By request:

For two years at Pitt, I was the copy editor for The Pitt News. One November, I was friends with the opinions editor and found out that some ROTC guy was writing some fluff piece editorial for Veteran's Day, which was on a Thursday. So I asked if I could whip something up for the Wednesday edition. I was a bit angry and overblown, but basically I wrote something that gave my standard spiel about how we always talk about national defense in this country, but by and large our military plays offense. I may have even referred to Veteran's Day as the holiday where we celebrate people who were sent abroad to shoot foreigners and lived (while we have a separate holiday in May for those who were killed in the process). OK, maybe that was a bit over the top, and I probably wouldn't write or publish the same thing in the same words today. Especially with John Ashcroft running around and all. But seriously, I wouldn't be quite as flippant about this today.

Anyway, apparently some of Pitt's College Republicans faxed this article to Jim Quinn, who had metamorphosed from half of a funny morning team duo on the biggest pop station in Pittsburgh into a solo morning guy on the classic rock station doing a schtick best described as a heavy dose of Limbaugh with a dash of Art Bell. In other words, conservative blowhard with a dash of conspiracy theorist blowhard. I have theories about this--in the '70s both Quinn and Limbaugh worked for the same rock station in Pittsburgh as young DJs, and I think Quinn was probably some combination of jealous, bitter, and opportunuistic about Limbaugh's success and sought to emulate it.

Anyway, apparently this article was a popular local dittohead topic on the Quinn show for about three days, and he started the ball rolling by calling the article's author (yours truly) as "an asshole". I wouldn't have ever found this out, except some guys at work told my dad about it, and he asked me if it was my article--not that he was curious enough to read the thing or anything (which was probably for the best).

Oh, and in case it was unclear, 10 days ago was the blog's birthday, not mine...