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Navy Recognizes Thune as Career Politician

We can still occasionally learn something from Pat Powers’s press-release blog. For instance, yesterday’s sponsored press release says that career politicians deserve awards:

U.S. Sen. John Thune (R-S.D.) today was awarded the Navy Distinguished Public Service Award, the highest honor the secretary of the Navy can award to a civilian, which was presented by Rear Admiral Craig Faller, the Navy’s chief of legislative affairs.

With grateful appreciation for his many years of public service to the Nation and for his outstanding contributions to the Navy and Marine Corps, the Honorable John Thune is awarded the Department of the Navy Distinguished Public Service Award [Senator John Thune, press release, 2017.01.05]. 

Years of public service—i.e., sitting in Washington, D.C. since 1997 raising lots of money for his campaigns, making trivial fussesshirking his Constitutional duty, and not achieving much that really warrants engraving a name in a medal or plaque. Thune has mostly just sat there looking pretty, making a career of being a politician. Well done, John!

19 Comments

  1. mike from iowa

    Last couple of photo ops of Marlboro Barbie and McCTurtle has Barbie behind and to the right of Mitchie. Usually he is to the left fawning all over his fearless leader.

  2. Rorschach

    I did a quick check, but I was unable to determine whether John McCain has received this award. You know … he’s the Navy pilot who spent years as a POW in Vietnam and who has a far more distinguished public service career than that of John Thune. I sure hope that McCain is a past recipient – or there has clearly been some mistake awarding Thune ahead of McCain.

  3. mike from iowa

    I looked thru McCain’s medal history and it isn’t listed on there. Maybe he isn’t a hero since he got caught and held prisoner. I had to explain one time to a wingnut, a couple of years ago, the Hanoi Hilton was not a vacationer’s dream hotspot.

  4. Dave Severson

    Yeah John! Never seen a war he doesn’t like, profiteering from war is a fine tradition among republicans. John doesn’t stand out though, in most photo ops he’s behind and slightly to the right of Mitch McConnell. All good yes men know their place in the pecking order!

  5. Note that the press release says this award is the highest award the Navy grants to civilians. It doesn’t go to service members like McCain. No harm, no foul on that score.

  6. Porter Lansing

    NOTABLE RECIPIENTS
    Joe Rosenthal, Pulitzer Prize winning photographer
    Sybil Stockdale, wife of the late Vice Admiral
    Freelance television news cameraman Chris Jackson
    Rep. John Murtha (chairman of the House Appropriations Committee’s Defense Subcommittee)
    Rep. Rodney Frelinghuysen – also a sitting member of the Defense Subcommittee
    ~ There ‘ya go, MFI. We’ve got Photo-Op, a couple photographers, an Admiral’s wife and a couple guys who send the Navy everything they ask for, no questions asked. he he Pathetic Powers has jumped the lutefisk, again.

  7. Mike Boswell

    So you take a jab at a Public Servant. Not very classy. Not every Republican agrees with Term Limits. Some of us agree with Ronald Reagan, that the people should be able to vote for whomever they want for as long as they want.

  8. Bogus argument, Boswell. Mike Rounds took shots at public servant Rick Weiland. Kristi Noem took shots at public servant Stephanie Herseth Sandlin. I criticize John Thune for pretending to be a public servant when he has done little to actually serve the public.

  9. But hey, we agree that the only term limits we have should be elections, where the people can choose whomever they want. Yay, democracy!

  10. Mike Boswell

    The point to take shots at a Public Servant while he’s being give an award. You could take the high ground and congratulate him. But no.

  11. Mike Boswell

    apples and oranges You are not the Huffington Post but obviously you take the same road.

  12. bearcreekbat

    right. . . .

  13. Bob Newland

    Nobel committee awards Obama the Peace Prize before he had done anything. After eight years, it is at least arguable that he deserved it.

    The Navy hands out a Distinguished Public Service Award to a person for whom the only argument for “distinguished public service” is the distinguished lack of distinguishment.

  14. mike from iowa

    and Paris Hilton and the Kardashian clan are famous for being famous. Ho accomplishments, but mucho press.

    I see right wing sites, including the Grifter Wasilla Gorilla have taken to claiming Obama awarded himself a medal.

  15. grudznick

    Mr. Ronald Reagan and my good friend Bob agree on this issue.

  16. grudznick

    Breakfasting in Hot Springs is probably going to become more challenging, Bob. On one hand the already slim choices will decrease. On the other hand there will be far fewer people there to compete for counter space. You and I agree that dining in is not an option, so looks like more long road trips for you.

  17. leslie

    didn’t they rename a battleship or something? thune helped, like the spearfish canyon swap so daugaard can get something named after him for his exemplary service to the state covering up accountability for EB5, MCEC, failure to expand Medicaid, pissing of our Indian brothers and sisters at many turns, challenging ethics measure and teacher pay mess.

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