“I grew up with ink on my fingers. But you can’t be so politically correct that you lose the humor of the situation.”
By Howard Altman; Tampa Bay Times:
TAMPA — At a time when journalists are under fire both literally and figuratively, Tampa Mayor Bob Buckhorn’s “joke” this week at a military conference about pointing twin 50 caliber machine guns at journalists and watching them “cry like little girls” rankled several reporters in the room.
Buckhorn’s remarks at the Special Operations Industry Conference quickly became fodder for the Facebook page of Military Reporters & Editors, which represents about 300 journalists.
“Personally, I was appalled,” wrote Susan Katz Keating, a freelance writer and organization board member who was in the conference room Tuesday for Buckhorn’s keynote address. Katz Keading had guns pointed at her while covering unrest in Northern Ireland in 1988.
Buckhorn said his critics are being overly sensitive. “I think that is a silly reaction,” he said of those upset by a story he has told “a dozen times.”
But some journalists in the room said they weren’t being thin-skinned. No skin is thick enough to stop a bullet or bomb blast, something Daily Beast national security reporter Kim Dozier knows all too well.
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11,500 Expected to Attend Special Ops Conference in Tampa
By Howard Altman; Tampa Bay Times:
TAMPA — A major annual conference that brings together special operations forces commanders and defense industry leaders kicked into high gear this morning at the Tampa Convention Center.
The Special Operations Forces Industry Conference began Monday but ramped up this morning with the opening of the exhibit hall, featuring commando-oriented goods and services from about 350 companies.
About 11,500 people, largely members of the special operations community and defense contractors, are expected to attend the annual conference, according to James “Hondo” Geurts, the acquisition executive for U.S. Special Operations Command. The command, headquartered at MacDill Air Force Base, has its own budget of several billion dollars a year to spend on buying goods and services and maintaining them.
The event also marks the biannual International Special Operations Forces conference, bringing together commandos from 80 nations. Also being held at the convention center, it is closed to the media except for key note speeches.
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