In today's Midday Open Thread, there was a brief item about a company in Michigan which makes military rifle scopes with Biblical references stamped next to the part numbers. Rachel Maddow also had an item about it on her show tonight.
Below the fold is a copy of the letter I sent to my Senators, Feingold and Kohl, and also to Senator Levin since he is Chairman of the Armed Service Committee. I am going to follow up with phone calls to all three senators' offices tomorrow.
Dear Senator Feingold:
I sent a copy of the message below to Senator Levin, as head of the Armed Services Committee. I am bringing this to the attention of you and Senator Kohl as well because Trijicon's practice of stamping Biblical references into rifle scopes made for the military is both a violation of military policy and is a practice which endangers our troops. The details are below.
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Dear Senator Levin,
Today I learned that the Trijicon company in Wixom, MI has been manufacturing rifle scopes with Biblical verse references stamped on them next to the part number for the United States Military.
This was first reported by ABC News in this story:
http://abcnews.go.com/...
and I also saw a report about it on tonight's episode (01-18-10) of "The Rachel Maddow Show" on MSNBC.
It is my understanding that the official policy of all branches of our military is to avoid giving the appearance of preferring any religion over any other. In light of this policy, I find the reaction of Tom Munson,the sales and marketing director for Trijicon, to be very puzzling. As quoted in the ABC News article, Mr. Munson said that stamping Biblical references on military rifle scopes is deliberate on Trijicon's part and there is "nothing wrong or illegal with adding them." It is very alarming that any representative of any company which contracts with our military fails to understand both policy and that stamping Biblical references on goods used by the military endangers our troops. Such references manufactured into military equipment gives our enemies the impression that our overseas campaigns have religious overtones and give organizations like al-Qaeda an additional recruiting tool.
Mr. Levin, since you are the Chairman of the Armed Services Committee, and as one of your former constituents, I ask you to investigate this matter. Trijicon should, in my opinion, be required stop stamping Biblical references on its military rifle scopes and to replace all such scopes now in the field with plain ones, and once the recall and replacement is complete, all Department of Defense contracts with Trijicon should be cancelled.
I will forward copies of this message to my own Senators, Mr. Feingold and Mr. Kohl, in order to bring their attention to this matter as well.
Sincerely,
Idgie Threadgoode