Once upon a time, I worked for a guy we'll call "Ken", because that was his name.
Ken was a real character, and I don't necessarily mean that in a good way. He had a very active fantasy life which he tried to share with the rest of the world.
In Ken's fantasy life, he was an SF sniper in Vietnam. He claimed that when "his sergeant" tried to take his beloved M-14 away and replace it with one of those cheap Mattel toys, Ken threatened to kill him, and was allowed to keep his M-14. (Which is an odd action for an eleven-year-old, that being about Ken's age when the M-14 was replaced in front line units.) Needless to say, Ken's unit was wiped out, leaving him the sole survivor, not once, but twice. And both times when he rolled all the bodies of his buddies over, they all had a jammed M-16 with a cleaning rod stuck down the barrel in their hands.
Ken's grandpa was an even bigger hero, having served in the USN during WWII, winning the Medal of Honor three times, and having three aircraft carriers sunk out from underneath him.
Needless to say, one of the most important tasks of myself and the other employees at the shop was to keep the owner from interacting in any way with the customers, lest he entertain them with his tales of imaginary derring-do in a fantasy Saigon, where he was apparently all the time stabbing pimps to death with his Gerber for vaguely-defined reasons.
A guy at GeorgiaPacking.org seems to have discovered an apparent relative of Ken's at a Fun Show who not only has the stories, but also decided to get the costume to go with them. (And yes, that MP badge does count for "impersonating an officer" under certain circumstances...)
(H/T to WRSA.)
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37 comments:
Ugh.
You know, when I see someone spouting a bit of BS, I get angry at them.
When I see someone spouting THAT much BS, the sympathetic part of me kicks in a bit - how badly screwed up must this individual be to create such a bizarre fantasy life for himself?
Stupid idjit / poor SOB.
TJIC,
The only thing I can think is that the fabulist must assume that everyone around him is either retarder, or as big a liar as he is.
...retarded, even...
Wow, the Army sure has gotten soft under the Obama administration!
How in the hell do you get to that age and pull something like that? Very sad, a life wasted.
captcha: folly. No kidding!
"Miniver Cheevy, born too late,
Scratched his head and kept on thinking;
Miniver coughed, and called it fate,
And kept on drinking."
There's a million wannabes and wish they were's - but only a few hundred real deals.
Who generally are extremely careful not to reveal much of their back trail.
Stranger
Somewhere, a mall is missing its ninja...
...a Gecko is missing its .45...
...a Gun is missing its Kid...
The Gent at Georgiapacking did some GOOD work! With any luck that miserable SOB did go home and leave the car running in the garage(rather doubt it though).
I'm still shaking my head that a 300+ lb. tub of donut batter thought he could pass himself off as active duty *anything*.
I mean, the whole "stolen valor" thing pisses me off enough (and I have never served, and have only worn camo when playing paintball). But to do it so poorly... Man...
I guess it does all boil down to "People. Are. Stupid"...
At the end of the month we'll be running our biannual machinegun shoot here in PA and this just reinforces some of our unwritten standards: the more camouflage an individual is wearing, the less they know about their firearms...and the more someone tries to look like they're active military, the less likely it is that they've ever been in the military.
It started as joke some years ago...it turned out to not be very funny because it was so often true.
A pair of "tactical" pants isn't alarming as having a Jesusload of pockets is quite useful...it's when you notice that they're wearing something close to the entire kit...those guys are usually accidents looking for a place to happen!
I worked with a twentysomething (in 1980) who had done two tours in nam, flown fighter jets, drove tanks, and killed hundreds of men in hand-to-hand.
he was a brilliant electrician- I mean, inspired. Everyone wanted him to fix their stuff because he was the best. You just couldn't stand to listen to his BS.
We did the numbers, and figured he'd have had to been 156 years old to have gone through all the things he claimed to have done.
This kind of shit just absolutely frosts me. All my life I've venerated my father because he was a combat veteran. People like this asshole cheapen the service of real heroes. Stolen valor, indeed. Such imposters should be killed twice.
A coworker of mine actually was in Vietnam, and did some recon patrols (I've seen his awards). It was durned tough to get him to talk about it, and usually the only things he'd talk about were the funny things that happened (well, funny if you were in combat).
He's retired now, and his wound (got hit with a 7.62x39) has aggravated his back problems to the point where he's now had two surgeries to try to fix the vertebrae that get nicked. He's the most easy-going fellow you can imagine...but I'd never want to see him mad.
The thought of a chair-borne ranger attempting to appropriate the respect due to this man and his fellows is nauseating.
Flip side of the story: I keep a Xerox copy of my DD214 with me at all times, nicely folded in a Ziploc baggie, surrounded by a bandana. Anybody asks for my Military Creds, I'm good to go. Started doing that a few years ago when I started attending college, and some asshole Prof started spewing crap against the U.S. Military. He was shocked when I had enough of his "and you know that everyone who joins the Military can't get a REAL job, so you might as well call them Mercenaries" B.S. Pulled my paperwork out of my book bag, handed it to a classmate, had her started reading it out loud. She went a few seconds, I told her to stop, said "Thank you, you all have now heard proof that I served in the U.S. Military", turned to the Prof, and said "You care to come with me to the Dean's Office and repeat what you just said? We can ask him how his Son is doing in Iraq while we're there".
The puke turned pale and nearly pissed himself, and stammered his way through the rest of the class. But I still went to the Dean's office and reported what had happened. The good thing is the puke was an Adjunct w/o Tenure, and he was not invited back the next Semester.
Moral of the Story? If you're a fake wannabe, be prepared to be called on it, but don't be afraid to confront these Commie Bastards if you're the REAL DEAL. The Lefties HATE it when you remind them that Freedom of Speech runs BOTH WAYS.
Thanks Tamara, I hope you don't mind I posted this information on my blog so one of my 4 readers might spread the word. This truly is priceless.
If I wear camo for airsoft, paintball or hunting purposes, the only insignia on it is an American flag on my shoulder and a name tape. If I'm in CADPAT, it's a Canadian flag. That's it. It's all I'm entitled to wear. Corporal as a cadet doesn't count.
I have a collection of various insignia and badges but wouldn't dream of wearing them and pretending I've earned them. The price in some cases for that right is very high.
Glad the scum got caught and called out. Good show.
Great story, Les!
FYI my cousin told me about his friend who owned an F-14 Tomcat.
He was 6 at the time, I told him I wasn't very impressed by made-up stories and preferred real ones, even if they weren't as interesting.
I wasn't impressed by a young boy doing it...guess how I feel about a grown man doing worse?
We ( those of us that are active or retired ) need to report or confront those idiots that are impersonating someone who has served or is serving. For us retired peaple (Men and Women) he is a discrace and should be tared and feathered. HANG him out to dry (legally)!!!!
Em1(sw) Ret. W.H.Hamilton
Is it a shame that I don't care that there was sumdood running around (figuratively, please, I saw the pics) acting like he was an Army officer?
(Snooze.)
Really, in the greater scheme of things for me to get wired about, this isn't even on my radar.
Your Wookie suit has a much more luxurious pelt than mine. ;)
I'm not particularly spun up about it, I just don't much like liars.
Some people don't suffer fools gladly. I am glad to see fools suffer.
Unfortunately, a friend of mine is a Wannabe to the max. Camo / fatigues everything, name tapes on peripheral gear, "combat boots" for everyday wear, and his AR is his pride and joy. His claim to fame is that his *father* was in.
At the range he decides to show off, and rapid fires from the shoulder at the 100 yard target. I see rounds hitting the ground 2/3 of the way there, and up on the hill behind the target. Another guy says "What the hell are you shooting at???"
I thought with all his .mil Style, he might know something about small unit tactics in case the SHTF. Nope. Not a single durned actual piece of knowledge. It's all just that, Style. I can only pity him, because he doesn't know what he doesn't know.
WV: shunkine - Ish really bight in thuh shunkine *hic*
There is justice in this world. I'm glad the guy got caught.
In 1984-85 I worked with a SEAL (a real one) who needed a part time job in the gun store I worked for. As others have alluded here, real ones are fine folks, but quiet about their jobs. The floor manager and one assistant manager were USAF, their was a smattering of USA & USN, too. The guy running the "gun room" (not retail but storage & wholesale) was a Marine. Needless to say, it was a fun place to work.
We had a wannabe as a regular - looked about as heavy as the guy in the photos from Gizmo - who made the unfortunate mistake of trying to engage a real SEAL in a conversation whereby Mr. Wannabe was pretending to be a Ranger-trained NCO in the 82nd Airborne.
I had a front-row seat. It was a fun show to watch. The pretender came back, though it wasn't many, many years later. And we didn't ahve to hear anymore of his stories, either.
BTW, thanks to all of the real ones. Thank you forever.
Architect, if you read more about it, it's a bit more sinister than that. He had already gone to jail for impersonating after "taking control" of rescue operations after a fatal bridge collapse in OK. He called the Russian embassy to say he was part of a "black ops" team tasked with assassinating Putin. He's beyond "sumdood" status.
"Your Wookie suit has a much more luxurious pelt than mine..."
I let out a guffaw at that one!
Tam,
You are a peach.
Seriously, beyond all the obviously sick, twisted, & purely illegal, if he wanted to fatally offend the interwebs, why did he have to claim to be Major Green or Captain Underpants?
Why didn't he just claim to be Major Caudill, in the flesh?
Wow, AW for the win! Darn, I wish I had thought of that!
Al T.
Jayson,
How many weirdos do you suppose make phone calls to government offices threatening to kill our own president, on a daily basis?
Yawn.
As to taking control of a rescue operation, gee, I'm not sure if I'd consider that to be an arrestable offense either. Not sure I'd care who was doing the pulling if I were one who was being pulled from a pile of rubble.
I'd also call attention to your use of the word, "sinister," and point you toward something approximating the correct definition of such. He currently sits in the oval office. Not that our chronic liar in question, here, is some choir boy, but the amount of derision being excercized upon this fellow seems to be something like swatting at flies, to me at least.
Keep the correct target in your view finder, but that is, as they say, a personal matter.
Oh well.
the irritablearchitect:
You can wear yer wookie suit while you lambast this tard.
Apparently he's a pro conman as well as a fat walter mitty. He has warrants out all over the US, and apparently in Canada as well for using fake .gov credentials to scam stolen stuff from both the military, and room and board comp from private folks.
Armed Canadian: don't sweat it ... no one thinks re-enactors, LARPers, stage actors, and paintball enthusiasts are really military.
theirritablearchitect,
"He has warrants out all over the US, and apparently in Canada as well for using fake .gov credentials to scam stolen stuff from both the military..."
Yeah, that part there kinda chaps my ass. Not only does he help himself to pelf stolen at 1040-point from productive citizens, but he doesn't even pretend to provide a useful service in return. Even the *hawwwwk...spit!* ATF accidentally catches a real bad guy every now and again.
I'm not condoning what he's done at all.
It's pretty obvious that he's lifted some creds here and there, and he's clearly trying to con as many people as he can along the way.
He's just small potatoes, in my opinion.
The sad part is that they never catch on to the rest of us figuring their game years ago and just keep on listening. (And laughing in private.)
I dont know which is sillier. The big kid and his fantasy or the military reject and his fantasy.
This reminded me of how little notice we take of change. Few years back, we always had some of these wannabes at Knoxville gun shows. Gradually, the herd thinned -- personally, I think Lumpy Lambert used 'em as target frames at Knob Creek. The last show I attended featured more high heels than camo. And no, I didn't see both on the same person.
Thanks Weer'd. Just getting too old and tired to put up with the Commie Propaganda anymore. You served honorably in the U.S. Military, whatever branch, or have kin folk out in Harm's way, taking on or supporting the fight against the scumbags who blow up Girl's Schools and murder Civilian Medical teams, you're cool with me. Couldn't get in because of health or age or other legal prohibitions? Thats okay, 'taint your fault. But put on something like that Bozo and claim you served? Don't come near me, or else you'll be losing more than some clothing.
Yeah Tom, I met superfruit here in Spokane. He had a networking job that he was the best non-certificated network specialist in Washington, inclusive of Redmond.
He's got a barber school diaploma, and claims to be a hair stylist now.
I should talk, I did the same jobs, with certificates. Now I build bookcases.
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