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iBoaterer[_2_]

In article ,
says...

On Wed, 26 Oct 2011 07:12:29 -0400, "Eisboch" wrote:

"iBoaterer" wrote in message
...

Like "hope and change" or "yes we can" Don't knock stupid slogans. They
worked for one clown.

Yeah, they did. "Mission Accomplished".

--------------------------------------------------

This myth keeps being perpetuated by the media and those who like to bash
Bush as if he was declaring the end of the war in Iraq.

The "Mission Accomplished" banner displayed on the USS Abraham Lincoln had
nothing to do with Iraq, despite what the media
and Bush haters would like to believe.

US Naval ships often deploy on long term "cruises" that typically last for
4-6 months or more away from their home port.
Each of these cruises have a specific "mission". The mission is unique to
the ship or the task force that it is part of.

Navy tradition includes a celebration of sorts by the ship (or task force)
to acknowledge that their specific, unique "Mission" has come to
an end and the ship(s) are returning to their home ports and families. On
smaller ships tradition often includes mounting a broom
upside down somewhere on the mast to indicate a "clean sweep" in the
performance of the unique cruise or mission.

When Bush visited the Abraham Lincoln, the aircraft carrier had just been
relieved by another carrier and was on it's way
back to it's home port. The "Mission Accomplished" banner on the ship was
in celebration of the end of it's specific cruise
and not the end of the Iraq war.

Eisboch (10 year Navy veteran)

It's not a good excuse to use the ship's schedule as the reason for
the banner. It was a media event, replete with a deck landing by the
CIC in flight jammies, including cod piece.

I seriously doubt the ship carries and hangs banners when it completes
each mission.

Nice try though.

Well, there's also this interesting banter where the White House admits
it was for Bush:

October 29, 2003

President Bush addresses the nation from aboard the USS Abraham Lincoln
on May 1 with the banner in the background.

What was once viewed as a premier presidential photo op continues to dog
President Bush six months after he landed on an aircraft carrier to
declare "one victory" in the war on terrorism and an end to major combat
operations in Iraq.

Attention turned Tuesday to a giant "Mission Accomplished" sign that
stood behind Bush aboard the USS Abraham Lincoln when he gave the speech
May 1.

The president told reporters the sign was put up by the Navy, not the
White House.

"I know it was attributed somehow to some ingenious advance man from my
staff -- they weren't that ingenious, by the way," the president said
Tuesday.

Now his statements are being parsed even further.

Navy and administration sources said that though the banner was the
Navy's idea, the White House actually made it.

Bush offered the explanation after being asked whether his speech
declaring an end to major combat in Iraq under the "Mission
Accomplished" banner was premature, given that U.S. casualties in Iraq
since then have surpassed those before it.

During the speech in May, Bush said, "The battle of Iraq is one victory
in a war on terror that began on September 11, 2001, and still goes on."

The speech and events surrounding it were widely publicized and served
as the symbolic end to the war in Iraq.

At the time, it appeared that every detail of the day's events had been
carefully planned, including the president's arrival in the co-pilot's
seat of a Navy S-3B Viking after making two flybys of the carrier.

The exterior of the four-seat S-3B Viking was marked with "Navy 1" and
"George W. Bush Commander in Chief."

White House spokesman Scott McClellan told CNN that in preparing for the
speech, Navy officials on the carrier told Bush aides they wanted a
"Mission Accomplished" banner, and the White House agreed to create it.