Quit Reading Blogs, U.S. Air Force Demands

The U.S. Air Force has started blocking access to any site that might be a blog. Wired writes that our fighter pilots and their brethren are being kept away from

...just about any independent site with the word "blog" in its web address. It's the latest move in a larger struggle within the military over the value — and hazards — of the sites.

Not everyone thinks the Pakistan-like measure is such a hot idea.

"When I hear stuff this utterly stupid, it makes me want to scream.... Piles of torn out hair are accumulating around my desk as we speak," one senior Air Force official writes in an e-mail. "I'm certain that by blocking blogs for official use, our airmen will never, ever be able to read them on their own home computers, so we have indeed saved them from a contaminating influence. Sorry, didn't mean to drip sarcasm on your rug."

It would be one thing if this was an across-the-board USAF crackdown against its employees goofing off on the Internet. But as Maj. Henry Schott of Air Force Network Operations clearly states, that's not the case. The idea is to offer "primary, official-use sources" only.

"If it's a place like The New York Times, an established, reputable media outlet, then it's fairly cut and dry that that's a good source, an authorized source."

For a service branch so dependent on cutting-edge technology, ignoring the tectonic shifts that blogging has brought to the media landscape these past five or six years is a little Luddite, perhaps.

But more to the point: how interesting that members of the Air Force are expected to put their lives on the line to defend American freedoms so vital that top brass won't entrust said liberties to these men and women themselves.

Comments

[Martin Owens]

What did General MacArthur say?

Never give an order that you know won't be obeyed.

For I suppose the USAF has an intelligence section someplace, and the Jihadi bomb throwers use blogs to recruit, communicate and trade tips on wiping out us infidels....are those off limits too, don't look at intel that might save somebody's life, so that some brain dead bureaucrat in uniform can reassure himself the troops are only looking at " approved" sources?

Anytime I doubt that Almighty God is looking out for the USA, I remember that we have idiots like these in charge at all levels, yet we continue not only to exist, but thrive. The age of miracles is surely still with us.

[Thomsa Jackson]

Good Grief, this story or the issue of Air Force blocking blogs just made it to the Coast Guard end of the blogosphere. At our end of internet, we have not all been blocked as of yet, but rumblings inside Coast Guard Headquarters point in that direction. We have uncovered what has been labeled the “ugly underbelly” of the Coast Guard and report on issues they sooner not have discussed. Of the three main blogs, CoastGuardReport.org, and two others we take on issues that otherwise would not be discussed at the level and with the sources inside the Coast Guard we use.
As the Coast Guard tries to come to grips with its new and increased missions since 911, along with its increased funding, we have much to report on. From the failed 27 billion dollar acquisition portfolio to upgrade the Coast Guard’s aged and deteriorating fleet of ships and aircraft, to a base infrastructure that is largely made up of base hand-me-downs from the other services, they have much to do. Coast Guards 27 billion dollar acquisition portfolio is still being managed today by an Admiral with ZERO professional acquisition training, qualifications or certifications. Why the congress let alone the Commandant of the Coast Guard don’t tackle that easy fix is beyond anything anyone outside the Coast Guard can fathom.
Good Luck Bloggers!