Bulletin: CVA needs new lunatic to run asylum

In news that reinforces my conviction that the left is playing with a deck that has less than the usual compliment of cards, prominent member of Iraq Veterans against the War and Colorado Veterans Alliance (CVA) founder Rick Duncan, nee, Richard Glen Strandlof apparently made a few trifling additions to his resume. He claimed to be a USMC Captain and graduate of the Naval Academy who was in the Pentagon on 9/11 then severely wounded in Iraq.

The good people at The Gazette in Colorado Springs noted these discrepancies:

The U.S. Naval Academy in Annapolis, Md., said the school has no record of a 1997 graduate named Rick Duncan.

Marine Corps spokeswoman Capt. Amy Malugani found no record of Strandlof or his alias Duncan serving in the Corps, and that the unit Strandlof claimed to have served with in Iraq doesn't exist.

But wait there's more:

The group said it found that Strandlof had been a patient in a mental hospital in Washoe County, Nev., at the time of the roadside bombing in Fallujah, Iraq, that he claimed left him severely wounded.

The blog This ain't Hell, but you can see it from here noticed that besides claiming to be the gay commander of a Marine Battalion Rick said an Iraqi IED was responsible for a plate in his head, his hip replacement and the loss of a finger. They also observed that Mr. Duncan, nee, Strandlof still had ten fingers left despite the loss.

It appears that Mr. Strandlof's transparent deception was either a desperate plea for help by a troubled individual or he was just plain stupid.

Members of CVA did contact the FBI when they noticed the discrepancies in his story I wonder if it was the fingers that tipped them off. The guy's history was a complete fabrication that he parlayed into fund raising and lots of news coverage, it seems the "Main Stream Press" was completely gulled by this charlatan, you would think due diligence would require fact checking, like maybe just a little, like some maybe. It couldn't be that his anti-war narrative dovetailed with their preconceived notions about the war, could it?

Here's a summary of his lies according to The Gazette:

Graduated from the U.S. Naval Academy in Annapolis, Md., in 1997
Commissioned as an officer in the Marine Corps, attained the rank of captain.
Survived the 9/11 terrorist attack on the Pentagon.
Served three combat tours in Iraq.
Severely wounded in a roadside bombing in Fallujah.
War injuries resulted in his having a plate in his head, synthetic ribs and a hip replacement.

Oh yeah, and they're investigating if he embezzled $25000 in funds he raised to send packages to soldiers in Iraq.