At long last, Staff Sgt. Matt Maupin is home. He was laid to rest with full military honors this weekend, after having been captured by jihadis and then murdered by them in disregard for the protections of the very Geneva Conventions they claim protection from when they fall into the hands of Americans.

Thousands walked past Staff Sgt. Matt Maupin's casket during a daylong visitation at a civic center in Clermont County, east of Cincinnati, where he grew up. Many of them headed to Great American Ball Park, home of the Cincinnati Reds, for an afternoon memorial service.

The crowd occupied the lower portion of the 42,000-seat stadium, behind home plate, stretching from first base to third.

Maupin's flag-draped casket was on a platform in the area of the pitcher's mound. The only people on the field were members of the 338th Army band and about 100 family members, military representatives and dignitaries.

This weekend was a long time coming for Maupin's family. He was captured on April 9, 2004, and executed a short time thereafter. His body was recovered this spring.

May the sacrifice of Matt Maupin, and of all soldiers in the war against jihadi terrorism, not be in vain.

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Having been the architect of success in iraq following the troop surge, General David Petraeus will be promoted to head the US Central Command -- giving him operational control over the entire Middle East.

Gen. David Petraeus has been tapped to become the next commander of U.S. Central Command, which oversees military operations from the Middle East to Central Asia and directs the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Defense Secretary Robert Gates announced his decision Wednesday at a press conference in Washington, saying President Bush would send Petraeus' nomination to the Senate soon.

"I recommended him to the president because he is absolutely the best man to do the job. The conflict in Iraq and Afghanistan are very much characterized by asymmetric warfare and I don't know anyone better prepared to deal with that," Gates said of Petraeus, speaking to reporters.

Petraeus issued a statement shortly afterward.

"I am honored to be nominated for this position and to have an opportunity to continue to serve with America's soldiers, sailors, airmen, Marines, Coastguardsmen, and civilians," Petraeus said.

The strategy designed and implemented by Petraeus has led to decreased violence and increased security in Iraq -- things that are positives for anyone who is interested in seeing an American victory over terrorism.

Interestingly enough, Harry Reid has indicated that the Democrats are going to use the summer hearings on this promotion and several related changes to play politics with the military command structure and the Iraq war in the run-up to the election. While such actions are disgusting, they are not unexpected. The only positive I see in this probability is that it will remind the American people of the fundamental unfitness of the Democrats to control our national defense.

H/T Hot Air, Malkin

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The leftists will no doubt remain dissatisfied.

President Bush plans to announce today that he will cut Army combat tours in Iraq from 15 months to 12 months, returning rotations to where they were before last year's troop buildup in an effort to alleviate the tremendous stress on the military, administration officials said.

The move is in response to intense pressure from service commanders who have expressed anxiety about the toll of long deployments on their soldiers and, more broadly, about the U.S. military's ability to confront unanticipated threats. Bush will announce the decision during a national speech, in which aides said he will also embrace Army Gen. David H. Petraeus's plan to indefinitely suspend a drawdown of forces.

Interestingly enough, this is being done even as the phased withdrawal of troops is underway -- and also under criticism from the anti-war crew because it is being conducted in a way consistent with preserving the security gains of the last year. They still are interested in a pell-mell cut-and-run strategy that would have every American out by next Thursday -- even though their false messiah Barack Obama is committed to leaving 60,000 troops in Iraq indefinitely, much like John McCain is (and much like we did in Germany, Japan, and Korea, those ongoing quagmires in progress for the last five or six decades).

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Highlight the seemingly negative news, bury the positive.

The percentage of recruits requiring a waiver to join the Army because of a criminal record or other past misconduct has more than doubled since 2004 to one for every eight new soldiers.

The increase reflects the difficulties the Army faces in attracting young men and women into the military at a time of war. "Each month is a struggle, for the Army in particular," said Bill Carr, a top military personnel official.

The percentage of active and Reserve Army recruits granted "conduct" waivers for misdemeanor or felony charges increased to 11% last fiscal year from 4.6% in fiscal 2004, according to Army Recruiting Command statistics. So far this fiscal year, which began last October, 13% of recruits have entered the Army with conduct waivers.

Most waivers involve misdemeanors. The Army has granted 4,676 conduct waivers among the 36,047 recruited from October through late February. The waivers have helped the Army meet its active and Reserve recruitment goals of about 100,000 people a year for the past several years.

Obviously this constitutes a degradation of our military, right.

Well, maybe not.

Indeed, certainly not.

Recruits who have come in with waivers generally perform better than peers who haven't needed special permission to join the Army, Carr said.
"When you have people volunteering that have made some mistakes in their life, you give them fair consideration," said Frank Shaffery, deputy director of the Army's Recruiting Command.

Interesting how the fact that these soldiers out-perform their peers gets buried at the very end of the story. You donÂ’t suppose it could be based upon a subconscious desire to bad talk the troops, do you?

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