Stein 2

On the Radio:

I'm sure you've seen the Hugh Hewitt beating of interview with our Mr. Stein. I have to say that, for me, it can be reduced to just one exchange. This is it:

HH: Do you honor the service that their son did?

JS: To honor the service their son...now this is a dumb question, but what do you mean by honor? That's a word you keep using. I'm not entirely...maybe that's my problem. But I'm not entirely sure what you're...

At this point, I would have simply said: "Thanks for coming on the show, Mr. Stein."

A Second

A Second:

Joel Stein seconds the "military men are like toilet cleaners" comments of earlier this week. He, like the Kossak commenter, feels that the proper liberal position is to despise the soldiers:

I DON'T SUPPORT our troops. This is a particularly difficult opinion to have, especially if you are the kind of person who likes to put bumper stickers on his car. Supporting the troops is a position that even Calvin is unwilling to urinate on.... But blaming the president is a little too easy. The truth is that people who pull triggers are ultimately responsible, whether they're following orders or not. An army of people making individual moral choices may be inefficient, but an army of people ignoring their morality is horrifying.

There is a point to be made here. We are far enough into the war that pretty much everyone involved has either enlisted or re-upped since the war began. It was an army of volunteers to start with; now, it's an army that volunteered for Iraq and Afghanistan.

So, I agree that the troops bear moral responsibility for the war. It could not be fought if they hadn't signed on, and didn't continue to sign back on. The soldiers and Marines are finally responsible for the fact that we're still fighting in Iraq, and retain the capacity to fight elsewhere.

The difference is this: does that mean they deserve the blame for the war, as Mr. Stein asserts -- or it does it mean that they deserve the praise?

Greyhawk, Uncle Jimbo, James Joyner, Michelle Malkin and others have responded to this, and I feel no need to repeat them. Instead, let's look at something else about Mr. Stein's piece, in light of today's earlier discussion on ideology. What does the piece reveal about what Mr. Stein's version of Leftist thinking has to say about what the right kind of man is, and what the right kind of society is?

On the right kind of man:

1) He should be bold. "I'm sure I'd like the troops. They seem gutsy, young and up for anything. If you're wandering into a recruiter's office and signing up for eight years of unknown danger, I want to hang with you in Vegas."

2) He should be able to feel guilt for doing the right thing. "I understand the guilt. We know we're sending recruits to do our dirty work, and we want to seem grateful." Recall that Mr. Stein is arguing that it is right and proper to show ingratitude and blame the troops for participating.

3) He should be morally opposed to war, with only a few exceptions. "An army of people making individual moral choices may be inefficient, but an army of people ignoring their morality is horrifying."

4) It is all right for him to want to fight to protect the country. "I do sympathize with people who joined up to protect our country, especially after 9/11, and were tricked into fighting in Iraq."

5) He should disdain the soldiers for doing what they swore to do, since keeping their oaths meant partaking in this war. "[W]e shouldn't be celebrating people for doing something we don't think was a good idea."

The right kind of society?

1) It should only go to war in pursuit of pressing national interest. "It's as if the one lesson they took away from Vietnam wasn't to avoid foreign conflicts with no pressing national interest but to remember to throw a parade afterward."

2) 'Pressing national interest' should be definied as stopping internal conflicts in regions barely associated with America. "Sometimes you get lucky and get to fight ethnic genocide in Kosovo."

3) The society should be solicitous of miniority political opinion. "Trust me, a guy who thought 50.7% was a mandate isn't going to pick up on the subtleties of a parade for just service in an unjust war."

4) It should provide for ready social services for its veterans, even those who chose to fight in an immoral war. "All I'm asking is that we give our returning soldiers what they need: hospitals, pensions, mental health and a safe, immediate return."

5) It should not celebrate them, however; but it might not go so far as spitting on them. "I'm not advocating that we spit on returning veterans like they did after the Vietnam War, but we shouldn't be celebrating people for doing something we don't think was a good idea.... please, no parades."

Every element here is emotional -- there is no obvious rationality behind any of these positions. Each one is associated with the kind of person he would like, and the kind of society he would like to live in. He wants men who are bold, but quick to feel guilt; who are willing to fight for their society, but sufficiently 'individual' to break their oaths if necessary to avoid doing something they don't think is a good idea.

The society he wants provides for the poor generously, including the poor foolish soldier. It takes care of those too stupid or immoral to do what's right while wearing its uniform; but it lets them know it doesn't approve of them, even if it doesn't quite go so far as spitting on them.

Exactly how this is meant to be consistent with providing for their "mental health" is not clear -- as unclear as what the "pressing national interest" was in Kosovo. Stopping ethnic cleansing may be the right thing to do, but it's hard to point to a region less directly related to American fortunes than Kosovo. Stopping ethnic cleansing in southern Iraq, where there is also a pressing national interest in the form of oil access and the ability to address the poisonous political structures? Well, not if it means fighting this war.

Nor is it clear how an army could be maintained if people were free to break their oaths at will. No, not even for fighting off invasions from Mexico -- which, by the way, has either made 216 armed incursions into the United States in the last nine years, or has been unable to prevent large drug gangs from wearing its military uniforms while doing so:

The U.S. Border Patrol has warned agents in Arizona of incursions into the United States by Mexican soldiers "trained to escape, evade and counterambush" if detected -- a scenario Mexico denied yesterday.
The warning to Border Patrol agents in Tucson, Ariz., comes after increased sightings of what authorities described as heavily armed Mexican military units on the U.S. side of the border. The warning asks the agents to report the size, activity, location, time and equipment of any units observed.... A total of 216 incursions by suspected Mexican military units have been documented since 1996 -- 75 in California, 63 in Arizona and 78 in Texas, according to a Department of Homeland Security report.

Attacks on Border Patrol agents in the past few years have been attributed to current or former Mexican military personnel.

One wonders what Mr. Stein thinks of the Border Patrol, which is in form and function much like the Texas Rangers during the famous days of the Old West: a few men, mobile and well-trained, trying to control a vast frontier full of hostiles. Do they get a pass, since they really are trying to control invasions from Mexico? Or does Mr. Stein share his city's prejudice against them too, preferring to defy Federal laws that the Patrol is bound to enforce?

The good news for Mr. Stein is that the troops will be more forgiving than others he's offended in the past. An apology and a few cases of the good stuff will go a long way to making it up to them -- if you can get past the fact that you might be interpreted as supporting them.

The bad news is that few of them, or other young men looking for an ideology, will be persuaded to his vision. The hard facts of reality will drag it down, and it apparently can no longer consider them with anything like a clear eye.

Bangladeshi Rumors:

Bill Roggio has links to a potentially huge story out of India and Bangladesh.

Bill mentions that Bangladesh has two Islamist ministers in the government; the more important of these is Industries Minister Nizami, who is also the head ("emir") of the largest Islamic political party in Bangladesh, Jamaat-e-Islami. Nizami isn't just an Islamist; he's been accused of being the real mastermind behind the bombing campaigns that have wracked Bangladesh through the autumn and winter.

The claim has been made by captured sympathizers of the JMB terrorist group, but more emphatically by the opposition political parties. The main opposition group is a collection of leftist/socialist groups called the Awami League. The AL has refused to participate in government anti-terrorist efforts, and has instead maintained that the government (and J-e-I in particular) is behind the terror.

Meanwhile, J-e-I and Nizami have maintained that really, it is Indian and Israeli intelligence behind the terrorist campaign. Increasingly, Nizami has posited that the AL must be an additional partner, given their refusal to participate in government anti-terror efforts and their constant criticism of those efforts. (No one seems interested in the possibility that Islamists are "really" behind the campaign to establish an Islamic state in Bangladesh through terrorism -- it's not a useful possibility for their real political game of gaining or holding control of the country's government.)

The capture of the leader of JMB in India will feed J-e-I's claim that he was partnered with Indian/Israeli intelligence. If he says anything in captivity that can be construed as blame for Nizami, the AL will feed on that. Both groups, the Islamists and the leftists, have the capability of fielding massive protests through the country -- and, in the case of the leftists, of making use of general strikes among unionized labor.

The capture of this terrorist, if it proves out, could be the beginning of complete chaos in Bangladesh. It would be an irony if it was the capture of JMB's leader that put an end to the fledgling democracy in Bangladesh, given that doing so was JMB's great desire all along.

Revolutions

Revolutions, In & Out of the Hemisphere:

Congratulations to Canada, which has done what was unthinkable even two years ago -- broken the hold of the Liberal party on the government. More at Captain's Quarters, which deserves a share of credit for breaking the strength of the previously-ruling party by exposing its corruption.

I wish them well, and indeed, they are among the most optimistic people in the world right now. The others are the Iraqis and the Afghans:

Canadians are bullish not just about their own finances (64%), but also about the economic prospects of their country (63%).
They are joined in their optimism by the people of two countries devastated by war and civil conflict, Iraq and Afghanistan.

In Afghanistan, 70% say their own circumstances are improving, and 57% believe that the country overall is on the way up.

In Iraq, 65% believe their personal life is getting better, and 56% are upbeat about the country's economy.

The Canadian "revolution" is like the Afghan and Iraqi ones in only one way: it promises freer markets and more open, honest government. That is a most important similarity.

There is less reason for optimism in our Southern hemisphere, where the recent revolutions have promised less-free markets, and a renewed Marxist influence. Here is a piece from former Mexican Foreign Minister Jorge G. Castaneda that is extremely critical of the American response:

At the inauguration tomorrow of Evo Morales as Bolivia's new president, the United States -- which has a significant military and aid presence in that country -- will be represented by a deputy assistant secretary of state. This is just further evidence -- if any was needed -- that U.S. relations with Latin America are in utter disrepair....

Today practically every nation seems to have some point of friction. Brazil is at odds with Washington on trade policy, especially anti-dumping and agricultural subsidies; on its wish to occupy a permanent seat on the U.N. Security Council; and on Iraq. Argentina rails at President Bush's support for the Free Trade Area of the Americas (FTAA), criticizes U.S. economic policy recommendations, and may advise Venezuela's Hugo Chavez on nuclear energy. The newly elected Morales wants to remove the penalties for coca-leaf cultivation -- and expand it. President Vicente Fox in Mexico has been left high and dry by George Bush: Instead of an immigration agreement that would have addressed the most important issue on the bilateral agenda and an increasingly intractable U.S. domestic problem, Fox now has to deal with a hateful proposal to build a wall on the border, criminalize unauthorized emigration to the United States and punish any association with it. Bush didn't push for an agreement when he could have; now he supports a bill that is offensive to everyone in the region.

And then, of course, there is Venezuela. Chavez is not only leading the fight against the FTAA (which was going nowhere anyway) and making life increasingly miserable for foreign -- above all, American -- companies in Venezuela. He is also supporting various left-wing groups or leaders in neighboring nations and has established a strategic alliance with Havana. Most important, he is attempting, with some success, to split the hemisphere in two: for or against Chavez, for or against the United States. Whenever this happens, everyone loses.

Castaneda, though harsh here in his criticism, should be best remembered by Americans for being Mexico's Foreign Minister on 9/11. Alone in his government, he took such an openly pro-American stance that it caused a tremendous backlash among the Mexican people. That backlash disrupted the early efforts of the Fox government -- the first government not from the ruling "Institutional Revolutionary Party" since the revolution -- but it was worth it to Castaneda, who thought it was the right thing to say and do. Though he is a Mexican first (as he ought to be), we should remember Castaneda as our friend.

I don't know how much good a commission of the sort he suggests would do, but it couldn't hurt. One thing we ought to know by now: it is free markets and open government that work. Those are two of the things we've been fighting for in Iraq and Afghanistan, and with real success. We need to do what we can to encourage them in the Southern hemisphere as well.

Ideology

On Ideology and Closed Systems:

I'm going to respond here, because what started as a comment turned out to be far too long for Haloscan.

I. On Changes

When a movement arises of people who are breaking out of a closed, dominant system of thought, it is a movement that often has the potential to become dominant. It's something to be watched closely when it happens.

This is because the new movement has been lately informed by direct examination of reality. The theoretical structures it builds -- the new ideology -- is at least momentarily closer to the current reality than the one it replaces.

This is why neoconservatism -- which has its origins among certain former liberals who were shocked by WWII and the rise of the Soviet state -- remains a strong philosophy in the West. But it is also why Reform Liberalism had been so strong beforehand: it, and its European counterpart Democratic Socialism, had broken out of the well-developed system of Marxism on the left. Thinkers who abandoned the Marxist worldview and structures, but were still interested in the social questions Marxism had arisen to protest, developed new political structures and ways of thinking that swept Europe and America in turn.

II. Growth and Ossification

I think there is a cyclical process here, which arises from the fact that these things (if they are successful) become movements. Movements require a lot of people; and almost no people are rational in the way of what your 'neo-neocon' describes as a "changer" is rational. As a result, any successful system will ossify over time and become "closed," and thus progressively less attached to the current reality and more vulnerable to a new breakout system. I'll explain what I mean.

Only a small subset of political thought considers large-scale systems at all. It's been a long time since I took political science, and I quote from memory so the percentages I offer should be considered rough, but you're welcome to clarify them with political science professors at your university. I seem to remember that the studies indicate that most people decide who to vote for based on personal considerations (this candidate offers tax cuts; that one offers better garbage collection); or based on party or other personal affiliation (I'm in the union, and the union says this is our guy); or based on purely social considerations (That fellow seems smarter in the debate; this fellow looks like a weasel).

Only about twenty percent of voters, as I recall, considered ideology in making their decisions. Of these, half were "ideologues," hard-core devotees to the system of their choice. This group was the most important group to possess in order to be successful as a political movement -- these people, because they think according to the system, understand what needs doing on their own and can mobilize others. These are often your party volunteers, the union leaders -- the ones who are telling the group-identifiers who 'the union's guy' is -- and other similar organizers.

The problem is that you need these people to be successful as a movement. However, because their approach to life is ideological, in order to capture them you need to present a system for them to apply to life. They are rational, but their rationality rarely extends to questioning the fundamentals of the system. It normally stops with thinking rationally about how events they observe fit within the system.

III. The Role of Emotional Thinking

This is not limited to politics -- Aristotle, for example, questioned whether it was possible to think rationally about the ends of ethics. Once you understood what you wanted to be -- "A good man should be generous to the poor," or "It is better to be a fireman than a banker" -- it was easy to think rationally about whether a given action fit with being that kind of person. It was not clear, however, if you could make those basic decisions based on simple reason. It seemed to Aristotle that it was the irrational part of the soul, the emotional part, that made those base decisions about what the ends of virtue are.

The same thing is at work in these political models. Your most effective political operatives are good at applying reason to questions within the model. "How does this political coup fit within the model?" is one such question. "What does the model suggest as the right response to rising gas prices?" is another.

Yet the reason they adopted the model wasn't rational -- it is tied up with emotional thinking about what kind of person they want to be and also what kind of society they want to have. These are the very questions that Aristotle said might not be able to be addressed wholly rationally, or possibly even at all rationally.

This is why the "changer" gets hit with a heavy emotional response when he begins knocking down the pillars of the system. It is because, at base, the real supporters of the system are invested based on deep emotional attachments to the ideals. They can be wholly clinical about applying reason to events, fitting them within the system and devising a response. Applying reason to the model, in a way that undermines it, moves you into an emotional field, and they will have an emotional response.

IV. The Process of, and Reasons for, Success

As a result, the system ossifies as it becomes successful. In order to succeed, you need these ideologues to move your politics out through society. In order to engage them, the system needs to stabilize enough that they can identify with it -- enough that it presents a coherent vision of society and the Right Kind of Man, so that the ideologues can see that and decide (emotionally) that this is what they want. At that point, the system succeeds, but it also hardens. It is no longer possible for the founders of the system, or other "changers," to modify it without enraging its most important supporters.

The system may become dominant over whatever was the old system, however, because even in the hardened form it is closer to the current reality than the older system it is replacing. The ossification was more recent. More recently, reason was applied to its foundations, and brought it in line with the broader world.

If you live long enough, and remain open minded, you will therefore outlive more than one of your ideologies. They break, over time.

V. How to Lead Rather than Follow

The solution is to make your emotional decisions about what the right kind of man is, and what society is for, based on things that aren't subject to politics. You can then move easily from working one ideology to another as necessary, choosing whichever one is most likely to approach your real goals. You can also influence the new ideologies as they are arising, so that they adopt your goals.

The normal sources for these decisions are family, religion, art and philosophy. You can't do much about your family, but you can look for other families you admire, and see what is important to them. You can, in this country, examine religions freely, with an eye toward what kind of men and what kind of societies they produce.

Art is properly emotional, but once you know what you like you can examine its underpinings.

And philosophy? I still think Aristotle has the right of things. But again: look not so much at the philosophy itself, but at what kind of men it produces. You're making your emotional decisions first -- what kind of man do you want to be? What kind do you want others to be? Pick a philosophy and encourage it if and only if it develops that kind of man.

When you see a new system breaking out, you will therefore be prepared to engage it during its still-purely-rational phase. This is the point at which it is most open to change. You can help to guide it toward the things you think are eternal, so that when the ideologues get there it will invest them with those things. You will be guiding the production of the right kind of families, what you feel is the right kind of religion (not necessarily "the right religion"; it can be the right way to believe in any religion), the right kind of art and the best understanding of beauty, and the right philosophy.

In this way, as new systems emerge to meet new challenges, you can push them to remain devoted to the things that are eternally important. You can help ensure that they continue to pursue the right kind of man, and the right kind of society.

Open Mind, Closed Mind

Open Mind, Closed Mind:

After a day spent toiling away at academic work, I took a pleasant break over at neo-neocon's place.

More specifically, I read her articles about changing mindsets, which sprang from an article about the metamorphosis of the thoughts of exiled Iraqi scholar Kanan Makiya.

I hesitate to speak of this subject: I am not too young to have gone through such a total investment in one socio-political mindset, but I am a little too young to have seen such a mindset fracture in the face of a dissonant reality.

There is an element to these stories involved which is troubling. In both cases mentioned, we read about people who gradually realize that they live in a closed system of thought. That is, they inhabit a mental environment in which the words and thoughts of those who disagree don't even rise to the dignity of error. Instead, this disagreement is the result of inability to see all of reality--or of active participation in evil plans to delude the rest of humanity.

Even as I try to avoid the error of thinking inside such a closed system, I am aware of the equal danger of being too open-minded. How many pieces of absurdity clamor for my attention on a daily basis? I filter most of them out with a few simple rules, rules which close my mental world.

Following the lead of Aristotle, I seek the golden mean. A mind that is open enough to acknowledge error, and a mind that is closed to nonsensical claims.

CIA Reports Blocked

CIA Blocks Reports:

Via Secrecy News, I see that the CIA is blocking critical reports on its intelligence gathering. At least three unclassified reports, which could be made available to the public, have been produced by the Center for Study of Intelligence since 2003.

These are the kinds of reports, to judge from the article linked, that could be informative in our efforts to improve intelligence capabilities and reduce intelligence failures. The national debate is poorer, because the Agency has decided it doesn't want these critiques of its methods to be available to the citizenry it serves, and whose taxes pay for its hidden budgets.

The reports are available by mail... just not published online, nor is there any notice that they're available offline. You have to know to request one.

I haven't seen a copy myself, so I don't know if they have language in the printed version that prevents them being scanned in and posted on (say) a blog. But I would be surprised if it didn't.

One of the Sharp Ones:

Uncle Jimbo, during an interview with Sgt. Boggs, lets the sergeant ask him a few questions back. Here's one of the exchanges:

What do you think when people call those in the military the “best and the brightest?” Since you are prior service I am expecting a different answer from you then say a politician might give.

I don't believe that the military, by and large represents our best and brightest, as it would normally be defined, I think it represents an excellent cross section of middle America. If you define best as offering to serve a greater good than yourself, then that certainly fits, but brightest?.....hardly. There were plenty of smart and even brilliant people I met, but there were also plenty of raging dumbasses, and even an entire class of people we termed oxygen thieves.

Well, OK, fair enough -- reference the LT from the previous post. But let me point you to one of the sharp ones: Specialist Phil Van Treuren of "Camp Katrina." One of the things about the Reserve and National Guard is that the "part-time soldiers" are often extremely qualified professionals in their civilian lives; I remember Marine Reserve Lieutenant Colonel Coulvillon praising some of his reservist enlisted Marines in Iraq, who were often very highly educated and able to bring their education and experience to bear on the tasks of the day.

I don't know exactly what Specialist Van Treuren does 'in real life,' but he's got a brain on him. That link is to his new "Weapons Cache Database," in which he's compiling DOD reports on captured war material:

Camp Katrina's 2006 Weapons Cache Databank, updated daily, now gives you the ability to check out a current list of MSM-ignored stories showing every bomb and gun our military takes out of terrorist hands this year. Check back daily for more stories proving that the U.S. military does much more than just kill people and break things!

Now, why didn't the DOD think of that? A tally of deadly weapons removed from the hands of professional killers is just the sort of thing to counterbalance the constant "Today, we passed X casualties" stories that the MSM loves to run. Good job, Spec.

TGL

Hanging! Fire!

If, like me, you haven't gotten over to The Gun Line lately, don't miss this story about mortar practice with a really stupid lieutenant issuing the orders.

Kerry/Kos

JohnKerry@DailyKos.com:

I've been reading some interesting reports that J. F. Kerry has decided to engage the folks at Daily Kos (the lack of a link is entirely intentional). Here is one such report; Cassandra has another, at her quietly-reopened blog. I'm rather amused that Kos said that Kerry should be taken out and shot; but apparently the Senator is a forgiving sort (as long as you aren't a Secret Service agent who "caused" him to trip).

But look especially at Greyhawk's writeup. The founder of the MilBlog Ring can't help but notice this little exchange between one of the Kos commenters and Mr. Kerry:

Commenter: Liberals shouldn't pretend to be in favour of the military (as a concept most liberals are instinctively against it) when we aren't. The military are 'special cirucmstances' - men who must do a dirty job when all other opportunities and options are exhausted. They aren't men to be lionised and put on a pedestal - they're like toilet cleaners: it's a dirty job, but someone's gotta do it. There's nothing brave or noble about it - it's a dirty, degrading, inhuman affair, but one which is occasionally necessary.

Kerry: As you can imagine, it's difficult to respond to each of you individually, but Teresa and I were impressed with your thoughtfulness, your honesty, and your dedication.

I don't know. I might have taken some time out to respond to that one individually, if I ever wanted to be taken seriously as a candidate for a national office. I'm not sure anyone outside of the Kos kids does take him seriously, though; even the despicable attack emails have essentially stopped mentioning him. The lastest "Democrats are pro-terrorist" urban-legend email to drop in my box had apparently reverted to bashing Gore, whereas it had been an anti-Kerry email in 2004. (This one, if you're curious.)

I really hate these things, by the way -- regardless of whom they target. They're designed to plant a big lie in your mind ("Candidate X is a child molestor"). Even if the lie is patently untrue, and in fact proven to be untrue, once you've forgotten the charge and the response you'll remember that you once heard something awful about the guy. It's a poisonous kind of discourse, and if you ever get one of these things, I hope you'll take a moment to research the truth about it rather than passing it on.

John Kerry, of course, claims to have been a victim of such a campaign all along -- or rather, a whole lot of them, including the "Swift Boat Veterans" campaign, the AuthentiSEAL team, the Stolen Valor movie, the authors of Unfit for Command, and others. That's an argument not worth having again, except to reassert that I actually know one of the AutheniSEAL team (Steve Robinson, mentioned on the page), and trust his honesty entirely. The charges they raised, I have every cause to believe they actually believe to be true. Since Kerry has still not released his full military records to the public as he's promised, I see no reason to take his word over my friend's beliefs at the end of his investigation.

In fairness to the Senator, however, Snopes considers him clear of the fake-medals charge. Actually, they have a whole page for Kerry, most of which claims are rated false by Snopes. My own sense is based on a personal friendship, and high regard for the honor of that friend. I see no reason why my regard for Steve Robinson should be persuasive to anyone else, but for what it is worth, there it is.

Bad guests

To Insufferable Guests:

I notice all to my grief,
My vegan guests will not eat beef;
But if I roast them in beef's stead,
And boil their over-suffer'd heads
And place those heads upon the board
That other guests are so informed,
The menu-muttering shall cease,
And we at last shall have some peace.

A small offering at a gathering of friends, where was discussed a number of similar topics. Another such finding: "Dragon is more like veal than beef, given their habit of cloistering themselves in small caverns for centuries."

Given that I named my son "Beowulf," the composition of dragons cannot be a matter of no interest to me. I suspect it will interest, or at least amuse, some of you as well.

Poker Game

A Crazy Game of Poker:

I spent last night playing poker at the house of a former neighbor of mine, who is the groundskeeper at the local Catholic church. He is a devout Catholic and a proud Virginian, and had invited in addition to me his father -- a retired Chicago police officer, who now works at the Pentagon -- and also the priest, and also a couple of other people. Among those "couple of others" was a fellow I'd never met, whom we shall call Blondie.

Blondie had obviously come for the festivities instead of the poker, as he began drinking with several glasses of beer, and then began "fortifying" the beer with some sort of cheap rum. After several more glasses, he moved on to straight hard liquor.

Oh, and what liquor. The advertisement for Tarantula Tequila begins, "You wouldn't expect Tequila to be blended and bottled in Italy, but..."

So anyway, amid all of this some of us are trying to play poker. Blondie, meanwhile, is so drunk that he accidentally deals about half the cards face up on his deal, can't actually tell whether he has a hand or not so just bets heavily on everything and then lays his hand down at the end of the game to see if he won.

He won almost everything. Seriously -- he must have won two out of three of the hands, all night long. I think I broke even, but two of the other players lost everything they'd brought, and most of it ended up in Blondie's pockets.

I would suspect him of being a cheat, except that (a) I actually watched him drink all that stuff, all of which was provided by others, so I know it was all genuine liquor he was drinking; and (b) in my misspent youth I learned several good ways to cheat at cards, and he wasn't making use of any of them. Furthermore, every time he saw an ace in his hand he would burst out laughing and beating his hands on the table, which isn't much of a poker face.

Anyway, Blondie -- who while still sober had been playfully harrassing his Catholic hosts about the 'high church' aspects of the faith, such as robes and bells and saints -- by the end of the night was demanding to know the name of the patron saint of poker so he could perform some sort of ritual sacrifice in his honor.

I don't see anything quite like that on the internet lists of patron saints -- there are saints for "compulsive gamblers," which I don't think is quite the right idea, and for "playing card manufacturers," but again, not just right. Perhaps one of our Catholic readers could help us discover the right saint.

Anyway, there must be one, because he cleaned up. I shall be interested to see if he follows through on his oft-repeated, drunken claim that he was going to donate it to the local Catholic church ("It'shall goin' ta th' poor, boys," was the usual formulation of this promise.) Though I don't know if less devoted gamblers can also benefit from the veneration, some of you may wish to try it.

UPDATE: I knew I could rely on Southern Appeal, which even today linked to this piece:

I am pleased to announce that we have started a campaign to ask the Vatican to name patron saints for... Texas Hold 'Em[.]

That's the Catholic Church I know -- finding a need and filling it.

Global

Global War:
(also posted at Wilde Karrde)

I seem to recall saying, shortly after the London Subway Bombings last July, that this is another reminder that the War on (Islamofascist) Terror isn't restricted to the Middle East.

It is a Global war.

A piece of evidence tying one side of that war to the other surfaced on Reuters today. (Thanks to Michelle Malkin for the pointer.)

It seems that the interrogators at Guantanamo Naval Base in Cuba have been asking questions of the detainees held there. Those detainees were, of course, rounded up during Coalition military operations in Afghanistan and Iraq.

But some of those detainees have connections in London. Apparently, some useful information about Al-Qaeda related operations in London has surfaced during questioning, and been passed on to London investigative officials.

I am actually somewhat happy that the Reuters story doesn't go into specifics as to what information has been passed along. If the information was leaked, it would quickly become useless to law-enforcement and investigative teams in England, or elsewhere.

But the reminder is welcome. Al-Qaeda has friends and allies all over the globe. Every piece of the network that is dismantled is a victory. And the war against AQ, and against like-minded Islamofascist terrorists, is a global war.

Whiskey

Whiskey in the Jar:

The COUNTERCOLUMN reports on the EU and Irish ballads. Short version: apparently, you have to be in a union to sing at the pub. It costs about forty euros to pay your "fee," every time you perform. Also, you need a permit. And so does the pub.

Unlike the Captain, I'm not an acoustic musician; on the other hand, I know quite a few Irish ballads well enough to sing (well, OK, "roar" -- though Sovay kindly said I have a good singing voice) them by heart. My favorite is "The Old Orange Flute," a good Protestant tune you don't often hear in American Irish pubs. Still, it's got a great sense of humor, and some very clever rhymes. I can also sing plenty of Green songs, lest anyone suspect me of partisanship.

My only point of difference with the Captain is this: what's wrong with someone requesting 'the Wild Colonial Boy'? That's a great song.

Truce

Bin Laden offers truce.

Sorry... but I'll only accept their surrender... preferably at bayonet tip.

I especially loved the:

"We are a nation that God has forbidden to lie and cheat. So both sides can enjoy security and stability under this truce so we can build Iraq and Afghanistan, which have been destroyed in this war."

Aren't we the great satan?

The Whiskey Wars

"The Whiskey Wars" Are Finally Over:

Unconditional surrender has at last been achieved. Only took 131 years; but our cause was just.

Friction & Medicare

Medicare & "Friction"

I'm going to take another stab at saying what I was trying to say below. Sovay is furious because she is shocked and angry that the government's screwups are causing human suffering -- sickness and, perhaps, death, due to something that should have been avoidable. I am angry at the obvious corruption, but I'm not at all shocked, and so I can't muster the same level of outrage. I don't think the government could have done better than it did, because of the flaws native to giant Federal bureaucracies.

People often make the mistake of trying to point fingers at specific mistakes in cases like this. I don't doubt that we will soon see documentation that shows particular administration officials made particular mistakes; and it's easy, in the face of such data, to believe that the mistakes could and should have been avoided. The response I often get to this fatalistic attitude about government incompetence is, "How can you say the government couldn't have done better? Here's ten things it did wrong. If it had done those things right instead, there would have been a much better result." Obviously, that is true on its face: if the Bush administration officials hadn't made the mistakes we will soon be told that they did, things would have been better.

The problem is that it's not possible to run a giant Federal agency without making mistakes. Nor, in fact, am I convinced that the mistakes made at the top are more important than the compilation of mistakes made by the 99.5% of any Federal bureaucracy who aren't at the top -- the civil servant class, which doesn't change from administration to administration except through natural hiring and retirement.

A lot of the problems that appear that arise in these efforts come of that great force impeding human design: friction. I'm no expert on health care, although as you can see I have some opinions about it. I do know a thing or two about military science, and history, and it seems to me that there's a very useful concept we need to bring across to this kind of discussion.

Probably the single greatest military scientist was von Clausewitz; and among the things that earned him that title was the recognition of the problem of friction in war. Clausewitz wrote about "friction in war," but it is obvious that friction exists outside of war as well -- it is just that war exaggerates and worsens its effects. Part of the reason that armies make the mistakes they do is the pressure of blood and fire; but a large part of it is that they are also large bureaucracies, and much of friction arises from the failures that are natural to that form of social organization.

For example, Clausewitz speaks of generals bedeviled by "reports both true and false; by errors arising from fear or negligence or hastiness; by disobedience born of right or wrong interpretations, of ill will, of a proper or mistaken sense of duty, of laziness, or of exhaustion; and by accidents that nobody could have foreseen." Well, and so are bureaucrats; and not only the top level bureaucrats, but bureaucrats at every level. The top level are getting their reports from the field filtered through multiple lower levels, each one blurring the picture; the middle levels can hardly compile the next set of reports from the top level before new directives come down for additional reports, all the while those middle-level bureaucrats must also try to direct operations below them; and the people below are separated from the ones above by these multiple levels, so that they cannot really know what they should be preparing to do or when, or why, or how. No sooner do they think they understand the plan of action and start to prepare, then down filters a new report from on high that tells them that last plan was abandoned weeks ago, and they're only just finding out about the change now. So they must begin again; and the report begins to make its way back to the top that they have had to start preparations over, and so they are not nearly so far advanced along as previous reports had indicated.

This is the nature of bureaucracy. War makes them worse; but so do any matters of life and death, such as health care.

This is not to say that brilliance is impossible, or that no 'general' is capable of better results than another. We celebrate Ulysses S. Grant's Vicksburg campaign because it was brilliant -- but not because it was flawless. A general has to make do with the reality of friction.

I thus regard it as essentially inevitable that, of the 3.6 million new prescription drug beneficiaries, 2.6 million were signed up within the last 30 days. Of course they were. Everything is done at the last minute. That is the nature of things. The bureaucracy designed for day to day operations couldn't handle the surge of the sudden crisis caused by having to institute a major change; it never can.

Where the Bush administration is culpable (aside from their participation in the corruption attendant to the law-writing) is in not having realized that a crisis was inevitable, and prepared accordingly. They should have warned people that major disruptions in basic, life-sustaining services were all but inevitable, and to prepare themselves as best they could. They should have been ready to delay the roll-out until the crisis of late registrations could be minimized. They should have been had excesses of money set aside to address the inevitable collapse.

Really, they should never have done this at all. Yet they insisted. Well. Every major change in a massive Federal bureaucracy must be approached as if it were war: and that means expecting casualties. For major changes to a bureaucracy of any size are always a crisis, just like a battle is a crisis. If anyone's life depends on that bureaucracy, some people will die. That truth, the truth of friction, is a law of nature as immutable as gravity.

So no, I am not shocked, nor surprised, only sad to see it. It is somewhat like receiving news of a distant battle, and mourning the dead -- but we are not surprised that there were dead in a battle. Nor should we be surprised if dead come from this -- not surprised, nor given over to fervent belief that if only this or that mistake had not been made, if only someone better had been in charge...

No, probably not even then. Even Grant made mistakes, and he was a genius in his day.

Medicare

The Medicare Disaster:

I've just had an enlightening conversation with dear Sovay, who is up in arms over the Medicare disaster. "What Medicare disaster?" you may be forgiven for asking if you, like me, have been paying no attention to the subject these last few months. But it's a big story, as you can see reading here and here, and also here, that last link being to Josh Marshall's blog. Marshall, as everyone knows, is given to monomaniacal focus -- which can be a useful trait in crisis situations, though it keeps me from reading him often -- and just now it's Medicare he's focused on.

I don't write to criticize except on one point, which is the corruption involved in (a) misleading everyone as to what this program would cost (i.e., the usual corruption involved in socialist welfare plans), and (b) allowing lobbyists so much influence in how the law was written. Both complaints are with the Congress as much as with the administration; they set out to pass this benefit for political gain among seniors, and apparently did whatever was necessary to achieve that goal. If that meant downplaying costs, as it always does when the government goes into health care, so be it; if that meant giving their corporate lobbyists access so as not to see a withering of financial support from them, so be it.

This is in fact corruption, of a predictable and sad, but pervasive type.

Sovay holds that I am "setting the bar too low" in not being outraged over the other aspects of this case, the most troubling of which is that people are going to die because of the government's rank mismanagement. As I've explained to her, people dying due to mismanagement is what I expect when the government is placed in charge of important matters. This is never more true than when it attempts to take over health care duties.

It's not that I don't care; it's that the political class and the seniors are absolutely insistent on the government doing this. As a result, these disasters are inevitable. Government is not competent to handle anything this important. There are some important things that have to be handled by government, because no one else can do it at all -- maintaining a functional blue-water navy, for example. That doesn't mean the government does it well, just that they're the only ones who can do it at all. Ask any squid what he thinks of Naval bureaucracy sometime. (If you really want to hear some griping, ask what he thinks of their health care.)

I have always been hostile to the idea of a prescription drug benefit, as I am always hostile to all government health care schemes. Mark Steyn has written a few pieces on this subject, including this one:

Making idle chitchat as his fingers felt his way around my fleshly delights, [Steyn's doctor] explained that "waiting" is built into the concept of a government health service: "If you need surgery," he said, "it's in my interest to get you in and operated on as soon as possible, because that's money for me. The faster it happens, the better my cash flow. But when the government runs the system, every time you get operated on it costs the government money. So it's in their interest to restrict or delay your access. When you look at the overall budgets--salaries, buildings--it's not hard to understand that the level of service you provide to the patient is one of your few discretionary costs. So the incentive is to reduce that."

...

A few years back, [Steyn's wife] felt herself beginning to miscarry. Nobody was at home so she called a cab and went to the emergency room at the Royal Victoria. Knowing what "emergency" means in the Quebec system, she grabbed a novel on the way out--an excellent choice, Mr. Standfast by John Buchan, our late Governor General. It's 304 pages, and my wife had the time to read every single one of them before any medical professional saw her. While she was reading, she was bleeding, all over the emergency room floor, the pool of large dark red around her growing bigger and bigger, until eventually a passing cleaner ran her mop over the small lake and delivered a small rebuke to my wife for having the impertinence not to cease bleeding.... Since my wife's experience, the average wait time in Montreal emergency rooms has apparently gone up to 48 hours. So don't pack an overnight bag, take two, and the complete works of John Buchan.

Steyn's wife didn't die, but in Montreal hospitals the death rate is four times the US average from an easily prevented infection that normally results from a lack of cleanliness. The government runs the janitorial services, too.

So now the government has taken it upon itself to provide for lifesaving drugs of millions more people than ever before. The short term consequence? Lots of those people will get very sick, and some of them will die, because the bureaucracy isn't up to the task.

Sovay asserts that any other administration -- Clinton, Bush I, Reagan -- would have handled this better. I honestly don't believe that. It's nothing in favor of Bush II, who certainly isn't the President that Reagan was. It's just that this is exactly what I expect from government, which is why I think we should keep it out of as many places as possible.

The other thing I think about it is that we should tend to push the required government "down" as much as we can, as local governments tend to be relatively more responsive. Sovay tells me that twelve or fourteen states are now providing lifesaving drugs on an emergency basis, since the Feds have totally failed to do so. Great, I say -- if they're succeeding where the Federal government has failed, let's have them do it instead. Block grant the money to them, and fire all these bureaucrats at the Federal level -- including the Bush appointees at the top, if you like. Fine with me. Then, if there is a problem, there's a chance the folks at the state level might really get it fixed.

I don't mind if Bush takes a political hit for this. He deserves one. But let's be clear on why he deserves it. It isn't because the program should have been managed better. It's because he should have known that this is how it would be managed.

This is what government does. It has no business being involved in health care, except -- perhaps -- in terms of block-granting money to the states to protect the poorest and the weakest who truly can't make market-based arrangements. Even those are far from perfect -- I get annoyed with my insurance company every time I think about them -- but they're far better than any government endeavor at the basic work of keeping patients alive, clean, and keeping the wait times short.

For those American citizens who really can't avail themselves of that better way of obtaining health care, I don't mind that we should look out for them. But let's do it at the state level, and restrict the Feds to providing the cash to poorer states if necessary.

Of course, we're not really going to do that. What we're going to do is muddle along with the bureaucracy in panic mode, with people growing sick and dying because they either trusted or were forced to trust the Feds to keep their promises and manage to run things in a good order.

Don't weary me with "experts" who say it could have been done better; if those experts think so, they can take the job at a government wage. They're obviously qualified. They'd rather work at their think tanks instead? Then they can shut up. They aren't interested in doing what it takes to fix the problem. They want to slam others for 'not caring enough,' but they care more about their cheery paycheck than about getting their hands dirty and making things right.

This is a disgrace. Congress, the President, and the whole health-care bureaucracy are equally damned by it. They ought to be ashamed of what they've wrought.

China e-Lobby: News of the Day (January 17)

Chinese Paramilitary Police:

In the comments to the "war games" post below, Eric mentions the Chinese and Russian responses to Iran. Russia obviously has a lot to lose from nuclear terrorism, but China is also concerned about it. It's just that they're more concerned about energy supplies.

China e-Lobby has (among very many interesting links, as always) a link to this story about Chinese plans to bolster their "People's Armed Police," which is to say, government paramilitary units in form somewhat like our SWAT teams. In form, I say; not in function.

In a November video presentation, the Ministry of Public Security identified several threats to national stability, according to Chinese academics, that are echoed in the article.

Among these were growing anger and angst among Chinese as social pressure ratchets up; clashes among domestic groups over corruption, land seizures and the growing gap between rich and poor; and conflicts involving groups Beijing identifies as enemies on its periphery. The latter includes those who advocate independence for Tibet, Taiwan and the far western province of Xinjiang, sometimes referred to as "East Turkestan," as well as members of the Falun Gong religious group and Tiananmen protesters who fled overseas.

Analysts said it has become increasingly difficult for local police to handle the growing number of conflicts, given limitations on their weapons and manpower, leading to calls for a stronger paramilitary force.

Fears of a "paramilitary police force" being used in this fashion is precisely why American libertarians (and, frequently, even some sorts of conservatives and liberals) harbor deep concerns about the militarization of the American police force. (See the post "Reasonable Men," below.) But in China those aren't concerns; it's the reality.

I added the emphasis on Xinjiang, or "East Turkestan." Xinjiang is a Mandarin word that means "New Frontier," which is how China views the lands of the Muslims they have annexed. Beijing has been enthusiastic in building railroads out there, and encouraging ethnic Han Chinese -- who are about 97% of the Chinese population, if memory serves -- to move out to the frontier. Speaking of what Chinese words mean, "Han" translates properly as "true man" or "hero." You can interpret that as you wish; probably almost all societies think of their type as the most heroic, but few are so up front in declaring other sorts of men to be lesser creatures. In any event, that understanding -- rooted in culture and language -- has had an effect on the settlement of the frontier, with the result that there is, ah, "unrest." Exactly how much is not clear, given the remoteness of the province and the short leash on which Chinese state media operates.

But it isn't only its ethnic minorities against which China plans to exercise paramilitary control. It's also unruly farmers, religious minorities, and especially democracy advocates:

"Compared to normal police, the paramilitary police are designed to safeguard social stability through the use of compelling force if necessary," said He Husheng, a professor of Communist Party history at Beijing's Renmin University. "We learned from Tiananmen what happened when we used the army, which was not proper."

The tanks made for bad footage, I guess.

Personal = Political

"The Personal Is Political"

See, I can actually understand why this guy wants to ban the ownership of guns by private families. Unfortunately for him, so can everyone else: "Brooks organized the protest at Rutgers University - 2,000 people were supposed to show up, and only 3 actually made it to the protest."

Maybe it's the messenger.