When I first envisioned this piece I wanted to call it “J.D. Vance is a Fucking POG.”

Because it’s true: J.D. Vance is a fucking POG. 

But to be fair, most people on this planet could be called POGs. 

Including myself during this particular point in time (though this wasn’t always the case). 

So, the brand sort of loses its sting. 

Unless, perhaps, we come to a better understanding of a few things. 

For instance: 

What is a POG?

For those who don’t know, it’s an acronym used by the U.S. military’s infantry to describe anyone who isn’t infantry — a person other than a grunt. 

It’s a term of contempt. 

Of course there are obvious and often unspoken exceptions — special forces, tankers, engineers, even attack pilots — and perhaps that’s a contradiction, but generally, “POG” means someone who isn’t in danger, who isn’t typically in the shit. 

And of course, it goes without saying that the wars of the Global War on Terror sidestepped this rule on many an occasion, making it so POGs — be they motor-t or maintenance or other non-combat personnel on the roads of a place like Iraq — would find themselves very much in the role of a grunt, firing M16s back at enemy shooting AKs and RPGs and mortars at them, rendering the derision of the term “POG” nearly pointless, at least in those moments — and this said nothing about the non-infantry types attached to grunt units or in direct support of them, the intrepid chaplains and corpsmen and civilian correspondents who shared many of the same dangers, or the artillerymen and drone pilots and other rear echelon personnel who contributed to a great deal of the killing. 

I guess what I’m saying is that POG is a complicated word that has flexible uses. 

So, yes, J.D. Vance is a POG. Big deal. 

Ordinarily I wouldn’t hold that against someone. 

The term made more sense when I was in the infantry, sleeping in the rain, coming into base caked with mud to see all of them in their offices, drinking coffee and wearing crisp, clean uniforms, well-rested and fed. It was hard not to feel a bit of resentment in those moments. A bit of anger.

Likewise, coming back into the wire after being shot at and shooting back, after stepping over dead bodies and seeing your friends killed or badly injured — it could thicken into something resembling hate. 

But outside of the fear and the pain and the tunnel vision that comes with it, my logical brain always came to the same conclusion, always said the same thing: tough shit. That they had chosen their path, and I had chosen mine. 

I can’t stand here and logically fault someone for avoiding service in the Marine Corps infantry. 

It only makes sense. 

Nor can I blame someone for avoiding combat duty in nothingburger wars like Iraq, Afghanistan, and Vietnam. 

Historical hindsight has shown such a dodge to be exceedingly prudent. 

However, I do make exceptions. 

Namely for hypocrites who wanna run their mouths and start new wars long after the point at which they’ll be put in any personal danger. 

Case in point: Ted Nugent, the rock and roll star who claimed to have avoided Vietnam service by pissing and shitting himself for days, snorting meth and refusing to bathe till he was crusted in a coat of dried excrement prior to appearing before his draft board — the same Ted Nugent who, years later, called people “weenies” and “insulated, spineless cowards” for opposing the war in Iraq. 

Other prominent examples include Dick Cheney, recipient of five draft deferments, and George W. Bush, who served in the Texas Air National Guard to avoid combat in Vietnam — men who, having grown old and having gained the reins of power, must’ve decided that they did want to go to war after all — just as long as they could fight it vicariously through 18- and 19-year-olds such as myself. 

The list goes on, but in general, these are the types of men I’m talking about — and this brings me back to J.D. Vance. 

Yes, he did serve four years in the Marines. 

And yes, he did deploy to Iraq. 

But J.D. Vance was a POG.

And unlike a lot of POGs who served in Iraq, he did not see any combat. 

Again — I don’t typically hold that against someone. 

But — slimy opportunist that he is — he just had to run his mouth. 

In particular about vice-presidential candidate Tim Walz, who retired in 2005 after 24 years of service in the Minnesota National Guard. 

Walz was an artillery guy who never saw combat, never even deployed to a combat zone. Instead, he retired a few months before his guard unit got orders for Iraq. Then he ran for Congress on an anti-war ticket. 

For this, Vance has essentially called him a coward. 

When Walz misspoke about assault rifles like the one he “carried to war,” Vance leveled charges of stolen valor — something usually reserved for people wearing uniforms and decorations they didn’t earn. 

Now I’d like to think that most intelligent people see this for what it is: Vance playing politics, being a petty, pedantic piece of shit who’s shown himself willing to say and do anything for power. 

But I’m not so sure these days. 

Say what you will about Walz; I’ve made it clear I’m not going to hold it against anyone for opting out of a pointless war like Iraq — especially when they’re on record being against it. 

While his statement about the assault rifle might’ve been an accident, while it might’ve been on purpose, I don’t really fucking care — nor do I feel one ounce of pride or excitement for either candidate’s status as an enlisted “veteran” (a term I have my own beef with, not to be confused with “combat veteran,” but that’s the subject of another essay). 

I don’t think military service is indicative of good political leadership anymore than business ownership is. 

And I can’t stress enough how I don’t really hate or dislike or want to disrespect POGs; indeed, watching Russia step on its own dick in Ukraine, especially during that early push on Kiev, has given me much more respect for all those logistics nerds. 

But I can’t help feel the young grunt inside me chafe, listening to Vance disparage Walz.

Vance, attached as he was to the Marine air wing, far from the main danger, a combat correspondent who never saw combat. 

Vance, who might’ve even gone outside the wire once or twice, but never got bit. 

Vance, joined now at the hip with a career criminal who avoided the Vietnam draft because of bone spurs, a man who claims to have no respect for POWs or anyone who fights and dies in America’s wars.

Vance, really one to talk–and I say this with total recognition of irony, but in response to the running of his mouth: to listen to him split hairs about the service of another man who served 20 years longer than he did, to hold his own service up and imply it to be of higher quality, to frame himself as a braver man because he took photos of pilots behind the walls of highly secure compounds–well, it brings out the infantryman in me and the flexible uses of our favorite acronym, so that I can mean it with maximum prejudice and the highest level of scorn when I say that in judgments about combat service, while I understand it’s a free country, maybe he should just shut the fuck up, because J.D. Vance is a fucking POG. 

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Fred Lambert is a writing tutor whose work has been featured in Ghost Parachute, War, Literature & the Arts, and After Action Review. He lives in his hometown of Orlando, Florida.