Burlington Free Press Snips Fundamentalist Military Academy From Rainville Bio
If anyone ever, ever dares ask you why you blow hundreds of hours a year reading snarky political blogs instead of edging your driveway, here’s your answer, in a nutshell.
The Burlington Free Press ran a sweeping front-page biographical feature on Martha Rainville yesterday. It focused briefly on Rainville’s childhood as a navy brat, and then jumped to a fairly in-depth consideration of her college and post-college military experiences.
In general, it was nicely written and informative. In general, that is. The key grafs on the Early Years:
“Rainville’s demeanor has its roots in her childhood. Born in 1958, Martha Trim was the middle of three daughters who followed their father to a series of Navy posts before he retired when she was nearly 11 and they moved to her parents’ hometown of Port Gibson, Miss.
“Rainville followed in her father’s military footsteps, joining the Air Force directly after college.”
But what got lost in the narrative jump from brat to co-ed? Hmm, VDB knows there was something . . . Oh, that’s right: Rainville’s years at a Christian Fundamentalist military academy where they teach the kids to shoot from the trees.
And it’s not as though the Free Press can argue that the pre-college years don’t count, or are of only passing interest to voters.
In fact, quite the opposite: Terri Hallenbeck argues for going back even further to find the real Martha Rainville. As she notes, “Rainville’s demeanor has its roots in her childhood.”
But not in her Christian military years, those tender teenage years at a school where the highest obligation was to obey, and the highest honor was to be known as a “Crusader”?
That’ll root your demeanor every time.
on November 28th, 2006 at 12:03 am
[…] Topic? “Why Read Blogs.” Okay, granted: VDB already laid out one of the reasons in spades here. But we suspect Parent has a good deal more to say, and the theoretical vocabulary in which to say it. […]