FORT JACKSON, SC – Soldiers of the 195th Infantry Brigade are unsure whether Command Sergeant Major Joe Bowden is intentionally doing an impression of comedian Bill Cosby or if he is so out of touch with today’s soldiers that any similarity is accidental.
“I’m 50/50 at this point whether he’s doing it on purpose or not,” reported Sergeant First Class George Valentine, a platoon sergeant in the 195th IN BDE’s HHC. “The other day, he was muttering under his breath behind a formation of basic training units about ‘the new soldiers, with their twitterings and their iPaddles and their fligem-flagem Facebook. The fact that he used the term ‘fligem-flagem’ made me think he was doing an impression of the Cos, but maybe that means something in Germany, where he was stationed for twelve or thirteen years.”
Other NCOs who have worked with CSM Bowden found it just as difficult to determine whether the CSM is punking the entire brigade by intentionally channeling the iconic 80s comic—who starred in The Cosby Show, I Spy, and Leonard Part 6—or if he is just a very strange man.
