From my perspective, this war is going about as well as I expected, and that's not a criticism of the planners or the conduct of the campaign to date. I do believe it's not going as well as a lot of people expected. I'm not happy about that, but I hope they're beginning to understand something now, before their alligator mouths overload their hummingbird assholes the next time. Technology does not "change everything." It does not alter the fact that war is a chaotic process, and we court chaos at our peril. That's kind of why folks who actually know a few things about war tend to regard it as a "last resort," not the first.
All that being said, folks should be prepared for this to get a hell of a lot worse before it gets better. And that means we're going to have to gut it out and win this thing. None of this "peace with honor" crap. The Battle of Baghdad is going to be as bloody as anything from WW II. I know it's kind of hard to grasp that sometimes the right thing to do in the face of death and destruction is to cause more death and destruction, but that's the unpalatable truth. If we fail at this, we've dishonored ourselves and the sacrifice of all who have already given their lives in this debacle; and failure will only guarantee far more death and destruction in the years to come. We have to win this thing, and leave something in our wake that means something. The dead in this war are an enormous down payment on something, let's make sure it's something worth what they've paid.
(My repetitive use of the word "something" in the last two sentences suggests we've got some work to do to craft a vision of what we'd like to see as the result of all this. To be sure, the Iraqi people should have the preponderance of the input on this, but we're going to have to help them "dream big.")
To do that, we're going to have to change our approach. We're going to have to start mending fences with some folks (France, Germany, Russia, Turkey, China - nobody, you know, "important"), because we're going to need all the help we can get. I don't think we're going to be able to really mend those fences until we get rid of the current administration. I think the Bush administration may not survive this war, and that's a good thing. But for that to happen, this electorate is going to have to get energized about doing something more constructive than blocking intersections.
Once we've defeated Saddam's regular forces, we're going to have to contend with large numbers of irregular forces, or "terrorists," if you will. Remember that general who said we're going to need something on the order of half a million troops to occupy Iraq? Remember the crap he took from Wolfowitz? That's what you get for blurting out the unpalatable truth. We really don't want to have those kinds of numbers pinned down in Iraq. We're going to need help, and lots of it.
Hopefully Saddam's military defeat will give a lot of the other bad actors in the world pause for a little while, until we sort out how we're going to pacify Iraq long enough to get a functioning civil administration up and running. If not, we could be challenged from other quarters. We really need additional help, and we're going to find it damn hard to come by given the demonstrated lack of social skills on the part of the Bush administration and the "go-it-alone" neo-cons. The next couple of years are going to be hard ones for everyone.
The only way out of this that's not worse than starting it was in the first place is seeing it through. It's another unpalatable truth, but that's the way the truth comes sometimes. I just hope we're up to this challenge. With the right leadership, I'm sure we could be. I'm not at all confident we have the right leadership.
The "anti-war movement" or whatever it is, if it's a truly "smart" mob, and not just a mob, needs to start thinking.
Let's quickly re-establish my sympathies. I was vehemently against the war. Then the war started. I am now vehemently against losing the war, and, more importantly, the peace that follows.
Because the "anti-war movement" is an amorphous social organism incorporating a huge array of constituent members with widely varying belief systems, it's not likely that any of this sort of thinking is going to take place. I'd love for all the technorati or digerati to prove me wrong, but I don't think it's going to happen. The main organizing belief that gets all these folks together is their opposition to the war, it doesn't bode well for establishing an authority structure that will allow it to organize more effectively, because they don't share enough core beliefs in common to identify an authority and recognize it.
What does the "anti-war movement" want? Presumably, they want peace. What is the definition of peace? Are all possible "peaces" equal? I think they are not.
Let's say their most favorable scenario is something like we change our minds, and withdraw from Iraq and stop all the bombing. Is this good?
Well, people aren't being killed by American bullets and bombs, but does that mean there won't be people inside Iraq doing their own killing and bombing? I don't think so. I think that even if we left, there would be internal violence until Saddam had re-established his control over the territory. So even if we stop shooting, it doesn't mean Iraqis stop dying.
There would be other consequences attendant to such an unlikely scenario, like a North Korea suddenly emboldened by a weak United States to try nuclear blackmail against South Korea or Japan. Then there's the small matter of Taiwan. I could go on and on, but the point is, the world would suddenly become a much more dangerous place than it already is, I know that's hard to believe, but it's true. I think there would be much less peace than there is right now.
Now, if we win the war, presumably we will have some impact on what the peace that follows will look like. There is an opportunity there, if a very small one. It is an open question whether or not this administration will make the most of that opportunity. It seems to me the "anti-war movement" could fashion itself as a "peace movement" and gain some credibility for themselves by ceasing the protests and instead focusing on shaping the debate of what to do once we've declared victory. If they don't start that right now, they'll have wasted all this time and they won't be prepared when the administration defines what the peace will look like.
So, all you really smart, technologically literate, "community"-minded, "smart mob," small pieces loosely joined, webbed posses, try to impress a cross old man and show me you can actually "change everything," and do it for once instead of just talking about it. There's about six billion people who would be grateful to you.
I've been away from here for a little while, partly because I'm not sure what to write about. I could write quite a bit if I wished to respond to everyone who has written something that seems to inspire a response from me, usually negative, but that's not very productive, as I've recently learned yet again. I could try to impress you all with my analysis of the war thus far, but then the only thing I really know about war is that it is chaotic; and that Clausewitz was right about some things, in war everything is hard. I might caution you not to take any of our weblogging armchair generals' analyses very seriously, and only about half of what you hear or read from official organs. It's not so much that official organs intentionally misrepresent the truth, though there is always some "spin," it's just that they're often not much better informed than you are. It's the fog of war, and all of our technology hasn't really dispelled it. That's neither a good thing, nor a bad thing, it's just the way it is. I am looking forward to reading the history of this war about 10 years from now. By then it shouldn't feel so raw and we might have a number of fairly reliable accounts to compare and contrast. Right now and for the next few years, we simply won't know what we don't know. I do know that I love my Marines. You would too if you got to know them. I wonder if there will ever be a free and democratic Iraq, and if there is, if the Iraqi people will ever really know how much it cost us to buy their freedom. Not that they aren't footing some of the bill, but I hope it is all worth it.
I know that I remain startled by how much better I feel after my Taekwondo class. It's probably the best gauge of how much stress I'm feeling right now, because after a hard workout I feel so much better. Those of you who may not be into a regular program of physical activity might do yourselves a favor by taking a vigorous walk or otherwise raising your activity level. It makes a difference. Don't remain sedentary in front of the television or the computer screen.
The last couple of mornings I've just tried to read some things that are inspirational, think about what they mean to me, and tried to recall some of the things I think I've learned.
I'm grateful that I sleep in a bed each night, under a roof that I share with my two children who are well and whole. I'm grateful that the sun has shone yesterday and today, and the air has been crisp and clear and cool. I've tried to appreciate it and be grateful for it, for the men and women who are experiencing vastly different weather, and for their family members who sleep each night wondering and trying not to think unthinkable thoughts.
I try not to think about the people who have strong opinions on either side of this affair. I think both are probably well intentioned, but I don't think they help. I don't think it helps when I point that out to either of them.
So I'm not sure what to write about. Except maybe the weather.
It's Tournament Players Championship week at Ponte Vedra, which is not Jacksonville. But it's close enough that traffic gets kind of ridiculous all over the beach. I'd been distracted by world events and had completely forgotten about it until I went to the store yesterday and promptly got stuck in traffic. It wasn't too bad, folks seemed nicer than usual about allowing me to changes lanes so I could get to the store.
It was a beautiful day yesterday. I debated washing the car, mowing the lawn, or riding along the beach. I settled on washing the car since it had been a very long time since I'd done it last, and I wanted to get a coat of wax on it before the really hot weather got here. I'm glad I did. It looks like today is going to be cloudy with a "strong chance of rain" beginning this afternoon. I'm sick of rain, but yesterday was another one of those days that kind of gives me a lift so I can tolerate some more gray sky and rain. Of course, the important chore I completely forgot was looking at the roof. That's what happens when you don't use your tools, like your PDA, and instead rely on your own fallible wetware.
I've only been sampling the news on the conflict to keep my stress level down as much as I can. I don't need to comment on it, enough people are doing that already.
I took Mandy for a walk yesterday morning which was another great stress-reducer. It was a beautiful morning, with that really warm light you get in the morning; cool, crisp air with dew on the grass; and a beautiful blue sky with a sprinkling of clouds. Throw in some birds singing and it was a pretty damn nice morning. Mandy gets so excited when I ask her if she wants to go for a walk. Every time I put on my shoes, she thinks she's going to go for a walk, and she's all over me hoping I'll ask her. If I do ask her, she runs over to the back door and sits to get her collar on. She's a pretty good dog. My neighbors across the street have a dog about Mandy's size, that I've probably mentioned before - Bear. After our walk, I heard Mandy whining really loudly at the window, and I look out and my neighbor is out mowing her lawn and Bear is out there with her. I went over and asked if I could put Bear in the backyard with Mandy for a while and she said okay. So I let them run around back there for a little while. Bear doesn't like fences it seems. He just goes and sits at the gate after he's explored the place and marked everything he cares to mark. So I took him back across the street and Mandy came along. They chased each other all over the yard and pretty much exhausted one another. My next-door neighbor just brought home a ten week old Boxer-Lab mix from the humane society. She's going to be a pretty dog. She's very hyper as a puppy just now, leaping into the air at approaching strangers, but I expect she'll be another good playmate for Mandy in about six months.
I picked up Jaguar's ashes on Friday and paid off the vet. Ouch. They put them in a little plastic urn that kind of resembles granite. Maria and Caitlin want to put the ashes in the garden Maria planted in remembrance of her father, while Chris wants to keep the urn as a reminder of Jag. Fine by me.
So today is looking questionable on the weather front. I should still be able to get to do the interior of the car, and I've got plenty of stuff to keep me busy indoors. More than I care to think about, actually. Caitlin's been spending the weekend with Maria down in Melbourne, so it's just been Chris and I (Me? Whatever) up here this weekend. We went to the movies Friday night and Saturday night. Old School was pretty funny, but it's probably not for everyone, it's a little raw in some places. It was a good laugh though, and I needed that. Caitie will be staying down in Melbourne tonight since she doesn't have school tomorrow, and I'll drive down and pick her up tomorrow evening. Makes for a long Monday, but at least Sunday is intact.
Well, I see by the clock in the menu bar it's time to go do the grocery shopping. I probably won't be back here again today, I've got enough to do and little to say, for once. So, see ya when I see ya.
Did I ever tell you I participated in something over thirty burials at sea? I can't remember.
Thirty's not a big number. I'm over thirty. The big box of Crayolas has more than 30 crayons. It's not a big number.
Anyway, it was my job to sprinkle the ashes into the sea. I was the XO, somehow that was my job. The technical term for ashes is cremains. Did you know that? It's kind of like cremate and remains stuck together, almost like a Reese's Peanut Butter Cup. Well, maybe not. But I digress. I like to digress. What is life, if not an enormous digression? Well, I'll leave that to you, because I'm still digressing.
Where was I? Oh yeah, ashes. Ashes. We all fall down.
So it was my job to sprinkle the ashes into the sea. This doesn't sound like a very big deal, and it probably isn't if you've never done it. Nothing is ever as easy as you think it is. Nothing. But you've probably twigged to that by now. Maybe not, but you will.
Anyway, back to the ashes. It's kind of amazing that a whole person can fit in a box about the size of a box of Kleenex. Amazed me anyway. So they'd send these boxes, well, they're called urns really, to the ship, and our job was to take them to sea and conduct a burial service. The CO would officiate, since that's what COs do best, and we'd tape the whole thing and when it was all said and done, we'd package up the tape and some mementos to send along to the survivors.
Now, this sounds pretty straightforward doesn't it? Take a box of ashes and kind of tip them over until they spill into the sea, what could go wrong with that?
Heh. Little do you know.
Ever been driving along and stuck your hand out the window and felt the breeze? Well, that's something we call relative wind. Relative wind is the combination of your motion through the atmosphere and the motion of the atmosphere. Cars go pretty fast, so what you feel with your hand is usually just the motion of the car through the atmosphere. Ships go pretty slow, especially when they're conducting burials at sea. Very slow. So the wind you'd feel on your hand, or your face, is the vector sum of the velocity of the true wind (the motion of the atmosphere) and the the velocity of the ship, except in the opposite direction (I "are" an engineer).
It's not the kind of thing you'd ever think about. I had never thought about it before, right up until the first time I sprinkled some guy's ashes into the sea. Then I thought about it a lot.
See, if you don't have the relative wind just right, funny things can happen to cremains as you're pouring them from the urn, like blowing back up into your face and all over your uniform. While you're on tape.
It was kind of creepy. No, not "kind of," it was very creepy.
Well, a short, one-way, very exciting conversation with the Officer of the Deck following the ceremony resulted in the addition of some standard procedures to the ceremony for burying the dead. They didn't always work, I got dead guy all over me a few more times, but for the most part they blew satisfactorily into the wake of the ship.
We often did more than one ceremony at a time. Bury one guy, "Cut!" bury the next one. We'd do three or four at a time. And then we'd box up the mementos and send them along in the next regular mail following our return to port. No big deal. Unless you send the wrong box to the wrong set of survivors. Then yours truly got to be on the receiving end of an exciting one-way conversation. That happened. Once.
So perhaps it's understandable why I didn't really look forward to the opportunity to excel afforded by yet another burial at sea. But, it's the Navy, so it's not like you can say," No." I got many more opportunities to sprinkle ashes. Accompanying the cremains were the usual documents making the whole thing legitimate, one of which was the deceased's DD-214, a form that documents a service member's discharge and the highlights of their service in very terse, bureaucratic terms. But they did afford me a brief glimpse into the lives of the these guys. Most of them were WW II vets, some later, and some were from the WW I era. Most of them weren't careerists, they did a few years during a war and went on with their lives. But when it came time to conclude the story of their lives, somehow they ended up on my desk. Go figure.
Well, you get lots of time to think when you're at sea. And in case you weren't thinking about burying the dead, there was usually a good twenty minutes or so in each ceremony before I had to go sprinkle the ashes, so there's lots of time to think about stuff right there. If I had twenty minutes to think today, I don't know what I would do.
Anyway, I had some opportunities to think about dead guys who were complete strangers to me having their last earthly remains deposited on my desk. I wondered if any of them thought about this ceremony, or was this the least expensive way for their survivors to dispose of their remains? I didn't know, but I had to think about what the right assumption would be. I didn't mind getting my ass chewed for mixing up mementos, stuff like that happens. But I didn't feel right feeling resentment about having to perform this service, and I did .
Conundrum.
In the end, I decided that if it was me, I'd hope the guys who had to do the deed would give me enough consideration to do it well. And then I got to thinking about all the shit that probably happened to these guys in their lives, and how I got to be the like the period at the end of it. So I figured I'd do them right, and make that period as good as I could. They did their hitch, or their career, they kept their end of the bargain. I'd hate to think I'd be such a shit that the last earthly event marking their existence would be an act conducted with resentment and impatience. And then I got to thinking that not many people get to do something like this, so maybe this was a good deal for me. Maybe there was something special between me and this dead guy I never knew, if only for a few minutes on the fantail of JOHN HANCOCK. I'm happy to say that it became my privilege, and I'm grateful for that.
So anyway, that's a sea story about something that I learned about keeping faith. There are others, but this one's enough for now.
Drinkin' a cold beer after spending three hours washing and waxing Shiva, the Destroyer of Worlds (because there is no overstating the importance of looking good while one is about the serious business of depleting the earth's natural resources, fouling her air and intimidating all the other drivers on the road), while listening to Springsteen's Dry Lightning :
Well the piss yellow sun
Comes bringin' up the day
She said "ain't nobody gonna give nobody
What they really need anyway"
Well you get so sick of the fightin'
You lose your fear of the end
But I can't lose your memory
And the sweet smell of your skin
And it's just dry lightning on the horizon line
Just dry lightning and you on my mind
Life is good.
And I mean that.
I really need to figure out how to format text in Tinderbox better. One of these days.
To the extent that it may be said that the examined life is the life worth living, it seems to me that any "worth" must be derived from the self-examination, not from the opinions or feelings, however well-intended, of others.
Similarly, while one remains alive, there must remain at least the potential to undertake self-examination at some point. Whether or not that effort is ever undertaken is under no one else's control except that of the individual whose life is to be examined.
Therefore, it seems to me that any choice to feel sorrow or pity or any similar negative emotion, for anyone who appears to be in some way failing to undertake the effort of self examination, is to focus on the fixed past and the uncertain present, to the exclusion of the individual's potential for an enlightened future.
The nature of ignorance is such that we don't know what we don't know. This suggests to me that I can never be said to be truly enlightened. Further, this suggests to me that if I wish to devote my cognitive facilities to the assessment of the progress or lack thereof of others' examinations of their lives, I do so at the expense of my own efforts in that regard.
Therefore, if I were to take the position that it is appropriate to feel sorrow for anyone who lives in a state of ignorance and who isn't devoting their fullest effort to self-examination, there would be no room for joy in my life, and little time to attend to my own self-examination, busy as I would be assessing others and finding them all wanting to at least some degree.
It seems to me it might be better for me to take the position that while someone lives, one always has the opportunity to discover something about oneself, and that is something for me to be grateful for and perhaps even to celebrate. A reason to feel some joy, not sorrow. I think this is a better choice. For me.
If love is faith in action, then loving my fellow man perhaps means exhibiting the faith in them that some day, perhaps not today, they may undertake the effort at self-examination, or that those who have already begun that journey will persevere in their effort. I see no reason for sorrow, and a multitude of reasons for joy.
None of the foregoing is a sure-fire antidote to having the occasional raging desire to kick somebody's ass. I'm working on it though.
Your mileage may vary. I'm an authority on nothing. I make all this shit up. Do your own work.
My son asked me last night if this was the beginning of World War III. I told him I didn't know, but it might be called that someday.
Assuming this all goes well, the question becomes, what next? This administration hasn't shared that with us, but its national security strategy, as manifested in the current conflict, suggests we may have more of the same to look forward to. Perhaps especially if this goes well. He'll be eighteen in two years. Gives me pause.
AKMA has responded and I confess I understand less than half of what he writes, but that's true most of the time. I know what the words mean, but I don't know what he means and he clearly doesn't understand what I mean. Enough of this, lesson learned.
I've discovered another way to reduce the noise level of my Powermac G4 MDD, at least subjectively. Spend two hours rolling down I-95 with Springsteen playing in the stereo at high volume.
I've read some fairly glowing pieces regarding the anti-war "movement" and the role of "smart-mobs" in forming it. I'm not sure what praise is warranted, unless we're merely content to conduct street theater.
Let's talk about "mobs" and "social organisms" for a just a little bit.
We're at war with Iraq right now because no "mob," no matter how "smart," is able to compete with a disciplined social organism structured around conventional notions of authority, however illegitimate the basis of that authority. That is to say, the best the "smart-mob" will ever be able to do is to foment a riot, to be destructive, which is seldom the desirable outcome.
We are in Iraq because no political entity within this country was able to coalesce around a coherent message in opposition to the war, which also offered a compelling vision of an alternative to war; two products which would presumably require some fairly rigorous analytical thinking and testing. Instead we got, "No blood for oil!" As insufferable as I find Glenn Reynolds, he's correct about this.
The relative ease with which this administration has been able to commit this nation to a doctrine of pre-emptive war and an armed conflict in Iraq is a reflection of the disarray and demoralization within what should normally have been the "loyal opposition," the Democratic Party. Then again, perhaps it is a reflection of some belief on the part of the party that this is a wise course of action. Even if the elected representatives of the Democratic Party were in some measure sympathetic to the administration's vision of a national security strategy, I would at least hope they would feel that they had a duty to the nation to demand a vigorous debate. Instead we got Robert Byrd speaking in the well of the Senate.
It's become increasingly clear in recent years that the Republican Party has its act together as a social organism. They have what is, at least by comparison with the Democratic Party, a coherent vision, a consistent message, and an adroit facility at manipulating the beliefs and therefore spurring action on the part of its constituent members.
Some of you may be offended by the notion that action on the part of individuals is spurred on by the manipulation of their beliefs, but that's normally called, "marketing." There are other, more defamatory, terms as well. One need only look to the proudly embraced appellation "ditto-head" for an indication of the degree of independent critical thinking present in many of the rank and file.
I've been a registered independent ever since I was eligible to vote. I didn't like either political party, seeing little to admire in the antics and actions of both of them. Nor did I wish to get involved with "politics," apart from being what I felt was somewhat of an informed citizen, and voting in every election, even though I didn't always accomplish either one of those limited goals.
In writing my numerous vain (and I like how that word has an appropriate double meaning in this context) responses to AKMA regarding responsibility, I've had to consider what my own responsibility is, and how I might meet it. I don't wish to become some feckless crank who ceaselessly utters useless criticisms or empty moral judgments without troubling to inconvenience myself by actually participating in the process.
I believe I mentioned to Loren recently that I was thinking of registering as a Democrat. Now I think that won't be enough. Instead I'm afraid I will not only have to register as a Democrat, but I will have to participate in the process, the local activities of the party, to do what little I can to help form a loyal opposition to what appears to be the thoroughly dominant political entity in this country today. No candle-light vigil summoned by the genie of the web can accomplish that. No street theater protest conjured up by cell phone and pager can accomplish that.
If we want to take back this government, we're going to have to stop being distracted by all our new toys and whizzy notions of "emergent" this or that, and just roll up our sleeves and do it the old-fashioned way, albeit with greater effectiveness through the innovative use of technology as those in the other party have done.
This is in reply to AKMA, to answer his questions and clarify what I think he misconstrues, sometimes, I believe, deliberately. Please read his post as I'll be quoting somewhat out of context. I expect this won't be taken as a friendly exchange, but these are serious things and some heat is probably not inappropriate. Having said that, this was exhausting, and it's not pretty. Tinderbox seems to have difficulty rendering italics across multiple paragaphs, and I'm to tired to try to fix it. Do the best you can.
"my shirking my responsiblity (sic) to support the army regardless of the circumstances "
AKMA twists my words. I wrote, "Better one should grieve for oneself than presume to grieve for the moral failure of a soldier doing his or her duty, holding up their end of the bargain while we shirked ours." Note the word, "ours." Now, what responsibility was I referring to? I can see that perhaps I wasn't clear. I wrote, "Although you will find it nowhere in the words, implicit in the oath is a reciprocal agreement with those whom the soldier serves." "Those whom the soldier serves" would be us, to which the "our" refers. But what responsibility have we shirked?
It was AKMA who used the word "honor," with no description of what he meant by the word, in his original post, the one which I chose to address in Responsibility. Additionally, he chose to separate soldiers into two groups, one of which he would "honor," and the other he would "grieve." He uses "sacrifice" in connection with "honor" and "loss" in connection with "grieve" which does confuse me; but what I took away from his words was that he felt comfortable choosing to honor some, but not others, on the basis of some assessment on his part as to the satisfactory degree of remorse or moral accountability expressed by an particular soldier, which I objected to, and obviously still do.
The reciprocal responsibility we bear with those who swear the oath is to honor their service, and that means to keep faith with them in an active, not a passive way. I wrote, "It's up to the rest of us to think about what our part of the bargain is, how we keep faith with those who we would have kill and die on our behalf.
Well, ladies and gentlemen, I submit to you we haven't kept our part of the bargain up to this point. And if we adopt AKMA's point of view, as pious as that may allow us to feel, we'll be shirking our share of the load even more, though it's hard to believe that's even possible, after the shooting starts. Why are our guys there? Why are we about to invade another country?"
This is the "shirking" to which AKMA mistakenly refers. Presumably, the reader would make the connection with this paragraph:
It's easy to lay the blame all on President Bush, and truthfully, if he weren't in office we probably wouldn't be having this war. But that doesn't get us off the hook. What allows President Bush to use his discretion as Commander in Chief to have this war is our abdication of our responsibility to keep faith with those we place under arms and send in harm's way. Saddam's had twelve years to disarm? Well, we've had twelve years to find some other solution as well. The sad fact is, we didn't. That's not the only way we've let our troops down, but it's enough for now.
When the soldier raises his or her right hand and takes the oath, they're placing their lives in our hands. They are giving their lives over to us to use as we see fit. They, as AKMA correctly points out, even surrender their unwillingness to take another life, and they surrender it to us, to you and me, not to anything or anyone else. We are responsible for that, not them."
It seems to me that most of us have been too preoccupied with other matters to demand the kind of accountability from our elected leaders that might have kept us from having to commit our armed forces in an endeavor of such ambiguous moral clarity, if that's not putting it too charitably. We've neglected our responsibility to our soldiers to be good stewards of the faith and trust they place in us. We're too busy writing all about "smart mobs" and "community," and congratulating one another on each seemingly new insight on the nature of "cyberspace." Meanwhile, Saddam builds his bombs and Wolfowitz whispers in the President's ear, and then we're all "shocked" to discover we've deployed a quarter of a million troops.
Perhaps AKMA isn't persuaded that there's a binding reciprocal moral agreement with those who serve. I don't know. But I never asserted he has a responsibility to "support the army regardless of the circumstances."
If I take his words to mean that he is referring to my assertion that he has a binding reciprocal moral agreement with those who serve, specifically, to honor them, and by that I mean to keep faith with them, I would say this is a different matter than supporting "the army regardless of the circumstances." One need not support the army if the army chooses to exclude blacks or women or gays. One need not support the army if the army chooses to employ weapons of mass destruction. Indeed, I submit there are as many ways of honoring the men and women who serve by not "supporting" them when we believe they err, or their decisions are not compatible with our values, but the vast majority of those are before the fact. Later on again in this piece I will address the institutions we have in place which will, however imperfectly, hold soldiers accountable when they violate their oath, or otherwise act in a dishonorable way. Those institutions afford us the privilege of allowing us to keep faith with the soldier, while still holding him accountable - which is also a part of keeping faith.
So, not to get wrapped around the semantic axle, to honor or keep faith does not mean to blindly endorse or support and I never made any such assertion, nor do I believe that is the context AKMA was offering his distinction in "honoring" some while "grieving" others.
So at least I hope we're clear on this "shirking" part.
I also never asserted AKMA was "covertly" passing judgment on them, I was asserting he was overtly passing judgment on them, if only in an irritating passively-aggressive way. Clear?
"although any rejoinder I make already stands under Dave's characterization of me as "unfit" to speak to this subject. "
Once again, AKMA twists my words. I never asserted he was unfit to "speak" to this subject. Specifically, I wrote:
AKMA fundamentally misunderstands the leap of faith the soldier makes, and this misunderstanding leads him to "honor" some and "grieve" others. It is a judgment he is not fit to render.
I think the word "unfit" seems to sting. I could have written something along the lines of, "AKMA, by virtue of some privileged state of grace that eludes most of the rest of us mere mortals, feels comfortable arrogating to himself the capacity to render judgment upon the moral fitness of men and women who have served in combat who fail to measure up to his standard of adequate remorse for whatever terrible acts they may have committed; which affords him the singular privilege of choosing to "honor" some while "grieving" others."
But I didn't want to be overly dramatic.
"Unfit" means "not suitable, below the required standards." AKMA is not suitable for passing judgment on men and women who have served in combat. In short, AKMA is not God, if that's not putting too fine a point on it; in addition to misunderstanding the leap of faith the soldier makes.
Whatever burden the soldier bears for his or her acts in combat, AKMA need not add to it by publicly sharing with them and the world his decision to "grieve" for them. He may of course choose to do so if he wishes, but he performs no larger public service for either the soldier or anyone else by proclaiming it to the world, and doing so, of itself, does not mean he is manifestly fit to do so. In other words, it's a conceit.
That's my assertion, and I have by no means indicated that AKMA is unfit to challenge it. If I am wrong, then he is free to persuade me, or at least make a case to others, that he is suitable, qualified, or otherwise fit to publicly pronounce this soldier honorable and that one grievable.
"if each of us respectfully speaks his piece (not only in words but in deeds) and we finally disagree, we don't have to fight to the rhetorical death."
I believe my first remarks were respectful, albeit blunt. I will leave it to others to decide for themselves if you have shown me the same courtesy in your subsequent replies to include the one I am addressing now.
"I don't feel morally superior to Dave and Jonathon. I respect them."
Evidently, not enough to respond other than to obliquely refer to how my style or the words I chose have somehow rendered you impotent; or to imply, again obliquely, that my words are beneath your dignity to reply to. Perhaps it's just the prose style of an academic, but you really come off passive-aggressive in your replies. "I know what I am, but what are you?" is what it feels like.
"I must support without questioning the work of those soldiers because "
Again, you misconstrue, if not deliberately twist my words. You use "support" twice in this paragraph where you are presumably trying to restate what I have asserted. "Support" and "honor" do not mean the same thing. Is this not clear? You can choose not to support the war, and that doesn't break faith with the troops. You can choose not to support any given course of action of the army and that does not break faith with the troops. You break faith with the troops when you place yourself in a morally superior position and pass judgment on them for acts they commit in combat. They are human. They err. They are placed in horrible circumstances by virtue of a decision they made to take the oath, and by our failure to properly attend to the faith and trust placed in us. When they err, we have institutions in place to hold them accountable. A military court will pass formal judgment on them, and they will be held accountable for any acts that are committed that are outside the bounds of the law of war or the Uniform Code of Military Justice. This relieves you of any misperceived responsibility you have to judge them, and affords you the opportunity to have compassion for them without being condescending. You should welcome this because unless you're somehow immune from being a citizen of this country, you're responsible for their actions as well.
"I haven't said more about Dave's imputations and his ethical reasoning because I don't know how."
This is really too much. Have I baffled you with my bullshit? Am I incoherent? Have I just stunned you into a state of unconsciousness? Really. This is how much you respect me? Why am I wasting my time?
"How does a soldier's voluntary oath to defend the Constitution bind me to hold my tongue? "
Because while the oath he takes may be voluntary, the acts he commits, on which you now seem so eager to pass judgment, he does not commit on his own behalf, he does so on our behalf, yours and mine. If we, as a "community" or a society or a nation, don't wish have men and women under arms who will be sent into harm's way to kill and die for us, on our behalf to be redundant, because of our moral convictions, then let's have that debate. If this "community," this nation, that you are a citizen of, decides to do so anyway, it seems to me that you enjoy no privileged position that makes you fit to break faith with those who place their faith in us, you and I. It also seems to me, then, that if we hold serious moral reservations regarding these institutions of combat arms, then we ought to give greater attention to the affairs of the world where they might be considered for service. I'm not saying you haven't done that, but I've never read anything you've written that suggests you have. Again, perhaps I wasn't clear, when I make reference to holding your tongue it is in the context of your not deigning to give us the benefit of your superior moral insight by asserting that some soldiers are worthy of honor, while others are only worthy of grief, by virtue of some standard of remorse for which you feel singularly fit to be the arbiter. They make a greater sacrifice than you. They endure combat and you don't. They do so at our command and on our behalf, in keeping faith with us, yet somehow you retain the privilege of being fit to pass judgment on them. This eludes me.
"How did I let the soldier down by inaction and indifference?"
Perhaps you didn't. Maybe you're a model citizen. In the illusory collective "we" there will be some of us who don't fit. I'm not as clever a rhetorician as you are, AKMA, I'm just an engineer and a career military man, a "warrior," if you will. Perhaps you have voted in every election. Perhaps you have expressed your views to your elected representatives about matters including Iraq, Iran, North Korea, Afghanistan, Syria, Pakistan, Israel and Palestine. Maybe they're quite aware of your concern that we aggressively purse enlightened foreign policies and diplomatic measures to ensure it doesn't come to the employment of force to resolve the difficult issues we face with those nations. I know I sure haven't, and I and everyone else that hasn't, who are opposed to this war, have not upheld our end of the bargain with the troops who serve us. But again, maybe you don't think you have any such responsibility.
Not wishing to be misunderstood, let me quickly add that even if we were spotless in our virtue on this matter, it would not afford us the privilege to publicly damn those who we feel have failed in some moral sense the course of doing their duty.
"On what basis does Dave reserve for himself the prerogative to call me unfit, while insisting that I keep silent on matters concerning the soul, concerning wrong and right, life and death? "
A sounder basis, and certainly not reserved for me alone, than the one you use to choose to honor some and not others. I make no moral judgment on whether or not you are a good man. I don't "grieve" for your soul. I simply assert you are not qualified to offer the kind of judgment you do when you decide who you shall honor and who you shall grieve on the basis of your understanding of their degree of remorse.
And again, I didn't assert you must keep silent on matters concerning the soul, right and wrong, life and death as a blanket statement; merely that you refrain from making distinctions regarding individuals' fitness to be honored or not on the basis of your understanding of their degree of remorse. You exaggerate my assertion to claim some unfair demand on my part. This is how much your respect me?
"Speaking out Ñ preaching Ñ is part of my job description. I have taken an oath, too Ñ an oath to stand for the truth, to speak up for life and peace rather than coercion and bloodshed, to talk candidly about what's right or wrong as I have been given to understand them by the saints of the tradition that commissions me. In talking through the problems relative to the moral justification for this war and the burdens that soldiers bear, I've been fulfilling my oath. "
Then presumably amidst all the deconstructing of post-modernism there's a body of work that instructs and edifies somebody regarding our progress or lack thereof of suitably addressing these difficult world issues so as to preclude the necessity, especially the manufactured necessity, to use force. Good for you, I say! You're a better man than I. Still doesn't make you fit to pass judgment on those who serve in combat on your behalf, and I don't think that's part of your oath as you kind of admit later..
"Who decides that the soldier's oath prevails over my oath, and who appointed that person my judge?"
You complain about something I never asserted; and if one were to tell you that your reciprocal obligation to a soldier's oath prevailed over your own, how would that be "judging" you in any way? To simply make the assertion says nothing about whether or not you are a good person. Again, you claim an injury or an offense where none has occurred.
"While in fulfilling that oath, I've explicitly prescinded from using language of judgment. I have not at any point suggested that I knew Dave or any soldier to stand morally condemned Ñ for which Dave criticizes me, on the basis that he suspects that my sorrow disguises a covert judgment. Since anything I say can thus be accounted a concealed judgment, I'll hold my tongue Ñ honoring Dave's stature and wisdom and experience and military oath."
Your supposed sorrow does not disguise a covert judgment, it reveals an overt one. Had you chosen to express sorrow for what both soldiers endured in your example, there would be no judgment. Instead, you made a distinction, which presumably must have as its basis a judgment, and a moral one at that. How you believe you can deny this escapes me. This was all offered by you in the context of presumably being more charitable or compassionate to men and women in uniform than your Sunday homily which was strikingly silent, and therefore utterly inoffensive, on the matter of men and women under arms. Instead, you elevate yourself.
Again, you choose to use a passive-aggressive non-argument to depict my words to be somehow beneath you. You then disingenuously use the word "honor" and smear me with false praise. Again, I'm impressed with the degree of respect you afford me.
Once again, I will offer you the final word, but I won't be disappointed if you don't take it. You're a far smarter man than I am, AKMA. You're probably a better man morally, too. But you're wrong here, unless you can demonstrate in an affirmative fashion that you are correct, instead of hiding behind rhetorical devices, false modesty and deliberate misconstrual of my words, things I would have thought were beneath you. If I'm wrong, then demonstrate it. I've been wrong before, I'll undoubtedly be wrong again - but on this I have to act as I believe is right. But please spare me the obtuse, the disingenuous and the misconstrued. If I'm persuaded, I'll let you know. If I'm not, then this piece will conclude my involvement with this affair, but at least you will have had the opportunity to clear the air, to make yourself understood.
Before I go, I would say, again, you keep faith with them by withholding your judgment of them. You keep faith with them by trying to exhibit some of God's grace to them. In your theological context, presumably they will be called to account soon enough before God, he doesn't need your help in this matter. Your grief will not lighten whatever burden they bear, and likely only adds to it. Who does your grief serve? What higher purpose? I submit it only serves yourself, and you could sacrifice that on their behalf.
I make no claim to stature or wisdom, but I do have experience; and as I said before, I believe I know something about faith and honor and service. Please share what you know of these matters, if you know more than I. I keep faith with my brothers and sisters in the service of my country by not permitting to go unchallenged the notion that some among us are fit to judge them in the moral performance of their duty, especially while we have neglected our duty as citizens.
We've had 10.19 inches of rain so far this month, which puts us about 7.77 inches above normal. It's wet, and it looks as though it's going to stay that way for a while. We're looking at clouds and rain again this weekend.
It's been fairly nice the past two days, but it's likely to be cloudy and rainy again today.
I have a feeling we're not going to have much of a spring, just a lot of rain before we get the full heat of summer.
That's just swell.
Melissa and Pat have picked the second of November as the date for their wedding. As soon as I get the taxes done, I suppose I'll have to try to nail down a budget for that extravaganza.
I've been playing a bit more with NoteTaker 2003. While I think it's never a good idea to include a year in a product name, NoteTaker is looking pretty cool.
I'm not sure what I make of the "decapitation strike." If it had worked, I suppose it would have been one thing. Since it didn't seem to, it seems like we've given our opponent an opportunity to score a few propaganda points. It's not like that is going to alter the outcome, but I think we'd have liked to maintain the initiative on both the operational and informational fronts. The quicker this is over, the better. Time is not our ally here. We're powerful, but we're far from omnipotent. The hardest part of this endeavor comes post-hostilities; how hard that will be is in some measure related to how long it takes to get this done. The longer it takes, the greater the possibility of some event happening out of our control that complicates both the cessation of hostilities and the ease or difficulty of the transition to humanitarian aid, and civil affairs operations.
I've seen some references to Japan as the model for post-Saddam Iraq from some people on the web. The people who point to Japan haven't been thinking about this very much. Japan was and remains a nearly homogenous society and certain aspects of their culture worked to the advantage of both of us in restructuring their political institutions and civil society. Iraq is not a homogenous society by any means, and it is not clear how much, if anything, of the various cultures present in Iraq can be relied upon to facilitate the creation of a civil society in Iraq. I think a federation will be the order of the day, but it's anybody's guess how well it'll hold together, and how long we're going to have to stick around to help hold it together.
This'll be brief. I'm just adding to the entropy for a moment.
There are days when I just can't stand humanity. Supposedly, that is a reflection of self-loathing. Whatever. When I was much younger man, one of my favorite movies was Escape From New York, where Kurt Russell broke out of his Disney-mold and fashioned himself as something akin to Clint Eastwood. One of my favorite lines in the movie was his when Cabbie (Ernest Borgnine) said, "I know you. You're Snake Plissken."
Snake says, "I'm an asshole."
That's how I feel. Not that I feel bad about it or anything. It's the way I feel when Springsteen sings in Youngstown:
When I die I don't want no part of heaven, I would not do heaven's work well
I pray the devil comes and takes me to stand in the fiery furnaces of hell.
There's more to Springsteen's song than that, but it's late in the morning and I've got to get Caitlin ready for school. But I want to scratch this particular itch.
There's entirely too much certainty in the world, and not enough faith, even from people who ought to know better. The fact is, life is uncertain; but we can't stand that, so we impose our belief in our illusions on the world and call that "certainty," and this gives us the magical ability to "rise to our responsibility." It also gives us the ability to claim greater moral virtue for one group of us worms over another. Everyone's got all the answers. It's just too bad they're all different.
Love is faith in action, and if you're wondering why there isn't more love in the world, there's your answer. We're all too damn certain. Me, I'm certain of nothing except on mornings like this, I have damn little faith and therefore little love for my fellow man.
If you want to find the best in ourselves in the days ahead, you're going to find it in the same place where you find the very worst, and it's going to be in that pile of sand over there. It won't be here in the land of the free and the home of the brave. Irony is the fifth fundamental force of the universe. That's not certainty, that's just a joke that's too painfully close to reality. You and I won't hear much about it, but you'd find more faith in the face of uncertainty over there than you will here. You'll also find some pretty ugly things too, but not as ugly as the things over here that got all this started. Not that anyone is going to be troubled to look, we're all going to be too busy blogging it, and shouting "I told you so!" from the highest weblog, or else we'll be "grieving" about it, in that earnest way that only the most humble of us can do, because humility is a virtue and we're nothing if not virtuous.
As we're waiting to listen to history in the making, a thunderstorm is rolling through the area. The lightning seems to be far enough away for the moment, or I'd be offline. The thunder is pretty loud though and the rain is coming down hard.
Turning our attention to events closer to home, my daughter Melissa became engaged to her boyfriend Pat over the weekend. We're very happy for both of them. Caitlin was especially pleased upon hearing the news, yelling, "Yea! Now I'll have a nice brother!"
Naturally, the Munchkin wants a big wedding. They haven't set a date yet, hopefully it will be far enough downstream to allow Mom and Dad to afford a big wedding. Perhaps fortuitously, the more I pay down my VISA, the more the credit union increases my credit limit. It's like they're trying to increase the potential between the balance that I owe, and what I could owe, much like you might increase the voltage in an electric circuit to increase the current flow. Taking the electrical analogy a little further, I'm going to have to increase my own internal resistance to keep the current flow, in the form of money from my pocket, at its present level. I almost wrote "current level," but that wouldn't have been much of a pun.
After an early morning throbbing vein in the temple, I tried to stay away from the computer yesterday for most of the day. I got back on later in the evening though.
I made an attempt to clean the bathroom, I'm afraid it was only a half-hearted one. Still, it's better than it was. Next was a trip to Home Depot to collect some silicone caulking for the roof, and some clear plastic panels for Chris's case-mod. Picked up a package of DeWalt drill bits as well. Think of it as "comfort food" for the male mind.
After that there was a one-hour seminar on pressure points at the TKD school. That was kind of fun. I probably could have used an hour kicking the heavy bags though.
The weather was gray and it wasn't clear whether it was going to rain or not. It was beginning to look as though it wouldn't, but I figured if I washed the car, that would be the tipping point and we'd get the rain, so I went to Books-a-Million. (How's that for rationalization?) They moved the Mac section again, those bastards. Every time they move it, I worry that they've gotten rid of it until my frantic searching finally reveals it. Took a look at Robin Williams' new book on OS X, this one covering 10.2.x, and it looks very good. If I were to recommend a book to a new Mac user trying to learn OS X, it'd be hard to choose either The Missing Manual or Williams' book. I think if the new user was someone who was a little intimidated by computers, Williams' book might be the better choice, it seems "warmer" somehow.
Picked up a copy of the collected fragments of Heraclitus and ended up buying it. Because of Richard Mitchell's repeated references to Socrates, I picked up a volume of selected dialogs from Plato. Most of what I know about Socrates I learned from Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure. Keanu Reeves, my spiritual guide. Now there's a scary thought. Anyway, that came home with me too. Haven't made it much past the introductory notes and the notes on the translation, but I read the whole thing from Heraclitus, there ain't much. Still, I get the impression I would have liked the guy, maybe. Let me lay a little Haraclitus on you this morning:
Applicants for wisdom do what I have done: inquire within.
Nothing like a pun to make an aphorism a little sweeter.
Things keep their secrets.
Ain't that the truth?
All people ought to know themselves and everyone be wholly mindful.
A little riff on Thales, who gets another mention earlier on.
The prophet's voice possessed of God requires no ornament, no sweetening of tone, but carries over a thousand years.
Something to keep in mind, lest one's charity be confused with condescension.
The oneness of all wisdom may be found, or not, under the name of God.
And this one's for Jonathon:
The soul is undiscovered though explored forever to a depth beyond report.
This one is for me:
Stupidity is better kept a secret than displayed. (Doh!)
and,
While those who mouth high talk may think themselves high-minded, justice keeps the books on hypocrites and liars.
Fortunately, Heraclitus also offers us the antidote in the final fragment in this volume:
It crossed my mind today that most of my non-cheese posts are responses to things other people post, and they're usually negative responses to the things other people seem very positive about, community and various technologies and their possible impacts most recently, and AKMA's views on war and morality.
I wrote and posted Responsibility last night, then took it down later in the evening. SiteMeter sort of indicated perhaps only one or two people saw it, and I didn't think it would be missed. Part of the reason why I took it down was I had this feeling that I was just being too negative. I hadn't really thought about all the other things I've been commenting on lately. Al Hawkins was one of the people who happened to see Responsibility when it was up, and I received an e-mail from him this morning saying he thought it was a good piece, but that he figured I had my reasons why I took it down. I pinged Al on whether or not I was being an ass, he didn't seem to think so, and I read it again and thought about it some more, and decided to put it up.
AKMA's a pretty universally admired guy by the people who write about him, and I am far more often in agreement with him than not, though I have had other occasions to disagree with him, and I do think he's a pretty nice guy.
So today I'm thinking about why I'm being such a spoil-sport, and why I'm just sort reflexively raining on others' parades. What's really bugging me?
I don't know the answer to that for sure just yet, but I'm thinking about it.
I know part of the answer is I'm frustrated with what I read. I'll refer again to Richard Mitchell, because so many of the things he writes really resonate with me. If he were still alive, and his writing were appearing as a series of weblog entries, I'm sure we'd all be linking to him. But since he's not, I'm guessing he's too passé for a crowd that I kind of perceive as being sensitive to what's hot, hip and new.
But Mitchell made reference to something that I think is important, and if I were a better man, I'd look up the reference and link to it. But it has to do with one's point of view, where one looks for answers. He made a distinction between an outward-directed point of view, and an inward one. And if I recall what he wrote correctly, he was making the point that the best answers are often found looking within rather than without.
So many of what seem to be the "hot topics" are naturally the new, the novel and the fascinating. But what I find somewhat depressing and sometimes grating, is the kind of self-congratulatory, self-satisified, almost smug sort of glee that seems to be the ever-present undercurrent in these things. This new technology, that new business model, all these really wonderful people wired together, this is going to "change everything." Aren't we special?
We're so special we're about to start a war. That's kind of depressing.
But everything, the links, the conceit, the war, it's all because we focus on externalities without ever considering the internal, or maybe the eternal.
Mitchell wrote there is no "we." Reference to this "we" is a kind of self-deception, there's just you and me and I can't speak for you. There are no communities. There are just individual human beings with hearts and minds. Have you ever spoken to a community? Be honest. No, you haven't. I'm sure I'm being quite confusing here because on the one hand I'm saying there's no such thing as a community, and on the other hand I'm saying that there are and they're social organisms.
When I read people writing about communities, I read about people walling themselves off from other people who aren't part of the "community." That's one of the things that allows people to make moral distinctions about other people. That's one of the things that allows people to never consider what responsibility they may have to others who are not a part of their community. I'd probably confuse you further if I told you nobody has any responsibility to anyone else, but I'll leave that for another day. Today, suffice to say, if you believe you have a responsibility to anyone in your "community" you have a responsibility to everyone on this planet.
People cling to community, I think, because it's comfortable, apart from the fact that it's just what we're biologically inclined to do. You can find anything you want in whatever community you're looking for. That's one of the criticisms some people (members of other communities) have of folks who adopt sort of New Age versions of Buddhism. In a community, a lot of your thinking is done for you. That may sound unfair, but it's true. Try doing your own thinking sometime. It's damn hard. Maybe it's not for you, but that's been my experience. But it's the only thinking that really matters. When you're in a community you're always thinking about where you stand in the community. Are you a member in good standing? Are you a leader? Are you an authority? Are you moving up? Falling down? Who's above you? Who's below? Most of the time when I'm at Taekwondo, I'm the only guy doing my particular form, which is like a kata. Lately, there's been another blue belt in class and we do our form together. When we do that, I find myself paying attention to his form and comparing his to mine and naturally I do mine worse because my attention is not where it belongs. Funny how that works.
People say you can't find identity outside the parameters of a community, that identity can't be created from nothing. That's probably true at some level, the internal language we use to reason with carries with it some kind of community baggage. But I'll tell you what, really try doing something outside the normal beliefs of your community sometime, you'll learn something.
I'm a first-born, an eldest son. There's something about birth order that makes first born particularly dutiful. We're the "good kids," we want to please. I'm an ENFJ, if you don't know what that is, go look it up. I've also learned I'm something of a "rescuer" and if you don't know what that is, don't worry about it. Suffice to say, I'm a community member poster-child. I did twenty-two years commissioned service. I've been a volunteer for a lot more things than I'd care to name here. I've donated a kidney, lots of blood and did more than a few turns at aphoresis which is a couple of hours hooked to a machine while your blood goes out one arm, your platelets are separated out and it goes back in the other arm. I did two tours on the home owners' association - those of you who are big "community" boosters have never done a turn as an officer of a home owners' association, I'll bet. I got married and had two kids and helped raise a third. But I had to do something that was incredibly hard for me to do, and in the process I had to learn a great deal.
Yes, it is hard when you try to fashion some sense of who you are outside of all of the conventionally accepted standards of your community. It is kind of self-referential. You do lose your footing. You go through some pretty dark times. But I'll tell you this, you come to a whole new understanding of faith, and you discover some other things as well. But you don't find them reading the latest news popping up in the aggregator. Most of those things are distractions, though some of them are clues; but you have to be paying attention and even then sometimes it's hard to tell the difference.
You know, you're never going to see, "Today, I meditated." as a hot topic in weblogs. It's a cheese sandwich kind of thing. It isn't going to get you a lot of attention, and that's something else certain of us like to do. Sainteros writes about his meditation. He does it well, and it resonates with me, but there's really nothing to say to it, other than to remind myself that I need to do it too. The only answers that really matter are the ones you have to find within yourself, not in your community, not in your aggregator, not on your LCD. They're often not the kinds of things you can relate in a weblog, though I've tried to do so for some of them from time to time. Less so of late. And even if you do try to share it, it really doesn't do a great deal of good because everyone has to do their own work. You have to discover what you believe on your own, and why you believe it, and what it means to you when you do. Maybe everybody does that already and I'm just sort of retarded. It's possible, I suppose.
But I get frustrated when I read a lot of this stuff when it's offered in this sort of gushing, breathless, uncritical, irrationally exuberant fashion. If we're all so smart, why aren't we rich?
I'd say quit reading CNET or Slashdot or me, and go read Epictetus, or Seneca, or Emerson, or Marcus Aurelius, they're all in the public domain and available online. Go read Mitchell. Go to the library and read Frankl or Suzuki or Watts. Read the Gita, the Upanishads, the Tao. Read outside your community and discover something about what is in common with all humanity, which is the only community that matters. What did Ghandi say? Something about you have to be the change you wish to see in the world? What is it about yourself that you're willing to change? There's a tough question - think about that one. Don't read things from outside your community with only a mind that looks for them to be wrong, look for the ways they share what you believe. I think you'll find you get hung up on the trivialities. Be still. I need to remember to do that one myself.
None of that's going to happen, I know. Well, at least not because I said so anyway. How can you get attention if you don't point to the new, the novel, the whizzy?
Sorry to have been such a grouch. I'll try to be more positive.
Tonight our nation stands at the threshold of war. It will be a war like none other in our nation's history, if for no other reason than this war is a war of discretion. In this endeavor we have discovered something about our national character that many of us never suspected before. It is unsettling.
Naturally at this time there is a large debate about the morality of war. This is as it should be. It is an old debate, and nothing will be resolved in any larger picture. At best, the debate may serve to help individuals resolve their own feelings on the issue; but there will be no universal agreement. Some individuals may be unable to make up their own minds about this war, others will allow the occasional necessity of war, but deny the necessity of this one. Others will affirm its necessity, while still others will reject all wars, regardless of the circumstances.
Inevitably, the debate turns to the people we call upon to fight our wars, at whose hands most of the terrible things we've come to loath about war will be inflicted upon the objects of our deadly intention. We consider their role in this, and try to determine what responsibility they bear.
AKMA wrote, "Second, while soldiers may be humble, altruistic, and noble, theirs is emphatically not the greatest sacrifice one can make. There's a tremendous difference between risking one's life in warfare, armed with automatic weapons, missiles, grenades, bombs, and so on (on one hand) and risking one's life in service to others un armed, from the conviction that helping those in need is one's fundamental obligation (on the other hand).
Soldiers do make the incalculably grave sacrifice of their unwillingness to take another human life. That's much, much bigger than fast-talking neocon pundits seem to understand, and greater even than the risk of their lives (what does it profit a soldier to win a war, and lose the meaning for which the war was fought?) I will honor the sacrifice of any soldiers, living or dead, who feel (or "felt") the weight of responsibility that comes from renouncing their obligation to not kill any other human being. I will grieve the loss of any soldiers, living or dead, who can't face the magnitude of that decision and so must make themselves out to be immune to moral responsibility."
AKMA fundamentally misunderstands the leap of faith the soldier makes, and this misunderstanding leads him to "honor" some and "grieve" others. It is a judgment he is not fit to render.
War is an unspeakably terrible thing, as it has too often been almost glibly uttered of late, by people who will know nothing of it at first hand. For most people, the horror and terror will remain little more than abstractions. We should be grateful for small favors. Among the terrible things that happen are, of course, the death and mutilation and trauma and depravity attendant to the destruction of men and machines, lives and property. Also destroyed is much of the moral context that most of us rely upon to shape and guide our choices. Although we are unquestionably the stronger force, and the military outcome is not in doubt, our soldiers will know fear, they will know suffering, they will endure stresses that those who have not faced combat can scarcely imagine. In that place, men and women will make mistakes. They will make terrible mistakes. The outcome of those mistakes will be death and suffering which cannot be excused even in the extreme circumstances encountered in the conduct of war.
And who will be held responsible? Who will be held accountable?
Sadly, we do them no service to excuse those who commit the atrocities of war. Those who commit them will be held accountable, but they are by no means solely responsible though the unfairness of life suggests to me that only they will be held accountable.
A soldier takes an oath when they begin their service. An oath is one of those things we sort of take for granted, we don't really think about them very much and nobody really teaches what it means to take an oath. Nevertheless, the meaning is there, if one searches for it. If one can be troubled to search for it. And everyone should search, because only a careful, mindful, sincere search would reveal that an oath is not an agreement that is binding on only the party taking the oath. Although you will find it nowhere in the words, implicit in the oath is a reciprocal agreement with those whom the soldier serves.
Honor is another word that probably isn't terribly well understood beyond some colloquial familiarity. Honor is a wonderful word because it is both a noun and a verb, and it's a transitive verb, it's an active verb, it has a direct object, it requires one to do something. What does it require one to do? What does honor mean?
To honor is simply to keep faith. But it's not a passive kind of faith, you can't honor someone simply by uttering the words. It's a transitive verb, it has a direct object. One has to do something, otherwise it's just a word. So one has to keep faith with those who have sworn an oath to support and defend the Constitution of the United States, to bear true faith and allegiance to the same, against all enemies foreign and domestic, and to obey the lawful orders of the officers appointed over them, by doing something. It's pretty well spelled out what the party taking the oath has to do. It's up to the rest of us to think about what our part of the bargain is, how we keep faith with those who we would have kill and die on our behalf.
Well, ladies and gentlemen, I submit to you we haven't kept our part of the bargain up to this point. And if we adopt AKMA's point of view, as pious as that may allow us to feel, we'll be shirking our share of the load even more, though it's hard to believe that's even possible, after the shooting starts. Why are our guys there? Why are we about to invade another country?
It's easy to lay the blame all on President Bush, and truthfully, if he weren't in office we probably wouldn't be having this war. But that doesn't get us off the hook. What allows President Bush to use his discretion as Commander in Chief to have this war is our abdication of our responsibility to keep faith with those we place under arms and send in harm's way. Saddam's had twelve years to disarm? Well, we've had twelve years to find some other solution as well. The sad fact is, we didn't. That's not the only way we've let our troops down, but it's enough for now.
When the soldier raises his or her right hand and takes the oath, they're placing their lives in our hands. They are giving their lives over to us to use as we see fit. They, as AKMA correctly points out, even surrender their unwillingness to take another life, and they surrender it to us, to you and me, not to anything or anyone else. We are responsible for that, not them.
So when the shooting starts and the terrible things happen, the burden is on us to keep faith with them, not to judge them, even if we couch our judgment in words like "grieve." Better one should grieve for oneself than presume to grieve for the moral failure of a soldier doing his or her duty, holding up their end of the bargain while we shirked ours. They will not fail in their military objective. Some few of them may fail in their duty as a soldier and as a human being, and commit acts not in accordance with the laws of war. Even then, the burden is on us to keep faith with them, because we placed them in those circumstances, through our own inaction and indifference. We keep faith with them by holding our tongues, and we forgive them, and we ask them to forgive us. We let them down first. Our institutions will hold them accountable. It's hard to say if anyone will hold us accountable.
Richard Mitchell writes that there is no "we." There is no "we" that will ask for the soldier's forgiveness. There's only you and me, and I can't speak for you. Of course that won't be enough, there will be other Saddams. I trust you can figure out the rest.
The days to come will be difficult ones. They will be difficult for me, I can't speak for you. People write so glibly of "community." They know nothing. Those men and women over there are my brothers and sisters. I hope no one ever utters a word against them within earshot of me, and certainly not within arm's reach.
Ah well, the housework didn't get done last night. There was a book report crisis, one that I didn't handle particularly well. All the more frustrating because it's the same book report crisis we had last time, and the same as the time before that. When will I learn that just giving direction doesn't work with a 10-year-old? Maybe this time.
And I'm a little frustrated with the whole computer situation at the moment. Instability of some kind seems to be the order of the day. Caitie did her book report in AppleWorks. I installed AppleWorks on the G4 so I could print it for her, since I haven't figured out how to make USB printer sharing work yet. For some reason, AW would only print the first page of the report. So I saved it as a Word document, and opened it in MS Word. Once it was opened in Word, selecting Print from the File menu would cause Word to crash every single time. I finally ended up copying the text from AW and pasting it into a new Word document and printing it that way.
Safari crashes with alarming regularity now, always on hitting the Back arrow. That didn't happen before.
Something is rotten in Denmark, or at least on my hard drive. I'm going to have to take this thing down to parade rest and start over again, I'm afraid. This is frustrating because this is why I own a Mac, so I don't have to do stuff like this. I think I'm going to reset the nvram again, zap the PRAM, reinstall the OS in a new System folder, set up my networking parameters, then install the 10.2.4 combo updater, the Security fix, and any other little thing that Software Update says is necessary. I'll have to reinstall the printer driver, again, and Palm Desktop and iSync. I'll synchronize Address Book with the .Mac file, and I should be able to import my e-mail, again. I don't really care too much about all the other preference files, though I may try to snag my bookmarks.
Kids and computers that don't do what you tell them to. Makes for a pretty frustrating evening, or an opportunity to practice. I'm afraid I didn't make much of the opportunity to practice. One of the things I like about Richard Mitchell's writing is that he makes several references to the difficulty attendant to doing better even when one actually knows better. Nevertheless, that's where the action is.
Before I get elbow-deep in toilet bowls, someone please define for me the term "anti-american," and its -ism cousin, "anti-americanism."
Just what the hell is it? Is it when some country doesn't agree with us? Is that all it takes? A UN Security Council veto? Is that the standard? Are they boycotting our products? Have they instituted trade barriers? Are they denying Americans visas? Have they seized our assets? Are they rounding Americans up and incarcerating them? Are they storming our embassies? Are they shooting our citizens?
What is the value of this word, "anti-american?" Does it describe something that we have to respond to? Is an appropriate response to rename a particular food?
Does it say a hell of a lot more about the emotional maturity of the people who use it than it does about the people they fling it against?
They decided to shampoo the carpets at the office today, so I bailed a little early. Since it was a pretty damn nice day, I mowed the lawn. That's normally Chris's job, but I'm giving him a bye this week because of his finger. I'm such a softie.
Since I cut the lawn, I may confine my interior housework to my bedroom or bathroom. Right now, I'm resisting a very strong urge to lay (lie? Where's that Grammarian guy when you need him?) down and take a nap.
Britt Blaser has written a lengthy reply to an e-mail I sent him the other day about the Obvious Society. I read it early this morning and dashed off a quick e-mail to him. I read it again later today and I may amend the remarks I offered in my e-mail in a longer reply that will appear here. Eventually.
There are two topics I'm somewhat immersed in at the moment, one being Britt's Obvious Society, the other having to do with, I think, the relationship of the individual with the community over at Jonathon Delacour's site. My challenge and my dilemma is finding enough time to address these issues adequately. Sometimes in cross-weblog conversation, if you're not quick with the posted reply, the discussion moves on to other matters. The good news is you don't descend into flame-wars, but the not-so-good news is you don't really get a chance to go into any depth.
Part of the problem with the individual/community thing is that I'm not sure we're all talking about the same things. Whenever the "self" gets mentioned, I'm pretty sure there's a high probability that we're not all on the same page. Same thing with "community."
In the case of the Obvious Society discussion, I'm not really sure how to proceed. I think at its root, the difference is Britt believes people will become better people as a result of technology. In a way, I kind of agree with that when I say that technology will compel us to confront our spiritual problems more quickly than our spiritual problems will. That's another word that probably needs to be defined, "spiritual." But I'm quite convinced that things will get far worse before they get better, if indeed they do get better. Cheery thought, that, but perhaps that's the approach I should take.
As I look at the trends Britt and I both perceive, Britt sees a better future. I look at the present and try to think of how it looked back in the fairly recent past when we thought it would be the future. Did anyone think that globalization, the internet, weblogs, "smart-mobs," p2p, satellite television, cloning, genetically modified food, cell phones, PDAs, CD-R and DVD-R, Tivo , broadband, wireless and GPS and every other whizzy new technology that was going to make life and the world "great" would lead to the United States of America, the world's "Good Guy" deciding to invade, conquer, occupy and remake another country when the rest of the world thinks maybe that's not such a hot idea? I don't know who saw that coming. But, if you think about it, it fits in with what we know about human nature.
Anyway, I don't want to get ahead of myself. I have to make dinner, which is probably just going to consist of me throwing a frozen pizza in the oven, and if I don't get that housework done tonight I'm either going to have to live with it, or do it over the weekend when it might be nice and I can ride my bike on the beach. And, as of late, I'm sick of living with it so I've got to clean.
In other exciting news, 10.2.3 and changing the Directory Access settings have had no effect on the G4's inability to remain asleep following a sleep command. Sometimes it will go to sleep by itself as configured in Energy Saver, but if I tell it to go to sleep, it just wakes up again almost immediately. I've repaired permissions, reset the nvram, zapped the PRAM, made the appropriate burnt offerings and it's still not staying asleep. I'll have to see if I can find something in the developer notes for this model about how sleep is supposed to function, and what causes waking. It's irritating because it has recently started taking a long time to shut down as well.
I've ordered the replacement power supply and fan to quiet it down a bit. That's supposed to ship sometime next month. Hopefully I'll have sleep repaired by then.
I just noticed I've been writing "Richard Martin" instead of "Richard Mitchell." Nobody else seems to have noticed, or at least they didn't bring it to my attention. I must have had some kind of Laugh-In flashback going on - Dan Rowan and Dick Martin? Who knows? Or maybe I was "blocking" because Mitchell was the last name of my first real love? That had an unhappy ending too. Whatever, it's Richard Mitchell, not Martin. My apologies.
In between domestic chores, I reinstalled Mac OS X and reverted back to 10.2.3. About the time I finished doing that, I received an e-mail from my brother Mark, who is also a Mac user (I like to think he got that from me). Mark said I should check the Directory Access app (you'll find it in the Utilities folder) and make sure LDAP v2 and LDAP v3 aren't checked. Mine were, so perhaps that had something to do with my problem. I'll run with 10.2.3 for a while and see how it goes. I had Safari quit on me just now in 10.2.3, which is something I thought was 10.2.4-related.
I'm pretty beat. I finally said screw it and spent the evening cleaning the TV room and the kitchen, which is a fairly large area. I dragged the couches away from the all to get a look at what was underneath them. Oh, the horror... the horror...
Well, at least that's all done for a while. I also did two loads of laundry and folded another two loads that were sitting in and on top of the dryer. The dryer is starting to make a funny noise, I suspect it may be a bearing. Dryers aren't too hard to fix, but it's kind of a pain since the laundry room isn't very large. I'll just keep an ear on it, maybe it was just an odd load or something.
Chris says his finger is starting to itch, which is probably a good thing, apart from the fact that he can't scratch it. I changed the dressing this morning and it is slowly crusting over. Much less difficulty doing it this time.
Caitie is slowly getting over her cold. I'm pleased I've gotten her to start blowing her nose with tissues instead of just wiping it on her shirt, now I just have to get her to put the tissues in the trash.
The notion of the illusion or existence of individuality is making the rounds in some of the weblogs I visit. Shelley Powers has a lengthy essay here, which seems to be at least partially in response to this post at someplace called Wealth Bondage. (Parenthetically, Wealth Bondage is one of those weblogs I almost never read. I tried it once, but it confused me. I don't get the schtick, I don't care for the narrative voice, and the subject matter isn't terribly interesting to me. All of which is apropos of nothing, except to say that I'm reluctant to comment on something when I'm really not sure what the hell they're talking about. At least I can understand Richard Mitchell. Nevertheless, the subject in this instance is one that interests me, so I'm going to speak my piece.)
I'm not sure we've exactly defined what the issue is we're debating. Like most subjects that get discussed across weblogs, we all seem to have somewhat different ideas of what the issue is, and it isn't always clear that we're discussing the same thing. I'm not sure I'll do any better here because, as is almost always the case, I'm writing out of time.
I get the sense that someone offered the observation that being a member of a community is more valuable than being an individual, and that notions of individuality are somehow wrong or, at least, overrated. This Tutor person seems to agree, and Shelley seems to disagree.
While I think the Tutor has some things right, I believe Shelley's closer to "the truth."
(A quick epistemological note: While there may be an account of a given circumstance that can be called "the truth," I am by no means certain it is within any human being's capability to know it. I'm pretty much a pragmatist in this regard. Information, or an account, has qualities of utility, reliability and duration and these three qualities can be used to locate a given account within the locus of all possible accounts for a given circumstance. Utility, reliability and duration are not fixed, and the centroid of verity shifts within the locus of all possible accounts depending on a given point of view. Makes a lot of folks unhappy, but it seems consistent with what I've observed.)
First, human beings evolved as members of groups, I call them social-organisms, others have as well. Howard Bloom, of The Lucifer Principle, calls them super-organisms, maybe without the hyphen, I forget. In any event, we are genetically disposed to affiliate with others in groups, almost always beginning with the family. The glue that holds social groups, social organisms, together is a shared belief system, a shared view of the world. Almost all of that belief system is unconsciously assimilated through socialization, acculturation, experience and education. Human beings in groups behave in ways that further the aims of the group. For most of our history, those aims coincided fairly well with the aims of the individual, as they were designed to allow individuals to survive long enough to pass along their genes. At a purely biological level, that still holds true today. From a metaphysical or spiritual point of view, the aims of the group are often not the aims of the individual, and indeed may be at cross-purposes.
We have always known, as part of our natural behavioral repertoire, how to exploit our need to affiliate in groups. We have also made a study of that behavior in order to improve our effectiveness at exploiting it. Two examples would be marketing, and indoctrination into military service. We're good at manipulating individuals to serve in groups.
In this context, The Happy Tutor may be correct, if I read him correctly, that the notion that we are all individuals is largely illusory. Indeed, it is a belief that has been exploited, along with many others, in the belief systems of the social organisms of the United States.
That is not to say, however, that individuals cannot become individuals. It is difficult, and it is almost certain that one will never live one's life entirely free of the behaviors that have caused us to be so successful from an evolutionary standpoint. But we can become much freer than we are.
Thales is one of the earliest Greek philosophers we know about. His most famous admonition was engraved at the temple of the Oracle: Know Thyself. Self-knowledge is the key to becoming an individual, yet such knowledge is actively opposed by most of our culture or society. Self-knowledge has little perceived value to social organisms. As a result, you find few social organisms that don't actively discourage self-knowledge. Indeed, it can make life much more difficult for social organisms to survive. Social organisms survive by growing, adding constituent members to the group. They require that the constituent members turn their efforts and activity toward those actions that support adding members to the group. To the extent that individuals are directing effort and activity toward aims which are not completely consistent with the aims of the group, they are a source of inefficiency or friction.
We all belong to many groups, social organisms, communities, call them what you will, at one time. They include our family, our neighborhood, our culture, our religion, our race, our gender, our employer, our country, the "brands" we are loyal to (Mac users, Corvette drivers, Pepsi drinkers, etc.), our political parties, and others. In this advanced technological society, none of these requires all of our effort and activity each day, but in the aggregate, the vast majority of our behavior is directed toward the aims of these social organisms. To the extent that we believe that the belief system we operate under is consistent with a belief system we would associate with our "self" then we're probably pretty happy, or content.
The effort required to become an individual is significant. It consists mainly in a thorough review of what one believes and any effort to examine that foundation can be disquieting to say the least.
What is the virtue of being an individual, as opposed to being merely a member of a group? Well, I'll leave that to you.
I'm running out of time again, but I can point you to Richard Mitchell's The Gift of Fire. He covers this process much better and in far more depth than I ever could.
The point is, it is possible to be an individual, and to exist in, contribute to, and interact with others in communities.
As the Happy Tutor pointed out, as any very clever member of a social organism would (we call them "authorities" and the "tutor" plays to type), "In Greek the word for the person outside the community is idiot. " I concede I may well be an idiot. I certainly don't understand much of what this individual writes. But I'm a happy idiot.
As always, I'm an authority on nothing, (except myself
