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‘Stop Loss’ opens in theatres across the country today.

If you have never heard of the term “stop loss,” you are probably not a member of the U.S. military. A lot of enlisted soldiers never heard of it either, at least not until it happened to them. So before you get swept away by one of those awesome armed forces commercials that makes you think you’re signing up to become G.I. Joe with a fighter jet and a hard on, let’s take a little True or False quiz:

1) True or False: When you sign up for the Army, you agree to serve a term of eight, count them EIGHT (8) years, like it or not.

A. True - You may request fewer years of active duty, but if you signed the contract the Army can keep you active for eight years without any further obligation on their part.

2) True or False: The U.S. Army has a policy that allows for soldiers who have already served their full term of duty to be sent back to active duty (that means eligible to go back in front of the bullets) for as long as the President sees fit.

A. True - “Stop loss,”sometimes called the “backdoor draft,” is an inherent part of the Army contract. In layman’s terms, the President can decide that he needs more troops, and stop letting people out of the Army. He can “stop” the “loss” of active duty soldiers by simply refusing to discharge them, regardless of the terms of their contract.

Although the policy was written to apply only during times of war, the Bush administration has used it regularly to provide the number of troops needed for deployment in Iraq. Activists (and not a few soldiers) have decried this administration’s tendency to “double dip” by both publicly declaring the War in Iraq over, and then privately stop-lossing active duty soldiers who expected to be discharged.

Ironically, the whole controversy is existential rather than practical, because congress never actually declared war on Iraq. They just funded the president’s foreign policy in what some might consider a warlike manner, which is not covered in the enlistment contract. So back to the front with you, G.I., whether you like it or not, even though your contract is up, even though we are not at war.

3) True or False: The “stop loss” policy is obscure and rarely used to actually retain soldiers.

A. False - Exactly how many soldiers have been stop lossed during the “War” in Iraq is a number that the Bush administration refuses to share with the public, despite the fact that it is “the public” to whom they appeal for more enlistments, and who therefore most need to know exactly what the enlistment contract really says. However, it is common knowledge among those who are already obligated to the military (and their families) that the stop loss policy is alive and kicking, and and being implemented with alarming regularity, especially considering the fact that no war has been declared. Go Army.

4) True or False: If you want to know what your enlistment obligations would be if you joined the Army, ask an Army recruiter.

A. False - Out of curiosity, we decided to see what Army recruiters would say about the matter. The Army has a recruitment website which we don’t particularly want to support, but which allows internet users to join a live “chat” with recruiters. We asked recruiters about the policy and were told that the Army did not sanction the movie, and therefore will not discuss the movie. We clarified that we didn’t want to know about the movie, but about the policy in reality. We were completely ignored by recruiters, but when we asked whether stop lossing really happens, another soldier present in the chat room responded directly to us, “hell yes.”

———-

You now officially know more about the stop loss policy than most of the recruits who enlisted to defend our nation. And right about now, the soldiers of Generation X (who enlisted in record numbers after to the Sept. 11 attacks) are learning all about the policy… the hard way. So if the Baby Boomers what to know where they lost our support, this would be a good place to start. Because the soldiers who put their lives on the line to defend our nation deserve better; they deserve a government that lives up to its end of the contract.

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‘Deal Or No Deal’ suitcase models enjoy a hefty paycheck.

Who says women don’t earn as much money as men? Oh, right. The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics.

Average pay gap by gender according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, 2005

Well, not to worry ladies. Sure, you might be facing an extra rough couple of years financially, but take heart! There is always a way to boost your income right up into (or at least near) the men’s bracket… just get pretty!

While it is true that women continue to earn on average about 30% less money than men in comparable positions, there are still a few fields in which women are the top moneymakers. Unfortunately for most of us, there’s a catch. Those rare fields in which women make more money on average than men are centered around women’s physical appearance, beauty industries like modeling and (dare we say it?) sex work.

Today’s case in point is NBC’s Deal or No Deal, which features models standing on the stage and occasionally opening a briefcase. Paparazzi kingpin TMZ recently conducted an impromptu interview with Deal model Claudia Jordan, who confirmed that she and her co-models earn a walloping six figures for their appearances on the show. Of course that’s peanuts to what host Howie Mandel makes, but it sure beats your average soccer mom’s meager salary.

So if you want to close that wage gap, get thee to a plastic surgeon!

The downside, of course, is that you’ll already need to be rich to afford the surgery and any resulting medical mishaps. And once you’ve squeezed in, sucked out, inflated, and tightened everything you can, you won’t look like yourself any more (but you will look like every other desperate chickiboo hoping to cash in). And no one will ever take your opinions seriously again. And you’ll have to remove more and more clothing in order to garner a pay raise. And you will still never earn as much dinero as the guy who owns the magazine that publishes your photo, or the guy who owns the station that broadcasts your image. And the same people who make money off of your looks will feel justified in referring to you as a “bitch” regardless of your actual personality (yeah, we’re talking to you Harvey).

But hey, it’s a small price to pay for “equality,” right?

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prettyontheoutside.com tackles the Millionaire Matchmaker

We can thank the WGA strike for the recent upwelling of heinously unwatchable reality TV series, the king (or queen) of which just has to be the BRAVO network’s Millionaire Matchmaker. If you’ve been fortunate enough to miss this series despite its obvious trainwreck potential, please allow us to catch you up.

The Ditz:

Patti Stanger, former director of marketing for the formative matchmaking company Great Expectations, brings the cameras into her psycho-dramatic, elitist little business of matching surgically “enhanced” golddiggers with horny but socially inept millionaires. Patti, who will go so far as to pimp out her own staff if she thinks she’ll make a buck, has rules: no curly hair (men won’t want to run their fingers through it), no short hair (not sexy enough), wear low-rise jeans or short dresses with high heels, AND no sex while dating (you gotta’ make them pay for it honey, just ask Anne Boleyn). If Patti’s victims, uh, clients are lucky, they’ll escape her harpie-like clutches altogether. If they are pragmatic, they might create a mutually satisfactory business arrangement and call it a marriage. If they are unlucky, she’ll hook ‘em up with a potential serial killer. But hey, the money’s right!!

The Date:

Case in point - Cidney meets Paul. Paul is a Las Vegas businessman. Cidney is a well-educated Bev Hills idiot (who incidentally was also the Playboy cyber-girl of the week for October 16, 2006 - Patti swears she doesn’t match ex-strippers, but I guess Playboy doesn’t count). When Cidney met Paul she mentioned that she lives with her mom and helps care for her aging grandmother (and would therefore not want to leave LA). So of course Paul insisted that she call her mother on the phone so he could “meet” her and assure her that he is “a good guy.” Once he got them on the phone he talked himself up to Dad and Grandma too. Paul then took Cidney on a date to Vegas, where he discerned that she is afraid of heights and promptly took her on a helicopter tour. Later at dinner, when Cidney facetiously mentioned how thrilled her family would be to get rid of her, and that her grandma is actually knitting baby clothes out of sheer hope, Paul did what every reasonable, common-sensed American male would do. He proposed to Cidney. She said “Um.” He called mom and grandma to tell them the good news. I swear to you it happened.

The Danger:

I’m not going to come right out and call Paul a vicious, malevolent woman-beating son of a motherless goat, mostly because he probably has enough money to dip me in molten gold and display me on his mantle in response. What I will say is that any woman who finds herself in Cidney’s situation should run screaming through the forest of red flags that should have been raised by the dude’s bizarro behavior in the first place.

Because here’s the problem - that kind of behavior just ain’t so bizarre if you can discern the method behind the madness. These are the trick of the trade for an abuser of the domestic violence ilk. I’ll explain:

• First trick - Keep your target off guard by constantly pushing. “You’re afraid of heights? Oh, look, a helicopter! Come on, it’ll be fun.” “You think it’s silly that your grandma is already knitting baby clothes? Here’s my ring! TAKE it! Aren’t I spontaneous and romantic? Don’t be a square. Say YES! Make your family happy!”
• Second trick - Get the family on your side immediately. “Hi, my name’s Paul. Let’s call your parents! Hi ‘rents, I’m rich and I’m a great guy and all I want in the whole world is to take care of your beautiful daughter! See, she likes me so much she made me call you! I must be the one!”
• Third trick - Force a commitment at a ridiculously early moment. “Now that you’ve spent the last two hours in mortal terror on that helicopter ride you didn’t want to take (and may I remind you I was a perfect gentleman the whole time), this seems like a perfect moment to propose. Oh, you’d need a ring? Here, take my frat ring, it’s Sigma Chi you know. I just happen to have it on me.”
• Fourth trick - If you can’t convince ‘em, confuse ‘em. “But you were the one who said your family would be so happy to see you married. You were the one who called them on our very first date. You were the one who mentioned that your friends got married on a helicopter once. You did sign up for the millionaire matching service. What else was I to think? This was obviously all your idea”
• Fifth trick - Isolate, isolate, isolate. Cidney is now dating Paul by default. I’ll give you two guesses whether he changed his life one iota so she could continue to live near her close knit family, or whether he insisted that she move to Las Vegas, where she has no connections, to be with him full time.

Sure, Cidney could have said “no” to all of these things. Oh wait, she did. Paul just went right along with his plans anyway. Now Cidney is in a position where she has to come up with a reason why she won’t date this great guy who she introduced to her parents on their first date, who is rich, tall, reasonably attractive and wants to marry her and make rich, tall, reasonably attractive babies. Good Beverly Hills girls just don’t say no to a chance like that. And don’t think Paul, uh, or some guy who isn’t Paul, doesn’t know it.

The Downside:

So that’s the scoop. Patti got her payday, Paul has whatever he wants, and Cidney somehow finds herself living in Vegas with no family and no friends, just wonderful Paul. Dollars to donuts he knocks her up in a matter of weeks… because he can’t start smacking her around until she’s good and committed. How embarrassing would it be for her to call Grandma then? So we say good luck, Cid, you’re gonna’ need it. By the way, the National Domestic Violence Hotline number is 1-800-799-SAFE. And from now on, stay away from people who hock toys to millionaires and refer to themselves as “The Mother Theresa Of Matchmaking.” She might have someone’s best interests at heart, but it sure as shitake ain’t yours.

More About Domestic Violence:

Domestic Violence (DV) is so common in the U.S. that the National Center for Disease Control (CDC) tracks it. The CDC estimates DV costs the U.S. nearly $8.3 billion per year

Experts estimate that somewhere between one million - three million women in the U.S. experience DV each year.

Separate Myth from Fact

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