Friday, January 30, 2004
Really, It IS a Privilege to Serve!
An ample description of privileges associated with deployment is up at Blackfive.
My wife has described her enthusiasm to support the listed preparation methods for deployment. "If you do any one of those things, I'll rip your arm off and beat you to death with it. End of deployment training."
(Hat Tip: Citizen Smash)
Thursday, January 29, 2004
Service is a Privilege Not a Right
My brother is gay and I am proud of him. I absolutely support his right to get married, and in fact I think his husband is a wonderful man. (I am not exceptionally happy that they have the same first name; but since my first name is Pat, perhaps I shouldn't throw stones. My wife's name is Abigail.) I absolutely believe in the rights of homosexuals to live safely, without harassment or abuse in this country. The gay community has done tremendous work helping confused and angry people come to an acceptance of their identity.
The point at which I break with he gay community is their method of seeking acceptance in the military over the question of rights. Military service is not a right. It is a privilege to serve. In the military you gain privileges by accepting responsibilities. The actions of predatory homosexuals are destructive to the privileges of responsible homosexuals. This problem is exacerbated because the gay community insists that it is not a problem.
I do not equate the acceptance of racial or gender identities in the military with homosexual acceptance, because the argument is different. The argument against acceptance of racial and gender identities was always performance, the false notion that these groups were incapable of accomplishing the mission. The impediment in acceptance of gays in the military is not one of performance, it is one of trust. Generations of predatory homosexuals have caused problems that burned their way into the institutional memory of the military. The failure to address this fundamental obstacle by the gay community is a slap in the face to everyone who has experienced harassment or abuse by predatory homosexuals in the military. It is a slap in my face because I have been harassed and abused by predatory homosexuals in the military.
Additionally, when I have this argument with gay advocates, they consistently bring up the question of equality. If they put half as much sincerity in their expressions of desire to serve their country as they do into their demand to be treated equally, I'd seriously consider them an asset to the defense of my nation. As it stands, I just see another minority leveraging for power without regard for the cost to our nation's security - in the middle of a war.
Is this any way to build trust? Is this any way to protect your country? Are you only concerned with your own interests?
If the gay community is seriously interested in serving their country in the military, they should start by showing the responsibility to clean their own house. That is a commitment to honorable service worthy of respect and privilege. That is how you can gain my trust.
Tuesday, January 27, 2004
Open Letter to IRAQ NOW
Jason,
One of the key strengths of a long existing military is the evolution of its culture and the transference of tribal knowledge. This strength needs to be tempered with common sense and honest self-evaluation from time to time, and this usually happens in wartime. By the way, thanks very much for doing this, the lives you're saving by your essays may be your grandchild's.
I am straight, but I served with homosexuals in the military. I have served with gay men who I would trust with my life who kept the faith. I have also served with predatory homosexuals who I simply would not trust as far as I could throw them. One senior enlisted who I reported to was the closest man I ever came to killing, and it was years later before I figured out that his behavior only made sense in context of being a deeply closeted predatory homosexual. I have spoken to female Marines who have related similar experiences with predatory lesbians.
Phobia is a term to describe an irrational fear. Predatory homosexuals in the military have compiled a body of guilt so profound as to make concern about their inclusion a rational behavior. If I felt the experience of hundreds of thousands of traumatized heterosexual servicemen was a shallow one, I might coin a simple phrase to describe the fool-hardiness of those who would inflict unrestrained homosexual predation on the military. As it stands, I'll leave the name calling to the idiots.
Predatory homosexuals have repeatedly broken the faith and violated the trust reposed in them by their country and their service. Legislation will not change this. The heroism of decent homosexuals might have some influence in the future. The repudiation of predatory homosexuals by the gay community will do a lot more to build trust in their lifestyle choice than any medal or Act of Congress.
Sunday, January 18, 2004
PETA Saves Nessie from Capture
Viscious Anti-Biodiversity "Scientists" attempt to enslave native wildlife before being foiled by PETA.
I think that PETA should be given full credit for the 100% success rate in preserving Nessie from capture. It is strongly indicative of their understanding of the food chain that they have been able to assure the continued survival of this valuable part of biodiversity. I think that PETA should point to this effort as the basis for their scientific understanding and integrity.
Perhaps someday humans will be worthy of this level of protection. If PETA's efforts continue to succeed in gaining the public trust, I'm sure that someday humans will achieve the same degree of species survival that Nessie enjoys.
Hat Tip: Brinker
Thursday, January 15, 2004
In the Dictionary Listed as Hard Corps Marine
Figure the odds this guy becomes a DI.
Local Marine injured in Afghanistan returning to duty
Written by: Cheryl Preheim, 9NEWS Reporter
AURORA - A Marine from Aurora is making history. Nearly two years ago, Cpl. Chris Chandler lost part of his leg in a land mine explosion in Afghanistan.
Chandler was fitted with a prosthetic foot after the explosion. He worked to regain his strength so he could re-take the Marine physical fitness test. He didn't just pass, he also graduated from jump school, making him the first amputee to ever go through the elite parachuting training.
Naturally, his family is very proud. “It is groundbreaking because he does have a prosthetic foot and because he did do it on his own he didn't have to take an easy way out,” said Stephanie Chandler, Chris’ sister. “It was done just like anyone else.”
Chandler has also been promoted to the rank of sergeant. He's on his way back to Camp Pendleton in California until he is deployed back overseas. No word on just when he'll go.
(Copyright 2004 by 9NEWS KUSA-TV. All Rights Reserved)
Hat Tip: Blackfive - The Paratrooper of Love
Saturday, January 10, 2004
Disco at the ICBM Silo!
You can't hold a rave on top of an ICBM silo, I checked. It turns out that certain areas of strategic value to the United States are exempted from the inalienable rights of Americans to get up, get down, and boogie. It gets worse! Women in Florida are no longer allowed to show their bodies on boats adjacent to Navy ships to get sailor's hats. It's something about the Coast Guard not believing in the security awareness of Squids in rut, or the increased chances of terrorist attacks. Motorcyclists are not being allowed do drag race F-14's like in the movie Top Gun, either.
Even worse, the traditional mosh pit and street theatre that calls itself a protest rally can no longer be located alongside the President's route. Some people are getting up in arms about this because they feel their First Amendment rights are being violated. As somebody who has watched protest rallies in downtown Portland, OR for a number of years, my response is that the protesters are full of crap. They do not want to speak with the President or petition for redress of grievances, they want to threaten him and be empowered by the threat of rioting. They care not at all about the issues of the day or the performance of the person in office; they care about being a pack animal that causes others to fear them.
Wherever the President of the United States goes, that area is of strategic value to the United States of America. His staff, their vehicles, and the processes of securing the President are all of strategic value to the country, even if you do not like the current office holder. It is reasonable and prudent to separate that area from the people who are stating that they view the President as a greater threat than the terrorists who would attack him. I watched a man carry a child into the front of a crowd opposite the riot police and not leave the area when the child was in danger in order to protest the president. I have no respect for the probity and restraint of protesters in my home town these days, and neither did my father.
My father was a sixties radical minister who was arrested multiple times for registering blacks to vote in the south, organizing migrant workers in California, and organizing a free speech event in a free speech area of campus. I may not be an expert on what is and is not a violation of First Amendment law, but my father was. My father worked to communicate important information to people who were unaware of grave problems with this country. My father worked to help people avoid compulsory induction into the military during the draft. My father worked during a time of government suppression of dissent and presidential enemies' lists. He worked to ensure that his children were safe from the dangers of his moral decisions, but we grew up knowing that the FBI was trying to arrest my father illegally.
I've watched the current protesters with a critical eye and I talked about them with my father before he died last June. He had no respect for them. They did not have a coherent message, they had no respect for non-violence, the ones with solidarity did not communicate their beliefs, and there was more interest in making a spectacle than making a change. If they had a message worth relating, they should not need to be violent to communicate it. There is no history of positive change occurring as a result of mob violence, although there is a vivid history of positive change occurring due to hard work. That the current crop of activists has abandoned the methods that are successful at bringing positive change spoke volumes to my father about what they were interested in.
I'm not particularly sorry that you can't hold a disco on an ICBM silo, sail your boat to within hat-toss range of a destroyer, drag race a fighter jet, or otherwise endanger national security for personal fulfillment. There are other arenas where you can party, expose yourself, drive fast, or speak freely about the president without risking anything but your own dignity. Further, the absence of concern for either the rights of others or the success of their actions of the current crop of protesters does not warrant their inclusion in all areas. If you were security, would you let this guy backstage to a concert?
Why would you let him near the leadership of the United States?
Sunday, January 04, 2004
Help Wanted: Augean Stables Cleaner
" For the fifth labor, Eurystheus ordered Hercules to clean up King Augeas' stables." After the stables were cleaned, vile and bitter recriminations followed, the ruler of a European nation refused to fulfill his obligations, and the value of the work was disqualified for technical reasons by churlish international arbiters. Hmmm…history may not repeat itself, but it sure rhymes this time. The lesson we should learn from this legend is not that accomplishing heroic labors never gets you any slack from the Europeans, it's that letting filth pile up indefinitely requires heroic effort to fix.
There are some who still claim that the stables would have gotten clean if diplomacy had been given more time. The only discernable results in Iraq of twelve years of diplomacy were more ruthless human rights abuses and a greater degree of polish in Saddam's palaces. More time for diplomacy was never going to provide the people of Iraq the tools and opportunity they needed to become successful themselves. More time for diplomacy was not going to stop the plastic shredders getting fed people. More time for diplomacy only made the filth deeper and more pervasive.
Now Geo. Bush & Co. never promised to clean up Iraq in one day, regardless of what the current Augeas' may claim. It was always about sticking with the process until the job was done. It's been hard work and will continue to be hard work. Unlike the legend, the Coalition is not using clever tricks. The methods of cleaning up Iraq have also been a lot more environmentally friendly; at least the people downstream think so.
The phrase "cleaning the Augean Stables" is used to note a task that is incredibly difficult, tedious, thankless, and probably smelly. It should probably be noted that the original task was largely due to bad planning and intractable adherence to previous methods. Without devolving into a dissertation on the downfalls of centralized agriculture, there are some points to consider. Maintaining the persistence of failed systems is a position taken by those who either get a direct benefit from the system's failure, those whose enemies are harmed by it, or those who value form over reality. Fixing Iraq is a process that threatens a number of entrenched interests. Success in Iraq makes it more likely that other Herculean tasks will be attempted and accomplished.
Many people no longer acknowledge the possibility of heroism in their worldview. Many influential people have such a limited definition of heroism that they openly deny heroic accomplishments despite compelling evidence. For some this is a matter of maintaining priorities, for most it is a matter of ignoring the failure of their worldview. Causing a psychotic break from reality for the movers and shakers in Hollywood and the media was not Geo. Bush & Co.'s primary agenda, and it must be said that such things were pretty common well before 9/11. The extreme contortions that the anti-war mob must go through to say anything positive is solved with Gordian-knot simplicity; they rarely say anything that is not an attack. I suppose this makes them ghastly dinner companions, but once again; such things were pretty common well before Iraq was invaded.
Another key difference between Geo. Bush & Co. and Hercules is the key matter of assistance. It makes a better story if one guy does the work, but with really big tasks, quality goes way up with committed help. One reason I refer to Geo. Bush & Co. as such is because the President reminds me of a really effective businessman who has a great staff and strong relations with other firms locally and abroad. Despite the chattering class's accusations of unilateralism, the invasion of Iraq was accomplished with a lot of help. Further, it called into question the value of a cause that would be acceptable to all. Do we really want the help of genocidal fascists in overthrowing genocidal fascists? In WWII, we absolutely needed Stalin's help in defeating Hitler. But not using the demon's help means not paying the demon's price. It looks very much like Geo. Bush & Co. got all the help they could afford, and did the job without those who asked the demon's price.
There are other stables that need cleaning. Here is the situation that is going to put many a Beverly Hills psychoanalyst's kid through college; Geo. Bush & Co. does not look afraid of the shovel. Perhaps it is that the President himself takes care of his body and goes to bed at a reasonable hour. Perhaps it is because Laura Bush is more interested in the health of her husband than the holy grail of a national health care plan. Perhaps it is easier at the end of the day; to have acted with integrity is restorative, even if the job was smelly and the judges of the work were unappreciative. That Col. Moammar Gadhafi was willing to clean his own stables, rather than have somebody do it for him speaks volumes as to the effectiveness of a willing shovel. It may very well be that the task of this greatest nation in the world for the next century will be to clean up the filth that has been allowed to accumulate and prevent it from occurring. I am convinced that we are up to the task and that there's no better work worth doing.
Update:
This is just too good not to link: Solomania gets the facts, Jack!
Samuel has some nice things to say in amplification at Roger L. Simon's place.
Thursday, January 01, 2004
The Horrors of Global Warming!!!
So, a few weeks ago my buddy Scott was over and we were talking about life, the universe, and everything. I brought up the Kyoto Accord and how even the Senate defeated it unanimously during the Clinton Administration. He brought up global warming as if it was something reasonable people should believe in, in the near term. He mentioned remembering snowy winters of his youth…and I stopped him. I have looked at the projections on global warming, and the progress rate is in degrees Centigrade per Century. At current rates in the year 2303, Fargo may have the balmy winters of Kansas City, but it won't be Miami.
Let me make one thing clear, though. My friend Scott is smart…okay, really gosh darn smart. As long as I have known him, I have greatly respected his intelligence, generosity, kindness, humor, and integrity. He cares deeply about his friends and he has raised a wonderful family. He has a quick and facile wit, and a tremendous sense of playfulness. That he has been presented what appears to him to be compelling evidence to believe that global warming is approaching at a rate where the differences of only thirty or so years could be readily discernable by an amateur through memory is disturbing to me.
Global warming is happening, and if you have a really good supercomputer and massive numbers of accurate observations over a few centuries, you can detect the change in a meaningful way. That reputable scientists are shaking down grant money through scare tactics that Scott can't see right through, concerns me. The reality about global warming is this; the world's oceans absolutely have the whip hand on weather, and they are incredibly vast and consequently slow to change. I personally have taken several thousand observations of ocean temperature at depth and made analyses on the basis of those observations. The US Navy invested several billion dollars over the last hundred and fifty years analyzing the ocean. In the last sixty years, they have gathered more data than any civilian organization has access to, probably by more than an order of magnitude.
In anthropomorphic terms, global warming is a sunburn, unpleasant, but not life threatening. The deep body temperature of the ecosphere is not the same as the surface temperature of the atmosphere. I have yet to see any strong indication that the planet is "running a fever" in the depths of the ocean, where weather is made. I also see behavior among advocates of the threat of global warming that is indistinguishable from fraud.
For right now, I'm going to stop worrying about the catastrophe of global warming and go outside and make a snowman. My wife Abigail can't get into work today because the snow is coming down so bad, and she's going to help as soon as she can find her gloves. I can't convince her to wear Bermuda shorts, though, so perhaps I don't have a future in the global warming shakedown industry.
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