps, right oh yep
yep, and I still live by thosetoday during during grain in my

(01:10:47):
head.
And you move forward right inlife, so any decision you make
right and if you're in aleadership role at all.
Those are the things that thatthat you should be doing right
to make sure that you're fair.
Right, you got knowledge towhat you're talking about.
Right, you got enthusiasm rightfor what you want to have

(01:11:09):
happen.
You're loyal right to eitherwho you work for your family, an
organization like the VFW, Imean.
There's all kinds of thingsthat go into it, right, some
some applies, some don't right,because they're more military
geared than they are civilian,but a lot of them actually
relate to what you do in yourpersonal life after the military

(01:11:31):
, right.
So when it, when it comes downto it, with your family, right,
you were raised hardcore.
I was raised pretty hardcore.
I don't know how you wereraised them, but pretty hard I'm
probably pretty sure hardcoreright.

Speaker 3 (01:11:43):
So I was raised smart because I had two older
brothers.
So I watched them and said Iain't never tell you, I know, I
think our generation they and Iwatch a lot of memes with about
GeneXus and they call us Farrell.

Speaker 5 (01:11:55):
We really were fucking Farrell as fuck.
You know my parents would kickme out the door first thing in
the morning this said don't comeback in.

Speaker 4 (01:12:03):
Oh yeah oh yeah, until the street lights come up.

Speaker 5 (01:12:05):
Yeah, street lights come on you take off.

Speaker 3 (01:12:07):
I lived on a lake when we were the only family
that was there year-round, so inthe in the winter we'd go
sledding and we came back fordinner.
We'd leave in the morning afterbreakfast.

Speaker 4 (01:12:20):
Ball gone, you're gone you know, yeah, so here
here in Michigan, right, my, myparents had a.
They had a boat in Bay City.
They have those little rubberdinghies right at a 15
horsepower motor, out at 5gallon gas can oh yeah it's an
early 90s, you know my parentsget up in the morning on a boat
and shit all the other otherkids, right, we'd all jump on

(01:12:41):
our dinghies and shit.
My dad would hand me 20 bucksand said gotta be home by 8 for
dinner, right, because theywanted to party with all their
friends and shit, they didn'twant the kids around.
See, they had me 20 bucks,right, they go down, fill up.
You know gas is 90 cents agallon.
Already had to, pre already hadto pre make soil.
You know shit.
We'd be up in freaking Linwood,caw, collins, 20, 30 miles

(01:13:05):
through the bay, right openwater Lake, here on up way up
north.
No radio, no cell phone, no,nothing.
I mean we could have beenfloating to Canada, yep, and our
parents wouldn't even haveknown about it.
You know rough, there was nolike now.
My wife's got the kids on 360our daughters 24 and married and
she's like, oh, they're at home.

Speaker 1 (01:13:24):
You know she's going to go to check in with the kids
are doing.
I'm like that's because theseparents were so crazy back.

Speaker 5 (01:13:31):
Yeah, but I look at our generation and I think a lot
of disconnect with ourgeneration and our in, in in our
kids is because a lot of thesemothers have been in.
Parents have been ingrained awhole.
You got to coddle your childrenbecause you know, whatever
reason, you know that the worldis so rough, and not these kids

(01:13:52):
or they, they've been.
Let me rephrase that the kidsnowadays have been pacified.
When they were fresh out thewomb they were pacified.
Every time they threw a fit.
Our parents had had it in there.
Their parents had it in theirmind saying, okay, we got to
give our kids whatever we neverhad.
So it got to the point we werespoiling them and giving them

(01:14:14):
whatever you.
Also, when a kid figured out,just like any animal figured out
, hey, I can do this to get whatI want, and what I want is
really to do nothing and befucking lazy and sit in front of
a.
So I'm gonna throw a fit and soI get what I want.
So I can get what I want.
So that's generation being.
We know we grew up.

(01:14:35):
We grew up there.
They grew up in the electronicsage.
They had screens, they hadiPhones, they had gameboys, they
had playstations.
So this art, you know, theparents of our generation said,
said, okay, when these kidsthrow a fit, we're just gonna
pass from throw them in front ofa screen.
And what are they doing?
They're not out in the worldgetting real world experience.

Speaker 4 (01:14:54):
Yeah, I mean, we used to jump out of bikes, right.
That's how you knew where allthe neighborhood kids were,
right.
You started riding around theblock and we're all the bikes
were piled up.
You know that's where all yourfriends were, right.
So, like my parents, right, andwe raised our kids that way.
If they were crying becausethey were over tired, we didn't
hold them, we threw them in thecrib.
We made them cry themselvesasleep like our parents did yeah

(01:15:15):
right now, nowadays, manthere's cameras and monitors and
all this stuff that they'rethere.

Speaker 3 (01:15:19):
We're like 35 people in there, yeah, yeah.
So I mean, there's just adifference and I think that
comes from our parents, the waythey raised us and why.

Speaker 4 (01:15:28):
You know, when we went to service we were kind of
no shit, that's just get themission accomplished, right and
and move forward.
But the afterlife of the way wecame out we still have that,
that that boomer mentality, andI think that's why the Xers are
different than the Millennialsand the Gen Z's and the whatever
nowadays right, that's the waywe were raised yeah, I was.

Speaker 5 (01:15:49):
I was raised pretty feral, like I said.
My parents kicked me out thegoddamn household, and long, I
said, and my mom refused toentertain me so I had to
entertain myself, so I'd be outin the woods mm-hmm, you know,
building forts, yep buildingforts, digging, digging dams or
blocking off creeks, or or goingup and fucking up some shit on

(01:16:10):
the neighbor's property.
Yeah, without them knowing.
I grew up hunting young grew upshooting deer, small animals.
So I mean I did what young boysdoing rural communities, so
what?

Speaker 4 (01:16:21):
do you think that we can't get?
You know, I mean, I obviouslywe've got a lot of these guys
right that have served from 2003, or let's just say 2000 to 2021
, right?
Besides, maybe they're raisingfamilies, but there's a lot of
single guys still out there,women out there, right.

(01:16:42):
What?
What do you think the biggesthurdle is that we've got to get
them to come to an AmericanLegion, come to the WFW's is, to
be exact, what's over there,right?
Let's talk about some of that.
You think it's still thatbecause I I had that that same
stigma, right?

Speaker 5 (01:16:58):
because I grew up with my grandfather and his
buddies right hanging out, so Ithought the VFW's going to be
the same way.
Is it more promotional stuff ofits?
Well, whatever it is that theyit pretty much.
We just got to get in in frontof them, in front of those type
of people too, so they could seeit, show and do you know, yeah,
but everything where you justdon't give and that in there,

(01:17:19):
and that's where you got tostart.
I mean, it's not a startsomewhere?
Well, right.

Speaker 4 (01:17:22):
But I mean, if you see no offense, our honor guard
is great, right, but we have onemember under the age of 50 on
it.
Probably right, and Andy Bealsthere's probably there's
probably the one guy under 50 onit.
So if I show up to a MemorialDay parade and I see the honor

(01:17:43):
guard and it's a bunch of 1670year old guys on it, you know, I
know why I mean I'm actually.

Speaker 5 (01:17:50):
I mean, this is this, is this is the problem that
we've got you know, to me, thisis how I'm taking it, you know,
for my thought process.
For me, I know why thisgeneration, or whoever, is
coming up and they feel this waybecause they got no fucking
pride.
They were taught not to haveany pride in shit, and you'd ah

(01:18:10):
how I was raised.
You know, when I look at myflag, I look at my country's
flag with pride.
I look at any flag, whether itbe a military flag or anything
that I used to represent orstill do represent.
I look at that with pride,because I put the work in, I did

(01:18:31):
what needed to do, and it'ssomething that makes me feel
good.

Speaker 3 (01:18:34):
Well, here's a question.
You have a renter right.
Yes, Bechard eligible for VFW.
We talked to him, Yep.

Speaker 4 (01:18:43):
How come he's never come in?

Speaker 3 (01:18:44):
Because he's.
Ah, I don't want to.

Speaker 5 (01:18:47):
He is real.
You know, I think thegeneration coming up now are
real introverted.

Speaker 4 (01:18:54):
They just are so Too much screen time.
I can have all my buddies onthe.

Speaker 5 (01:18:58):
X-Files and too much about how my feelings.
They don't really realize thatthey need to let those feelings
go because it's all to mebullshit and get out there and
experience people and that's thedisconnect in this world today
is people.
I really do.
I mean, I will admit it, Ifucking hate people.
I hate people.
People are crazy these days.

(01:19:20):
I keep my circles so damn smallthat when somebody asks me oh,
who are your friends?
I tell them I don't have anyfriends.

Speaker 4 (01:19:27):
Really, man, really, we're sitting right here brother
, I got family.
Oh, look at this guy.
He turned the script out of themiddle.

Speaker 5 (01:19:34):
Yeah, that's shit.
I seriously that's how Ifucking feel.

Speaker 3 (01:19:37):
So I got a question for you show how many people and
I think we need to bring thisup in our golf outing how many
members of our unit are in theVFW that we served in combat
with oh, you guys do yourhooligans.
Golf outing.
Golf outing how many?

Speaker 4 (01:19:55):
It should be every one of them.

Speaker 3 (01:19:57):
Should be every flippin' one of Ryan Chief just
joined the Charlotte Post.
Well, he's been here.
What two, three years now.

Speaker 4 (01:20:05):
I tell you what you should do.

Speaker 3 (01:20:08):
Take membership son.

Speaker 4 (01:20:09):
And there should be a requirement.
There should be a requirementIf you're gonna golf in the
hooligan golf outing, you gottabe a member of the team.

Speaker 3 (01:20:17):
You gotta be a member of the VF or the American
Legion, I don't care.

Speaker 4 (01:20:20):
Well, that's, you know, you gotta be a member of
one or the other.
I'm a member of both, right.

Speaker 5 (01:20:26):
There are some legal things that have to be taken
care of in order to get to thatpoint.
As far as our golf outing isconcerned, those are easily you
know.

Speaker 4 (01:20:36):
Well, it'd be a legal thing.
That's a requirement.
It's like you gotta have golfclubs to golf in a golf outing.

Speaker 3 (01:20:40):
Well, we actually have, we're working on getting,
or we have one.
We actually have a 501Cfoundation to when we raise that
money that we give out tonon-profit.

Speaker 4 (01:20:51):
The best thing is, if you wanna get around it if
you're a VFW American Legionmember, it's 75 bucks.
If you're a non-member, it's100 bucks.
Honestly, if you wanna getaround it, you wanna spend
another 25 bucks.
You just spend another 10,whatever, you can join this one
or you can join this one Forjust 10 bucks more right, give a

(01:21:14):
discount to those that are partof a service organization and
don't for the ones that aren't.

Speaker 3 (01:21:21):
Ah, that's something we could throw at new, because,
realistically, I often wonderedthat Now Homie still owes us
right, so we need to go seeHomie and get his ass signed up
for the post.

Speaker 5 (01:21:36):
Oh, yeah, definitely.

Speaker 3 (01:21:38):
And then we'll rename the post Echo Company.
Well, shit, I got like.
I got half a dozen people thatserved together in the post.

Speaker 4 (01:21:52):
There's a half a dozen out of 189 members and you
wanna rename the post?

Speaker 3 (01:21:57):
There would be active .
There's me, you Really, that'sDuby Cherry, Duby Cherry, you
Seaboard.

Speaker 5 (01:22:07):
Bill me.

Speaker 4 (01:22:11):
And you're out of names at six.

Speaker 5 (01:22:13):
That's eight of us.

Speaker 4 (01:22:14):
Who.
He's only got six on his hand.
I know who you're talking about.

Speaker 5 (01:22:17):
He's already counted me and him.

Speaker 3 (01:22:19):
Oh, oh, so me and you yeah that's eight.
You Betz, I'll take eight.
Who.

Speaker 5 (01:22:24):
Adam Betz, major Adam Betz oh.

Speaker 3 (01:22:27):
Betz.

Speaker 5 (01:22:27):
He's yup, duby, cherry, brian, who else?
Who else did I say Seaboard,seaboard.
Yeah, don, and there was oneother one.
That's so there's eight of us.

Speaker 4 (01:22:45):
So you're like a half a percentage of the post.
We're not, we're not, we're notrenaming the post.
No offense Because nobody knowshow to spell who again.
So that sign would still bemessed up.

Speaker 5 (01:22:56):
Make it a spell.
Yeah, he would still be messedup by Pickersfree.
I don't know about you Marines.
I mean, you guys did eat quitea few crayons.

Speaker 4 (01:23:03):
Only only the purple ones.
They taste like grape.
Oh, yup, that's it, man, it'sall about the flavors.
It's like.
It's like nobody calls there.
It's like hey, what kind ofGatorade you want?
I want the red one.
Nobody has any idea what flavorit is, it just you go off the
color.
Right, I want the red, I wantthe light blue, the dark blue,
whatever it is, you know.
Yeah.
So crayons, crayons are nodifferent to us man.

(01:23:24):
And for Christmas gift at leastgive me the 64 pack.

Speaker 3 (01:23:26):
Yeah, there you go, that's a variety for my desserts
, you know.

Speaker 4 (01:23:30):
He's only eat three a day, keeps the doctor away.
That's funny.
Well, you know, and this hasalways been the biggest
challenge, right Is, how do webecause we've got a shit ton
Eligible veterans, any of theseorganizations that come back,
but how do you get them to comein?

Speaker 3 (01:23:49):
How do you get them to come in?

Speaker 4 (01:23:50):
It's hard right, Because most of the promotional
stuff that we put out is aboutjoining.
It shouldn't be about joining.
It should be about just comingin through the doors, Because if
you come in through the doorsand you have a great experience,
you have the eagle right andall these posts right that
welcome me in.

Speaker 5 (01:24:09):
And it's just it's.

Speaker 4 (01:24:10):
Then the membership portion becomes simple and easy.
But yeah, absolutely.
But if it's come, join us.
No, I don't want to.
I just want to come in and havea good time and not be
pressured in a joining.

Speaker 5 (01:24:22):
And let me join when I want to join, and that'll open
up a door to resources thatthese other vets didn't realize
they had.

Speaker 4 (01:24:29):
See, and that's why I think we're also go back to the
writers group stuff.
Right, if you have a love formotorcycles, right, and you
support the military, right, oryou served in the military, you
could join this separatesubgroup of the VFW or American
Legion, because they got Legionwriters out there right and then
you can become a part of theVFW through this other entity.

(01:24:53):
And that's huge, because we'reout at bike nights, we're out at
all these cancer benefit ridesor and you just got to wear them
.
Veteran suicide awarenessthrough veterans for USA out of
Alma.

Speaker 5 (01:25:04):
Michigan.
But you just made it a point.
You just made a point rightthere.
That is that really resonateswith me.
It's a really deep issue.
You know, guys like us, we wereraised a certain way.
We have fathers that serve, wehad grandfathers that serve, so
we were raised with a certainamount of patriotism and pride
and you good.

Speaker 4 (01:25:28):
Well, you and I have had these conversations.

Speaker 5 (01:25:30):
Yeah, and it's about to me, it's teaching how I was
raised with that moral, thatsimple moral of when you walk
out, when a man walks out intothis world and is trying to be a
man on his own, it's aboutbeing a part of something
greater than yourself.

Speaker 4 (01:25:49):
Well, that's what we served, right?
Yep, we were one tiny cog inthe wheel.

Speaker 5 (01:25:55):
Yep, but I was raised and I love how I was raised
because I was taught not to beselfish.
I was taught to help others,put my feelings aside and help
somebody that may truly needsomething that I have to offer,
and to me that's that moral ofgoodness that needs to be put

(01:26:18):
back in this world, as fucked upas this world is.

Speaker 4 (01:26:22):
Yeah, and I think, in the grand scheme of things,
right, everybody has to findtheir place.
Yep.
That transition from being toldwhat you want to do 24, 7, 365,
right four years, or six years,right Yep To now, all of a
sudden, you're free on your ownto make your own decisions and
your own choices.
You get lost, because theworld's a big fucking place.

(01:26:45):
Yes it is Right.
There's a million things goingright and that transition and
some people pick that transitionup in a year or less.
Some take 10 years to do right,to find their place, to find
their mission, to get it, tounderstand it, to eat it, to
chew it the whole thing right,yep, and that's why I love the

(01:27:07):
motorcycle groups is because alot of us rode in the military
right and we got out.
We kept on riding right andthis gives a way to ride with
people that we understand, toride with people that we get.
It gives us a great perspectiveon what these organizations

(01:27:30):
like the VFW can do right, andit's a great gateway.
We've picked up quite a fewmembers, new members, to our
post just through having ariders group, and I think that's
something that the Departmenthere in Michigan is trying to do
is to get more riders groupsthroughout the department

(01:27:51):
because it's a huge recruitingtool right when we're out doing
these rides.
One it shows these otherorganizations like Veterans for
USA right, we attend theirsuicide awareness ride.
Right, we lead it.
Right, they had us out frontleading the group this year
because one we're proficientwith riding.

(01:28:11):
We know what we're doing.
They wanted to have veteransout front of everybody else,
right?
Not riding in the rear, right.
They want us to lead the way,because that cause, that
Veterans suicide awareness cause, is so big for us because we've
dealt with it.
I've lost out of my fast team.
I've lost three guys.
How?

Speaker 5 (01:28:27):
many have we lost Since we've been back 11?
Oh man, We've lost way morethan we lost actually in theater
.
Yeah 11, right, right, close,right, close to 11?
.
Yeah, we're about, yeah, it wasabout 11 guys.
We've lost just suicide.

Speaker 4 (01:28:39):
Yeah, so these are the causes.
And that Cousy's killing me,dude, that Dean Myers.
Cousy with the bird on thebottom the middle finger bird is
killing me.
It's perfectly aimed right atme when you were taking a drink.

Speaker 3 (01:28:54):
It was absolutely hilarious.
I loved it.
By the way, I'm drinking soda.

Speaker 4 (01:28:58):
Is that what you're drinking?
I'm drinking Miller Lite,sponsored by Anaheiser Bush, by
the way.
I think it's Anaheiser Bush, Idon't know.
It's Union May Beer and I'm atUnion Cottage.
No, it's not.

Speaker 3 (01:29:06):
Anaheiser Bush is Bud Light stuff.

Speaker 4 (01:29:08):
Who is it?

Speaker 3 (01:29:09):
Miller Brewing Company.

Speaker 4 (01:29:10):
Oh, miller Lite, how come I didn't know that?
Cool.
This Miller Lite sponsored byMiller Lite Brewing Company.
My apologies, Best taste isbeer and it's Union May, so
that's why.

Speaker 3 (01:29:20):
I drink it, oh yeah.

Speaker 4 (01:29:21):
So we always support Union Workers in the United
States of America, by the way.
No, but when it comes down toit, right, those are the things
that we should be doing, and theVFW as a whole, or American
Legion as a whole, couldn't doit without having these other
groups.
Absolutely.
There was no way that they'regoing to jump in a cage or a car

(01:29:44):
or a truck or whatever right,and then ride these things
because they're from motorcyclegroups.
So the fact that we do it ishuge you know what I mean and
obviously it's a big cost.
So there's going to be thatMission 6 service dogs ride to
the Leathernecks do up inHarrison, right?
So we'll be riding for that,helping support the cause for
veterans that need service dogswhen they come back.

(01:30:05):
Oh, yeah, right.
And that's just a way that wecan give back to the community.
That one our local post getscredit for, the VFW gets credit
for right, but it's also a greatcause that we should be
supporting.
So we pay to go on these rides.
Sometimes it's $20 a person,sometimes it's $40 a person.

(01:30:26):
Just depends on what the causeis.
But that's that generosity thatour members which is crazy, we
were talking about the supportpeople earlier right, they don't
have an affiliation other thanthrough that motorcycle club,
their group right, but they'rewilling to do this.
They're willing to shell it outon our behalf.

Speaker 5 (01:30:43):
Enjoying these cars is huge Yep, and that's what it
takes to get the word out.

Speaker 4 (01:30:47):
Well, and I think this has been a good tool to
gobble up those younger membersLike.
Joe Gates is a great one.
Right, this guy works inSaginaw.
Here's, we got one.
Comes in Now he's going to be acrazy active member, and he's
actually.
He's well, besides Joe.
How was Joe?
Probably in his 30s late?

Speaker 3 (01:31:05):
20s, mid 30s.
Mid 30s 35, maybe, maybe, maybe.
OK, so besides, and how we gothim is he called up and he said,
hey, I'd like you guys need anyhelp or whatever.
And I said something about arider's group.
He said you got a rider's group.
I said yeah, and he goes.
Well, I'm eligible to be in theVFW.
And I'm like then, why the hellare you?

(01:31:25):
I'm like what the hell dude?
And he's like, well, when willyou be there?
And I told him and I told himabout the group and all that
bullshit.
And then Joyne come to find outhe was a member of Coleman.
That led his membership laps.
Oh really, because his grandmawas an auxiliary president over
there and put him in way back inthe day.

(01:31:47):
And he probably didn't even know, about it Never went and didn't
even know about it.
So you know, and the dude's agreat IT guy, look what he did
on bike night, man, I mean.

Speaker 4 (01:31:56):
Yeah, so those are the other things.
Right that these motorcyclegroups?
Right, those riders groups cando for the VFW American Legion?
Right, we host a bike night.
Right, so you're looking at theauxiliary's doing food in the
kitchen sold out food, right,posted.
Well, you gotta stop using thatcoosy man.
It's killing me.
Well, once again, dude.

Speaker 3 (01:32:19):
Want me to aim in a different way?
Yeah, aim at Brad.
Aim at Brad when you do it.

Speaker 4 (01:32:23):
Because he's no but these are the flashbacks.

Speaker 5 (01:32:29):
These are the things right.

Speaker 4 (01:32:32):
that play a huge role and I think it can help drive
that younger membership.
Because what I hated and thereason why I didn't join forever
right, and I actually joined asmembership at large through
national I was I'm not, I'm atechie, but not a crazy techie,
right.
So I jumped online right and Iscanned in my DD 214, crossed
off my social right.

(01:32:52):
Sat it in.
I get my card in the mail and Iwas like member at large
through national, for I was post10,994, whatever the hell, it
was right.
Whatever national is, didn't donothing with it.
I paid three years in a row orsomething like that, maybe four
years in a row paid.
It never came into the post.
Then a buddy of mine, randy,who is long as I remember.

Speaker 3 (01:33:15):
Gilray, gilray, grimace, yes, grimace.

Speaker 4 (01:33:17):
Yep, yep, he was up there, right he's awesome.
And I see him on Facebook.
He posts I'm like oh shit,randy's up there, I better go up
there, walk in there, and Inever left sense right.
And then I transferred fromnational to the post here, right
, and then obviously I've beengetting involved in things going
on there, so the way I did itwas just weird.
I was like you know, my grandpawould be pissed because they

(01:33:39):
have the Marine Corps Leaguehere in Michigan, right, and he
was the commandant, so he'd beno different than department
commander.

Speaker 3 (01:33:44):
Right right right.

Speaker 4 (01:33:44):
My grandpa was commandant, right, he never
joined the VFW and I'll diveinto that in a second, but he
was a member of the AmericanLegion and the reason why he
never joined the VFW was becausehe felt that it was shameful
that, even if you served overhere, you never left the United
States.
Right, he always thought youshould still be able to be a

(01:34:07):
member because you supportedthose that were over fighting.
So I get it right.
Like my wife used to email mewhen I was over there shit, the
direct deposit was fucked up.
Now I'm dealing with that.
But if that dude or girl backhere, woman back here, wasn't
doing her job, I'm dealing withsome bullshit over there that I

(01:34:28):
didn't need to deal with right.
So that payroll specialist orwhatever right was just as
important as me pulling thetrigger over there because if
shit or my MREs didn't make itto us.
You know what I mean when wewere over there Bees and bullets
, yeah, I mean that was just asbad, right.
So he was under the impression,right and this is him right

(01:34:49):
that if you served, you served.
So that's why he got involvedin the Marine Corps League and
then he got involved with theAmerican.

Speaker 3 (01:34:55):
Legion but not the VFW.

Speaker 4 (01:34:56):
Not the VFW, because he didn't feel he didn't feel
right that you should segregatelike that.

Speaker 3 (01:35:01):
And there's been some conversation that I've had with
people in Claire the greatthing and a curse also of being
a post-commander districtcommander, whatever is because
people, no matter where I go,people come up to me and hey,
how come this is?
And I run into a couple guys upthere that said you know you

(01:35:26):
should be able to be in the VFWif you served in that time frame
.
And I said, ok, the VFW standsfor Veterans of Foreign Wars.
And he's like, well, I was in aforeign war.
I'm like where he said, well, Iwas stationed at Fort Bragg
during Vietnam.
Or I was Germany, bob Lackeyduring Germany, and I'm like,

(01:35:52):
but it wasn't made up that way.
I mean, I understand it, I'mnot saying I'm against it, but
then we're just all Americanlegions.

Speaker 4 (01:36:01):
Yeah, because basically, well, or am vets,
Well the difference betweenAmerican legion.

Speaker 3 (01:36:06):
In order to be an American legion member, you have
to serve during a time ofconflict, but you didn't get
deployed.
Am vets are.
Anybody that's a veteran canjoin the am vets.

Speaker 4 (01:36:16):
OK, so I guess I didn't realize with the.
American legion, because I justthought it was any veteran I
thought it was any veteran.
No, I was like I'm during thetime of, but not actually in
combat.
Yes, gotcha, gotcha and I waslike well why?

Speaker 3 (01:36:32):
What's the difference between am vets, American
legion I just thought it was anoffshoot.
And but the am vets are,anybody can join.
They served their country.
Legion got to serve during atime of conflict, but you didn't
go to the conflict.
The VFW boots.

Speaker 4 (01:36:48):
On the ground bullets are firing people are dying,
blood's flying, yeah, so it'sactually good knowledge because
I didn't even know that and I'vebeen a member of the American
Legion for about 10 years and Iwill not pay their life
membership due is because when Iwent to look at it it was like
dude.

Speaker 3 (01:37:05):
When I did it.

Speaker 4 (01:37:06):
When I did it, it was almost $1,500.

Speaker 2 (01:37:08):
I think, you're a life membership.

Speaker 4 (01:37:10):
This guy makes way too much money if he paid for
that life membership.
I'm just saying becauseliterally you'd have to live to
about 90 by the time you payyour $45 a year.
I mean seriously, right, I'm 60, and I'm checking out.
That's probably as long as I'mgoing to live.

Speaker 6 (01:37:27):
Yeah, there you go, but I mean just seriously right,
because I just ride too manymiles.

Speaker 4 (01:37:31):
Something stupid is going to happen, the way it's
going to be, and I'm like $45.
At 10 years it's only $450,another 10 years, that's 20
years 800.
I'm like man, by the time I getto it's like 25 years of paying
$45 a month.
That's crazy to me, but that'sthe way they do it.

Speaker 3 (01:37:48):
I don't understand how the JV team costs that much.

Speaker 4 (01:37:54):
Well, because they have a lot of members that are
eligible way more than we have.

Speaker 3 (01:37:58):
No, I get that, but what I'm saying is I don't
understand why they set it at$45.
Because I would join the Legion, but I get my disability and
that's about it.
I'm not paying $45 a year whenI can pay $35 a year to be on
the varsity team.
Well, but just like that.
So let me ask you.

Speaker 4 (01:38:17):
I'll tell you 100% exactly the reason why, I did it
, and I don't like the word theJV team, but that's cool man, it
was funny, it was funny.
I did giggle a little bitsilently, by the way.
No, but the reason why isbecause so many VFWs don't have
a canteen.
So when I'm traveling around,when I drive by a VFW, they're

(01:38:39):
going to be closed.
If they don't have a canteen at4 or 5 o'clock at night around
on Saturday, they're probablyclosed.
They got nothing going on, orbingo no offense, I'm not a
bingo player, Me either.

Speaker 3 (01:38:51):
I should be, because it actually looks fun.
If you can drink beer whileyou're doing it, I'm in.

Speaker 4 (01:38:55):
Yeah, no, all right, 100% agree.
But American legions all have acanteen.
They all have a bar.
So, no matter where I go, if Idrive by an American Legion I've
never stopped an AmericanLegion ever.
That's never had one ever.
I think that every one of themhas it.
So you know what?

(01:39:16):
If I drive by the VFW, it'sclosed.
I go right to an AmericanLegion.
No offense, but that's what Ido.

Speaker 3 (01:39:22):
Well, I personally think that they, both entities,
should honor each card.
Oh, absolutely.
But if you go to the FirewellClaire Legion, if you walk in
there and you don't, I went inthere after a bike night and I
knew the bartender because I wasin there with Eagle and the
Eagle wasn't with us and youmissed that bike night, charlie,

(01:39:45):
I believe.
And they walked up and saidwell, I need to see a card.
So Sean pulls out his creditcard because that's what he's
saying he's pulling out hiscredit card.
And she said, no, I need to seea Legion card.
So I look around and I'm likeI'm Fuck, there ain't nobody

(01:40:06):
here.
That's a legion member, mm-hmm.
And I looked at her and I saidI said, ma'am, you know me right
.
She goes yeah, you come in withTerry all the time.
I said, well, none of us arelegion members, but because
tonight was a bike night, wethought that maybe we she's like
.
Well, just don't tell anybody.

Speaker 4 (01:40:23):
Yeah, I'm lucky.

Speaker 3 (01:40:24):
Yeah, yeah, because if you get the old sticklers oh
yeah, no, sorry Out that you cansit here all night.

Speaker 4 (01:40:31):
but yeah so it's crazy.
I'm obviously not a memberthere.
I'm a member here in mypleasant right, but I go up
there.
I'm never been carded once.
I'll actually get my card outwaiting Right and but I'll hold
it under my wallet or under myhand Just waiting to see.
Yep, never once been carded inthere.
And I don't even go in therethat often.

(01:40:52):
I mean maybe five times a year,six times a year.
And when we maybe a little bitmore now that that we're riding
a little bit more, you know forthe riders group, but but when
we do we who do we run?

Speaker 3 (01:41:00):
into the eagle oh yeah, Usually Terry's on his
tours the.
Terry tour the Terry tour the.

Speaker 4 (01:41:07):
Terry tour.
Yeah, so we actually were.
We went up to Leathernecks Openhouse right Friday night Great,
great motorcycle club, you know, and we're out there to support
them, just like they support usto come to our bike night stuff
.
So we, we had their open houseand we had our burger and our
beer up there.
I'm gonna out and shot the shitwith some of the some of my
marine brothers, right, mm-hmm,although they're their own

(01:41:28):
motorcycle club, so they'redifferent.

Speaker 3 (01:41:30):
I actually had to stop them from humping each
other's legs.

Speaker 4 (01:41:34):
Well, I tell you what I get around that many jar
heads.
It gets you know that chubbystarts happening.
No but so we end up stopping tothe clear VFW on the way home,
right, right.
I'm like, well, shit's eighto'clock and most of you have W's
about eight o'clock.
They're closed.

Speaker 3 (01:41:48):
Claire's, claire's rocking, they're there they're
doing very well, since they puttheir boards in there.

Speaker 4 (01:41:52):
They're doing awesome and, of course, a lot of those
guys when we go down todepartment stuff right, the
conventions, the conferences,midwinners, johnny one, all that
stuff right.
1900, johnny Wad man.

Speaker 1 (01:42:01):
We hang out with those guys, right, so we walk in
there.

Speaker 4 (01:42:04):
They come up.
Oh man, great, see you guys.
You know they're just sofriendly up there, so we stop in
there.
We're there not even fiveminutes.
We just set our drinks down atthe table and in comes Terry.
Yep.
Terry the eagle doing is doingis Terry tour.
You know Terry's out on tourthat night.
You know it was insane, likewhat?
What's the?
What are the odds?
Yeah Well, probably pretty highwith Terry because he's all

(01:42:26):
over the place all the time.
But you know it's pretty cool,it is it was definitely pretty
cool, but in the, in the grandscheme of things, that's the way
that all VFW post should be,that's the way all American post
should be, and I do agree.
But here's the issue if theAmerican Legion allowed a VFW
member to have the sameprivileges as their membership

(01:42:46):
does, I don't think that the VFWwould allow an American Legion
member to come into a VFW andgive them the same privileges
because, as you said earlier,they're the JV team, so I don't
think no, no but I mean and thenthis is the terrible part of it
I don't think that a lot of VFWMemberships at the hierarchies

(01:43:07):
right will ever accept it goingthe other way.
They, they, will think right,the VFW hierarchy will always go
.
Well, we should, we're betterthan them, so they should allow
us.
Right, they should have theprivilege to allow us to come
into their place.
Unfortunately, you're probablycorrect, right and in that and
it would know I'm not either,and it would never go the other

(01:43:28):
way.
We won't let someone less thanus to come in.
I think that's bullshit.
I really do.
I do too, but I think that'sthe reason why it'll probably
never happen.
You agree?

Speaker 3 (01:43:41):
Yeah, you know.
I mean there's obviously notgonna change, change the whole
Stipulation that in order to bein the VFW you have to be a
member of a form war.
They're not gonna change thatstipulation.

Speaker 4 (01:43:54):
I get that.

Speaker 2 (01:43:56):
That was what it was founded for.
Right was the very foundingprinciple, so there's no way
that I get it.

Speaker 4 (01:44:01):
But but these two entities should be working
together.
Yes for the common goal,because we all have the same
common goal man serve veterans.
That's right, right, that'sright and we're lucky, our
communities that we're in.

Speaker 3 (01:44:12):
Luckily, here in town , rich young is a life member of
our post.

Speaker 4 (01:44:16):
Yeah, and he's a commander of the Legion and he
is command of the Legion.

Speaker 3 (01:44:19):
And we're me and him work together very well, like
we're gonna we're gonna work onthe War on terrorism memorial
memorial.

Speaker 4 (01:44:28):
So and I don't know if you, if you've heard so we
have here in Mount Pleasant,right, we've got where we're,
one more or two right that areseparate memorials, right down a
Broadway, we got Korea downtownat town center, and then we got
the Vietnam, the VietnamMichigan wall, right Island Park
, along with the global used tobe called the Justin Ellsworth

(01:44:50):
Because he was a Marine that waskilled during the Iraqi
conflict, and Some people Saidthat, hey, it shouldn't be just
for one person, it's got to benamed after.
so they call it, the IraqiAfghanistan Now no, I think it's
global war on terrorism.

Speaker 3 (01:45:06):
Oh, is that one?
Yeah okay, I thought theychanged it to because we don't
have a desert storm one, so Ithink it's I think it's doing
the whole desert storm, iraq,afghanistan conflicts so we're
looking at redoing that memorialbecause His fiance at the time
floated back in the town andBeautifully young lady, very

(01:45:30):
smart, rides a wicked bike to noreally got a choke.

Speaker 5 (01:45:33):
Oh yeah, it's got the choke.

Speaker 3 (01:45:38):
Yeah, something, she got the big eight fingers 16 is
a hanger.

Speaker 5 (01:45:42):
Yeah, but.

Speaker 3 (01:45:44):
But she wants to get involved with that and start
something to build that memorial, kind of like the one they have
in Harrison.

Speaker 4 (01:45:50):
Yeah, that's a beautiful one.
So, anyways, where I was goingwith this is the city of Mount
Pleasant is gonna redo towncenter Right, so they just got
awarded a grant through thestate.
They've been, they've beenworking and spending the works.
They reached out to us and atthe VFW, along with the American
Legion, about moving All thememorials down to downtown, down
to Island Park, yep, and takethe one out of town center
because they want to.

(01:46:10):
They're gonna redesign thewhole town center area and we
said they want to know if thatwould offend us or if it was
okay to for them to do it.
And Michelle Sponseller hereshe runs the downtown.
Development district, businessarea thing for the city, and I
happened to be up there doing aproclamation thing for for work

(01:46:30):
and I said absolutely Just makesure we're involved with it,
because we want to have ourhonor guard there, probably the
riders group there to helpescort the monuments down to
Island Park, absolutely stufflike that.
So just make sure that we'reinvolved in it.
But absolutely we want them alltogether, we want one spot for
everybody to go and they shouldall be and yeah, they should all

(01:46:51):
be together and everybody, andthen you could just drive to one
location and you can see themall.
Right, I mean, they should bein some sort of order.

Speaker 3 (01:46:59):
Right and so you do World War one then, to then yes
so they would have to start onthe if you're looking at the
Vietnam wall, they would have tostart to the east well, yeah, I
mean they would, but it shouldbe in a Right.

Speaker 4 (01:47:14):
It would just make sense to have it that way.
So there'll be some discussionsthat's gonna be happening now
that they got this grant, someother things.
I think that that that towncenter area is under.
They had a concept of what theywant to do, but I think now
it's moving forward.

Speaker 3 (01:47:27):
It's gonna be like a green space.

Speaker 4 (01:47:28):
Yeah, so they're adding more parking and stuff,
because that's just a clusterfuck down there.

Speaker 3 (01:47:31):
Yeah, it really is, but so we're fucked up.
Then a run over dog down there,yeah is Because.

Speaker 2 (01:47:40):
Okay, so Mount Pleasant already has the
Michigan Vietnam Memorial.
Yes, yes so once we moveeverything to there.
Do we know of any othermemorials Statewide, or would
that honestly become theMichigan veterans memorial, do

(01:48:02):
you think?

Speaker 3 (01:48:02):
No, cuz Harrison has their own Memorial.

Speaker 4 (01:48:07):
Coleman's gotta be a phone to have.
It has one, but I will tell youthis though we need to.

Speaker 3 (01:48:12):
We need to ride down to Down by Greenville, belding,
belding, and see the one thatDenny Craig craft put up down
there, because that's supposedto be high.

Speaker 4 (01:48:25):
I will tell you this if you live in Michigan and you
support veterans and you want tosee a fantastic Memorial,
coleman is awesome.
Yes cuz they got brick, paversand stuff.
But the Harrison one is.

Speaker 5 (01:48:41):
Legit.

Speaker 4 (01:48:42):
It literally has a wall.
So if you served and you werefrom this county, this county,
this county, this county,although the local central
Michigan counties, right,isabella's, the Claire's glad
ones, right their names aroundthe wall, and then they have
these little little gardens thatyou have.
World War one, world War two,right.

(01:49:02):
Golf war, vietnam, korea,little warranty, as they go,
they go around Afghanistan,they're ackee ba ba ba right.
And then, if you served, rightin that time, prane, you can get
a brick with your name in it.
Yep, right, it is unbelievable.
Unbelievable that's probablybesides going to Washington DC,

(01:49:24):
right, which I think which, Iwhich.
I've Been through them all rightwhich are narrowing it.
Oh, yeah, yeah.
So actually when I was at FastCompany we actually took a bus.
They took our open to and upand we did we should do a post
visit.

Speaker 2 (01:49:39):
Yeah, man post Anybody who is wanting to go
rent a coach bus and just be alittle money to well, we have to
raise money for that.

Speaker 5 (01:49:48):
That'd be a pricey trip.

Speaker 2 (01:49:49):
That'd be a hell of a trip, though.
So so we I got nice trip.
Sorry, sidebar, but no no, no,you're good.

Speaker 4 (01:49:55):
So on that trip, right and DC, right, we did all
those, all those more else.
But we also got the opportunityto go to eighth and I, which is
the Marine Corps barrackseighth and I and that's where
the silent drill team is Right.
So at Fast Company, we wouldhelp.
Do they call them eveningparades?
Right, they do like two a monthright on on the Norfolk base,

(01:50:16):
where our headquarters is thatFor the public to come in and
see?
You know, we'd be marchingaround doing all the all the
stuff and address blues, but wegot to go to eighth and I and
watch what they do.
That sound drill team comes out.
You literally have to get onright now and register your four
spots.
I think it's like five bucks orsomething.
I mean something stupid, right?
You probably cannot get inthere until 2025 or 2026.

(01:50:40):
They're booked out that far.
It's unbelievable.
If you've never seen the MarineCorps silent drill team, I know
probably the Army has one, I'msure the Air Force has one, I'm
sure everybody has one.

Speaker 2 (01:50:50):
Unfucking real, unfucking real gives you a
little bit of a chubby.
Huh, Well, yeah, Well I get achubby, just beat him around.

Speaker 4 (01:50:57):
Marines in general.

Speaker 3 (01:51:00):
Right, but you see the stuff that these guys do,
slinging rifles around, all shitman.
Now we're talking a whole zerozero cadence, zero calls or
anything.

Speaker 4 (01:51:08):
They literally walk out.
That's why they're silent.
It is absolutely off the hook.

Speaker 2 (01:51:16):
Not to disrespect the silent drill platoon, but I
think that's the first time aMarine has ever been silent
about being a Marine.
Don't hate.

Speaker 4 (01:51:30):
You were attached to Marines, right?
I wasn't.
No, oh, you're not me, you're.

Speaker 2 (01:51:34):
Oh, yeah, I was blues , what they call so blue, so you
had a ship.
Yeah, I was blue side, greenside.
So green side is FMF fleet,marine Force with with the
Marines and blue side isEverything that's not with the
Marines.
Yeah, so hospitals, clinics,ships I was not on the ship.

(01:51:54):
I did a tour at the BethesdaNaval Hospital, which is now
Walter Reed.
Yeah, I was there during thename change and everything, I
had to have my orders reissued.
That was crazy, how's weird.
But then from there I went overto Naval Health Clinic Hawaii.
When I got my orders for NavalHealth Clinic Hawaii, I was

(01:52:14):
actually trying to go FMF, butNeeds of the Navy didn't allow
that to happen.
So what do they do?
They get me at Naval HealthClinic Hawaii and they put me on
a kind of yo-hey bae.

Speaker 4 (01:52:26):
Oh, with all the Marines and all the Marines and
you're in Hawaii, so you're notbitchin.

Speaker 2 (01:52:30):
I wasn't bitchin, but I still wanted to be.
You know whatever, but it iswhat it is.

Speaker 4 (01:52:35):
So that's what, after you served at County of Hawaii
Bay, did you really still wantto be around Marines?
No, not really.
Probably not.
Yeah we get a lot of debauchery.
If you give Marines in time,nothing good happens.

Speaker 3 (01:52:49):
Sounds like the infantry.

Speaker 4 (01:52:55):
Oh, so I actually actually did a refuel defuel
when I was a fast company weactually deployed to Pearl
Mm-hmm and where they take thenuclear fuel off the sub or the
ships right and put them back inand we actually do security.
Well, that's happening right.
So we're already in a base butwe're doing legit around it.

(01:53:15):
We had to wear the, the TDSmonitors right for the radiation
on the shit right.
So I spent about three monthsout there and it was awesome
because we were three days on,three days off.
So those three days off I was.
I was an NCO as a corp of thetime, so all the other NCOs, we
had a van at the time did this?

Speaker 2 (01:53:34):
does this story end and you not being a corporal?
Oh, no, no, no.

Speaker 4 (01:53:40):
Probably if they found out what we did.
So we had this little clickright, there was four of us
right.
So, yeah, when we, when we hadour three days off yeah, it was
spent a lot down at WaikikiBeach Spent.

Speaker 2 (01:53:54):
It was awesome, man.
I had an apartment right on,right off the Waikiki, a block
away from Waikiki, yeah.

Speaker 4 (01:53:58):
I mean we, we, we hopped in the Gov.
You know, we had a, we had acard for gas.
We, just man, we were all overthe little monitors.
Yeah, so it's called like Ithink it was a TDS monitor and
measure the radiation, right.
So they had what they called aTSL time-sensitive operation.
So they literally, like welocked the sub down.

(01:54:19):
All the hatches aredouble-locked.
We had to go through the sub atthe time I think it was the
California that was thereEverything was locked up and
Every employee that worked therethere's lots of villains that
work there, right, becausethat's not just military but
there's lots of villains.
We had gangways that went outbecause it's dried act, right.

(01:54:41):
So we had a guy literally bombthe dried act just walking
around the ship Whole time downthere 120 feet down.
You know it's a lot of steps Upand down, right, but anyways,
all these gangways that went outto the sub, everything's
barricaded off and they all hadcolor-coded badges, like ours
were orange, so if you had a redone, you you had to go through

(01:55:05):
the red gate Down your gangwayinto the in the sub.
For whatever you had to do Idon't know what they did on the
subs or the ships, because wedid one in Bremerton, washington
too, but we had a guy we werein Bremerton, anyways comes out,
he had a red badge on it, camedown a blue gangway and you shot
him, and I had one of my guysbecause I was a corporal there

(01:55:27):
too.
Literally m590 Mossberg,shotgun, with a civilian dude on
his face, shot gun to the backof his head Because he came,
because he came out he.
A different colored badge cameout the wrong off the wrong
gangway, off that ship, andactually I think the California
was a ship I can't remember whatthe sub was, but anyways Comes.

(01:55:51):
Yeah, I mean, it's like how thehell did you get?
Because they compartmentalize,right everything, so certain
people can only get in certainareas, but yeah, so anyways,
when they're removing that,those fuel rods, they have those
huge dock cranes, right.
So there's crews that go up,there's like four guys that go
up in those cranes and they haveeverything from kitchens to

(01:56:11):
bedrooms to everything, as theydo like a 24-hour shifts, right,
oil guy, whatever and they pullthose fuel it's like a big
container with the fuel and theydrop it into a Container like a
rail rail container, get sealedin there and then they haul it
wherever.
They bury it in the mountains.

Speaker 3 (01:56:30):
So that's why you got a third ear grown out of your,
for that's the reason why mylower extremities?

Speaker 4 (01:56:35):
people would think I'm African-American right.
Touches my kneecap every nowand again.
Yeah but no.
So I mean it was just all thesecrazy things.
I'm looking back when I'm that20 year old kid Right and I
literally get a call over theradio and I was driving a golf
cart right, because I have to gofrom one side of the dry dock
those things are thousands offeet long Over to see the guy.

(01:56:57):
You know he calls over theradio.
I will shoot this mother Well wehad a cold, just like the
police.
Do you know 906, gate blue, oryou know 906, whatever right,
that was something that washappening.
You know I had to get overthere.
So I'm cruising around and Iroll up and he's got the shotgun
of people like, oh my god, it'sgonna shoot this guy.
How the hell did you get fromwhen you went?
So they shut everything down.

(01:57:17):
They pulled everybody out ofthe boat Right off that sub and
they went in there and found outhow that's that hatch?
Because it's double locked.
It's like from one side life onthe other side.
So how, why was that other sideunlocked for that hatch to open
?
Right?
I mean, it was a huge deal.
I mean I was like you know,generals are calling and you

(01:57:38):
know, because we got thecivilian with a shotgun back in
the back of his head laying outof the concrete.
You know the fuck's going on.
Yeah, it was.
It was wild at 20 years old,like I mean that he had all
rights to shoot the guy right.
I mean, that was that was it.
They all know the game.

Speaker 2 (01:57:54):
Right, especially with nuclear.
They don't joke around with no.
The one experience that.
I have with nuke.
With nuclear was actually notwhen I was active duty.
It was.
You guys are probably laugh,but it was back when I was a C
cadet that's a great program,man.
It's the C.
Cadets is a great program andyou still have to wear that

(01:58:14):
faggity wet uniform.

Speaker 4 (01:58:22):
Jack Nicholas man.

Speaker 3 (01:58:25):
Some fucking courtesy .

Speaker 2 (01:58:32):
It's all right.
You guys are old, so I don'tknow the reference that you're
talking about.

Speaker 3 (01:58:36):
Oh he's he's he's Want the truth.
Did you know?
Bills.
Did you know bills?
Yeah, some bills, sorry bills.
He could run through that andhe did it in a major pains voice
.

Speaker 4 (01:58:59):
We digress.

Speaker 2 (01:59:01):
To tell the story.
I'll tell real quick about thesecret that's.
It's a great program.
You know Anyone ages 10 to 17if they're interested in the sea
services Coast Guard or Navythat they can join and they can
learn all kinds of differentstuff.
But anyway, one of the thingsthat I did was port operations

(01:59:24):
training, and so to do that, Iended up going down to Kings Bay
, georgia.

Speaker 4 (01:59:29):
Oh man, I had some Marines from security forces
down there.
They did security on the base.

Speaker 2 (01:59:33):
Okay, so Loan the Rockets, yeah I did a two week
training down there back in 2006.
I did a two week training downthere with the C cadets and the
base would shut down, seemedlike almost daily.
And then, you know, sirenswould go off and you used to
just sat wherever you wereoutside, nobody moved, nobody

(01:59:55):
moved.
And they told us that and itwas kind of crazy.
It was kind of crazy how theydid all that.
And then a few years later, Ihad graduated high school and I
was I was active duty.
Well, one of the guys Igraduated high school with, he
ended up going Naval securityforce and he ended up doing Nuke
nuke security down in Kings Bayas well.

Speaker 4 (02:00:18):
Yeah.
So it's crazy is when I wentthrough security for school, my
one of my best friends stillbest friends I actually went
visit them out in Boston a fewyears ago Well, probably five,
six years ago at this point, butit was good for school together
.
I went to fast company,qualified to go there, got
selected.
He ended up going to Kings Bay,georgia, with another buddy of
mine, steve Harwood.
They both live Massachusettsfor Mount area now, but anyways

(02:00:44):
they went down there.
So I just got Damian toactually join the American
Legion and now he's joined theirLegion ride writers program.
So I'm getting him involved,right.
And it comes down to he boughta Harley, right and I'm like,
hey, brother, you know you gotto get.

Speaker 3 (02:01:00):
American steel.

Speaker 4 (02:01:01):
Unfortunately, unfortunately, doesn't qualify
to be in the VFW.
Oh, really no, because, likeyou know that's, I Qualified
through my service at fastcompany, right.
But he didn't have that right.
He was standing at Kings Bay,georgia garden, nuclear missiles
Loaded them on the subs orwhatever right, back and forth
as they come and go, do it doingwhatever right.
So yeah, he just never got thatexperience.

(02:01:21):
Then we met back up in thefleet at three at Thorbiton
submarines on 29 palms.
We just did a quick pump overto Japan for six months, never
signed anything over there.
But yes, he just doesn'tqualify.
But at least I got him insomething, which is which is the
important, the important factright, we're gonna say how you
serve.
Right, join something.
Now he absolutely loves it.

(02:01:41):
He's becoming an active memberof that American Legion in
Massachusetts which he'sactually a state trooper has
been Fuck, he's got to belieutenant by now.
He was actually Was at Airportwhen we landed, so he was a
shift commander.
So he came over and grabbed usfrom the gate, which was pretty
cool, man.
And then some of the other thirdpretend something were in
brothers of mine.

(02:02:01):
We all met up, went out todinner with all the wives and
shit and girlfriends.
You know it was, it was cool.
So I just went over there toactually see it was.
I haven't seen him since we gotout.
You know we got out within acouple weeks of each other, but
we had the other eas time, right, all the extra leave.
So, yeah, I actually left early, right like 30 days, but yeah,
it was, it was, it was cool andthat that's where that

(02:02:23):
brotherhood part comes from,right?
So these guys that you guysServe with an Iraq right, you
guys get together, you guys aredoing golf outings, right, or
you're, you're hanging out,you're going up to someone's
cottage up north or doingwhatever.
Unfortunately, all my guys havegot a frickin fly halfway
across the country to go see him, so it doesn't happen as often
as it should, but we actuallyJump on the phones and we

(02:02:44):
FaceTime once a month.
You know I'll sit, I'll go back, I'll go down to one of the
spare bedrooms.
You know We'll crack beers andwe FaceTime and bullshit, just
like we're doing right now,which is crazy important, right,
you know so.
But yeah, so I actually hadsomebody that was down to Kings
Bay, so it's cool that you'vebeen there.
I've never been there.

Speaker 2 (02:03:02):
Yeah, yeah, and I remember all the craziness that
I had to go through to get there.
I had at how old was I?
15, 16 years old.
I had to fill out the 12 pagepaperwork to get a security
clearance to even be on the base, you know, and Most of our
training was they all.

(02:03:23):
What they call it the upper andthe lower base is, I think, is
how they called it and Lowerbase is out by the water where
all the ships and stuff were.
And you know, upper is whenmost of my training was, but
when we obviously were out onthe water then.

Speaker 3 (02:03:39):
So they made a 15 year old get a secret security
clearance to go.
Well, how fucked up can it be15 year old be at that time?
Ninja assassin.
Yeah so that's that's exactlywe had that.

Speaker 4 (02:03:54):
We had that secret security clearance is to be in
security forces.
Yeah, because we're around thebut.
But what's the same example ofan 18 year old to a 15 year old?
Well, I mean, you could stillbe a turd at 14, as you can be
an 18 right.

Speaker 3 (02:04:07):
I had to have a secret because of the the
Singars.
To operate the Singars, you hadto have what's that?
It's the radio system.

Speaker 4 (02:04:17):
Really and when I first I could the new school and
make my machine.

Speaker 3 (02:04:21):
No, it's not so.
Basically, when I went in, wehave the.
We had the prick 77 and theprick 46 we always had the prick
E7.

Speaker 4 (02:04:33):
We always had the prick E6 of the we had the prick
E7 for the staff.
So it's a dick, so.

Speaker 3 (02:04:39):
But you had, in order to do To change the frequencies
and stuff you would have to do,authentification.
So you had carried that ceo Iso what it basically was like in
the movies you got to break itopen.

Speaker 4 (02:04:54):
No, no, not like that .
That's a big book.

Speaker 3 (02:04:57):
I mean it's like nine pounds, and then you'd have to
find the fucking day and thetime and then you call into your
fucking your headquarters guyand you'd be like, hey, this is
me Authenticate.
And then he come back and sayauthenticate, charlie tango.
So then you'd have to gothrough this fucking book and

(02:05:19):
find out what the that's one is,and then you'd be like whiskey.
You were now logged on to thenet so that what they did is
they got rid of the prick 77'sand all that, and I'll call you
back Erlton.
They got all that bullshit onthere and With the Singars it's

(02:05:41):
like a frequency hopper.
You didn't have to do that.
They would give you a frequency, but the once you got on the,
the radio, it would, they wouldsimultaneously, and yeah, they
would jump, they jumpfrequencies, so they could be
synchronized.
So when his radio is jumping,mines jumping so that they

(02:06:02):
couldn't triangulate.
You know this other bullshit.

Speaker 4 (02:06:05):
That's cool.

Speaker 5 (02:06:06):
Yeah, it was, it was, it was a level of those radios
operated on satellites.
Yeah, and it was all encrypted.
We had, you know, we hadencryption boxes that would, you
know, change our frequencies.

Speaker 3 (02:06:17):
That's right, because a chief and Caucus the
Culkinator would have to come upand put the CU plug it in and
and get the days codes and stuff.
So it was pretty interesting.

Speaker 2 (02:06:29):
Yeah, but a reminder for operational security.
Gentlemen the crazy.
I know that's old technology.

Speaker 4 (02:06:36):
But no, but that's that's the.
That's the crazy part of it,right?
Is you talk about I Made a jokeabout the enigma machine, right
, like I longer took him tocrack that and you're talking
World War two stuff, right, yep?
And now we have stuff that canhop frequencies right, you could
do the same thing with your,your computer, right?
Right, I'm not, I'm enough tobe dangerous, but don't you have

(02:06:56):
like whatever VPNs or somethingthat can bounce you all over
the fucking place so you can'ttrack people right or whatever?
So I'm sure that that stuffnowadays is so high-tech that I
should have learned computers.
I'd probably be a gazillionaireby now.

Speaker 2 (02:07:10):
There's certain things that you know if you
enlist, and there's certain MOScodes and whatnot that basically
guarantee you Top secretclearance to do your job.
You know when you can walk inanything when you get out, I'm
sure it's crazy because, as as aNavy corpsman, I had to have a
secret clearance because I'mdealing with people social
security number.
I could have stole anyone'sidentity if I wanted to, you

(02:07:33):
know.
So you had to have, you know,those clearances and it's I
don't know.
Look it back, it just didn'tseem like a big deal, but and
how old were you?

Speaker 4 (02:07:44):
20 yeah 18, and this is where I always circle back to
.
I look at 19 and 20 year oldkids nowadays.
It's typically your 18 when yougo in, but you can't drink a
beer in a bar in Michigan.
But by the time, by the timeyou will, you always go to
Canada.

Speaker 1 (02:08:01):
No, but I mean by the time you know right, you're,
you're.

Speaker 4 (02:08:03):
You look at a 20 year old kid and I see him at the
local bars or something right,or out in town, because we got
CMU right, and I'm like what inthe?
Fuck.
I'm like you would never make aday in the military like the
shit we dealt with in thetechnology that we use and the
mission that we drove.
It's so crazy.
These kids tonight have no cluebecause they're soft.

Speaker 5 (02:08:26):
They're soft as fuck they have not gotten out and
experienced the real world?
Yeah, they don't know they're.
They're so inundated withwhat's in front of them and it's
usually a screen or a phone orsomething, but they don't know
real-world shit.

Speaker 4 (02:08:40):
Yeah, they had big shit.
So let me ask you a question Doyou think everybody should
serve two years in the military?

Speaker 5 (02:08:46):
Yeah because, it doesn't Israel do that.

Speaker 4 (02:08:48):
I think Israel does a lot of a lot of countries.

Speaker 5 (02:08:52):
European countries.
Israel is one of them.

Speaker 3 (02:08:55):
So it's one of them, it's, it's, it's everyone,
everybody.
Well, right, no, I know, I know, it's in everybody.

Speaker 4 (02:09:01):
No, I get it but would you Want to serve with
somebody that had zero interestto be in there?

Speaker 2 (02:09:08):
No.

Speaker 4 (02:09:09):
I wouldn't either.
Honestly, I wouldn't want toeither but it'd make your
country better?

Speaker 3 (02:09:13):
Well, because they'd get whipped into shape, or were
they?

Speaker 4 (02:09:16):
just say fuck it and throw me out.
I Don't care.
What are you gonna do to me?

Speaker 3 (02:09:20):
Throw me out.

Speaker 4 (02:09:22):
I guess I'm making 11 worth until your time's up and
make their yeah, but then you'dmake their attitude against the
country worse.

Speaker 3 (02:09:28):
Well, that's true too right For me.

Speaker 4 (02:09:31):
I want to be, and I did have right, a few guys.
When I got out to the fleet.
They were in to get the greencard Right, they do four years
honorable service right, theycould become a US citizen.
They were Cubans right, awesome, 100% agree with it.
Right, they're.
They're great guys.
They're still doing greatthings out there.
I had one.

(02:09:51):
The judge says I got one of twochoices.
You're not you're, you're gonnago to prison or you're gonna
Marines.
Yeah, Guess what I serve with aguy great guy.
I think he's still doing goodthings right.
I haven't heard anything badabout him because a lot of us
still talk.
You know, Facebook's a greatthing, but in the grand scheme

(02:10:11):
of things right.
I don't think me personallywould I want to be with somebody
that had zero interest to be inthere.

Speaker 5 (02:10:18):
You know, you know if they usually those type of
people that have zero interestof doing that stuff.
They've been to me, they've,they've been inundated with not
they're selfish there, I mean, Iwould say that's a broad
generalization, it's justthey've.
They've never been taughtanything Other than themselves.

(02:10:38):
They've never been taught tosay hey, sometimes you got to be
a team player, sometimes yougot to think about things other
than your immediate environmentTo get through this foot through
, get through this world.

Speaker 2 (02:10:50):
What's the?
There's a quote coming to myhead.
You guys might know it, but Ithink it's.
What is it?
It's Tough times create strongmen.
Strong men create good times.
Good times create weak men.
And weak men create tough times.

Speaker 4 (02:11:09):
Yep, that's exactly.
It's full circle and it's fullcircle.
So so you start talking aboutgenerations, right, and now
we're looking at the generationsof World War two's.
To the boomers Yep, right,boomers.
To the Gen X guys right.
And now we're back to the week.
People are gonna create toughtimes, right?

Speaker 5 (02:11:24):
That's what I say to that brick is that's exactly it.
I was thinking about that,maybe a few weeks ago.
Yeah, I had came across anarticle or a video log of
Somebody saying.
It wasn't that exact quote, butit was somebody saying
something along those, alongthose lines, right, you know?
I want to say it was one of.

Speaker 2 (02:11:44):
That's the simplest way to put it.
You know no for sure, becauseit is that way yeah.

Speaker 4 (02:11:50):
I mean, I can remember my, you know the
grandparents, right they were.
They were huge on canning food.

Speaker 1 (02:11:56):
But we used to walk into the basement and there'd be
.

Speaker 4 (02:11:59):
So three years full of shit that's canned.
We don't can anything anymorevery rarely, right, let me know
us there's.
There's a few right now.
Preppers unfortunately get geta bad rap.
Right, there are theseconspiracy people, right, but
you look at COVID times shorttime ago, you couldn't get shit
from the grocery store, right,and the people that I've lived.

Speaker 5 (02:12:20):
It are the people that have prepped well,
comfortably survived it.

Speaker 4 (02:12:25):
Right, they're the ones that are canning the food,
crannied, you know, the greenbeans or whatever's coming out
of the garden, the tomatoes andshit.
Those are the people that arethat get it right.
But our grandparents did itbecause why?
Every ounce of food, everyPiece of metal, had to go to the
war effort?
Right?
So they struggled through thetimes.
Right, they had victory gardens, but they called them back then

(02:12:48):
right, they, they the canned,they did the prepping, they did
all the things.
And then now we've gotten tothe point where we rely on Myer
or Walmart for our food.
And if myer, walmart don't havefood, what are you gonna do?
Yep right you know I'm saying,or what happens when the gas
station shuts down right, peopleare not here.

Speaker 2 (02:13:07):
Yeah Well, look at how I don't know how long ago is
, probably a few years ago nowbut ransomware attacks shut down
that whole pipeline on theSoutheast East Coast.

Speaker 4 (02:13:18):
Yeah, it was the East .

Speaker 2 (02:13:18):
Coast yeah.
Yeah, for sure shut them down.
For what a week.
People are running out of gas,like what do you do without gas?
Yeah, you know what are yougonna do when it's the fan and
your only choice is to survive.

Speaker 4 (02:13:34):
Well, but typically you're gonna get the guys right
from the military that havelived without a lot of things
Right because we've gone to thefield right.
I would, I would well, I wouldgo to the field for two weeks
and then give us 15 MREs.
Right, we break them down fieldstyle, throw them.
Our packs are humping it and Iknew I only had crackers today
with Jalapeno cheese was thefucking bomb.

Speaker 5 (02:13:59):
Bro I made.

Speaker 4 (02:14:00):
I made when I was a fireteam leader.
I swear to God, I made everyone of my guys.
I checked their packs, for weever went, mrs Dash, seasoning
Small, the small bottle, yep ofa one, bold and spicy yes.
Cuz.
I don't know if you ever gotthe vegetarian fucking MRE main
meal.
Fuck that.
Garbage, garbage back in theday, garbage.

(02:14:21):
You put a little Mrs Dash inthat bitch, a little poor, a one
bold and spicy, mix it up Bestmeal you ever ate in your life,
but out of an MRE pancake.

Speaker 5 (02:14:33):
Oh, you put him huh range of pudding Well we would,
so I well, I don't, let me.

Speaker 4 (02:14:39):
Let me.
Let me tell you we didn't raise.
You take the pound cake, whichI think was a lemon pound cake.
Yep, we crumple it up, you openup it up.
You take your cocoa, a littlebit of water.
Yep, you mix it up so it's realthick, right then pour it in
there.
Is that what it was?

Speaker 5 (02:14:51):
Yeah basically no, we get our crackers, we use our
MRE crackers to oh really, youknow.
I mean, you know you cannotwith the MRE crackers.
You can't take a bite of thatshit without taking a drink of
something that's just gonna bindyou to fuck up.

Speaker 4 (02:15:04):
You need about four gallons of water.

Speaker 5 (02:15:07):
Yeah.
So we would take that, you know, crumple it, just break them
down to pretty much a powder.
Mm-hmm, you know whether or notwe want to dump some pound cake
in it.
Take the fucking cocoa andcoffee and the cock in the
creamer Packets, the the Folgersinstant coffee in the creamer
packet, dumping in our stirredup Into a pudding consistent
consistency.

(02:15:27):
Yeah yep, that was, that wasour dessert.

Speaker 4 (02:15:30):
So yeah, so we just took the, or I just took the,
the cocoa powder, right, mm-hmm,mix it up, so it's real thick,
right, and I just pour it overthe pound cake.
That's the way.
Yep, I didn't know about thecracker thing.
But we used to take thenon-rates the boots right, that
just came out.

Speaker 5 (02:15:42):
You had to hydrate those crackers cuz.

Speaker 4 (02:15:44):
Yeah, oh yeah, they straight suck every ounce of
liquid in your body right out,right.
But we would actually take yeah, we would actually take Our
boots right, that just came tous, and we would do a cracker
race right, so we get to thefield, right, these guys are
maybe Maybe to the unit coupleweeks, right, we'd be out in the
field.
We'd make those motherfuckersopen up the crackers right, and

(02:16:08):
there's usually back.
I don't know if you only hadone.
Did you have one wafer or didyou have two, two?
Yeah, we had one.
Yeah, so there were like adouble pack, right, but there's
like four crackers in each waferkind of thing.
We'd make them race Right, soyou could finish first, and the
one that finished first no firewatch that night the loser had

(02:16:29):
to stay in double shift right,you're a dick, so that guy might
be up at 1100,.
that guy might be up again at 04, right, but we would make him
race, so they would get thefirst one just about down.
They looked at the second onegoing.
I don't know if it's worth it,because they weren't allowed to
drink when they did it.
No canteen water, no, nothing.

(02:16:49):
You had to eat it dry and they'dbe like, oh, I can do it.
You're all trying to act alltough and shit right, they don't
know AMRE crackers.
Man, they would hit that secondcracker and they'd be pfft,
pfft, shit's falling out oftheir mouth dry shit, Not one
ounce of fucking saliva in theirmouth left at all.
And they were like you guyswere dicks to us.

Speaker 5 (02:17:07):
Oh shit, yeah.
I took a half canteen of waterjust to hydrate.

Speaker 4 (02:17:09):
But they were the first ones to make the next set
of boots that came to the unit.
Do it right, because they werelike you know, I did it.

Speaker 5 (02:17:14):
That's because shit rolls downhill.

Speaker 4 (02:17:16):
But is it hazing?
Maybe a little bit, but notreally, because we're not
physically abusing someone.

Speaker 2 (02:17:22):
Yeah, you weren't hurting anybody.
Yeah, you know what I mean.
It was just a fun joke that youwere teaching them about MREs.

Speaker 4 (02:17:27):
It gets passed on.
Yeah for sure, man Make sureyou pour water on the crackers.

Speaker 2 (02:17:31):
I've only had a handful of MREs, Obviously at
Navy.
We don't.

Speaker 4 (02:17:36):
You guys read that Denny's every day.
I tell you what, though?
Mres are the best shit.
No, no, no, no.

Speaker 5 (02:17:42):
Air Force eats that Denny's every day.
Do you know?
Weeks worth of MREs.
I'm telling you the type ofshit you would fucking take
after MRE most civilians woulddope.
They will never, evercomprehend.

Speaker 4 (02:17:52):
US Gen US Gen XMECer.
She had a two liter Coke at thehouse when I come back from the
field.

Speaker 5 (02:17:58):
You were shit, literally a center block.

Speaker 4 (02:18:01):
I would drink a whole two liter when I got back to
the house after coming out ofthe field for two weeks and I
would not leave the bathroom forabout 48 hours Because yeah,
that's MRE will bind you up.

Speaker 5 (02:18:15):
It is.

Speaker 4 (02:18:16):
Well, by design, but that's the purpose of it right,
so you're not hitting the headcall all the time.

Speaker 3 (02:18:20):
right, I'm going to use Mavitair the corpsman's got
to come in there and do the old.

Speaker 5 (02:18:25):
Yeah, let me give you an imminent item of you guys
got to stick the old thumb upthere and pry that fucking rock
out.

Speaker 4 (02:18:33):
You're hoping it's just the thumb.
Yeah, Ha, ha, ha ha.

Speaker 2 (02:18:38):
Can't give away the trade secrets.
Yeah, it's why they don't keepgoats on boats, just stay away
with the silver bullet brother.

Speaker 3 (02:18:43):
I don't want the silver bullet Keep goats on
boats.

Speaker 4 (02:18:45):
That's right?

Speaker 2 (02:18:46):
No, so I only had a couple MREs over my years.

Speaker 3 (02:18:51):
But like ravioli.
Ravioli was decent.
I'll tell you what the sea ratsBecause.
I'm aging myself here.
When I first joined, it wasright when they were
transitioning from sea rats toMREs 1972.
83,.
Thanks anyway, Pretty much thesame difference 83,.

Speaker 4 (02:19:10):
I think I was in third grade.

Speaker 6 (02:19:13):
So I had this Vietnam back.
I had this Vietnam back.

Speaker 3 (02:19:19):
We're eating MREs in the old P-38.
You're opening up with them andhe goes.
You know what the best thingabout these are?
I'm like I really don't know,because it looks disgusting.
He goes.
You can put them in a sock andyou can beat gooks off you with
them and I was like what he goesyeah.

(02:19:42):
This one time on this fire base,we got overrun and I'm like
whole and he's sitting there thewhole time he's eating it.
He's like making love to thisfucking sea rat.
Yeah, they saved my life.
Yeah, I was like what the hellman?
What have I got myself into?

(02:20:03):
Let's do this the same one.
I was an E5.
He was an E4.
Figure that out right Combatveteran.

Speaker 4 (02:20:11):
He's got a CIB Vietnam and I'm his boss Because
he had zero fucks, so he didn'tcare about that.
Yep, he had zeroes, Zeroes, ohyeah.

Speaker 3 (02:20:24):
So I'm his boss right and the first siren and we were
going from the long handledE-tools to the D-Rates the
D-Rates yeah.
So the first siren came out andhe said hey, you need to go and
you need to get all your squad,they need to turn that shit in.

Speaker 4 (02:20:45):
The long handles.

Speaker 3 (02:20:46):
You're talking about the long handles to get, the
short handles To get thecollapsibles?

Speaker 4 (02:20:48):
Yeah, to get the collapsibles.
The old wood handle.

Speaker 5 (02:20:51):
When I first listened to it, I listened to it.

Speaker 4 (02:20:52):
I'm trying to track where you're going because I
don't know this before my time,the D-rings.

Speaker 5 (02:20:58):
Yes, I know about the old wood handle E-tools Because
when I listened it was right.
At that time everything wasstill transitioning from the old
Vietnam era to all the newstuff.
So when I got into my uniteverything was already issued
out.
The only thing they had leftwere old Vietnam eras.

(02:21:18):
My TA-50 was all still oldVietnam.
I had the fucking old LBE.
I got issued the old, fuckingVietnam era fucking Rucksack the
E-tool.
I looked at it.
I was like what the fuck isthis?

Speaker 3 (02:21:31):
Yeah, so everyone knows what the wood handle
E-tool looks like.
It's got the shovel on one sideand a pick on the other so that
if you're in the field to takea dump you can open that up and
you put your hand on the pickside and you just have your
cheeks hung off the other sideand you can do your business.
So anyway, they told us that wehad to turn them in and I went

(02:21:56):
up to Nick and I said read cityposts.
I think when we did the plus hesaid I ain't turning them in.
I was like I was like damn it,nick, come on.
And he's like hey, sorry, I'mnot turning them in and I'm like
you have to.
And he goes no, I don't, I'mnot turning them in.
And I said why he goes.
Do you think you can beat Gooksoff you with that fucking

(02:22:19):
D-ring?

Speaker 6 (02:22:20):
And I was like here we are Because he was the same
one with the fucking sock andthe.

Speaker 3 (02:22:25):
I was like what are you talking about?
He goes, yeah, he goes.
I can tell you the story.
I was on this fire base and wegot over, run my 16 jammed up
and and that's what I had.
He goes, and I had to beatmotherfuckers off me to stay
alive.
I ain't giving it up.
So, anyway, I go to my squadleader, allen Corsair, who was a

(02:22:48):
Vietnam veteran, but he waslike a river rat.
He did the boats up the river,so he didn't.
He didn't have much experiencebeating Gooks off, he just shot
him with a 50 cap.

Speaker 4 (02:23:04):
50 cap.

Speaker 3 (02:23:05):
So then I go to my platoon sergeant, sergeant
Lannick, vietnam, that, and Itold them both.
I said Nick's not going to turnit in and they're like why Does
?
He said you ever try to beatGooks off you with a D-ring or
some shit like that, and theystarted laughing.
So we're getting held upbecause that was the only one

(02:23:26):
that wasn't in First SergeantMonogu.
The guy joined when he was 16.
I don't know how he did that.
He was a first sergeant therefor 39 years or something.
Salt dog.
Yeah, salt dog.
He's like what the fuck's goingon with the scouts?
There's one D-ring out thereand this guy has it and it needs

(02:23:47):
to be turned in, and of course,corsair and Lannick throw me
right under the bus they justlook at me and said, sergeant
Hardaby, why has specialist vanCoovering not turned that in?
I looked at him and I said hesaid that because I have no idea
what it's like to beat Gooksoff him with a D-ring.
Or with a E-tool and the firstsergeant looked at me and goes

(02:24:10):
OK, he can keep that.
So the next drill.
We go to drill right and we'reout in the woods.
He's sitting there and he'ssharpening.
He's got a sharpening edge onthat bitch he's sharpening both
edges and the pick, and I'mthinking, dude, we're engrailing
for the love of a fucking godman, Nothing's going to fall out

(02:24:33):
of the sky that's going to hurtus.
And he's like you, never know,the motherfucker was great.
He was fucking cool.

Speaker 4 (02:24:42):
But those are those old school guys right, yeah.

Speaker 5 (02:24:46):
You just don't forget it right, you know I came up
around a lot of old school guysand I learned a lot from a lot
of old school guys and I've gotfamily, I've got cousins, that
kind of look up to me and when Igo visit them.
They always you know that tooWell they always bring up
stories.
I would tell them.

(02:25:06):
When I first enlisted and I hadthis one cousin, he asked me he
was probably, I was 18, freshout of fucking AIT, I think he
had it been probably six orseven.
And he asked me he's like hey,cuz, what do you do?
Somebody shoots at you.
I just kind of, you know,nonchalantly, I'm like shoot
back.

Speaker 3 (02:25:25):
Shoot back, no kidding right.
Shoot back Like duck and shit.

Speaker 5 (02:25:28):
I mean, what the fuck ?
But that's just one of thosethings that you know he did not
take.
I mean, he took it literal atthe time, but as he grew older
and he actually learnedsomething from that meeting,
he's always be prepared.
Yeah, and he's always beenprepared.

Speaker 4 (02:25:43):
That's like the.

Speaker 5 (02:25:44):
Scouts model right, yep.
And he's always been one ofthose guys, you know, that has
learned something from oldschool.
I learned from old school, sothere was something that I made.
You know that I realized that Ipassed down to him you know,
from my.
You know what I learned fromold school teachings and doctor.

Speaker 4 (02:26:04):
So when I was in right I was at Fast Company and
the past started majoring inMarine Corps Troy Black.
He was a staff star six-petune.
I was with fifth-petune right.
Insane To actually say that.
I taught to him as a staff star.
You know what I mean and now hebecame the star major in the

(02:26:24):
Marine Corps right.
So out of all the star majors,he was the guy right, senior
enlisted.
It's absolutely insane to me.
So unfortunately I wasn'taround.
I was around a few Gulf Warvets, right, not very many.
Definitely not around anyVietnam guys, because I was late
90s, right.
So we just had a few Gulf Warguys that were still around, but

(02:26:46):
not very many.
You know, they would have beena first-side or something like
that in the Marines, so I didn'tget to talk to them or anything
.
You know, they weren't in myleadership.
I mean they were, but theyweren't.
They were so high up that Inever got to talk to them.
But yeah, I mean it's justcrazy the way those guys look.
So I don't remember what yearthe movie with Clint Eastwood
came out, the Grand Torino.

(02:27:07):
Oh yeah, oh yeah Was that, likelate 2000s, mid-2000s, let's ask
Googles.

Speaker 3 (02:27:14):
Yeah, ask Googles.
But my dad and I loved thatmovie right.
Because, yeah, because 2008,.

Speaker 4 (02:27:24):
Right, so my grandfather just passed away,
right, and Clint Eastwood's gota saying in that movie, right.
My dad loves it because ClintEastwood in that movie was my
grandfather Straight up oldschool.
I think it was a Vietnam vet atthe time.

Speaker 3 (02:27:39):
No, he was Korean War vet.

Speaker 4 (02:27:40):
Was he Korean War?
Ok, well, so my grandfatherwrote World War II.
But he was like this is yourfucking grandfather, 100% Old
school, just grit his teeth allthe time, pissed off at the
world.
That kind of guy that was mygrandpa.

Speaker 5 (02:27:56):
I mean.
Ain't Rural.
Ties a shit-out steel.

Speaker 4 (02:28:00):
But he was like I used to fucking stack you nips
10, I used you for sandbags, hegoes.
Your grandfather said shit likethat you know.
That's just the way they were.
And they had to live it, so Iget it.
I didn't grow up with theprejudice like they did, right?
So he was actually here inMount Pleasant.
He was the president of thewhat's the business organization

(02:28:25):
.

Speaker 3 (02:28:25):
Chamber of Commerce.

Speaker 4 (02:28:26):
Chamber of Commerce, right, and CME opened up that
plant on the south end of town.
They built fuel pumps.
On the summer.
I was a Japanese company andthey said, hey, you got to go to
their grand opening.
This is in the 80s.
My grandfather was like thefuck I do, I ain't doing it,
right.
So the vice president orwhoever went and did it, and he
kind of got scolded by the stategroup, whatever Chamber of

(02:28:48):
Commerce, for not doing it andhe goes, you just don't get it.
And those are the unfortunate.
So for us, right In the sandbox, right, we kind of get those
prejudiced.
I try not to.
I'm not going to includeeverybody.
Right, right, but he did.
But his experiences were wayworse, right, three years.

Speaker 3 (02:29:06):
Yeah.

Speaker 4 (02:29:07):
Hopped across islands right.
He did like nine months rightto three years and he watched
the guy on the right and theleft right never come back,
constantly, constantly,constantly, constantly.
So he got to the point.
It was weird because when Igraduated bootcamp right, I grew
up with a photo book right andthere were all his buddies
hugging and whatever.

(02:29:28):
There was a very mellow photobook from his time of service.
I graduated bootcamp.
The other photo book came outright, the one of the action
pictures and the crazy picturesthat you don't talk about at
parties.
Definitely the picture.
Yeah, for sure, right.

Speaker 5 (02:29:46):
Yeah, I got the pictures.

Speaker 4 (02:29:49):
And it wasn't until the point when I graduated
bootcamp right, we actuallybecame a Marine.
He brought that book up.
My dad's never seen it until hepassed away right oh really, and
my parents were unpacking thehouse right Right before we
bought it, putting what theywanted to keep in the basement
of their house.
That's when my dad saw thephoto book.
And I was talking about thephoto book after I graduated,
like hey, I saw Papa's photobook and my dad's like what are

(02:30:11):
you talking about?
No idea it even existed, right.
And I'm like well, this, this,this, I've never seen that.
You know, dah, dah, dah.
And I can only assume he askedhis dad about the book, right,
and he was like yeah, there's nobook he's going to straight up,
lie to his own kid.
Right, like whatever, I don'teven know what he's talking
about.
Probably right, and until then,my dad's like holy shit, you

(02:30:32):
were telling me the truth thatthere's this photo book, so
that's why I assume that heasked his dad about it.
Right, never got to see it, butit was literally their arms
around and they're holding ahead with spines hanging off it.
Right and whatever.
Boganville Island, right, youknow wherever they were at,
right, tirewood and shit that hewas on.
You know, like you don'tunderstand it, right, yes, so

(02:30:53):
like.
So you don't understand theprejudice that comes from it.

Speaker 3 (02:30:55):
No, I understand the hears no, you do, I'm talking
about the general civilians.
They don't understand that.

Speaker 4 (02:31:01):
So they're all pissed off that he didn't want to go
do this ribbon kind of ceremonyfor a.
Japanese company.
Well, he had to fight theJapanese for years and years,
and years.

Speaker 3 (02:31:08):
Yeah, those sons of bitches were trying to kill him
every day.

Speaker 4 (02:31:10):
So yeah, but he didn't have a prejudice about
anybody else, right?
Just because these people right, they bombed us and then we
watched his friends die.
You know what I mean?
And that's real-word shit likeus, right.
Like I mean, they bombed us, wewent over there and tried to
take care of them.
When they're killing us, right?
So we have prejudice rightagainst a certain ethnicity,
right, just like he did.

(02:31:30):
And I've grown up to the pointwhere I try not to do it as a
whole.
I'm not going to lump everybodyinto one right.
So I've gotten a lot better atthat and we've raised our kids
to be like that too.
Like, hey, this is me, not you,right, I can have it because I
chewed it.
Right, like my grandfather hadit.

(02:31:51):
Because he chewed it, my dadshouldn't have it.
I shouldn't have it for thosepeople, right, because they
didn't do anything to me, theydid it to him or whoever?

Speaker 3 (02:31:58):
right.

Speaker 4 (02:31:59):
So, don't you know, if you see me not happy, don't
be happy because you know thatshould be your own experience.
Right, and this is somethingthat we all struggle with.
Right, doesn't matter, veteransdoesn't matter, civilian side
doesn't matter, whatever.
But as we get older we becomeable to accept a little bit
better and I don't think ourexperience is compared to past

(02:32:21):
generations.
Right, we talked to the Vietnamguys.
Right, they like one of thebest commercials ever.
And now Shem and I have talkedabout this at the post at night
one time.
Right, oh, at the Tiki Bar, myfavorite commercial ever was a
Budweiser commercial Absolutelyphenomenal commercial.
They show a whole bunch ofsoldiers.
Right, army guys walkingthrough the airport.

(02:32:42):
It was right, after 9-11.

Speaker 3 (02:32:44):
I think it was a.

Speaker 4 (02:32:44):
Super Bowl commercial actually.

Speaker 3 (02:32:46):
Probably was, yeah.

Speaker 4 (02:32:47):
And everybody in the airport stands up and claps
right.
They're changing planes anddoing or going to their plane or
whatever it was right Cominghome everybody stands up and
they're clapping for thesoldiers as they're walking by,
and some of them are crying.
You know, absolutely Americana,americana, commercial right,
when the United States cametogether for a common goal,

(02:33:07):
right, we got attacked.
We're going to go take care ofbusiness.
That's what we do, that's whatwe're trained to do.
That's why we signed the dottedline.

Speaker 5 (02:33:12):
Damn right.

Speaker 4 (02:33:13):
Right, that's what we do.
Best fucking commercial.
I love it.
I still watch it.
I do YouTube it.
Great commercial.
So unless you chewed it, youmight not understand.
We all try not to be that waybut unfortunately sometimes that
happens to us, right?

Speaker 3 (02:33:31):
Well, something that pisses me off.
Obviously I was in Iraq.
So Muslims, iraqis, iranians,that culture, yeah, that culture
in the Middle East, when I seethem, don't trust them.

(02:33:54):
But I have a certain amount ofrespect for them, because
they're not like the people herein our country that run around
and stomp on the flag and shiton the flag and do all these
other fucking things yeah butdid you have terps with you,
interpreters with you?

Speaker 4 (02:34:13):
Oh, Joe and Randy were awesome man, so that's what
I'm saying.
So now, you've got, Not all ofthem, OK.
So this is where we need tohave this discussion, because
there's probably a lot of peoplethat might listen to this.
Right, they might struggle withthe same things, right.
So you see somebody out andabout and because they're in
this city, right, you might nottrust them.
Right, but you can't lump themall in one group.

(02:34:33):
Not at all.
Not at all.
Because we all had terps with us, right?
Yeah, so when you're over there, these are the guys that are.
They know the area, they knowwhat's going on.
Same thing with the Vietnamguys, right they're saying
they're something scouts, theycalled them.

Speaker 3 (02:34:48):
Yeah, I can't even remember what they call them
yeah.

Speaker 4 (02:34:50):
Yeah, it's an old school term that they got right.
So they still had the localright.
That still helped them out.
Yes, and we had terps likeliterally I just watched a
TikTok the other day.
I think they called the guyGeorge literally in a firefight
right, everybody's behind theberm right Shooting this dude,
walks like 100 meters ahead ofeverybody with a frickin' RPG.

Speaker 2 (02:35:14):
Yep, you saw the video, yes.

Speaker 5 (02:35:16):
And they're like man.

Speaker 4 (02:35:17):
George is a bad mothole.
He's like launching RPG shots.

Speaker 5 (02:35:23):
Takes out a tank.

Speaker 4 (02:35:26):
Yeah they're all hidden in the woods, you know,
and he just walks right outrounds, cracking by him and shit
, and he's just like man, hejust strolls back back to cover.
He was like he's a bad dude, sothey're out there.

Speaker 3 (02:35:38):
Absolutely.
They're Joe and Randy and wehad embedded terps, yeah.

Speaker 4 (02:35:43):
We ran with the platoons.

Speaker 3 (02:35:45):
I worked with Joe and Randy in the headquarters.
They were my interpreters.
So if I had a problem with apolice station I'd be like Randy
, call these motherfuckers andfind out what the fuck.
And Randy would get on thereand he'd be like blah, blah,
blah, blah, blah, blah, blah,blah, blah.
What'd they say?
Hey, can you do that one moretime?

Speaker 2 (02:36:04):
I just want to make sure that the translation is
right there.
I know Where's the video atwhen you need it, right.

Speaker 3 (02:36:10):
So, but no, Randy and Joe were both like that and the
bad thing about that is well,when we came home, Randy went on
home on leave and he wassupposed to get his papers to be
a citizen to come to the UnitedStates.
Because Joe's in Montana orsome fucking place like that
right In Montana yeah, why inthe fuck would somebody who

(02:36:33):
lived in the hot all the timewant to live in fucking Montana?
But Randy's in Montana, orJoe's in Montana, and Randy went
home to visit his family.
Before he left, the mightymilitia caught him and strung
him up and skinned him in thisfamily's front yard and that
dude was a turp for us for sevenyears, some shit like that.

(02:36:58):
Right when the war started, hewas an interpreter for the
United States because he wantedto make the country better.
And it was crazy, as Joe was aSunni and Randy was a Shia,
which are basically Mortalenemies.
They were mortal enemies, butthem too.

(02:37:19):
I sat down one night and talkedto them too.
Amazing, amazing to listen to.
Everyone said Saddam was a cock.
He was, but I'd be a cock tooif Montana let Canada come in
behind us and wipe out one ofour armor brigades, if we had a

(02:37:40):
conflict with Canada.
But it's amazing, but it stilldoesn't change the fact that
here here now, right now, when Iwent to school at mid, where
the old Holiday Inn used to be,I'm there getting ready to go
into my computer class.
I'm sitting there.
I see three middle Eastern guyswith backpacks walking around.

(02:38:03):
All of a sudden I see one ofthem put the backpack down and
leave.
I instantly went into holy fuckmode.
Holy fuck, I would have had tograb the backpack throwing it
out the building, I would havehad to run with it.
So what I did is I found aprofessor and I said, look it,
you need to get people out ofhere.
And he's like what's up?

(02:38:24):
And I'm like, look it.
And he knew my background and Itold him and so he did, he
cleared the building.
Well, then the dudes came outof the bathroom, picked up their
backpack and walked away.
And then I got people kind oflooked at me like well, look at
you.

Speaker 5 (02:38:41):
That's that paranoia that we develop as vets,
especially combat vets, and it'sa stigma that's part of our
PTSD, because we get nervous, wesee shit that most people don't
see.

Speaker 4 (02:38:52):
No, I didn't notice.

Speaker 2 (02:38:53):
And that's the thing they will notice it and we're
always.

Speaker 5 (02:38:56):
For years we're trained to be a certain way and
most people don't understand.
You just can't flip that switchoff.

Speaker 2 (02:39:02):
Right, and so it sucks how, like you said, it's a
stigma.
Our country has asked us to goand do a job, and when we come
back and we can't turn it off,then we're the enemy again.

Speaker 4 (02:39:16):
It's like it's a double standard.
We still don't turn it off.
And it's been 20, 25 years laterwe still haven't turned off.
So here's the greatest thingand Chem just alluded to it we
see things that most peopledon't see.
So I went to the Desiree andMarksman School and it was a
fast company.
So first day of class we're allsitting in tables and chairs,

(02:39:37):
got a big projector on the wall.
Starters walk in.
Hey, you know, welcome toDesiree and Marksman School.
Da, da, da.
They introduce themselves.
They go hand out sheets ofpaper, one through 10.
Just written, write your nameat the top, blank all the
different lines.
They said we're going to play atension-getter video.
We'll be back in 10 minutes.

(02:39:58):
Dude hits play.
They walk out the room.
It's a porno, literally a porno.
There's a dude and a chick onthe bed going at it.
Right, they walk in.
About 10 minutes later theyturn it off.
They say how many pillows wereon the bed, what was the
painting above the bed, how manylamps were in the room, what
color were the sheets?

Speaker 5 (02:40:19):
They ask you everything else around actual
action, Because you know,goddamn a bunch of grown-ass
kids, and how many?
Marines were jerking off.

Speaker 4 (02:40:28):
Every one.
It's the number one how manyjerked off everybody.
No, no but seriously.
So what they're trying to do isto get you to notice other than
the obvious thing, right,because they want to see if
you're going to be a shooter,you're going to be a spotter,
right, kind of a guy, right, soyou have to.
They're going to do somethingto distract you and something
else is like the trick, playingfootball, right?

(02:40:50):
Hey, look at me over here,don't see what I'm doing over
there, kind of thing, right,it's a classic diversion.
So when you notice the backpackdropped and the guy walks away
from it, first thing you thinkis the same thing you were
trained at, right, the samething that we had in that class.
They got us to think outside ofdon't look at the action, notice

(02:41:12):
everything else around it,right, yeah, because there's
something else, right, and it'sso hard to turn off, like I
still sit down from boot camp1998, dude, I still eat my
dinner.
In about 3.2 minutes I scarf itdown and I sit at the table
while everybody else is eatingluxurious, because if I didn't
eat my food fast, you didn't eat, I probably would not eat,

(02:41:36):
right?
I mean, I'd get halfway throughand I'd throw the rest of it
away because we had to move onto the next training exercise or
whatever right.
So I sit there and it doesn'tmatter if it's blazing hot.

Speaker 3 (02:41:47):
You just eat it.

Speaker 4 (02:41:48):
I just eat it.
And my wife's like I don't knowhow you can eat something that
just came out the stove.
I'm like if I don't eat it, I'mnot going to eat, and I haven't
been able to turn it off eversince.
It's insane.
I'm always the first one doneand I've gotten to the point
where I've had to tell myselfslow down.
Well, take a bite, put yourfork down.
Count to 20.
As you chew Right, Pick yourfork back up.

(02:42:10):
I said I hope my fork is justgoing to be shoveling.
I have to actually put it downon the table.
You know what I'm saying?
And that's just those hardthings that we all have to break
that.
They've been with us forever,man.
So we all struggle with thesame things, right?
We all deal with the samethings, and those are just the
habits that you can't get rid of.
As they say, you do anythingfor 21 days, it becomes a habit,
right?

(02:42:31):
I can never get myself to that21 day.
I'm like day 12.
I quit putting my fork down,you know what I mean.
Or the same thing, right.
I mean you walk into class, youcan't do 21 days and not notice
the guy that puts the backpackdown, not notice the bag, so you
can never break the habit.

Speaker 2 (02:42:49):
Because you're trained so long.
One of the biggest wake-upsyeah, one of the biggest wake-up
calls for me was prior to goingoverseas was the required
training I had to go through andit was bullshit, like online
training, whatever.
But something about it to thisday still sticks with me, and
that is there was a wholesection of it talking about if

(02:43:15):
you get a choice, what hotelroom to pick, one that's on the
opposite side of the buildingfrom the entrance, not directly
above the entrance, but moretowards down the other side.
Things like that what airplaneseat to sit in?
All of?

Speaker 4 (02:43:30):
these things, the pilot's seat, always the window
seat, always the window seat,because the terrace walks up and
down the aisle right.
They're going to grab thepeople that are close to them.
So that's why you always leaveyour lap belt locked and on.
So even when the passenger seatbelt sign goes off, you always
leave it on, because if they'regoing to grab somebody to take
as a hostage and your seatbelt's done, they can't pick you
up.
They'll grab the next person.

(02:43:51):
And if you're not sitting in anaisle seat, you're sitting in a
window seat or the middle seat,they're going to grab the
person on the aisle.
They're not going to grab youright.
So that's what I was alwaystrained.
I'm sure it's probably on thesame lines of you right, just
obviously.

Speaker 2 (02:44:04):
The whole point of the training was not to make
yourself the obvious and easytarget.
Don't fly in your uniform.

Speaker 4 (02:44:11):
Oh, absolutely not.

Speaker 2 (02:44:12):
That's inviting a bullet, yeah.

Speaker 4 (02:44:15):
And then the same thing they always invite the
active duty to board first.
Don't ever do it.
Nope, don't ever do it.
Even though you're wearingcivvies, right, don't ever do it
.
So, shem and I, we went on aride with the wife and stuff
over Fourth of July weekend andmy wife was trained to our kids
right, that always sees the doorRight.

Speaker 3 (02:44:38):
Always, always sees the door.

Speaker 4 (02:44:40):
So we walk into boomers and Coleman right, and
we're having a beer, gettingfood, whatever, and Shem sits
down or goes to sit down, nice,and I'm good Sitting here with
my back to the door becausethere's a back door with the
hallway, so Shems checking outthe front door.

Speaker 3 (02:44:56):
You're checking out the back door.

Speaker 4 (02:44:58):
Directly into the back door, coleman Michigan man.
Who the hell is going to comein and shoot up a bar at Coleman
Michigan?
It's like population 18.
You know, what I mean, butthat's still what we do to this
day.

Speaker 3 (02:45:07):
Even the VFW.
Where do?

Speaker 4 (02:45:08):
I stand.
Well, we always stand at theend of the bar, so we can see
the front door.
So we're actually looking atchanging that door and putting a
one-way glass in it so we cansee out the door and not have to
wait till the door opens.
We can actually see who'swalking in their entrance or
breezeway before they actuallycome in, so we can actually see
them right, because we all, assoon as we hear the outdoor,

(02:45:29):
open and the door wiggles.
Yeah, everybody's checking itout Every time and that's just a
stigma that we can't ever drop.

Speaker 2 (02:45:36):
And for me it's the whoosh of the wind.
That door will jump in justenough.
Everybody just turns.

Speaker 4 (02:45:44):
We all look, but it's been 20-some years.
Man, I can't drop it.
So, shem, I was just telling astory about us at Boomers or
bombers over in Coleman.
You're watching the front door,I'm watching the back door.
It's been 20 years and we stilllive by it.
Brother, you know what I meanand love my wife to death
because she trained the kids.
The kids know where to sit.

(02:46:05):
So we walk in the restaurant.
I'm always the last one to sitdown, but the kids knew right
where to go, always know whereto go.
That's just the way it is.

Speaker 3 (02:46:14):
So you were saying about shuffling because you
never know when you're going toeat again, because you got to go
.

Speaker 4 (02:46:20):
So I was the guide for a while in Marine Corps Boot
Camp.
So we had like 115 guys in myplatoon so everybody eats, then
the guides always last.
Right.
So by the time I sat down I gotthrough the line.
I sat down.
I maybe had three minutes toeat whatever's on my tray, so I
would sit down.
I didn't even get nothing todrink.

(02:46:41):
The first guys depends on ifthey one, two, three in the line
, for what squad you were in orwhatever, Because you're
marching squads of four rightLines of four, so it depends on
which one went.
I always went last, anyways,when I was the guide.

Speaker 3 (02:46:56):
As you should.

Speaker 4 (02:46:57):
Well, it's your men always eat before you, right, I
mean that's that's somebody'sgoing hungry.

Speaker 3 (02:47:00):
It's going to be the NCO.

Speaker 4 (02:47:01):
It's always been the way.
So yeah, I mean, if I said that, like these guys were going up,
they're getting chocolate milk,they're getting fruit punch,
they're getting water, they'regetting whatever right Orange
juice, fuck that.
I never drank shit when I wasthe guide.
I sat down and I would bewalking to drop my tray in a
scullery still eating.
Yeah, right, because we had ourwhole platoon had to eat in 20

(02:47:25):
minutes.
So the time I actually sat downyeah, I'm lucky to get three,
four minutes.
Lucky to get three, fourminutes.
I'm, before I hand my tray tothe recruits, work in the
scullery.
You know where the dishes go.
I'm still shoveling as I'mwalking.
Hopefully the drill sergeantdoesn't see me doing it, because
you're not supposed to do it,but you had to eat.
So I still sit down to this day.

Speaker 3 (02:47:45):
So we first started monogying Terrible.
He used to have us eggs toorder in the field.
He would make the fuckingkitchen Because at that time we
actually had a mess hall.
It wasn't farmed out like it isnow.

Speaker 4 (02:48:02):
This must be the national guide.
Yeah, that makes sense.

Speaker 3 (02:48:08):
So it was a branch of service, by the way.
So, anyway, whatever he wouldyour story he was Well, we could
go there, but that would take alot longer.
We got, so he would have us dothe eggs to order.
And I would always be like youknow, I ate after my troops.

(02:48:28):
I had two troops because wewere a six-person squad, so
there was a squad leader andthen there was, he had two
people in his Jeep and thenthere was me as a team leader
with two people in my Jeep, sothe squad leader would eat after
me.
So it would be the team mesquad leader.

(02:48:49):
Well, as they'd go through thekitchen, guys like, how do you
want your eggs?
I'm like done and I'm justyelling each one, and so they're
here.
And so there was a slop in thefucking shit on there when they
went and bitched.
They went to fucking bitch tothe first sergeant, and this was
the dude.
That's about 40 years in themilitary, right, they went bitch

(02:49:11):
.
Well, how come everybody elsegets their eggs like over easy
and whatever.
So, and Corsair loved it becauseit took the heat off, because
he put it right on me, so firstour money could come over to me
and he goes what are you doing?
I said what do you mean?
First, sir, he goes.
When I bring the mess hall outand we do eggs order, they get

(02:49:33):
to order their eggs.
I'm like first, we ain't gottime to do that.
And he said well, what do youmean?
I said OK, we get up, we get inline.
Usually the scouts are the lastones to eat.
We have a hit time, we havemissions to do, we have stuff to
do.
And if I let my men lollygagaround and get fucking
sunny-side up or super hard orwhatever fuck that, I said now

(02:49:58):
we're behind and what are yougoing to do?
You and the commander are goingto come down on us and say, hey
, you missed your hit timeBecause we're playing around
with our food.
Eat it, shovel it in, get yourshit ready to go, get on the
fucking jeep and get ready to go.

Speaker 4 (02:50:13):
So we had options for eggs.
Either you get them or youdon't.
Yeah, exactly, that was prettymuch it right For those that may
be listening that don't realizethat the military actually did
have jeeps after World War II inVietnam.
So some of these older guysright?
Oh my god.
Maybe the 90s, and still havejeeps we all had Humvees in our
day, right, so those old schoolguys still running around in
jeeps.
It's cool, though I like it.

(02:50:35):
Sound of freedom.

Speaker 3 (02:50:36):
Sound of freedom.
Yeah, but the jeeps were coolthough, the jeeps could do
fucking anything.
You could make it a two-wheeljeep, a three-wheel jeep, a
four-wheel jeep, it doesn'tmatter.

Speaker 2 (02:50:48):
Hey, do you?

Speaker 3 (02:50:49):
pack them in a crate.
Yeah, that's right.

Speaker 2 (02:50:51):
Do jeeps have keys for ignitions?
Nope, ok, just checking.

Speaker 3 (02:50:57):
No, easy to steal.
That's why you always got toput that chain around the
steering wheel.
Could you imagine that?

Speaker 4 (02:51:03):
Where are my keys?
Yeah, we got to go somewhereand just miss the set of keys.

Speaker 3 (02:51:07):
Yeah, the only keys I had was the keys to the padlock
, so you can unlock the steeringwheel.

Speaker 4 (02:51:15):
That's not smart.
I didn't even realize we stillhad jeeps in the 90s, something
like 80s.

Speaker 3 (02:51:20):
No, this would Well.
I joined in 83.
We phased out of jeeps about 88.
That's when the Humvees startedtaking over and of course
excuse me the toes got.

Speaker 4 (02:51:32):
Oh, you got your Humvees first, because they were
in my armor, so they got them.
Yeah, you got them out.
Yeah, you got them out the toe,so we.

Speaker 3 (02:51:38):
And we liked the jeeps, because you could take
the cheap jeeps where therabbits wouldn't go.
I mean, they were so small andmaneuverable.
And then we got the Humvees andwe get fiberglass bumpers
broken, chipped off becausewe're hitting trees, and shit
like that.

Speaker 4 (02:51:54):
So when we were a good tire.
We were out riding Humvees, wewere doing a mission for
Operation Southern Watch.
Navy's firing P3 spy planes,wrapping sonar buoys, tracking
Saddam was smuggling oil.

Speaker 3 (02:52:08):
That's an app.

Speaker 4 (02:52:10):
Saddam, you son of a bitch, wasn't supposed to, so we
would throw some Marines onthat plane had missiles on it.
Right, we had it rained and itwas insane with the rain, right,
puget mud puddles.
Well, one of the Humvees gotdriven through and I didn't
realize.
In Humvee they literally have aplastic fan to cool the motor.

(02:52:32):
The fins the fins were plastic,broke the fins.
We're down to one Humvee rightOn our little section of the
Katari Air Base right.
So we had a.
He was a surgeon, got bustedback to a corporal.
He did what he was supposed todo.

(02:52:53):
His mission was to do somethingand he did it, but the higher
ups didn't want to takeresponsibility for what he did
so he got thrown under the buskby fire.

Speaker 3 (02:53:02):
Yeah, and then they re-re-re.

Speaker 4 (02:53:03):
So then he got a promotion, for he found scrap
metal right and he redesigned,remade the fins for that Humvee
and got back up around, he got aNavy, the NAM right, the Navy
Achievement Medal, and then hegot a promotion back to Sergeant
for it.
But he got busted back forabout four or five months.
You know, yeah, this is the waythe military works, so, yeah,

(02:53:28):
so who wants to takeresponsibility?
For I tell you, do something.
But I already didn't tell himthat he did that on his own and
I was like, come on, man.
So anyways, yeah, he and himget a NAM out of it.
But I didn't even realize thatHumvees and I guess that's on
design, yeah, on design they'resupposed to break away and not
puncture the radiator, whatever,right, yep, well, I didn't even
know that.
But he was a fire boy fromArkansas or whatever the hell

(02:53:49):
that could build shit.
It was pretty cool.

Speaker 2 (02:53:53):
I think the next question I have for you guys is
could instigate another hour'sconversation?
Keep it rolling.
Yeah, let's do it.

Speaker 3 (02:54:02):
But we still got beer .
I got plenty, I mean pop, pop.

Speaker 4 (02:54:07):
There's plenty of pop at the AJ Sky Lounge.

Speaker 3 (02:54:10):
Had to throw the plug in for that.

Speaker 4 (02:54:12):
You know it.
You know it, boys, this is whatwe're doing, yeah, and.

Speaker 5 (02:54:16):
I just noticed a sign right there below the window
yeah, which is sitting?

Speaker 4 (02:54:18):
by AJ Sky Lounge open today Yep.

Speaker 2 (02:54:21):
That's it.
I'll summarize by saying thiswhat do you think about
civilians kind of piggybackingoff of the military, our wisdom,
our different things like that?

(02:54:41):
Now give you an example.
There's a guy that I follow.
He's a motivational speaker.
He's also an expert inleadership and that kind of
thing.
His name is Simon Sinek.
I don't know if you've heard ofhim before, but he wrote a book
called Leaders Eat Last.
I'll give you one guess as towhere he got that from.

(02:55:04):
Military For sure, exactly, heclaims that he's got a lot of
higher ranking friends.
That's where he's learned allthis stuff from, but not just
him, but everywhere.
The little wisdom snippets thatwe have.
Like eaters, leaders eat last,or eating as fast as you can

(02:55:29):
because of XYZ reason, we gotmissions to go on or, god forbid
, the base comes under attackand you got things like that.
They're trying to take thosebits of wisdom and apply them to
other walks of life, which I'mnot against, but I am curious as

(02:55:52):
to what you guys think in thatregard.
For Simon Sinek, he's mostlybooked as a speaker for
corporate events and things likethat.
So he's taking all of thesethings that he's interviewed us
and learned about from us andhe's applying it to corporate
America.
And one of the coolest thingsthat he's done is one where he

(02:56:18):
spoke with a bunch of Navy SEALsand they talked about who they
would want to be their leaderand he went on this whole thing
about.
If you were to graph it, yourY-axis would be your level of
trust of a person and yourX-axis would be your level of

(02:56:41):
expertise in your craft or inyour field, and so you don't
want the person of low trust andlow expertise, obviously, and
so he goes on and on and onabout that and just kind of
elaborates and it's a reallygood snippet.
If you ever get a chance toYouTube it, I would definitely
do that.
But what do you think?

(02:57:01):
What do you think about?

Speaker 3 (02:57:05):
Well, first of all, I guess my thought process would
be and this happens in the VFWwhen you go to a function,
usually the higher rankingpeople eat first, right, for
sure they do.
I mean corporate leveldepartment commander, national

(02:57:26):
commander, auxiliary presidentthe national.
I think, once you get past acertain level, I'll just give a,
for instance Whatever happensin our post when we have an
event and we are serving food, Iwait, Even if they say hey get

(02:57:50):
up here head table each first,which would be a good way to put
that right Head table eachfirst.
If I'm setting up the head tableI'm going to be like, yeah well
, you guys go ahead and I'llwait.
So I don't know if that kind ofmakes sense, but it doesn't
make sense because they're notreally following what the
leadership principles of themilitary is.

Speaker 4 (02:58:12):
Well, see, and I get exactly what you're saying
because when you're thestormtrooper right man, you're
the boots on the ground takingcare of the guys right, that's
your job.
Make sure your troops arealways fed before you, make sure
they got ammo before you, theymake sure they got medical
before you, they make sure theysleep before you, you make sure
they do everything before you.
But I think once you get toupper echelon rank structure

(02:58:37):
right, regardless of itscorporate level, right, you're
part of the sales team, thenyou're part of the finance team,
then you're part of whateverright, as it goes up right the
chain and then you're the owner,right or whatever.
I think you lose track of whereyou've been, where you came
from, because some people mightstart at the top right, because
they got some crazy degree andtheir daddy owns the place.

(02:58:59):
They have no concept, right, sothey have no idea what it's
like to be All of us thatstarted as privates, right, or
PFCs, private first class,whatever.
You guys started at right and weworked our way up Siemens,
right, siemens.
You lost right.
Siemens recruit, siemensrecruit, then yeah, as you
worked up your petty officersand all that stuff right.
So I think you kind ofunderstand a little bit more,

(02:59:22):
right?
It's about taking care of thepeople that take care of you,
right?

Speaker 3 (02:59:27):
Yeah, I would say that.

Speaker 4 (02:59:28):
And I think, once you get to a certain level, you
forget where you came from.
Absolutely you know what I mean, and that's terrible thing to
think.

Speaker 5 (02:59:36):
And that goes back to what Britton was saying, with
civilians being into taking someof the doctrine that we've
learned.
They may not know about tryingto implement.
That I wholeheartedly agree.
And that kind of touches on thepoint that you were talking
about whether our governmentshould require every citizen to

(03:00:02):
serve at least at the minimumtwo years, like other countries
in the world do.
That type of lifestyle doesinstill certain morals, certain
values that will sit with youall your life.

Speaker 4 (03:00:19):
Yeah, but leadership is different, right.

Speaker 5 (03:00:22):
Leadership.
I just want to learn to be aleader, if you don't know how to
follow.
How do you learn?

Speaker 2 (03:00:28):
Well, that goes back to the age-old argument of these
old timers that are pissed offwhen they have this newbie
coming in with the collegedegree and knows absolutely dog
shit, right he?

Speaker 4 (03:00:41):
knows the book and they hate his guts, but he's got
no experience, and that's thereason why it's always
experienced.

Speaker 2 (03:00:46):
I've worked with them .

Speaker 3 (03:00:47):
So I've worked with them and I can tell you one of
the guys I butted at Edwards hewas a cadet.
He went to Iraq.
He was the best fucking platoonleader over there and
unfortunately I did not get tobe his platoon sergeant and his
name was Lieutenant Vanderbeethat fucker rot.
And when he first came in hewas a cadet and he didn't see

(03:01:12):
the light.
And that's what old NCOs aretaught to do to new lieutenants
is show them the light.
Just because you are in chargedoesn't mean you know what's
fucking going on.
Doesn't mean the soldiers aregoing to follow you.

Speaker 2 (03:01:27):
Doesn't mean, you know what's best.

Speaker 4 (03:01:28):
Yeah, but we've all heard of the natural born leader
, right?

Speaker 3 (03:01:31):
Right.

Speaker 4 (03:01:31):
So there's just people that have those
characteristics about themselvesright, ok, so that leads to
another thing.
But wait a minute, though youcan train them to get it,
Doesn't mean they're going toapply it right.
So I still think you've got tohave some sort of leadership
characteristics, either way youwere raised, or that natural
born leadership quality to beable to do it, Because I've had.

(03:01:52):
Trust me, the Marine Corps doesless with more.
Does more with less.

Speaker 2 (03:01:58):
I was going to say you had that backwards, I do
have that backwards.

Speaker 4 (03:02:01):
I had to think about it for a second.
But, yeah, we do more with less, right, and that comes from and
still leadership into you.
But that doesn't mean justbecause you went through this
training, you went through theschool, you're going to grasp it
, right?
I think at some point you'vegot to have that born into you
of being a natural born leaderin order to be able to actually
lead effectively, right?

(03:02:22):
So go ahead, tom.

Speaker 3 (03:02:24):
Well, no, I agree with you, Because that comes to
the age old question is are youborn with leadership or is
leadership trained?

Speaker 4 (03:02:33):
Yeah, so this guy could be a motor vehicle.

Speaker 2 (03:02:35):
That's like an egg.
What comes first, egg or thechicken?

Speaker 3 (03:02:38):
Well, no, I personally believe in order to
be a good leader, like Charliesaid, you have to have some
natural charisma as a leader.
You can't be a dude that knowshis job and knows how to do it,
but nobody, he doesn't know howto turn that into people

(03:03:02):
following him Natural leaders,like a quarterback on a football
team.
So there's a quarterback outthere.

Speaker 4 (03:03:09):
You can be the best player on the team, but the
line's not going to block foryou.
Yeah, that's right.
That's right, you can be thebest player.

Speaker 3 (03:03:16):
So there's got to be some fucking, there's got to be
some leadership qualities withinthe individual in order to make
leadership.
And.
I had these in all myleadership classes, a-noc well,
I'm going to age myself againPLDC, b-noc and A-Noc.
Now it's called Warrior Leaders, course 1.

(03:03:37):
There were some, you know, so,going through that.
That was the question Areleaders born or trained, borned?

Speaker 4 (03:03:48):
True leaders have a born leadership ability right,
and they get their own skills bybeing trained right.

Speaker 2 (03:03:57):
Because we're asking young men and women.
I was just going to say thatbecause it's kind of like a
happy medium.
Well, it is.

Speaker 4 (03:04:03):
So you've got to have some qualities going into it
and you can get refined inleadership skills as you move
forward.
But you can't take somebodythat has zero born ability and
train them enough to be able tolead somebody to take the hill
right.
Or run into the fire or kick thedoor down.
Right, some people have thecharisma, tim, as you said.

(03:04:24):
Right, they've got that.
Hey, I'm going to follow thisguy to the fucking end of hell,
right, and I'm going to be righton a six, or you know, if he
tells me to go kick the door,and I'm going to go kick the
door and not going to hesitateone second.
But there's people out there,right, you go tell me to do
something.
I'll be like, hey, who the fuckare you?
Right, I don't trust you.
Right.

(03:04:44):
Right.
So this is where exactly, brent, where you were going with it
earlier, right, some people haveit, have that stick to them.
Some people don't have it.
You know it's crazy because,when you think about it, doesn't
matter if you're corporatelevel, doesn't matter if you're
small business level, doesn'tmatter if you're military level
right.
We've all worked for people orbeen led by people we like and

(03:05:07):
ones we don't, and typically theones we like they have.
Oh yeah, you'll chew the barbedwire for them, right?
Yep, because they have thatleadership, charisma and style
to them that articulates to youand your style, right.
And we've all had the ones thatwe're just like.
You're just a figurehead.
I'm going to do my own thing.

(03:05:27):
You can tell me, but I'm goingto do my own thing, right, and I
don't care what you say.
I don't think you're right.
And there's other ones that Iknow they're wrong and I'll
still do it Because I have thattrait to them, right.

Speaker 2 (03:05:40):
So yeah, what do you think about the impacts of
leadership?
Because where I was gettingwith this is I just think it's
funny how again kind of talkingback on what we were saying not
too long ago some of the thingsthat we bring home with us, they

(03:06:05):
like to poke and prod and makefun of us and this, that and
another thing.
Because we're different, right,but because we were forced to
be different due to ourenvironment, right.
So then I just think it's funnynow that they do that and yet
they're piggybacking off of ourwisdom and our leadership

(03:06:27):
abilities and all of that stuff.
So and I guess that wasprobably one of the main
questions I had was what do you?

Speaker 4 (03:06:38):
They piggyback off what we've learned and the way
we've been trained, because theyknow what they've been doing.
Forever is wrong.

Speaker 2 (03:06:44):
Right.

Speaker 3 (03:06:44):
And what we've been doing works.
You can't take somebody.
They've been doing this for 200fucking years.
It works.

Speaker 4 (03:06:49):
You can't take somebody that's gone through
college, right, and they've gotsome degree, or they got some
whatever, and thrust them into aleadership position if they've
never actually done it.
My industry right inconstruction, right.
We get these kids right out ofFerris State or Michigan or
Michigan State or whatever.
They have these degrees right.
Yeah, they educated absolutely,but have they ever put a bolt

(03:07:11):
in a nut together?
Probably not right In realworld application.
Yeah.
Right.
So I think when it comes tocorporate America or it comes to
these other entities, right,they realize that we were born
with some qualities, we were ledby doing right and we got
leadership skills through doingthings and being trained to do

(03:07:33):
things right, where you can'tjust take somebody just and I
hate to say it, right, because Ithink people they get college
degrees or they're smart people,they get it, but doing it in a
book or in a controlledclassroom and doing things real
world are totally different.

Speaker 5 (03:07:53):
Yes, they are.

Speaker 4 (03:07:54):
Right.
So when it comes to leadership,right and you got rounds
cracking over your head and it'slife and death it's a total
different type of leadershipthan it is just because I hired
into a job and now I'm your boss, now I'm your foreman, now I'm
your plant manager and I'mwhatever, if you weren't the guy
that did that sweeping thefloors, and now you're going to
run the plant, how are you goingto tell the guy that's sweeping

(03:08:15):
the floors wrong?
He's doing it wrong.
You've never done it?

Speaker 2 (03:08:18):
right, exactly.

Speaker 4 (03:08:19):
So I still think that those people right that get the
degrees, they should move upright.
But they should have to do.
They should have to sweep thefloors, they should have to run
the machine, they should have tobuild the car, they should have
to run the electrical wire,they should have to dig the hole
right.

Speaker 5 (03:08:33):
Because they don't know the fucking guy, because
they don't understand it, sothat it took to get somebody to
start the bottom.

Speaker 4 (03:08:38):
So I think, when you talk about leadership, there's a
difference of I've been thereand done it, so I know I've got
some experience to what I'mtelling you, compared to I've
read it in a book, right, and Igot this fancy piece of paper
hanging on my wall and I knowthat sounds terrible for me to
say that, right, but I live thatall the time and the job that I

(03:08:58):
have.

Speaker 2 (03:08:58):
Right, so let's paint a picture of the stereotypical,
horrible leader.
Do as I say not as I do Exactly100%.
If you say me, I'm going to cry.

Speaker 4 (03:09:22):
And I will literally bet that anybody that works for
anybody will live and die bythat.
Do as I say, not as I do, right, I mean, that's just the
quintessential terribleleadership.

Speaker 2 (03:09:35):
Right.
Well, and I'll say this becauseand I'm just going to get real
on as to my military experiencebut that type of leadership, I
think to a certain degree, isrampant in our military right
now.

Speaker 4 (03:09:55):
For sure, and that just comes from the generation
that we're in.

Speaker 2 (03:09:58):
Yeah, your poison, and we get to a point where it
just gets to be too much.

Speaker 4 (03:10:13):
Well, for sure.

Speaker 2 (03:10:13):
And then we just give up and we just don't care
anymore.

Speaker 4 (03:10:15):
Well, that's right.
So when I got out, my decisionof getting out was based on
several factors Right, 9-11 hadjust happened.
Right, I've already been overthere.
The program that I wanted to doI actually got accepted to CMU
to go to college was the ROTCprogram.
Right, I had a 10-yearenlistment.

(03:10:36):
Got put on hold because 9-11.
Right.
So when I was more worriedabout my family not myself right
, because I'm still married tomy hospital sweetheart, two kids
right.

Speaker 3 (03:10:49):
He was going to go dark side shit.

Speaker 4 (03:10:51):
No, no, no no Right, but I had terrible leadership.
My last platoon commander,right, we call him Captain
Insano, captain Insano.
Which is off of Adam Sandlerright.

Speaker 3 (03:11:04):
The wrestling movie right, so we call him Captain
Insano.

Speaker 4 (03:11:06):
His name was Captain Monty.
This guy was horrendous,absolutely horrendous.
If he could do something toscrew with us, he did.
And he didn't care, absolutelyhad zero care about the troops.
It was fun for him to make usdo the dumbest things that

(03:11:26):
didn't need to be done.
If it made us mad the more madwe got, the happier he got.
So his leadership was terribleand nine months before I got out
I bet you half the platoon atthat time was transitioning out.
Right, they weren't going tore-enlist because his leadership
let us down that much that somany of us got out.

(03:11:51):
If we would have had myprevious platoon sergeant right
when I was at Fast Company orsomething, I probably would have
said hey, babe.

Speaker 3 (03:11:59):
I'm here for the ride .

Speaker 4 (03:12:01):
We're here for the ride, but he was so bad, so bad
that I was gone.
I mean, it wasn't necessarilythat I was going to be thrust
back into it again, right, andbeing gone all the time and all
the things, right.
But his leadership was so badthat I just figured the next guy
is going to be just as bad ashim.

(03:12:21):
And I dealt with him for 18months, 19 months, and I wasn't
going to do it again.
I wasn't going to do four yearsof having a guy like that.
Right, and he was a freakingcaptain.
He was an 0-3.
It was terrible, fuckingterrible, and it pisses me off
because we should have wanted tostay.
I wanted to stay, but betweenthe family obligations and then

(03:12:44):
just terrible leadership, yeah.

Speaker 2 (03:12:45):
It was an easy call for me, piggybacking off of what
you said, my decision to getout was a multitude of things.
I had done a lot of maturingsince I joined.
I joined straight out of highschool and obviously hated high
school.

(03:13:05):
Think I graduated with a 2.1.
It was very average.
That's why you weren't in theNavy.

Speaker 3 (03:13:13):
Ha ha ha, very funny.
Ha ha, ha, ha ha.
Hey, it's higher.
Never mind, I'm not even goingto go to the Marine Corps.
Ha ha, ha, ha ha.

Speaker 4 (03:13:24):
Sees, get degrees right.

Speaker 2 (03:13:26):
Yeah, exactly no, but I joined the Navy and just
learned that obviously there wassuch thing as having an
interest in what you werelearning.
So fast forward a little bit,and I did a hell of a lot better
in college.
But I digress Back to the point.
Point was.
One of the biggest reasons,though, that I decided to leave

(03:13:47):
was because of a person who justshouldn't have been put in a
leadership position period.
We're talking about a personwho, technically, was one grade
higher than I was at E5.
I was E4 when I left.
I was a pediatrics of thirdclass and had one higher grade

(03:14:11):
than me, but had less time inservice and had never been
deployed.
And we're talking aboutexperience here.
We were just talking aboutexperience, and what does the
word experience translate tomilitary Time and service?

Speaker 4 (03:14:30):
Time and grade.
Time and grade yep.
Time and right yep.

Speaker 2 (03:14:34):
And she had made it.
She had made life so freakinginsane and you just heard her
walking down the hallway.

Speaker 5 (03:14:50):
You guys were addicted.
I'm going to see that fuckingass.
How many dicks did she suck?

Speaker 4 (03:14:58):
It's totally good that we don't have a camera on
us right now?
No, we don't have.

Speaker 3 (03:15:02):
Because we'd have to take the platoon off the table.
I said how many dicks did shefucking?
Suck.

Speaker 4 (03:15:09):
Come on.

Speaker 3 (03:15:10):
They're not all that way.

Speaker 4 (03:15:12):
Just 90%.
Just kidding.

Speaker 3 (03:15:16):
The lieutenant in Egypt.
How many platoons did she runthrough?
It's our major's driver in Iraq, yeah.

Speaker 4 (03:15:28):
She automatically became a lieutenant.

Speaker 2 (03:15:29):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (03:15:31):
Meritorious promotion yeah, a meritorious promotion
Field commission yeah, I get youon that, because the whole
leadership thing is, there's away things are supposed to be
done and then there's peoplegetting leadership and they
think that they can do it theway they want to be done.
Right, right, I went to NTC.
I took a platoon.

Speaker 5 (03:15:53):
National training center.
National training center.

Speaker 3 (03:15:55):
Fort Irwin, right next door, 29 stumps Right next
door.
Out by Barstow.

Speaker 4 (03:16:00):
Yeah, barstow, yeah, barstow's on the other side of
the mountains from us.

Speaker 3 (03:16:03):
Yeah, so right there I took a platoon of a commo
maintenance 11 hotels which toldMissile Crewman, I took a squad
, six of us, seven of us,something like that.
So I took seven of them, orsome shit like that, and we went

(03:16:30):
out to NTC and we did four,which is in case anybody's
wondering, ntc is the nationaltraining center.
The 11th Cav is out there andthey do the op for units getting
ready to deploy, and at thattime it was a whole Soviet Cold
War kind of thing.
So their tanks and theirhelicopters are mock-ups of

(03:16:54):
Soviet tanks and shit like that.
So we went out there and we gotthis thing called a movement to
daylight.
Ok, and so I'm one of theseleaders that I'm not going to

(03:17:19):
make you do stupid shit justbecause.
So, first of all, we're a towplatoon and for the mile system
on the toes there's just a daysite on it, basically they don't

(03:17:39):
have to take the night site andall that bullshit.
Well, they were going to makeus carry all this bullshit
because they thought we were aninfantry guy that didn't know
anything about the toes, becausewe were attached to an infantry
unit.
So this staff sergeant comes up, tells my dude, wally Qualsack,
confirm, kill in Desert Stormwith a tow awesome guy.

(03:18:04):
They told Wally that you haveto carry this and Wally's like
no, we don't.
And he's like you have to carrythis.
And it was the day site orsomething.
It was the day site and theculminate.
Oh yes, it was a culminator,because the culminator is what
hooks the day site and the nightsite so that they can see the
same thing, so that during theday you can use the day site and

(03:18:27):
at night you use the night site.

Speaker 4 (03:18:28):
Yeah, but it's still zero.
At the same time, yes, theculminator, the tow zero.

Speaker 3 (03:18:33):
And this guy's like no, you've got to carry it.
Wally's like no, we don't.
And the guy's like, yes, you do, and Wally was an E4.
He goes, yeah, specialist,you're going to carry it because
I said so.
Wally's like OK, sorry, I neverto be here.
So I come over and Wally's like, hey, he's telling me I'm going
to carry this.
I looked at the dude and I'mlike dude, we ain't carrying
that.

(03:18:53):
And he's like staff sergeant,you're carrying, and I'm like
staff sergeant, we're notcarrying it.
I said, do you know our MOS?
And he's like 11 Bravo.
I said, well, I have an 11Bravo MOS, but I'm a 11 hotel.
And he's like, oh, I said soyou're not going to make us
carry shit.
Yeah.
That you don't know about, justbecause you want us to carry it.

Speaker 6 (03:19:15):
Even though it's the latest series, we're never going
to tell us to make a nice moveIn combat you might have to do
this.

Speaker 3 (03:19:21):
Well, in combat I might get shot in the fucking
chest.
Are you going to take me out inthe fucking side yard and shoot
me in the chest?
So I know what it feels like.
So, anyway, pissed that guy off, right?
So then we're going.
Movement to daylight is what wecalled.
We had this captain.
Called him Captain America.

Speaker 4 (03:19:42):
So we got ready.
I like Captain Assano better.

Speaker 5 (03:19:44):
Yeah, I do too, captain Lowry.

Speaker 3 (03:19:46):
Captain America Lowry .
So we're getting ready to go onthis mission and, mind you,
this is an infantry company thathas a squad of maintenance
commo tow right.
So the captain kind of comes upto me and says, hey, you guys

(03:20:09):
are leading the movement.
And I'm like why don't you haveone of your fucking infantry
squads lead it?
Right?
He goes well, we're going tohave you do it and I was like
all right.
So I go up to Captain Americaand I'm like OK, sir, so what's?
the we need we need direction,distance as myth.
He looks at me and goes justfollow me.

(03:20:31):
I was like no sir.
I said what happens if you falldown and break your leg.
And I have no idea where to go.
I don't know where to go and hegoes look, we ain't got time
for this, you just follow me.
I'm like, hey, I ain't fuckingmoving until you give me
direction, distance, and, asmyth, he goes.

(03:20:52):
Well, you see that saddle andthe thing there.
Just head towards that.
And I'm like whoa time out, itain't happening, sir, it's not
happening.
So he threw a fit, got thecompany commander in the first
hour and they come over andthey're doing the your.

Speaker 4 (03:21:07):
They're arguing, yeah , they're arguing, for sure.
And they're doing their oldthing.

Speaker 3 (03:21:11):
Captain Kiddings, who turns around and looks at me
and goes just follow him.
I'm like hey, I'm like hell.
No, sir, I want to know whereI'm going, how far I'm doing it
and the as myth I'm taking toget there.

Speaker 4 (03:21:26):
That's actually protocol, right Protocol.
I mean, come on, that's astandard operating fucking
procedure.

Speaker 3 (03:21:32):
So the first sergeant which, very disappointingly,
this guy was a snake eaterspecial forces Vietnam.
The dude was slick, he was weak, very good, he looked at me and
goes South, Sergeant, do it.
So Sergeant Bills was my pointman.
And we had the old PBS fours,the old stupid dual-eyed fucking

(03:21:56):
thing.
We had those too.

Speaker 4 (03:22:01):
Yeah, you could have been four miles away, though you
were four feet.
Yeah, yeah, I guess that was it.

Speaker 3 (03:22:05):
So I went up to Sergeant Bills and I said OK,
look it.
I said I'm running point.
A staff sergeant doesn't runpoint.
He's like what do you mean?
I said I'm running point.
I said you do not move thiscompany until I stop and turn
around and flash you the cateyes, and when you do, you walk
to me.
And then, when you get to me,we'll move again, because

(03:22:30):
Captain America had the highspeed deltas.
And all the stars, like sing-go.

Speaker 5 (03:22:35):
Oh yeah, he has a high speed ones.

Speaker 3 (03:22:38):
So we take off.
So Captain Kinninger comes upto Bills and says why aren't we
moving?
And Bills like sir, I was givena directive that I don't move
until Sergeant RDB flashes methe cat eyes.
He's like well, you need tofollow him.
He goes, sir, I'm sorry, butSergeant RDB is my squad leader

(03:22:58):
and I'm not moving until heflashes and he's an E5.
Right?

Speaker 4 (03:23:02):
So I get up there.
He's got some balls to him,right?
Yeah, I like that guy.

Speaker 3 (03:23:05):
He wasn't very smart, sergeant.

Speaker 4 (03:23:07):
Bills was not very smart.
But he had some fucking balls.

Speaker 3 (03:23:10):
So Captain Kinninger was like all right.
So I went up there about Idon't know 50 meters, turned
around Bam, he brought thecompany up and we kept doing
this You're.

Speaker 4 (03:23:21):
Lee Poppins.

Speaker 3 (03:23:22):
Yeah, we just kept doing this, he kept doing this
and I stopped the CaptainAmerican.
I'm like dude.
We've been walking for fourfucking hours.
We started at 10 o'clock atnight and now it's 2 in the
morning.

Speaker 4 (03:23:35):
I'm like what the fuck is going on, that's 0-2 for
the rest of us right.

Speaker 3 (03:23:39):
Yeah, oh, sorry.
Yeah, that's what we're doingnow.
Ha, ha, ha ha.

Speaker 4 (03:23:45):
I just want to throw that out there.
It was 2 AM 0-2,.
It's on here 0-2.

Speaker 3 (03:23:49):
And he's like well, we're almost there.

Speaker 4 (03:23:51):
They were like what's 0-2?

Speaker 3 (03:23:53):
Yeah.

Speaker 4 (03:23:54):
I know, I know 2 AM, I know 0-2.

Speaker 3 (03:23:56):
So he's like well, we're almost there.
And I'm like, all right, weneed a break.
He's like all right, so wehunker down.
The squad gets around me.
Chief Bansmer comes up to meand he's like dude, what in the
fuck are we doing?
And I'm like I don't know,we're just walking.
I'm like we're just walkingthrough the desert, right, and

(03:24:18):
he's like do you know how far?
I'm?
Like I have no fucking clue.
I said I'm just following thisguy.

Speaker 4 (03:24:24):
You see that saddle up in the mouth.
We're going that way, right,you know what I mean.
That's it.

Speaker 3 (03:24:30):
So all right, now it's like 5-30.

Speaker 4 (03:24:32):
0-5-30.

Speaker 3 (03:24:33):
0-5-30.
Wally comes up to me and goesare we almost there?
And I'm like we have to bebecause the sun's coming out,
man.
So we walked until about 6.

Speaker 2 (03:24:44):
0-6.
0-6.

Speaker 3 (03:24:48):
0-6.
We set up fucking Humvee, pullsup a fucking dude, jumps out of
the fucking vehicle and saysI'm the tow gunner.
I was like you are fucking lost, you're fucking mine.
I said we just fucking walkedfucking seven hours with this

(03:25:09):
fucking tow and you're tellingme you're the tow gunner.
Yeah, he goes, we're at 4.
And that's what we do and thisis how this is and this is to
train you guys.
I'm like, oh fuck, no, I saidthat ain't going to happen.

Speaker 5 (03:25:21):
Yes go, sit your ass down.
We're going to shoot this bitch.

Speaker 3 (03:25:23):
And he looked at me and he goes hey, staff, sergeant
, and he was at E-5.
I said, hey, sergeant, my fullhouse, I'll bring you three of a
kind.
I said so go set your fuckingass down, because my gunner did
just hump this fucking thing.
He's going to shoot, he's goingto shoot it.

Speaker 5 (03:25:39):
Damn right.

Speaker 3 (03:25:40):
So then he went to the fucking first Sergeant
commander and then they comeback and said well, sergeant, I
ought to be, you got to do thisand you got to be, and I was
like he's done.
That's terrible leadershipright there.

Speaker 4 (03:25:49):
Yeah, I mean 100%, and that's the stuff that makes
us mad.
And that same thing, right?
If you got a workforce thatworks for you, you go through
all this drama and all this BSand then stuff gets staked out
from underneath you, right?
It pisses you off.
Oh hell, yeah, you know what Imean.
It's ridiculous.
So, as much as we want to bringsomebody in from the military

(03:26:11):
to train corporate America orwhatever else, right, great idea
, right?
I don't know if you remember 10years ago all these corporate
companies are doing these teambuilding exercises.
So my sister-in-law works forConsumer's.
Energy right.
And if I can recall correctlyI'm not going to say yes or no

(03:26:32):
it's Consumer's Energy, right.
But I have other friends incorporate America that they were
doing these team buildingexercise days where they would
bring the office together orwhatever right, and they were
doing all these mock things thatwe in boot camp would do, right
.

Speaker 3 (03:26:49):
Oh yeah, we called the crucible.
Well, we called it the obstaclecourse.

Speaker 2 (03:26:53):
OK so it's a battle stations.

Speaker 4 (03:26:56):
So the crucible in the Marine Corps is a 54-hour
exercise at the very end of bootcamp.

Speaker 3 (03:27:00):
We called it the mungadang.

Speaker 4 (03:27:02):
But we did the obstacle course during boot camp
and stuff like that too, but itwas a lot of team building
stuff.
So they're mocking what we do,right, or mock-uping what we do.
They're not making fun of us,right, but they're trying to
incorporate that stuff to try toget the team to come together,
because you might work in thisoffice and I work upstairs at
you or whatever, and I don'teven know you.
So they try to bring everybodytogether, right, for a common

(03:27:25):
goal.
Right, but the leadershipportion of it great idea, none
executed very well, because oneday of us walking across the
monkey bars or walking acrossthe balance beam or whatever,
holding a bag of whatever A bagof dicks Probably isn't the same

(03:27:48):
as what we were doing, right.
I mean, it's a great concept andidea, but that still doesn't
mean you know the guy that worksupstairs at you or the guy that
works in the cubicle next toyou.
That well, right.
So it's a good concept.
I don't think it works the sameand that's why it fails
corporate-wise, because they'renot doing it together, like we
literally live together, we eattogether, we shit together, we

(03:28:12):
sleep together.
We do all the things together,we drink together all the time
For months and months and monthsand months.
Maybe third platoon and they'reonly doing it for an afternoon
or a day, right, so it's a coolway to meet your coworkers that
you don't really know, butteam-building-wise, I think it
just fails.
I think it falls short.
I think it's a good conceptthey're leadership but I don't

(03:28:32):
think it's the same.

Speaker 2 (03:28:33):
And I don't know Obviously I don't have the
experience in the sergeant'scourse for the Marine Corps or
whatever your other leadershipcourses are, but all of them
what I'll tell you about myexperience with the leadership
course that I had to do once Ihad picked up E-4, it was

(03:28:57):
garbage.
Just to tell you the truth, itwas over three days and because
the Navy's core values are honor, courage and commitment, they
split this training up intothree days and the first day was
all about honor and the secondday was all about courage and
the third day was all aboutcommitment and all I wanted to

(03:29:18):
do is just go back to fuckingwork.
It was the stupidest shit.

Speaker 4 (03:29:24):
So the Marine Corps is, and it taught me nothing
about leading anybody.
So the Marine Corps hassomething similar.
Right, we have a corpus course,a sergeant's course that says
you're picking up, right,because you're going to go from
a Lance Corporal and MarineCorps E-3, e-4.
So now you're going to be incharge of E-3s, e-2s, e-1s,
right?
So you have to be able toseparate yourself, because I was
literally living in a room withanother Lance Corporal.

Speaker 2 (03:29:46):
Let me just say this real quick that's how the Marine
Corps works.
But I can tell you that's nothow the Navy.

Speaker 4 (03:29:51):
Well, no for sure.
And this is Well everything'sdone.

Speaker 2 (03:29:54):
And it's probably not all the.

Speaker 3 (03:29:55):
Air Force sports either.

Speaker 4 (03:29:55):
Well, like you know, we got three of the four
branches here, right, right.

Speaker 2 (03:30:01):
A PFC or whatever.
Forget Space Force.
Well, even in Air.

Speaker 5 (03:30:04):
Force fucking them assholes.
Everybody got their own condo.
Yeah, they just test out.

Speaker 3 (03:30:09):
That's how they get right, because they just take a
test and then, if there's a slot, they take a test, they move up
.

Speaker 2 (03:30:14):
Well, when everything is all said and done, they go
down to Denny's and have dinner.

Speaker 4 (03:30:18):
For our leadership stuff, though.
Right, so you go through CorpusCores because I'm living with
another E-3, lance Corporal.
Now I get promoted, I have tomove rooms.
Yep, so either I'm living withanother Corporal, I get my own
room, because I'm not allowed,after hours per se, to hang out
with an E-3, e-2, e-1.

Speaker 2 (03:30:38):
And that's what I wanted to tell you was, at least
for the Navy is concerned, likea Marine Corps, pfc is going to
listen to what a Lance Corporalsays.

Speaker 4 (03:30:48):
For sure 100%.

Speaker 2 (03:30:50):
But a Navy semen recruit, or in my case as a
corpsman, we're calledhospitalmen.
A hospitalman recruit orwhatever, is not going to listen
to an E-3.
There is a higher rank there,obviously, but they don't look
at each other like that.

(03:31:10):
I think the Marine Corps Atleast in my experience the
Marine Corps is different, right.

Speaker 4 (03:31:14):
So I talked to Shaman , I talked to Timbough at the
Army Life right, and they'retalking about E-6's do a job
that the Marine Corps and E-5does right.
And the job that E-5 does andthe Marine Corps and E-4 does
right is a Corporal.
So it's just because they're sobig right, with so many
enlisted right, that they can dothat.
So that's where I go back to.

(03:31:34):
We do more or less.
So we expect a lot more out ofour younger members, our junior
members.
But those courses teach usright and Corpus Course is a
great course.
Army Course is a great courseas well, and it teaches you that
transition of what you shouldbe doing and what you shouldn't
be doing.
So, for instance, right, like wehave on our bases, we have NCO

(03:31:55):
clubs and non-NCO clubs.
So the privates, pfcs, lanceCobbles, so E1, e2, e3s, they
have their own little bar theycan hang out at, and then we
have the NCO club, corporalSartre's hanging out at that,
and then there's a staff NCOclub, sart, e6's, staff,
sergeants and above go to andour officers clubs right, and
they all I'm assuming they alljust have one club.

(03:32:17):
Yeah they do.
They all get to hang out atright, so that transition
period's hard because I might berooming with Shem.
And we're-.
And you're best buddies hangingout all the time we're the best
buddies and all of a sudden Ibecome his boss.
I have to be able to separate,and that's hard.
I had to be able to separate.
Hey, dude, we were just hangingout yesterday and now I gotta
tell you to go do a shit job,and you better go do it, no

(03:32:38):
matter how good of friends weare.
I think the Marine Corps does agood job at training us Well,
coming from boot camp.

Speaker 5 (03:32:45):
Army has a doctrine.
It's probably the same in theMarine Corps On active duty.
I know when I started climbingthe ranks on active duty anytime
I was ever trained to go into aleadership position like, for
instance, back when I wasenlisted first time I was
getting my sergeant stripes.
I had to go through PLDCprimary leadership development
course.
As soon as I graduated and Igot my fucking my stripes, they

(03:33:11):
took me and they shipped me offto another duty station.

Speaker 3 (03:33:14):
That's all the army does.

Speaker 5 (03:33:16):
Yep, they pulled me away that way because there was
one thing that was.
It was never taught, but it wasan underlying you just you know
the so that you didn't have the.

Speaker 3 (03:33:24):
You didn't have the.
He's now, all of a sudden, he'sordering around the dude he was
drinking with yesterday.

Speaker 4 (03:33:31):
Yeah, marine Corps is not like that at all, right?
So when I transitioned right, Iwent from a fire team member to
a fire team leader right, I'mstill in the same guys Now maybe
I might switch a differentsquad, but it's still the same
platoon, so it's not like Idon't know the guy, right?
And then I can shift meplatoons or whatever else.

Speaker 5 (03:33:48):
When I first got promoted to sergeant, I didn't
leave my unit.
They just put me in a differentplatoon.
So I, you know, I was stillaround.

Speaker 4 (03:33:56):
I was still around the guys that I came up with,
but you weren't in charge ofyour friends, right, yep.
So the Marine Corps is not likethat, at least when I was in
right.
Maybe it's changed since then.
Right, it's been 20 years.

Speaker 2 (03:34:05):
The Navy, I should say, does do that.
I don't want to bash on, youknow everything, but you know,
when I did pick up rank they didtransfer me to another clinic.
So in practice, in a way, theydid do that.

Speaker 4 (03:34:19):
Yeah, no, Marine Corps does do that.

Speaker 3 (03:34:21):
I personally think that's detrimental to the morale
and welfare of the group,because who are you gonna fight
harder for?
Your friend, for sure yourfriend, the person that's been
there, the person that we'vebeen drinking beers banging.

Speaker 4 (03:34:35):
Quiff let's say Quiff , right, right, I got you there,
good saying, good saying, I washere for you, brother, yeah.

Speaker 3 (03:34:43):
But that's but to me that's the most important my
friends that I served with for24 years in Echo Company.
First it was combat supportcompany, then it went to Delta
Company, then it went to EchoCompany.

Speaker 4 (03:34:56):
Yeah, but you think about it though, right?
So now, all of a sudden, youget promoted, and now you get
shifted to a whole another dutystation, right?
So not only you know is thatyou personally, but maybe it's
your family that's gonna nowmove too again right.
So you think about that tolltake.
So you start talking retentionright Now.
All of a sudden it's like man,I don't even wanna get promoted

(03:35:17):
because I gotta freaking moveagain.
My family's gotta move again.
My kids gotta move again.
So you start talking about otherthings that are crazy.

Speaker 2 (03:35:22):
Okay, so in the Army and in the Marine Corps?
Cause I can tell you, for theNavy, the answer is yes to this
question, but is rank forced onyou?

Speaker 4 (03:35:33):
Up to a certain level in the Marine Corps.

Speaker 2 (03:35:35):
I don't think.

Speaker 3 (03:35:35):
Something in the Army yep Up to a certain level In
the Army.
Not used to be, not used to be.
Hell, I was a fucking E6 for 13years.

Speaker 5 (03:35:44):
I was an E6 for 13 years.

Speaker 3 (03:35:46):
And then finally they came with you had to move up or
get out.
So then all of a sudden, eitherI had like 18 years in and
there's like hey, you need to goto a platoon sergeant, or we're
gonna get you out and I'm likeI don't wanna be a fucking
platoon sergeant, because thenI'm taking myself away from the

(03:36:10):
people that I, they care about,the people I love, the people I
wanna eat the dirt with and Iwanna kill the people with, you
know, and so as far as theMarine Corps is concerned, so an
automatic grade or promotion.

Speaker 4 (03:36:25):
If you're a private, after like six months you become
a PFC right.
And then a year and six monthsyou become a Lance Corporal
right.
And then when you move from E4,e5 all the way up right, it
goes off a year's in service.
You gotta have a minimum amountof time in In grade and service
, in grade and service right.
But you also have to have whatwe call a cutting score and I'm

(03:36:47):
assuming it's still the same.
It very well could have changed.
But for instance, right, likethe Marine Corps needs so many,
your MOS corporals, right.
So it goes off your grade andproficiency marks that you get
from your leadership right.
It goes off your PFD score,your F-erange score for that
year.
All these different things,right.

(03:37:07):
They come up to an accumulativescore.

Speaker 3 (03:37:10):
Right, yep, the Army does that too.

Speaker 4 (03:37:11):
Say, in the Marine Corps I have 1,000 points for my
and the cutting score might be1,100.
So if I had 1,100 or more Iwould get promoted.
If I'm at 1,000, I'm not.
This month, every month itchanges because the guys are
coming and going, the guys aregetting out, guys are getting
promoted.

Speaker 3 (03:37:27):
That's how the Army did it too.
Towards the end of my career,we started doing that.
You had to get on a list.

Speaker 4 (03:37:33):
Yeah, so basically that's what it was right, and it
would show your name on thislist with what your score was
right.
And then if you made theyneeded 500 corpals, that score
might be 900, and I would havegot promoted to 1,000.
So then we needed 400,.
I might have been 1,200,.
Yeah, so there was all thesedifferent factors that kind of
came in, but I never ever heardof anybody turn it out of

(03:37:56):
promotion in the Marine Corpsnever once.

Speaker 3 (03:37:58):
Why would you?

Speaker 4 (03:37:59):
Well, you did you wanted to.

Speaker 3 (03:38:01):
No, I didn't turn it down.
Well, I just wasn't.
I was happy where I was at,because if I could have stayed
as Staff Sergeant for my entirecareer because I wanted to be
where the bullets- where therubber meets the road.
But they come up with thatthing that said, hey, you have
to move.

Speaker 4 (03:38:17):
So I heard something similar in the Marine Corps when
I was in or coming out right Ifyou didn't move from E6, which
is a Staff Sergeant, up toGunnery Sergeant after 12 years
or something like that you wereout.

Speaker 3 (03:38:29):
Yep, yep, that's where the Army did that.

Speaker 4 (03:38:30):
Yeah, so if you didn't make the score from six
to seven, right, you gottransitioned out.

Speaker 3 (03:38:36):
Because they didn't want you to be stagnant.

Speaker 5 (03:38:38):
They wanted to keep the Well that and retirement I
mean Christ retirement pay at E6and the Army Still pretty
fucking good.

Speaker 4 (03:38:45):
Yeah, I mean.
Well, we all get paid the sameregardless, right?
E5, no matter what branch, areinsane and it, you know, like
any company in the world.
There might be some differenceif you're married or you're
deployed, but why would somebodypay?

Speaker 5 (03:38:55):
somebody you know sit there until the retirement.
Now we gotta pay extra.
I mean, that's one of thosegovernment financed things, but
that's whole another fucking.

Speaker 4 (03:39:06):
Yeah, well, and I think each branch is kind of
similar at the same instance,right, but when it comes down to
it, you know, I think there's apoint in leadership where
either you need to move up oryou need to get out.
Absolutely, I do agree withthat, right, but sometimes,
because they bump up, you losegood leadership too.

(03:39:29):
So it's like a catch-22sometimes, right, you know,
regardless, if you're working ina factory, right, and your
supervisor is a great, greatperson, they bump up.
Now the next person getspromoted as a ship bird.
Right now you gotta deal with aship bird.
That's like man.
Life was good.
This guy made sure that we hadeverything we needed, or this

(03:39:49):
girl's got to make sure we haveeverything we needed.
Life is good, conditions aregood, and all of a sudden,
everything goes to hell in ahandbasket.
Quick Straight, quick right,and nobody wants that.

Speaker 3 (03:39:59):
So and the thing with me for me is my readiness NCO
former Marine and he was ourfull-time guy.
He couldn't do the platoonsergeant thing so they moved me
from second platoon into firstplatoon so that I ran the

(03:40:20):
platoon because I was kind ofthe next guy on the list.
But at that time the list was Iwasn't high enough on the list
because I refused to go tocollege, because they pushed the
whole college thing.
You got more points if you wentto college than practical

(03:40:40):
experience that you have bootson the ground and doing the job.

Speaker 5 (03:40:46):
So Right, let's go ahead and wrap this up, because
we got real life shit to do.
We're grown men.
I gotta go cut my grass, youhaven't cut your grass yet.
Fuck.
No, it rained yesterday.
I was gonna do yesterday,Hooker, I thought you did it
before you came.
Motherfucker.

Speaker 3 (03:41:03):
Go to my house and cut my grass first.
You don't cut your own grass.
I don't want to.
Well, let it grow.
I wanna go drink.

Speaker 5 (03:41:10):
I wanna go drink beer .
Well, go do that.
I'm like I'm gonna drink.
Well, I'm not gonna drink beer,but I'm gonna drink something
while I'm cutting my grass.

Speaker 3 (03:41:18):
Oh, there you go, there you go, so All right.

Speaker 2 (03:41:25):
Well, what do you guys think?
We did quite a bit of talkinghere.
We're at three hours and 41minutes.

Speaker 3 (03:41:35):
Well, I liked it because we just kind of floated
around and we just not scripted,just real talk about real
veteran bullshit, you know, andhow we deal with shit.

Speaker 2 (03:41:45):
Absolutely.

Speaker 3 (03:41:46):
I think it was a good session, and me personally.
I don't think you should editit, I think you should just just
post it.
Yeah, he's got his mama wantshim home.
Yeah, we were talking aboutthis earlier, right, yeah, yeah.
So but that's kind of mythought process is.

Speaker 4 (03:42:06):
There was not much break anywhere.
I mean, this is like I say whenwe're up at the postman seminar
get into a two, three hourpretty easy, just talk about it.

Speaker 2 (03:42:15):
We're still recording .

Speaker 4 (03:42:17):
Well then, you know, we were still recording.
Sorry about that, yeah.

Speaker 2 (03:42:21):
I just got to wrap it on.

Speaker 3 (03:42:24):
Well, you got to make mama happy.
Yeah for sure.

Speaker 4 (03:42:26):
I get it.
So we'll go from there and wedefinitely need to do more of
these, for sure, man, becausethis is what you know, just that
talk right when other peopleout there that have done what
we've done or thinking aboutwhat we're thinking about, and
we'll get way more in depth aswe go on.
This was pretty good intro one.

Speaker 2 (03:42:43):
Absolutely.

Speaker 4 (03:42:44):
Places we've been, things we've done, but moving
forward, right, we'll get intosome more deeper stuff, for sure
.

Speaker 3 (03:42:49):
Yeah, I agree.
So, all right, all you folksout there have a good day.
I hope you enjoyed ourconversation and please stop
back again.
Hallelujah Shall, we now sing.

Speaker 2 (03:43:07):
No, no, we're not singing, we're not singing,
we'll save their eardrums, yeah,but I will say thanks for
joining us at Soup Sandwich.
We'll hope to see you on thenext episode, thank you.

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