The Pink Flamingo

Jim Fryer – Real World Libertarian – sent a link to the Libertarian Republican, where Lindsey is being honored for his military service.  Naturally the Lindsey haters are out in full force to try and ruin this nice salute.

Senator Lindsey Graham

For some absurd reason, there is this little hit team who seem to attack anything on the blogs that might be complementary about South Carolina’s senior senator.  They point to how disliked he is, but ignore the fact that Lindsey won reelection by 58% a few weeks ago.  The truth be known, there is an active minuscule pocket of white supremacist, anti-immigration supporters who don’t like Lindsey’s stand on immigration reform.  They often neglect to mention that when attacking him.

Consequently, conservative opinion about Lindsey has been poisoned, primarily by the likes of Michelle Malkin and her VDare, white supremacist handlers who take their marching orders from John Tanton.  It is disgusting, and annoying, especially considering they never bother to get to know the real man.

Before he graduated from high school, both of Lindsey’s parents had died, leaving him with a much younger sister and tens of thousands of dollars of medical bills and debts. Before going off to USC (my only real complaint about him) he adopted his sister.  By the time he had completed law school he had paid off all of his parents medical bills and debts.

Lindsey was one of the Army’s top prosecutors in Europe before he came back to SC and joined the reserves.

He is an obsessive golfer.

Last year Malkin denigrated Lindsey after a photo surfaced of him in Baghdad, wearing a side arm.  I asked my brother about the use of a side arm, considering he is currently serving in the very same location where Lindsey was at that time.  According to my brother, EVERYONE wears a side arm at all times, and keeps it very close, even when they are sleeping.  He said he even takes his to the shower when he goes.

From the McClatchy Newspapers by James Rosen:

“…Graham’s central and sometimes controversial role as a senator in determining how the United States detains, interrogates and tries terror suspects has been widely covered. Less well known are the Seneca Republican’s efforts, in large measure as an Air Force JAG — judge advocate general — to help establish Western-style legal systems in Iraq and Afghanistan.

But with federal courts picking apart U.S. detention laws and President-elect Barack Obama vowing to close the Guantanamo Bay prison, Graham’s unheralded labors in a military uniform might prove more enduring than his high-profile anti-terrorism work as a senator….

A month before Graham was in Afghanistan, the assistant dean of the Baghdad University Law School visited the United States at the senator’s initiative.

Graham, 53, has earned praise for insisting that Guantanamo Bay detainees have the right to see the evidence used against them in military commission trials, and for opposing waterboarding and other aggressive interrogation techniques. But civil liberties advocates have criticized him for helping craft legislation denying the Guantanamo Bay prisoners habeas rights to challenge their detentions in federal court. The U.S. Supreme Court in June restored the detainees’ access to U.S. civilian courts in a 5-4 ruling that Graham branded “dangerous and irresponsible.”

But during five active-duty tours totaling six weeks since August 2006, Graham also has played a role in building the Iraqi and Afghan legal systems. He has guided judges, worked at prisons and sat in courtrooms in the two war-torn nations.

He also has advised military lawyers from the United States and allied forces, and from the Iraqi and Afghan armed services.

As he observed an April 2007 trial in Baghdad, a car bomb exploded across the street from the court.

“Democracy is based on the rule of law,” Graham said recently. “How you jail people and how you try them — these are essential ingredients in winning the war on terror.”

On separate congressional trips, most of them with McCain, Graham has visited Iraq 10 times since the U.S. invasion in March 2003. He’s made a half-dozen such trips to Afghanistan.

Graham’s service stints in the two countries, which have lasted as long as 10 days apiece, have given him a deeper understanding of the wars than other lawmakers, Rives said.
“He’s able to learn things in a way he never could on a quick congressional visit,” Rives said.

In Iraq — as an Air Force Reserve colonel, not as a senator — Graham serves on the 72-member Law and Order Task Force of U.S. military and Justice Department lawyers.
Set up by Gen. David Petraeus, head of U.S. Central Command, the task force works closely with Iraqi military and civilian officials, judges and lawyers….

Graham joined the Air Force’s Judge Adjutant General Corps and served as a military lawyer for six years in the 1980s. He had returned to private practice in 1990 when he was called to active duty in the Persian Gulf War. He helped military personnel arrange their legal affairs while serving at McEntire Joint Air National Guard Base in Eastover. Graham served in the S.C. House of Representatives in 1993 and 1994, and then was elected to the U.S. House. He was elected to the Senate in 2002.

Graham is careful to separate his congressional duties from his military jobs. While on active duty, he never volunteers that he is a senator and shares standard housing with other officers, according to Rives….For all his senatorial advocacy of military force in Iraq and Afghanistan, Graham believes that the legal systems he’s helping to create as a JAG are more important.

“Getting honest judges, honest prison guards and honest police are worth battalions of soldiers,” Graham said. “They can do more good to turn a country around than all the military power in the world.”…”

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• More Libertarian Lies about Lindsey