Comments on: Semper Fi: Why the Marine Social Media Ban May Not Go Far Enough

By: Susan Katz Keating

Susan Katz Keating — Mon, 10 Aug 2009 19:41:04 +0000

Commentary notwithstanding (and there’s been some GREAT zingers here!), we live in a brave new world of open info, and it’s rightfully given a lot of folks the heebie jeebies. The sensible approach is to carry on with the ban on using mil-networks to access SN sites, but to maintain hands-off on the personal computers. There will ALWAYS be some bozo who doesn’t quite get OpSec; but you can bet he/she will only do it once.

By: MarkD

MarkD — Mon, 10 Aug 2009 18:14:53 +0000

Why stop with the Marines? Let’s just ban all discussion of anything related to the military by anyone, including the press and the Congress. It would be more secure.

Does it not occur to the author that many/most Marines are married these days, and the military can’t exactly court martial spouses? Instructing servicemembers on the risks of abusing social networking is probably a better idea. I could never see any upside in treating a man you ask to risk his life for this country like a child.

By: now and Then

now and Then — Mon, 10 Aug 2009 14:02:00 +0000

Hold on, I just realized that the Marine logo isn’t the Nazi logo at all, it’s the logo for Obama’s new evil death panel. So, you don’t have to think about Rush. Think about Sarah. Further instructions forthcoming. Carry on.

By: Now and Then

Now and Then — Mon, 10 Aug 2009 13:58:29 +0000

That Marine logo looks an awful lot like the Nazi logo that our dear leader El Rushbo was referring to. Are the Marines secret Nazis? A few good fascists?

By: M. Simon

M. Simon — Sun, 09 Aug 2009 22:54:15 +0000

It appears that the military is becoming socially aware of current events: Oath Keepers Oath Keepers is a non-partisan association of currently serving military, veterans, peace officers, and firefighters who will fulfill the oath we swore to support and defend the Constitution against all enemies, foreign and domestic, so help us God. Our motto is "Not on our watch!"

By: john k

john k — Sun, 09 Aug 2009 17:21:21 +0000

Someone needed a filler piece for the homepage huh?

By: Tom Perkins

Tom Perkins — Sun, 09 Aug 2009 14:02:37 +0000

I’ve placed my comment on Mr. Owens idea at the blog reachable at by clicking my name above this comment.

Which comment does not remotely violate any of the posting guidelines.

By: Bill Carson

Bill Carson — Sun, 09 Aug 2009 13:19:11 +0000

Jeremy: “If we can’t trust individual military members to safeguard sensitive information (or represent themselves and the military service well) on social media sites, how can we trust them to do the same when off-duty in public?”

1) Banning soldiers from being in public is unrealistic.
2) Spying through facebook is easy. You or I could probably become “friends” with 10,000 Marines by posing as old school mates, hot girls, setting up sporting groups, maintaining weapons pages etc.. I joined a Signals Intelligence group on Facebook last month looking for old friends. I was asked a few questions by the moderator, but it was nothing formal and nothing that couldn’t be faked.
3) Information on facebook can be aggregated to predict or better understand operations.
4) Even the New York Times can spy through facebook.

By: Walt

Walt — Sun, 09 Aug 2009 11:43:07 +0000

Inspector Rudy – 12:47

I don’t know what Viet Nam conflict you were in, but the one where I served ’67-’68 had no mail censorship whatsoever!

By: Tom Perkins

Tom Perkins — Sun, 09 Aug 2009 11:08:00 +0000

“Social relationships established on Craigslist and MySpace have led to homicides, and a relationship status change on Facebook led to murder.”

Well obviously we have make it contrary to good unit order to have social relationships…

#3 of the posting guidelines prohibits me from treating your ludicrous post as it fully deserves, Mr Owen.

When genuine failures of OPSEC can be demonstrated, educate or punish the offenders as appropriate. The most that can be done which is reasonable is the most you should do.

@ 19. RM3 Frisker FTN

If the jihadis decided to attack essentially any elementary school near a big base they’d accomplish much the same thing. I suppose you and Owen now feel the need to take the fatuous step of prohibiting service personnel from having kids?

@ 20. Ecosium:

You are correct in theory, I admit I don’t think the sort of alienation of the military from general society that leads to increased tyranny will be a result of this even in the long run.

@ 21. Bill Quick:
“As usual, the classic conservative response to an issue of security is More Controls! More Regulations! More Bans! Less Liberty!”

There is nothing conservative about being stupid. Stupidity is the liberals province. What is conservative in this country is the Revolutionary Spirit of 1776.

You are correct Elementary schools should be harder targets.

The bottom line is, that in spite of the chin high sewage spewed by the MSM instead of either raw facts or reasoned analysis, the war effort in Iraq and at least up until now in Afghanistan enjoyed good recruitment and re-up rates. Treating the troops like utter morons and abject mushrooms will change that in a hurry.

Mr. Owens’ suggestion is a profoundly poor one.

Yours, TDP, ml, msl, & pfpp