Hey D-Ringers,

Sorry I’ve been gone for a while. It has been busy at work. And I had a birthday. And my little brother from my fraternity got married. Good times.

Anyhow, in the world of “pitches that made me go ‘hrmmm,’” I give you the latest installment from LT Cragg  at OSD(PA):

All-

We have a Bloggers Roundtable scheduled for Thursday, June 5 @ 1100 ET w/Bruce West, Chief Scientist, U.S. Army Research Office, Mathematical and Information Science.

TOPIC: The causes of global warming may not be what you think — Dr. Bruce West discusses recent research into how global warming may be caused by more solar cycles than human influences.

Please let me know if you can attend.

V/r,

LT Jennifer Cragg

New Media Directorate

Office of the Assistant Secretary of Defense for Public Affairs

Overall pitch form? Not bad. But the topic? Not so sure that hosting a roundtable about why global warming is a myth is the best idea right now. The Pentagon already has tons of critics who are accusing the roundtables of being propaganda forums for the administration (though they are not).

You are dealing with a pretty unpopular war. Why open yourself up to more attacks on an issue that isn’t what the DoD is known for?

Besides, do you really want to be pissing off Al Gore?

Came earlier today from OSD Public Affairs. It came from Jack Holt, the chief of their new media operations.

Who wants to talk to the guy who flew the first C130 relief flight into Burma?

Bloggers Roundtable w/Capt. Trevor Hall, USAF, the pilot-in-command of the C-130 Hercules transport aircraft to fly the first emergency relief supplies into Rangoon International Airport in Burma.

Wednesday 14 May
0900 Eastern

Can you make it?

Awesome story. Timely. Brief and to the point. And finally recognizes that not all the good military stories (in fact I would say few of the good military stories) come from men and women with stars on their shoulders.

Put the people on the front lines front and center more often.

Too bad I can’t make the call. Hooah, Jack.

I’ve already written about the New York Times non-story expose on the efforts of the Pentagon to provide briefings to retired generals who serve as military analysts for television media about ongoing action in Iraq and Afghanistan. You know, things they might have interest in knowing about.

Well, apparently a bunch of e-mails, memos, fact sheets and other boring pieces of paper related to this program got FOIA’ed, and OSD has released them.

Take this group of documents for example. Other than former political appointee Dallas Lawrence’s occasional bad grammar and use of text message abbreviations in his correspondence, the most interesting thing about these e-mails is how frequently the e-mail addresses are redacted. All of the blocked out passages are labeled (b)(6). How cryptic!

Shall we play a game? Who are these mystery junior-to-mid-level communicators at the Pentagon?

I’m probably the only one who thinks this is remotely interesting.

But if you care to play, there are hundreds of pages of documents for your pleasure. Enjoy!

The Army Web Risk Assessment Cell has some new toys with which to track blogs.

Anyone from AWRAC wish to share? I’d love to hear more…

This is apparently blog tipping week in the D-Ring; here is my second tip in two days. As an added bonus, it is yet another military public affairs blog! (Chris and Chris, he is a former Chair Forcer Air Force officer).

Anyone who has been to a military school knows that you make good friends who you inevitably fall out of touch with. You are together all day, every day for several weeks, then split and head your respective ways. You get restationed, you lose contact.

Well, I stumbled upon one of my good buddies from DINFOS — a guy named Aaron Henninger.

He is now out of the Air Force and running his own communications consulting agency. And he has a blog, called on the DEFENSE.

Check out the writings of another DINFOS-trained killer. You won’t regret it.

Under the category of new-to-me-milblogs, check out fewl.net, a blog written by a sailor stationed in Japan.

One of my favorites is his redacted blog post, poking fun at blog censorship:

The rest is just as good. You won’t be disappointed.

Apparently everyone is up in arms over the fact that Pentagon public affairs folks host regularly scheduled briefings for retired general officers (who happen to also be on-camera pundits for cable networks) about current military activities.

From Reuters:

Many U.S. military analysts used as commentators on Iraq by television networks have been groomed by the Pentagon, leaving some feeling they were manipulated to report favorably on the Bush administration, The New York Times said in Sunday editions.

A Times report examining ties between the Bush administration and former senior officers who acted as paid TV analysts said they got private briefings, trips and access to classified intelligence meant to influence their comments.

“Records and interviews show how the Bush administration has used its control over access and information in an effort to transform the analysts into a kind of media Trojan horse — an instrument intended to shape terrorism coverage from inside the major TV and radio networks,” the newspaper said.

The Pentagon defended its work with the analysts, saying they were given only accurate information.

In other outrageous displays of the obvious news, Democrat and Republican spokespeople are given talking points and corporate CEOs are media trained. Details, tonight at 11.

Update: Jason hits the nail on the head. Check out what he has to say.

From Reuters:

About 300,000 U.S. troops returning from Iraq and Afghanistan suffer symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder or depression, but about half receive no care, an independent study said on Thursday.

The study by the RAND Corp. also estimated that another 320,000 troops have sustained a possible traumatic brain injury during deployment. But researchers could not say how many of those cases were serious or required treatment.

Billed as the first large-scale nongovernmental survey of its kind, the study found that stress disorder and depression afflict 18.5 percent of the more than 1.5 million U.S. forces who have deployed to the two war zones.

The numbers are roughly in line with previous studies. A February assessment by the U.S. Army that showed 17.9 percent of U.S. troops in Iraq and Afghanistan suffering from acute stress, depression or anxiety in 2007, down from 19.1 percent in 2006.

Who says the Navy can’t have some fun?

h/t: ASY Live

Big ups to Phillip Carter, whose awesome blog Intel Dump has been picked up by The Washington Post.

I think this is a brilliant move by the Post. Carter is a great writer, has incredible insight, and truly gets how to create content for an online audience. Not bad for someone who is a lawyer by day. As pressures on traditional media to grow into the online space builds, I think we’ll begin to see more and more blogger acquisitions by media giants.

So who wants to scoop up the D-Ring? Politico? Anybody?

Maybe the topic of digital communications in the military is a BIT too niche…

At any rate, check out the blog at his new home. Congrats!