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Soldiers warned to lay off Obama

Emails disparaging Barack Obama, violate military regs and federal law.

Mark Rutherford
The military establishment's ever increasing reliance on technology and whiz-bang gadgetry impacts us as consumers, investors, taxpayers and ultimately as the defended. Our mission here is to bring some of these products and concepts to your attention based on carefully selected criteria such as importance to national security, originality, collateral damage to the treasury and adaptability to yard maintenance-but not necessarily in that order. E-mail him at markr@milapp.com. Disclosure.
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Mark Rutherford

Soldiers have been warned to not use official computers to forward a chain email that purports to out presidential candidate Barack Obama as a Muslim who attended a madrassa, the Boston Globe reported.

Using government equipment to distribute this type of missive constitutes unlawful political activity and is against federal law and Army regulations.

"Currently there is a chain email floating around with the subject line: 'Who is Barack Obama,'" according to the official memorandum sent to all soldiers of the Army Medical Command in Fort Sam Houston, Texas. "Like virtually all chain emails this one is false."

The Army took action after the claims about Obama's background were sent from an Army computer to what appear to be thousands of soldiers worldwide, the Globe reported.

Army personnel were admonished that political e-mails violate regulations that specifically bar the military from engaging in any political activities while on duty, saying, "The subject email falls under the realm of prohibited political activity." Further, government communications equipment is for official use only; any other use else is punishable under the Uniform Code of Military Justice.

Federal Law (Titles 10, 2, and 18, United States Code), Department of Defense (DOD) Directives, plus specific military regulations strictly limit the active duty military form participation in partisan political activities.

They'll have to find something else to do at Fort Sam, like hunting down that Clinton supporter.