Ink on paper:
Tides of War: Steven Pressman
A bunch of Nero Wolfe: Rex Stout
Nikon Manual for the DH2
TK
I read threads like this and remember why I want more posting here.
But, to business,
I keep trying not to say, So this is why some parents want their kids to enlist because it seems so heartless, but that does seem to underly TKs argument. Or maybe some kids are realistic enough to know they still need limits and so enlist. Again, it seems a heartless thing to say. But people do these things. They're doing them now.
Kathryn Cramer
Again, I respectfully disagree. I know a lot of people who've joined the "military" and damned few of them did it to be led by the nose.
Some of them wanted some structure, but those are a small number (though I confess, I don't know all that many Marines). What I find amusing is that those who wanted structure are disappointed at the low level of it. Not that this is relevant to them wanting it, but they found it wanting.
And, for those who do it, thinking they need an outside formative force, it's not heartless to say so. And it's not a flaw in them (which is the context in which this is being discussed). That is the examined life without which life isn't really worth living.
If I know I need something, and go to a place I can find it (lets say I have an urge, undeniable, to dance; so I go to Julliard) that is held a good thing; but not it seems, in this venue. But I digress.
The Army (which is the part of the military I know best) is a cross section of the culture, as such it, pretty well, reflect the rest of the society in which it lives.
While it may be possible to lead most people around by the nose, most of them don't want to be so led, or are, at least, not aware of it, which means (in light of this conversation) it is not a driving force.
TK
No problems. If you hit my blog, or Obsidian Wings (where Sebastian is ranting about how evil it is too) the specific text, and working links, can be found.
TK
Lucy: the real question is what happens if H.R. 10 passes, as is, and the two laws conflict. Given the secretive nature of the implementation of sec 3031-3033 of H.R. 10... it may be years before that conflict comes to the courts, years in which suspects are whisked away to be tortured by others.
We are sowing the seeds of legal, and "aboveboard" disparisados.
TK
Weird, they are supposed to be.
Here, I'll try again.
Obsidian Wingshttp://www.crookedtimber.org/archives/002593.html
Crooked Timber http://www.crookedtimber.org/archives/002593.html
Pecunium http://www.livejournal.com/users/pecunium/53188.html
Hunh, they are still getting munched, so the raw stuff is added
Old topic, new clothes
Torture.
I'm ranting about this Cold fury and rage
Obsidian Wings is ranting on it.
Crooked Timber is ranting on this...
I know it goes on, but no point in posting more links, when what I want is more people to write about it.
H.R. 10 makes it legal to send any alien, who can't prove he isn't a terrorist, to any country we want, specifically so they can torture him.
TK
I have my doubts, purely inferential, but doubts.
If they had him, they'd have set it up at the Convention. The lack of so much as one reference to him, not one single comment about him, leads me to think they really didn't want people thinking about who really attacked New York and DC, but rather on the smoke and mirrors of the war as it's being, and poorly, fought.
TK
Bruce: I did that. I spent a lot of the summer barely noticing the political scene. Puttered with snakes, and plants and baby mules, and the camera.
The past few weeks, I've been arguing (a long discussion with a friend, [in texas] who says she doesn't know whom to vote for. She loathes Bush, but that's as far as she can commit... given that her vote is meaningless in the electoral issue... I ought to have let it go, but I didn't) all sorts of political questions (if you care to see the things that prompt me, has it all.
For the first time in my life, I care... not just at a level of, A is better than B, but with a deep passion, about the outcome. I no longer believe that either party will engage in caretaking, and four years of drifting to one side, or the other, around a common center is what will happen if the guy I prefer loses.
Sorry, I'm ranting again.
Resignation happens, and it will probably wear off.
TK
Last I was dealing with the Swiss, they all got a rifle (just as the US, everyone has a weapon, even if they are in the rear... and Switzerland has a lot less rear) and a basic load.
Some things (like AA) could be checked out... by the passed out reservists, so as to avoid a predicatable pattern of distribution. Again, the ammo is cased, can be insepected, and using it will cause the neighbors to complain... with dire consequences.
Pilots are not cadre, but put in a lot of extra duty. They are probably the best trained Air Force in the world, though the Israelis and the US get the credit.
Once they age out, they are still possessed of rifles, but no longer perform live fire excercises. They are also released from the unit they were with when they were in the active forces, and become part of a local call-up. That call up usually spends a week or so with blanks, figuring out the best ways to defend the area.
As for a balck-powder musket... not what I want to be shot with. It can take out moose and bear because it is large, slow and heavy. Lots of tranferred energy. But those same qualities (which make it so lethal against flesh) make it far less so against anything with armor. Those vests everyone was decrying (the ones I got issued to take to Iraq, which were replaced mid-tour) would stop one of those, no problem. It would knock me on my ass, and I might get my throat cut while I cleared the cobwebs and recovered my rifle... but the guy on my left might take him out instead.
Any weapon is useful, application is the problem (and yes, I know how to make one of those black-powder pieces defeat those vests... but I digress)
TK
I have been getting reports of rumors (some from service members) of Guardsmen being treated like Swiss Soldiers, and being issued weapons, and a basic load to take home.
I happen to think it impossible (both logistically, and to keep truly secret) but I worry that such thoughts are given credence.
As Teresa says, I hate it that this administration makes me feel like a nutbar conspiracy theorist.
TK
I know that when I was in, "The Box," LJ, and other blogs were listed as message/chat, and so blocked.
Making Light and Electrolite were both allowed (to my inexpressible gratitute).
I'd like to think this was not a direct response to Ginmar's stuff, but sadly I don't have anyone I can ask, directly, who is not in her immediate A/O (which means I can't tell if this is local, or regional).
If it's local... someone with eagles (i.e. at least a COL) was offended. If it's regional, then it is something at Websense.
As for Teresa being cut off... "I pity da foo."
TK
Lis: I seem to be defective... perhaps I need to see it, or peharps it's like Hitler, or Lenin, I'd need to be there, in person.
I think I just read too well... I can hear, and feel, the cadence, the swelling, the places where it needs to be just above a conversational tone.
I listened to the speech, it didn't affect me the way reading his stuff has.
But the message... gives me chills.
TK
Obama's speech, this delicate skewering (let the slim point Sliiide in) and the simple passion.
I think the loyal opposition has found those cojones.
TK
Bleary eyed with emotion.
If he talks as well as he reads... he is gonna kick some serious ass.
If he can keep his tone, save his ideals, avoid the perils of compromise, for the sake of apparent progess; to get his back scratched later, if his rhetoric is matched by his actions, and he doesn't lose that turn of phrase...
He'll be president.
And I will be a very happy man.
TK
Yep... and how do we get our cojones back?
TK
Did they lose the vote? yes
Was it it a given the vote was lost from the get-go?
Yes.
Did they tie up the senate for four days? Yes.
Did it push more substantive issues from the news? Yes.
Did it give them a rallying cry (like abortion, which they'd rather not have outlawed, because it no longer rallies the troops) about how the evil, "homosexual agenda," is being rammed down the unwilling throats of the god-fearing? yes.
Will its defeat help to turn out those opposed to Bush, or for him?
The victory may be phyrric, esp. with all the hullaballoo, all the vocal opposition, which makes the cries of evil agenda easier to bruit about.
How much was lost to the memory hole in the past few weeks, because we were watching the magician's left hand?
TK
I think the FMA was a brilliant piece of (evil) political theater, which; while I think not enough to matter, did Bush more good than harm, and wasted the nation's time.
Now that I'm done with being serious, and overly literal minded, welcome back and everyone knows MS has flaws, but hey... they are still the one to beat.
TK
Lots of papers have some comics seperated into sections where they think they will be more read.
The LA Times has Dilbert in Business, and Tank MacNamara in Sports.
I forget where they keep Doonesbury, but apart from Sunday it isn't with the rest of the comics.
The, not uncommon, placing of Doonesbury with the editorial section is because Trudeau has won a Pulitzer, for editorial cartooning.
Lenny: Abstract, in that it is not the responsibility of one person to guarantee that the Army, et al., are not used in the way in question, as opposed to the concrete act of making it the sole responsibilty of some single person.
It may provide a momentary satisfaction to say, "it was "x"s fault, because "x" is at the top of the food chain, but there are a whole lot of "y"s in the equation; the people who were willing to carry out the orders, the people who were willing to pass along the orders, the people who approved of the orders.
All of them are in some way culpable.
If you're in the revenge business, then I suppose laying it all to the guy on the top is satisfying, but it won't really fix the problem.
And, as Clark points out, when shall we use it? Who shall be the judge who sits to say, "This is so important it gets to disrupt the gov't, until it is resolved."
Because we've seen what allowing a civil suit does to the Gov't, and if a president's advisors are up to snuff, you won't see a trial, you'll see a default, with no admission of guilt, and nothing more than money changing hands.
That won't fix the problem, merely make one of making sure the offenses don't come to light, and that can often be done without actually engaging in a cover up.
The problem is not the reaction, but rather the actions you protest, and your attempt at solution only invokes the law of unintended consequences.
| Year | Number of comments posted |
|---|---|
| 2005 | 1 |
| 2004 | 95 |
| 2003 | 56 |
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