re: #83 Cato the Elder

Here’s my challenge:

Among the legions of Lizards, let one come forward with a personal account of the “spat-upon Vietnam vet” syndrome. Time, place, date, physical description of the hippie scum who did it (right - like hippies have ever had balls big enough to go up to a soldier in uniform and spit on him - there’s an end to the myth right there), what said scumster said or did during the spit incident, and I’ll relent.

Otherwise, it’s “I heard this and my buddy told me that”, which is the point here. A year from now, the teabaggers will be telling each other and anybody without the wit to walk away, “I was there with fifteen million other outraged Americans and Glenn Beck.”

Sure you were.

Cato -

here is a link to J Shafer at Slate who writes on this issue.

I assume you have already read his articles on the topic. Please notice the subtle shifting in standards for proof he has.

At first he demanded that people with first person accounts come forward since he could find none.

They did.

He now demands that people who come forward have with them contemporaneous documentation in the form of a news article reporting the very same incident having occurred at that time.

So you may get someone coming forward and you may find yourself shifting your demands much as Shafer has.

That aside I was spat on as a Cadet in ROTC at California Polytechnic University in San Luis Obispo by someone I assume to have been a student outside of the Architecture building adjacent to Dexter Lawn on my way out of the southern entrance of the Military Science building on October 26, 1983 at about 10:00 am. It was the day after the invasion of Grenada and ROTC cadets wore uniforms every Wednesday. The word had gone out that we shouldn’t wear our uniforms that day but I had not gotten it and was on my way back to my place to change to civies (having been excused by an instructor to do so) when it happened. I was with another cadet who I have lost contact with but if you don’t find my account credible I am sure I could locate him.

Granted - it was not Vietnam, and if spitting from that time were a “myth” (a possibility that I am open to but requires more than assertions coupled with shifting standards of proof) some may have assumed it to have become acceptable behavior for expressing opinion as I assume the guy who spat on me must have.

One other thing - as instructed (because such behavior was anticipated) I simply walked on after the incident and didn’t wipe the spit off my uniform until I was in my bedroom. So I guess my roommates saw the spit but didn’t see the incident, and I have kept in touch with them.

And - no - there is no press account to back this up. The policy at the time was to avoid all controversy and keep a very low profile.