by Ugh
By now I'm sure everyone has heard of the bombings in the Brussels subway and airport (an airport I spent several hours in last month). There is much talk in the U.S. about how security wasn't ratcheted up high enough and perhaps there needs to be more border controls, etc. etc. etc. But… I'm not sure any of that would help. There is no end to this any time soon that I can see – and by "soon" I mean not within the next 20 years.
As it is, it seems the biggest barrier to carrying out these kinds of bombings is access and willing volunteers. The former is likely why we don't see too much of it in the U.S. – the oceans really do protect us, ISTM, in the sense that the supply of willing volunteers has a great deal more trouble getting here than to Europe where they can walk (or grew up there). But otherwise, it doesn't take much. Guns appear readily available, and apparently (according to the NYTimes), explosives 80% as powerful as TNT can be built with drug store ingredients – a tablespoon of which can blow up a laptop.
In the meantime, certain politicians in the United States are actively increasing - if unwittingly (I assume) – the possibility of such a successful attack in the U.S., or at least making the detection/prevention of such an attack much less likely. Preceding these most recent bombings was of course the capture of a suspect wanted in the Paris attacks, who managed to hide out undetected for four months, it seems, in a Brussels suburb with at least the passive acquiescence of the surrounding community (to read between the lines). And here is where IMHO the current rhetoric (and worse) emanating from the right side of the aisle in the U.S. endangers the country – by alienating the U.S. Muslim community. By pushing people who might be inclined to report suspicious activity in their neighborhood to the proper authorities into indifference or acquiescence.
This is why the honest reassurance that the U.S. is not "at war" with Islam is so important. Why ethnic and religious profiling should not be done. Why everyone is subject to screening at airports, etc. and not just those who might be "suspicious." In addition to ensuring that such measures are not overreaching and imposed on just "those people," it also sends the message – we are all in this together. Alas, it seems a large percentage of the country is not mature enough to understand this.
P.S. If you watch the NYTimes video at the link, part of it talks about the work being done to create sensors to detect TATP complete with video of TSA folk swabbing carry on luggage. That's all well and good, but it's not going to do anything to prevent what happened in Brussels today, or Paris last November.
UPDATE: I put this in the comments but it really is too unbelievable to not have it in the post. Ted Cruz: "We need to empower law enforcement to patrol and secure Muslim neighborhoods before they become radicalized." Why not move them into concentrated areas where they can be watched….
And right on cue Ted Cruz steps in it:
We need to empower law enforcement to patrol and secure Muslim neighborhoods before they become radicalized.
Feh.
Oh, and this is just insane:
The days of the United States voluntarily surrendering to the enemy to show how progressive and enlightened we can be are at an end. Our country is at stake.
And right on cue Ted Cruz steps in it:
We need to empower law enforcement to patrol and secure Muslim neighborhoods before they become radicalized.
Feh.
Oh, and this is just insane:
The days of the United States voluntarily surrendering to the enemy to show how progressive and enlightened we can be are at an end. Our country is at stake.
And right on cue Ted Cruz steps in it:
We need to empower law enforcement to patrol and secure Muslim neighborhoods before they become radicalized.
Feh.
Oh, and this is just insane:
The days of the United States voluntarily surrendering to the enemy to show how progressive and enlightened we can be are at an end. Our country is at stake.
The attack in Brussels was of a piece with the mid-eighties simultaneous attacks on airports at Rome and Vienna.
They were all outside of the security checkpoints, so making the checkpoints more secure does no good at all.
The attack in Brussels was of a piece with the mid-eighties simultaneous attacks on airports at Rome and Vienna.
They were all outside of the security checkpoints, so making the checkpoints more secure does no good at all.
The attack in Brussels was of a piece with the mid-eighties simultaneous attacks on airports at Rome and Vienna.
They were all outside of the security checkpoints, so making the checkpoints more secure does no good at all.
What’s the deal with an airport’s “checkpoints?” If the checkpoints is the only thing that survives a bombing, why not build the whole country out of checkpoints?
/Seinfeld
What’s the deal with an airport’s “checkpoints?” If the checkpoints is the only thing that survives a bombing, why not build the whole country out of checkpoints?
/Seinfeld
What’s the deal with an airport’s “checkpoints?” If the checkpoints is the only thing that survives a bombing, why not build the whole country out of checkpoints?
/Seinfeld
And here is where IMHO the current rhetoric (and worse) emanating from the right side of the aisle in the U.S. endangers the country – by alienating the U.S. Muslim community. By pushing people who might be inclined to report suspicious activity in their neighborhood to the proper authorities into indifference or acquiescence.
There is an obvious solution. One which I expect Trump (or maybe Cruz) to come out with before the year is out. Simply set up “relocation camps” and move all American Muslims there. (I believe the locations of most of the ones used during World War II are still available.)
Presto! No neighborhoods to worry about watching. At least, none outside the barbed wire.
And here is where IMHO the current rhetoric (and worse) emanating from the right side of the aisle in the U.S. endangers the country – by alienating the U.S. Muslim community. By pushing people who might be inclined to report suspicious activity in their neighborhood to the proper authorities into indifference or acquiescence.
There is an obvious solution. One which I expect Trump (or maybe Cruz) to come out with before the year is out. Simply set up “relocation camps” and move all American Muslims there. (I believe the locations of most of the ones used during World War II are still available.)
Presto! No neighborhoods to worry about watching. At least, none outside the barbed wire.
And here is where IMHO the current rhetoric (and worse) emanating from the right side of the aisle in the U.S. endangers the country – by alienating the U.S. Muslim community. By pushing people who might be inclined to report suspicious activity in their neighborhood to the proper authorities into indifference or acquiescence.
There is an obvious solution. One which I expect Trump (or maybe Cruz) to come out with before the year is out. Simply set up “relocation camps” and move all American Muslims there. (I believe the locations of most of the ones used during World War II are still available.)
Presto! No neighborhoods to worry about watching. At least, none outside the barbed wire.
I may have mentioned this before, but my thoughts on security checkpoints, based particularly on my experience with attending NFL games, is that the best place to kill a bunch of people is in the massive, dense lines where they are awaiting passage through those very checkpoints.
*imagine seamless segue to another point*
The situation in Europe differs from that in the US in contradictory ways, IMO. They have a colonial history in North Africa and Middle East (NAME) as well as greater proximity and passage over land, so the flows of immigration from those parts of the world have been going on longer and more robustly. (On top of that are the recent waves of refugees.) But their mostly Muslim immigrants from NAME are more isolated, to the point of near-ghettoization.
At the same time, it seems European leader are more likely to have regular contact with leaders in NAME who are also dealing with Islamist terrorism. They seem to have a sense that they’re in this together with victims of terrorism in NAME countries, who are themselves largely Muslim. As a result, European leaders – not to a person, but on the whole – are less likely to generalize about Muslims being terrorists.
Muslims are far more likely to be victims of terrorism than they are to be terrorists. At the same time, looking at the global situation, they are also more likely to be the victims of terrorism than are non-Muslims. Europeans seem to get that far more than people in the US.
I may have mentioned this before, but my thoughts on security checkpoints, based particularly on my experience with attending NFL games, is that the best place to kill a bunch of people is in the massive, dense lines where they are awaiting passage through those very checkpoints.
*imagine seamless segue to another point*
The situation in Europe differs from that in the US in contradictory ways, IMO. They have a colonial history in North Africa and Middle East (NAME) as well as greater proximity and passage over land, so the flows of immigration from those parts of the world have been going on longer and more robustly. (On top of that are the recent waves of refugees.) But their mostly Muslim immigrants from NAME are more isolated, to the point of near-ghettoization.
At the same time, it seems European leader are more likely to have regular contact with leaders in NAME who are also dealing with Islamist terrorism. They seem to have a sense that they’re in this together with victims of terrorism in NAME countries, who are themselves largely Muslim. As a result, European leaders – not to a person, but on the whole – are less likely to generalize about Muslims being terrorists.
Muslims are far more likely to be victims of terrorism than they are to be terrorists. At the same time, looking at the global situation, they are also more likely to be the victims of terrorism than are non-Muslims. Europeans seem to get that far more than people in the US.
I may have mentioned this before, but my thoughts on security checkpoints, based particularly on my experience with attending NFL games, is that the best place to kill a bunch of people is in the massive, dense lines where they are awaiting passage through those very checkpoints.
*imagine seamless segue to another point*
The situation in Europe differs from that in the US in contradictory ways, IMO. They have a colonial history in North Africa and Middle East (NAME) as well as greater proximity and passage over land, so the flows of immigration from those parts of the world have been going on longer and more robustly. (On top of that are the recent waves of refugees.) But their mostly Muslim immigrants from NAME are more isolated, to the point of near-ghettoization.
At the same time, it seems European leader are more likely to have regular contact with leaders in NAME who are also dealing with Islamist terrorism. They seem to have a sense that they’re in this together with victims of terrorism in NAME countries, who are themselves largely Muslim. As a result, European leaders – not to a person, but on the whole – are less likely to generalize about Muslims being terrorists.
Muslims are far more likely to be victims of terrorism than they are to be terrorists. At the same time, looking at the global situation, they are also more likely to be the victims of terrorism than are non-Muslims. Europeans seem to get that far more than people in the US.
>There is an obvious solution. One which I expect Trump (or maybe Cruz) to come out with before the year is out. Simply set up “relocation camps” and move all American Muslims there. (I believe the locations of most of the ones used during World War II are still available.)
Or just cordon off areas in the inner cities — places like Detroit. :-/
>There is an obvious solution. One which I expect Trump (or maybe Cruz) to come out with before the year is out. Simply set up “relocation camps” and move all American Muslims there. (I believe the locations of most of the ones used during World War II are still available.)
Or just cordon off areas in the inner cities — places like Detroit. :-/
>There is an obvious solution. One which I expect Trump (or maybe Cruz) to come out with before the year is out. Simply set up “relocation camps” and move all American Muslims there. (I believe the locations of most of the ones used during World War II are still available.)
Or just cordon off areas in the inner cities — places like Detroit. :-/
the government shall make no whosits regarding an establishment of whatnow ?
the government shall make no whosits regarding an establishment of whatnow ?
the government shall make no whosits regarding an establishment of whatnow ?
Is it a law regarding “the establishment of religion” if you make a law which discriminates against a particular religion?
I’m betting that all those “activist judges” on the Supreme Court would decide that both are banned. Perhaps even unanimously.
Is it a law regarding “the establishment of religion” if you make a law which discriminates against a particular religion?
I’m betting that all those “activist judges” on the Supreme Court would decide that both are banned. Perhaps even unanimously.
Is it a law regarding “the establishment of religion” if you make a law which discriminates against a particular religion?
I’m betting that all those “activist judges” on the Supreme Court would decide that both are banned. Perhaps even unanimously.
Dropping in for a moment: these attacks do, well and truly, bring out the stupid in Cruz and Trump. I’m not sure the “left”, on balance, can claim any real high ground on coming up with a viable, long term battle plan, even if neither Sanders nor HRC have taken this opportunity to out-stupid each other and their opposition. Cutting ties with Israel isn’t going to happen and wouldn’t affect much even if it did.
The “left”, in my view, doesn’t really understand the nits and nuances, and mainly the cost, of having a military that can project credible force around a globe (the oceans, they are a mixed blessing). Similarly, the “left” tends to under-play military power to the end that nothing really decisive is even likely to occur.
I am an incrementalist myself in many respects when it comes to use of force, although I’d have a larger, deeper standing force and force projection capacity than is currently the case.
I used quotes to indicate what I see as a general proclivity, not to invite a side battle on who is or isn’t *left*, or what is or isn’t *left*. Also, I am fully aware of a lively section on the right that shoots first and formulates policy second. I get that and am not suggesting equivalency.
My question is: can the “left” reach a consensus on military power: how much and how to use it? If so, what are the general outlines that program/policy might take? And how would it apply to ISIS, terror cells, safe harbors, failed states, etc?
Dropping in for a moment: these attacks do, well and truly, bring out the stupid in Cruz and Trump. I’m not sure the “left”, on balance, can claim any real high ground on coming up with a viable, long term battle plan, even if neither Sanders nor HRC have taken this opportunity to out-stupid each other and their opposition. Cutting ties with Israel isn’t going to happen and wouldn’t affect much even if it did.
The “left”, in my view, doesn’t really understand the nits and nuances, and mainly the cost, of having a military that can project credible force around a globe (the oceans, they are a mixed blessing). Similarly, the “left” tends to under-play military power to the end that nothing really decisive is even likely to occur.
I am an incrementalist myself in many respects when it comes to use of force, although I’d have a larger, deeper standing force and force projection capacity than is currently the case.
I used quotes to indicate what I see as a general proclivity, not to invite a side battle on who is or isn’t *left*, or what is or isn’t *left*. Also, I am fully aware of a lively section on the right that shoots first and formulates policy second. I get that and am not suggesting equivalency.
My question is: can the “left” reach a consensus on military power: how much and how to use it? If so, what are the general outlines that program/policy might take? And how would it apply to ISIS, terror cells, safe harbors, failed states, etc?
Dropping in for a moment: these attacks do, well and truly, bring out the stupid in Cruz and Trump. I’m not sure the “left”, on balance, can claim any real high ground on coming up with a viable, long term battle plan, even if neither Sanders nor HRC have taken this opportunity to out-stupid each other and their opposition. Cutting ties with Israel isn’t going to happen and wouldn’t affect much even if it did.
The “left”, in my view, doesn’t really understand the nits and nuances, and mainly the cost, of having a military that can project credible force around a globe (the oceans, they are a mixed blessing). Similarly, the “left” tends to under-play military power to the end that nothing really decisive is even likely to occur.
I am an incrementalist myself in many respects when it comes to use of force, although I’d have a larger, deeper standing force and force projection capacity than is currently the case.
I used quotes to indicate what I see as a general proclivity, not to invite a side battle on who is or isn’t *left*, or what is or isn’t *left*. Also, I am fully aware of a lively section on the right that shoots first and formulates policy second. I get that and am not suggesting equivalency.
My question is: can the “left” reach a consensus on military power: how much and how to use it? If so, what are the general outlines that program/policy might take? And how would it apply to ISIS, terror cells, safe harbors, failed states, etc?
I’m against bombing Brussels, or even Paris.
I’m against bombing Brussels, or even Paris.
I’m against bombing Brussels, or even Paris.
“Cutting ties with Israel isn’t going to happen and wouldn’t affect much even if it did.”
I partly agree with this. ISIS and the like have far more on their nasty little minds than just Israeli oppression of Palestinians. If Israel miraculously became the beacon of humanity its defenders claim it to be, ISIS would still be there. Possibly it would cut down a little bit on one recruitment technique–I would defer to whatever experts there might actually be on the subject, but that’s my impression.
We should be tough on Israel for other reasons (though terrorism is a small part of it.) The main one is that we bear a large part of the responsibility for their crimes.
As for the “left’s” plan for ISIS, I think that varies with the leftist. I’m somewhat ambivalent. Bombing them might help. Going after their funding would. But I have no brilliant notions and don’t think I’ve read any elsewhere. We probably should try confronting Saudi Arabia and the other Gulf states–Obama’s rather remarkable interview with Goldberg at the Atlantic made it sound like he is very sick of the Saudis (and ironically he spoke of being dragged into their wars, even as we help them in their nasty little war in Yemen.) I would like to hear more about this–maybe he will say more once he is out of office.
“Cutting ties with Israel isn’t going to happen and wouldn’t affect much even if it did.”
I partly agree with this. ISIS and the like have far more on their nasty little minds than just Israeli oppression of Palestinians. If Israel miraculously became the beacon of humanity its defenders claim it to be, ISIS would still be there. Possibly it would cut down a little bit on one recruitment technique–I would defer to whatever experts there might actually be on the subject, but that’s my impression.
We should be tough on Israel for other reasons (though terrorism is a small part of it.) The main one is that we bear a large part of the responsibility for their crimes.
As for the “left’s” plan for ISIS, I think that varies with the leftist. I’m somewhat ambivalent. Bombing them might help. Going after their funding would. But I have no brilliant notions and don’t think I’ve read any elsewhere. We probably should try confronting Saudi Arabia and the other Gulf states–Obama’s rather remarkable interview with Goldberg at the Atlantic made it sound like he is very sick of the Saudis (and ironically he spoke of being dragged into their wars, even as we help them in their nasty little war in Yemen.) I would like to hear more about this–maybe he will say more once he is out of office.
“Cutting ties with Israel isn’t going to happen and wouldn’t affect much even if it did.”
I partly agree with this. ISIS and the like have far more on their nasty little minds than just Israeli oppression of Palestinians. If Israel miraculously became the beacon of humanity its defenders claim it to be, ISIS would still be there. Possibly it would cut down a little bit on one recruitment technique–I would defer to whatever experts there might actually be on the subject, but that’s my impression.
We should be tough on Israel for other reasons (though terrorism is a small part of it.) The main one is that we bear a large part of the responsibility for their crimes.
As for the “left’s” plan for ISIS, I think that varies with the leftist. I’m somewhat ambivalent. Bombing them might help. Going after their funding would. But I have no brilliant notions and don’t think I’ve read any elsewhere. We probably should try confronting Saudi Arabia and the other Gulf states–Obama’s rather remarkable interview with Goldberg at the Atlantic made it sound like he is very sick of the Saudis (and ironically he spoke of being dragged into their wars, even as we help them in their nasty little war in Yemen.) I would like to hear more about this–maybe he will say more once he is out of office.
I’m not sure the “left”, on balance, can claim any real high ground on coming up with a viable, long term battle plan,
This is not a problem unique to the left. Indeed, it seems that no one, anywhere, has any such plan. There just seems to be a long string of examples of things that didn’t work, most (if not all) of which involve killing lots of people.
Obama, to the extent he might be included in what you term the “left,” seems quite comfortable killing lots of people. That he seems to have read the U.S. public (correctly, ISTM) as not wanting to launch a ground invasion of Syria/the greater middle east to “stop” ISIS is hardly evidence of under-playing military force.
I’m not sure the “left”, on balance, can claim any real high ground on coming up with a viable, long term battle plan,
This is not a problem unique to the left. Indeed, it seems that no one, anywhere, has any such plan. There just seems to be a long string of examples of things that didn’t work, most (if not all) of which involve killing lots of people.
Obama, to the extent he might be included in what you term the “left,” seems quite comfortable killing lots of people. That he seems to have read the U.S. public (correctly, ISTM) as not wanting to launch a ground invasion of Syria/the greater middle east to “stop” ISIS is hardly evidence of under-playing military force.
I’m not sure the “left”, on balance, can claim any real high ground on coming up with a viable, long term battle plan,
This is not a problem unique to the left. Indeed, it seems that no one, anywhere, has any such plan. There just seems to be a long string of examples of things that didn’t work, most (if not all) of which involve killing lots of people.
Obama, to the extent he might be included in what you term the “left,” seems quite comfortable killing lots of people. That he seems to have read the U.S. public (correctly, ISTM) as not wanting to launch a ground invasion of Syria/the greater middle east to “stop” ISIS is hardly evidence of under-playing military force.
More insanity from the Cruz Campaign:
she warned of the Muslim Brotherhood’s “infiltration at the highest levels of our national security,” according to audio posted by Right Wing Watch on Monday.
“Brotherhood affiliates and associates and those connected to it are the go-to advisers, if not appointees, for the top levels of our national security in our government, in this administration for sure, but going back many decades, really, is the program of this Brotherhood,” she said.
Ted Cruz, the current choice of the GOP Establishment™ for the most powerful job in the world.
More insanity from the Cruz Campaign:
she warned of the Muslim Brotherhood’s “infiltration at the highest levels of our national security,” according to audio posted by Right Wing Watch on Monday.
“Brotherhood affiliates and associates and those connected to it are the go-to advisers, if not appointees, for the top levels of our national security in our government, in this administration for sure, but going back many decades, really, is the program of this Brotherhood,” she said.
Ted Cruz, the current choice of the GOP Establishment™ for the most powerful job in the world.
More insanity from the Cruz Campaign:
she warned of the Muslim Brotherhood’s “infiltration at the highest levels of our national security,” according to audio posted by Right Wing Watch on Monday.
“Brotherhood affiliates and associates and those connected to it are the go-to advisers, if not appointees, for the top levels of our national security in our government, in this administration for sure, but going back many decades, really, is the program of this Brotherhood,” she said.
Ted Cruz, the current choice of the GOP Establishment™ for the most powerful job in the world.
In spite of being a Democrat, Clinton is another neocon when it comes to foreign policy.
In spite of being a Democrat, Clinton is another neocon when it comes to foreign policy.
In spite of being a Democrat, Clinton is another neocon when it comes to foreign policy.
The “left” hasn’t come up with a clear plan for changing the freezing point of water, either.
I think it’s silly to think that the problem is that the United States lacks the ability to project force around the globe. What nation on earth has anything approaching our ability in that regard?
I think it’s far more a question of what we do with it rather than whether we have enough of it.
The “left” hasn’t come up with a clear plan for changing the freezing point of water, either.
I think it’s silly to think that the problem is that the United States lacks the ability to project force around the globe. What nation on earth has anything approaching our ability in that regard?
I think it’s far more a question of what we do with it rather than whether we have enough of it.
The “left” hasn’t come up with a clear plan for changing the freezing point of water, either.
I think it’s silly to think that the problem is that the United States lacks the ability to project force around the globe. What nation on earth has anything approaching our ability in that regard?
I think it’s far more a question of what we do with it rather than whether we have enough of it.
@hairshirthedonist:
It’s also very difficult to bomb your way to people not hating you. Not to mention that many of the terrorists involved in the attacks in Paris and Brussels- and plenty of the Muslims involved in terrorist attacks here in the USA- are home-grown. It’s almost as if trying to solve the problem of terrorism through military force can have negative consequences closer to home.
@hairshirthedonist:
It’s also very difficult to bomb your way to people not hating you. Not to mention that many of the terrorists involved in the attacks in Paris and Brussels- and plenty of the Muslims involved in terrorist attacks here in the USA- are home-grown. It’s almost as if trying to solve the problem of terrorism through military force can have negative consequences closer to home.
@hairshirthedonist:
It’s also very difficult to bomb your way to people not hating you. Not to mention that many of the terrorists involved in the attacks in Paris and Brussels- and plenty of the Muslims involved in terrorist attacks here in the USA- are home-grown. It’s almost as if trying to solve the problem of terrorism through military force can have negative consequences closer to home.
My question is: can the “left” reach a consensus on military power: how much and how to use it?
no more than the “right” can.
Trump can’t reach consensus with himself.
Similarly, the “left” tends to under-play military power to the end that nothing really decisive is even likely to occur.
what “decisive” use of military power has the American “right” made ?
the first Iraq invasion ? (unless you consider W’s adventure to be a consequence of HW’s) Grenada ?
the left should want to pick up more crappy little countries and throw them against the wall, just to show the world we mean business?
My question is: can the “left” reach a consensus on military power: how much and how to use it?
no more than the “right” can.
Trump can’t reach consensus with himself.
Similarly, the “left” tends to under-play military power to the end that nothing really decisive is even likely to occur.
what “decisive” use of military power has the American “right” made ?
the first Iraq invasion ? (unless you consider W’s adventure to be a consequence of HW’s) Grenada ?
the left should want to pick up more crappy little countries and throw them against the wall, just to show the world we mean business?
My question is: can the “left” reach a consensus on military power: how much and how to use it?
no more than the “right” can.
Trump can’t reach consensus with himself.
Similarly, the “left” tends to under-play military power to the end that nothing really decisive is even likely to occur.
what “decisive” use of military power has the American “right” made ?
the first Iraq invasion ? (unless you consider W’s adventure to be a consequence of HW’s) Grenada ?
the left should want to pick up more crappy little countries and throw them against the wall, just to show the world we mean business?
Nuke teh terrorists!
Nuke teh terrorists!
Nuke teh terrorists!
We should probably shift some of that enormous foreign-aid budget to defense.
We should probably shift some of that enormous foreign-aid budget to defense.
We should probably shift some of that enormous foreign-aid budget to defense.
I think it’s silly to think that the problem is that the United States lacks the ability to project force around the globe. What nation on earth has anything approaching our ability in that regard?
One doesn’t follow the other. We have more force projection capacity than any other country, true. Do we have enough to sustain regional sized operations? Probably not. This may be a good thing for some since it limits what we can do. However, should it ever become necessary to do more than make a token appearance or overcome something like ISIS, we will come up short.
That’s my point: there is a significant information shortage when it comes to what people think our capacity is and what it actually is.
I think it’s far more a question of what we do with it rather than whether we have enough of it.
And I think I raised that question.
I think it’s silly to think that the problem is that the United States lacks the ability to project force around the globe. What nation on earth has anything approaching our ability in that regard?
One doesn’t follow the other. We have more force projection capacity than any other country, true. Do we have enough to sustain regional sized operations? Probably not. This may be a good thing for some since it limits what we can do. However, should it ever become necessary to do more than make a token appearance or overcome something like ISIS, we will come up short.
That’s my point: there is a significant information shortage when it comes to what people think our capacity is and what it actually is.
I think it’s far more a question of what we do with it rather than whether we have enough of it.
And I think I raised that question.
I think it’s silly to think that the problem is that the United States lacks the ability to project force around the globe. What nation on earth has anything approaching our ability in that regard?
One doesn’t follow the other. We have more force projection capacity than any other country, true. Do we have enough to sustain regional sized operations? Probably not. This may be a good thing for some since it limits what we can do. However, should it ever become necessary to do more than make a token appearance or overcome something like ISIS, we will come up short.
That’s my point: there is a significant information shortage when it comes to what people think our capacity is and what it actually is.
I think it’s far more a question of what we do with it rather than whether we have enough of it.
And I think I raised that question.
overcome something like ISIS
how?
explain how we would do that and the lack of capability that’s standing in our way.
overcome something like ISIS
how?
explain how we would do that and the lack of capability that’s standing in our way.
overcome something like ISIS
how?
explain how we would do that and the lack of capability that’s standing in our way.
And I think I raised that question.
You did, but I’m noting the relative importance of the two questions.
That’s my point: there is a significant information shortage when it comes to what people think our capacity is and what it actually is.
You mean we can’t occupy the world?
Believe it or not, I don’t think ISIS poses and existential threat to the United States. They’re horrible people who do horrible things, but such people always have and always will exist. I’m not sure what level of resources you’re proposing we dedicate to defeating ISIS and the like, particularly with military force.
And I think I raised that question.
You did, but I’m noting the relative importance of the two questions.
That’s my point: there is a significant information shortage when it comes to what people think our capacity is and what it actually is.
You mean we can’t occupy the world?
Believe it or not, I don’t think ISIS poses and existential threat to the United States. They’re horrible people who do horrible things, but such people always have and always will exist. I’m not sure what level of resources you’re proposing we dedicate to defeating ISIS and the like, particularly with military force.
And I think I raised that question.
You did, but I’m noting the relative importance of the two questions.
That’s my point: there is a significant information shortage when it comes to what people think our capacity is and what it actually is.
You mean we can’t occupy the world?
Believe it or not, I don’t think ISIS poses and existential threat to the United States. They’re horrible people who do horrible things, but such people always have and always will exist. I’m not sure what level of resources you’re proposing we dedicate to defeating ISIS and the like, particularly with military force.
@mckinneytexas–
given the enormous force projection capabilities of the united states military it occurs to me to ask if we don’t have enough of that capability to handle the fallout from our foreign policy we might ought to consider scaling back our foreign policy to fit the abilities of the military we have. isis represents an enormous charlie foxtrot but it isn’t solely ours by any means. it also belongs to assad, it belongs to turkey, it belongs to iraq, it belongs i part to the anglo-french division of the region into “nations” they could administrate.
in my opinion, mcktx, unless you’re talking about reinstating the draft and piling wwii numbers into the engagement, with all the potentialities for blowback and further charlie foxtrots, i don’t see what having a larger military force is going to do for us in the situation. this is a situation that seems to call for diplomacy and patience.
@mckinneytexas–
given the enormous force projection capabilities of the united states military it occurs to me to ask if we don’t have enough of that capability to handle the fallout from our foreign policy we might ought to consider scaling back our foreign policy to fit the abilities of the military we have. isis represents an enormous charlie foxtrot but it isn’t solely ours by any means. it also belongs to assad, it belongs to turkey, it belongs to iraq, it belongs i part to the anglo-french division of the region into “nations” they could administrate.
in my opinion, mcktx, unless you’re talking about reinstating the draft and piling wwii numbers into the engagement, with all the potentialities for blowback and further charlie foxtrots, i don’t see what having a larger military force is going to do for us in the situation. this is a situation that seems to call for diplomacy and patience.
@mckinneytexas–
given the enormous force projection capabilities of the united states military it occurs to me to ask if we don’t have enough of that capability to handle the fallout from our foreign policy we might ought to consider scaling back our foreign policy to fit the abilities of the military we have. isis represents an enormous charlie foxtrot but it isn’t solely ours by any means. it also belongs to assad, it belongs to turkey, it belongs to iraq, it belongs i part to the anglo-french division of the region into “nations” they could administrate.
in my opinion, mcktx, unless you’re talking about reinstating the draft and piling wwii numbers into the engagement, with all the potentialities for blowback and further charlie foxtrots, i don’t see what having a larger military force is going to do for us in the situation. this is a situation that seems to call for diplomacy and patience.
I’m at a loss as to what a viable, long-term battle plan would look like, in the context of ISIS / Daesh / whatever.
The territory they hold is also claimed by other folks, some of whom we are friendly with, some not.
The collection of interested parties – which is quite large – includes folks whose interests align with ours, and others whose interests do not.
To add to the complexity, some of the folks whose interests align with ours *with regard to ISIS* do not align with ours in other ways.
Can we just tell everybody else to clear out and let us handle it? And, then what? Do we plan on taking and holding territory for an extended period of time? If not, what prevents them from simply re-forming once we leave the theater?
If we work with others, who do we work with? Russia? Iran? Turkey?
All of the those folks have interests and agendas that, combined with ours, weave a great big tangled mess.
What we’re doing so far is air power, within limits so we don’t step on folks we don’t want to step on, and very limited on-the-ground involvement.
Which is sort-of a safe bet, but is probably not going to be sufficient to eliminate them as a source of general hell-raising and violence.
I guess you could say that the response of “the left” is insufficient, but you’d have to leave out folks like Clinton, who for good or ill would likely wade in more forcefully.
I haven’t really seen a realistic, concrete plan of action from anyone, anywhere, that is likely to be an effective curb to ISIS.
Putin’s goals seem quite focused – Assad is my guy and he’s not going anywhere, and nobody is going to screw with our naval base, full stop.
It’s easy to “win” if your goals are that narrow.
I’m not sure what end result we want, other than to not have people trying to kill us in our beds.
A worthy goal, but not really a sufficient rationale for viable, long-term strategies.
Basically, I have no great ideas, not because I’m nominally on the “left”, but because I don’t think any exist.
I’m at a loss as to what a viable, long-term battle plan would look like, in the context of ISIS / Daesh / whatever.
The territory they hold is also claimed by other folks, some of whom we are friendly with, some not.
The collection of interested parties – which is quite large – includes folks whose interests align with ours, and others whose interests do not.
To add to the complexity, some of the folks whose interests align with ours *with regard to ISIS* do not align with ours in other ways.
Can we just tell everybody else to clear out and let us handle it? And, then what? Do we plan on taking and holding territory for an extended period of time? If not, what prevents them from simply re-forming once we leave the theater?
If we work with others, who do we work with? Russia? Iran? Turkey?
All of the those folks have interests and agendas that, combined with ours, weave a great big tangled mess.
What we’re doing so far is air power, within limits so we don’t step on folks we don’t want to step on, and very limited on-the-ground involvement.
Which is sort-of a safe bet, but is probably not going to be sufficient to eliminate them as a source of general hell-raising and violence.
I guess you could say that the response of “the left” is insufficient, but you’d have to leave out folks like Clinton, who for good or ill would likely wade in more forcefully.
I haven’t really seen a realistic, concrete plan of action from anyone, anywhere, that is likely to be an effective curb to ISIS.
Putin’s goals seem quite focused – Assad is my guy and he’s not going anywhere, and nobody is going to screw with our naval base, full stop.
It’s easy to “win” if your goals are that narrow.
I’m not sure what end result we want, other than to not have people trying to kill us in our beds.
A worthy goal, but not really a sufficient rationale for viable, long-term strategies.
Basically, I have no great ideas, not because I’m nominally on the “left”, but because I don’t think any exist.
I’m at a loss as to what a viable, long-term battle plan would look like, in the context of ISIS / Daesh / whatever.
The territory they hold is also claimed by other folks, some of whom we are friendly with, some not.
The collection of interested parties – which is quite large – includes folks whose interests align with ours, and others whose interests do not.
To add to the complexity, some of the folks whose interests align with ours *with regard to ISIS* do not align with ours in other ways.
Can we just tell everybody else to clear out and let us handle it? And, then what? Do we plan on taking and holding territory for an extended period of time? If not, what prevents them from simply re-forming once we leave the theater?
If we work with others, who do we work with? Russia? Iran? Turkey?
All of the those folks have interests and agendas that, combined with ours, weave a great big tangled mess.
What we’re doing so far is air power, within limits so we don’t step on folks we don’t want to step on, and very limited on-the-ground involvement.
Which is sort-of a safe bet, but is probably not going to be sufficient to eliminate them as a source of general hell-raising and violence.
I guess you could say that the response of “the left” is insufficient, but you’d have to leave out folks like Clinton, who for good or ill would likely wade in more forcefully.
I haven’t really seen a realistic, concrete plan of action from anyone, anywhere, that is likely to be an effective curb to ISIS.
Putin’s goals seem quite focused – Assad is my guy and he’s not going anywhere, and nobody is going to screw with our naval base, full stop.
It’s easy to “win” if your goals are that narrow.
I’m not sure what end result we want, other than to not have people trying to kill us in our beds.
A worthy goal, but not really a sufficient rationale for viable, long-term strategies.
Basically, I have no great ideas, not because I’m nominally on the “left”, but because I don’t think any exist.
I’m at a loss as to what a viable, long-term battle plan would look like, in the context of ISIS / Daesh / whatever.
The territory they hold is also claimed by other folks, some of whom we are friendly with, some not.
The collection of interested parties – which is quite large – includes folks whose interests align with ours, and others whose interests do not.
To add to the complexity, some of the folks whose interests align with ours *with regard to ISIS* do not align with ours in other ways.
Can we just tell everybody else to clear out and let us handle it? And, then what? Do we plan on taking and holding territory for an extended period of time? If not, what prevents them from simply re-forming once we leave the theater?
If we work with others, who do we work with? Russia? Iran? Turkey?
All of the those folks have interests and agendas that, combined with ours, weave a great big tangled mess.
What we’re doing so far is air power, within limits so we don’t step on folks we don’t want to step on, and very limited on-the-ground involvement.
Which is sort-of a safe bet, but is probably not going to be sufficient to eliminate them as a source of general hell-raising and violence.
I guess you could say that the response of “the left” is insufficient, but you’d have to leave out folks like Clinton, who for good or ill would likely wade in more forcefully.
I haven’t really seen a realistic, concrete plan of action from anyone, anywhere, that is likely to be an effective curb to ISIS.
Putin’s goals seem quite focused – Assad is my guy and he’s not going anywhere, and nobody is going to screw with our naval base, full stop.
It’s easy to “win” if your goals are that narrow.
I’m not sure what end result we want, other than to not have people trying to kill us in our beds.
A worthy goal, but not really a sufficient rationale for viable, long-term strategies.
Basically, I have no great ideas, not because I’m nominally on the “left”, but because I don’t think any exist.
I’m at a loss as to what a viable, long-term battle plan would look like, in the context of ISIS / Daesh / whatever.
The territory they hold is also claimed by other folks, some of whom we are friendly with, some not.
The collection of interested parties – which is quite large – includes folks whose interests align with ours, and others whose interests do not.
To add to the complexity, some of the folks whose interests align with ours *with regard to ISIS* do not align with ours in other ways.
Can we just tell everybody else to clear out and let us handle it? And, then what? Do we plan on taking and holding territory for an extended period of time? If not, what prevents them from simply re-forming once we leave the theater?
If we work with others, who do we work with? Russia? Iran? Turkey?
All of the those folks have interests and agendas that, combined with ours, weave a great big tangled mess.
What we’re doing so far is air power, within limits so we don’t step on folks we don’t want to step on, and very limited on-the-ground involvement.
Which is sort-of a safe bet, but is probably not going to be sufficient to eliminate them as a source of general hell-raising and violence.
I guess you could say that the response of “the left” is insufficient, but you’d have to leave out folks like Clinton, who for good or ill would likely wade in more forcefully.
I haven’t really seen a realistic, concrete plan of action from anyone, anywhere, that is likely to be an effective curb to ISIS.
Putin’s goals seem quite focused – Assad is my guy and he’s not going anywhere, and nobody is going to screw with our naval base, full stop.
It’s easy to “win” if your goals are that narrow.
I’m not sure what end result we want, other than to not have people trying to kill us in our beds.
A worthy goal, but not really a sufficient rationale for viable, long-term strategies.
Basically, I have no great ideas, not because I’m nominally on the “left”, but because I don’t think any exist.
I’m at a loss as to what a viable, long-term battle plan would look like, in the context of ISIS / Daesh / whatever.
The territory they hold is also claimed by other folks, some of whom we are friendly with, some not.
The collection of interested parties – which is quite large – includes folks whose interests align with ours, and others whose interests do not.
To add to the complexity, some of the folks whose interests align with ours *with regard to ISIS* do not align with ours in other ways.
Can we just tell everybody else to clear out and let us handle it? And, then what? Do we plan on taking and holding territory for an extended period of time? If not, what prevents them from simply re-forming once we leave the theater?
If we work with others, who do we work with? Russia? Iran? Turkey?
All of the those folks have interests and agendas that, combined with ours, weave a great big tangled mess.
What we’re doing so far is air power, within limits so we don’t step on folks we don’t want to step on, and very limited on-the-ground involvement.
Which is sort-of a safe bet, but is probably not going to be sufficient to eliminate them as a source of general hell-raising and violence.
I guess you could say that the response of “the left” is insufficient, but you’d have to leave out folks like Clinton, who for good or ill would likely wade in more forcefully.
I haven’t really seen a realistic, concrete plan of action from anyone, anywhere, that is likely to be an effective curb to ISIS.
Putin’s goals seem quite focused – Assad is my guy and he’s not going anywhere, and nobody is going to screw with our naval base, full stop.
It’s easy to “win” if your goals are that narrow.
I’m not sure what end result we want, other than to not have people trying to kill us in our beds.
A worthy goal, but not really a sufficient rationale for viable, long-term strategies.
Basically, I have no great ideas, not because I’m nominally on the “left”, but because I don’t think any exist.
should it ever become necessary to do more than make a token appearance or overcome something like ISIS
Actually, I take it back. Here is what I think a viable strategy for “overcoming ISIS” might look like.
We would need to establish some kind of unified command and control structure for the region, which would involve getting the co-operation of — at a minimum — ourselves, Iran, Russia, and Turkey.
We would need to field a truly large force – half a million people, maybe a million – to take and hold territory ranging from Aleppo to Baghdad, up to the border of Turkey.
Those folks would have to stay there for years, I would say at least ten years, while all of the folks with political and security interests in the area figured out what the hell to do with the tiger they were holding by the tail.
If we could get all of that done, we could probably overcome ISIS *as a presence in Syria and Iraq*.
The focus of caliphate-building would likely then shift somewhere else.
should it ever become necessary to do more than make a token appearance or overcome something like ISIS
Actually, I take it back. Here is what I think a viable strategy for “overcoming ISIS” might look like.
We would need to establish some kind of unified command and control structure for the region, which would involve getting the co-operation of — at a minimum — ourselves, Iran, Russia, and Turkey.
We would need to field a truly large force – half a million people, maybe a million – to take and hold territory ranging from Aleppo to Baghdad, up to the border of Turkey.
Those folks would have to stay there for years, I would say at least ten years, while all of the folks with political and security interests in the area figured out what the hell to do with the tiger they were holding by the tail.
If we could get all of that done, we could probably overcome ISIS *as a presence in Syria and Iraq*.
The focus of caliphate-building would likely then shift somewhere else.
should it ever become necessary to do more than make a token appearance or overcome something like ISIS
Actually, I take it back. Here is what I think a viable strategy for “overcoming ISIS” might look like.
We would need to establish some kind of unified command and control structure for the region, which would involve getting the co-operation of — at a minimum — ourselves, Iran, Russia, and Turkey.
We would need to field a truly large force – half a million people, maybe a million – to take and hold territory ranging from Aleppo to Baghdad, up to the border of Turkey.
Those folks would have to stay there for years, I would say at least ten years, while all of the folks with political and security interests in the area figured out what the hell to do with the tiger they were holding by the tail.
If we could get all of that done, we could probably overcome ISIS *as a presence in Syria and Iraq*.
The focus of caliphate-building would likely then shift somewhere else.
should it ever become necessary to do more than make a token appearance or overcome something like ISIS
Actually, I take it back. Here is what I think a viable strategy for “overcoming ISIS” might look like.
We would need to establish some kind of unified command and control structure for the region, which would involve getting the co-operation of — at a minimum — ourselves, Iran, Russia, and Turkey.
We would need to field a truly large force – half a million people, maybe a million – to take and hold territory ranging from Aleppo to Baghdad, up to the border of Turkey.
Those folks would have to stay there for years, I would say at least ten years, while all of the folks with political and security interests in the area figured out what the hell to do with the tiger they were holding by the tail.
If we could get all of that done, we could probably overcome ISIS *as a presence in Syria and Iraq*.
The focus of caliphate-building would likely then shift somewhere else.
should it ever become necessary to do more than make a token appearance or overcome something like ISIS
Actually, I take it back. Here is what I think a viable strategy for “overcoming ISIS” might look like.
We would need to establish some kind of unified command and control structure for the region, which would involve getting the co-operation of — at a minimum — ourselves, Iran, Russia, and Turkey.
We would need to field a truly large force – half a million people, maybe a million – to take and hold territory ranging from Aleppo to Baghdad, up to the border of Turkey.
Those folks would have to stay there for years, I would say at least ten years, while all of the folks with political and security interests in the area figured out what the hell to do with the tiger they were holding by the tail.
If we could get all of that done, we could probably overcome ISIS *as a presence in Syria and Iraq*.
The focus of caliphate-building would likely then shift somewhere else.
should it ever become necessary to do more than make a token appearance or overcome something like ISIS
Actually, I take it back. Here is what I think a viable strategy for “overcoming ISIS” might look like.
We would need to establish some kind of unified command and control structure for the region, which would involve getting the co-operation of — at a minimum — ourselves, Iran, Russia, and Turkey.
We would need to field a truly large force – half a million people, maybe a million – to take and hold territory ranging from Aleppo to Baghdad, up to the border of Turkey.
Those folks would have to stay there for years, I would say at least ten years, while all of the folks with political and security interests in the area figured out what the hell to do with the tiger they were holding by the tail.
If we could get all of that done, we could probably overcome ISIS *as a presence in Syria and Iraq*.
The focus of caliphate-building would likely then shift somewhere else.
We’d save more lives by instituting a national driving-helmet program than by trying to “defeat” ISIS.
We’d save more lives by instituting a national driving-helmet program than by trying to “defeat” ISIS.
We’d save more lives by instituting a national driving-helmet program than by trying to “defeat” ISIS.
The beatings will continue until radicalism abates!
The beatings will continue until radicalism abates!
The beatings will continue until radicalism abates!
I must respectfully disagree with ugh’s last non-PS paragraph.
“This is why the honest reassurance that the U.S. is not ‘at war’ with Islam is so important.”
This is a fairly egregious strawman. It’s easy to make honest reassurances that we’re not at war with Islam as a whole, but it’s wildly dishonest not to acknowledge that we are very much at war with a nontrivial segment of Islam. The US didn’t brand this terrorism as Islamic; the terrorists did. It’s always a good idea to believe your enemies’ statements about their motives and intentions. After all, they have PR needs, too.
If we can’t engage in sufficiently clear thinking to describe the enemy, and sufficiently competent PR to communicate this description to both ourselves and the Muslim world, then we have no hope of designing effective strategies of combating the problem.
“Why ethnic and religious profiling should not be done. Why everyone is subject to screening at airports, etc. and not just those who might be ‘suspicious.'”
This sounds all lovely and high-minded, but from a management standpoint it’s just terrible. Counter-terrorism intelligence and security are two of the most skilled-labor-intensive activities on the planet. Diluting that labor for PR purposes will lead to significantly worse outcomes (i.e., more dead people) than if we use appropriate classifiers to direct attention to the highest-risk individuals, communities, and organizations.
Of course, that’s what we’re actually doing behind the scenes. And if we all need to play Egalitarian Security Theater to disguise the fact that it’s what we’re doing, so be it–although it then becomes the most expensive and least effective PR campaign in human history.
Again, this all comes down to accurately describing your enemy in ways that are not horribly divisive but still true.
“In addition to ensuring that such measures are not overreaching and imposed on just ‘those people,’ it also sends the message – we are all in this together.”
First, this does absolutely nothing to ensure that measures are “not overreaching”. Instead, it merely ensures that the overreach is less likely to be effective. The security apparat is still perfectly capable of inflicting all kinds of PATRIOT Act and enemy combatant mumbo-jumbo on some random person, US or otherwise. The level of mumbo-jumbo practiced is solely dependent on the amount of labor devoted to practicing mumbo-jumbo; it’s their job, and their management requires getting the most out of the labor. All that failing to discriminate early in the process does is increase the likelihood that the mumbo-jumbo is practiced on people without measurably improving security.
And we all are in this together. To the extent that American Muslims have better contacts with friends and family overseas, they’re in a much better position to understand the dynamics that armed gangs use to take and control territory. They way you prevent gangs from taking over your neighborhood is through policing, and cooperation with those police.
It would be lovely if the American public wasn’t frightened of terrorism, and if that fear didn’t manifest itself in irrational and xenophobic ways. But that’s how humans respond to threats. The good news is that it’s usually not how counter-terrorism professionals respond. The pros have some idea of what works, at least tactically, and they know how to get the most bang for their buck. They are, admittedly, not perfect, and I’m sure that some of them are assholish enough to be counterproductive. That’s why security organizations need aggressive oversight.
But slathering a bunch of policy gumgoozalum that actively denies the reality of the situation neither makes the job easier for the vast majority of good professionals nor serves any effective strategic purpose. Nothing good ever comes of pretending that something is what it isn’t.
I must respectfully disagree with ugh’s last non-PS paragraph.
“This is why the honest reassurance that the U.S. is not ‘at war’ with Islam is so important.”
This is a fairly egregious strawman. It’s easy to make honest reassurances that we’re not at war with Islam as a whole, but it’s wildly dishonest not to acknowledge that we are very much at war with a nontrivial segment of Islam. The US didn’t brand this terrorism as Islamic; the terrorists did. It’s always a good idea to believe your enemies’ statements about their motives and intentions. After all, they have PR needs, too.
If we can’t engage in sufficiently clear thinking to describe the enemy, and sufficiently competent PR to communicate this description to both ourselves and the Muslim world, then we have no hope of designing effective strategies of combating the problem.
“Why ethnic and religious profiling should not be done. Why everyone is subject to screening at airports, etc. and not just those who might be ‘suspicious.'”
This sounds all lovely and high-minded, but from a management standpoint it’s just terrible. Counter-terrorism intelligence and security are two of the most skilled-labor-intensive activities on the planet. Diluting that labor for PR purposes will lead to significantly worse outcomes (i.e., more dead people) than if we use appropriate classifiers to direct attention to the highest-risk individuals, communities, and organizations.
Of course, that’s what we’re actually doing behind the scenes. And if we all need to play Egalitarian Security Theater to disguise the fact that it’s what we’re doing, so be it–although it then becomes the most expensive and least effective PR campaign in human history.
Again, this all comes down to accurately describing your enemy in ways that are not horribly divisive but still true.
“In addition to ensuring that such measures are not overreaching and imposed on just ‘those people,’ it also sends the message – we are all in this together.”
First, this does absolutely nothing to ensure that measures are “not overreaching”. Instead, it merely ensures that the overreach is less likely to be effective. The security apparat is still perfectly capable of inflicting all kinds of PATRIOT Act and enemy combatant mumbo-jumbo on some random person, US or otherwise. The level of mumbo-jumbo practiced is solely dependent on the amount of labor devoted to practicing mumbo-jumbo; it’s their job, and their management requires getting the most out of the labor. All that failing to discriminate early in the process does is increase the likelihood that the mumbo-jumbo is practiced on people without measurably improving security.
And we all are in this together. To the extent that American Muslims have better contacts with friends and family overseas, they’re in a much better position to understand the dynamics that armed gangs use to take and control territory. They way you prevent gangs from taking over your neighborhood is through policing, and cooperation with those police.
It would be lovely if the American public wasn’t frightened of terrorism, and if that fear didn’t manifest itself in irrational and xenophobic ways. But that’s how humans respond to threats. The good news is that it’s usually not how counter-terrorism professionals respond. The pros have some idea of what works, at least tactically, and they know how to get the most bang for their buck. They are, admittedly, not perfect, and I’m sure that some of them are assholish enough to be counterproductive. That’s why security organizations need aggressive oversight.
But slathering a bunch of policy gumgoozalum that actively denies the reality of the situation neither makes the job easier for the vast majority of good professionals nor serves any effective strategic purpose. Nothing good ever comes of pretending that something is what it isn’t.
I must respectfully disagree with ugh’s last non-PS paragraph.
“This is why the honest reassurance that the U.S. is not ‘at war’ with Islam is so important.”
This is a fairly egregious strawman. It’s easy to make honest reassurances that we’re not at war with Islam as a whole, but it’s wildly dishonest not to acknowledge that we are very much at war with a nontrivial segment of Islam. The US didn’t brand this terrorism as Islamic; the terrorists did. It’s always a good idea to believe your enemies’ statements about their motives and intentions. After all, they have PR needs, too.
If we can’t engage in sufficiently clear thinking to describe the enemy, and sufficiently competent PR to communicate this description to both ourselves and the Muslim world, then we have no hope of designing effective strategies of combating the problem.
“Why ethnic and religious profiling should not be done. Why everyone is subject to screening at airports, etc. and not just those who might be ‘suspicious.'”
This sounds all lovely and high-minded, but from a management standpoint it’s just terrible. Counter-terrorism intelligence and security are two of the most skilled-labor-intensive activities on the planet. Diluting that labor for PR purposes will lead to significantly worse outcomes (i.e., more dead people) than if we use appropriate classifiers to direct attention to the highest-risk individuals, communities, and organizations.
Of course, that’s what we’re actually doing behind the scenes. And if we all need to play Egalitarian Security Theater to disguise the fact that it’s what we’re doing, so be it–although it then becomes the most expensive and least effective PR campaign in human history.
Again, this all comes down to accurately describing your enemy in ways that are not horribly divisive but still true.
“In addition to ensuring that such measures are not overreaching and imposed on just ‘those people,’ it also sends the message – we are all in this together.”
First, this does absolutely nothing to ensure that measures are “not overreaching”. Instead, it merely ensures that the overreach is less likely to be effective. The security apparat is still perfectly capable of inflicting all kinds of PATRIOT Act and enemy combatant mumbo-jumbo on some random person, US or otherwise. The level of mumbo-jumbo practiced is solely dependent on the amount of labor devoted to practicing mumbo-jumbo; it’s their job, and their management requires getting the most out of the labor. All that failing to discriminate early in the process does is increase the likelihood that the mumbo-jumbo is practiced on people without measurably improving security.
And we all are in this together. To the extent that American Muslims have better contacts with friends and family overseas, they’re in a much better position to understand the dynamics that armed gangs use to take and control territory. They way you prevent gangs from taking over your neighborhood is through policing, and cooperation with those police.
It would be lovely if the American public wasn’t frightened of terrorism, and if that fear didn’t manifest itself in irrational and xenophobic ways. But that’s how humans respond to threats. The good news is that it’s usually not how counter-terrorism professionals respond. The pros have some idea of what works, at least tactically, and they know how to get the most bang for their buck. They are, admittedly, not perfect, and I’m sure that some of them are assholish enough to be counterproductive. That’s why security organizations need aggressive oversight.
But slathering a bunch of policy gumgoozalum that actively denies the reality of the situation neither makes the job easier for the vast majority of good professionals nor serves any effective strategic purpose. Nothing good ever comes of pretending that something is what it isn’t.
Snarki: They were all outside of the security checkpoints, so making the checkpoints more secure does no good at all.
The biggest single impact of security checkpoints is to create a large group of people queued up to go thru them. And that group is necessarily outside those checkpoints. Which is to say, the checkpoints actually create great targets for terrorists, where none were before.
All that making checkpoints more secure accomplishes is to make the queues longer. And thus even bigger and better terrorist targets.
Snarki: They were all outside of the security checkpoints, so making the checkpoints more secure does no good at all.
The biggest single impact of security checkpoints is to create a large group of people queued up to go thru them. And that group is necessarily outside those checkpoints. Which is to say, the checkpoints actually create great targets for terrorists, where none were before.
All that making checkpoints more secure accomplishes is to make the queues longer. And thus even bigger and better terrorist targets.
Snarki: They were all outside of the security checkpoints, so making the checkpoints more secure does no good at all.
The biggest single impact of security checkpoints is to create a large group of people queued up to go thru them. And that group is necessarily outside those checkpoints. Which is to say, the checkpoints actually create great targets for terrorists, where none were before.
All that making checkpoints more secure accomplishes is to make the queues longer. And thus even bigger and better terrorist targets.
I’m sure having a separate security process for Muslims will work out just fine in the end, TRM. Perhaps we can require them to wear armbands to make it easy to identify them.
I’m sure having a separate security process for Muslims will work out just fine in the end, TRM. Perhaps we can require them to wear armbands to make it easy to identify them.
I’m sure having a separate security process for Muslims will work out just fine in the end, TRM. Perhaps we can require them to wear armbands to make it easy to identify them.
Ugh, why armbands? Don’t they all wear turbans? Isn’t that how that guy in Wisconsin knew who to shoot?
Ugh, why armbands? Don’t they all wear turbans? Isn’t that how that guy in Wisconsin knew who to shoot?
Ugh, why armbands? Don’t they all wear turbans? Isn’t that how that guy in Wisconsin knew who to shoot?
but it’s wildly dishonest not to acknowledge that we are very much at war with a nontrivial segment of Islam.
likewise, Islam is very much at war with a nontrivial segment of Christianity (and Judaism!) – just as terrorist recruitment propaganda requires.
but it’s wildly dishonest not to acknowledge that we are very much at war with a nontrivial segment of Islam.
likewise, Islam is very much at war with a nontrivial segment of Christianity (and Judaism!) – just as terrorist recruitment propaganda requires.
but it’s wildly dishonest not to acknowledge that we are very much at war with a nontrivial segment of Islam.
likewise, Islam is very much at war with a nontrivial segment of Christianity (and Judaism!) – just as terrorist recruitment propaganda requires.
No, HSH, not turbans. (Those are Sihks.)
But they do all have beards. So we can just go after anyone with a beard. Even if they claim to be part of Duck Dynasty.
No, HSH, not turbans. (Those are Sihks.)
But they do all have beards. So we can just go after anyone with a beard. Even if they claim to be part of Duck Dynasty.
No, HSH, not turbans. (Those are Sihks.)
But they do all have beards. So we can just go after anyone with a beard. Even if they claim to be part of Duck Dynasty.
Technically, an airport security check is meant to prevent people from blowing up or hijacking airplanes. In fact, they are fairly successful in this regard. If you compare the current situation with 1970’s, you’ll see that hijackings and plane explosions are much more rare.
At the airport itself, there is no way to prevent a bombing. You’ll have a security perimeter somewhere and a crowd outside it in any case. The same applies to urban public traffic: there is no way to check everyone boarding a train or subway.
Technically, an airport security check is meant to prevent people from blowing up or hijacking airplanes. In fact, they are fairly successful in this regard. If you compare the current situation with 1970’s, you’ll see that hijackings and plane explosions are much more rare.
At the airport itself, there is no way to prevent a bombing. You’ll have a security perimeter somewhere and a crowd outside it in any case. The same applies to urban public traffic: there is no way to check everyone boarding a train or subway.
Technically, an airport security check is meant to prevent people from blowing up or hijacking airplanes. In fact, they are fairly successful in this regard. If you compare the current situation with 1970’s, you’ll see that hijackings and plane explosions are much more rare.
At the airport itself, there is no way to prevent a bombing. You’ll have a security perimeter somewhere and a crowd outside it in any case. The same applies to urban public traffic: there is no way to check everyone boarding a train or subway.
heh. derp.
likewise, Islam is very much at war with a nontrivial segment of Christianity (and Judaism!) – just as terrorist recruitment propaganda requires.likewise, Christianity (and Judaism!) is very much at war with a nontrivial segment of Islam – just as terrorist recruitment propaganda requires.
heh. derp.
likewise, Islam is very much at war with a nontrivial segment of Christianity (and Judaism!) – just as terrorist recruitment propaganda requires.likewise, Christianity (and Judaism!) is very much at war with a nontrivial segment of Islam – just as terrorist recruitment propaganda requires.
heh. derp.
likewise, Islam is very much at war with a nontrivial segment of Christianity (and Judaism!) – just as terrorist recruitment propaganda requires.likewise, Christianity (and Judaism!) is very much at war with a nontrivial segment of Islam – just as terrorist recruitment propaganda requires.
@wj: The biggest single impact of security checkpoints is to create a large group of people queued up to go thru them.
This is generally true, but airports really are a special case. Even quite a small bomb can destroy an airplane and kill everyone on board; the bomb that took down Pan Am 103 (the Lockerbie bombing) was one pound or less. So even though the security line at the airport is a tempting target, it’s a much less tempting one than the airplanes.
@wj: The biggest single impact of security checkpoints is to create a large group of people queued up to go thru them.
This is generally true, but airports really are a special case. Even quite a small bomb can destroy an airplane and kill everyone on board; the bomb that took down Pan Am 103 (the Lockerbie bombing) was one pound or less. So even though the security line at the airport is a tempting target, it’s a much less tempting one than the airplanes.
@wj: The biggest single impact of security checkpoints is to create a large group of people queued up to go thru them.
This is generally true, but airports really are a special case. Even quite a small bomb can destroy an airplane and kill everyone on board; the bomb that took down Pan Am 103 (the Lockerbie bombing) was one pound or less. So even though the security line at the airport is a tempting target, it’s a much less tempting one than the airplanes.
If you compare the current situation with 1970’s, you’ll see that hijackings and plane explosions are much more rare.
Seems like it might be much more relevant to compare to the 1990s. After all, crime in general has dropped a fair amount since the 1970s, so it might be expected that hijackings had dropped as well.
Also I would note that the things which have actually had a real impact on hijackings are:
1) reinforced cockpit doors,
2) armed air marshalls on random flights
Plus, passengers knowing that getting up and fighting the hijacker was a better option than sitting passively. Don’t know if that has actually stopped one yet. But given how easily test subjects get weapons and explosives past TSA, it seems like it may be important. More important than TSA’s security theater anyway.
If you compare the current situation with 1970’s, you’ll see that hijackings and plane explosions are much more rare.
Seems like it might be much more relevant to compare to the 1990s. After all, crime in general has dropped a fair amount since the 1970s, so it might be expected that hijackings had dropped as well.
Also I would note that the things which have actually had a real impact on hijackings are:
1) reinforced cockpit doors,
2) armed air marshalls on random flights
Plus, passengers knowing that getting up and fighting the hijacker was a better option than sitting passively. Don’t know if that has actually stopped one yet. But given how easily test subjects get weapons and explosives past TSA, it seems like it may be important. More important than TSA’s security theater anyway.
If you compare the current situation with 1970’s, you’ll see that hijackings and plane explosions are much more rare.
Seems like it might be much more relevant to compare to the 1990s. After all, crime in general has dropped a fair amount since the 1970s, so it might be expected that hijackings had dropped as well.
Also I would note that the things which have actually had a real impact on hijackings are:
1) reinforced cockpit doors,
2) armed air marshalls on random flights
Plus, passengers knowing that getting up and fighting the hijacker was a better option than sitting passively. Don’t know if that has actually stopped one yet. But given how easily test subjects get weapons and explosives past TSA, it seems like it may be important. More important than TSA’s security theater anyway.
can the “left” reach a consensus on military power: how much and how to use it? If so, what are the general outlines that program/policy might take? And how would it apply to ISIS, terror cells, safe harbors, failed states, etc?
I doubt it. I doubt the “right” can either.
Of course, reaching a consensus is not the main point. We are not deciding where to have lunch. The main point is to develop a strategy that has a decent chance of working without having a lot of negative repercussions. Once that is done, if it can be, it becomes somewhat necessary to sell it to the country.
I don’t know how to do that either.
can the “left” reach a consensus on military power: how much and how to use it? If so, what are the general outlines that program/policy might take? And how would it apply to ISIS, terror cells, safe harbors, failed states, etc?
I doubt it. I doubt the “right” can either.
Of course, reaching a consensus is not the main point. We are not deciding where to have lunch. The main point is to develop a strategy that has a decent chance of working without having a lot of negative repercussions. Once that is done, if it can be, it becomes somewhat necessary to sell it to the country.
I don’t know how to do that either.
can the “left” reach a consensus on military power: how much and how to use it? If so, what are the general outlines that program/policy might take? And how would it apply to ISIS, terror cells, safe harbors, failed states, etc?
I doubt it. I doubt the “right” can either.
Of course, reaching a consensus is not the main point. We are not deciding where to have lunch. The main point is to develop a strategy that has a decent chance of working without having a lot of negative repercussions. Once that is done, if it can be, it becomes somewhat necessary to sell it to the country.
I don’t know how to do that either.
“but it’s wildly dishonest not to acknowledge that we are very much at war with a nontrivial segment of Islam. ”
Let me rephrase that–for Palestinians, it’s wildly dishonest not to acknowledge that the people who stole their land identify as Jews, have the support of many Jews in other countries, and so it makes perfect sense if they say they are at war with a nontrivial segment of Judaism. And wouldn’t you know it? Some do see it that way. And man, has it ever been helpful.
“but it’s wildly dishonest not to acknowledge that we are very much at war with a nontrivial segment of Islam. ”
Let me rephrase that–for Palestinians, it’s wildly dishonest not to acknowledge that the people who stole their land identify as Jews, have the support of many Jews in other countries, and so it makes perfect sense if they say they are at war with a nontrivial segment of Judaism. And wouldn’t you know it? Some do see it that way. And man, has it ever been helpful.
“but it’s wildly dishonest not to acknowledge that we are very much at war with a nontrivial segment of Islam. ”
Let me rephrase that–for Palestinians, it’s wildly dishonest not to acknowledge that the people who stole their land identify as Jews, have the support of many Jews in other countries, and so it makes perfect sense if they say they are at war with a nontrivial segment of Judaism. And wouldn’t you know it? Some do see it that way. And man, has it ever been helpful.
And no, I’m not being snarky. Why is it that some people want to play the bigot’s game? Or the terrorist’s game? They want to say they fight for Islam–why should we pay them the compliment of agreeing with them? I know it’s a “no true Scotsman” thing and as far as I am concerned if an adherent of religion x says he is doing some terrible thing because of his religion, for him that is true. But we don’t have to go beyond acknowledging that. What does it get us except a lot of bigots on our side stirring up hatred? It is the responsibility of Muslims to distance themselves from the extremists and most do.
My Palestinian analogy works the same way. The Palestinians have legitimate grievances, putting it mildly. It does no one any good, not them and not the Israelis and not anyone except some antisemitic demagogues, to make it about Judaism even if the people who took their land do it in the name of Judaism. Those who do make it about Judaism end up justifying terrorist attacks, as everyone already knows.
And no, I’m not being snarky. Why is it that some people want to play the bigot’s game? Or the terrorist’s game? They want to say they fight for Islam–why should we pay them the compliment of agreeing with them? I know it’s a “no true Scotsman” thing and as far as I am concerned if an adherent of religion x says he is doing some terrible thing because of his religion, for him that is true. But we don’t have to go beyond acknowledging that. What does it get us except a lot of bigots on our side stirring up hatred? It is the responsibility of Muslims to distance themselves from the extremists and most do.
My Palestinian analogy works the same way. The Palestinians have legitimate grievances, putting it mildly. It does no one any good, not them and not the Israelis and not anyone except some antisemitic demagogues, to make it about Judaism even if the people who took their land do it in the name of Judaism. Those who do make it about Judaism end up justifying terrorist attacks, as everyone already knows.
And no, I’m not being snarky. Why is it that some people want to play the bigot’s game? Or the terrorist’s game? They want to say they fight for Islam–why should we pay them the compliment of agreeing with them? I know it’s a “no true Scotsman” thing and as far as I am concerned if an adherent of religion x says he is doing some terrible thing because of his religion, for him that is true. But we don’t have to go beyond acknowledging that. What does it get us except a lot of bigots on our side stirring up hatred? It is the responsibility of Muslims to distance themselves from the extremists and most do.
My Palestinian analogy works the same way. The Palestinians have legitimate grievances, putting it mildly. It does no one any good, not them and not the Israelis and not anyone except some antisemitic demagogues, to make it about Judaism even if the people who took their land do it in the name of Judaism. Those who do make it about Judaism end up justifying terrorist attacks, as everyone already knows.
It’s easy to make honest reassurances that we’re not at war with Islam as a whole, but it’s wildly dishonest not to acknowledge that we are very much at war with a nontrivial segment of Islam.
Speaking of wildly dishonest, how many of the 1.6 billion Muslims on this planet are we at war with, TRM? Because if your answer is 1% or less, as one must suspect it would be w/o further wild dishonesty regarding precisely what you mean by “at war with”, I’m immensely curious how it’s anything but wildly dishonest to characterize the US as “being at war with a non-trivial segment of Islam”.
It’s easy to make honest reassurances that we’re not at war with Islam as a whole, but it’s wildly dishonest not to acknowledge that we are very much at war with a nontrivial segment of Islam.
Speaking of wildly dishonest, how many of the 1.6 billion Muslims on this planet are we at war with, TRM? Because if your answer is 1% or less, as one must suspect it would be w/o further wild dishonesty regarding precisely what you mean by “at war with”, I’m immensely curious how it’s anything but wildly dishonest to characterize the US as “being at war with a non-trivial segment of Islam”.
It’s easy to make honest reassurances that we’re not at war with Islam as a whole, but it’s wildly dishonest not to acknowledge that we are very much at war with a nontrivial segment of Islam.
Speaking of wildly dishonest, how many of the 1.6 billion Muslims on this planet are we at war with, TRM? Because if your answer is 1% or less, as one must suspect it would be w/o further wild dishonesty regarding precisely what you mean by “at war with”, I’m immensely curious how it’s anything but wildly dishonest to characterize the US as “being at war with a non-trivial segment of Islam”.
At the airport itself, there is no way to prevent a bombing. You’ll have a security perimeter somewhere and a crowd outside it in any case.
I agree with this.
More broadly, there are crowds lots of places.
At the airport itself, there is no way to prevent a bombing. You’ll have a security perimeter somewhere and a crowd outside it in any case.
I agree with this.
More broadly, there are crowds lots of places.
At the airport itself, there is no way to prevent a bombing. You’ll have a security perimeter somewhere and a crowd outside it in any case.
I agree with this.
More broadly, there are crowds lots of places.
as far as I am concerned if an adherent of religion x says he is doing some terrible thing because of his religion, for him that is true. But we don’t have to go beyond acknowledging that.
There are, after all, any number of folks who claim to be doing the terrible things that they are doing in the name of our religion.
as far as I am concerned if an adherent of religion x says he is doing some terrible thing because of his religion, for him that is true. But we don’t have to go beyond acknowledging that.
There are, after all, any number of folks who claim to be doing the terrible things that they are doing in the name of our religion.
as far as I am concerned if an adherent of religion x says he is doing some terrible thing because of his religion, for him that is true. But we don’t have to go beyond acknowledging that.
There are, after all, any number of folks who claim to be doing the terrible things that they are doing in the name of our religion.
@wj: There are, after all, any number of folks who claim to be doing the terrible things that they are doing in the name of our religion
I want to reply either
“What is this ‘our’ of which you speak, Kemosabe,”
or
“For any value of ‘our.'”
@wj: There are, after all, any number of folks who claim to be doing the terrible things that they are doing in the name of our religion
I want to reply either
“What is this ‘our’ of which you speak, Kemosabe,”
or
“For any value of ‘our.'”
@wj: There are, after all, any number of folks who claim to be doing the terrible things that they are doing in the name of our religion
I want to reply either
“What is this ‘our’ of which you speak, Kemosabe,”
or
“For any value of ‘our.'”
The Cubbies are a greater danger to the Republic than ISIL, as of this afternoon:
http://sports.yahoo.com/news/donald-trump-threatens-run-attack-083500362.html
Cruz threw in that Florida law enforcement should patrol and secure Tampa Ray Devil Rays and Florida Marlin dugouts all season before they become radicalized as a result of Obama having survived among the living for seven and a half years now, against all odds.
The large, visible, marvelous hand, his other in his pocket for safekeeping, of Donald Trump will work its magic on the American economy as foretold by the foretellers, who spaketh “a travesty if you can keep it”
It will don the jellied rubber glove of free market canoodling and crawl up our manifest fundaments and palpate our innermost American laugh tracks, spurring us on to ever more exceptional and risible destinies.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=he58B8gjfBc
We are a ridiculous people.
Is so much flying really necessary, especially among the business class? Can’t American business hire locals everywhere to execute, rather than flying know-it-alls from headquarters to check up on everyone?
I think we should get rid of airport terminals altogether, park the planes in a long line on the tarmac and let everyone run like hell, like O.J. Simpson, across the tarmac and claim the flights on a first-come first-serve basis.
The Cubbies are a greater danger to the Republic than ISIL, as of this afternoon:
http://sports.yahoo.com/news/donald-trump-threatens-run-attack-083500362.html
Cruz threw in that Florida law enforcement should patrol and secure Tampa Ray Devil Rays and Florida Marlin dugouts all season before they become radicalized as a result of Obama having survived among the living for seven and a half years now, against all odds.
The large, visible, marvelous hand, his other in his pocket for safekeeping, of Donald Trump will work its magic on the American economy as foretold by the foretellers, who spaketh “a travesty if you can keep it”
It will don the jellied rubber glove of free market canoodling and crawl up our manifest fundaments and palpate our innermost American laugh tracks, spurring us on to ever more exceptional and risible destinies.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=he58B8gjfBc
We are a ridiculous people.
Is so much flying really necessary, especially among the business class? Can’t American business hire locals everywhere to execute, rather than flying know-it-alls from headquarters to check up on everyone?
I think we should get rid of airport terminals altogether, park the planes in a long line on the tarmac and let everyone run like hell, like O.J. Simpson, across the tarmac and claim the flights on a first-come first-serve basis.
The Cubbies are a greater danger to the Republic than ISIL, as of this afternoon:
http://sports.yahoo.com/news/donald-trump-threatens-run-attack-083500362.html
Cruz threw in that Florida law enforcement should patrol and secure Tampa Ray Devil Rays and Florida Marlin dugouts all season before they become radicalized as a result of Obama having survived among the living for seven and a half years now, against all odds.
The large, visible, marvelous hand, his other in his pocket for safekeeping, of Donald Trump will work its magic on the American economy as foretold by the foretellers, who spaketh “a travesty if you can keep it”
It will don the jellied rubber glove of free market canoodling and crawl up our manifest fundaments and palpate our innermost American laugh tracks, spurring us on to ever more exceptional and risible destinies.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=he58B8gjfBc
We are a ridiculous people.
Is so much flying really necessary, especially among the business class? Can’t American business hire locals everywhere to execute, rather than flying know-it-alls from headquarters to check up on everyone?
I think we should get rid of airport terminals altogether, park the planes in a long line on the tarmac and let everyone run like hell, like O.J. Simpson, across the tarmac and claim the flights on a first-come first-serve basis.
Wj– you can say ” our religion” in my case.
Wj– you can say ” our religion” in my case.
Wj– you can say ” our religion” in my case.
Nothing good ever comes of pretending that something is what it isn’t.
In the spirit of intellectual generosity and/or beating a dead horse, I think TRM’s error lies chiefly in the conflation of “a non-trivial number of Muslims” with “a non-trivial segment of Islam”. Despite having the same number of syllables, these are in fact two entirely different things.
Nothing good ever comes of pretending that something is what it isn’t.
In the spirit of intellectual generosity and/or beating a dead horse, I think TRM’s error lies chiefly in the conflation of “a non-trivial number of Muslims” with “a non-trivial segment of Islam”. Despite having the same number of syllables, these are in fact two entirely different things.
Nothing good ever comes of pretending that something is what it isn’t.
In the spirit of intellectual generosity and/or beating a dead horse, I think TRM’s error lies chiefly in the conflation of “a non-trivial number of Muslims” with “a non-trivial segment of Islam”. Despite having the same number of syllables, these are in fact two entirely different things.
The GOP brings chaos to the Virgin Islands, too.
http://talkingpointsmemo.com/dc/virgin-island-gop-chaos
States and territories in the United States needs to do a better job of interdicting subversive GOP operatives before they commit terrorism.
This crossing of borders without even a bye-your-leave must stop.
Shoot them on sight.
The GOP brings chaos to the Virgin Islands, too.
http://talkingpointsmemo.com/dc/virgin-island-gop-chaos
States and territories in the United States needs to do a better job of interdicting subversive GOP operatives before they commit terrorism.
This crossing of borders without even a bye-your-leave must stop.
Shoot them on sight.
The GOP brings chaos to the Virgin Islands, too.
http://talkingpointsmemo.com/dc/virgin-island-gop-chaos
States and territories in the United States needs to do a better job of interdicting subversive GOP operatives before they commit terrorism.
This crossing of borders without even a bye-your-leave must stop.
Shoot them on sight.
It is fascinating, the assumptions folks seem to be making about my religion. I was trying to keep it generic enough that all of us, regardless of our religion, could see it apply. (OK, maybe not the atheists among us. Nothing’s perfect.)
Because pretty much every religion has members who do the same thing. Islam just is (un)lucky enough to have folks with megaphones insisting that every one of them is to blame for their tiny minority of lunatics.
It is fascinating, the assumptions folks seem to be making about my religion. I was trying to keep it generic enough that all of us, regardless of our religion, could see it apply. (OK, maybe not the atheists among us. Nothing’s perfect.)
Because pretty much every religion has members who do the same thing. Islam just is (un)lucky enough to have folks with megaphones insisting that every one of them is to blame for their tiny minority of lunatics.
It is fascinating, the assumptions folks seem to be making about my religion. I was trying to keep it generic enough that all of us, regardless of our religion, could see it apply. (OK, maybe not the atheists among us. Nothing’s perfect.)
Because pretty much every religion has members who do the same thing. Islam just is (un)lucky enough to have folks with megaphones insisting that every one of them is to blame for their tiny minority of lunatics.
Two examples of “passengers stopping/hindering a terrorist”: Ralph Reed (shoe bomber) and Whatisname (underwear bomber).
The actual threat to US flights is from *outside* the US: at their point of first contact (int’l flight landing in the US). And TSA doesn’t run those checkpoints.
Once the ‘bad guys’ are inside the US, there are far softer targets at hand, and plenty of guns to do it with. Why risk going through *any* checkpoint? Just load up at the gun show and head for the shopping mall.
The TSA could revert to 1990’s security level, and it would do just as much good in reality. Just not to their budget or sense of self-importance.
Two examples of “passengers stopping/hindering a terrorist”: Ralph Reed (shoe bomber) and Whatisname (underwear bomber).
The actual threat to US flights is from *outside* the US: at their point of first contact (int’l flight landing in the US). And TSA doesn’t run those checkpoints.
Once the ‘bad guys’ are inside the US, there are far softer targets at hand, and plenty of guns to do it with. Why risk going through *any* checkpoint? Just load up at the gun show and head for the shopping mall.
The TSA could revert to 1990’s security level, and it would do just as much good in reality. Just not to their budget or sense of self-importance.
Two examples of “passengers stopping/hindering a terrorist”: Ralph Reed (shoe bomber) and Whatisname (underwear bomber).
The actual threat to US flights is from *outside* the US: at their point of first contact (int’l flight landing in the US). And TSA doesn’t run those checkpoints.
Once the ‘bad guys’ are inside the US, there are far softer targets at hand, and plenty of guns to do it with. Why risk going through *any* checkpoint? Just load up at the gun show and head for the shopping mall.
The TSA could revert to 1990’s security level, and it would do just as much good in reality. Just not to their budget or sense of self-importance.
I think the best way to fight ISIS would be carpet bomb Syria, Iraq, and nearby areas with food, medicine, water, tents, bedding, clothing, books, teachers,nurses, doctors, art supplies…
I think the best way to fight ISIS would be carpet bomb Syria, Iraq, and nearby areas with food, medicine, water, tents, bedding, clothing, books, teachers,nurses, doctors, art supplies…
I think the best way to fight ISIS would be carpet bomb Syria, Iraq, and nearby areas with food, medicine, water, tents, bedding, clothing, books, teachers,nurses, doctors, art supplies…
“It is fascinating, the assumptions folks seem to be making about my religion.”
To be fair, your post said ‘our’, not ‘my’, so it ow;d have been surprising had it not provoked a reaction.
As far as the US is concerned, ‘our’ religion has a pretty clear meaning.
In the case of the UK not so much, despite the continued existence of an ‘established’ church. Indeed I’m not sure that a mild atheism isn’t now the dominant belief.
“It is fascinating, the assumptions folks seem to be making about my religion.”
To be fair, your post said ‘our’, not ‘my’, so it ow;d have been surprising had it not provoked a reaction.
As far as the US is concerned, ‘our’ religion has a pretty clear meaning.
In the case of the UK not so much, despite the continued existence of an ‘established’ church. Indeed I’m not sure that a mild atheism isn’t now the dominant belief.
“It is fascinating, the assumptions folks seem to be making about my religion.”
To be fair, your post said ‘our’, not ‘my’, so it ow;d have been surprising had it not provoked a reaction.
As far as the US is concerned, ‘our’ religion has a pretty clear meaning.
In the case of the UK not so much, despite the continued existence of an ‘established’ church. Indeed I’m not sure that a mild atheism isn’t now the dominant belief.
Nigel: “In the case of the UK not so much…”
In the UK, isn’t the established religion an irrational belief in the entertainment value of cricket?
While in the US, it’s baseball.
I don’t think that schism will ever be mended.
Nigel: “In the case of the UK not so much…”
In the UK, isn’t the established religion an irrational belief in the entertainment value of cricket?
While in the US, it’s baseball.
I don’t think that schism will ever be mended.
Nigel: “In the case of the UK not so much…”
In the UK, isn’t the established religion an irrational belief in the entertainment value of cricket?
While in the US, it’s baseball.
I don’t think that schism will ever be mended.
I was wondering if Merrick Garland should just don a black robe and wander over to the Supreme Court and say to Roberts, et. al., “Well, here I am. Where do you want me to start?”
Contra McKinney: The childlike worship of force exhibited by those on the Right is a feature not a bug. That not an insignificant part of the Right also believes that government “cannot work” is somewhat endearing, but like any movement, it will pass. Organized force is an elemental part of maintaining a hierachical society. Thus the logical end of the right’s argument is that classic line, “exterminate the brutes.”
The question then is, where do you stop?
I was wondering if Merrick Garland should just don a black robe and wander over to the Supreme Court and say to Roberts, et. al., “Well, here I am. Where do you want me to start?”
Contra McKinney: The childlike worship of force exhibited by those on the Right is a feature not a bug. That not an insignificant part of the Right also believes that government “cannot work” is somewhat endearing, but like any movement, it will pass. Organized force is an elemental part of maintaining a hierachical society. Thus the logical end of the right’s argument is that classic line, “exterminate the brutes.”
The question then is, where do you stop?
I was wondering if Merrick Garland should just don a black robe and wander over to the Supreme Court and say to Roberts, et. al., “Well, here I am. Where do you want me to start?”
Contra McKinney: The childlike worship of force exhibited by those on the Right is a feature not a bug. That not an insignificant part of the Right also believes that government “cannot work” is somewhat endearing, but like any movement, it will pass. Organized force is an elemental part of maintaining a hierachical society. Thus the logical end of the right’s argument is that classic line, “exterminate the brutes.”
The question then is, where do you stop?
“I think the best way to fight ISIS would be carpet bomb Syria, Iraq, and nearby areas with food, medicine, water, tents, bedding, clothing, books, teachers,nurses, doctors, art supplies…”
… also carpeting. Throw rugs, for those who don’t have flying carpets.
“I think the best way to fight ISIS would be carpet bomb Syria, Iraq, and nearby areas with food, medicine, water, tents, bedding, clothing, books, teachers,nurses, doctors, art supplies…”
… also carpeting. Throw rugs, for those who don’t have flying carpets.
“I think the best way to fight ISIS would be carpet bomb Syria, Iraq, and nearby areas with food, medicine, water, tents, bedding, clothing, books, teachers,nurses, doctors, art supplies…”
… also carpeting. Throw rugs, for those who don’t have flying carpets.
the Islamic terror orgs kill far more ME Muslims than they do anyone else. so, it seems typically self-centered to think they’re specifically at war with the west.
the Islamic terror orgs kill far more ME Muslims than they do anyone else. so, it seems typically self-centered to think they’re specifically at war with the west.
the Islamic terror orgs kill far more ME Muslims than they do anyone else. so, it seems typically self-centered to think they’re specifically at war with the west.
“I was wondering if Merrick Garland should just don a black robe and wander over to the Supreme Court and say to Roberts, et. al., “Well, here I am. Where do you want me to start?”
Seems reasonable to me.
In this ridiculous country, it couldn’t be any sillier than this f*cked up sh&t:
http://finance.yahoo.com/news/sarah-palin-becoming-next-judge-201012321.html
You can see Republicans are grooming her for the Supreme Court with this appointment.
A Reality Show, if you can keep it, said the man.
Where do I go to be charged with contempt?
I’ll take eleven years in Twelvesworth.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=td3p2XKHP2M
We are idiots.
“I was wondering if Merrick Garland should just don a black robe and wander over to the Supreme Court and say to Roberts, et. al., “Well, here I am. Where do you want me to start?”
Seems reasonable to me.
In this ridiculous country, it couldn’t be any sillier than this f*cked up sh&t:
http://finance.yahoo.com/news/sarah-palin-becoming-next-judge-201012321.html
You can see Republicans are grooming her for the Supreme Court with this appointment.
A Reality Show, if you can keep it, said the man.
Where do I go to be charged with contempt?
I’ll take eleven years in Twelvesworth.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=td3p2XKHP2M
We are idiots.
“I was wondering if Merrick Garland should just don a black robe and wander over to the Supreme Court and say to Roberts, et. al., “Well, here I am. Where do you want me to start?”
Seems reasonable to me.
In this ridiculous country, it couldn’t be any sillier than this f*cked up sh&t:
http://finance.yahoo.com/news/sarah-palin-becoming-next-judge-201012321.html
You can see Republicans are grooming her for the Supreme Court with this appointment.
A Reality Show, if you can keep it, said the man.
Where do I go to be charged with contempt?
I’ll take eleven years in Twelvesworth.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=td3p2XKHP2M
We are idiots.
This line from the Death Palin article, twisted my gut with hilarity:
“Though Palin doesn’t have a juris doctor degree like Judges Judy and Brown …”
This line from the Death Palin article, twisted my gut with hilarity:
“Though Palin doesn’t have a juris doctor degree like Judges Judy and Brown …”
This line from the Death Palin article, twisted my gut with hilarity:
“Though Palin doesn’t have a juris doctor degree like Judges Judy and Brown …”
Gingivitis, Cruise, Tramp, and McCurdell plan on replacing the Ninth Circuit with Death Palin’s new gig.
If you think that is funny, you didn’t get the joke.
Gingivitis, Cruise, Tramp, and McCurdell plan on replacing the Ninth Circuit with Death Palin’s new gig.
If you think that is funny, you didn’t get the joke.
Gingivitis, Cruise, Tramp, and McCurdell plan on replacing the Ninth Circuit with Death Palin’s new gig.
If you think that is funny, you didn’t get the joke.
“the Islamic terror orgs kill far more ME Muslims than they do anyone else. so, it seems typically self-centered to think they’re specifically at war with the west.”
When you consider the number of Americans every Republican candidate has promised to murder their first day as President, Islamic terror seems like a good deal.
“the Islamic terror orgs kill far more ME Muslims than they do anyone else. so, it seems typically self-centered to think they’re specifically at war with the west.”
When you consider the number of Americans every Republican candidate has promised to murder their first day as President, Islamic terror seems like a good deal.
“the Islamic terror orgs kill far more ME Muslims than they do anyone else. so, it seems typically self-centered to think they’re specifically at war with the west.”
When you consider the number of Americans every Republican candidate has promised to murder their first day as President, Islamic terror seems like a good deal.
http://finance.yahoo.com/news/trump-lays-vision-gaining-respect-100003354.html
Ooh, your kisses, sweeter than honey
And guess what? So is my money
All I want you to do for me
Is give it to me when you get home
R-E-S-P-E-C-T
Find out what it means to me
R E S P E C T
Take care, T.C.B.
RESPECT
Just a little bit)
I get tired
(Just a little bit)
Keep on tryin’
(Just a little bit)
You’re runnin’ out of foolin’
(Just a little bit)
And I ain’t lyin’
(Just a little bit)
http://finance.yahoo.com/news/trump-lays-vision-gaining-respect-100003354.html
Ooh, your kisses, sweeter than honey
And guess what? So is my money
All I want you to do for me
Is give it to me when you get home
R-E-S-P-E-C-T
Find out what it means to me
R E S P E C T
Take care, T.C.B.
RESPECT
Just a little bit)
I get tired
(Just a little bit)
Keep on tryin’
(Just a little bit)
You’re runnin’ out of foolin’
(Just a little bit)
And I ain’t lyin’
(Just a little bit)
http://finance.yahoo.com/news/trump-lays-vision-gaining-respect-100003354.html
Ooh, your kisses, sweeter than honey
And guess what? So is my money
All I want you to do for me
Is give it to me when you get home
R-E-S-P-E-C-T
Find out what it means to me
R E S P E C T
Take care, T.C.B.
RESPECT
Just a little bit)
I get tired
(Just a little bit)
Keep on tryin’
(Just a little bit)
You’re runnin’ out of foolin’
(Just a little bit)
And I ain’t lyin’
(Just a little bit)
http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/ted-cruz-defends-patrol-muslim-neighborhoods
Translation: “Hey, don’t sweat it. “Muslim” is just another way of (here, he puts the back of his hand adjacent to one side of his mouth to deflect the dog whistle) using the “n” word, as we were taught by our foredaddies. We’ll just continue to shoot the enns in the back in those neighborhoods, as we have been doing all along.”
http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/ted-cruz-defends-patrol-muslim-neighborhoods
Translation: “Hey, don’t sweat it. “Muslim” is just another way of (here, he puts the back of his hand adjacent to one side of his mouth to deflect the dog whistle) using the “n” word, as we were taught by our foredaddies. We’ll just continue to shoot the enns in the back in those neighborhoods, as we have been doing all along.”
http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/ted-cruz-defends-patrol-muslim-neighborhoods
Translation: “Hey, don’t sweat it. “Muslim” is just another way of (here, he puts the back of his hand adjacent to one side of his mouth to deflect the dog whistle) using the “n” word, as we were taught by our foredaddies. We’ll just continue to shoot the enns in the back in those neighborhoods, as we have been doing all along.”
Just f*ck me, and get it over with:
http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/jeb-bush-endorsement-ted-cruz
Just f*ck me, and get it over with:
http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/jeb-bush-endorsement-ted-cruz
Just f*ck me, and get it over with:
http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/jeb-bush-endorsement-ted-cruz
Better yet, maybe a four-year-old will shoot me:
http://juanitajean.com/fun-with-guns-trouble-figuring-out-whos-the-victim-edition/
Better yet, maybe a four-year-old will shoot me:
http://juanitajean.com/fun-with-guns-trouble-figuring-out-whos-the-victim-edition/
Better yet, maybe a four-year-old will shoot me:
http://juanitajean.com/fun-with-guns-trouble-figuring-out-whos-the-victim-edition/
The President of the United States needs to issue a nationwide terror alert:
http://digbysblog.blogspot.com/2016/03/the-cheapest-patient-is-dead-one-by.html
This is murder. Millions more promised by the Republican Party.
The President of the United States needs to issue a nationwide terror alert:
http://digbysblog.blogspot.com/2016/03/the-cheapest-patient-is-dead-one-by.html
This is murder. Millions more promised by the Republican Party.
The President of the United States needs to issue a nationwide terror alert:
http://digbysblog.blogspot.com/2016/03/the-cheapest-patient-is-dead-one-by.html
This is murder. Millions more promised by the Republican Party.
As long as we’re “carpet” bombing, throw in some pornography. Nothing X-rated; our Air Force is probably too officially prudish for that. Copies of the SI swimsuit issue should be adequate. The idea is not to provoke the pious young men who call themselves ISIL, but to distract them. (To provoke them, pictures of young women graduating from college would be more effective.) As self-styled defenders of The Faith, they would naturally decree that innocent civilians must turn in any of this filthy stuff they happen to find, so that it can be burned in huge bonfires. And there would be bonfires, but I bet the burning magazines would be short a few pages.
Infecting the minds of devout young barbarians with lascivious thoughts is practically biological warfare, so this proposal may be in violation of the Geneva conventions. If so, I withdraw it unreservedly.
–TP
As long as we’re “carpet” bombing, throw in some pornography. Nothing X-rated; our Air Force is probably too officially prudish for that. Copies of the SI swimsuit issue should be adequate. The idea is not to provoke the pious young men who call themselves ISIL, but to distract them. (To provoke them, pictures of young women graduating from college would be more effective.) As self-styled defenders of The Faith, they would naturally decree that innocent civilians must turn in any of this filthy stuff they happen to find, so that it can be burned in huge bonfires. And there would be bonfires, but I bet the burning magazines would be short a few pages.
Infecting the minds of devout young barbarians with lascivious thoughts is practically biological warfare, so this proposal may be in violation of the Geneva conventions. If so, I withdraw it unreservedly.
–TP
As long as we’re “carpet” bombing, throw in some pornography. Nothing X-rated; our Air Force is probably too officially prudish for that. Copies of the SI swimsuit issue should be adequate. The idea is not to provoke the pious young men who call themselves ISIL, but to distract them. (To provoke them, pictures of young women graduating from college would be more effective.) As self-styled defenders of The Faith, they would naturally decree that innocent civilians must turn in any of this filthy stuff they happen to find, so that it can be burned in huge bonfires. And there would be bonfires, but I bet the burning magazines would be short a few pages.
Infecting the minds of devout young barbarians with lascivious thoughts is practically biological warfare, so this proposal may be in violation of the Geneva conventions. If so, I withdraw it unreservedly.
–TP
I was serious about the art supplies. People who have been traumatized can use art to help with emotional healing. Plus the displaced, terrified survivors need something more than survival supplies; they need a sense of having a future. So my dream intervention would be focused on emotional as well as physical survival and on the future as well as the immediate circumstances. Thus teachers, books, tools…
Can anyone think of a military intervention by the US outside of Western Europe that had an intended positive result? I can think of lots with unintended negative consequences and some which were intended to be harmful and succeeded.
I was serious about the art supplies. People who have been traumatized can use art to help with emotional healing. Plus the displaced, terrified survivors need something more than survival supplies; they need a sense of having a future. So my dream intervention would be focused on emotional as well as physical survival and on the future as well as the immediate circumstances. Thus teachers, books, tools…
Can anyone think of a military intervention by the US outside of Western Europe that had an intended positive result? I can think of lots with unintended negative consequences and some which were intended to be harmful and succeeded.
I was serious about the art supplies. People who have been traumatized can use art to help with emotional healing. Plus the displaced, terrified survivors need something more than survival supplies; they need a sense of having a future. So my dream intervention would be focused on emotional as well as physical survival and on the future as well as the immediate circumstances. Thus teachers, books, tools…
Can anyone think of a military intervention by the US outside of Western Europe that had an intended positive result? I can think of lots with unintended negative consequences and some which were intended to be harmful and succeeded.
Remarkably and foolishly, and unlike ISIL assassins murdering Americans on video via the knife, Trump, Cruz and Ryan don’t hide their faces when they threaten their next murders on video.
Shouldn’t be too difficult to track them down and do what needs to be done.
Remarkably and foolishly, and unlike ISIL assassins murdering Americans on video via the knife, Trump, Cruz and Ryan don’t hide their faces when they threaten their next murders on video.
Shouldn’t be too difficult to track them down and do what needs to be done.
Remarkably and foolishly, and unlike ISIL assassins murdering Americans on video via the knife, Trump, Cruz and Ryan don’t hide their faces when they threaten their next murders on video.
Shouldn’t be too difficult to track them down and do what needs to be done.
I’d like to drop dozens of this very heavy objets d’art from military transport planes on the Quicken Loans Arena when it is at full capacity the week of July 18-21:
https://www.superstock.com/stock-photos-images/1486-8643
I’d like to drop dozens of this very heavy objets d’art from military transport planes on the Quicken Loans Arena when it is at full capacity the week of July 18-21:
https://www.superstock.com/stock-photos-images/1486-8643
I’d like to drop dozens of this very heavy objets d’art from military transport planes on the Quicken Loans Arena when it is at full capacity the week of July 18-21:
https://www.superstock.com/stock-photos-images/1486-8643
Can anyone think of a military intervention by the US outside of Western Europe that had an intended positive result?
The Philippines? kinda’? Sorta?
The human cost? Just collateral damage.
Can anyone think of a military intervention by the US outside of Western Europe that had an intended positive result?
The Philippines? kinda’? Sorta?
The human cost? Just collateral damage.
Can anyone think of a military intervention by the US outside of Western Europe that had an intended positive result?
The Philippines? kinda’? Sorta?
The human cost? Just collateral damage.
Does the Korean War count as US military intervention?
–TP
Does the Korean War count as US military intervention?
–TP
Does the Korean War count as US military intervention?
–TP
As long as we’re “carpet” bombing, throw in some pornography. Nothing X-rated; our Air Force is probably too officially prudish for that. Copies of the SI swimsuit issue should be adequate. The idea is not to provoke the pious young men who call themselves ISIL, but to distract them.
I’m not sure that this would be all that effective.
First, judging from al Qaeda’s leadership, they already have plenty of pornography on their computers.
Second, given the number of women they are kidnapping for sex slaves, the attraction of mere photographs may be limited. Except, I suppose, as a source of new ideas for what to do.
As long as we’re “carpet” bombing, throw in some pornography. Nothing X-rated; our Air Force is probably too officially prudish for that. Copies of the SI swimsuit issue should be adequate. The idea is not to provoke the pious young men who call themselves ISIL, but to distract them.
I’m not sure that this would be all that effective.
First, judging from al Qaeda’s leadership, they already have plenty of pornography on their computers.
Second, given the number of women they are kidnapping for sex slaves, the attraction of mere photographs may be limited. Except, I suppose, as a source of new ideas for what to do.
As long as we’re “carpet” bombing, throw in some pornography. Nothing X-rated; our Air Force is probably too officially prudish for that. Copies of the SI swimsuit issue should be adequate. The idea is not to provoke the pious young men who call themselves ISIL, but to distract them.
I’m not sure that this would be all that effective.
First, judging from al Qaeda’s leadership, they already have plenty of pornography on their computers.
Second, given the number of women they are kidnapping for sex slaves, the attraction of mere photographs may be limited. Except, I suppose, as a source of new ideas for what to do.
According to my dad, the UN should be dissolved, since the Brussels attacks occurred. The UN should have somehow eliminated ISIS, and the UN doesn’t do anything, anyway.
Putting aside any misconceptions about the UN’s (non-)role in fighting terrorists, I have to wonder if he knows that the WHO, UNICEF, UNESCO, etc. are UN programs. I guess they should all go away because some assholes killed people in Brussels yesterday.
This is my America. Thanks for reading.
According to my dad, the UN should be dissolved, since the Brussels attacks occurred. The UN should have somehow eliminated ISIS, and the UN doesn’t do anything, anyway.
Putting aside any misconceptions about the UN’s (non-)role in fighting terrorists, I have to wonder if he knows that the WHO, UNICEF, UNESCO, etc. are UN programs. I guess they should all go away because some assholes killed people in Brussels yesterday.
This is my America. Thanks for reading.
According to my dad, the UN should be dissolved, since the Brussels attacks occurred. The UN should have somehow eliminated ISIS, and the UN doesn’t do anything, anyway.
Putting aside any misconceptions about the UN’s (non-)role in fighting terrorists, I have to wonder if he knows that the WHO, UNICEF, UNESCO, etc. are UN programs. I guess they should all go away because some assholes killed people in Brussels yesterday.
This is my America. Thanks for reading.
Another example of “hate the idea; want the reality.” Just like “hate big (especially Federal) government; want the government’s two biggest programs — Social Security and Medicare.”
It does suggest, however, that both the Federal government and the UN could do a better job of educating people about all of the critical but non-spectacular things that they do.
TSA at airports, and the occasional military bombing strikes, are real visible. But they are not really anywhere near being the bulk of what the government does. Specifically, not the bulk of what the government does that really impacts most people’s lives. (You can argue that they should be. But not that they currently are.)
Another example of “hate the idea; want the reality.” Just like “hate big (especially Federal) government; want the government’s two biggest programs — Social Security and Medicare.”
It does suggest, however, that both the Federal government and the UN could do a better job of educating people about all of the critical but non-spectacular things that they do.
TSA at airports, and the occasional military bombing strikes, are real visible. But they are not really anywhere near being the bulk of what the government does. Specifically, not the bulk of what the government does that really impacts most people’s lives. (You can argue that they should be. But not that they currently are.)
Another example of “hate the idea; want the reality.” Just like “hate big (especially Federal) government; want the government’s two biggest programs — Social Security and Medicare.”
It does suggest, however, that both the Federal government and the UN could do a better job of educating people about all of the critical but non-spectacular things that they do.
TSA at airports, and the occasional military bombing strikes, are real visible. But they are not really anywhere near being the bulk of what the government does. Specifically, not the bulk of what the government does that really impacts most people’s lives. (You can argue that they should be. But not that they currently are.)
“…given the number of women [ISIL] are kidnapping for sex slaves, the attraction of mere photographs may be limited. Except, I suppose, as a source of new ideas for what to do.”
Okay, so airdrop issues of “Goat Fancier Monthly”. I hear that the manly men of NRO have a stash that would do quite nicely.
“…given the number of women [ISIL] are kidnapping for sex slaves, the attraction of mere photographs may be limited. Except, I suppose, as a source of new ideas for what to do.”
Okay, so airdrop issues of “Goat Fancier Monthly”. I hear that the manly men of NRO have a stash that would do quite nicely.
“…given the number of women [ISIL] are kidnapping for sex slaves, the attraction of mere photographs may be limited. Except, I suppose, as a source of new ideas for what to do.”
Okay, so airdrop issues of “Goat Fancier Monthly”. I hear that the manly men of NRO have a stash that would do quite nicely.
Never try to get Erick Erickson’s goat and redistribute it to the undeserving.
He’s very attached to it.
Never try to get Erick Erickson’s goat and redistribute it to the undeserving.
He’s very attached to it.
Never try to get Erick Erickson’s goat and redistribute it to the undeserving.
He’s very attached to it.
You could say they are stuck in .. I mean .. ON each other.
You could say they are stuck in .. I mean .. ON each other.
You could say they are stuck in .. I mean .. ON each other.
He’s running for President now:
http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/paul-ryan-politics-civility
Well then, stop scaring and insulting me, Paul.
He promises to at least pay lip service to foreplay when he gets our goats.
He’s running for President now:
http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/paul-ryan-politics-civility
Well then, stop scaring and insulting me, Paul.
He promises to at least pay lip service to foreplay when he gets our goats.
He’s running for President now:
http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/paul-ryan-politics-civility
Well then, stop scaring and insulting me, Paul.
He promises to at least pay lip service to foreplay when he gets our goats.
the Islamic terror orgs kill far more ME Muslims than they do anyone else. so, it seems typically self-centered to think they’re specifically at war with the west.
BS, cleek. ME Muslims are killed in local crime, not war – it’s like gang violence in inner cities. Why the hell would Islam be at war with ME Muslims? They’re not exactly overburdened with freedoms, and as any fool can tell you it takes people being free to incite Muslims to war.
the Islamic terror orgs kill far more ME Muslims than they do anyone else. so, it seems typically self-centered to think they’re specifically at war with the west.
BS, cleek. ME Muslims are killed in local crime, not war – it’s like gang violence in inner cities. Why the hell would Islam be at war with ME Muslims? They’re not exactly overburdened with freedoms, and as any fool can tell you it takes people being free to incite Muslims to war.
the Islamic terror orgs kill far more ME Muslims than they do anyone else. so, it seems typically self-centered to think they’re specifically at war with the west.
BS, cleek. ME Muslims are killed in local crime, not war – it’s like gang violence in inner cities. Why the hell would Islam be at war with ME Muslims? They’re not exactly overburdened with freedoms, and as any fool can tell you it takes people being free to incite Muslims to war.
Donald Trump likes to say “They’re chopping off the heads of Christians.” He has since added, as an aside, “…and other people’s.” Oh, yeah, them – the other people, the non-Christians.
Donald Trump likes to say “They’re chopping off the heads of Christians.” He has since added, as an aside, “…and other people’s.” Oh, yeah, them – the other people, the non-Christians.
Donald Trump likes to say “They’re chopping off the heads of Christians.” He has since added, as an aside, “…and other people’s.” Oh, yeah, them – the other people, the non-Christians.
i do like that Cruz is all “treat it like a law enforcement problem!”
fifteen years ago, he would’ve been branded as a naive liberal terrorist coddler for that.
i do like that Cruz is all “treat it like a law enforcement problem!”
fifteen years ago, he would’ve been branded as a naive liberal terrorist coddler for that.
i do like that Cruz is all “treat it like a law enforcement problem!”
fifteen years ago, he would’ve been branded as a naive liberal terrorist coddler for that.
Might’s well get these all out of the way at once to keep the beat-down focused properly:
@ugh: If you can come up with a set of classifiers that are more accurate, have at it. My complaint isn’t that we aren’t targeting Muslims; it’s that egalitarian security screening in any form is silly and a waste of resources.
@cleek: It’s a fair statement but a non sequitur. The US has a security problem, and its solution requires proper enemy identification. The enemy in this case is religiously motivated, no? You can argue that the enemy has perverted their religion, but that doesn’t change the fact that they do what they do because of their religion. The US isn’t fighting them because it’s a Christian nation; it’s fighting them because it has national interests, foremost being security.
@Donald Johnson: I think that that’s a completely accurate description of the Palestinians’ interest and works very well as a statement of fact. I merely hope that we are capable of making equally clear statements of fact about our interests. If you’d like to make value judgements about the morality of those interests, that’s completely fair. But I very much doubt that you’ll find many security pros who think that the morality of the situation has much to do with the realistic need to stop Bad Guys from doing Bad Things. They tend to be–oh, what’s the word I’m looking for? oh yeah–agnostic about such considerations.
As for your follow-on comment, if the “bigot’s game” is to take people who wish you harm at their word, then I guess you’ve got me nailed there.
@NV: If you’re going to peg the definition of “nontrivial” at “>1%”, then you’ve got me. A little googling yielded a number of trained fighters in Islamist groups of about 225K if you leave out the IRGC. But that hardly seems “trivial”. It’s certainly well beyond the point where you can dismiss Islamist-motivated military force as simply a few nutjobs. “Nontrivial” seems about right to me.
@NV again: Please remember that the original comment is asking that we use reality-based classifiers for assessing threats and determining screening.
On reflection, though, you’re right: Building classifiers based on religion is silly, because religion isn’t immediately apparent. Let’s do it on national origin of surname instead. Is that better?
Might’s well get these all out of the way at once to keep the beat-down focused properly:
@ugh: If you can come up with a set of classifiers that are more accurate, have at it. My complaint isn’t that we aren’t targeting Muslims; it’s that egalitarian security screening in any form is silly and a waste of resources.
@cleek: It’s a fair statement but a non sequitur. The US has a security problem, and its solution requires proper enemy identification. The enemy in this case is religiously motivated, no? You can argue that the enemy has perverted their religion, but that doesn’t change the fact that they do what they do because of their religion. The US isn’t fighting them because it’s a Christian nation; it’s fighting them because it has national interests, foremost being security.
@Donald Johnson: I think that that’s a completely accurate description of the Palestinians’ interest and works very well as a statement of fact. I merely hope that we are capable of making equally clear statements of fact about our interests. If you’d like to make value judgements about the morality of those interests, that’s completely fair. But I very much doubt that you’ll find many security pros who think that the morality of the situation has much to do with the realistic need to stop Bad Guys from doing Bad Things. They tend to be–oh, what’s the word I’m looking for? oh yeah–agnostic about such considerations.
As for your follow-on comment, if the “bigot’s game” is to take people who wish you harm at their word, then I guess you’ve got me nailed there.
@NV: If you’re going to peg the definition of “nontrivial” at “>1%”, then you’ve got me. A little googling yielded a number of trained fighters in Islamist groups of about 225K if you leave out the IRGC. But that hardly seems “trivial”. It’s certainly well beyond the point where you can dismiss Islamist-motivated military force as simply a few nutjobs. “Nontrivial” seems about right to me.
@NV again: Please remember that the original comment is asking that we use reality-based classifiers for assessing threats and determining screening.
On reflection, though, you’re right: Building classifiers based on religion is silly, because religion isn’t immediately apparent. Let’s do it on national origin of surname instead. Is that better?
Might’s well get these all out of the way at once to keep the beat-down focused properly:
@ugh: If you can come up with a set of classifiers that are more accurate, have at it. My complaint isn’t that we aren’t targeting Muslims; it’s that egalitarian security screening in any form is silly and a waste of resources.
@cleek: It’s a fair statement but a non sequitur. The US has a security problem, and its solution requires proper enemy identification. The enemy in this case is religiously motivated, no? You can argue that the enemy has perverted their religion, but that doesn’t change the fact that they do what they do because of their religion. The US isn’t fighting them because it’s a Christian nation; it’s fighting them because it has national interests, foremost being security.
@Donald Johnson: I think that that’s a completely accurate description of the Palestinians’ interest and works very well as a statement of fact. I merely hope that we are capable of making equally clear statements of fact about our interests. If you’d like to make value judgements about the morality of those interests, that’s completely fair. But I very much doubt that you’ll find many security pros who think that the morality of the situation has much to do with the realistic need to stop Bad Guys from doing Bad Things. They tend to be–oh, what’s the word I’m looking for? oh yeah–agnostic about such considerations.
As for your follow-on comment, if the “bigot’s game” is to take people who wish you harm at their word, then I guess you’ve got me nailed there.
@NV: If you’re going to peg the definition of “nontrivial” at “>1%”, then you’ve got me. A little googling yielded a number of trained fighters in Islamist groups of about 225K if you leave out the IRGC. But that hardly seems “trivial”. It’s certainly well beyond the point where you can dismiss Islamist-motivated military force as simply a few nutjobs. “Nontrivial” seems about right to me.
@NV again: Please remember that the original comment is asking that we use reality-based classifiers for assessing threats and determining screening.
On reflection, though, you’re right: Building classifiers based on religion is silly, because religion isn’t immediately apparent. Let’s do it on national origin of surname instead. Is that better?
ME Muslims are killed in local crime, not war – it’s like gang violence in inner cities. Why the hell would Islam be at war with ME Muslims?
Nope, what ISIS (for example) is doing is war, not merely local crime. We can argue about how much territory a group has to control, to the exclusion of any other group, in order to count as a war. (And whether some of our drug gangs manage to make the cut.) But on any threshold I can think of, ISIS is well past it.
Why would Muslims be at war with Muslims? Theological differences. (Recall that Europe saw something similar a while back.) Not just between Shia and Sunni, but even within the Sunni branch between moderate, fundamentalist, and ultra-fundamentalists.
ME Muslims are killed in local crime, not war – it’s like gang violence in inner cities. Why the hell would Islam be at war with ME Muslims?
Nope, what ISIS (for example) is doing is war, not merely local crime. We can argue about how much territory a group has to control, to the exclusion of any other group, in order to count as a war. (And whether some of our drug gangs manage to make the cut.) But on any threshold I can think of, ISIS is well past it.
Why would Muslims be at war with Muslims? Theological differences. (Recall that Europe saw something similar a while back.) Not just between Shia and Sunni, but even within the Sunni branch between moderate, fundamentalist, and ultra-fundamentalists.
ME Muslims are killed in local crime, not war – it’s like gang violence in inner cities. Why the hell would Islam be at war with ME Muslims?
Nope, what ISIS (for example) is doing is war, not merely local crime. We can argue about how much territory a group has to control, to the exclusion of any other group, in order to count as a war. (And whether some of our drug gangs manage to make the cut.) But on any threshold I can think of, ISIS is well past it.
Why would Muslims be at war with Muslims? Theological differences. (Recall that Europe saw something similar a while back.) Not just between Shia and Sunni, but even within the Sunni branch between moderate, fundamentalist, and ultra-fundamentalists.
The US isn’t fighting them because it’s a Christian nation
there are plenty of people (“conservative” people, especially) who disagree with you about that.
The US isn’t fighting them because it’s a Christian nation
there are plenty of people (“conservative” people, especially) who disagree with you about that.
The US isn’t fighting them because it’s a Christian nation
there are plenty of people (“conservative” people, especially) who disagree with you about that.
@wj
Perhaps I would have been clearer had I referred to it as petty crime.
—
@TRM:
So your number of choice is 225K? Even “better”. We’re not talking about “less than 1% of Muslims”, we’re talking about right around 1% of 1% of Muslims – well, okay, more like 1.4% of 1% (0.014%). How on earth do you get from “1 in 10,000” (which is in no way, shape or form uniformly distributed globally) to “a non-trivial segment“? Again, not a non-trivial number, but a non-trivial segment? In the last four years, a bit less than 1% of Congress has been convicted of felonies (5/535). How would it be anything but wildly dishonest of me to characterize this as “a non-trivial segment of Congress”?
Nothing good ever comes of pretending that something is what it isn’t, right. There is a huge, glaring, non-trivial difference between something representing a non-trivial segment of a given population, and something comprising a non-trivial number of individuals. If we pretend(against all common sense) that “Muslims at war with the US” are uniformly distributed across the globe, how exactly is it anything but wildly dishonest to claim that the US’s 365 Muslims who are “at war” with “us” are a non-trivial segment of the US’s 2,750,000 Muslims? How can you possibly hope to credibly claim that making such a baldly absurd and ill-considered assertion is anything but a lazy mischaracterization?
@wj
Perhaps I would have been clearer had I referred to it as petty crime.
—
@TRM:
So your number of choice is 225K? Even “better”. We’re not talking about “less than 1% of Muslims”, we’re talking about right around 1% of 1% of Muslims – well, okay, more like 1.4% of 1% (0.014%). How on earth do you get from “1 in 10,000” (which is in no way, shape or form uniformly distributed globally) to “a non-trivial segment“? Again, not a non-trivial number, but a non-trivial segment? In the last four years, a bit less than 1% of Congress has been convicted of felonies (5/535). How would it be anything but wildly dishonest of me to characterize this as “a non-trivial segment of Congress”?
Nothing good ever comes of pretending that something is what it isn’t, right. There is a huge, glaring, non-trivial difference between something representing a non-trivial segment of a given population, and something comprising a non-trivial number of individuals. If we pretend(against all common sense) that “Muslims at war with the US” are uniformly distributed across the globe, how exactly is it anything but wildly dishonest to claim that the US’s 365 Muslims who are “at war” with “us” are a non-trivial segment of the US’s 2,750,000 Muslims? How can you possibly hope to credibly claim that making such a baldly absurd and ill-considered assertion is anything but a lazy mischaracterization?
@wj
Perhaps I would have been clearer had I referred to it as petty crime.
—
@TRM:
So your number of choice is 225K? Even “better”. We’re not talking about “less than 1% of Muslims”, we’re talking about right around 1% of 1% of Muslims – well, okay, more like 1.4% of 1% (0.014%). How on earth do you get from “1 in 10,000” (which is in no way, shape or form uniformly distributed globally) to “a non-trivial segment“? Again, not a non-trivial number, but a non-trivial segment? In the last four years, a bit less than 1% of Congress has been convicted of felonies (5/535). How would it be anything but wildly dishonest of me to characterize this as “a non-trivial segment of Congress”?
Nothing good ever comes of pretending that something is what it isn’t, right. There is a huge, glaring, non-trivial difference between something representing a non-trivial segment of a given population, and something comprising a non-trivial number of individuals. If we pretend(against all common sense) that “Muslims at war with the US” are uniformly distributed across the globe, how exactly is it anything but wildly dishonest to claim that the US’s 365 Muslims who are “at war” with “us” are a non-trivial segment of the US’s 2,750,000 Muslims? How can you possibly hope to credibly claim that making such a baldly absurd and ill-considered assertion is anything but a lazy mischaracterization?
The enemy in this case is religiously motivated, no? You can argue that the enemy has perverted their religion, but that doesn’t change the fact that they do what they do because of their religion.
This is an answer as lazy as your others. AQ was/is a religiously aligned organization that did not target the US for religious reasons. Their attacks on the US were politically motivated, and directly tied to US foreign policy. Pretending that these attacks were something that they were not led to no good, and still does. Likewise, it’s difficult to conclude that Daesh’s motivations in attacking Western nations are strictly religious, particularly since they’ve only taken place after the west began engaging in proxy and direct war against their nation (such as it is). A far better case of religious motivation can be made in their case than AQ’s, obviously, and I don’t think in their case it’s unreasonable to say that they are religiously motivated. However, it’s laughably absurd to equate their fringe sect with all of Islam as you quite eagerly and confidently do. Was the US at war with Christianity when they laid siege to Koresh’s Waco compound in 1993? Were they even at war with a “non-trivial segment of Christianity”? Your xenophobia is showing.
The enemy in this case is religiously motivated, no? You can argue that the enemy has perverted their religion, but that doesn’t change the fact that they do what they do because of their religion.
This is an answer as lazy as your others. AQ was/is a religiously aligned organization that did not target the US for religious reasons. Their attacks on the US were politically motivated, and directly tied to US foreign policy. Pretending that these attacks were something that they were not led to no good, and still does. Likewise, it’s difficult to conclude that Daesh’s motivations in attacking Western nations are strictly religious, particularly since they’ve only taken place after the west began engaging in proxy and direct war against their nation (such as it is). A far better case of religious motivation can be made in their case than AQ’s, obviously, and I don’t think in their case it’s unreasonable to say that they are religiously motivated. However, it’s laughably absurd to equate their fringe sect with all of Islam as you quite eagerly and confidently do. Was the US at war with Christianity when they laid siege to Koresh’s Waco compound in 1993? Were they even at war with a “non-trivial segment of Christianity”? Your xenophobia is showing.
The enemy in this case is religiously motivated, no? You can argue that the enemy has perverted their religion, but that doesn’t change the fact that they do what they do because of their religion.
This is an answer as lazy as your others. AQ was/is a religiously aligned organization that did not target the US for religious reasons. Their attacks on the US were politically motivated, and directly tied to US foreign policy. Pretending that these attacks were something that they were not led to no good, and still does. Likewise, it’s difficult to conclude that Daesh’s motivations in attacking Western nations are strictly religious, particularly since they’ve only taken place after the west began engaging in proxy and direct war against their nation (such as it is). A far better case of religious motivation can be made in their case than AQ’s, obviously, and I don’t think in their case it’s unreasonable to say that they are religiously motivated. However, it’s laughably absurd to equate their fringe sect with all of Islam as you quite eagerly and confidently do. Was the US at war with Christianity when they laid siege to Koresh’s Waco compound in 1993? Were they even at war with a “non-trivial segment of Christianity”? Your xenophobia is showing.
TRM @ 1:28 – Forgive me if you have previously commented on this, but given what you’ve written, I am left wondering what your opinion is on the NYPD’s ‘stop & frisk’ policies? Or that of Chicago, Los Angeles, Philly, etc.?
TRM @ 1:28 – Forgive me if you have previously commented on this, but given what you’ve written, I am left wondering what your opinion is on the NYPD’s ‘stop & frisk’ policies? Or that of Chicago, Los Angeles, Philly, etc.?
TRM @ 1:28 – Forgive me if you have previously commented on this, but given what you’ve written, I am left wondering what your opinion is on the NYPD’s ‘stop & frisk’ policies? Or that of Chicago, Los Angeles, Philly, etc.?
Cruz still digging.
http://www.cbsnews.com/news/ted-cruz-defends-police-us-muslim-neighborhoods/
Cruz still digging.
http://www.cbsnews.com/news/ted-cruz-defends-police-us-muslim-neighborhoods/
Cruz still digging.
http://www.cbsnews.com/news/ted-cruz-defends-police-us-muslim-neighborhoods/
I get the feeling TRM is arguing in favor of the Israeli methods of screening.
I get the feeling TRM is arguing in favor of the Israeli methods of screening.
I get the feeling TRM is arguing in favor of the Israeli methods of screening.
The US isn’t fighting them because it’s a Christian nation
there are plenty of people (“conservative” people, especially) who disagree with you about that.
I think we are fighting ISIS, Al Qaeda, etc because of a series of terrorist events going back to and maybe preceding Pan Am 103, and we are doing so because we’ve been attacked. What motivates people to blow up airplanes or set off bombs at ticket counters or fly planes into buildings? Who would want to cut another person’s head off? Beats me. I can’t come within miles of getting that mentality. I can guess that it is some form of extreme religious and philosophical drive, but that’s just a guess.
But, a common element in the terrorism the West faces seems to be a very radical subset of Islam. Does that radical subset create a milieu for attacking other Muslims of differing sects or insufficient enthusiasm as well as non-Muslims? Maybe so, but if it does, how is that anything other than an aggravating factor?
Ugh is correct. This isn’t going away anytime soon. I was hoping to hear something from lefties here about how to address the situation. Still waiting for that. Unless “I don’t know” is the answer.
The US isn’t fighting them because it’s a Christian nation
there are plenty of people (“conservative” people, especially) who disagree with you about that.
I think we are fighting ISIS, Al Qaeda, etc because of a series of terrorist events going back to and maybe preceding Pan Am 103, and we are doing so because we’ve been attacked. What motivates people to blow up airplanes or set off bombs at ticket counters or fly planes into buildings? Who would want to cut another person’s head off? Beats me. I can’t come within miles of getting that mentality. I can guess that it is some form of extreme religious and philosophical drive, but that’s just a guess.
But, a common element in the terrorism the West faces seems to be a very radical subset of Islam. Does that radical subset create a milieu for attacking other Muslims of differing sects or insufficient enthusiasm as well as non-Muslims? Maybe so, but if it does, how is that anything other than an aggravating factor?
Ugh is correct. This isn’t going away anytime soon. I was hoping to hear something from lefties here about how to address the situation. Still waiting for that. Unless “I don’t know” is the answer.
The US isn’t fighting them because it’s a Christian nation
there are plenty of people (“conservative” people, especially) who disagree with you about that.
I think we are fighting ISIS, Al Qaeda, etc because of a series of terrorist events going back to and maybe preceding Pan Am 103, and we are doing so because we’ve been attacked. What motivates people to blow up airplanes or set off bombs at ticket counters or fly planes into buildings? Who would want to cut another person’s head off? Beats me. I can’t come within miles of getting that mentality. I can guess that it is some form of extreme religious and philosophical drive, but that’s just a guess.
But, a common element in the terrorism the West faces seems to be a very radical subset of Islam. Does that radical subset create a milieu for attacking other Muslims of differing sects or insufficient enthusiasm as well as non-Muslims? Maybe so, but if it does, how is that anything other than an aggravating factor?
Ugh is correct. This isn’t going away anytime soon. I was hoping to hear something from lefties here about how to address the situation. Still waiting for that. Unless “I don’t know” is the answer.
Trump screens:
http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/npr-training-hostile-environments-trump-rallies
Imelda screened for Beatles:
http://lisawallerrogers.com/2009/04/08/imelda-marcos-almost-gets-the-beatles-killed/
Kansas will screen you and your little dog Toto too:
http://www.ottumwacourier.com/region/new-kansas-law-lets-campus-religious-groups-restrict-members/image_99b04ba6-dd5b-51d9-a98f-207ea366dbc4.html
Republicans want to screen the terminally and chronically ill from the health insurance system.
It’s like being turned away from the conservative disco club: You … not you .. you’re OK; hold on there, bub, you look a little sickly, not tonight, move along; no way, pops! I smell cancer!”
If you’re stoopid, of course, you get in. “You, dimwit, front of the queue, I can tell you watch Judge Death Palin regularly. Hey, you with the KKK t-shirt, you and the kirlfriend, kree krinks on the kouse. Lookee here, we’ve got this kanumbskull dressed up like John Galt, and either you’re glad to see me or you’re packing heat too;…. jeez, you shoulda been here last night, cause a dying guy gave us some trouble, gangway, everyone, let dis guy enter. There’s nothing says “Entree, Monsieur” like a hundred-round clip on an open carry automatic weapon. Get in here, skeezix!”
ISIS doesn’t screen. They’ll kill anyone.
But Obama is the great divider, so it’s OK, all this increased screening to weed out the unwanted.
I look at it as choosing up sides for the next great bloody uncivil war in this country.
Trump screens:
http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/npr-training-hostile-environments-trump-rallies
Imelda screened for Beatles:
http://lisawallerrogers.com/2009/04/08/imelda-marcos-almost-gets-the-beatles-killed/
Kansas will screen you and your little dog Toto too:
http://www.ottumwacourier.com/region/new-kansas-law-lets-campus-religious-groups-restrict-members/image_99b04ba6-dd5b-51d9-a98f-207ea366dbc4.html
Republicans want to screen the terminally and chronically ill from the health insurance system.
It’s like being turned away from the conservative disco club: You … not you .. you’re OK; hold on there, bub, you look a little sickly, not tonight, move along; no way, pops! I smell cancer!”
If you’re stoopid, of course, you get in. “You, dimwit, front of the queue, I can tell you watch Judge Death Palin regularly. Hey, you with the KKK t-shirt, you and the kirlfriend, kree krinks on the kouse. Lookee here, we’ve got this kanumbskull dressed up like John Galt, and either you’re glad to see me or you’re packing heat too;…. jeez, you shoulda been here last night, cause a dying guy gave us some trouble, gangway, everyone, let dis guy enter. There’s nothing says “Entree, Monsieur” like a hundred-round clip on an open carry automatic weapon. Get in here, skeezix!”
ISIS doesn’t screen. They’ll kill anyone.
But Obama is the great divider, so it’s OK, all this increased screening to weed out the unwanted.
I look at it as choosing up sides for the next great bloody uncivil war in this country.
Trump screens:
http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/npr-training-hostile-environments-trump-rallies
Imelda screened for Beatles:
http://lisawallerrogers.com/2009/04/08/imelda-marcos-almost-gets-the-beatles-killed/
Kansas will screen you and your little dog Toto too:
http://www.ottumwacourier.com/region/new-kansas-law-lets-campus-religious-groups-restrict-members/image_99b04ba6-dd5b-51d9-a98f-207ea366dbc4.html
Republicans want to screen the terminally and chronically ill from the health insurance system.
It’s like being turned away from the conservative disco club: You … not you .. you’re OK; hold on there, bub, you look a little sickly, not tonight, move along; no way, pops! I smell cancer!”
If you’re stoopid, of course, you get in. “You, dimwit, front of the queue, I can tell you watch Judge Death Palin regularly. Hey, you with the KKK t-shirt, you and the kirlfriend, kree krinks on the kouse. Lookee here, we’ve got this kanumbskull dressed up like John Galt, and either you’re glad to see me or you’re packing heat too;…. jeez, you shoulda been here last night, cause a dying guy gave us some trouble, gangway, everyone, let dis guy enter. There’s nothing says “Entree, Monsieur” like a hundred-round clip on an open carry automatic weapon. Get in here, skeezix!”
ISIS doesn’t screen. They’ll kill anyone.
But Obama is the great divider, so it’s OK, all this increased screening to weed out the unwanted.
I look at it as choosing up sides for the next great bloody uncivil war in this country.
I get the feeling TRM is arguing in favor of the Israeli methods of screening.
I’ve seen plenty of ethnic screening in the UK, in France and in Italy. Pretty much every time I’ve been to any of those countries, or made a connection in one of them.
If Baader Meinhoff was blowing the shit out of US sites, I don’t think anyone would complain about giving Germans a harder look at airports and elsewhere.
If the KKK was smuggling bombs on airplanes, I don’t think we’d be spending a lot of time frisking African Americans.
If some weird ass white supremacist militia group in Montana declares war, there is no need to shake down people of color entering and leaving the state.
The problem is, we don’t like picking on non-white people because of their color or their faith. Any differential treatment is an anathema. Our history of mistreating minorities and Native Americans makes it very difficult for most of us to verbalize a rationale for taking a harder look at non-Caucasians.
Focusing on Muslims or people originating in the ME isn’t *irrational bigotry* when it is from among Muslims and people originating from the ME that we find the vast majority of terrorists. It’s not *invidious discrimination* since adverse action isn’t taken unless the person being singled out has additional indicia of being a threat, i.e. a bomb or a gun and also because, in the absence of repeated terrorist events from among that quarter, Muslims would no more likely to be singled out than anyone else.
But, even if it isn’t irrational, or bigoted in a venal sense, it is still singling out an identifiable group for somewhat differential treatment, i.e. heightened security at more vulnerable security points. We can’t bring ourselves to do that. If, looking back in 20 years, our present policy did not materially and adversely affect public security, all well and good. If, OTOH, significant attacks were allowed in part because of a color blind security policy, that will be worth noting for future reference as well.
I get the feeling TRM is arguing in favor of the Israeli methods of screening.
I’ve seen plenty of ethnic screening in the UK, in France and in Italy. Pretty much every time I’ve been to any of those countries, or made a connection in one of them.
If Baader Meinhoff was blowing the shit out of US sites, I don’t think anyone would complain about giving Germans a harder look at airports and elsewhere.
If the KKK was smuggling bombs on airplanes, I don’t think we’d be spending a lot of time frisking African Americans.
If some weird ass white supremacist militia group in Montana declares war, there is no need to shake down people of color entering and leaving the state.
The problem is, we don’t like picking on non-white people because of their color or their faith. Any differential treatment is an anathema. Our history of mistreating minorities and Native Americans makes it very difficult for most of us to verbalize a rationale for taking a harder look at non-Caucasians.
Focusing on Muslims or people originating in the ME isn’t *irrational bigotry* when it is from among Muslims and people originating from the ME that we find the vast majority of terrorists. It’s not *invidious discrimination* since adverse action isn’t taken unless the person being singled out has additional indicia of being a threat, i.e. a bomb or a gun and also because, in the absence of repeated terrorist events from among that quarter, Muslims would no more likely to be singled out than anyone else.
But, even if it isn’t irrational, or bigoted in a venal sense, it is still singling out an identifiable group for somewhat differential treatment, i.e. heightened security at more vulnerable security points. We can’t bring ourselves to do that. If, looking back in 20 years, our present policy did not materially and adversely affect public security, all well and good. If, OTOH, significant attacks were allowed in part because of a color blind security policy, that will be worth noting for future reference as well.
I get the feeling TRM is arguing in favor of the Israeli methods of screening.
I’ve seen plenty of ethnic screening in the UK, in France and in Italy. Pretty much every time I’ve been to any of those countries, or made a connection in one of them.
If Baader Meinhoff was blowing the shit out of US sites, I don’t think anyone would complain about giving Germans a harder look at airports and elsewhere.
If the KKK was smuggling bombs on airplanes, I don’t think we’d be spending a lot of time frisking African Americans.
If some weird ass white supremacist militia group in Montana declares war, there is no need to shake down people of color entering and leaving the state.
The problem is, we don’t like picking on non-white people because of their color or their faith. Any differential treatment is an anathema. Our history of mistreating minorities and Native Americans makes it very difficult for most of us to verbalize a rationale for taking a harder look at non-Caucasians.
Focusing on Muslims or people originating in the ME isn’t *irrational bigotry* when it is from among Muslims and people originating from the ME that we find the vast majority of terrorists. It’s not *invidious discrimination* since adverse action isn’t taken unless the person being singled out has additional indicia of being a threat, i.e. a bomb or a gun and also because, in the absence of repeated terrorist events from among that quarter, Muslims would no more likely to be singled out than anyone else.
But, even if it isn’t irrational, or bigoted in a venal sense, it is still singling out an identifiable group for somewhat differential treatment, i.e. heightened security at more vulnerable security points. We can’t bring ourselves to do that. If, looking back in 20 years, our present policy did not materially and adversely affect public security, all well and good. If, OTOH, significant attacks were allowed in part because of a color blind security policy, that will be worth noting for future reference as well.
Maybe so, but if it does, how is that anything other than an aggravating factor?
my point there was that there is a non-trivial number of people who think that we in the US are, in fact, fighting Islam because we are a Christian nation (a subset of those who mistakenly insist we are “Christian nation”).
and, i tried to say (but flubbed the first time through) that these people play directly into the propaganda efforts of those Muslims who insist that Christians are deliberately attacking Muslims because they are Muslims.
religious fundamentalists want to make this a battle of religions – because it helps recruitment, i suppose. and they are helped by people who seem eager to frame everything as an existential crisis.
well, i don’t buy either of those viewpoints.
we are not at war with Islam. and Christianity is not at war with Islam. there are a handful of people who, for whatever reason, have been seduced into adopting a perverse version of a religion that is, statistically speaking, about as peaceful as any religion has ever been. and those people are trying to frame their terrorism as a grand battle between their self-proclaimed-“pure” version of Islam and everybody else. and they’re killing many more Muslims than they are killing Christians or Jews. but by framing it as a war of religion, which sets all the fundamentalists and ‘existential’ hyperventilators into fits of stamping and foaming, they have distracted everybody into ignoring that. they’ve convinced people who apparently adore war and desperately want to live in a time of existential crisis that this is the battle for the future of civilization.
it’s not.
no, the problem not going away soon. but it’s going take more than Trumpian bluster and Cruzian bravado to fix it. what else ya got?
I was hoping to hear something from lefties here about how to address the situation.
and i’m still waiting for you to tell me about all of the great “decisive” military actions that the right has taken on. surely there must be some? and what is the right’s great plan to defeat ISIS? surely you must have one. otherwise, what are you doing by drawing a left/right divide here?
Maybe so, but if it does, how is that anything other than an aggravating factor?
my point there was that there is a non-trivial number of people who think that we in the US are, in fact, fighting Islam because we are a Christian nation (a subset of those who mistakenly insist we are “Christian nation”).
and, i tried to say (but flubbed the first time through) that these people play directly into the propaganda efforts of those Muslims who insist that Christians are deliberately attacking Muslims because they are Muslims.
religious fundamentalists want to make this a battle of religions – because it helps recruitment, i suppose. and they are helped by people who seem eager to frame everything as an existential crisis.
well, i don’t buy either of those viewpoints.
we are not at war with Islam. and Christianity is not at war with Islam. there are a handful of people who, for whatever reason, have been seduced into adopting a perverse version of a religion that is, statistically speaking, about as peaceful as any religion has ever been. and those people are trying to frame their terrorism as a grand battle between their self-proclaimed-“pure” version of Islam and everybody else. and they’re killing many more Muslims than they are killing Christians or Jews. but by framing it as a war of religion, which sets all the fundamentalists and ‘existential’ hyperventilators into fits of stamping and foaming, they have distracted everybody into ignoring that. they’ve convinced people who apparently adore war and desperately want to live in a time of existential crisis that this is the battle for the future of civilization.
it’s not.
no, the problem not going away soon. but it’s going take more than Trumpian bluster and Cruzian bravado to fix it. what else ya got?
I was hoping to hear something from lefties here about how to address the situation.
and i’m still waiting for you to tell me about all of the great “decisive” military actions that the right has taken on. surely there must be some? and what is the right’s great plan to defeat ISIS? surely you must have one. otherwise, what are you doing by drawing a left/right divide here?
Maybe so, but if it does, how is that anything other than an aggravating factor?
my point there was that there is a non-trivial number of people who think that we in the US are, in fact, fighting Islam because we are a Christian nation (a subset of those who mistakenly insist we are “Christian nation”).
and, i tried to say (but flubbed the first time through) that these people play directly into the propaganda efforts of those Muslims who insist that Christians are deliberately attacking Muslims because they are Muslims.
religious fundamentalists want to make this a battle of religions – because it helps recruitment, i suppose. and they are helped by people who seem eager to frame everything as an existential crisis.
well, i don’t buy either of those viewpoints.
we are not at war with Islam. and Christianity is not at war with Islam. there are a handful of people who, for whatever reason, have been seduced into adopting a perverse version of a religion that is, statistically speaking, about as peaceful as any religion has ever been. and those people are trying to frame their terrorism as a grand battle between their self-proclaimed-“pure” version of Islam and everybody else. and they’re killing many more Muslims than they are killing Christians or Jews. but by framing it as a war of religion, which sets all the fundamentalists and ‘existential’ hyperventilators into fits of stamping and foaming, they have distracted everybody into ignoring that. they’ve convinced people who apparently adore war and desperately want to live in a time of existential crisis that this is the battle for the future of civilization.
it’s not.
no, the problem not going away soon. but it’s going take more than Trumpian bluster and Cruzian bravado to fix it. what else ya got?
I was hoping to hear something from lefties here about how to address the situation.
and i’m still waiting for you to tell me about all of the great “decisive” military actions that the right has taken on. surely there must be some? and what is the right’s great plan to defeat ISIS? surely you must have one. otherwise, what are you doing by drawing a left/right divide here?
“Ugh is correct. This isn’t going away anytime soon. I was hoping to hear something from lefties here about how to address the situation. Still waiting for that. Unless “I don’t know” is the answer.”
I may be wrong, but I thought Russell came down on the “I don’t know”.
Mostly, when I consider the zillion tons of ordnance dropped on the problem in the Mideast in the past whatever years and now the all-out Trump/Cruz assault on civil liberties in this country as the go-to alternative, just STOPPING all of that sounds like a good start on doing something.
As far as immigration security stateside, given the unemployment problem in this problem, hire one million new immigration agents and train them rigorously to screen EVERYONE entering the country, whether tourist, refugee, or work visa recipient and then follow-up in a disciplined but civilized and welcoming manner to make sure they are enjoying themselves pursuing the legit purposes for which they claimed to enter the country.
I’ve traveled abroad enough and in many different kinds of countries to realize that the entrance interview, even it’s just standing opposite a well-trained serious looking mofo agent and trying to hold eye contact without either laughing or dropping the illegal invasive species secreted in my pants, or triggering my non-explosive vest, is a sobering experience, capable of sending at least one testicle into my abdomen for safekeeping.
I expect a well-trained, smart hard ass can spot a another hard ass, male or female, most of the time.
Diplomatically in the Mideast, undermine the current conservative governments of all of those countries, from Israel to Bahrain, and from Saudi Arabia to Pakistan, by seeking back channel influence and economic carrots and sticks with more liberal, humanitarian political elements in those societies.
Course, that probably wouldn’t work in many cases, they’d just be disappeared.
But, given the recent elections in Iran which moderated their elected bodies considerably, it looks like the undermining Iran deal, much like the undermining Cuban deal, is having that very result.
No walls, no invasions. No turning away from hospitals and public assistance.
Batter up.
And the next time Trump and/or Cruz or any of these other characters say they will torture, or remove civil liberties from innocent people, arrest and prosecute the former under the new Homeland Security Protection From Asshole legislation, just to show the rest of the world that we take our exceptionalism seriously and we aren’t going to let idiots f*ck with it.
“Ugh is correct. This isn’t going away anytime soon. I was hoping to hear something from lefties here about how to address the situation. Still waiting for that. Unless “I don’t know” is the answer.”
I may be wrong, but I thought Russell came down on the “I don’t know”.
Mostly, when I consider the zillion tons of ordnance dropped on the problem in the Mideast in the past whatever years and now the all-out Trump/Cruz assault on civil liberties in this country as the go-to alternative, just STOPPING all of that sounds like a good start on doing something.
As far as immigration security stateside, given the unemployment problem in this problem, hire one million new immigration agents and train them rigorously to screen EVERYONE entering the country, whether tourist, refugee, or work visa recipient and then follow-up in a disciplined but civilized and welcoming manner to make sure they are enjoying themselves pursuing the legit purposes for which they claimed to enter the country.
I’ve traveled abroad enough and in many different kinds of countries to realize that the entrance interview, even it’s just standing opposite a well-trained serious looking mofo agent and trying to hold eye contact without either laughing or dropping the illegal invasive species secreted in my pants, or triggering my non-explosive vest, is a sobering experience, capable of sending at least one testicle into my abdomen for safekeeping.
I expect a well-trained, smart hard ass can spot a another hard ass, male or female, most of the time.
Diplomatically in the Mideast, undermine the current conservative governments of all of those countries, from Israel to Bahrain, and from Saudi Arabia to Pakistan, by seeking back channel influence and economic carrots and sticks with more liberal, humanitarian political elements in those societies.
Course, that probably wouldn’t work in many cases, they’d just be disappeared.
But, given the recent elections in Iran which moderated their elected bodies considerably, it looks like the undermining Iran deal, much like the undermining Cuban deal, is having that very result.
No walls, no invasions. No turning away from hospitals and public assistance.
Batter up.
And the next time Trump and/or Cruz or any of these other characters say they will torture, or remove civil liberties from innocent people, arrest and prosecute the former under the new Homeland Security Protection From Asshole legislation, just to show the rest of the world that we take our exceptionalism seriously and we aren’t going to let idiots f*ck with it.
“Ugh is correct. This isn’t going away anytime soon. I was hoping to hear something from lefties here about how to address the situation. Still waiting for that. Unless “I don’t know” is the answer.”
I may be wrong, but I thought Russell came down on the “I don’t know”.
Mostly, when I consider the zillion tons of ordnance dropped on the problem in the Mideast in the past whatever years and now the all-out Trump/Cruz assault on civil liberties in this country as the go-to alternative, just STOPPING all of that sounds like a good start on doing something.
As far as immigration security stateside, given the unemployment problem in this problem, hire one million new immigration agents and train them rigorously to screen EVERYONE entering the country, whether tourist, refugee, or work visa recipient and then follow-up in a disciplined but civilized and welcoming manner to make sure they are enjoying themselves pursuing the legit purposes for which they claimed to enter the country.
I’ve traveled abroad enough and in many different kinds of countries to realize that the entrance interview, even it’s just standing opposite a well-trained serious looking mofo agent and trying to hold eye contact without either laughing or dropping the illegal invasive species secreted in my pants, or triggering my non-explosive vest, is a sobering experience, capable of sending at least one testicle into my abdomen for safekeeping.
I expect a well-trained, smart hard ass can spot a another hard ass, male or female, most of the time.
Diplomatically in the Mideast, undermine the current conservative governments of all of those countries, from Israel to Bahrain, and from Saudi Arabia to Pakistan, by seeking back channel influence and economic carrots and sticks with more liberal, humanitarian political elements in those societies.
Course, that probably wouldn’t work in many cases, they’d just be disappeared.
But, given the recent elections in Iran which moderated their elected bodies considerably, it looks like the undermining Iran deal, much like the undermining Cuban deal, is having that very result.
No walls, no invasions. No turning away from hospitals and public assistance.
Batter up.
And the next time Trump and/or Cruz or any of these other characters say they will torture, or remove civil liberties from innocent people, arrest and prosecute the former under the new Homeland Security Protection From Asshole legislation, just to show the rest of the world that we take our exceptionalism seriously and we aren’t going to let idiots f*ck with it.
“unemployment problem in this ‘country””
YMMV
“unemployment problem in this ‘country””
YMMV
“unemployment problem in this ‘country””
YMMV
I was hoping to hear something from lefties here about how to address the situation. Still waiting for that. Unless “I don’t know” is the answer.
I have no idea what a “lefty” solution might look like. But I do have some vague thoughts on what parts of a solution might be.
– We need radical political and economic changes in the Middle East. Ones which will give young men some vision of how they can accomplish something outside the radical religious context. [We need the same thing in Europe, especially with respect to their (frequently Muslim) immigrant populations, too.]
At the moment, there is nothing much to do for young Saudi men, and very little constructive to do for young men across the region. “Idle hands do the devil’s work” and all that.
Also, in a lot of countries, the mosque is the only alternative to government organizations. The only place where anyone who is not willing to just accept the (bad) government they have can meet and talk. Which colors the kind of alternatives that get discussed.
– We need to slash the economic power of the Saudis to warp the way Islam is taught around the world. At the moment, they spend massive amounts of money to fund mosques and schools which teach their particular, fundamentalist, brand of Islam. If they didn’t have the money, Wahabism would be a fringe Arab sect at most. As it is, it has been spread far and wide.
Dropping oil prices will help with that — as long as it lasts. But I’m not sure that will be enough. Maybe we can refrain from getting involved while they wade in to some more unwinable local wars….
– While we’re at it, in a lot of places, the only education available is at the mosque. Having somewhere else that kids can be taught, and taught something besides religion, would be a big step forward. All those kids are going to have to live in the modern world . . . unless the ISIS types manage to restore the 12th century, of course. And they are going to need to know something about how it works to get jobs doing something other than fighting.
Will that still leave some disgruntled young men, who will still want to start a fight and/or blow something up? Sure. We have them in militias here. But what is important is getting the numbers down to where they are an irritant, not a significant threat.
I was hoping to hear something from lefties here about how to address the situation. Still waiting for that. Unless “I don’t know” is the answer.
I have no idea what a “lefty” solution might look like. But I do have some vague thoughts on what parts of a solution might be.
– We need radical political and economic changes in the Middle East. Ones which will give young men some vision of how they can accomplish something outside the radical religious context. [We need the same thing in Europe, especially with respect to their (frequently Muslim) immigrant populations, too.]
At the moment, there is nothing much to do for young Saudi men, and very little constructive to do for young men across the region. “Idle hands do the devil’s work” and all that.
Also, in a lot of countries, the mosque is the only alternative to government organizations. The only place where anyone who is not willing to just accept the (bad) government they have can meet and talk. Which colors the kind of alternatives that get discussed.
– We need to slash the economic power of the Saudis to warp the way Islam is taught around the world. At the moment, they spend massive amounts of money to fund mosques and schools which teach their particular, fundamentalist, brand of Islam. If they didn’t have the money, Wahabism would be a fringe Arab sect at most. As it is, it has been spread far and wide.
Dropping oil prices will help with that — as long as it lasts. But I’m not sure that will be enough. Maybe we can refrain from getting involved while they wade in to some more unwinable local wars….
– While we’re at it, in a lot of places, the only education available is at the mosque. Having somewhere else that kids can be taught, and taught something besides religion, would be a big step forward. All those kids are going to have to live in the modern world . . . unless the ISIS types manage to restore the 12th century, of course. And they are going to need to know something about how it works to get jobs doing something other than fighting.
Will that still leave some disgruntled young men, who will still want to start a fight and/or blow something up? Sure. We have them in militias here. But what is important is getting the numbers down to where they are an irritant, not a significant threat.
I was hoping to hear something from lefties here about how to address the situation. Still waiting for that. Unless “I don’t know” is the answer.
I have no idea what a “lefty” solution might look like. But I do have some vague thoughts on what parts of a solution might be.
– We need radical political and economic changes in the Middle East. Ones which will give young men some vision of how they can accomplish something outside the radical religious context. [We need the same thing in Europe, especially with respect to their (frequently Muslim) immigrant populations, too.]
At the moment, there is nothing much to do for young Saudi men, and very little constructive to do for young men across the region. “Idle hands do the devil’s work” and all that.
Also, in a lot of countries, the mosque is the only alternative to government organizations. The only place where anyone who is not willing to just accept the (bad) government they have can meet and talk. Which colors the kind of alternatives that get discussed.
– We need to slash the economic power of the Saudis to warp the way Islam is taught around the world. At the moment, they spend massive amounts of money to fund mosques and schools which teach their particular, fundamentalist, brand of Islam. If they didn’t have the money, Wahabism would be a fringe Arab sect at most. As it is, it has been spread far and wide.
Dropping oil prices will help with that — as long as it lasts. But I’m not sure that will be enough. Maybe we can refrain from getting involved while they wade in to some more unwinable local wars….
– While we’re at it, in a lot of places, the only education available is at the mosque. Having somewhere else that kids can be taught, and taught something besides religion, would be a big step forward. All those kids are going to have to live in the modern world . . . unless the ISIS types manage to restore the 12th century, of course. And they are going to need to know something about how it works to get jobs doing something other than fighting.
Will that still leave some disgruntled young men, who will still want to start a fight and/or blow something up? Sure. We have them in militias here. But what is important is getting the numbers down to where they are an irritant, not a significant threat.
and i’m still waiting for you to tell me about all of the great “decisive” military actions that the right has taken on. surely there must be some? and what is the right’s great plan to defeat ISIS? surely you must have one. otherwise, what are you doing by drawing a left/right divide here?
I give “the right” credit for turning around Saddam’s invasion of Kuwait and the initial success in Afghanistan. I give “the right” credit for deterring the Soviet Union long enough for it to fall apart. I give “the right” including me credit for invading Iraq, so that’s one on the negative side and a big one. I give a slice of “the right” credit for understanding how defense works and for recognizing real, potentially existential risks in the world and for having a much more realistic view of what it would take in material terms to deal with those threats if things ever got out of hand. However, that is a sideshow. I made the point that Cruz and Trump were demonstrably idiots. By default, that leaves your group. Does your group have a plan?
by seeking back channel influence and economic carrots and sticks with more liberal, humanitarian political elements in those societies.
Good plan. I like it. Heading home for a vino. Adios, Count.
and i’m still waiting for you to tell me about all of the great “decisive” military actions that the right has taken on. surely there must be some? and what is the right’s great plan to defeat ISIS? surely you must have one. otherwise, what are you doing by drawing a left/right divide here?
I give “the right” credit for turning around Saddam’s invasion of Kuwait and the initial success in Afghanistan. I give “the right” credit for deterring the Soviet Union long enough for it to fall apart. I give “the right” including me credit for invading Iraq, so that’s one on the negative side and a big one. I give a slice of “the right” credit for understanding how defense works and for recognizing real, potentially existential risks in the world and for having a much more realistic view of what it would take in material terms to deal with those threats if things ever got out of hand. However, that is a sideshow. I made the point that Cruz and Trump were demonstrably idiots. By default, that leaves your group. Does your group have a plan?
by seeking back channel influence and economic carrots and sticks with more liberal, humanitarian political elements in those societies.
Good plan. I like it. Heading home for a vino. Adios, Count.
and i’m still waiting for you to tell me about all of the great “decisive” military actions that the right has taken on. surely there must be some? and what is the right’s great plan to defeat ISIS? surely you must have one. otherwise, what are you doing by drawing a left/right divide here?
I give “the right” credit for turning around Saddam’s invasion of Kuwait and the initial success in Afghanistan. I give “the right” credit for deterring the Soviet Union long enough for it to fall apart. I give “the right” including me credit for invading Iraq, so that’s one on the negative side and a big one. I give a slice of “the right” credit for understanding how defense works and for recognizing real, potentially existential risks in the world and for having a much more realistic view of what it would take in material terms to deal with those threats if things ever got out of hand. However, that is a sideshow. I made the point that Cruz and Trump were demonstrably idiots. By default, that leaves your group. Does your group have a plan?
by seeking back channel influence and economic carrots and sticks with more liberal, humanitarian political elements in those societies.
Good plan. I like it. Heading home for a vino. Adios, Count.
Who would want to cut another person’s head off?
I have to admit that there are people that I fantasize about doing pretty nasty things to.
Personal cutting of throats is not included though. Too messy and far to quick and good for those guys. Breaking on the wheel would be more like it but only after the extended capsaicin cure (imagine burning at the stake without any fire involved).
Who would want to cut another person’s head off?
I have to admit that there are people that I fantasize about doing pretty nasty things to.
Personal cutting of throats is not included though. Too messy and far to quick and good for those guys. Breaking on the wheel would be more like it but only after the extended capsaicin cure (imagine burning at the stake without any fire involved).
Who would want to cut another person’s head off?
I have to admit that there are people that I fantasize about doing pretty nasty things to.
Personal cutting of throats is not included though. Too messy and far to quick and good for those guys. Breaking on the wheel would be more like it but only after the extended capsaicin cure (imagine burning at the stake without any fire involved).
As far as immigration security stateside, given the unemployment problem in this problem, hire one million new immigration agents and train them rigorously to screen EVERYONE entering the country, whether tourist, refugee, or work visa recipient and then follow-up in a disciplined but civilized and welcoming manner to make sure they are enjoying themselves pursuing the legit purposes for which they claimed to enter the country.
Count, to get me to sign on to this, you are going to have to give me some reason to believe that it would work out better than the TSA jobs program we have already. Yes, TSA employs lots of people. But nobody can convince me that they are capable of rigorous work you envision.
Now maybe that is just a matter of a better training program. But has anyone seen an example of a massive training program like that? I mean, one which actually worked as intended?
The closest thing I can recall is the CCC (Civilian Construction Corps) during the Depression. It actually accomplished some useful work. But it was doing pretty low-tech construction work. Not something that requires high levels of people skills.
As far as immigration security stateside, given the unemployment problem in this problem, hire one million new immigration agents and train them rigorously to screen EVERYONE entering the country, whether tourist, refugee, or work visa recipient and then follow-up in a disciplined but civilized and welcoming manner to make sure they are enjoying themselves pursuing the legit purposes for which they claimed to enter the country.
Count, to get me to sign on to this, you are going to have to give me some reason to believe that it would work out better than the TSA jobs program we have already. Yes, TSA employs lots of people. But nobody can convince me that they are capable of rigorous work you envision.
Now maybe that is just a matter of a better training program. But has anyone seen an example of a massive training program like that? I mean, one which actually worked as intended?
The closest thing I can recall is the CCC (Civilian Construction Corps) during the Depression. It actually accomplished some useful work. But it was doing pretty low-tech construction work. Not something that requires high levels of people skills.
As far as immigration security stateside, given the unemployment problem in this problem, hire one million new immigration agents and train them rigorously to screen EVERYONE entering the country, whether tourist, refugee, or work visa recipient and then follow-up in a disciplined but civilized and welcoming manner to make sure they are enjoying themselves pursuing the legit purposes for which they claimed to enter the country.
Count, to get me to sign on to this, you are going to have to give me some reason to believe that it would work out better than the TSA jobs program we have already. Yes, TSA employs lots of people. But nobody can convince me that they are capable of rigorous work you envision.
Now maybe that is just a matter of a better training program. But has anyone seen an example of a massive training program like that? I mean, one which actually worked as intended?
The closest thing I can recall is the CCC (Civilian Construction Corps) during the Depression. It actually accomplished some useful work. But it was doing pretty low-tech construction work. Not something that requires high levels of people skills.
“The closest thing I can recall is the CCC (Civilian Construction Corps) during the Depression.”
WPA. They also hired writers, artists, etc, for public projects.
“The closest thing I can recall is the CCC (Civilian Construction Corps) during the Depression.”
WPA. They also hired writers, artists, etc, for public projects.
“The closest thing I can recall is the CCC (Civilian Construction Corps) during the Depression.”
WPA. They also hired writers, artists, etc, for public projects.
Re: “profiling”
while it seems like a quick ‘win’, the problem is that if you concentrate your effort on X, your opponents will start using “not-X”.
you need to have a random-sample component, independent of stuff like “morally and ethically acceptable”, “PC”, “you’re just gonna piss ’em off more”, and “YOOOGE violation of constitutional principles”.
Re: “profiling”
while it seems like a quick ‘win’, the problem is that if you concentrate your effort on X, your opponents will start using “not-X”.
you need to have a random-sample component, independent of stuff like “morally and ethically acceptable”, “PC”, “you’re just gonna piss ’em off more”, and “YOOOGE violation of constitutional principles”.
Re: “profiling”
while it seems like a quick ‘win’, the problem is that if you concentrate your effort on X, your opponents will start using “not-X”.
you need to have a random-sample component, independent of stuff like “morally and ethically acceptable”, “PC”, “you’re just gonna piss ’em off more”, and “YOOOGE violation of constitutional principles”.
McT,
I give “the right” credit for deterring the Soviet Union long enough for it to fall apart.
I think this is inaccurate. NATO and the rebuilding of Europe were bipartisan efforts, and these were main forces of deterrence. There was always considerable liberal support for strong deterrence:
“Let every nation know, whether it wishes us well or ill, that we shall pay any price, bear any burden, meet any hardship, support any friend, oppose any foe, in order to assure the survival and the success of liberty.”
We an certainly differ about specific policy disagreements, but the myth that Reagan telling Gorbachev to tear down the wall led directly to the collapse of the Soviet Union is just that – a simplistic myth.
Empires collapse for lots of reasons, not least internal corruption, non-functioning economies and the consequent dissatisfactions, and other things. So take a litlle credit, but not too much, and not all of it.
McT,
I give “the right” credit for deterring the Soviet Union long enough for it to fall apart.
I think this is inaccurate. NATO and the rebuilding of Europe were bipartisan efforts, and these were main forces of deterrence. There was always considerable liberal support for strong deterrence:
“Let every nation know, whether it wishes us well or ill, that we shall pay any price, bear any burden, meet any hardship, support any friend, oppose any foe, in order to assure the survival and the success of liberty.”
We an certainly differ about specific policy disagreements, but the myth that Reagan telling Gorbachev to tear down the wall led directly to the collapse of the Soviet Union is just that – a simplistic myth.
Empires collapse for lots of reasons, not least internal corruption, non-functioning economies and the consequent dissatisfactions, and other things. So take a litlle credit, but not too much, and not all of it.
McT,
I give “the right” credit for deterring the Soviet Union long enough for it to fall apart.
I think this is inaccurate. NATO and the rebuilding of Europe were bipartisan efforts, and these were main forces of deterrence. There was always considerable liberal support for strong deterrence:
“Let every nation know, whether it wishes us well or ill, that we shall pay any price, bear any burden, meet any hardship, support any friend, oppose any foe, in order to assure the survival and the success of liberty.”
We an certainly differ about specific policy disagreements, but the myth that Reagan telling Gorbachev to tear down the wall led directly to the collapse of the Soviet Union is just that – a simplistic myth.
Empires collapse for lots of reasons, not least internal corruption, non-functioning economies and the consequent dissatisfactions, and other things. So take a litlle credit, but not too much, and not all of it.
And I give credit to George F. Kennan, Harry Truman and the policy of containment
And I give credit to George F. Kennan, Harry Truman and the policy of containment
And I give credit to George F. Kennan, Harry Truman and the policy of containment
I give credit to the mountains of Afghanistan.
I give credit to the mountains of Afghanistan.
I give credit to the mountains of Afghanistan.
What motivates people to blow up airplanes or set off bombs at ticket counters or fly planes into buildings?
What motivates people to kill thousands with sanctions, train dictators in oppression and torture, supply them with arms and technology, incarcerate and torture innocent people, blow up wedding parties with drones and first responders with double tap strikes …
Beats me.
What motivates people to blow up airplanes or set off bombs at ticket counters or fly planes into buildings?
What motivates people to kill thousands with sanctions, train dictators in oppression and torture, supply them with arms and technology, incarcerate and torture innocent people, blow up wedding parties with drones and first responders with double tap strikes …
Beats me.
What motivates people to blow up airplanes or set off bombs at ticket counters or fly planes into buildings?
What motivates people to kill thousands with sanctions, train dictators in oppression and torture, supply them with arms and technology, incarcerate and torture innocent people, blow up wedding parties with drones and first responders with double tap strikes …
Beats me.
What motivates people to kill thousands with sanctions, train dictators in oppression and torture, supply them with arms and technology, incarcerate and torture innocent people, blow up wedding parties with drones and first responders with double tap strikes …
Apparently, ivy league institutions don’t teach future policy makers Greek mythology any more.
What motivates people to kill thousands with sanctions, train dictators in oppression and torture, supply them with arms and technology, incarcerate and torture innocent people, blow up wedding parties with drones and first responders with double tap strikes …
Apparently, ivy league institutions don’t teach future policy makers Greek mythology any more.
What motivates people to kill thousands with sanctions, train dictators in oppression and torture, supply them with arms and technology, incarcerate and torture innocent people, blow up wedding parties with drones and first responders with double tap strikes …
Apparently, ivy league institutions don’t teach future policy makers Greek mythology any more.
Does your group have a plan?
I have some plans.
If we want to eliminate ISIS as an actor in the Middle East, we will need to assemble an overwhelming military force, put it in country, and leave it there for a generation.
As far as I can tell, that’s what it will take.
I don’t see a constituency for that, on the right, left, or middle, so I don’t see it happening. But that’s my plan, and it’s as good as any other plan I’ve seen.
The fact that nobody wants to sign up for it ain’t my fault.
Were we to do that, it would have zero effect on acts of terror like what we’ve seen in Brussels, Paris, San Bernardino, and elsewhere. It’s just not that hard to kill a lot of people if you’re determined to do it, and especially if you’re willing to blow yourself up in the process.
It’s among the easier things in the world, it appears. All it requires a willingness to actually do it, which thankfully is not that common.
What I suggest is that, if what we want is to minimize people getting to a state of mind where they are willing to brutally kill random strangers, that we not respond to crap like Brussels by embarking on a program of harassment of all of the Muslims, Arabs, South Asians, or any other scary-looking demographic.
It’s hard to blow up a random collection of strangers if you recognize your common humanity with them. If you treat people humanely, and with respect, they will be more likely to recognize their common bond of humanity with you. They will be less likely to be willing to blow you up, or cut your head off.
So, as far as dealing with acts of random religiously inspired terror, my plan is that we do our utmost to make people who live among us, and who are at some risk of being inspired by fanatical violent religious propaganda, feel that we welcome them and wish them well.
That’s my plan on that front.
Muslim and Arab people wait on my at local restaurants, fix my car, are co-workers of mine at my job. One of the counter girls at my local pizzeria wears a hijab, I assume she’s a Muslim.
If these folks want to kill me, I’m probably going to end up dead.
So, my best best is not to treat them with suspicion or hostility. It’s not a matter of ‘slathering policy gomgoozalum’ on anything, it’s a matter of establishing a relationship of common humanity with people who might otherwise be prone to viewing me with some hostility. For whatever reason.
I don’t know how people get to the point where chopping somebody’s head off, or blowing somebody up, is a good idea. Lucky me.
As far as I can tell, my best shot at not having somebody that I know or come in contact with get to that point is to treat them with respect and basic human decency.
If McK wants to convince his people on ‘the right’ to re-instate the draft, send hundreds of thousands of their sons and daughters to Syria and Iraq for about the next 20 years, expect that a non-trivial number of them will not be coming back, and raise their taxes by a hefty amount to pay for the privilege, then we’re on the same page.
If ISIS are the “new Nazis”, let’s treat them like the new Nazis. Crush them utterly and thoroughly. They suck. Let’s plow them into the fucking sand. I’m up for it if folks on ‘the right’ are up for it.
That said:
ISIS is not highly likely to blow me up. I live on the East Coast of North America, if I’m gonna get offed, it’s probably gonna be some dumb-asses like the Tsarnaevs, or Mohammed Atta, or some other disaffected angry shit-heel loser.
My best bet to avoid that is to treat the Muslim and/or Arab people I actually do know and meet with respect and kindness.
I don’t need ‘the right’ to do that, so I’m just gonna move ahead with that plan.
Does your group have a plan?
I have some plans.
If we want to eliminate ISIS as an actor in the Middle East, we will need to assemble an overwhelming military force, put it in country, and leave it there for a generation.
As far as I can tell, that’s what it will take.
I don’t see a constituency for that, on the right, left, or middle, so I don’t see it happening. But that’s my plan, and it’s as good as any other plan I’ve seen.
The fact that nobody wants to sign up for it ain’t my fault.
Were we to do that, it would have zero effect on acts of terror like what we’ve seen in Brussels, Paris, San Bernardino, and elsewhere. It’s just not that hard to kill a lot of people if you’re determined to do it, and especially if you’re willing to blow yourself up in the process.
It’s among the easier things in the world, it appears. All it requires a willingness to actually do it, which thankfully is not that common.
What I suggest is that, if what we want is to minimize people getting to a state of mind where they are willing to brutally kill random strangers, that we not respond to crap like Brussels by embarking on a program of harassment of all of the Muslims, Arabs, South Asians, or any other scary-looking demographic.
It’s hard to blow up a random collection of strangers if you recognize your common humanity with them. If you treat people humanely, and with respect, they will be more likely to recognize their common bond of humanity with you. They will be less likely to be willing to blow you up, or cut your head off.
So, as far as dealing with acts of random religiously inspired terror, my plan is that we do our utmost to make people who live among us, and who are at some risk of being inspired by fanatical violent religious propaganda, feel that we welcome them and wish them well.
That’s my plan on that front.
Muslim and Arab people wait on my at local restaurants, fix my car, are co-workers of mine at my job. One of the counter girls at my local pizzeria wears a hijab, I assume she’s a Muslim.
If these folks want to kill me, I’m probably going to end up dead.
So, my best best is not to treat them with suspicion or hostility. It’s not a matter of ‘slathering policy gomgoozalum’ on anything, it’s a matter of establishing a relationship of common humanity with people who might otherwise be prone to viewing me with some hostility. For whatever reason.
I don’t know how people get to the point where chopping somebody’s head off, or blowing somebody up, is a good idea. Lucky me.
As far as I can tell, my best shot at not having somebody that I know or come in contact with get to that point is to treat them with respect and basic human decency.
If McK wants to convince his people on ‘the right’ to re-instate the draft, send hundreds of thousands of their sons and daughters to Syria and Iraq for about the next 20 years, expect that a non-trivial number of them will not be coming back, and raise their taxes by a hefty amount to pay for the privilege, then we’re on the same page.
If ISIS are the “new Nazis”, let’s treat them like the new Nazis. Crush them utterly and thoroughly. They suck. Let’s plow them into the fucking sand. I’m up for it if folks on ‘the right’ are up for it.
That said:
ISIS is not highly likely to blow me up. I live on the East Coast of North America, if I’m gonna get offed, it’s probably gonna be some dumb-asses like the Tsarnaevs, or Mohammed Atta, or some other disaffected angry shit-heel loser.
My best bet to avoid that is to treat the Muslim and/or Arab people I actually do know and meet with respect and kindness.
I don’t need ‘the right’ to do that, so I’m just gonna move ahead with that plan.
Does your group have a plan?
I have some plans.
If we want to eliminate ISIS as an actor in the Middle East, we will need to assemble an overwhelming military force, put it in country, and leave it there for a generation.
As far as I can tell, that’s what it will take.
I don’t see a constituency for that, on the right, left, or middle, so I don’t see it happening. But that’s my plan, and it’s as good as any other plan I’ve seen.
The fact that nobody wants to sign up for it ain’t my fault.
Were we to do that, it would have zero effect on acts of terror like what we’ve seen in Brussels, Paris, San Bernardino, and elsewhere. It’s just not that hard to kill a lot of people if you’re determined to do it, and especially if you’re willing to blow yourself up in the process.
It’s among the easier things in the world, it appears. All it requires a willingness to actually do it, which thankfully is not that common.
What I suggest is that, if what we want is to minimize people getting to a state of mind where they are willing to brutally kill random strangers, that we not respond to crap like Brussels by embarking on a program of harassment of all of the Muslims, Arabs, South Asians, or any other scary-looking demographic.
It’s hard to blow up a random collection of strangers if you recognize your common humanity with them. If you treat people humanely, and with respect, they will be more likely to recognize their common bond of humanity with you. They will be less likely to be willing to blow you up, or cut your head off.
So, as far as dealing with acts of random religiously inspired terror, my plan is that we do our utmost to make people who live among us, and who are at some risk of being inspired by fanatical violent religious propaganda, feel that we welcome them and wish them well.
That’s my plan on that front.
Muslim and Arab people wait on my at local restaurants, fix my car, are co-workers of mine at my job. One of the counter girls at my local pizzeria wears a hijab, I assume she’s a Muslim.
If these folks want to kill me, I’m probably going to end up dead.
So, my best best is not to treat them with suspicion or hostility. It’s not a matter of ‘slathering policy gomgoozalum’ on anything, it’s a matter of establishing a relationship of common humanity with people who might otherwise be prone to viewing me with some hostility. For whatever reason.
I don’t know how people get to the point where chopping somebody’s head off, or blowing somebody up, is a good idea. Lucky me.
As far as I can tell, my best shot at not having somebody that I know or come in contact with get to that point is to treat them with respect and basic human decency.
If McK wants to convince his people on ‘the right’ to re-instate the draft, send hundreds of thousands of their sons and daughters to Syria and Iraq for about the next 20 years, expect that a non-trivial number of them will not be coming back, and raise their taxes by a hefty amount to pay for the privilege, then we’re on the same page.
If ISIS are the “new Nazis”, let’s treat them like the new Nazis. Crush them utterly and thoroughly. They suck. Let’s plow them into the fucking sand. I’m up for it if folks on ‘the right’ are up for it.
That said:
ISIS is not highly likely to blow me up. I live on the East Coast of North America, if I’m gonna get offed, it’s probably gonna be some dumb-asses like the Tsarnaevs, or Mohammed Atta, or some other disaffected angry shit-heel loser.
My best bet to avoid that is to treat the Muslim and/or Arab people I actually do know and meet with respect and kindness.
I don’t need ‘the right’ to do that, so I’m just gonna move ahead with that plan.
Thelonious Monk on race relations:
My plan for dealing with religiously-inspired acts of terror here in the good old USA is to be like the “some white guy” that Monk kept meeting.
I don’t think there’s a better plan available.
Thelonious Monk on race relations:
My plan for dealing with religiously-inspired acts of terror here in the good old USA is to be like the “some white guy” that Monk kept meeting.
I don’t think there’s a better plan available.
Thelonious Monk on race relations:
My plan for dealing with religiously-inspired acts of terror here in the good old USA is to be like the “some white guy” that Monk kept meeting.
I don’t think there’s a better plan available.
I’m just going to wear a helmet when I drive to decrease my chances of dying in the next several years. Or not. But I might avoid standing outside with a long metal rod in my hand during electrical storms. That’ll be easier, since I can avoid doing that passively. I never do that, anyway.
Now I can sleep at night, knowing I’ve increased my survival chances moreso, by orders of magnitute, than would devoting the resources of the United States government to an all-out effort to eliminate ISIS.
You can all thank me for your lower tax bills (or saving you from whatever fretting you might do over higher deficits) than would have resulted from any ISIS-elimination effort.
I’m just going to wear a helmet when I drive to decrease my chances of dying in the next several years. Or not. But I might avoid standing outside with a long metal rod in my hand during electrical storms. That’ll be easier, since I can avoid doing that passively. I never do that, anyway.
Now I can sleep at night, knowing I’ve increased my survival chances moreso, by orders of magnitute, than would devoting the resources of the United States government to an all-out effort to eliminate ISIS.
You can all thank me for your lower tax bills (or saving you from whatever fretting you might do over higher deficits) than would have resulted from any ISIS-elimination effort.
I’m just going to wear a helmet when I drive to decrease my chances of dying in the next several years. Or not. But I might avoid standing outside with a long metal rod in my hand during electrical storms. That’ll be easier, since I can avoid doing that passively. I never do that, anyway.
Now I can sleep at night, knowing I’ve increased my survival chances moreso, by orders of magnitute, than would devoting the resources of the United States government to an all-out effort to eliminate ISIS.
You can all thank me for your lower tax bills (or saving you from whatever fretting you might do over higher deficits) than would have resulted from any ISIS-elimination effort.
HSH, it’s obvious you haven’t a clue what macho means. (Maybe you even realize it’s a word we picked up from the Mexicans.) But it’s a critical concept here.
Every real man knows that, if you do something that is merely effective, but doesn’t involve a lot of posturing, it’s worthless. In fact, effectiveness is almost a negative — it detracts from the merit gained by proper posturing.
You do get a gain, however, if your posturing can be combined blowing stuff up. Loudly. And even more if someone (especially someone else) can get injured or killed. The more someone elses the better.
It’s a concept that works in inner city gangs. And in certain parts of our political spectrum. (To anyone who feels I am picking on them here, all I can say is “If the shoe fits . . . .”)
HSH, it’s obvious you haven’t a clue what macho means. (Maybe you even realize it’s a word we picked up from the Mexicans.) But it’s a critical concept here.
Every real man knows that, if you do something that is merely effective, but doesn’t involve a lot of posturing, it’s worthless. In fact, effectiveness is almost a negative — it detracts from the merit gained by proper posturing.
You do get a gain, however, if your posturing can be combined blowing stuff up. Loudly. And even more if someone (especially someone else) can get injured or killed. The more someone elses the better.
It’s a concept that works in inner city gangs. And in certain parts of our political spectrum. (To anyone who feels I am picking on them here, all I can say is “If the shoe fits . . . .”)
HSH, it’s obvious you haven’t a clue what macho means. (Maybe you even realize it’s a word we picked up from the Mexicans.) But it’s a critical concept here.
Every real man knows that, if you do something that is merely effective, but doesn’t involve a lot of posturing, it’s worthless. In fact, effectiveness is almost a negative — it detracts from the merit gained by proper posturing.
You do get a gain, however, if your posturing can be combined blowing stuff up. Loudly. And even more if someone (especially someone else) can get injured or killed. The more someone elses the better.
It’s a concept that works in inner city gangs. And in certain parts of our political spectrum. (To anyone who feels I am picking on them here, all I can say is “If the shoe fits . . . .”)
I give “the right” credit for turning around Saddam’s invasion of Kuwait and the initial success in Afghanistan. I give “the right” credit for deterring the Soviet Union long enough for it to fall apart. I give “the right” including me credit for invading Iraq,
i’ll give you HW’s invasion of Iraq. and counter it with Kosovo.
and your initial assertion was that the left was somehow working to avoid and/or prevent “decisive” military victories. so it seems strange to count “initial” successes (that immediately fall into chaos and then bring even bigger problems) as examples of the right’s great military record.
would you count Libya as a great decisive military victory for Obama?
Does your group have a plan?
several. there’s one being implemented right now in fact.
i haven’t heard anything better come from anyone on the right. i hear a lot of childish bluster and magical thinking about the power of symbols – and idiotic things like conflating Iran and ISIS.
I give “the right” credit for turning around Saddam’s invasion of Kuwait and the initial success in Afghanistan. I give “the right” credit for deterring the Soviet Union long enough for it to fall apart. I give “the right” including me credit for invading Iraq,
i’ll give you HW’s invasion of Iraq. and counter it with Kosovo.
and your initial assertion was that the left was somehow working to avoid and/or prevent “decisive” military victories. so it seems strange to count “initial” successes (that immediately fall into chaos and then bring even bigger problems) as examples of the right’s great military record.
would you count Libya as a great decisive military victory for Obama?
Does your group have a plan?
several. there’s one being implemented right now in fact.
i haven’t heard anything better come from anyone on the right. i hear a lot of childish bluster and magical thinking about the power of symbols – and idiotic things like conflating Iran and ISIS.
I give “the right” credit for turning around Saddam’s invasion of Kuwait and the initial success in Afghanistan. I give “the right” credit for deterring the Soviet Union long enough for it to fall apart. I give “the right” including me credit for invading Iraq,
i’ll give you HW’s invasion of Iraq. and counter it with Kosovo.
and your initial assertion was that the left was somehow working to avoid and/or prevent “decisive” military victories. so it seems strange to count “initial” successes (that immediately fall into chaos and then bring even bigger problems) as examples of the right’s great military record.
would you count Libya as a great decisive military victory for Obama?
Does your group have a plan?
several. there’s one being implemented right now in fact.
i haven’t heard anything better come from anyone on the right. i hear a lot of childish bluster and magical thinking about the power of symbols – and idiotic things like conflating Iran and ISIS.
NPR asked noted squish and former CIA and NSA director, Micheal Hayden, about the rhetoric coming from the candidates about what to do about Muslims. he replied:
but, of course it’s much more thrilling and invigorating to pretend that western civ is teetering on the edge of being wiped out by a couple thousand lunatics.
NPR asked noted squish and former CIA and NSA director, Micheal Hayden, about the rhetoric coming from the candidates about what to do about Muslims. he replied:
but, of course it’s much more thrilling and invigorating to pretend that western civ is teetering on the edge of being wiped out by a couple thousand lunatics.
NPR asked noted squish and former CIA and NSA director, Micheal Hayden, about the rhetoric coming from the candidates about what to do about Muslims. he replied:
but, of course it’s much more thrilling and invigorating to pretend that western civ is teetering on the edge of being wiped out by a couple thousand lunatics.
I’ve been trying to express what Hayden did in that quote, but I haven’t been as successful at it. I think I’ll just commit what Hayden said to memory so I can recite it as the need arises.
I’ve been trying to express what Hayden did in that quote, but I haven’t been as successful at it. I think I’ll just commit what Hayden said to memory so I can recite it as the need arises.
I’ve been trying to express what Hayden did in that quote, but I haven’t been as successful at it. I think I’ll just commit what Hayden said to memory so I can recite it as the need arises.
ditto
ditto
ditto
The best part is, when you get accused of being a mush-headed liberal who’s out of touch with the hard realities of life, you can point out that you’re quoting a 4-star USAF general who was the head of the CIA and NSA under George W. Bush and an advocate of “enhanced interrogation.” (Like you wrote, “noted squish.”)
The best part is, when you get accused of being a mush-headed liberal who’s out of touch with the hard realities of life, you can point out that you’re quoting a 4-star USAF general who was the head of the CIA and NSA under George W. Bush and an advocate of “enhanced interrogation.” (Like you wrote, “noted squish.”)
The best part is, when you get accused of being a mush-headed liberal who’s out of touch with the hard realities of life, you can point out that you’re quoting a 4-star USAF general who was the head of the CIA and NSA under George W. Bush and an advocate of “enhanced interrogation.” (Like you wrote, “noted squish.”)
The best part for Hayden is that he’s quoting us.
It might be the worst part for him too as he is introduced to the enhanced interrogation techniques and undying enmity of the Republican leaders now wielding THEIR jihadi narrative.
The best part for Hayden is that he’s quoting us.
It might be the worst part for him too as he is introduced to the enhanced interrogation techniques and undying enmity of the Republican leaders now wielding THEIR jihadi narrative.
The best part for Hayden is that he’s quoting us.
It might be the worst part for him too as he is introduced to the enhanced interrogation techniques and undying enmity of the Republican leaders now wielding THEIR jihadi narrative.
If things become too stressful for him, Hayden might want to practice some relaxation/mindfulness/flexibility techniques:
http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/georgia-parents-freak-out-yoga-classes-non-christian
Namaste, Hari Krishna, and the Devil take Dagny Taggart’s hindmost later.
If things become too stressful for him, Hayden might want to practice some relaxation/mindfulness/flexibility techniques:
http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/georgia-parents-freak-out-yoga-classes-non-christian
Namaste, Hari Krishna, and the Devil take Dagny Taggart’s hindmost later.
If things become too stressful for him, Hayden might want to practice some relaxation/mindfulness/flexibility techniques:
http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/georgia-parents-freak-out-yoga-classes-non-christian
Namaste, Hari Krishna, and the Devil take Dagny Taggart’s hindmost later.
I doubt less Hayden’s sincerity in the quote above than I do Ryan’s in his recent come-to-Jesus moment regarding the plight of the poor and the wrongness of his prior makers-versus-takers characterization of the American people.
But I do hope Ryan means it, for whatever it might be worth.
I doubt less Hayden’s sincerity in the quote above than I do Ryan’s in his recent come-to-Jesus moment regarding the plight of the poor and the wrongness of his prior makers-versus-takers characterization of the American people.
But I do hope Ryan means it, for whatever it might be worth.
I doubt less Hayden’s sincerity in the quote above than I do Ryan’s in his recent come-to-Jesus moment regarding the plight of the poor and the wrongness of his prior makers-versus-takers characterization of the American people.
But I do hope Ryan means it, for whatever it might be worth.
It’s really kind of sad how many folks, in Cobb County and elsewhere, have so little faith in their own religion. But apparently they think that the least exposure to any other way of thought will turn their children against their faith. Sad.
Of course, anyone looking at history would think that Christianity was one of the greats when it comes to proselytizing. And so has little to fear. But apparently these folks are ignorant of the history of their faith. (Among other things.)
It’s really kind of sad how many folks, in Cobb County and elsewhere, have so little faith in their own religion. But apparently they think that the least exposure to any other way of thought will turn their children against their faith. Sad.
Of course, anyone looking at history would think that Christianity was one of the greats when it comes to proselytizing. And so has little to fear. But apparently these folks are ignorant of the history of their faith. (Among other things.)
It’s really kind of sad how many folks, in Cobb County and elsewhere, have so little faith in their own religion. But apparently they think that the least exposure to any other way of thought will turn their children against their faith. Sad.
Of course, anyone looking at history would think that Christianity was one of the greats when it comes to proselytizing. And so has little to fear. But apparently these folks are ignorant of the history of their faith. (Among other things.)
Well, there are several odd mistakes being made regarding the yoga thing, by both, but not all of, the “Christians” and the (not all) the yoga practitioners.
It’s difficult to express, but to boil it down to its nut, it’s that both parties, to differing degrees, believe they are dealing from a position of religious and ascetic purity, when really both American yoga and American Christianity are the watered down, barely recognizable dregs of centuries of influences braided into this polyglot American culture we call the one true thing.
On the one hand — the one that claps — yoga, except for the pure practitioners, is an import to America, like karate, that has been, in American fashion, and very astutely by immigrant populations converted into a business proposition, mostly of the small store-front variety.
In the similar example of the Maharishi Mahesh Yogi, transcendental meditation has been marketed into a big, lucrative business and although its founder(s) may be true believers versed in the nuances and spiritual beauties of the original thing as passed down through various forms and incarnations, very few truly appreciate the religious essence, but rather practice for other reasons, health, bliss, etc.
When the Beatles showed up to hear the maharishi all those years ago, the twinkle in his eye was partly the vision of the main marketing chance for his entrepreneurial business plan, and while I don’t doubt George Harrison’s spiritual sincerity, even he admitted he had barely scratched the surface (an illusion) of hare krishna krishna hare, while the other three used the Maharishi right back for lesser purposes, musically or otherwise.
Lennon found Sexy Sadie a bit to hands-on with the ladies, if you know what I mean, though the backstory there is not to Lennon’s credit at all, if everyone knew it.
Ringo didn’t like the food, which is about the level of the religious feeling and expression the kids in the yoga class possess as well.
As for the outraged Christians, the same could be said for their faith. I doubt many of them have much a grasp of how Christianity came to be, nor how it has evolved, please God not that, over the centuries.
And if you don’t think in many instances American Christianity is a business, check out the megachurches.
The storefront ministries are nothing less than yoga parlors in kind, but with prayer instead.
Now tithe, because we’re thinking of franchising this money-maker.
I’m not doubting anyone’s sincerity. I had a sister-in-law who was earnestly sincere about the healing power of crystals.
I know nothing, and I know it religiously.
Joseph Campbell, Mircea Eliade, Heinrich Zimmer and the rest called it syncretism, this twining of cultural and religious influences, but in America and now in the rest of the world, it’s more of a formal business, like Amazon’s shopping cart, where we take one from column A and two from Column B, and return one thing next week because it didn’t match our spiritual outfit that week.
How’s that for syncretic metaphor mongering/mixing?
The Christians going after the yoga kids might as well stomp up and down and demand the reading of the Iliad be stopped because someone might be brainwashed into believing that Athena really did swoop down and speak directly to Achilles, for all the “religion” that is being practiced or malpracticed by the lot of them.
Don’t the lot of them see that both American Christianity and American Yoga share a commonality — as the new incarnation called the Prosperity Gospel, or if you will, the Mammon-Facing Dog Position.
But that’s tomorrow’s headline, which is, “America Misses The Point, Succumbs to Bullshit”.
I get ahead of myself.
Well, there are several odd mistakes being made regarding the yoga thing, by both, but not all of, the “Christians” and the (not all) the yoga practitioners.
It’s difficult to express, but to boil it down to its nut, it’s that both parties, to differing degrees, believe they are dealing from a position of religious and ascetic purity, when really both American yoga and American Christianity are the watered down, barely recognizable dregs of centuries of influences braided into this polyglot American culture we call the one true thing.
On the one hand — the one that claps — yoga, except for the pure practitioners, is an import to America, like karate, that has been, in American fashion, and very astutely by immigrant populations converted into a business proposition, mostly of the small store-front variety.
In the similar example of the Maharishi Mahesh Yogi, transcendental meditation has been marketed into a big, lucrative business and although its founder(s) may be true believers versed in the nuances and spiritual beauties of the original thing as passed down through various forms and incarnations, very few truly appreciate the religious essence, but rather practice for other reasons, health, bliss, etc.
When the Beatles showed up to hear the maharishi all those years ago, the twinkle in his eye was partly the vision of the main marketing chance for his entrepreneurial business plan, and while I don’t doubt George Harrison’s spiritual sincerity, even he admitted he had barely scratched the surface (an illusion) of hare krishna krishna hare, while the other three used the Maharishi right back for lesser purposes, musically or otherwise.
Lennon found Sexy Sadie a bit to hands-on with the ladies, if you know what I mean, though the backstory there is not to Lennon’s credit at all, if everyone knew it.
Ringo didn’t like the food, which is about the level of the religious feeling and expression the kids in the yoga class possess as well.
As for the outraged Christians, the same could be said for their faith. I doubt many of them have much a grasp of how Christianity came to be, nor how it has evolved, please God not that, over the centuries.
And if you don’t think in many instances American Christianity is a business, check out the megachurches.
The storefront ministries are nothing less than yoga parlors in kind, but with prayer instead.
Now tithe, because we’re thinking of franchising this money-maker.
I’m not doubting anyone’s sincerity. I had a sister-in-law who was earnestly sincere about the healing power of crystals.
I know nothing, and I know it religiously.
Joseph Campbell, Mircea Eliade, Heinrich Zimmer and the rest called it syncretism, this twining of cultural and religious influences, but in America and now in the rest of the world, it’s more of a formal business, like Amazon’s shopping cart, where we take one from column A and two from Column B, and return one thing next week because it didn’t match our spiritual outfit that week.
How’s that for syncretic metaphor mongering/mixing?
The Christians going after the yoga kids might as well stomp up and down and demand the reading of the Iliad be stopped because someone might be brainwashed into believing that Athena really did swoop down and speak directly to Achilles, for all the “religion” that is being practiced or malpracticed by the lot of them.
Don’t the lot of them see that both American Christianity and American Yoga share a commonality — as the new incarnation called the Prosperity Gospel, or if you will, the Mammon-Facing Dog Position.
But that’s tomorrow’s headline, which is, “America Misses The Point, Succumbs to Bullshit”.
I get ahead of myself.
Well, there are several odd mistakes being made regarding the yoga thing, by both, but not all of, the “Christians” and the (not all) the yoga practitioners.
It’s difficult to express, but to boil it down to its nut, it’s that both parties, to differing degrees, believe they are dealing from a position of religious and ascetic purity, when really both American yoga and American Christianity are the watered down, barely recognizable dregs of centuries of influences braided into this polyglot American culture we call the one true thing.
On the one hand — the one that claps — yoga, except for the pure practitioners, is an import to America, like karate, that has been, in American fashion, and very astutely by immigrant populations converted into a business proposition, mostly of the small store-front variety.
In the similar example of the Maharishi Mahesh Yogi, transcendental meditation has been marketed into a big, lucrative business and although its founder(s) may be true believers versed in the nuances and spiritual beauties of the original thing as passed down through various forms and incarnations, very few truly appreciate the religious essence, but rather practice for other reasons, health, bliss, etc.
When the Beatles showed up to hear the maharishi all those years ago, the twinkle in his eye was partly the vision of the main marketing chance for his entrepreneurial business plan, and while I don’t doubt George Harrison’s spiritual sincerity, even he admitted he had barely scratched the surface (an illusion) of hare krishna krishna hare, while the other three used the Maharishi right back for lesser purposes, musically or otherwise.
Lennon found Sexy Sadie a bit to hands-on with the ladies, if you know what I mean, though the backstory there is not to Lennon’s credit at all, if everyone knew it.
Ringo didn’t like the food, which is about the level of the religious feeling and expression the kids in the yoga class possess as well.
As for the outraged Christians, the same could be said for their faith. I doubt many of them have much a grasp of how Christianity came to be, nor how it has evolved, please God not that, over the centuries.
And if you don’t think in many instances American Christianity is a business, check out the megachurches.
The storefront ministries are nothing less than yoga parlors in kind, but with prayer instead.
Now tithe, because we’re thinking of franchising this money-maker.
I’m not doubting anyone’s sincerity. I had a sister-in-law who was earnestly sincere about the healing power of crystals.
I know nothing, and I know it religiously.
Joseph Campbell, Mircea Eliade, Heinrich Zimmer and the rest called it syncretism, this twining of cultural and religious influences, but in America and now in the rest of the world, it’s more of a formal business, like Amazon’s shopping cart, where we take one from column A and two from Column B, and return one thing next week because it didn’t match our spiritual outfit that week.
How’s that for syncretic metaphor mongering/mixing?
The Christians going after the yoga kids might as well stomp up and down and demand the reading of the Iliad be stopped because someone might be brainwashed into believing that Athena really did swoop down and speak directly to Achilles, for all the “religion” that is being practiced or malpracticed by the lot of them.
Don’t the lot of them see that both American Christianity and American Yoga share a commonality — as the new incarnation called the Prosperity Gospel, or if you will, the Mammon-Facing Dog Position.
But that’s tomorrow’s headline, which is, “America Misses The Point, Succumbs to Bullshit”.
I get ahead of myself.
would you count Libya as a great decisive military victory for Obama?
No, but it started out as a European operation which we ultimately had to support. I recall a lively thread or two here on that topic.
NATO and the rebuilding of Europe were bipartisan efforts, and these were main forces of deterrence. There was always considerable liberal support for strong deterrence:
True for liberals prior to Vietnam, after, much less so.
I see a bit of a parallel between post-Vietnam liberals vis-a-vis the Soviet Union and modern liberals post-Iraq vis-a-vis jihadist terrorism. I see continuity is the left’s–relatively speaking–lack of interest and therefore lack of sophistication in how our forces stack up against potential adversaries.
Somewhere between blow-the-shit-out-of-everybody and whatever the left has to offer, there is–or needs to be–something that works now and in the future, with the understanding that, in war or other conflict, ‘victory’ is not ‘success’ and ‘success’ is not always immediately apparent.
would you count Libya as a great decisive military victory for Obama?
No, but it started out as a European operation which we ultimately had to support. I recall a lively thread or two here on that topic.
NATO and the rebuilding of Europe were bipartisan efforts, and these were main forces of deterrence. There was always considerable liberal support for strong deterrence:
True for liberals prior to Vietnam, after, much less so.
I see a bit of a parallel between post-Vietnam liberals vis-a-vis the Soviet Union and modern liberals post-Iraq vis-a-vis jihadist terrorism. I see continuity is the left’s–relatively speaking–lack of interest and therefore lack of sophistication in how our forces stack up against potential adversaries.
Somewhere between blow-the-shit-out-of-everybody and whatever the left has to offer, there is–or needs to be–something that works now and in the future, with the understanding that, in war or other conflict, ‘victory’ is not ‘success’ and ‘success’ is not always immediately apparent.
would you count Libya as a great decisive military victory for Obama?
No, but it started out as a European operation which we ultimately had to support. I recall a lively thread or two here on that topic.
NATO and the rebuilding of Europe were bipartisan efforts, and these were main forces of deterrence. There was always considerable liberal support for strong deterrence:
True for liberals prior to Vietnam, after, much less so.
I see a bit of a parallel between post-Vietnam liberals vis-a-vis the Soviet Union and modern liberals post-Iraq vis-a-vis jihadist terrorism. I see continuity is the left’s–relatively speaking–lack of interest and therefore lack of sophistication in how our forces stack up against potential adversaries.
Somewhere between blow-the-shit-out-of-everybody and whatever the left has to offer, there is–or needs to be–something that works now and in the future, with the understanding that, in war or other conflict, ‘victory’ is not ‘success’ and ‘success’ is not always immediately apparent.
The US is the home of retail, free market religion. Whereas in most other countries, at least until recently, it’s wholesale, take it or leave kind.
Although, at the moment, South Korea has the largest megachurch in the world.
The US is the home of retail, free market religion. Whereas in most other countries, at least until recently, it’s wholesale, take it or leave kind.
Although, at the moment, South Korea has the largest megachurch in the world.
The US is the home of retail, free market religion. Whereas in most other countries, at least until recently, it’s wholesale, take it or leave kind.
Although, at the moment, South Korea has the largest megachurch in the world.
No, but it started out as a European operation
actually, it was a NATO operation and we were involved from the very first day. the French and Italians were the first of the coalition to attack, but only by a matter of hours.
but again, what’s the right’s consensus plan to deal with ISIS?
therefore lack of sophistication in how our forces stack up against potential adversaries
what does that mean? the left doesn’t play your Game Of Counterfactuals with sufficient pizzazz ?
No, but it started out as a European operation
actually, it was a NATO operation and we were involved from the very first day. the French and Italians were the first of the coalition to attack, but only by a matter of hours.
but again, what’s the right’s consensus plan to deal with ISIS?
therefore lack of sophistication in how our forces stack up against potential adversaries
what does that mean? the left doesn’t play your Game Of Counterfactuals with sufficient pizzazz ?
No, but it started out as a European operation
actually, it was a NATO operation and we were involved from the very first day. the French and Italians were the first of the coalition to attack, but only by a matter of hours.
but again, what’s the right’s consensus plan to deal with ISIS?
therefore lack of sophistication in how our forces stack up against potential adversaries
what does that mean? the left doesn’t play your Game Of Counterfactuals with sufficient pizzazz ?
but again, what’s the right’s consensus plan to deal with ISIS?
I don’t think there is a coherent plan much less a viable and coherent plan. I thought that was implicit in my very clear criticisms of Trump and Cruz.
therefore lack of sophistication in how our forces stack up against potential adversaries
what does that mean? the left doesn’t play your Game Of Counterfactuals with sufficient pizzazz ?
It means what it says. The left, in general, doesn’t much concern itself with, e.g. the PRC (which expands militarily every year for no apparent and certainly no benign reason) getting excessively heavy handed with Taiwan or Japan and whether we have the legs to intervene, and if necessary, prevail. The left, in general, doesn’t think 10 and 20 years ahead and imagine what kind of national defense structure we will need. You may think this is counterfactual. That’s fine. One of us is closer to right than the other.
but again, what’s the right’s consensus plan to deal with ISIS?
I don’t think there is a coherent plan much less a viable and coherent plan. I thought that was implicit in my very clear criticisms of Trump and Cruz.
therefore lack of sophistication in how our forces stack up against potential adversaries
what does that mean? the left doesn’t play your Game Of Counterfactuals with sufficient pizzazz ?
It means what it says. The left, in general, doesn’t much concern itself with, e.g. the PRC (which expands militarily every year for no apparent and certainly no benign reason) getting excessively heavy handed with Taiwan or Japan and whether we have the legs to intervene, and if necessary, prevail. The left, in general, doesn’t think 10 and 20 years ahead and imagine what kind of national defense structure we will need. You may think this is counterfactual. That’s fine. One of us is closer to right than the other.
but again, what’s the right’s consensus plan to deal with ISIS?
I don’t think there is a coherent plan much less a viable and coherent plan. I thought that was implicit in my very clear criticisms of Trump and Cruz.
therefore lack of sophistication in how our forces stack up against potential adversaries
what does that mean? the left doesn’t play your Game Of Counterfactuals with sufficient pizzazz ?
It means what it says. The left, in general, doesn’t much concern itself with, e.g. the PRC (which expands militarily every year for no apparent and certainly no benign reason) getting excessively heavy handed with Taiwan or Japan and whether we have the legs to intervene, and if necessary, prevail. The left, in general, doesn’t think 10 and 20 years ahead and imagine what kind of national defense structure we will need. You may think this is counterfactual. That’s fine. One of us is closer to right than the other.
I don’t think there is a coherent plan much less a viable and coherent plan.
but it’s a problem that the left (played for the next 8 months by Barack Obama) actually does have a plan and is implementing it.
heads, the left loses. tails, the right wins.
how conveeeeenient.
You may think this is counterfactual.
indeed. not just counterfactual, but question-begging, too.
I don’t think there is a coherent plan much less a viable and coherent plan.
but it’s a problem that the left (played for the next 8 months by Barack Obama) actually does have a plan and is implementing it.
heads, the left loses. tails, the right wins.
how conveeeeenient.
You may think this is counterfactual.
indeed. not just counterfactual, but question-begging, too.
I don’t think there is a coherent plan much less a viable and coherent plan.
but it’s a problem that the left (played for the next 8 months by Barack Obama) actually does have a plan and is implementing it.
heads, the left loses. tails, the right wins.
how conveeeeenient.
You may think this is counterfactual.
indeed. not just counterfactual, but question-begging, too.
The left, in general, doesn’t think 10 and 20 years ahead and imagine what kind of national defense structure we will need.
For probably half of my career, I’ve worked for organizations whose primary customer was the DoD. Air Force Logistics Command, Marine Corps tactical training, and a variety of other things.
My impression is that the DoD itself does a lot of the heavy lifting as far as prospective planning for future scenarios, and future needs, and has done so, consistently, for decades at least, regardless of which party was driving the bus.
Defense readiness reviews – they’re a way of life, for a lot of people.
There are differences in, for lack of a better word, the strategic vision that motivates that exercise. Which, and how many, theaters are likely to be problematic and need attention, which other parties are reliable partners and which are not, what role should the US have in overall global security.
Those things — things having to do with policy goals — do vary with administrations, and they should, because changes of administration and party reflect changes in what the people want.
But as far as the basic issue of thinking about where we need to be 10 or 20 years out, and how do we get there, I don’t see a left / right difference.
That’s been my experience, such as it is.
The left, in general, doesn’t think 10 and 20 years ahead and imagine what kind of national defense structure we will need.
For probably half of my career, I’ve worked for organizations whose primary customer was the DoD. Air Force Logistics Command, Marine Corps tactical training, and a variety of other things.
My impression is that the DoD itself does a lot of the heavy lifting as far as prospective planning for future scenarios, and future needs, and has done so, consistently, for decades at least, regardless of which party was driving the bus.
Defense readiness reviews – they’re a way of life, for a lot of people.
There are differences in, for lack of a better word, the strategic vision that motivates that exercise. Which, and how many, theaters are likely to be problematic and need attention, which other parties are reliable partners and which are not, what role should the US have in overall global security.
Those things — things having to do with policy goals — do vary with administrations, and they should, because changes of administration and party reflect changes in what the people want.
But as far as the basic issue of thinking about where we need to be 10 or 20 years out, and how do we get there, I don’t see a left / right difference.
That’s been my experience, such as it is.
The left, in general, doesn’t think 10 and 20 years ahead and imagine what kind of national defense structure we will need.
For probably half of my career, I’ve worked for organizations whose primary customer was the DoD. Air Force Logistics Command, Marine Corps tactical training, and a variety of other things.
My impression is that the DoD itself does a lot of the heavy lifting as far as prospective planning for future scenarios, and future needs, and has done so, consistently, for decades at least, regardless of which party was driving the bus.
Defense readiness reviews – they’re a way of life, for a lot of people.
There are differences in, for lack of a better word, the strategic vision that motivates that exercise. Which, and how many, theaters are likely to be problematic and need attention, which other parties are reliable partners and which are not, what role should the US have in overall global security.
Those things — things having to do with policy goals — do vary with administrations, and they should, because changes of administration and party reflect changes in what the people want.
But as far as the basic issue of thinking about where we need to be 10 or 20 years out, and how do we get there, I don’t see a left / right difference.
That’s been my experience, such as it is.
If we want to avoid counter-factuals when it comes to military capabilitiees, let’s look at the F-35.
It theory, this was a matter of developing a system that would meet the needs of all branches of the US military for 10-20 years ahead. So far, it has cost pots of money, while delivering a plane that does no jobs well. And that, as far as I can tell, no branch of the military actually wants.
You can argue that the right isn’t solely responsible for it. But no way you can argue that the left is solely responsible. And no way you can argue that it came out of a good appreciation of our future military needs. (It did, however, take long enough to produce to meet your 10-20 year criteria.)
If we want to avoid counter-factuals when it comes to military capabilitiees, let’s look at the F-35.
It theory, this was a matter of developing a system that would meet the needs of all branches of the US military for 10-20 years ahead. So far, it has cost pots of money, while delivering a plane that does no jobs well. And that, as far as I can tell, no branch of the military actually wants.
You can argue that the right isn’t solely responsible for it. But no way you can argue that the left is solely responsible. And no way you can argue that it came out of a good appreciation of our future military needs. (It did, however, take long enough to produce to meet your 10-20 year criteria.)
If we want to avoid counter-factuals when it comes to military capabilitiees, let’s look at the F-35.
It theory, this was a matter of developing a system that would meet the needs of all branches of the US military for 10-20 years ahead. So far, it has cost pots of money, while delivering a plane that does no jobs well. And that, as far as I can tell, no branch of the military actually wants.
You can argue that the right isn’t solely responsible for it. But no way you can argue that the left is solely responsible. And no way you can argue that it came out of a good appreciation of our future military needs. (It did, however, take long enough to produce to meet your 10-20 year criteria.)
but it’s a problem that the left (played for the next 8 months by Barack Obama) actually does have a plan and is implementing it.
heads, the left loses. tails, the right wins.
Some people either won’t take “yes” for an answer or are uncommonly defensive or, in some instances, both. I haven’t seen a viable, coherent anti-ISIS plan from anyone on the right, and that is pathetic. I have minimal expectations from the left, not because I think the left is deficient morally or ethically, but rather because it has a worldview that makes military stuff secondary if not tertiary in terms of priorities. It’s a world view I don’t agree with, but then, I don’t agree with most on the right in this arena either, even if my views would not be out of place in Republican circles 20-30 years ago.
If we want to avoid counter-factuals when it comes to military capabilitiees, let’s look at the F-35.
Currently, we have a mix of combat aircraft, with 5 main fighters: F-14, 15, 16, 18 and 117 (stealth). We have some F-22’s, but not a lot.
The F-35 is the product of many things, one of which was the long time, not completely invalid criticism of military procurement that we kept spending bazillions on all of these different models when, it would seem, 2 or 3 air frames and attendant stuff could do the job as well as a dozen or more. It makes sense. In theory.
We have three air forces with more than three discrete missions. The traditional air force has a strategic, nuclear war fighting role, a continental defense role and a support/tactical air defense role in combined arms operations. These roles call for different in-air capabilities. The naval air forces, including the Marines, focus on fleet defense, littoral force projection and close air support of Marine amphibious operations. Plus, their aircraft need to be carrier-capable. The Marines, in addition to the foregoing, make effective use of VTOL jets that have some tactical air defense capability and decent close air support capability. Against 2d and 3d tier militaries, the Harrier (I think that is what the Marines still use) is just fine.
As a result, everyone is trying to make the same jet do all of these different jobs and it’s not working.
The Marines want a VTOL F-35, the Navy and Marines can’t function without one that will take off and land effectively on aircraft carriers and the USAF has it’s own set of unique needs that drive yet another subset.
Years ago, all three branches used the F-4. That was Vietnam through the early 90’s.
Trying to find a one-size-fits-all air frame is not working out so well. And, modern military aircraft as so expensive to design and build, we can’t run up half a dozen different ones and then take the ones we like best, like we did 50 years ago.
No on said–at least not loud enough to be heard–that placing all bets on the F-35 was a bad call. As the F-22 became increasingly expensive, many pointed to the F-35 as the cost-effective alternative (the one active duty fighter pilot I know says the F-35 is not an alternative to the F-22 FWIW). Blame placing for the F-35 is easy to do: it was all of us.
but it’s a problem that the left (played for the next 8 months by Barack Obama) actually does have a plan and is implementing it.
heads, the left loses. tails, the right wins.
Some people either won’t take “yes” for an answer or are uncommonly defensive or, in some instances, both. I haven’t seen a viable, coherent anti-ISIS plan from anyone on the right, and that is pathetic. I have minimal expectations from the left, not because I think the left is deficient morally or ethically, but rather because it has a worldview that makes military stuff secondary if not tertiary in terms of priorities. It’s a world view I don’t agree with, but then, I don’t agree with most on the right in this arena either, even if my views would not be out of place in Republican circles 20-30 years ago.
If we want to avoid counter-factuals when it comes to military capabilitiees, let’s look at the F-35.
Currently, we have a mix of combat aircraft, with 5 main fighters: F-14, 15, 16, 18 and 117 (stealth). We have some F-22’s, but not a lot.
The F-35 is the product of many things, one of which was the long time, not completely invalid criticism of military procurement that we kept spending bazillions on all of these different models when, it would seem, 2 or 3 air frames and attendant stuff could do the job as well as a dozen or more. It makes sense. In theory.
We have three air forces with more than three discrete missions. The traditional air force has a strategic, nuclear war fighting role, a continental defense role and a support/tactical air defense role in combined arms operations. These roles call for different in-air capabilities. The naval air forces, including the Marines, focus on fleet defense, littoral force projection and close air support of Marine amphibious operations. Plus, their aircraft need to be carrier-capable. The Marines, in addition to the foregoing, make effective use of VTOL jets that have some tactical air defense capability and decent close air support capability. Against 2d and 3d tier militaries, the Harrier (I think that is what the Marines still use) is just fine.
As a result, everyone is trying to make the same jet do all of these different jobs and it’s not working.
The Marines want a VTOL F-35, the Navy and Marines can’t function without one that will take off and land effectively on aircraft carriers and the USAF has it’s own set of unique needs that drive yet another subset.
Years ago, all three branches used the F-4. That was Vietnam through the early 90’s.
Trying to find a one-size-fits-all air frame is not working out so well. And, modern military aircraft as so expensive to design and build, we can’t run up half a dozen different ones and then take the ones we like best, like we did 50 years ago.
No on said–at least not loud enough to be heard–that placing all bets on the F-35 was a bad call. As the F-22 became increasingly expensive, many pointed to the F-35 as the cost-effective alternative (the one active duty fighter pilot I know says the F-35 is not an alternative to the F-22 FWIW). Blame placing for the F-35 is easy to do: it was all of us.
but it’s a problem that the left (played for the next 8 months by Barack Obama) actually does have a plan and is implementing it.
heads, the left loses. tails, the right wins.
Some people either won’t take “yes” for an answer or are uncommonly defensive or, in some instances, both. I haven’t seen a viable, coherent anti-ISIS plan from anyone on the right, and that is pathetic. I have minimal expectations from the left, not because I think the left is deficient morally or ethically, but rather because it has a worldview that makes military stuff secondary if not tertiary in terms of priorities. It’s a world view I don’t agree with, but then, I don’t agree with most on the right in this arena either, even if my views would not be out of place in Republican circles 20-30 years ago.
If we want to avoid counter-factuals when it comes to military capabilitiees, let’s look at the F-35.
Currently, we have a mix of combat aircraft, with 5 main fighters: F-14, 15, 16, 18 and 117 (stealth). We have some F-22’s, but not a lot.
The F-35 is the product of many things, one of which was the long time, not completely invalid criticism of military procurement that we kept spending bazillions on all of these different models when, it would seem, 2 or 3 air frames and attendant stuff could do the job as well as a dozen or more. It makes sense. In theory.
We have three air forces with more than three discrete missions. The traditional air force has a strategic, nuclear war fighting role, a continental defense role and a support/tactical air defense role in combined arms operations. These roles call for different in-air capabilities. The naval air forces, including the Marines, focus on fleet defense, littoral force projection and close air support of Marine amphibious operations. Plus, their aircraft need to be carrier-capable. The Marines, in addition to the foregoing, make effective use of VTOL jets that have some tactical air defense capability and decent close air support capability. Against 2d and 3d tier militaries, the Harrier (I think that is what the Marines still use) is just fine.
As a result, everyone is trying to make the same jet do all of these different jobs and it’s not working.
The Marines want a VTOL F-35, the Navy and Marines can’t function without one that will take off and land effectively on aircraft carriers and the USAF has it’s own set of unique needs that drive yet another subset.
Years ago, all three branches used the F-4. That was Vietnam through the early 90’s.
Trying to find a one-size-fits-all air frame is not working out so well. And, modern military aircraft as so expensive to design and build, we can’t run up half a dozen different ones and then take the ones we like best, like we did 50 years ago.
No on said–at least not loud enough to be heard–that placing all bets on the F-35 was a bad call. As the F-22 became increasingly expensive, many pointed to the F-35 as the cost-effective alternative (the one active duty fighter pilot I know says the F-35 is not an alternative to the F-22 FWIW). Blame placing for the F-35 is easy to do: it was all of us.
“Currently, we have a mix of combat aircraft, with 5 main fighters: F-14, 15, 16, 18 and 117 (stealth).”
The F-14 has been retired for almost 10 years now.
“Currently, we have a mix of combat aircraft, with 5 main fighters: F-14, 15, 16, 18 and 117 (stealth).”
The F-14 has been retired for almost 10 years now.
“Currently, we have a mix of combat aircraft, with 5 main fighters: F-14, 15, 16, 18 and 117 (stealth).”
The F-14 has been retired for almost 10 years now.
Also..
“Trying to find a one-size-fits-all air frame is not working out so well.”
I would argue that while not perfect, the F-18 is a pretty effective strike fighter combination.
Also..
“Trying to find a one-size-fits-all air frame is not working out so well.”
I would argue that while not perfect, the F-18 is a pretty effective strike fighter combination.
Also..
“Trying to find a one-size-fits-all air frame is not working out so well.”
I would argue that while not perfect, the F-18 is a pretty effective strike fighter combination.
The F-14 has been retired for almost 10 years now.
Yep. My bad.
I would argue that while not perfect, the F-18 is a pretty effective strike fighter combination.
We have a lot of really good stuff, but it’s all 20 plus years old and the PRC and even Russia keeps coming out with new stuff.
The F-14 has been retired for almost 10 years now.
Yep. My bad.
I would argue that while not perfect, the F-18 is a pretty effective strike fighter combination.
We have a lot of really good stuff, but it’s all 20 plus years old and the PRC and even Russia keeps coming out with new stuff.
The F-14 has been retired for almost 10 years now.
Yep. My bad.
I would argue that while not perfect, the F-18 is a pretty effective strike fighter combination.
We have a lot of really good stuff, but it’s all 20 plus years old and the PRC and even Russia keeps coming out with new stuff.
Here is a rather more optimistic view of how US (and other) action against ISIS is working.
Even allowing for some overstatement it may be that ISIS as a military force is being defeated. That’s a somewhat different problem than terrorist networks, of course, but not unrelated.
Maybe there’s a strategy after all.
Here is a rather more optimistic view of how US (and other) action against ISIS is working.
Even allowing for some overstatement it may be that ISIS as a military force is being defeated. That’s a somewhat different problem than terrorist networks, of course, but not unrelated.
Maybe there’s a strategy after all.
Here is a rather more optimistic view of how US (and other) action against ISIS is working.
Even allowing for some overstatement it may be that ISIS as a military force is being defeated. That’s a somewhat different problem than terrorist networks, of course, but not unrelated.
Maybe there’s a strategy after all.
We have three air forces with more than three discrete missions. […] Trying to find a one-size-fits-all air frame is not working out so well.
You fail to mention the vitriolic ground pounders’ lament, which is that we have four air forces, even if one of them isn’t allowed to have significant manned fixed-wing assets despite their utility for their mission… and for whose mission requirements the F-35 will be at least as ill-suited as for any other branches’, if not more so…
We have three air forces with more than three discrete missions. […] Trying to find a one-size-fits-all air frame is not working out so well.
You fail to mention the vitriolic ground pounders’ lament, which is that we have four air forces, even if one of them isn’t allowed to have significant manned fixed-wing assets despite their utility for their mission… and for whose mission requirements the F-35 will be at least as ill-suited as for any other branches’, if not more so…
We have three air forces with more than three discrete missions. […] Trying to find a one-size-fits-all air frame is not working out so well.
You fail to mention the vitriolic ground pounders’ lament, which is that we have four air forces, even if one of them isn’t allowed to have significant manned fixed-wing assets despite their utility for their mission… and for whose mission requirements the F-35 will be at least as ill-suited as for any other branches’, if not more so…
No on said–at least not loud enough to be heard–that placing all bets on the F-35 was a bad call…
The F35 program was heavily criticised from the start; just reading the Wikipedia page makes that very clear (and confirms my memory).
That the program went ahead was rather less to do with arguments in its favour than money and politics.
No on said–at least not loud enough to be heard–that placing all bets on the F-35 was a bad call…
The F35 program was heavily criticised from the start; just reading the Wikipedia page makes that very clear (and confirms my memory).
That the program went ahead was rather less to do with arguments in its favour than money and politics.
No on said–at least not loud enough to be heard–that placing all bets on the F-35 was a bad call…
The F35 program was heavily criticised from the start; just reading the Wikipedia page makes that very clear (and confirms my memory).
That the program went ahead was rather less to do with arguments in its favour than money and politics.
but rather because it has a worldview that makes military stuff secondary if not tertiary in terms of priorities
so what is your plan? if Obama’s plan isn’t cutting it for you, what’s better?
it seems to me that Obama isn’t outside the consensus about what our military can do in this situation. and he’s right up to the edge (if not over) when it comes to how much our military can do before it becomes counterproductive in terms of giving ISIS dead civilians to use as propaganda.
and i assume, but obviously can’t know, that our intel operations are on 11 these days.
what’s better?
but rather because it has a worldview that makes military stuff secondary if not tertiary in terms of priorities
so what is your plan? if Obama’s plan isn’t cutting it for you, what’s better?
it seems to me that Obama isn’t outside the consensus about what our military can do in this situation. and he’s right up to the edge (if not over) when it comes to how much our military can do before it becomes counterproductive in terms of giving ISIS dead civilians to use as propaganda.
and i assume, but obviously can’t know, that our intel operations are on 11 these days.
what’s better?
but rather because it has a worldview that makes military stuff secondary if not tertiary in terms of priorities
so what is your plan? if Obama’s plan isn’t cutting it for you, what’s better?
it seems to me that Obama isn’t outside the consensus about what our military can do in this situation. and he’s right up to the edge (if not over) when it comes to how much our military can do before it becomes counterproductive in terms of giving ISIS dead civilians to use as propaganda.
and i assume, but obviously can’t know, that our intel operations are on 11 these days.
what’s better?
Maybe there’s a strategy after all.
Could be.
The F35 program was heavily criticised from the start; just reading the Wikipedia page makes that very clear (and confirms my memory).
Depends on how you define “start”. The JSF Task Force led to the F-35 concept. Early manufacturing started in 2003. Problems, as best I can tell, started popping up in 2006. Problems are inevitable. Politics are also inevitable. It’s still trying to do too much with one toy given the our and our adversaries’ advancing technology.
You fail to mention the vitriolic ground pounders’ lament
I did, because the Air Force is supposed to fly the F-35 in support of the Army.
so what is your plan? if Obama’s plan isn’t cutting it for you, what’s better?
I have two answers, one tied to reality, the other, not so much.
Reality–what we are doing now, but with more NATO investment, less restrictive ROE, and a much more stepped up operational tempo. Boots on the ground? Not without congressional authorization.
Wish List–after full public debate and discussion in the US and NATO, form units along the lines of our Marine Expeditionary Forces but coupled to land-based operations out of southern Italy and perhaps Greece and perhaps Turkey. The mission would be to identify, fix and destroy ISIS and ISIS-type units, depots, staging areas, etc. No pretense of fixing what is broken, or at least not while the shooting is going on and not if it puts our folks in harm’s way.
If done properly, i.e. with a heavy hand and for the limited purpose of inflicting maximum harm, now that ISIS holds real estate and can be tracked using satellite and other intelligence, an awful lot of damage can be inflicted in a short time, given sufficient resources (we’d need NATO). The idea isn’t to capture and hold ground, to inflict a political defeat, or other traditional military goals, but rather to make the cost of associating with ISIS fatal.
Our ability to hit and hit hard is just fine. Occupation and whatnot, not so much. Were it up to me, our boots would be on the ground only to do a lot of shooting. Then, wheels up and adios.
Maybe there’s a strategy after all.
Could be.
The F35 program was heavily criticised from the start; just reading the Wikipedia page makes that very clear (and confirms my memory).
Depends on how you define “start”. The JSF Task Force led to the F-35 concept. Early manufacturing started in 2003. Problems, as best I can tell, started popping up in 2006. Problems are inevitable. Politics are also inevitable. It’s still trying to do too much with one toy given the our and our adversaries’ advancing technology.
You fail to mention the vitriolic ground pounders’ lament
I did, because the Air Force is supposed to fly the F-35 in support of the Army.
so what is your plan? if Obama’s plan isn’t cutting it for you, what’s better?
I have two answers, one tied to reality, the other, not so much.
Reality–what we are doing now, but with more NATO investment, less restrictive ROE, and a much more stepped up operational tempo. Boots on the ground? Not without congressional authorization.
Wish List–after full public debate and discussion in the US and NATO, form units along the lines of our Marine Expeditionary Forces but coupled to land-based operations out of southern Italy and perhaps Greece and perhaps Turkey. The mission would be to identify, fix and destroy ISIS and ISIS-type units, depots, staging areas, etc. No pretense of fixing what is broken, or at least not while the shooting is going on and not if it puts our folks in harm’s way.
If done properly, i.e. with a heavy hand and for the limited purpose of inflicting maximum harm, now that ISIS holds real estate and can be tracked using satellite and other intelligence, an awful lot of damage can be inflicted in a short time, given sufficient resources (we’d need NATO). The idea isn’t to capture and hold ground, to inflict a political defeat, or other traditional military goals, but rather to make the cost of associating with ISIS fatal.
Our ability to hit and hit hard is just fine. Occupation and whatnot, not so much. Were it up to me, our boots would be on the ground only to do a lot of shooting. Then, wheels up and adios.
Maybe there’s a strategy after all.
Could be.
The F35 program was heavily criticised from the start; just reading the Wikipedia page makes that very clear (and confirms my memory).
Depends on how you define “start”. The JSF Task Force led to the F-35 concept. Early manufacturing started in 2003. Problems, as best I can tell, started popping up in 2006. Problems are inevitable. Politics are also inevitable. It’s still trying to do too much with one toy given the our and our adversaries’ advancing technology.
You fail to mention the vitriolic ground pounders’ lament
I did, because the Air Force is supposed to fly the F-35 in support of the Army.
so what is your plan? if Obama’s plan isn’t cutting it for you, what’s better?
I have two answers, one tied to reality, the other, not so much.
Reality–what we are doing now, but with more NATO investment, less restrictive ROE, and a much more stepped up operational tempo. Boots on the ground? Not without congressional authorization.
Wish List–after full public debate and discussion in the US and NATO, form units along the lines of our Marine Expeditionary Forces but coupled to land-based operations out of southern Italy and perhaps Greece and perhaps Turkey. The mission would be to identify, fix and destroy ISIS and ISIS-type units, depots, staging areas, etc. No pretense of fixing what is broken, or at least not while the shooting is going on and not if it puts our folks in harm’s way.
If done properly, i.e. with a heavy hand and for the limited purpose of inflicting maximum harm, now that ISIS holds real estate and can be tracked using satellite and other intelligence, an awful lot of damage can be inflicted in a short time, given sufficient resources (we’d need NATO). The idea isn’t to capture and hold ground, to inflict a political defeat, or other traditional military goals, but rather to make the cost of associating with ISIS fatal.
Our ability to hit and hit hard is just fine. Occupation and whatnot, not so much. Were it up to me, our boots would be on the ground only to do a lot of shooting. Then, wheels up and adios.
I did, because the Air Force is supposed to fly the F-35 in support of the Army.
Well, except for the part where you only listed fighter-bombers as the aircraft the F-35 is supposed to half-assedly replace.
I recently read a frankly appalling analysis of the forthcoming adoption of the HV-22 for Navy COD missions (currently executed by C-2s), but can’t find it now. Pity, because it seemed like the sort of thing that’d give you apoplexy. By all appearances this is a fiscal-and-politically driven decision, following intense lobbying by the USMC, and if it’s followed through with it’ll reduce the deployed operational range of our carrier groups in exchange for the Marines getting their remaining Ospreys and replacement parts slightly cheaper. It’s hardly just the left that’s given to being short-sighted and unwilling to actually consider the consequences of defense decisions. Plenty of people on the right – including those who quite honestly should know better – are equally willing to degrade our military’s existing capabilities, though it’s typically for thoroughly venal reasons instead of idealism.
I did, because the Air Force is supposed to fly the F-35 in support of the Army.
Well, except for the part where you only listed fighter-bombers as the aircraft the F-35 is supposed to half-assedly replace.
I recently read a frankly appalling analysis of the forthcoming adoption of the HV-22 for Navy COD missions (currently executed by C-2s), but can’t find it now. Pity, because it seemed like the sort of thing that’d give you apoplexy. By all appearances this is a fiscal-and-politically driven decision, following intense lobbying by the USMC, and if it’s followed through with it’ll reduce the deployed operational range of our carrier groups in exchange for the Marines getting their remaining Ospreys and replacement parts slightly cheaper. It’s hardly just the left that’s given to being short-sighted and unwilling to actually consider the consequences of defense decisions. Plenty of people on the right – including those who quite honestly should know better – are equally willing to degrade our military’s existing capabilities, though it’s typically for thoroughly venal reasons instead of idealism.
I did, because the Air Force is supposed to fly the F-35 in support of the Army.
Well, except for the part where you only listed fighter-bombers as the aircraft the F-35 is supposed to half-assedly replace.
I recently read a frankly appalling analysis of the forthcoming adoption of the HV-22 for Navy COD missions (currently executed by C-2s), but can’t find it now. Pity, because it seemed like the sort of thing that’d give you apoplexy. By all appearances this is a fiscal-and-politically driven decision, following intense lobbying by the USMC, and if it’s followed through with it’ll reduce the deployed operational range of our carrier groups in exchange for the Marines getting their remaining Ospreys and replacement parts slightly cheaper. It’s hardly just the left that’s given to being short-sighted and unwilling to actually consider the consequences of defense decisions. Plenty of people on the right – including those who quite honestly should know better – are equally willing to degrade our military’s existing capabilities, though it’s typically for thoroughly venal reasons instead of idealism.
“The idea isn’t to capture and hold ground”
not my field, admittedly, but if you don’t hold territory, it seems to me that you have no way to manage whatever happens next.
which, in turn, is how CF’s like this start in the first place.
I’m not sure that the kind of ‘none of our guys get hurt’ approach works well. maybe the Balkan is a counterexample?
it just seems like you’re calling for ‘do what we do now, but more and faster’.
eliminating is is as a player, even if possible, will leave a vacuum. someone has to fill it.
who?
“The idea isn’t to capture and hold ground”
not my field, admittedly, but if you don’t hold territory, it seems to me that you have no way to manage whatever happens next.
which, in turn, is how CF’s like this start in the first place.
I’m not sure that the kind of ‘none of our guys get hurt’ approach works well. maybe the Balkan is a counterexample?
it just seems like you’re calling for ‘do what we do now, but more and faster’.
eliminating is is as a player, even if possible, will leave a vacuum. someone has to fill it.
who?
“The idea isn’t to capture and hold ground”
not my field, admittedly, but if you don’t hold territory, it seems to me that you have no way to manage whatever happens next.
which, in turn, is how CF’s like this start in the first place.
I’m not sure that the kind of ‘none of our guys get hurt’ approach works well. maybe the Balkan is a counterexample?
it just seems like you’re calling for ‘do what we do now, but more and faster’.
eliminating is is as a player, even if possible, will leave a vacuum. someone has to fill it.
who?
“eliminating ISIS”, not “is is”
a thousand poxes on the house of auto-complete
“eliminating ISIS”, not “is is”
a thousand poxes on the house of auto-complete
“eliminating ISIS”, not “is is”
a thousand poxes on the house of auto-complete
I’ll say right up front that I don’t know dick about fighter jets, but my relatively uninformed impression is that the F-35 is to air combat what the space shuttle was to space exploration. It’s made to lots of different things, but doesn’t do any of them (or does very few of them) all that well. Since I don’t know dick, I could be very wrong about that.
I’ll say right up front that I don’t know dick about fighter jets, but my relatively uninformed impression is that the F-35 is to air combat what the space shuttle was to space exploration. It’s made to lots of different things, but doesn’t do any of them (or does very few of them) all that well. Since I don’t know dick, I could be very wrong about that.
I’ll say right up front that I don’t know dick about fighter jets, but my relatively uninformed impression is that the F-35 is to air combat what the space shuttle was to space exploration. It’s made to lots of different things, but doesn’t do any of them (or does very few of them) all that well. Since I don’t know dick, I could be very wrong about that.
I may even be thinking of the F-22. That’s how much I don’t know.
I may even be thinking of the F-22. That’s how much I don’t know.
I may even be thinking of the F-22. That’s how much I don’t know.
“an awful lot of damage can be inflicted in a short time, given sufficient resources (we’d need NATO)”
You don’t need NATO. What you need is intel as to where to strike when. And since ISIS doesn’t seem inclined to cooperate by separating themselves from civilian populations, creating ‘front lines’, etc., there’s only so much damage that can be inflicted without doing the whole `boots on the ground, root them out of the cities’ stuff that no one wants to do.
Your ‘plan’ = Obama + epsilon. Where epsilon << 1 .
“an awful lot of damage can be inflicted in a short time, given sufficient resources (we’d need NATO)”
You don’t need NATO. What you need is intel as to where to strike when. And since ISIS doesn’t seem inclined to cooperate by separating themselves from civilian populations, creating ‘front lines’, etc., there’s only so much damage that can be inflicted without doing the whole `boots on the ground, root them out of the cities’ stuff that no one wants to do.
Your ‘plan’ = Obama + epsilon. Where epsilon << 1 .
“an awful lot of damage can be inflicted in a short time, given sufficient resources (we’d need NATO)”
You don’t need NATO. What you need is intel as to where to strike when. And since ISIS doesn’t seem inclined to cooperate by separating themselves from civilian populations, creating ‘front lines’, etc., there’s only so much damage that can be inflicted without doing the whole `boots on the ground, root them out of the cities’ stuff that no one wants to do.
Your ‘plan’ = Obama + epsilon. Where epsilon << 1 .
I may even be thinking of the F-22. That’s how much I don’t know.
You know enough to be right. Except, as I shrilly whined to McT, it’s intended to be “that” for Close Air Support as well as more traditional air combat roles.
(Yes, they use fighter-bombers for CAS now. But there are those who argue that the main reason they’re used as extensively in that role as they have been is because the AF is trying to portray them as superior to dedicated CAS craft IOT justify their beloved F-35 (and ofc to realize the dreamed-about-since-it-before-it-came-into-service scrapping of the A-10…))
I may even be thinking of the F-22. That’s how much I don’t know.
You know enough to be right. Except, as I shrilly whined to McT, it’s intended to be “that” for Close Air Support as well as more traditional air combat roles.
(Yes, they use fighter-bombers for CAS now. But there are those who argue that the main reason they’re used as extensively in that role as they have been is because the AF is trying to portray them as superior to dedicated CAS craft IOT justify their beloved F-35 (and ofc to realize the dreamed-about-since-it-before-it-came-into-service scrapping of the A-10…))
I may even be thinking of the F-22. That’s how much I don’t know.
You know enough to be right. Except, as I shrilly whined to McT, it’s intended to be “that” for Close Air Support as well as more traditional air combat roles.
(Yes, they use fighter-bombers for CAS now. But there are those who argue that the main reason they’re used as extensively in that role as they have been is because the AF is trying to portray them as superior to dedicated CAS craft IOT justify their beloved F-35 (and ofc to realize the dreamed-about-since-it-before-it-came-into-service scrapping of the A-10…))
there’s only so much damage that can be inflicted without doing the whole `boots on the ground, root them out of the cities’ stuff that no one wants to do.
yeah, but think of the great increases massive indiscriminate bombing will make in our Resolve™ and Image™ reserves!
we’ll be rolling in Pride™!
there’s only so much damage that can be inflicted without doing the whole `boots on the ground, root them out of the cities’ stuff that no one wants to do.
yeah, but think of the great increases massive indiscriminate bombing will make in our Resolve™ and Image™ reserves!
we’ll be rolling in Pride™!
there’s only so much damage that can be inflicted without doing the whole `boots on the ground, root them out of the cities’ stuff that no one wants to do.
yeah, but think of the great increases massive indiscriminate bombing will make in our Resolve™ and Image™ reserves!
we’ll be rolling in Pride™!
Problems, as best I can tell, started popping up in 2006
That’s simply wrong. The program was misconceived from the start, and it’s not hard to find trenchant criticisms for around the time of the first contract being awarded…
http://www.ausairpower.net/jsf-analysis-2002.html
The airframe was in trouble as soon as it started being produced, as you could have gleaned from the wikipedia entry:
“….Manufacturing of parts for the first F-35 prototype airframe began in November 2003.[29] Because the X-35 did not have weapons bays, their addition in the F-35 would cause design changes which would lead to later weight problems.[30][31]
The F-35B STOVL variant was in danger of missing performance requirements in 2004 because it weighed too much; reportedly, by 2,200 lb (1,000 kg) or 8 percent. In response, Lockheed Martin added engine thrust and thinned airframe members; reduced the size of the common weapons bay and vertical stabilizers; re-routed some thrust from the roll-post outlets to the main nozzle; and redesigned the wing-mate joint, portions of the electrical system, and the portion of the aircraft immediately behind the cockpit.[32] Many of the changes were applied to all three variants to maintain high levels of commonality. By September 2004, the weight reduction effort had reduced the aircraft’s design weight by 2,700 pounds (1,200 kg),[33] but the redesign cost $6.2 billion and delayed the project by 18 months…”
This is the most successful US weapons program of recent years – and it happened almost completely outside of the (broken) normal procurement process:
http://www.wired.com/2015/12/how-rogue-techies-armed-the-predator-almost-stopped-911-and-accidentally-invented-remote-war/
Problems, as best I can tell, started popping up in 2006
That’s simply wrong. The program was misconceived from the start, and it’s not hard to find trenchant criticisms for around the time of the first contract being awarded…
http://www.ausairpower.net/jsf-analysis-2002.html
The airframe was in trouble as soon as it started being produced, as you could have gleaned from the wikipedia entry:
“….Manufacturing of parts for the first F-35 prototype airframe began in November 2003.[29] Because the X-35 did not have weapons bays, their addition in the F-35 would cause design changes which would lead to later weight problems.[30][31]
The F-35B STOVL variant was in danger of missing performance requirements in 2004 because it weighed too much; reportedly, by 2,200 lb (1,000 kg) or 8 percent. In response, Lockheed Martin added engine thrust and thinned airframe members; reduced the size of the common weapons bay and vertical stabilizers; re-routed some thrust from the roll-post outlets to the main nozzle; and redesigned the wing-mate joint, portions of the electrical system, and the portion of the aircraft immediately behind the cockpit.[32] Many of the changes were applied to all three variants to maintain high levels of commonality. By September 2004, the weight reduction effort had reduced the aircraft’s design weight by 2,700 pounds (1,200 kg),[33] but the redesign cost $6.2 billion and delayed the project by 18 months…”
This is the most successful US weapons program of recent years – and it happened almost completely outside of the (broken) normal procurement process:
http://www.wired.com/2015/12/how-rogue-techies-armed-the-predator-almost-stopped-911-and-accidentally-invented-remote-war/
Problems, as best I can tell, started popping up in 2006
That’s simply wrong. The program was misconceived from the start, and it’s not hard to find trenchant criticisms for around the time of the first contract being awarded…
http://www.ausairpower.net/jsf-analysis-2002.html
The airframe was in trouble as soon as it started being produced, as you could have gleaned from the wikipedia entry:
“….Manufacturing of parts for the first F-35 prototype airframe began in November 2003.[29] Because the X-35 did not have weapons bays, their addition in the F-35 would cause design changes which would lead to later weight problems.[30][31]
The F-35B STOVL variant was in danger of missing performance requirements in 2004 because it weighed too much; reportedly, by 2,200 lb (1,000 kg) or 8 percent. In response, Lockheed Martin added engine thrust and thinned airframe members; reduced the size of the common weapons bay and vertical stabilizers; re-routed some thrust from the roll-post outlets to the main nozzle; and redesigned the wing-mate joint, portions of the electrical system, and the portion of the aircraft immediately behind the cockpit.[32] Many of the changes were applied to all three variants to maintain high levels of commonality. By September 2004, the weight reduction effort had reduced the aircraft’s design weight by 2,700 pounds (1,200 kg),[33] but the redesign cost $6.2 billion and delayed the project by 18 months…”
This is the most successful US weapons program of recent years – and it happened almost completely outside of the (broken) normal procurement process:
http://www.wired.com/2015/12/how-rogue-techies-armed-the-predator-almost-stopped-911-and-accidentally-invented-remote-war/
Plenty of people on the right – including those who quite honestly should know better – are equally willing to degrade our military’s existing capabilities, though it’s typically for thoroughly venal reasons instead of idealism.
I might quibble with some of your modifiers as overstating the situation, but you are correct that there are many defense opportunists on the right. I won’t pick a fight by noting the rent seeking opportunities for lefties.
not my field, admittedly, but if you don’t hold territory, it seems to me that you have no way to manage whatever happens next.
Correct, and that is part of the plan. In my view, we are not going to “manage” people who think head chopping is part of church service. In my world, when enough people of that ilk are in one place, we kill them and then wait for the next opportunity. Rather than sustained operations and endless occupation, we fight a very aggressive war of attrition. With an equally aggressive intelligence and special operations aspect.
And I *would* limit immigration from the ME. Sorry, but as you seem to acknowledge upthread, assimilation is an issue. Once you have a safe haven in your own city for terrorists, you have problems of a whole different kind. There are significant cultural differences and I am not of the school that thinks every culture makes the same valuable contribution to a better society. There is a reason why immigration is pretty much a one way street.
You don’t need NATO.
We do, for all kinds of reasons, but mainly logistics and, quite frankly, we don’t have the horses we once did. Too bad, in my opinion, but that’s the way it is.
Nigel, I read the full article. A very interesting piece. Hardly critical of the F-35 though, simply noting where, in trying to be all things to all jets, it will not compare as markedly favorably or favorably at all with some variants of some aircraft.
As for Predators and such, the day may come when air superiority is determined solely by unmanned craft, but we aren’t there yet.
Plenty of people on the right – including those who quite honestly should know better – are equally willing to degrade our military’s existing capabilities, though it’s typically for thoroughly venal reasons instead of idealism.
I might quibble with some of your modifiers as overstating the situation, but you are correct that there are many defense opportunists on the right. I won’t pick a fight by noting the rent seeking opportunities for lefties.
not my field, admittedly, but if you don’t hold territory, it seems to me that you have no way to manage whatever happens next.
Correct, and that is part of the plan. In my view, we are not going to “manage” people who think head chopping is part of church service. In my world, when enough people of that ilk are in one place, we kill them and then wait for the next opportunity. Rather than sustained operations and endless occupation, we fight a very aggressive war of attrition. With an equally aggressive intelligence and special operations aspect.
And I *would* limit immigration from the ME. Sorry, but as you seem to acknowledge upthread, assimilation is an issue. Once you have a safe haven in your own city for terrorists, you have problems of a whole different kind. There are significant cultural differences and I am not of the school that thinks every culture makes the same valuable contribution to a better society. There is a reason why immigration is pretty much a one way street.
You don’t need NATO.
We do, for all kinds of reasons, but mainly logistics and, quite frankly, we don’t have the horses we once did. Too bad, in my opinion, but that’s the way it is.
Nigel, I read the full article. A very interesting piece. Hardly critical of the F-35 though, simply noting where, in trying to be all things to all jets, it will not compare as markedly favorably or favorably at all with some variants of some aircraft.
As for Predators and such, the day may come when air superiority is determined solely by unmanned craft, but we aren’t there yet.
Plenty of people on the right – including those who quite honestly should know better – are equally willing to degrade our military’s existing capabilities, though it’s typically for thoroughly venal reasons instead of idealism.
I might quibble with some of your modifiers as overstating the situation, but you are correct that there are many defense opportunists on the right. I won’t pick a fight by noting the rent seeking opportunities for lefties.
not my field, admittedly, but if you don’t hold territory, it seems to me that you have no way to manage whatever happens next.
Correct, and that is part of the plan. In my view, we are not going to “manage” people who think head chopping is part of church service. In my world, when enough people of that ilk are in one place, we kill them and then wait for the next opportunity. Rather than sustained operations and endless occupation, we fight a very aggressive war of attrition. With an equally aggressive intelligence and special operations aspect.
And I *would* limit immigration from the ME. Sorry, but as you seem to acknowledge upthread, assimilation is an issue. Once you have a safe haven in your own city for terrorists, you have problems of a whole different kind. There are significant cultural differences and I am not of the school that thinks every culture makes the same valuable contribution to a better society. There is a reason why immigration is pretty much a one way street.
You don’t need NATO.
We do, for all kinds of reasons, but mainly logistics and, quite frankly, we don’t have the horses we once did. Too bad, in my opinion, but that’s the way it is.
Nigel, I read the full article. A very interesting piece. Hardly critical of the F-35 though, simply noting where, in trying to be all things to all jets, it will not compare as markedly favorably or favorably at all with some variants of some aircraft.
As for Predators and such, the day may come when air superiority is determined solely by unmanned craft, but we aren’t there yet.
Does Engineering Education Breed Terrorists?
Does Engineering Education Breed Terrorists?
Does Engineering Education Breed Terrorists?
Rather than sustained operations and endless occupation, we fight a very aggressive war of attrition. With an equally aggressive intelligence and special operations aspect.
You don’t exactly seem to have a realistic sense of how intelligence works.
You also seem to have a painfully ahistorical – to the point of naivete – attitude towards the reaction of a conventionally inferior force to force-on-force engagement. Which is particularly hard to understand given the origin of Daesh.
You’re essentially saying that you want to engage Daesh as a traditional military, over and over again, with Daesh obligingly lining themselves up to be knocked down each time. If I may glean some cynical amusement from this discussion, you who was recently lauding the rightwing of the West’s wisdom in sitting back and observing the military overreach and mistakes of the USSR are currently advocating the “clear and don’t hold” tactics which served the Soviets oh-so-well in Afghanistan, right down to the disengagement-but-somehow-intense-and-accurate intelligence.
The left certainly does not hold a monopoly on wishful thinking, refusal to understand the limits of our military’s capabilities, and a profound unwillingness to consider the nuts-and-bolts logistics required to achieve military objectives.
Rather than sustained operations and endless occupation, we fight a very aggressive war of attrition. With an equally aggressive intelligence and special operations aspect.
You don’t exactly seem to have a realistic sense of how intelligence works.
You also seem to have a painfully ahistorical – to the point of naivete – attitude towards the reaction of a conventionally inferior force to force-on-force engagement. Which is particularly hard to understand given the origin of Daesh.
You’re essentially saying that you want to engage Daesh as a traditional military, over and over again, with Daesh obligingly lining themselves up to be knocked down each time. If I may glean some cynical amusement from this discussion, you who was recently lauding the rightwing of the West’s wisdom in sitting back and observing the military overreach and mistakes of the USSR are currently advocating the “clear and don’t hold” tactics which served the Soviets oh-so-well in Afghanistan, right down to the disengagement-but-somehow-intense-and-accurate intelligence.
The left certainly does not hold a monopoly on wishful thinking, refusal to understand the limits of our military’s capabilities, and a profound unwillingness to consider the nuts-and-bolts logistics required to achieve military objectives.
Rather than sustained operations and endless occupation, we fight a very aggressive war of attrition. With an equally aggressive intelligence and special operations aspect.
You don’t exactly seem to have a realistic sense of how intelligence works.
You also seem to have a painfully ahistorical – to the point of naivete – attitude towards the reaction of a conventionally inferior force to force-on-force engagement. Which is particularly hard to understand given the origin of Daesh.
You’re essentially saying that you want to engage Daesh as a traditional military, over and over again, with Daesh obligingly lining themselves up to be knocked down each time. If I may glean some cynical amusement from this discussion, you who was recently lauding the rightwing of the West’s wisdom in sitting back and observing the military overreach and mistakes of the USSR are currently advocating the “clear and don’t hold” tactics which served the Soviets oh-so-well in Afghanistan, right down to the disengagement-but-somehow-intense-and-accurate intelligence.
The left certainly does not hold a monopoly on wishful thinking, refusal to understand the limits of our military’s capabilities, and a profound unwillingness to consider the nuts-and-bolts logistics required to achieve military objectives.
You don’t exactly seem to have a realistic sense of how intelligence works.
I’m sure you’re right.
You don’t exactly seem to have a realistic sense of how intelligence works.
I’m sure you’re right.
You don’t exactly seem to have a realistic sense of how intelligence works.
I’m sure you’re right.
Charles WT:
Yes, but can they design an F-35 that doesn’t shed parts and greenish fluids in mid-air?
No offense to engineers, but my relatively brief work experience in the vicinity of engineers clued me in to a general feeling [see, right there, you can see the problem ;)] that they are a literal sort who get a look on their face if the square corners on their bunks aren’t precisely something.
I’m thinking this can be related to how they interpret (which is to say, there is no interpretation, can’t you see with your own eyes what the schematic says? It doesn’t say 89 degree angle, does it now? Just follow the instructions!) founding documents and instructional manuals of all types — the Koran, the Bible, the Constitution, the Second Amendment, Aunt Sue’s recipe for baked green bean and mushroom casserole (add fresno peppers? who does that?) — and when the Humanities majors among us start with the “yeah buts”, peevishness morphs into slow burn into outrage and the next thing you know, you’ve got three guys with engineering degrees huddled around a table devising clever ways to blow sh*t up.
GIMME THAT! Now watch and maybe you’ll learn something!
Also, it’s the quiet ones you’ve got to watch.
If you read accounts of the survivors of the trenches in World War I, you ever notice how the engineering types with one limb blown off and lung tissue scarred from poison gas account for events like this as they cast a rum eye down at the blanket covering their stump: “Yes, that projectile took it clean off at the hip. Good job, that. I’ll say one thing for Gerry, he can sure deliver ordnance the right way. Now, if I had designed that weapon, I’d have …”, while the sensitive poets among em can barely get through an unrhymed couplet without breaking down with with the permanent shakes and syndromes, he wept?
I’ve yet to understand however why the literalists and concretists in the Republican Party have it in for their seemingly kindred science types regarding global warming.
Probably because clouds are such an amorphous physical concept. Too much data leads to inexactitude which leads to poetry which leads to one’s head in the clouds, I guess.
What does “35” refer to in F-35? Wasn’t 34 good enough?
Charles WT:
Yes, but can they design an F-35 that doesn’t shed parts and greenish fluids in mid-air?
No offense to engineers, but my relatively brief work experience in the vicinity of engineers clued me in to a general feeling [see, right there, you can see the problem ;)] that they are a literal sort who get a look on their face if the square corners on their bunks aren’t precisely something.
I’m thinking this can be related to how they interpret (which is to say, there is no interpretation, can’t you see with your own eyes what the schematic says? It doesn’t say 89 degree angle, does it now? Just follow the instructions!) founding documents and instructional manuals of all types — the Koran, the Bible, the Constitution, the Second Amendment, Aunt Sue’s recipe for baked green bean and mushroom casserole (add fresno peppers? who does that?) — and when the Humanities majors among us start with the “yeah buts”, peevishness morphs into slow burn into outrage and the next thing you know, you’ve got three guys with engineering degrees huddled around a table devising clever ways to blow sh*t up.
GIMME THAT! Now watch and maybe you’ll learn something!
Also, it’s the quiet ones you’ve got to watch.
If you read accounts of the survivors of the trenches in World War I, you ever notice how the engineering types with one limb blown off and lung tissue scarred from poison gas account for events like this as they cast a rum eye down at the blanket covering their stump: “Yes, that projectile took it clean off at the hip. Good job, that. I’ll say one thing for Gerry, he can sure deliver ordnance the right way. Now, if I had designed that weapon, I’d have …”, while the sensitive poets among em can barely get through an unrhymed couplet without breaking down with with the permanent shakes and syndromes, he wept?
I’ve yet to understand however why the literalists and concretists in the Republican Party have it in for their seemingly kindred science types regarding global warming.
Probably because clouds are such an amorphous physical concept. Too much data leads to inexactitude which leads to poetry which leads to one’s head in the clouds, I guess.
What does “35” refer to in F-35? Wasn’t 34 good enough?
Charles WT:
Yes, but can they design an F-35 that doesn’t shed parts and greenish fluids in mid-air?
No offense to engineers, but my relatively brief work experience in the vicinity of engineers clued me in to a general feeling [see, right there, you can see the problem ;)] that they are a literal sort who get a look on their face if the square corners on their bunks aren’t precisely something.
I’m thinking this can be related to how they interpret (which is to say, there is no interpretation, can’t you see with your own eyes what the schematic says? It doesn’t say 89 degree angle, does it now? Just follow the instructions!) founding documents and instructional manuals of all types — the Koran, the Bible, the Constitution, the Second Amendment, Aunt Sue’s recipe for baked green bean and mushroom casserole (add fresno peppers? who does that?) — and when the Humanities majors among us start with the “yeah buts”, peevishness morphs into slow burn into outrage and the next thing you know, you’ve got three guys with engineering degrees huddled around a table devising clever ways to blow sh*t up.
GIMME THAT! Now watch and maybe you’ll learn something!
Also, it’s the quiet ones you’ve got to watch.
If you read accounts of the survivors of the trenches in World War I, you ever notice how the engineering types with one limb blown off and lung tissue scarred from poison gas account for events like this as they cast a rum eye down at the blanket covering their stump: “Yes, that projectile took it clean off at the hip. Good job, that. I’ll say one thing for Gerry, he can sure deliver ordnance the right way. Now, if I had designed that weapon, I’d have …”, while the sensitive poets among em can barely get through an unrhymed couplet without breaking down with with the permanent shakes and syndromes, he wept?
I’ve yet to understand however why the literalists and concretists in the Republican Party have it in for their seemingly kindred science types regarding global warming.
Probably because clouds are such an amorphous physical concept. Too much data leads to inexactitude which leads to poetry which leads to one’s head in the clouds, I guess.
What does “35” refer to in F-35? Wasn’t 34 good enough?
Hardly critical of the F35….
I have some difficulty in reading an article entitled “A Cold War Anachronism” as uncritical – particularly as the author concludes it is exactly that.
Pretty well every one of the risks identified in the report – which remember came out four years before the production contract was awarded – came about:
“…All of these analytical arguments are essentially contingent upon the JSF meeting its design performance and cost targets. This remains to be seen since the JSF is arguably the highest technological risk program in the pipeline at this time. Key risk factors derive from its reliance upon bleeding edge technology to achieve the combination of capability for its size and cost. There are no less than five areas of concern: the COTS derived avionic system departs from established technology and is in many respects a repeat of the F-111D Mk.II avionics idea; the reliance upon software goes well beyond established designs and software systems with many millions of lines of code are not reknowned for timely deliveries; any durability problems with the hot running F135 engines would be handled by derating which cuts into an already marginal thrust/weight ratio; differing needs and expectations by the JSF’s diverse customer base could cause divergence in program objectives and cost blowouts in common areas; the sheer complexity of what the JSF project is trying to achieve in melding untried technologies with diverse missions could create unforseen problems in its own right. Until we see production JSFs coming off the production line, it remains a high risk option…”
The software still isn’t working.
And the only argument in its favour – that it would be a compromise, an ‘incremental improvement’, but a cheap one – turned out to be a joke:
“…Indeed, if we pretend that the PRC doesn’t exist and India’s strategic competition with the PRC in the region doesn’t concern us, and that cruise missiles are not the hottest selling item across the wider region, then the F-35 becomes an attractive proposition – a cheap to buy, cheap to run, stealthy hi-tech fighter which is an incremental improvement over the RAAF’s somewhat anaemic F/A-18A Hornet…”
And you see, to have missed my point about the Predator – not that it’s any sort of F35 alternative, but that the defence establishment didn’t even think it worth developing at the time.
Hardly critical of the F35….
I have some difficulty in reading an article entitled “A Cold War Anachronism” as uncritical – particularly as the author concludes it is exactly that.
Pretty well every one of the risks identified in the report – which remember came out four years before the production contract was awarded – came about:
“…All of these analytical arguments are essentially contingent upon the JSF meeting its design performance and cost targets. This remains to be seen since the JSF is arguably the highest technological risk program in the pipeline at this time. Key risk factors derive from its reliance upon bleeding edge technology to achieve the combination of capability for its size and cost. There are no less than five areas of concern: the COTS derived avionic system departs from established technology and is in many respects a repeat of the F-111D Mk.II avionics idea; the reliance upon software goes well beyond established designs and software systems with many millions of lines of code are not reknowned for timely deliveries; any durability problems with the hot running F135 engines would be handled by derating which cuts into an already marginal thrust/weight ratio; differing needs and expectations by the JSF’s diverse customer base could cause divergence in program objectives and cost blowouts in common areas; the sheer complexity of what the JSF project is trying to achieve in melding untried technologies with diverse missions could create unforseen problems in its own right. Until we see production JSFs coming off the production line, it remains a high risk option…”
The software still isn’t working.
And the only argument in its favour – that it would be a compromise, an ‘incremental improvement’, but a cheap one – turned out to be a joke:
“…Indeed, if we pretend that the PRC doesn’t exist and India’s strategic competition with the PRC in the region doesn’t concern us, and that cruise missiles are not the hottest selling item across the wider region, then the F-35 becomes an attractive proposition – a cheap to buy, cheap to run, stealthy hi-tech fighter which is an incremental improvement over the RAAF’s somewhat anaemic F/A-18A Hornet…”
And you see, to have missed my point about the Predator – not that it’s any sort of F35 alternative, but that the defence establishment didn’t even think it worth developing at the time.
Hardly critical of the F35….
I have some difficulty in reading an article entitled “A Cold War Anachronism” as uncritical – particularly as the author concludes it is exactly that.
Pretty well every one of the risks identified in the report – which remember came out four years before the production contract was awarded – came about:
“…All of these analytical arguments are essentially contingent upon the JSF meeting its design performance and cost targets. This remains to be seen since the JSF is arguably the highest technological risk program in the pipeline at this time. Key risk factors derive from its reliance upon bleeding edge technology to achieve the combination of capability for its size and cost. There are no less than five areas of concern: the COTS derived avionic system departs from established technology and is in many respects a repeat of the F-111D Mk.II avionics idea; the reliance upon software goes well beyond established designs and software systems with many millions of lines of code are not reknowned for timely deliveries; any durability problems with the hot running F135 engines would be handled by derating which cuts into an already marginal thrust/weight ratio; differing needs and expectations by the JSF’s diverse customer base could cause divergence in program objectives and cost blowouts in common areas; the sheer complexity of what the JSF project is trying to achieve in melding untried technologies with diverse missions could create unforseen problems in its own right. Until we see production JSFs coming off the production line, it remains a high risk option…”
The software still isn’t working.
And the only argument in its favour – that it would be a compromise, an ‘incremental improvement’, but a cheap one – turned out to be a joke:
“…Indeed, if we pretend that the PRC doesn’t exist and India’s strategic competition with the PRC in the region doesn’t concern us, and that cruise missiles are not the hottest selling item across the wider region, then the F-35 becomes an attractive proposition – a cheap to buy, cheap to run, stealthy hi-tech fighter which is an incremental improvement over the RAAF’s somewhat anaemic F/A-18A Hornet…”
And you see, to have missed my point about the Predator – not that it’s any sort of F35 alternative, but that the defence establishment didn’t even think it worth developing at the time.
Ummm …..
http://www.motherjones.com/kevin-drum/2016/03/isis-appears-be-close-collapse
Ummm …..
http://www.motherjones.com/kevin-drum/2016/03/isis-appears-be-close-collapse
Ummm …..
http://www.motherjones.com/kevin-drum/2016/03/isis-appears-be-close-collapse
http://www.cnn.com/2016/03/25/politics/isis-no-2-in-command-killed-u-s-believes/index.html
http://www.cnn.com/2016/03/25/politics/isis-no-2-in-command-killed-u-s-believes/index.html
http://www.cnn.com/2016/03/25/politics/isis-no-2-in-command-killed-u-s-believes/index.html
David Brooks gets with the new disorder:
https://www.balloon-juice.com/2016/03/25/bobo-reaches-the-fifth-stage-fear-as-a-stimulant/
Coincidentally, I’ve been reading Marilynne Robinson’s novels and essays lately.
Half way through “Housekeeping”. Lovely stuff.
She’s informed by Calvinism and is a great champion of John Calvin.
She’s a conservative in many ways and I can relate.
David Brooks gets with the new disorder:
https://www.balloon-juice.com/2016/03/25/bobo-reaches-the-fifth-stage-fear-as-a-stimulant/
Coincidentally, I’ve been reading Marilynne Robinson’s novels and essays lately.
Half way through “Housekeeping”. Lovely stuff.
She’s informed by Calvinism and is a great champion of John Calvin.
She’s a conservative in many ways and I can relate.
David Brooks gets with the new disorder:
https://www.balloon-juice.com/2016/03/25/bobo-reaches-the-fifth-stage-fear-as-a-stimulant/
Coincidentally, I’ve been reading Marilynne Robinson’s novels and essays lately.
Half way through “Housekeeping”. Lovely stuff.
She’s informed by Calvinism and is a great champion of John Calvin.
She’s a conservative in many ways and I can relate.
Interesting the guy was apparently a physics teacher.
Another data point…
http://www.amazon.com/Engineers-Jihad-Connection-Extremism-Education/dp/0691145172
Interesting the guy was apparently a physics teacher.
Another data point…
http://www.amazon.com/Engineers-Jihad-Connection-Extremism-Education/dp/0691145172
Interesting the guy was apparently a physics teacher.
Another data point…
http://www.amazon.com/Engineers-Jihad-Connection-Extremism-Education/dp/0691145172
Charles, that was a fascinating article on Engineering and terrorism. But I had a couple of problems with it’s description of engineering education. (Of course, maybe things have changed massively since I was in school.)
Then, a lot of my fellow engineering students fit the description of engineers (both in the article and the comments). But the engineering professors definitely did not. My fellow engineering students all seemed totally bewildered that I had chosen to take a second major in Anthropology. But the professors generally (and the Dean of the College of Engineering in particular) not only understood, they strongly approved.
Maybe that was a matter of selection as to which engineers went into academia. Or maybe it was just that, when the professors were in school, engineers got a broader education. But the difference was striking.
Charles, that was a fascinating article on Engineering and terrorism. But I had a couple of problems with it’s description of engineering education. (Of course, maybe things have changed massively since I was in school.)
Then, a lot of my fellow engineering students fit the description of engineers (both in the article and the comments). But the engineering professors definitely did not. My fellow engineering students all seemed totally bewildered that I had chosen to take a second major in Anthropology. But the professors generally (and the Dean of the College of Engineering in particular) not only understood, they strongly approved.
Maybe that was a matter of selection as to which engineers went into academia. Or maybe it was just that, when the professors were in school, engineers got a broader education. But the difference was striking.
Charles, that was a fascinating article on Engineering and terrorism. But I had a couple of problems with it’s description of engineering education. (Of course, maybe things have changed massively since I was in school.)
Then, a lot of my fellow engineering students fit the description of engineers (both in the article and the comments). But the engineering professors definitely did not. My fellow engineering students all seemed totally bewildered that I had chosen to take a second major in Anthropology. But the professors generally (and the Dean of the College of Engineering in particular) not only understood, they strongly approved.
Maybe that was a matter of selection as to which engineers went into academia. Or maybe it was just that, when the professors were in school, engineers got a broader education. But the difference was striking.
sounds like most programmers i know, tho.
maybe we should give away free copies of Atlas Shrugged. potential jihadis could then grow up to be grumpy Objectivists who want to run away and form their own isolated Utopias, instead of taking out their frustrations on other people.
sounds like most programmers i know, tho.
maybe we should give away free copies of Atlas Shrugged. potential jihadis could then grow up to be grumpy Objectivists who want to run away and form their own isolated Utopias, instead of taking out their frustrations on other people.
sounds like most programmers i know, tho.
maybe we should give away free copies of Atlas Shrugged. potential jihadis could then grow up to be grumpy Objectivists who want to run away and form their own isolated Utopias, instead of taking out their frustrations on other people.
The software still isn’t working.
Since I first got out of graduate school and went to work for Bell Labs, part of my job has always ended up being technology “forecasting”. It’s been more than 30 years since the first time I stood up in front of a group of Labs’ project managers and said, “It’s a software world. From here on, your projects won’t be late because the hardware doesn’t work, your projects will be late because the software doesn’t work.” Repeated many times, in many different places, and it’s more true now than it was then.
Most recently for the F-35, software glitches force the radar subsystem to reboot while in flight. OTOH, they do seem to have pulled the ability of the software to actually fire the cannon mounted in the left wing up from 2019 to 2016…
The software still isn’t working.
Since I first got out of graduate school and went to work for Bell Labs, part of my job has always ended up being technology “forecasting”. It’s been more than 30 years since the first time I stood up in front of a group of Labs’ project managers and said, “It’s a software world. From here on, your projects won’t be late because the hardware doesn’t work, your projects will be late because the software doesn’t work.” Repeated many times, in many different places, and it’s more true now than it was then.
Most recently for the F-35, software glitches force the radar subsystem to reboot while in flight. OTOH, they do seem to have pulled the ability of the software to actually fire the cannon mounted in the left wing up from 2019 to 2016…
The software still isn’t working.
Since I first got out of graduate school and went to work for Bell Labs, part of my job has always ended up being technology “forecasting”. It’s been more than 30 years since the first time I stood up in front of a group of Labs’ project managers and said, “It’s a software world. From here on, your projects won’t be late because the hardware doesn’t work, your projects will be late because the software doesn’t work.” Repeated many times, in many different places, and it’s more true now than it was then.
Most recently for the F-35, software glitches force the radar subsystem to reboot while in flight. OTOH, they do seem to have pulled the ability of the software to actually fire the cannon mounted in the left wing up from 2019 to 2016…
your projects won’t be late because the hardware doesn’t work, your projects will be late because the software doesn’t work.
In my experience, the main software problemm is that projects are scheduled on how long the software will take to design and write. With zero time allocated to testing — i.e. it is assumed that, unlike every other human endeavor, software can be created right the first time, every time. (Hey, we’re good. But nobody is that good!)
Then, when the software turns out not to work perfectly, the whole project falls behind schedule. Or, at minimum, whatever the software is supposed to be controlling doesn’t function quite as intended.
your projects won’t be late because the hardware doesn’t work, your projects will be late because the software doesn’t work.
In my experience, the main software problemm is that projects are scheduled on how long the software will take to design and write. With zero time allocated to testing — i.e. it is assumed that, unlike every other human endeavor, software can be created right the first time, every time. (Hey, we’re good. But nobody is that good!)
Then, when the software turns out not to work perfectly, the whole project falls behind schedule. Or, at minimum, whatever the software is supposed to be controlling doesn’t function quite as intended.
your projects won’t be late because the hardware doesn’t work, your projects will be late because the software doesn’t work.
In my experience, the main software problemm is that projects are scheduled on how long the software will take to design and write. With zero time allocated to testing — i.e. it is assumed that, unlike every other human endeavor, software can be created right the first time, every time. (Hey, we’re good. But nobody is that good!)
Then, when the software turns out not to work perfectly, the whole project falls behind schedule. Or, at minimum, whatever the software is supposed to be controlling doesn’t function quite as intended.
Many volumes have been written on the problems in software projects, but the Mythical Man Month is still the best.
Many volumes have been written on the problems in software projects, but the Mythical Man Month is still the best.
Many volumes have been written on the problems in software projects, but the Mythical Man Month is still the best.
In my experience, the main software problemm is that projects are scheduled on how long the software will take to design and write. With zero time allocated to testing
In my experience, which is admittedly a bit quirky, software projects are scheduled by unicorns. IOW, the time estimates have no discernible relationship with consensus reality.
In my experience, the main software problemm is that projects are scheduled on how long the software will take to design and write. With zero time allocated to testing
In my experience, which is admittedly a bit quirky, software projects are scheduled by unicorns. IOW, the time estimates have no discernible relationship with consensus reality.
In my experience, the main software problemm is that projects are scheduled on how long the software will take to design and write. With zero time allocated to testing
In my experience, which is admittedly a bit quirky, software projects are scheduled by unicorns. IOW, the time estimates have no discernible relationship with consensus reality.
With zero time allocated to testing…
Well, with some amount of time allocated to testing in the initial schedule. Everyone else’s schedule slips come out of testing, though, so eventually the remaining time for testing is zero.
With zero time allocated to testing…
Well, with some amount of time allocated to testing in the initial schedule. Everyone else’s schedule slips come out of testing, though, so eventually the remaining time for testing is zero.
With zero time allocated to testing…
Well, with some amount of time allocated to testing in the initial schedule. Everyone else’s schedule slips come out of testing, though, so eventually the remaining time for testing is zero.
In my experience, which is admittedly a bit quirky, software projects are scheduled by unicorns.
My particular favorite was always the parts that translated into roughly: “On Tuesday, the 3rd, Mike will be brilliant and deliver a previously unknown algorithm with 10x the performance of the current state of the art…” Because asking the software folks how much processing power and memory is needed before the hardware design is frozen was apparently inconvenient.
In my experience, which is admittedly a bit quirky, software projects are scheduled by unicorns.
My particular favorite was always the parts that translated into roughly: “On Tuesday, the 3rd, Mike will be brilliant and deliver a previously unknown algorithm with 10x the performance of the current state of the art…” Because asking the software folks how much processing power and memory is needed before the hardware design is frozen was apparently inconvenient.
In my experience, which is admittedly a bit quirky, software projects are scheduled by unicorns.
My particular favorite was always the parts that translated into roughly: “On Tuesday, the 3rd, Mike will be brilliant and deliver a previously unknown algorithm with 10x the performance of the current state of the art…” Because asking the software folks how much processing power and memory is needed before the hardware design is frozen was apparently inconvenient.
The minimum time required to complete a software project is equal to or greater than the maximum time available to do it.
The minimum time required to complete a software project is equal to or greater than the maximum time available to do it.
The minimum time required to complete a software project is equal to or greater than the maximum time available to do it.
asking the software folks how much processing power and memory is needed before the hardware design is frozen was apparently inconvenient.
Hey, if they said anything about processing power, memory, or even disk storage before implementation, you were ahead of the game. We usually got brought in to do emergency tuning on the day after (or day of) implementation, when it was discovered that there weren’t resources to get the job done. And there had been zero additional resources planned for it.
asking the software folks how much processing power and memory is needed before the hardware design is frozen was apparently inconvenient.
Hey, if they said anything about processing power, memory, or even disk storage before implementation, you were ahead of the game. We usually got brought in to do emergency tuning on the day after (or day of) implementation, when it was discovered that there weren’t resources to get the job done. And there had been zero additional resources planned for it.
asking the software folks how much processing power and memory is needed before the hardware design is frozen was apparently inconvenient.
Hey, if they said anything about processing power, memory, or even disk storage before implementation, you were ahead of the game. We usually got brought in to do emergency tuning on the day after (or day of) implementation, when it was discovered that there weren’t resources to get the job done. And there had been zero additional resources planned for it.
In my view, we are not going to “manage” people who think head chopping is part of church service.
I guess my point was that, assuming you actually can subdue the folks who enjoy head chopping as a religious practice via dropping bombs and other kinetic adventures, the day after you get get done doing that there are a lot of people still around who have to pick up pieces and carry on.
It’s not a matter of ‘managing people’, it’s a matter of not breaking everything and then walking away. Even leaving the humanitarian aspect aside, you’re asking for undesirable outcomes when you do that.
Basically, I find your proposals to be profoundly naive. Call in the Marines, kick ass until the ass is thoroughly kicked, and then come home, is not a recipe for any outcome that is in our interest. As far as I can tell.
I’m looking for the 10 to 20 year view, here.
Sorry, but as you seem to acknowledge upthread, assimilation is an issue.
I guess I missed the part where I said anything about “assimilation is an issue”.
As regards the Muslim community in the United States, I don’t see assimilation as anything remotely like an insuperable issue.
it is assumed that, unlike every other human endeavor, software can be created right the first time
In my opinion and experience, this is pretty close to the heart of it.
If you understand what you actually need to do to a very high degree of accuracy, estimation is hard, but not intractable.
Most times folks have to make their estimates before they have a really accurate understanding of what it is they need to do. And, in my experience, that’s because it’s basically impossible to have a really accurate understanding of what you need to do until you wade in and start doing stuff.
The best approach to dealing with this that I’ve seen is:
1. Identify the time frame in which it makes sense to do something
2. Triage the things you are trying to do so that you know the absolute minimum thing you must do for it to be worth doing
3. Be prepared to throw it away if you can’t do (2) within the bounds of (1)
If you make (2) by the time (1) elapses, victory. If you make (2) sooner than (1) elapsing, bonus. Add the next thing.
If (1) elapses and you haven’t completed (2), re-evaluate and decide if it’s really worth going any further with it. But one of the answers on the table for re-evaluating has to be burn it down and move on.
Basically, you have to commit up front to be willing to eat the sunk cost and move on if that’s how things play out, and you have to have a reasonably crisp definition of when it’s time to do that. *Before* you start.
Factor the risk of failure in as one of the costs of doing it in the first place, and then go for it.
Either that, or just keep lighting big stacks of money on fire.
In my view, we are not going to “manage” people who think head chopping is part of church service.
I guess my point was that, assuming you actually can subdue the folks who enjoy head chopping as a religious practice via dropping bombs and other kinetic adventures, the day after you get get done doing that there are a lot of people still around who have to pick up pieces and carry on.
It’s not a matter of ‘managing people’, it’s a matter of not breaking everything and then walking away. Even leaving the humanitarian aspect aside, you’re asking for undesirable outcomes when you do that.
Basically, I find your proposals to be profoundly naive. Call in the Marines, kick ass until the ass is thoroughly kicked, and then come home, is not a recipe for any outcome that is in our interest. As far as I can tell.
I’m looking for the 10 to 20 year view, here.
Sorry, but as you seem to acknowledge upthread, assimilation is an issue.
I guess I missed the part where I said anything about “assimilation is an issue”.
As regards the Muslim community in the United States, I don’t see assimilation as anything remotely like an insuperable issue.
it is assumed that, unlike every other human endeavor, software can be created right the first time
In my opinion and experience, this is pretty close to the heart of it.
If you understand what you actually need to do to a very high degree of accuracy, estimation is hard, but not intractable.
Most times folks have to make their estimates before they have a really accurate understanding of what it is they need to do. And, in my experience, that’s because it’s basically impossible to have a really accurate understanding of what you need to do until you wade in and start doing stuff.
The best approach to dealing with this that I’ve seen is:
1. Identify the time frame in which it makes sense to do something
2. Triage the things you are trying to do so that you know the absolute minimum thing you must do for it to be worth doing
3. Be prepared to throw it away if you can’t do (2) within the bounds of (1)
If you make (2) by the time (1) elapses, victory. If you make (2) sooner than (1) elapsing, bonus. Add the next thing.
If (1) elapses and you haven’t completed (2), re-evaluate and decide if it’s really worth going any further with it. But one of the answers on the table for re-evaluating has to be burn it down and move on.
Basically, you have to commit up front to be willing to eat the sunk cost and move on if that’s how things play out, and you have to have a reasonably crisp definition of when it’s time to do that. *Before* you start.
Factor the risk of failure in as one of the costs of doing it in the first place, and then go for it.
Either that, or just keep lighting big stacks of money on fire.
In my view, we are not going to “manage” people who think head chopping is part of church service.
I guess my point was that, assuming you actually can subdue the folks who enjoy head chopping as a religious practice via dropping bombs and other kinetic adventures, the day after you get get done doing that there are a lot of people still around who have to pick up pieces and carry on.
It’s not a matter of ‘managing people’, it’s a matter of not breaking everything and then walking away. Even leaving the humanitarian aspect aside, you’re asking for undesirable outcomes when you do that.
Basically, I find your proposals to be profoundly naive. Call in the Marines, kick ass until the ass is thoroughly kicked, and then come home, is not a recipe for any outcome that is in our interest. As far as I can tell.
I’m looking for the 10 to 20 year view, here.
Sorry, but as you seem to acknowledge upthread, assimilation is an issue.
I guess I missed the part where I said anything about “assimilation is an issue”.
As regards the Muslim community in the United States, I don’t see assimilation as anything remotely like an insuperable issue.
it is assumed that, unlike every other human endeavor, software can be created right the first time
In my opinion and experience, this is pretty close to the heart of it.
If you understand what you actually need to do to a very high degree of accuracy, estimation is hard, but not intractable.
Most times folks have to make their estimates before they have a really accurate understanding of what it is they need to do. And, in my experience, that’s because it’s basically impossible to have a really accurate understanding of what you need to do until you wade in and start doing stuff.
The best approach to dealing with this that I’ve seen is:
1. Identify the time frame in which it makes sense to do something
2. Triage the things you are trying to do so that you know the absolute minimum thing you must do for it to be worth doing
3. Be prepared to throw it away if you can’t do (2) within the bounds of (1)
If you make (2) by the time (1) elapses, victory. If you make (2) sooner than (1) elapsing, bonus. Add the next thing.
If (1) elapses and you haven’t completed (2), re-evaluate and decide if it’s really worth going any further with it. But one of the answers on the table for re-evaluating has to be burn it down and move on.
Basically, you have to commit up front to be willing to eat the sunk cost and move on if that’s how things play out, and you have to have a reasonably crisp definition of when it’s time to do that. *Before* you start.
Factor the risk of failure in as one of the costs of doing it in the first place, and then go for it.
Either that, or just keep lighting big stacks of money on fire.
“An essential and page-turning narrative on the history of drone warfare by the acclaimed author of Rumsfeld, exploring how this practice emerged, who made it happen, and the real consequences of targeted killing”
Kill Chain: The Rise of the High-Tech Assassins
“An essential and page-turning narrative on the history of drone warfare by the acclaimed author of Rumsfeld, exploring how this practice emerged, who made it happen, and the real consequences of targeted killing”
Kill Chain: The Rise of the High-Tech Assassins
“An essential and page-turning narrative on the history of drone warfare by the acclaimed author of Rumsfeld, exploring how this practice emerged, who made it happen, and the real consequences of targeted killing”
Kill Chain: The Rise of the High-Tech Assassins
Once upon a time, there was a land where decent people lived. Then a band of evil trolls cast a spell on it and turned it into a steaming pile of sh*t.
http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/nra-adds-guns-fairy-tales
The End.
Once upon a time, there was a land where decent people lived. Then a band of evil trolls cast a spell on it and turned it into a steaming pile of sh*t.
http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/nra-adds-guns-fairy-tales
The End.
Once upon a time, there was a land where decent people lived. Then a band of evil trolls cast a spell on it and turned it into a steaming pile of sh*t.
http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/nra-adds-guns-fairy-tales
The End.
Triage the things you are trying to do so that you know the absolute minimum thing you must do for it to be worth doing
3. Be prepared to throw it away if you can’t do (2) within the bounds of (1)
Which seems pretty well antithetical to how military procurement works; extraneous stuff usually getting added by diktat from above, rather than thrown away.
Triage the things you are trying to do so that you know the absolute minimum thing you must do for it to be worth doing
3. Be prepared to throw it away if you can’t do (2) within the bounds of (1)
Which seems pretty well antithetical to how military procurement works; extraneous stuff usually getting added by diktat from above, rather than thrown away.
Triage the things you are trying to do so that you know the absolute minimum thing you must do for it to be worth doing
3. Be prepared to throw it away if you can’t do (2) within the bounds of (1)
Which seems pretty well antithetical to how military procurement works; extraneous stuff usually getting added by diktat from above, rather than thrown away.
Sweden’s FMV seems to provide one of the better models for rational defence procurement.
http://natoassociation.ca/revamping-canadian-defence-procurement-swedish-style/
It is entirely independent of the Swedish military.
Sweden’s FMV seems to provide one of the better models for rational defence procurement.
http://natoassociation.ca/revamping-canadian-defence-procurement-swedish-style/
It is entirely independent of the Swedish military.
Sweden’s FMV seems to provide one of the better models for rational defence procurement.
http://natoassociation.ca/revamping-canadian-defence-procurement-swedish-style/
It is entirely independent of the Swedish military.
Russell: As regards the Muslim community in the United States, I don’t see assimilation as anything remotely like an insuperable issue.
Indeed, the Muslims I know in the US are pretty thoroughly assimilated. Sure, their religion is different. So is that of the Jews.** Not to mention the Buddhists. And Hindus. So what? At least in the eyes of some, the religion of Catholics is different, too.
I guess what I’m saying is that assimilation is not a strictly one-way street. Yes, we expect immigrants to embrace American culture. But we also have to make the occasional accomodation to their culture as well.
Does it damage American culture is some folks celebrate the Sabbath on Saturday, rather than Sunday? Does it damage us if someone wants to open a judo dojo? Does it damage us if some restaurants serve sushi or tacos or hummus? We deal with the small increase in diversity and move on.
We aren’t damaged. In fact we are strengthened, simply because our ability to adapt to a changing world is enhanced by the mere fact of having practiced. Not to mention the talents those slightly different people bring us.
** I know one guy who is an Orthodox Jew. Not ultra-orthodox, but quite strict. He’s also the manager for computer network systems for an extremely large east coast city.
For our company retreats, we have to work our schedule around the fact that his daughter (one of my co-workers) can’t travel, or do business, between sunset Friday and sunset Saturday. And meal planning is a bit of a challenge. Doesn’t seem to have hurt the company, or any of us, in the slightest. (And the guy who is Seventh Day Adventest appreciates the fact that, as a result, he doesn’t have to deal with working on Saturday either.)
Russell: As regards the Muslim community in the United States, I don’t see assimilation as anything remotely like an insuperable issue.
Indeed, the Muslims I know in the US are pretty thoroughly assimilated. Sure, their religion is different. So is that of the Jews.** Not to mention the Buddhists. And Hindus. So what? At least in the eyes of some, the religion of Catholics is different, too.
I guess what I’m saying is that assimilation is not a strictly one-way street. Yes, we expect immigrants to embrace American culture. But we also have to make the occasional accomodation to their culture as well.
Does it damage American culture is some folks celebrate the Sabbath on Saturday, rather than Sunday? Does it damage us if someone wants to open a judo dojo? Does it damage us if some restaurants serve sushi or tacos or hummus? We deal with the small increase in diversity and move on.
We aren’t damaged. In fact we are strengthened, simply because our ability to adapt to a changing world is enhanced by the mere fact of having practiced. Not to mention the talents those slightly different people bring us.
** I know one guy who is an Orthodox Jew. Not ultra-orthodox, but quite strict. He’s also the manager for computer network systems for an extremely large east coast city.
For our company retreats, we have to work our schedule around the fact that his daughter (one of my co-workers) can’t travel, or do business, between sunset Friday and sunset Saturday. And meal planning is a bit of a challenge. Doesn’t seem to have hurt the company, or any of us, in the slightest. (And the guy who is Seventh Day Adventest appreciates the fact that, as a result, he doesn’t have to deal with working on Saturday either.)
Russell: As regards the Muslim community in the United States, I don’t see assimilation as anything remotely like an insuperable issue.
Indeed, the Muslims I know in the US are pretty thoroughly assimilated. Sure, their religion is different. So is that of the Jews.** Not to mention the Buddhists. And Hindus. So what? At least in the eyes of some, the religion of Catholics is different, too.
I guess what I’m saying is that assimilation is not a strictly one-way street. Yes, we expect immigrants to embrace American culture. But we also have to make the occasional accomodation to their culture as well.
Does it damage American culture is some folks celebrate the Sabbath on Saturday, rather than Sunday? Does it damage us if someone wants to open a judo dojo? Does it damage us if some restaurants serve sushi or tacos or hummus? We deal with the small increase in diversity and move on.
We aren’t damaged. In fact we are strengthened, simply because our ability to adapt to a changing world is enhanced by the mere fact of having practiced. Not to mention the talents those slightly different people bring us.
** I know one guy who is an Orthodox Jew. Not ultra-orthodox, but quite strict. He’s also the manager for computer network systems for an extremely large east coast city.
For our company retreats, we have to work our schedule around the fact that his daughter (one of my co-workers) can’t travel, or do business, between sunset Friday and sunset Saturday. And meal planning is a bit of a challenge. Doesn’t seem to have hurt the company, or any of us, in the slightest. (And the guy who is Seventh Day Adventest appreciates the fact that, as a result, he doesn’t have to deal with working on Saturday either.)
As far as assimilation goes, I ought to point out that two out of the England cricket eleven in the World Cup are devout Muslims.
One (Adil Rashid) is the first decent leg spinner England have had in some time – and a Yorkshireman to boot.
As far as assimilation goes, I ought to point out that two out of the England cricket eleven in the World Cup are devout Muslims.
One (Adil Rashid) is the first decent leg spinner England have had in some time – and a Yorkshireman to boot.
As far as assimilation goes, I ought to point out that two out of the England cricket eleven in the World Cup are devout Muslims.
One (Adil Rashid) is the first decent leg spinner England have had in some time – and a Yorkshireman to boot.
Conservatives in every generation always have a list of groups who can’t be assimilated. A few generations later some of the descendants of these groups are assimilated conservatives pointing to groups who can’t be assimilated.
On the Mideast, this interview with Patrick Cckburn is interesting. I read him from time to time– I think I will get his book.
http://www.vice.com/read/patrick-cockburn-interview-yohann-koshy
Conservatives in every generation always have a list of groups who can’t be assimilated. A few generations later some of the descendants of these groups are assimilated conservatives pointing to groups who can’t be assimilated.
On the Mideast, this interview with Patrick Cckburn is interesting. I read him from time to time– I think I will get his book.
http://www.vice.com/read/patrick-cockburn-interview-yohann-koshy
Conservatives in every generation always have a list of groups who can’t be assimilated. A few generations later some of the descendants of these groups are assimilated conservatives pointing to groups who can’t be assimilated.
On the Mideast, this interview with Patrick Cckburn is interesting. I read him from time to time– I think I will get his book.
http://www.vice.com/read/patrick-cockburn-interview-yohann-koshy
Cultures, as well as animal breeds, benefit from “hybrid vigor”.
Cultures, as well as animal breeds, benefit from “hybrid vigor”.
Cultures, as well as animal breeds, benefit from “hybrid vigor”.
a Yorkshireman to boot
But did he have to get up in the morning at ten o’clock at night, half an hour before he went to bed, eat a lump of cold poison, work twenty-nine hours a day down mill, and pay mill owner for permission to come to work, and when he got home, his Dad would kill him, and dance about on his grave singing “Hallelujah.”?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xe1a1wHxTyo
a Yorkshireman to boot
But did he have to get up in the morning at ten o’clock at night, half an hour before he went to bed, eat a lump of cold poison, work twenty-nine hours a day down mill, and pay mill owner for permission to come to work, and when he got home, his Dad would kill him, and dance about on his grave singing “Hallelujah.”?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xe1a1wHxTyo
a Yorkshireman to boot
But did he have to get up in the morning at ten o’clock at night, half an hour before he went to bed, eat a lump of cold poison, work twenty-nine hours a day down mill, and pay mill owner for permission to come to work, and when he got home, his Dad would kill him, and dance about on his grave singing “Hallelujah.”?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xe1a1wHxTyo
Aye, ‘appen as like.
Also contributed significantly to Yorkshire’s first county championship for fifteen years.
Aye, ‘appen as like.
Also contributed significantly to Yorkshire’s first county championship for fifteen years.
Aye, ‘appen as like.
Also contributed significantly to Yorkshire’s first county championship for fifteen years.
There’s always safe harbor available for racist, subhuman vermin in at least one of the Republican Party’s many circus rings, ain’t there:
http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/sam-nunberg-ex-trump-aide-endorses-cruz
Meanwhile, this is a highly unfortunate decision:
http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/secret-service-no-guns-rnc-convention
By what Constitutional perogative does the Federal government intervene in the mutual killing of freedom-loving, armed, right-wing filth inside the Quicken Loans Arena at the Republican Convention in Cleveland, I ask all those who cherish the divinely-inspired words in that document, not to mention States rights?
This is the regulatory state run amok and every red-blooded right-winger should blanch at this travesty of Federal overreach, contravening the God-given rights of the People to shoot who the f8ck they deem shootable.
These armed individuals at the Convention are bound and determined to be gunned down and by everything that is dear to Americans they WILL have to gunned down in the near future anyway to save the country, so why not let they these guilty ones have the first shots at each other, saving the rest of us some bullets when the time comes:
http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/secret-service-no-guns-rnc-convention
This just in. Looks like patriots are getting an early start:
http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/reports-shots-fired-us-capitol
There’s always safe harbor available for racist, subhuman vermin in at least one of the Republican Party’s many circus rings, ain’t there:
http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/sam-nunberg-ex-trump-aide-endorses-cruz
Meanwhile, this is a highly unfortunate decision:
http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/secret-service-no-guns-rnc-convention
By what Constitutional perogative does the Federal government intervene in the mutual killing of freedom-loving, armed, right-wing filth inside the Quicken Loans Arena at the Republican Convention in Cleveland, I ask all those who cherish the divinely-inspired words in that document, not to mention States rights?
This is the regulatory state run amok and every red-blooded right-winger should blanch at this travesty of Federal overreach, contravening the God-given rights of the People to shoot who the f8ck they deem shootable.
These armed individuals at the Convention are bound and determined to be gunned down and by everything that is dear to Americans they WILL have to gunned down in the near future anyway to save the country, so why not let they these guilty ones have the first shots at each other, saving the rest of us some bullets when the time comes:
http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/secret-service-no-guns-rnc-convention
This just in. Looks like patriots are getting an early start:
http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/reports-shots-fired-us-capitol
There’s always safe harbor available for racist, subhuman vermin in at least one of the Republican Party’s many circus rings, ain’t there:
http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/sam-nunberg-ex-trump-aide-endorses-cruz
Meanwhile, this is a highly unfortunate decision:
http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/secret-service-no-guns-rnc-convention
By what Constitutional perogative does the Federal government intervene in the mutual killing of freedom-loving, armed, right-wing filth inside the Quicken Loans Arena at the Republican Convention in Cleveland, I ask all those who cherish the divinely-inspired words in that document, not to mention States rights?
This is the regulatory state run amok and every red-blooded right-winger should blanch at this travesty of Federal overreach, contravening the God-given rights of the People to shoot who the f8ck they deem shootable.
These armed individuals at the Convention are bound and determined to be gunned down and by everything that is dear to Americans they WILL have to gunned down in the near future anyway to save the country, so why not let they these guilty ones have the first shots at each other, saving the rest of us some bullets when the time comes:
http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/secret-service-no-guns-rnc-convention
This just in. Looks like patriots are getting an early start:
http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/reports-shots-fired-us-capitol
Count, you might like
http://www.latimes.com/nation/la-georgia-governor-religious-exemptions-bill-20160328-story.html
Sometimes, Republicans do things you actually approve of.
Count, you might like
http://www.latimes.com/nation/la-georgia-governor-religious-exemptions-bill-20160328-story.html
Sometimes, Republicans do things you actually approve of.
Count, you might like
http://www.latimes.com/nation/la-georgia-governor-religious-exemptions-bill-20160328-story.html
Sometimes, Republicans do things you actually approve of.
You tryin’ to distract me from the us- versus-them feud?
Probably time for a primary challenge to the Governor.
Methinks, the powerful, pro-business interstate wedding cake lobby got to him.
Never cross Sara Lee.
You tryin’ to distract me from the us- versus-them feud?
Probably time for a primary challenge to the Governor.
Methinks, the powerful, pro-business interstate wedding cake lobby got to him.
Never cross Sara Lee.
You tryin’ to distract me from the us- versus-them feud?
Probably time for a primary challenge to the Governor.
Methinks, the powerful, pro-business interstate wedding cake lobby got to him.
Never cross Sara Lee.
Prophet Larry brings God and guns to the table right in the seat of government, as the Foreplay Fathers intended, and they put the kibosh on him.
http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/larry-dawson-capitol-armed-suspect
Apparently the Visitor’s Center at the U.S. Capital is a God and gun-free zone and the conservatives don’t bat an eye.
Meanwhile the rest of us have to put up with Larry everywhere else.
Why didn’t he carry into church where gunfire lives?
Prophet Larry brings God and guns to the table right in the seat of government, as the Foreplay Fathers intended, and they put the kibosh on him.
http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/larry-dawson-capitol-armed-suspect
Apparently the Visitor’s Center at the U.S. Capital is a God and gun-free zone and the conservatives don’t bat an eye.
Meanwhile the rest of us have to put up with Larry everywhere else.
Why didn’t he carry into church where gunfire lives?
Prophet Larry brings God and guns to the table right in the seat of government, as the Foreplay Fathers intended, and they put the kibosh on him.
http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/larry-dawson-capitol-armed-suspect
Apparently the Visitor’s Center at the U.S. Capital is a God and gun-free zone and the conservatives don’t bat an eye.
Meanwhile the rest of us have to put up with Larry everywhere else.
Why didn’t he carry into church where gunfire lives?
This is what I wonder, when I see complaints about leftist wimpiness.
3000 people died on 9/11 and thousand more in various incidents before and after. It’s sensible, as nearly as I know, to take 10,000 deaths as a round figure.
In the 1990s, we killed half a million children under the age of five with our sanctions. Presumptively, none of those children were guilty of terrorism, they were just in the neighborhood. Children and adults are continuing to die of harm done during that era, too, thanks to battlefields never decontaminated, infrastructure damage that could never be repaired, and so on.
A minimal tally of deaths in the wake of 9/11 and our invasion includes several hundred thousand civilians, and several million refugees. It is possible that the actual total of civilian deaths is two to ten times higher than the minimum, but let’s be cautious here. And deaths continue from the war and occupation, too, of course. It looks like we’ve done our part to help kill another million or so Iraqis by flooding sometime in the near future.
Here’s my question: When is the debt paid?
The civilian death total since the first Gulf War is somewhere north of a million, which means a hundred dead Iraqis for every dead Westerners. Since this is apparently not enough, what is enough? 200? 500? 1,000? Total depopulation of whole countries?
This is what I wonder, when I see complaints about leftist wimpiness.
3000 people died on 9/11 and thousand more in various incidents before and after. It’s sensible, as nearly as I know, to take 10,000 deaths as a round figure.
In the 1990s, we killed half a million children under the age of five with our sanctions. Presumptively, none of those children were guilty of terrorism, they were just in the neighborhood. Children and adults are continuing to die of harm done during that era, too, thanks to battlefields never decontaminated, infrastructure damage that could never be repaired, and so on.
A minimal tally of deaths in the wake of 9/11 and our invasion includes several hundred thousand civilians, and several million refugees. It is possible that the actual total of civilian deaths is two to ten times higher than the minimum, but let’s be cautious here. And deaths continue from the war and occupation, too, of course. It looks like we’ve done our part to help kill another million or so Iraqis by flooding sometime in the near future.
Here’s my question: When is the debt paid?
The civilian death total since the first Gulf War is somewhere north of a million, which means a hundred dead Iraqis for every dead Westerners. Since this is apparently not enough, what is enough? 200? 500? 1,000? Total depopulation of whole countries?
This is what I wonder, when I see complaints about leftist wimpiness.
3000 people died on 9/11 and thousand more in various incidents before and after. It’s sensible, as nearly as I know, to take 10,000 deaths as a round figure.
In the 1990s, we killed half a million children under the age of five with our sanctions. Presumptively, none of those children were guilty of terrorism, they were just in the neighborhood. Children and adults are continuing to die of harm done during that era, too, thanks to battlefields never decontaminated, infrastructure damage that could never be repaired, and so on.
A minimal tally of deaths in the wake of 9/11 and our invasion includes several hundred thousand civilians, and several million refugees. It is possible that the actual total of civilian deaths is two to ten times higher than the minimum, but let’s be cautious here. And deaths continue from the war and occupation, too, of course. It looks like we’ve done our part to help kill another million or so Iraqis by flooding sometime in the near future.
Here’s my question: When is the debt paid?
The civilian death total since the first Gulf War is somewhere north of a million, which means a hundred dead Iraqis for every dead Westerners. Since this is apparently not enough, what is enough? 200? 500? 1,000? Total depopulation of whole countries?
In my view, we are not going to “manage” people who think head chopping is part of church service.
I just wanted to note that Erik Prince’s salvation and good standing in the eyes of the Lord is personally attended to by James Dobson. Prince doesn’t order heads cut off in church, but he does order torture and mass slaughter as part of his service to God and country.
In my view, we are not going to “manage” people who think head chopping is part of church service.
I just wanted to note that Erik Prince’s salvation and good standing in the eyes of the Lord is personally attended to by James Dobson. Prince doesn’t order heads cut off in church, but he does order torture and mass slaughter as part of his service to God and country.
In my view, we are not going to “manage” people who think head chopping is part of church service.
I just wanted to note that Erik Prince’s salvation and good standing in the eyes of the Lord is personally attended to by James Dobson. Prince doesn’t order heads cut off in church, but he does order torture and mass slaughter as part of his service to God and country.