The Laches

The very first dialogue of Plato's that I ever read was the Laches, which is often also called "On Courage." The recent events remind of why even non-philosophical men can see the value of courage in this and every generation. It's fairly short, and I feel like running through it tonight.

The subject of the dialogue is education of the young to be courageous, which it proves that none of the men present can do: at the end they must all admit that they don't know what courage even is. After Aristotle's EN, you know why: Socrates was treating the virtues as a species of knowledge, and this gives rise to puzzles about why then they don't always admit of precise definitions and can't always be taught, as knowledge should be capable of being. We can't always even teach our sons the virtues no matter how much we wish to do so -- and that, how to teach your sons to be courageous, is the subject of the discussion.

Plato uses his dramatis personae to highlight the problem in several ways. Lysimachus was the son of a very good general (strategos, obviously a cognate of 'strategy'), Aristides, who commanded at the Battle of Plataea. This is a clear example of a son who should have had the right kind of education if his father could teach the virtue. The second is another famous son, Melesias the son of the powerful and successful Thucydides (the political leader, not the historian). This Thucydides had reorganized Athens into a powerful naval power that dominated its era, striving against the famous Pericles for leadership. Nicias was a prominent general in his own right during the Peloponnesian War. He had noted victories and arranged a statesman-like peace with Sparta (which bears his name, so much was he the author of it). Laches was another general commanding during the Peloponnesian War: both he and Nicias would die in it. Socrates, as readers of this blog know, was a noted war hero himself -- his respect was high enough among these men that they ask his opinion on the topic of how to educate their sons to be courageous men.

After the jump, I'll go through the arguments, but I want to give my own opinion on why the dialogue ends in aporia, the state of admitting that you don't really know. I think this was often Socrates' goal, because it is only when you get to that point that you really begin to think. Thinking is hard work and expensive calorically, so for the most part we use heuristics, resort to familiar paths or old sayings or stories that we think have a relevant moral. It's only when you exhaust all this that you really start to struggle with a problem.

Aporia, then, should often be the goal of a serious inquiry. Here you can see how, though Socrates nor Plato ever succeeded in figuring out that the error lay in assuming that virtue was a species of knowledge, the challenge eventually prompted Aristotle's alternative. That was satisfying enough for two thousand years: but if the challenge had not been so severely pressed by Socrates, over and over, it might never have provoked the insight.

The dialogue opens with a discussion many of us have also had: whether or not training in a martial art improves courage and fighting ability, or if it is a sort of showmanship that leads to false courage (the latter is at least sometimes the case: we often mock this kind of martial art as 'bullshido'). Here the martial artists have been putting on an exhibition of fighting in armor.

Richard Fernandez on the Air Defenses

Wretchard is making the same point I was thinking about earlier, but better and with greater detail.

Venezuela had a Russian-supplied integrated system focused on protecting Caracas and strategic sites. This included long-range, medium-range, short-range, and point-defense systems, supplemented by anti-aircraft guns and fighter interceptors. 

They had around 12 batteries of S-300VM (approximately 1–2 divisions sapid effective against aircraft, cruise missiles, and some ballistic threats up to 200–250 km. Medium-range: Buk-M2E (SA-17 Grizzly) systems, with 9–12 batteries up to 45–50 km. Medium/short-range: S-125 Pechora-2M with dozens of units for low-to-medium altitude threats.  Short-range/point defense:  Tor-M1/Tor-M2E (up to 10 systems in some reports) and possible Pantsir systems. They had 5,000 MANPADS Russian Igla-S for low-flying threats like helicopters and cruise missiles. 

Anti-aircraft artillery: Over 400 pieces, including 200+ ZU-23-2 23mm twins and 114+ 40mm Bofors L/70 (some modernized). 

Aerial component: Su-30MK2 Flanker fighters (around 20–21 operational) for interception, with limited F-16s (few airworthy due to maintenance issues). 

All that proved useless or was neutralized on January 3, 2026 practically instantaneously.

He is always worth reading. 

The Glorious Revolution

In 1688 the heretofore subjects of the English King James II elected to remove him from power, as of course they had a right to do. This is generally known as "the Glorious Revolution" because it was relatively nonviolent (not quite completely so, but surprisingly so). 

Thomas Macaulay's account of the Revolution in The History of England from the Accession of James the Second exemplifies the "Whig history" narrative of the Revolution as a largely consensual and bloodless triumph of English common sense, confirming and strengthening its institutions of tempered popular liberty and limited monarchy. Edmund Burke set the tone for that interpretation when he proclaimed: "The Revolution was made to preserve our ancient indisputable laws and liberties, and that ancient constitution of government which is our only security for law and liberty."

Today's revolution was even less bloody than that, apparently; I haven't heard any casualty figures from the other side, but we seem to have lost no ships and no fighting men. That's shocking given that the raid was conducted with helicopters over a nation with many, many surface to air missiles. That, combined with the surprise and the lack of leaks from "government sources speaking anonymously because they lacked authority to talk to the press" suggests that some genuine progress has been made since the Afghan withdrawal in military leadership and coherence. 

However, it also suggests a strong performance by the clandestine service. While of course I can't prove it, the striking likelihood is that our clandestine service under the present leadership is more capable both of penetration of a hostile regime and of keeping its own secrets. 

Let us hope this all remains as bloodless as possible.

UPDATE: The NYT reports some 40 Venezuelans may have died in the action; they also confirm a successful and lengthy clandestine operation to map and prepare for the raid.

In August, a clandestine team of C.I.A. officers slipped into Venezuela with a plan to collect information on Nicolás Maduro, the country’s president, whom the Trump administration had labeled a narco-terrorist.

The C.I.A. team moved about Caracas, remaining undetected for months while it was in the country....  It was a highly dangerous mission. With the U.S. embassy closed, the C.I.A. officers could not operate under the cloak of diplomatic cover. But it was highly successful. Gen. Dan Caine, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said at a news conference that because of the intelligence gathered by the team, the United States knew where Mr. Maduro moved, what he ate and even what pets he kept.

That information was critical to the ensuing military operation, a pre-dawn raid Saturday by elite Army Delta Force commandos, the riskiest U.S. military operation of its kind since members of the Navy’s SEAL Team 6 killed Osama bin Laden in a safe house in Pakistan in 2011.

The result was a tactically precise and swiftly executed operation that extracted Mr. Maduro from his country with no loss of American life, a result heralded by President Trump amid larger questions about the legality and rationale for the U.S. actions in Venezuela.

Mr. Trump has justified what was named Operation Absolute Resolve as a strike against drug trafficking.  

Although we usually talk about the Abbotobad raid as a military raid, officially the SEALs who carried it out were placed in the temporary command of the CIA for the purpose. This was to cover a legality: the legal authority to do it isn't military, but the Agency's. You may remember a similar plot device in the movie Sicario, where the Agency has to get a fig leaf of an FBI agent in order to establish a 'joint task force' that can operate inside the United States (normally, CIA employees aren't armed inside the United States except for training, and to provide security and such; and indeed, relatively few of them are armed even outside of the borders; in the movie, CIA SAD (now SAC) wanted to run an operation just a bit within the border, so they needed a fig leaf). 

I keep expecting to learn that some similar legal fig leaf was deployed here -- there was an FBI agent along on the raid, apparently, which is being described as a law-enforcement matter in pursuit of indictments in US Federal Court. So far, however, I haven't read of that being the case; the NYT piece says the FBI HRT was there in case he was needed to negotiate a surrender. It would only be a fig leaf in any case, but I'm surprised if it were omitted because it's the kind of thing that is usually done by the lawyers.

"Possession of Machine Guns"

It is a very strange casus belli, to claim that a foreign leader broke our laws in his country. Of course, the NFA is itself an unconstitutional violation of the Second Amendment which should have no legal force in any event: thus, there's even less reason to try to enforce it on a foreigner in his own nation.

The War Powers Resolution doesn't seem to forbid this since the action began and ended so quickly -- well within the timelines the law sets up. That ship probably sailed with the Libyan overthrow in any case; Secretary of State Clinton quite openly declared the Obama administration wasn't going to bother with it. 

This sets up a kind of loophole, I guess, presuming that you can win your wars quickly enough. Many a war has begun under the presumption that it would end quite quickly -- it is said that picnickers came out to watch the first battle of Manassas (also known as the first battle of Bull Run). Not every war expected to be short and easy has turned out so.

The Women of Iran

I’ll go to this war, if he means it. I’ll die in it gladly.

ΜΟΛΩΝ ΛΑΒΕ

It’s probably fine for Manhattan, collectivism instead of rugged individualism. Well, no, it’s not. But it’s their problem rather than ours. 

I was surprised to realize that I cared about New York City on 9/11. Maybe I don’t, still. 

Hogmanay

Happy New Year.

Imagining the Alternative

It's easy to complain about the things that a given administration gets wrong; they're actual, after all, and their mistakes therefore have consequences. Still, it's helpful to think on how things would have gone wrong had the other side won, too. I feel obligated to write in opposition to the many things I disagree with; but I would have disagreed even more, I expect, had things gone the other way. 

A mild self-reproof: it's hard to remember how much worse it could have been, since it isn't. It's important to try to keep it in mind all the same.

Requiescat in Pace, Ms. Bardot

Openness to New Experiences

AVI sometimes accuses me of this, with fairness. Today for our late Sunday breakfast I made applewood-smoked bacon and fried eggs, but I decided to try DL Sly's take on biscuits (see the comments to the Southern Biscuits post). Just to be fair to Lodge Cast Iron's Dutch oven cookbook, and because I was making bacon instead of sausage, I decided to try their recommended packet gravy as well. I baked the biscuits in a Dutch oven, pictured.

The chief difference in Sly's family biscuits and mine is the lack of any kneading or folding. As a result, the biscuits are very much like my mother's spoon biscuits: my grandmother, who taught me, was my paternal grandmother; my maternal grandmother never made biscuits because she made them for my maternal grandfather one time when they were first married and he laughed at them, so she never once made them again for him again in her entire life. (He taught me to make bacon; my paternal grandmother made it daily, but it’s his method of baking it in the oven that I use.) As a result, my mother's biscuits were learned after she married and was majoring in home economics in college (apparently a thing one could do in those days; she later transferred her major to education and became a career teacher).

These biscuits are excellent for gravy-and-biscuits because the zero kneading and folding means that they have almost no gluten in them. They are thus extremely tender to the fork. They are less suitable than mine for making an egg-and-bacon sandwich, as they lack the fluffy layers that keep them from falling apart as easily. Depending on the meal plan, however, they might be a great choice.

The packet gravy was not a good recommendation: I stand by my earlier condemnation of it, now on empirical grounds. It is not a third as good as the from-scratch sausage gravy, and it isn't even particularly easier to make because you still have to mix the packet with cold water before then stirring it into boiling water. If you're going to do that much, go all the way and have the full and delicious experience. 

Still, you know, you try new things and some of it works, some of it doesn't. The biscuits were great; the packet gravy was not. Live and learn. 

A Conversation at Whitewater

I met a British lady on the trail at Whitewater Falls. We spoke because she complimented my patience with her in taking photos of the thing, and I thanked her for her compliment and then told her the bit about the two overlooks being in different states even though they’re only about 170 yards apart just as a fun piece of trivia about where she was. 

She was struck by that, and then asked me where Cherry Point was. I was surprised by the question, since it is all the way across the state on the coast. “It’s very far,” I said, pointing east. “That way, about five hundred miles. The Marine Corps has an air station there.” 

She said she knew that, because she had a son stationed there cross-training with the USMC in flying fighters. Her husband had been a Marine for 24 years— Royal Marines, of course— before he retired. When he died, she said sadly, indicating the Kabar on my belt, the government had made them turn in all his knives and shotguns. 

“I’m sorry to hear that,” I said. “We have a different policy here, as you might know.”

She then waxed positively about Trump’s rebuke of London’s mayor, a subject about which she had a great deal to say in agreement. I was surprised to hear someone from overseas speaking so positively about Trump, who doesn’t go out of his way to ingratiate himself with Europe. 

Just an anecdote, of course, but a striking interaction. I hope she enjoys the rest of her visit. 

Balsam Lake, Christmas Day

Lots of good motorcycle weather lately. A rare Christmas present! It’s ending soon; next week is going to have weather in the teens again. 

Balsam Lake in the Nantahala National Forest. Bald eagles nest here to breed in warmer weather. 

Whitewater in Late December

Whitewater Falls, as viewed from ~100 yards inside South Carolina.

The same waterfall about 100 yards back inside North Carolina.

Lake Jocasse far below in South Carolina.

Christmas

May God grant you all a fine feast and a peaceful celebration on this most glorious of days. Thank you for being my friends and companions, which is itself a great gift. 

“Contemplate This…”

UPDATE:

Told you (see comments to the post below this one):

Intel Alert, Christmas Eve

 

NORAD Tracker

Southern Biscuits and Gravy

An early gift I received this year was The Lodge [Cast Iron Company] Book of Dutch Oven Cooking. It's a very thoughtfully constructed book for the most part, with insightful tips on how to use a Dutch oven, how to build the best kind of fires for them, how to dig a bean hole the right way, what woods are best, etc. However, one page of recipes -- 'Southern biscuits and gravy' -- is ridiculously bad. Every part of the biscuit recipe is wrong, and the gravy recipe directs you to mix a package of a particular brand's gravy mix with water!

So, since I share recipes sometimes, here's my recipe for biscuits and gravy. This sort of thing causes fights among Southern cooks, as it is a matter of great pride to do it right, usually meaning -- as indeed I do mean -- "the way my grandmother taught me." Any of you who are Southerners whose family recipe differs are not hereby declared wrong; I have room for a diversity of opinions (and please leave your own version in the comments). This one is from the mountains of Tennessee, as you'll intuit from the brand recommendations: White Lily is located in Knoxville, and Tennessee Pride is from Nashville (their 'farmboy' character has appeared on the Grand Ol' Opry).

Southern Biscuits

2 cups White Lily Self-Rising flour (or White Lily regular flour plus baking soda and powder, if you prefer; but White Lily for certain because they are the only flour that produces soft enough biscuits because they use 100% soft winter red wheat, which will make tender biscuits).

1/4 cup bacon grease, reserved from the last time you made bacon (my grandmother made biscuits and bacon every morning)

3/4 cup buttermilk or sour milk (i.e. whole milk plus a bit of lemon juice, wait five minutes after combining before mixing)

Combine until moist. On a well-floured surface knead not more than five-seven times, fewer if you can mange it. (Kneading produces gluten, the protein that makes bread stiff; biscuits are meant to be soft and tender.) I like to press the dough out into a layer, fold a quarter of it onto itself from each end, and then fold the two parts at the middle of the dough so it looks like you're closing a book; this will create layers. Cut into biscuits with a knife or biscuit cutter. Bake at 450 until they are golden brown on the top; remove and brush with melted butter (or I often use a refrigerated stick of butter, as they will be hot enough to melt it).

Gravy

First, make a pound of sausage (Tennessee Pride Hot is the family favorite here). In the grease thereof, make a roux; typically I mix two tablespoons of flour (all purpose is fine for this) with about a half a cup of cold water, then add it to the grease and mix. Thin with whole milk (not sour or buttermilk) and then cook until it thickens again. Salt and black pepper to taste. 

A Warm Day in December

Aggression

The discussion of the war crime of aggression has been long; it is still perhaps of interest. I’m going to post a series of photographs of philosopher Michael Walzer’s arguments about it.* I don’t intend this as an endorsement of his position, only an attempt to inform our discussion with what might be called the standard position of contemporary Just War Theory. 

Marriage among the Young

AVI linked an interesting discussion of the forces pulling young people away from marriage. The study attempts balance, but I think it is broadly describing the value of marriage in terms of female happiness. It's ready to grant the value of feminist criticisms of marriage's fairness and desirability; the counterpoint the study makes is that all the data on happiness, as opposed to fairness, points to women being very much happier if they marry.

Our research at the Institute for Family Studies routinely reveals that the women in America who are forging the most meaningful and happy lives are married mothers. In fact, married mothers are nearly twice as likely to be “very happy” with their lives as their single, childless peers.

And while marriage rates increasingly fall along ideological lines, female happiness doesn’t: the newest data show that married liberal women with children are now a staggering 30 percentage points more likely to say they are “very happy” or “pretty happy” than liberal women who are single and childless. What’s even more striking is the trend among prime-aged women 25 to 55: happiness among single, childless liberal women has plummeted since “the Great Awokening” of the last decade while it remains high for their peers who have managed to marry and have a family. The tragic irony is that the very group of women who are most likely to think marriage and family are an obstacle to happiness—women on the left—are less happy than their peers on the right, in part, because they are less likely to be married with children.

They don't really consider the perspective of the young men, whom they chiefly describe in terms of the female complaints against them. They do add some context about how the same forces making young men less marriageable are also making young women so in other ways, which is an attempt at balance, but they don't entertain any of the expected perspectives about how marriage is a bad deal for men.  

I realize that the advocates for that position are often bitter, angry, or otherwise unlikeable figures. However, there's an important aspect of the problem that they have identified, one that is persuasive to a lot of young men. The institution of marriage has inherited very high guardrails to protect the interests of the mothers and children that it is expected to produce. In an era in which women initiate most of the divorces, however, these guardrails have not been rebalanced to protect the interests of the men who join the institution. A man wagers his lifetime capacity to earn a decent living disproportionately, while the odds of him getting to retain access to the children the marriage produces is also greatly unbalanced. There's something like a 50/50 shot that he'll end up without his children while subjected to punishing alimony and child support payments to a woman who decided to cheat on him and leave him. 

The zero-sum-game aspect of any rebalancing on that score means that making marriage more attractive to young men would make it less attractive to young women. That's a hard problem not tackled by the article.

Another serious problem is their treatment of the question in terms of the parents' happiness. Marriage's basic value as an institution is that it sets up an environment in which child rearing is more stable: marriage is not really about the good of the parents but about the good of the children, in other words. That it makes the women happier is well-studied and adequately demonstrated, but also beside the point. The point is that men and women who have sex are likely to produce children, and those children need to be supported, educated, and fitted out to join society over the course of decades. An enduring institution that achieves that most difficult of tasks is necessary for humanity's continuance. 

Thus, this sort of commentary is entirely missing the point:

The nature and content of digital offerings are degrading men’s marriageability and women’s, especially liberal women’s, interest in putting a ring on it. Neither sex is developing the capacity to embrace self-sacrifice or long-suffering commitment, precisely the virtues which marriage requires. They’re also what makes marriage so life-giving, character building and personally gratifying. Psychologists have long documented this paradox: deep, lasting happiness is much more strongly tied to meaning than it is to pleasure. 

No doubt, if you are selling marriage in terms of happiness, "self-sacrifice" and "long-suffering" as requirements are going to make the whole project seem like insanity. It may in fact actually produce happiness as well, but it doesn't seem likely to; and all of us who have been married a long time will attest that self-sacrifice and long-suffering are in fact highly accurate descriptions (both for ourselves and our spouses!).

Very likely the real problem is that the institution is failing because it no longer fits the civilization we've evolved into. I don't know how you sustain marriage in a civilization that treats the children as trivial non-considerations, and the 'happiness of the adults' as the only thing that matters. 

Who gives a damn if the parents are happy? It turns out they will be, more likely than if they remain unmarried; but that's not the point at all. It's just a good thing that falls out of it, as the old virtue of chivalry -- the quality that allows a man to tame a horse and ride it to war -- happens to produce gentlemen who can treat women better than other men normally do. That's good, but the point wasn't the gentle treatment of women: the point was the cavalry. 

By that token, if you don't have horses anymore you won't get much chivalry; and if you don't care about the children predominantly, marriage is going to fail. Slowly, as chivalry did, but surely, all the same.

Cowpens

In a discussion of 'America's art of war,' historian VDH notes: 

[T]hroughout the American Revolution, Patriots exhibited a singular ability to create their own capable military forces ex nihilo. And they ingeniously supplied and equipped local militias in addition to their eventual establishment of a Europeanized and professional army.... [T}he spirited “army” that began the war at Lexington, Concord, and Bunker Hill in 1775 bore little resemblance to the multifaceted and lethal military that defeated the British at Cowpens and at Yorktown in 1781 to end the war.

I've walked the battlefield at Cowpens, which isn't all that far from here. 

It was in fact a combination of untrained militia similar to the Lexington and Concord forces and hardened militia from Maryland, Delaware, Georgia, and Virginia that was key to the victory there. The Continental commander, Brigadier General Daniel Morgan, deployed these forces in an innovative manner, similar to the Zulu "bull's horn formation" that was developed some years later and deployed against (also) the British in Africa. 

Specifically, Morgan deployed the unblooded irregulars in two lines at the very front of his formation, and the hardened militia in two mutually-reinforcing lines closer to his command position. He did this between two rivers, which created a funnel that couldn't be avoided. As he anticipated, the first two lines quickly broke and withdrew in the appearance of a rout. Because they couldn't flee in any direction except towards his stiffer lines, they fled towards his hardened units. This drew the British cavalry into a charge against what they thought was a rout that separated them from the rest of their forces. 

When they hit the hardened infantry, they were defeated in detail -- indeed, slaughtered so thoroughly that the unit couldn't be reconstituted, the few survivors having to be broken up and sent to other units. The Continental forces then charged with bayonets, capturing two cannons, forcing the surrender of a Highlander unit, and causing what remained of the British cavalry to flee and the rest to withdraw in the best order they could manage. 

This followed the victory of the "Overmountain Men" at King's Mountain (the town of which is in North Carolina, also relatively nearby, but the battle a few miles south in South Carolina) and led to the ultimate victory at Yorktown, as this whole wing of the British Army in the South was crippled and had to withdraw to Cornwallis' forces. Quoting Wikipedia:

Along with the Loyalist defeat at Kings Mountain, Cowpens was a serious blow to Cornwallis, who might have defeated much of the remaining American troops in South Carolina had Tarleton won at Cowpens. Instead, the battle set in motion a series of events leading to the end of the war. Cornwallis abandoned his pacification efforts in South Carolina, stripped his army of its excess baggage, and pursued Greene's force into North Carolina. Skirmishes occurred at the Catawba River (including the Battle of Cowan's Ford on February 1, 1781) and other fords. Yet, after a long chase Cornwallis met Greene at the Battle of Guilford Court House, winning a victory but so weakening his army that he withdrew to Wilmington to rest and refit. Later, when Cornwallis went into Virginia, Washington and his French ally Rochambeau, seized this opportunity to trap and defeat him at the siege of Yorktown, which caused the British to seek peace terms with the Americans that would acknowledge the United States' independence.

In the opinion of John Marshall, "Seldom has a battle, in which greater numbers were not engaged, been so important in its consequences as that of Cowpens." It gave Greene his chance to conduct a campaign of "dazzling shiftiness" that led Cornwallis by "an unbroken chain of consequences to the catastrophe at Yorktown which finally separated America from the British crown".

"You Can Still Hunt"

In nearby Canada, allegedly soon to be the 51st state, the 2nd Amendment doesn't yet apply. 

I did see someone comment the other day: "The government will never ban your hunting rifle. They'll call it a 'sniper rifle' first."

Yuletide

The Winter Solstice was today; we are in winter true from about ten o'clock in the morning local time.

Christmas is still a little ways off. The Yuletide starts a few days before the Christmastide. 

The Hall Alit

More Shenanigans

Once again Blogger has been moving comments from regulars to the Spam folder. Eric Hines alerted me to the matter, and I found that a number of valued regulars had commented but had them vanish. We seem to have rounds of this irregularly, for reasons that Alphabet leaves opaque but would probably blame on AI if there were any way to ask them. 

If this happens to you, please let me know. I can restore them, and have, if they’ve been sent to Spam. 

A Happier Story

Separated from her family and lost since Hurricane Helene, local cat Gabby was reunited with her family thanks to a microchip. 

Georgia 2020

I told you it was stolen way back when (as did Rasmussen, and 2022 didn't look clean either). At least the documentation is finally following; it would be nice if people came to realize how crooked this system really is. 

Massive scandal: 

Fulton County admits they "violated" the rules in 2020 when they certified ≈315K early votes that lacked poll workers' signatures 

"We don't dispute the allegation."

Here's the map:

Fulton County reported at 72% for Biden; even more in neighboring Dekalb County. Wikipedia notes that this was the first time that anyone had broken 70% in Fulton County since FDR did it 1944, at the height of the war when Georgia was part of the "Solid South." Here's what that map looked like, when FDR did it, for comparison.

So FDR in '44 I buy. It's a plausible result. 2020 was plainly stolen.

Acts of War and War Crimes

The field that likes to call itself "international law" has rules that are functionally guidelines ignored by the powerful. It has rules even if it lacks any power to enforce them on anyone. This makes them a laughingstock, but they seem devoted to the project even if it never goes anywhere. (One might think of the devotees of Esperanto as a world language on similar terms.) 

We're getting a chance to observe this right now as the Trump administration commits acts of war against Venezuela. These are not necessarily crimes in any sense, even the 'international law' sense: nations are permitted to conduct wars against each other. A blockade of Venezuela is by definition an act of war; it isn't obviously a crime. 

However, blockades can become crimes -- either war crimes or crimes against humanity -- if they meet certain criteria. Although otherwise legal, there are limits in the rules as to how the nations are allowed to fight. 

Meanwhile, the imposition of the blockade by the United States in order to extract control of Venezuela's oil fields -- which the President outright says is his intention -- may be an act of aggression. Aggression is a crime, indeed in some sense it is the crime, under the international laws of war. The only argument against this being US aggression is that Venezuela decades ago nationalized oil fields that US companies had developed, which the President describes as theft (as, indeed, it was; but nations are permitted to steal, too, at least things in their own territories). So far none of these companies are agreeing to take back their old facilities even if the President can extract them by blockade or other force. What happens if you conquer an oil field and nobody will operate it? 

An aside: Venezuela asked for a UN Security Council emergency meeting to discuss the charge of US aggression, which led to a rather laughable display by the Chinese Communist government, backing Venezuela's play: 

“China supports Venezuela’s request to convene an emergency meeting of the UN Security Council,” Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Guo Jiakun told a news conference in Beijing.

Guo said China “opposes all forms of unilateral bullying and supports countries in safeguarding their sovereignty and national dignity,” according to the Beijing-based daily Global Times.

Yes, famously; tell it to the Philippines, to say nothing of Taiwan. Tibet and the Uighur have their national aspirations suppressed genocidally, but sure. Still, just because the Chinese government are hypocrites doesn't mean they're not right that the US is engaging in the war crime of aggression here: very likely the administration is committing that crime before our eyes. 

To return to the discussion: Blowing up Venezuelan-based cartel smugglers is not necessarily an act of war, since it's aimed at stateless actors not clearly aligned with any government. There is some discussion of whether it is nevertheless a war crime. It might seem strange that an act of non-war could be a war crime, and there's only a narrow path to finding it so, but that's where you end up with 'international law.' 

It seems very likely to me that the Trump administration is committing the war crime of aggression by blockading Venezuela; it is certainly already committing acts of war against Venezuela, which means that even absent a declaration we are already at war with Venezuela. That doesn't matter legally, since the United States is a permanent member of the Security Council and will certainly veto any attempt to hold it responsible for doing so. 

It merits notice, at least. We should at least speak the truth. These laws aren't really laws, and they're not enforceable, and the institutions that claim the power to enforce them are jokes at best; the diplomacy around it is hypocritical to the point of being ridiculous. Nevertheless, it does look as if the US is committing an act of war that is a war crime against a nation that has not in fact attacked us in any way that would violate the rules. 

Custody agreement done

In my neighbor's custody case, mom, dad, and grandma have all signed an agreed order giving custody to grandma and arranging for the minimal child support that is all the unemployed mom and dad can afford. Dad's auxiliary disability benefits for his daughter have been duly transferred to grandma. Dad continues to show signs of good faith in reconciling with his alarmed daughter, and she's very willing to try, as well, as long as he's not threatening to remove her from grandma's home. I can't say enough good things about grandma's family lawyer, who was worth every penny.

The granddaughter turned 14 a few weeks ago. In four years, she'll be past even the threat of this kind of thing.

Two Articles on Military Change

Reportedly the US military is about to make a major adjustment to the Combatant Command structure, one that aligns with the Trump administration's view of foreign policy. 

If adopted, the plan would usher in some of the most significant changes at the military’s highest ranks in decades, in part following through on Hegseth’s promise to break the status quo and slash the number of four-star generals in the military. It would reduce in prominence the headquarters of U.S. Central Command, U.S. European Command and U.S. Africa Command by placing them under the control of a new organization known as U.S. International Command, according to five people familiar with the matter....

The plan also calls for realigning U.S. Southern Command and U.S. Northern Command, which oversee military operations throughout the Western Hemisphere, under a new headquarters to be known as U.S. Americas Command, or Americom, people familiar with the matter said... Combined, the moves would reduce the number of top military headquarters — known as combatant commands — from 11 to eight while cutting the number of four-star generals and admirals who report directly to Hegseth. Other remaining combatant commands would be U.S. Indo-Pacific Command, U.S. Cyber Command, U.S. Special Operations Command, U.S. Space Command, U.S. Strategic Command and U.S. Transportation Command.

USEUCOM and USAFRICOM used to be one command, and are both still co-located in Stuttgart, Germany. AFRICOM remains small, and won't be a particular problem to re-integrate. 

That's not true for USCENTCOM. I used to work at Central Command years ago. It is a huge headquarters, really a whole compound of various buildings and trailers on MacDill AFB near Tampa. They also have a forward deployed headquarters at Al Udeid Air Base in Qatar. Trying to integrate that monster into an even larger command with massive responsibilities is going to be a fun exercise. 

I wonder if this is the latest version of the 'pivot to Asia' we've been hearing about since the Obama terms, which the military has found difficult to actualize. I notice that USINDOPACOM is not on the chopping block; if the idea is to radically shrink our commitments in the Middle East and Europe, we could focus on the Western hemisphere and on keeping China hemmed in behind the first island chain.

Separately, another article that came to my attention was a significant re-thinking of information warfare by the US Army. It was published in Small Wars Journal. Very long-time readers will remember that I wrote for SWJ in 2007, as an embedded correspondent with Special Operations forces conducting combat operations against the Moro Islamic Liberation Front and Abu Sayyaf. Since then SWJ joined the Foundation for Defense of Democracies for a long stint, but now is no longer there: they've moved out to Arizona State University since the death of their founder, Dave Dillege (another name that long-timer readers will recognize). It's good to see the US Army is using them to release major publications; clearly the move out of the Swamp hasn't hurt their influence in the community. 

The problem they're talking about is one I wrote about extensively during the Security Studies Group era; it's a problem that is bigger than the Army, too. If this latest reshuffle solves every problem the Army has (which is likely won't, though it may improve things), the USG will still have significant issues coordinating its information warfare efforts. If you want a brief introduction to the problem, this panel on Russian disinformation efforts opens with a short talk on that topic. 

No Whining

Here is a poem that occurred to me this morning as I awoke from a dream. I don't recall the dream, as I usually do not, but I assume someone was annoying me with whining in it given the content of the verse I woke up with today.

I’m tired of whiny people
No matter how many there be;
It doesn’t matter if one or two
A half a dozen or quite a slew;
It doesn’t matter if there’s only three
Their whining does not interest me.

The Pardoner's Tale

Technically, we all received a Federal pardon today.

I never expected to receive a Presidential pardon, but I once knew a man who had received one. Dewey Clarridge was quite proud of his. He kept it framed on the wall of his house all the days of his life. 

Australia

Not a great start to Hannukah, but the hero who wrestled a gun out of the hands of the killers was also a Muslim. Islam is a false religion, and Muhammad is no prophet but a liar; but all the same, good men are sometimes Muslims. It happens fairly often, as good men occur everywhere that there are men.

UPDATE: Of course. It's the only way the ratchet is allowed to turn. Strip the people of power, make them weak and submissive before the State, and refuse to acknowledge the truth.

UPDATE: There were in fact four men (3 men and one heroic woman, as Tom points out in the comments) who attempted what only one succeeded in doing. Three died in the attempt. Such gallantry should never be forgotten.

Gaudete

A Healthy Pizza

There's really no reason pizza shouldn't be healthy to eat, according to this article from the Cambridge University Press. 

This is empirical science following from a reasoned theory: the stuff is just bread, tomato sauce, cheese and some toppings that could include vitamins and dietary fiber. If we made it nutritionally-balanced instead of salt- and fat-heavy, in principle it would be perfectly fine to eat as a stand-alone meal. So, let's try it and see if people like it. Empirically, people did. 

The reformulated pizza is only slightly different in appearance and virtually identical in taste to the original pizza recipe, and is still prepared using traditional Italian baking methods.... 

The pizza was rated very highly for both appearance and taste by both children and adult tasters... Among the children, 46 % rated the pizza as good as their usual one and 35 % rated it better (i.e. 81 % at least as good as), moreover 41 % would eat the pizza instead of their usual one. Most adults (57 %) rated the pizza as good as their usual one, with 20 % better (i.e. 77 % found it at least as good as their usual pizza); 69 % of the adults would buy it instead of their usual one. Most would be willing to pay an extra 50 pence for a nutritionally balanced pizza....

Our study therefore shows that, perhaps contrary to popular opinion, it is perfectly possible to have an attractive, nutritionally balanced meal as a single-item pizza meal.

"An extra 50 pence" is, if I understand correctly, about sixty-seven cents.  

A Thirteen Year Old Man

This is almost two weeks ago now, but in Afghanistan a young man was granted the opportunity to execute his family's killer.

This is framed carefully by the British newspaper as a horrifying specter of abuse.

In a disturbing return to the dark days of the Taliban's first rule, tens of thousands of Afghan spectators flocked to a sports stadium to witness a 13-year-old boy carry out a public execution.... The incident brings to 12 the number of men publicly put to death since the Taliban returned to power in 2021, in the wake of the chaotic withdrawal of U.S. and NATO  forces.

The alarming spike in public executions comes as Western travel influencers post glowing videos on Instagram about their adventures in Afghanistan, even as the UN warns of a rapid human rights deterioration.

The 13-year-old boy shot his family's killer three times in front of 80,000 Afghan sports stadium spectators, after his relatives refused the Taliban's offer to pardon the convicted criminal.

The same story provides details that suggest another interpretation.

The country's supreme court said the victim, identified as Mangal, was guilty of having slaughtered 13 members of the teenager's family, including several children and three women....

The executions are carried out as part of the Taliban’s implementation of 'Qisas', which translates as 'retaliation in kind' – effectively an eye for an eye.... The execution was ordered after a death sentence was passed down by a court, an appeals court and the top court itself, and approved by Afghanistan's supreme leader, Hibatullah Akhundzada. 

The man had been convicted along with others of entering a family home in Khost province and shooting to death an extended family in January 2025.

He had been sentenced to 'retaliatory punishment' for murder after his case was 'examined very precisely and repeatedly', the court said.

'The families of the victims were offered amnesty and peace, but they refused,' it added.

That's actually quite a lot of due process, with the additional step of allowing the victimized family to forgo vengeance and reconcile instead if it wished. No American court would allow the family to waive the state's judgment. Neither would they allow the family to be the ones to avenge their dead. The cult of the state is too strong for either of those things in all of the West. 

One may doubt the quality of the Taliban's courts -- or ours, frankly -- and one may reasonably abhor Sharia law. Nevertheless, the 'eye for an eye' concept is far more ancient than Islam, and this system preserves the centrality of the family in a way that ours does not. One might also add that the Taliban won their sovereignty the hard way, against the USSR and then our own military might. They have the right to do things according to their own ideas: they won that right the same way we won ours. 

I doubt that young man will grow up into a man I could be friends with; our ideals and ways of life are too different for true friendship. I can respect, however, the kind of man he is even at his young age.

They Droned Back

Here's an interesting story. You may know that there have been some mysterious drone swarms in the EU recently. Seven German journalism students took some OSINT training and then tracked down the source of the swarms.

Cool stuff. The article explains how they did it, including the tools they used.

Next of Kin

The Orthosphere has a post arguing that Islam's god is the closest to the god of Judaism, and that it is is in fact Judaism and not Christianity that is the closest relative to Islam. 

I can't speak to the author's historical claims; you can all speak to his doctrinal ones if you wish. I can say, however, that philosophically he is correct. During the Medieval period there was a time when all three of these Abrahamic religions had adopted a broadly Aristotelian, somewhat Neoplatonic metaphysics following the influence of Avicenna. At that time, in other words, philosophically all three religions believed mostly the same things about God's own nature and our ability to understand or approach it. All three took Aristotle's "Unmoved Mover" to be a reasonable first-pass approximation, and then used Neoplatonic insights to try to tackle the parts of God that prove ineffable, and to the same basic effect: mostly we can only speak negatively about what God isn't ("limited," "bad," etc.), but we can make some positive claims that, whatever God is like, he roots our basic ideas of the good, the worthy, the noble, and so forth. 

The one thing that the philosophers really couldn't come together on, however, was the Trinity. There's actually a pretty good pre-Christian Neoplatonic number theory argument for how One necessarily implies Three; in other words, even before the debate passed into the Abrahamic religions, the subject was already under discussion and fully grounded. Those of you who remember our discussion of the Parmenides might recall some of how this works; it's a genuinely ancient problem about the One and the Many, or whether there is in fact only one thing or many, or what would be necessary for something that is One to give rise to things that are apparently many. 

Nevertheless, by the time we get to the period of Maimonides, who was a contemporary of the Islamic philosopher Ibn Rushd, better known as Averroes -- the latter very regularly cited by Aquinas in the Summa Theologiae as "the Commentator" on Aristotle -- we can see that the Jewish philosopher could find a lot of agreement with several Islamic schools, but found the Christians to be incoherent. Avicenna's arguments, as well as Averroes' commentaries on Aristotle, demonstrated clearly the need for the ultimate mover to be a Unity. 

Having accepted all of that, there just wasn't room for a Trinity. Avicenna gives this argument explicitly; in easy-to-digest form it is this:

Assumption: The ultimate mover could be one thing or more than one.

A: If it were one thing, it would be simple in the sense of having no parts but being just one thing.

B: If it were more than one thing, there would have to be a third kind of thing holding the other things together.

C: In the case of (B), the third kind of thing would actually be prior to the ability of the other things to interoperate.

D: In the case of (C), then, the third kind of thing would be a better candidate for the real ultimate mover than the other things it brings together and unifies.

Sub-Conclusion 1: To reach the real ultimate, we have to go through this cycle to the bottom.

E: A 'third kind of thing' like the one mentioned in (B-D) could either be one thing or several things, but this repeats the cycle.

F: Such a repetition of cycles could happen once or many times, potentially infinitely. 

G: It is not possible to go through an actual infinite series (this is proven twice in Avicenna).

H: Thus, there must be a finite number of cycles before we reach a thing that is simple and serves as the ground for all of the other things.

I: From B-D, we know this ultimately prior thing is the best candidate for the real ultimate mover.

∴: The ultimate mover is one simple thing.

Aquinas accepts the simplicity of God and argues for it right at the beginning of the Summa in Question 3 of the whole work. But he also wants it to be three things. For Maimonides, this whole Christian approach is nonsense: it's basically incoherent. He lists his objections to all the other nearby schools of philosophy, but the Christians are the ones he thinks are just out to sea. 

Islam too insists on the ultimate unity of the One that is its god. Christianity doesn't. In this basic way, the Orthosphere is right: Islam's and Judaism's ideas about God are much closer metaphysically than either are to Christianity's. 

Advent posts from AVI

Most of you I think read AVI's place as well as mine, but definitely don't miss some of his excellent pre-Christmas warm-up posting right now. Here are two favorites of mine recently:

La! Thaet Waes Blithe Willspell

Tolkien's Christmas Poem

Advent is at least partly about getting into the spirit of the thing, which can be hard with all the noise and work that continually presses closer and closer to the day -- indeed, this year it'll press into the last hours of Christmas Eve here at my house. 

Irregulars at Sea

The Washington Post did a creditable job of covering the controversy about the order to deliver a second strike to complete the sinking of a drug boat at sea, inter alia killing two survivors. I don't see anything highly objectionable in their coverage, and they correctly grasp and convey that the decision was ultimately not the lawyer's but the military commander's. He is ultimately responsible for making the determination of what applies to the case, as he also carries the responsibility for the action. A military lawyer's opinion is advisory. 

It doesn't sound as if the admiral is likely to face any sort of military tribunal to second-guess his decision; Congress seems likely to go along with it as well, although as is their oversight privilege they seem to want more inclusion in discussions about all this (a point they recently made clear in the NDAA budget bill). Thus, the controversy will pass. 

This is a matter of law rather than ethics, because it pertains to the application of technical definitions stipulated in the law (specifically, the Second Geneva Convention). The Post thus further obtained my approval for this article by actually citing and linking the exact text of those laws. In this case, you also have to look at Article 13, which helps to clarify who is and isn't covered by the convention. 

Speaking as a philosopher rather than a lawyer, we can apply logic to the categories. That leaves out entirely the debate about whether it was moral or ethical to kill them; whether it was militarily legal is the only question here under discussion.

Article 12 states who is covered:

Article 12 applies to persons who are either members of the armed forces or who belong to the other categories of persons mentioned in Article 13 of the Second Convention. In the context of the Second Convention, it is important to recall that, pursuant to Article 13(5), civilian members of the merchant marine (who are wounded, sick or shipwrecked) are also protected persons.[17] Article 12(4) contains an additional obligation with a specific personal scope of application: the wording of this provision indicates that female members of the armed forces or of the categories of persons mentioned in Article 13 are entitled to specific protections.

These are obviously not members of the armed forces or the merchant marine, nor were they females. Thus, we have to look at Article 13 to see who fits in the "other categories." Those of us who have been involved in what we used to call the GWOT since the beginning will know this one well, because it covers the same categories that have been an issue since the very first days when we were trying to decide who was a POW and who could be detained at Guantanamo Bay or in other facilities outside the American court system. 

(1) Members of the armed forces of a Party to the conflict, as well as members of militias or volunteer corps forming part of such armed forces.

(2) Members of other militias and members of other volunteer corps, including those of organized resistance movements, belonging to a Party to the conflict and operating in or outside their own territory, even if this territory is occupied, provided that such militias or volunteer corps, including such organized resistance movements, fulfil the following conditions:

(a) that of being commanded by a person responsible for his subordinates; 

(b) that of having a fixed distinctive sign recognizable at a distance;

(c) that of carrying arms openly;

(d) that of conducting their operations in accordance with the laws and customs of war.

(3) Members of regular armed forces who profess allegiance to a Government or an authority not recognized by the Detaining Power.

(4) Persons who accompany the armed forces without actually being members thereof, such as civilian members of military aircraft crews, war correspondents, supply contractors, members of labour units or of services responsible for the welfare of the armed forces, provided that they have received authorization from the armed forces which they accompany.

(5) Members of crews, including masters, pilots and apprentices of the merchant marine and the crews of civil aircraft of the Parties to the conflict, who not benefit by more favourable treatment under any other provisions of international law

(6) Inhabitants of a non-occupied territory who, on the approach of the enemy, spontaneously take up arms to resist the invading forces, without having had time to form themselves into regular armed units, provided they carry arms openly and respect the laws and customs of war.

These are not covered under (1) as they are not members of an armed force or any sort of volunteer corps or militia formally part of an armed force. (2) does not apply because they lack fixed distinctive signs/insignia, the habit of being openly armed, and the habits of carrying out their operations in accord with the laws of war. (3) is irrelevant as these are not members of any regular forces at all; (4) is also not relevant as these were not accompanying any armed forces; (6) is not relevant because it covers only spontaneous guerrillas protecting home territory, not people traversing the open ocean. (That was often relevant to us in Iraq and Afghanistan, however.)

So we are down to (5). In order to argue that (5) did apply, you would have to argue that these constituted a "crew" of a ship (or aircraft) "of [one of] the Parties to the conflict." 

The lawyers among you -- we used to have several military lawyers in the audience, and among my co-bloggers as well -- can discuss whether or you not you think that there's sufficient cause to grant that condition. Usually a crew would have a degree of formality, ranks and positions and jobs; and the tie to the Party to the conflict would be formalized in some way as well. But perhaps receiving pay is sufficient to formalize the relationship; and perhaps even if this was a one-off group, the fact that they were operating a boat together would make them a "crew" for that purpose. 

I'm not sure about the value of all of this these days. In the beginning of the GWOT, this all made perfect sense to me: these groups were analogs of pirates, hostis humani generis, that anyone might kill because the world would be better off without them. 

Yet the reason we have not wanted to apply these laws all along has been that the courts provide an additional field for conducting a kind of warfare ('lawfare') to bedevil American efforts using asymmetrical and irregular capabilities. I'm not sure how effective that has been pragmatically; the Guantanamo Bay detainees have in fact managed to tie up American courts for decades in spite of the precaution. If there isn't a good pragmatic reason for doing it, why kill them? Survivors washing ashore would also provide a helpful warning to deter the behavior of running drugs; or if you provided them with aid and assistance, you'd also collect evidence. Even if you couldn't interrogate the men under the Conventions, you could analyze the physical evidence and generate intelligence. The only cost would be a cost you're going to end up paying anyway, i.e., letting their ideological allies fight you in court while you also try to fight them physically abroad. 

Perhaps the United States simply can't avoid that cost, in which case it could at least have the good of abiding by the Convention and extending the protections of the laws of war to the conflict. As it is the government still gets the asymmetrical bedevilment in the press and court while also clearly killing helpless men at sea. 

All Roads Led to Rome

A functional atlas of the many Roman roads of yore has only just finally been prepared. [This article should be paywall-free; if not, here's the archived version.]

A Matter of Law and Honor

The VFW posts an open letter to the President regarding the recent attack on National Guardsmen in DC, the late Specialist Sarah Beckstrom and the still-wounded Staff Sergeant Andrew Wolfe. The force of the letter is that, if this is determined to have been a terrorist attack, they are entitled to Purple Hearts that they have not so far received. 

It's a very serious matter, but I am taken by a trivial concern: the VFW is referring to the soldiers using a civilian-style form of their titles. The Army normally would symbolize Specialist as "SPC" and Staff Sergeant as "SSG" but -- perhaps because the VFW is a veterans organization, and therefore civilian -- they have chosen to use the civilian-style abbreviations "Spec." and "Staff Sgt." A letter to the Commander in Chief on behalf of a group like the VFW is one in which the etiquette and protocol will have been thought through seriously, so I assume that decision was taken with care. 

In any case, here is the meat of their open letter.

We understand the importance of a full and thorough investigation and make no presumption about the final determination. The VFW’s only request is that, should federal investigators conclude this was an act of terror, the Administration be ready to ensure these members of the National Guard receive the recognition their sacrifice deserves.  

The VFW has always defended the integrity of the Purple Heart; it must remain reserved for those wounded or killed resulting from hostile enemy or terrorist action. Our position applies only when the facts clearly meet that definition under law. 

Mr. President, this tragedy cuts deeply across the veteran community – especially considering the circumstances, and what it means for veterans of Afghanistan whose lives were saved by local Afghan allies who escaped prosecution during the fall of Kabul. Many veterans are wondering how this could have happened and are seeking appropriate justice.  

Spc. Beckstrom and Staff Sgt. Wolfe answered their nation’s call and wore the same uniform as every American who has been called away from their families to stand a post, whether at home or abroad. If this investigation confirms terroristic intent, recognizing them under the Purple Heart is not just a matter of law, it is a matter of honor. 

Second Amendment in Schools

Many years ago when I was in high school myself, I recall that we had a class in which we were debating education as a preparation for citizenship -- we were probably reading Plato's Republic and riffing off of that, but I can't recall that part for sure. I recall suggesting that one of the duties of citizenship is the responsible keeping and bearing of arms, and therefore that public schools ought to provide instruction. 

The teacher shut that down immediately and refused to proceed, although one of my friends jumped in to ably defend the proposition by analogy to sex education: it might be uncomfortable for some people to think about, but it is a real set of hazards that will come up in a normal American life. If it's reasonable to educate children and youths about sex so they manage it better, why wouldn't it be reasonable to educate them about the firearms that they will soon be able to purchase and carry about themselves? The teacher as I recall granted the quality of the analogy, but refused to allow a discussion of the proposition.

Well, today I read that the University of Wyoming is developing a 2nd Amendment course for high schools in that state. They still won't be teaching the safe and accurate use of firearms, but at least they'll be teaching something about why the right is recognized and its legitimate history. 

The U.S. Department of Education awarded a $908,991 grant to the college this year to develop what university officials have promised would be “historically grounded school curriculum on the Second Amendment.”

The money came from more than $137 million in federal funds that were redirected by President Donald Trump.

The University of Wyoming hosts the nationally known Firearm Research Center, which is one of very few college programs that do not add a leftist “gun-violence” perspective to everything they study and teach.

Instead, the FRC’s mission is to “foster a broad discourse and produce meaningful change in how firearms and the Second Amendment are discussed and understood in America through research, scholarship, legal training, and publicly available resources.”

FRC officials said the funds would create nationwide tools that will allow educators “to better understand the constitutional right to bear arms.”

FRC is a good organization. It gives me some confidence that they are involved. 

At Will

The experts think the Supreme Court will at least limit the ability of Congress to create 'nonpartisan' institutions to restrain the executive. This would allow the President to function as an at-will employer where such things exist.

At-will is the opposite of for-cause, meaning that employees can be fired for any reason. You can read the best version of the argument for public sector at-will employment in this discussion between Judge Glock and Santi Ruiz. The general claim as I understand it is that:

• managerial flexibility in hiring, firing and payments generally leads to better personnel outcomes
• some state governments experimented with moving to at-will hiring, while sometimes weakening unions, and the best evidence we have is that it worked reasonably well

On the first part of the claim, difficulties in hiring has been a long-standing concern. There is broad consensus that public employee hiring is too slow and does not generate outcomes.

Obviously if you are me, public employee hiring at any speed it too fast because we should be shrinking rather than expanding the role of government. Yet if you are a liberal, in the old sense, you believe that the government can do good things and improve society through its functions. You might want a bureaucracy that is removed from the winds of politics, just as the Founders wanted a Senate that wouldn't be driven by similar strong winds. The House can be, but the Senate cools; so perhaps could an independent, nonpartisan board. 

A problem is that the Constitution doesn't in any way allow for such things. Congress could set up a board that reports to Congress and performs Congressional functions however it wants, short of actually delegating the legislative function to it. It can't handcuff the Executive with 'nonpartisan' experts, who of course are always really partisan anyway: they're from the Party of Government. Article II sets up the Executive as fully independent, and vests its power in the one elected President. 

That might not be the best way of setting things up, but it is the only Constitutional way to proceed. If the Supreme Court recognizes that, well, we'll have to sort our the problems of that approach as we go. So too all the other problems. It's still helpful to have bright lines on the edge of the playing field.

Speaking Truth to the Powerless

A National Security Strategy that is honest has advantages. That was also a positive feature of the first Trump term; it was not so during the last administration.

Analysis of Japanese Naval Logistics for the Pearl Harbor Attack

 With maritime historian Sal Mercogliano

Pearl Harbor Day in the High Rocks

Grand Olde Station Pub decked out for Christmas

The greeter was a local before his career at the pub.

The mountain lion was also a local: this is right by the Panthertown Wilderness of the Nantahala National Forest. There is not now nor ever has there been a town in Panthertown.

⁨⁨I like this place. Its clientele are rich folks on vacation at the lake who never complain when bikers show up to drink at their bar. The managers sometimes look a bit nervous about it, but the staff are always cool mountain folk and often bike riders themselves.⁩ The bartender asked me if I knew a good place for her to get tattoos, which I don't -- bikes and tattoos often go together, but not always. Another of the kitchen staff stopped by to ask me about my Norse Fitness gear, which he admired. 

The owner I don't know, but he's clearly a local history aficionado whom I suspect I'd get along with well. The whole place is full of pieces of local history, photographs from long ago in the mountains, historic weaponry -- note the very rare falling block double rifle in the one photo -- as well as framed news clippings.  It's a little pricey for the mountains, though it'd be cheap in a city. The food is always good, and they keep an interesting and rotating selection of local brews on tap. It's convenient for me as a stop after or amidst a ride on the southeastern part of my regular range. 

Honky-Tonk Christmas

Lay them raises down

Texas Red Had Not Cleared Leather

Strict red chili.

All these recent comments about chili had me wanting some. This is strict Texas Red, made with dried chilies — anchos and moritas and arbol — and dried onions, plus garlic and tomato powder. There are no beans; the only substitution was venison for beef, but I added some tallow for beef flavor and for fat to brown the lean game. 

I might try a touch of brown sugar on just one bowl to see how plausible that is, but it’s sweet enough for me without added sugar. The sugars already in the tomatoes are sufficient to my taste. 

“Texas Red” always makes me think of this song: