Herschel Walker Gives Up on the Pro Football Hall of Fame

Herschel Walker has enjoyed an amazing football career. In his college career, he anchored the offense for the University of Georgia's only National Championship squad in 1980, winning the Heisman Trophy in 1982. 

He left school early to join the New Jersey Generals of the startup USFL and, after that league folded, he jumped to the Dallas Cowboys and enjoyed a hugely productive NFL career.

Walker's combined USFL and NFL statistics make him one of the most productive pro backs ever. The Pro Football Hall of Fame has finally come around to the idea that he deserves credit for all his career yards, adding Walker to the list of players under consideration for 2010 induction into the hall.

So you have to wonder why Herschel just signed a deal with Strikeforce and announced that he plans to begin his career as a 47-year-old MMA fighter next spring once he's completed his a training program at the American Kickboxing Academy.

Is Herschel really that bored? There's no way Roger Goodell and the other control freaks in the NFL corporate offices will think this is good for the league's precious "image." Hell, Roger would probably suspend Walker right now if he could get away with it.

Good luck with the mixed martial arts, old man Walker. They'll probably give you another shot at the Hall of Fame when you're 70. (via FanHouse)

Cable News Smackdown

Faced with an expansion of the war in Afghanistan, a national debate about the future of health care and an ongoing economic crisis, our national news media is pointing its laser focus on the only thing it truly cares about: itself.

This weekend, CNN's Rick Sanchez devoted over six minutes to a pro-wrestling-style smackdown of a Fox News newspaper ad that mocked its competitors for what Fox called their insufficient coverage of the September 12th Tea Parties in Washington, DC.

Sanchez never points out that the news story in question was about an event staged and promoted by Fox News, instead delivering a tedious recap of everything story CNN did to cover Fox's media circus.

And there's no doubt it's a circus, as evidenced by this YouTube video showing a young Fox News producer whipping up the crowd while Fox reporter Griff Jenkins is reporting live.

CNN and MSNBC will angrily report this and Fox will snipe back, complaining about the bias of the liberal media. None of them will actually research and report the news.

Krakauer Says Pat Tillman's Death 'Didn't Mean Anything'

In an interview with the Wall Street Journal where he talks about his new book Where Men Win Glory: The Odyssey of Pat Tillman, author Jon Krakauer declares that Tillman's sacrifice "didn't mean anything." 

It speaks to the mythology of war and how we glorify it for our national interests. There is nothing glamorous or romantic about war. It's mostly about random pointless death and misery. And that's what his death tells us. It reminds me that the good aren't rewarded, there's no such thing as karma.

That's rough talk, especially from an author whose compelling books about survivalism in Alaska (Into the Wild) and the dangers of Mt. Everest climbing (Into Thin Air) have made him a favorite with military readers. Krakauer even claims that Tillman had a copy of his book Eiger Dreams in his backpack when he died.

Pat Tillman was a former Arizona Cardinals safety who walked away from a multimillion dollar contract to join the Army Rangers in the wake of the 9/11 attacks. After serving eighteen months in Iraq, Tillman was killed on patrol in Afghanistan in what was eventually declared a friendly-fire incident.

Initial Army reports declared that Tillman was killed by enemy fire and he was posthumously awared the Silver Star and a Purple Heart. Almost immediately, that story came into question and, as suggestions that Tillman was murdered arose, the family pressed for an investigation that established the friendly-fire version of events.

Tillman's widow alowed Krakauer to read Pat Tillman's private journals. Krakauer uses those writings to portray Tillman as a "liberal" who opposed the war as it was being conducted but whose sense of honor and duty compelled him to finish his service.

In the course of researching the book, Krakauer spent five months embedded with troops in Afghanistan and convinced at least some of Tillman's platoon-mates to give their first interviews about what happened on the day of his death. 

What's fascinating here are Krakauer's attempts to separate Tillman's life from political forces that would use his death as basis to debate one side or the other. Krakauer, never one for easy conclusions in any of his books, suggests here that the interests of military personnel (as symbolized by Tillman) are too complex to be served by the interests of any one party and that military service is a calling that necessarily exists outside the political debates going on at any given moment.

That's a powerful notion, one that neither Rush nor Keith will be particularly happy to hear.

You can read a couple of more interviews with Krakauer at Entertainment Weekly and The Daily Beast, plus check out another story here at Military.com.

"Supporting the Troops" Does Not Cover Up the Fact that Your Song Sucks

Dear Smile Empty Soul,

Without the press releases you've sent to us here at Military.com, we'd think of you as just another nu metal band that got dropped from your major label deal but was still trying to make a living. 

Your publicist has so effectively hammered his point home about "This is War," the free acoustic download that you've recorded as a thank you to the military, that we've posted a link here on our site.

However, we can't figure out why anyone who's actually seen action would identify with your imagined first-person narrative that sounds more like it was inspired by Halo 3 than actual real-life battle experiences. 

Also: your producer really doesn't like your lead singer. Anyone who lays that much Autotune on a vocal for an acoustic song is really just trying to draw attention to how badly he thinks you sing.

Anyway here's the link again to your song. Your publicist got it posted up in here and all press is good press, right? No worries.

Sincerely, best of luck with the making a living part. It's hard out there for a band and most everyone who makes music deserves better than we've gotten this decade.

Regards,

Hearts & Minds Military.com Entertainment Blog 

Charlie Sheen Demands that President Obama Face the Truth About 9/11

Most Americans don't realize that Two and a Half Men actor and noted Hollywood john Charlie Sheen gained extensive foreign policy and national security experience from his roles in the classic '80s films Red Dawn and Platoon.

Sheen has put that experience to good use as one of America's highest-profile spokesmen for the 9/11 Truth movement. In a compelling post for Alex Jones' Prison Planet blog, Charlie transcribes an imaginary interview with President Barack Obama where Sheen both confuses and dazzles the President with his irrefutable logic. Obama eventually promises to take him seriously and hints that a new investigation just might be forthcoming. 

No word yet as to whether real-life President Obama plans to listen to Charlie, even though Sheen has assured the White House that Obama's alternate-reality predecessor Jed Bartlet would have surely taken the meeting by now.

(Military.com has a new blog from former CNN correspondent Jamie McIntyre called Line of Departure. Jamie's talking about the 9/11 conspiracy theories today with posts titled What Really Happened 9/11 and Will the Conspiracy Theories Ever Die?)

Outsourcing Gets Outed

Pop quiz: is this picture (A) an outtake from the hit summer movie The Hangover or (B) photos of actual ArmorGroup guards hired by the US Government to protect the U.S. embassy in Kabul, Afghanistan? 

If you guessed (B), congratulate yourself for being someone who understands the perils of a privatized military.

News broke today that the State Department is now investigating ArmorGroup (a subsidiary of Wackenhut Services) after photographs surfaced on Gawker showing the hazing rituals at Camp Sullivan, the guards' quarters situated a few miles from the embassy.

The picture above is the only one we can get away with publishing here, but feel free to wander over to Gawker for the really graphic stuff. This probably isn't exactly what Dick Cheney had it mind. 

Seriously, This is Just Wrong

When I first heard that the new Guitar Hero 5 game would feature a Kurt Cobain avatar, I figured he'd be playing a left-handed Jagstang guitar and it would be a little weird but ultimately OK. As the video capture above shows, what actually happened is just gross. 

Once you unlock the KC avatar, you find out he's the lead singer and not the guitarist. He's wearing the fuzzy sweater and singing songs by Billy Idol, Bon Jovi, Stevie Wonder and (worst of all) Bush. No matter what you think about Gavin Rossdale's career, does anyone seriously think Bush's first album would've had a chance if radio didn't need to fill the playlist void created by Kurt's death? Bush: slightly creepy then, incredibly creepy here in Guitar Hero.

I'm not sure how much control the Cobain Estate gave up when they made what now seems like an ill-advised deal with Primary Wave Music Publishing in 2006, but Karaoke Kurt tears down an icon instead of teaching a young audience why they should care about Nirvana.

I've got some history here: I've worked with the Cobain Estate on the catalog and know (and respect) many of the principals over at Primary Wave. I'm sympathetic to the problems that come with making money from Nirvana, because Kurt's rebellion was far more than a pose and that anarchic spirit always shows through in the end. But still, really bad choice here.

World Premiere of Queensryche's New Video

As they did for the album's first video, "If I Were King," once again Queensryche is using Military.com to host the world premiere of a video from their latest album, "American Soldier." "Home Again," a song about military homecomings, showcases vocals by lead singer Geoff Tate's daughter Miranda. The video features actual photographs submitted by the Military.com audience. The result is very moving.

Beer Makes You Strong & Healthy

MSNBC reports that a U.S. government study has discovered a powerful secret: the more you drink, the more you exercise. And everybody knows that exercise makes you healthy.

Mouse Eats Spider

Anyone who grew up in the '60s and '70s can remember that kids chose Marvel Comics to get away from the clean-scrubbed world of Disney. Spider-Man, Iron Man, the Hulk and the X-Men all questioned the natural order of things, while Mickey Mouse and Donald Duck were cartoon characters every parent could love. 

That's why today's Wall Street Journal report that Disney has paid $4 billion for Marvel Entertainment comes as a total shock. The recent success of Spider-man and Iron Man movies (and the OK performance of the Incredible Hulk movie) have made Marvel the most successful independent company in Hollywood and a valuable property, but Disney seems like an uneasy fit. Captain Jack Sparrow might cut it as a Marvel character, but there's not much else in the Disney universe that seems to fit. Let's hope they know what they're doing here. No one wants to see the Hulk make a guest appearance on Hannah Montana to sing a duet with Miley.