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Pentagon Changes Mind, Won't Deploy Congressman
AP ^ | 4\1\03

Posted on 04/01/2003 10:54:38 AM PST by InHisImage

WASHINGTON -- Congressman Steve Buyer won't be trading his business suit for Army fatigues after all.

The Indiana Republican is a member of the Army Reserve and said he had been called to active duty. But the Pentagon is having second thoughts.

Buyer received a letter Monday from the military brass saying his services wouldn't be needed. The Pentagon said Buyer's high-profile status could endanger him and his fellow soldiers.

Buyer is a lieutenant colonel and served in the first Gulf War as a military legal adviser. He would have been the first member of Congress since World War II to take a leave of absence to serve in the war.


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To: cynicom
As I recall it, Johnson was an influential senator or congressman's son. He served in some PR version of JAG or something, and for informational purposes was allowed on a B-29 flight.

Crewmembers on that same mission didn't recall anything out of the ordinary, and didn't receive anything except points towards an Air Medal (30 flights in hostile territory unless special circumstances). When they found out the JAFO on board received a Silver Star, they were amazed.

21 posted on 04/01/2003 12:24:54 PM PST by struwwelpeter (kuda ukhodit detstvo? v kakie goroda?)
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To: bedolido
"I say if he's a lib and a dem... DEPLOY!"

Congressman Buyer (R-IN) was one of the very brave, courageous Managers who brought about the Impeachment of clinton.

I don't know much about him, but the guy will always be A#1 in my book.

22 posted on 04/01/2003 12:29:13 PM PST by Exit148
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To: TaRaRaBoomDeAyGoreLostToday!
There are NO 22 year old Full Bird Colonels!!
23 posted on 04/01/2003 12:33:48 PM PST by PISANO
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To: struwwelpeter
stru...

" LBJ's Silver Star Navy Lt. Cmdr. Lyndon Baines Johnson, the first member of Congress to enter active duty in World War II, was awarded the Silver Star in 1942 for gallantry in action on a flight over enemy territory. But historians have called Johnson's decoration one of the most undeserved Silver Stars in history, and CNN's review of the historical record raises new questions about the circumstances of its award by Gen. Douglas McArthur nearly 60 years ago.

LBJ had been in congress since 1938. The acft was a B-25, the crewmembers got nothing.

24 posted on 04/01/2003 12:36:07 PM PST by cynicom
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To: cynicom
That's the skivvy, thanks. Everytime I get around you, I think of Superfortresses ;-)

Ever hear the tale of LBJ's flight home? Supposedly when his helo took him to his ranch after Nixon's inauguration, no one was there to meet him. LBJ insisted that Marine-1 remain there, but the crew stated: "This isn't your helicopter anymore", unloaded his bags and took off. The pilot said the last he saw of LBJ was the big old SOB stomping his foot and shaking a fist at them.

Probably a myth, but does a heart good.

25 posted on 04/01/2003 12:52:02 PM PST by struwwelpeter (kuda ukhodit detstvo? v kakie goroda?)
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To: struwwelpeter
Myth or not, it fits the egomaniac LBJ to a T.
26 posted on 04/01/2003 12:55:06 PM PST by cynicom
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To: JimVT
Re: And that would, no doubt, be that great Americun Silver Star holder LBJ.

Now, hold on! LBJ flew a long way to get that Silver Star in a old un-air conditioned, non-pressureized Catalina. Why his uniform got mussed!

He had a worse time than
Algore but he didn't have to invent all those pesky guns to win honor and glory.

All Texas knows LBJ. He's our very own Liberal Butthead Jerk whose Great Society wiped out poverty and hunger for all time! Not to mention he lost our first war to the media and whetted their thirst for blood and Watergate.

Ha, the greatest thing about JBL:
"He's dead, Jim."

27 posted on 04/01/2003 1:22:48 PM PST by sonofatpatcher2 (Love & a .45-- What more could you want, campers? };^)
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To: Bisesi
Batallion company/ troop squadron commanders, CWO's, CPO's,LPO's/ are bound to be younger than this congressman.Irregardless I do not think a congressmen should be a soldier.
28 posted on 04/01/2003 1:25:05 PM PST by TaRaRaBoomDeAyGoreLostToday!
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To: Conservative Iowan
The congressman may have had many specialties who knows where he would be placed or his rank and status? Since you pointed out his rank (that I did not notice,) I still don't think it is a good call but understand why some may think he should go. The Pentagon made the right call on this.I think it is a democrat Senator/congressmen that has a son fighting.

Someone 40+ and retired/ and activated is not necessarily sent front line/ or even in theatre. They could be AD in the home front.

29 posted on 04/01/2003 1:34:49 PM PST by TaRaRaBoomDeAyGoreLostToday!
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To: InHisImage
Pentagon nixes lawmaker's offer to serve


30 posted on 04/01/2003 2:14:18 PM PST by TaRaRaBoomDeAyGoreLostToday!
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To: InHisImage
"The Pentagon said Buyer's high-profile status (as a comgressman) could endanger him..."

O.K. then Pentagon people, will you at least reconsider the point and perhaps send a Senator into action instead? Say a Jr. one from N.Y.? Surely she wouldn't refuse to be come the first entombed Senator in Iraq. (Oops, sorry, I meant embedded of course---LOL)

31 posted on 04/01/2003 2:35:29 PM PST by Pagey (Hillary Rotten is a Smug , Holier-Than-Thou Socialist)
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To: Exit148
Congressman Buyer (R-IN) was one of the very brave, courageous Managers who brought about the Impeachment of clinton.

I don't know much about him, but the guy will always be A#1 in my book.

He also went down to Florida during the post-election re-re-re-re-re-recount, when it became known that the 'rats were trying to get military ballots tossed.

He's definitely one of the good guys, and that's why I have made him my adopted congressman, to help me deal with the fact that my actual congresscritter is Jerry Nadler.

32 posted on 04/01/2003 3:36:41 PM PST by NYC GOP Chick (Clinton Legacy = 16-acre hole in the ground in lower Manhattan)
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To: TaRaRaBoomDeAyGoreLostToday!
think it is a democrat Senator/congressmen that has a son fighting.

That would be Tim Johnson, 'rat senator from S. Dakota.

33 posted on 04/01/2003 3:38:02 PM PST by NYC GOP Chick (Clinton Legacy = 16-acre hole in the ground in lower Manhattan)
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To: Pagey
O.K. then Pentagon people, will you at least reconsider the point and perhaps send a Senator into action instead? Say a Jr. one from N.Y.? Surely she wouldn't refuse to be come the first entombed Senator in Iraq. (Oops, sorry, I meant embedded of course---LOL)

Then again, we could also just use her as a wide-load MOAB and drop her over Baghdad...

34 posted on 04/01/2003 3:46:15 PM PST by NYC GOP Chick (Clinton Legacy = 16-acre hole in the ground in lower Manhattan)
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To: cynicom
--Roosevelt's rule must have been changed later in the war. IMHO, members of Congress have plenty to do in Washington-especially in wartime-and should be required to choose one or the other -military or Congress.
35 posted on 04/01/2003 3:46:25 PM PST by rellimpank
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To: TaRaRaBoomDeAyGoreLostToday!
During Gulf War I, Steve Buyer in his military capacity served as an attorney having something to do with overseeing the Iraqi POWs.
36 posted on 04/01/2003 3:50:50 PM PST by wimpycat ('Nemo me impune lacessit')
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To: Conservative Iowan
Pentagon Rejects Lawmaker's Serve Offer
Pentagon Says Thanks, but No Thanks to Indiana Congressman's Offer to Serve

The Associated Press


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WASHINGTON April 1

In the end, Rep. Steve Buyer got a thanks, but no thanks from the Pentagon for wanting to report for military duty near the battlefields of Iraq rather than in the halls of Congress.

Even before the first bombs were dropped on Baghdad, the Indiana Republican and a lieutenant colonel in the Army Reserve was making plans to ship out as a judge advocate to the Persian Gulf, where 12 years ago in an earlier war he was a legal adviser in a POW camp.

He sought and immediately received from House Speaker Dennis Hastert an indefinite leave from Congress and returned to his home in Monticello, Ind., to spend a few days with his family before what he thought would be a speedy deployment.

The plan came to an end Monday night, not abruptly but after days of wrangling by Pentagon officials over whether Buyer's desire to report for active military duty should prevail over a six-decade practice of not sending lawmakers into harm's way as soldiers while Congress is in session.

"The Army appreciates your willingness to serve the nation in Operation Iraqi Freedom," Buyer (pronounced BOO-yer) quoted a Pentagon notice he received Monday. "However, due to your high profile status as a United States representative, we are concerned that your presence would put in jeopardy your safety and the safety of those serving around you, given the current security environment in the theater of operations."

Buyer, 44, said in a telephone interview before heading back to Washington that he had mixed feelings about the Army's decision.

"When you get ready and you're prepared to go, you're ready," he said. "(But) I have a family and I've already done this once.... I'm neither the first nor will I be the last soldier ever told to pack your bags, you're deploying, stand by, stand down, now unpack your bags."

Others were not surprised.

"There is a tradition of not wearing two hats in the government," said Senate historian Donald Ritchie.

Sen. Tom Carper, D-Del., was a member of the House and a Navy Reservist when he offered to serve in the Persian Gulf war. He recalled Dick Cheney, the secretary of defense then, telling him to stay put.

"I think Secretary Cheney recognized that making it possible for me to fly missions with P3 air crews in a war setting probably created more problems than it solved," Carper said.

Had the Army decided the other way, Buyer would have become the first lawmaker since the early days of World War II to go to war while Congress is in session without first having to give up his seat. When several lawmakers did it then, President Roosevelt issued an order in 1942 prohibiting members of Congress from being activated.

About a dozen congressmen and one senator later gave up their seats in Congress to serve. Others did the opposite. Lyndon B. Johnson resigned his commission in the Navy to stay in the House.

According to Defense Department directives, lawmakers in the reserves or National Guard units can volunteer for active duty but cannot be called up unless there is a pressing need for their specific skills. Even then, they can turn down activation orders, officials said.

One of Buyer's colleagues, Rep. Mark Kirk, R-Ill., a Naval Reserve intelligence officer, has arranged to spend Congress' two-week spring recess as a watch officer in the Pentagon's war room.

"I think it's important for a member of the Congress to get a view from the bottom up," said Kirk, who typically spends one weekend a month on duty.

Other reservists in Congress include Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., and Rep. Roger Wicker, R-Miss., both lieutenant colonels in the Air Force Reserve, and Rep. John M. Shimkus, R-Ill., a lieutenant colonel in the Army Reserve. Rep. Joe Wilson, R-S.C., is a colonel in his state's Army National Guard.


37 posted on 04/01/2003 3:53:43 PM PST by wimpycat ('Nemo me impune lacessit')
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To: rellimpank
FDR did indeed later rule that no more congressmen would go on active duty. If you have never studied the LBJ Silver Star, you should do so, very dirty game.
38 posted on 04/01/2003 3:55:52 PM PST by cynicom
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To: cynicom
--I was. There is only one president of the twentieth century that I despise as much as Clinton--LBJ. I do believe as George F. Will posits, that Clinton is the worst person to serve as president, however--
39 posted on 04/01/2003 4:01:56 PM PST by rellimpank
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To: NYC GOP Chick
I had forgotten that Congressman Buyer went to FLA. I do remember when he did, I thought ----"Reinforcements on the way!!"

For a picture:

http://www.politicalresource.net/in_steve_buyer.html
40 posted on 04/01/2003 4:50:57 PM PST by Exit148
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