Froggy @ B5

Froggy Five:

Good news -- BlackFive's place has been improved by the addition of a new co-blogger. Matthew Heidt has come aboard. Mr. Heidt is a former Navy SEAL and better known as Froggy of Froggy Ruminations. FR, long a favorite blog of mine, has been inactive for some time. It's good to see the Frog back up and running.

MilBlogger Cancer

A MilBlogger In Need:

The Mudville Gazette asks for prayers for a fellow MilBlogger, Greg of Greg Note's. The guy has just returned from duty in Iraq, only to discover that he's come down with a form of cancer. Details are available through the first link.

CNN stinks

Blood Pressure Medicine:

There is a scene, early in the classic Disney movie Lady and the Tramp, in which Lady brings back the newspaper with the front page torn up. "Have you noticed, Darling," her master says to his wife, "that ever since we have Lady we see less and less of those disturbing headlines?"

Since I've abandoned cable TV -- any TV, actually -- these last two years, I find my sense of anger about things has greatly subsided. I was reminded of why tonight, while dining out at a place showing CNN.

When I arrived, there was a piece on the Moussaoui verdict. Several experts were discussing the verdict, and explaining that the jury had decided against the death penalty because nine of them believed he had been abused as a child.

It's a little more complicated than that, but no time for such things! We have to move on to the next story:

War on the Middle Class!

What? Oh, well, it turns out to be a story about high gasoline prices. Which aren't an economic story because economics is, like, really boring and stuff. So it needs to be a war story. That's a good angle. OK, no more time, quick, on to the next story...

Broken Borders!

What's this story about? I quote the tagline from memory: 'States are being forced to fight the immigration battle alone.'

It's a war! On immigration! No, wait, immigration IS the war! On us! Or, wait, no, because we need to work in a sympathetic portrait of a migrant, so that symbol won't work, but maybe...

No time! We have to move on to the next story! On government corruption!

Good Lord. No wonder people are totally upset with the country.

So, let me see here: the gas price story is not an economic story but the story of a war against the middle class (being waged by whom, exactly?); the illegal immigration story is not a law enforcement story, but the story of a war being fought by the states (and who is the enemy?); but the story of Zacarais Moussaoui, who entered the country as part of a terrorist organization and plotted to kill thousands of innocent people, that's not a war story, no...

...it's just a law story. One that shows the kind heart of the American people, standing up for a poor abused boy from France, and righteously rejecting the cruel and unusual "death penalty."

I will never watch TV News again.

CENTCOM & Bloggers

CENTCOM & Bloggers:

John Donovan has this post in which he proposes to test CENTCOM's PAO/blogger system. He'd like you to read up and submit questions, which I encourage you to do.

2 from Mudville

Two from Mudville:

Thanks to the always-excellent Dawn Patrol, two links with comments.

First, former Marine officer Chester agrees on hiring Blackwater to deal with Darfur. He has some interesting options on how to pay for it, including what he calls "the PayPal option."

I have to say that I like the idea. "Click here to stop genocide," the button would say -- and it would actually mean it. Not rhetoric, action, pushed down to the level where the individual can kick in ten or a hundred bucks and still make a difference.

Second, Bolton smacks Sy Hersh. And Kucinich:

BOLTON: I said I had not heard of the report and I didn’t intend to read the article in “The New Yorker.”

KUCINICH: If I gave you this article right now, walked it over, would you look at it?

BOLTON: I don’t think so, honestly, Congressman, because I don’t have time to read much fiction.

Bolton is being himself, but I wonder if he knows he is echoing the Pentagon?

Economic Illiteracy

Whee:

Tim Russert asks the hard questions:

MR. RUSSERT: Mr. Secretary, if, if demand is up but supply is down, why are the profits so high?

MR. BODMAN: For that reason.

Supply and demand graphing must not have been on the curriculum at journalism school. Or, er, high school macroeconomics.

(H/t: The Commissar.)

Chaplains

The Post on Chaplains:

I read this story in the Washington Post, entitled "In the Hands of God." It's a good piece, in every sense of the word.

Well done. More like this, please.

Down Mexico Way

"Down Mexico Way"

MilBlogger poet laureate Russ Vaughn sends one of his older, but still quite appropriate, works.

Down Mexico Way

Try crossing our southern border; try going the other way,
To enter Mexico illegally for an extended, unlawful stay.
Ignore immigration quotas, all their visas and their fees,
And quietly slip their border, anytime you damn well please.
Just sneak in past the policía, ignoring Mexican laws;
You’ve a desperate need to improve your lot; you have a righteous cause.
With Evil Bush in power now, destroying your liberal order,
You’ve a right to seek asylum, to trespass their northern border.

Once there, speak English only and demand it in their schools;
Forget assimilation; make Mexicanos change their rules.
What right do these Latinos have to make you learn their lingo?
Tell those churlish campesinos¹ you’ve the right to remain a gringo.
Move right on in, live your own way, ignore their cultural norms,
And demand the use of English on all their official forms.
Free healthcare is, of course, your right; let poor peones² pay,
For bilingual health providers throughout your border-bending stay.

Be sure to have a baby just as quickly as you can;
A citizen in the family helps legitimize your clan.
Then have another three or four, or maybe six or eight;
Don’t worry how you’ll feed them, just demand help from the state.
Paisanos³ paying taxes may resent your reckless breeding,
And protest loudly to their states about your gringo kids they’re feeding;
“But it’s just our way,” is your excuse, “Brought from our Yanquí land.”
How dare they question gringo ways they’ll never understand?

So defend your Anglo ethos; yield not your Yanquí essence;
And demand a driver’s license to legitimize your presence.
Just so you know what you’ve done wrong in case of policía stops,
Insist the Federales must teach English to all cops.
Make Mexicans accept your ways, make them your pliant fools;
Demand a Yanquí culture course be taught in all their schools.
So what you paid no taxes; when you’re an old gringo who will care?
File for your Seguridad Social, after all, you’re due your share.

If all this sounds preposterous, an irrational expectation,
Dems are demanding it for Illegals now in our multicultural nation.

Russ Vaughn

¹Rube, hick, unsophisticated person
²Laborer, worker
³Citizen

I have to say I think this is one of Russ' best efforts.

Quagmire

Quagmire:

There's an article in today's Washington Post that shows us the way to the First Great Chinese Quagmire.

Militants in Nigeria's volatile oil-producing region detonated a car bomb late Saturday and issued a warning that investors and officials from China would be "treated as thieves" and targeted in future attacks.

The threat came as Chinese President Hu Jintao returned home from a week-long tour of Africa in which he reached a series of deals securing access to oil and other resources to meet the needs of China's booming economy.... A spokesman for the Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta said in an e-mail sent to news organizations that the car-bomb attack was "the final warning" before the militants turned their attention to oil workers, storage facilities, bridges, offices and other "soft oil industry targets."

A few weeks ago, Kim du Toit had a post about China and Africa. He wrote:

Looks as though the Chinese are getting into Africa—several reports show them in Sudan, for instance—and now we’re getting noises that they’re going into Zimbabwe to “help out”, which triggered an article saying that the Zims should learn Chinese.

Some people may be alarmed by this trend. Not me.

What the Chinese are going to learn—and they don’t have a lot of money to throw at this—is the meaning of the phrase “Africa Wins Again”.

He's right on both points: China, which is still dependent on foreign investment for it's own economics, doesn't have a lot of money to sink in any foreign investments of its own. It needs to get a substantial return, on average, for its investments to be worthwhile. (Their investment in American ports, for example, is probably wise.)

Further, much of Africa is mired in a culture that is the exact negative of what you need for successful investments. Kim offers an example of the pernicious effect of the African environment on business in the form of an expensive, Chinese-built hospital -- useless, because no one will come to it. Reason magazine had a lengthy but excellent article on the same topic. It pointed out that much of Africa is built around the idea that success comes from putting up roadblocks, so you can extort a toll on anyone trying to accomplish something:

The rot starts with government, but it afflicts the entire society. There’s no point investing in a business because the government will not protect you against thieves. (So you might as well become a thief yourself.) There’s no point in paying your phone bill because no court can make you pay. (So there’s no point being a phone company.) There’s no point setting up an import business because the customs officers will be the ones to benefit. (So the customs office is underfunded and looks even harder for bribes.) There’s no point getting an education because jobs are not handed out on merit. (And in any case, you can’t borrow money for school fees because the bank can’t collect on the loan.)

It is not news that corruption and perverse incentives matter. But perhaps it is news that the problem of twisted rules and institutions explains not just a little bit of the gap between Cameroon and rich countries but almost all of the gap. Countries like Cameroon fall far below their potential even considering their poor infrastructure, low investment, and minimal education. Worse, the web of corruption foils every effort to improve the infrastructure, attract investment, and raise educational standards.

The so-called "Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta" aren't any more concerned about liberation than Mugabe was when he used the same terms. It's about piracy: they see some money and -- rather than getting a stake in the prosperity by helping out -- they take up arms and build bombs to try and extort some of the wealth. In return, the government will demand more Chinese money to protect Chinese workers. The money will never quite be enough, however, because the government in Africa benefits from the low-level violence too: the existence of the MEND means China has to help pay for the expanded local military.

"Africa wins again."

May Day

May Day:

May Day used to be a day for celebrating the fullness of spring; the entrance into "the Cathedral of May," which in England in much of the Middle Ages was the most beautiful month of the year.

At some point it became a holiday for malcontents and Communists. Today we're apparently expecting some sort of pro-illegal immigrant protests in America, but that's not what I want to write about. I'd like to point to a more traditional form of May Day protests -- the labor protests in Indonesia.

Workers across Asia rallied Monday to press for better factory conditions and higher wages, often encountering a heavy police presence and, in some places, outright resistance.

Demonstrations were planned in major cities across Indonesia, with up to 50,000 people expected in the capital alone to protest government plans to revise a labor law. The new law would cut severance packages and introduce more flexible contracts that would chip away at worker security.

"Don't change the law," thousands of laborers chanted at Jakarta's main downtown roundabout, as others arrived in buses and trucks, waving green, yellow and red flags and banners expressing their demands.

Fearing violence, about 13,000 police were deployed on the streets, some carrying riot shields and manning water cannons, said police chief Maj. Gen. Firman Ganisaid.

Measure of Effectiveness time: how does this compare with the latest anti-American protests? The anti-American movement in Indonesia had the advantage of a big-time vistor to rally their numbers: the US Secretary of State, Dr. Rice. She was there in person, one of the architects of US policy on Iraq and Afghanistan, one of the chief warmongers. How was she greeted?

On March 14, 2006 approximately 200 people staged a demonstration in front of U.S. Embassy Jakarta in protest of the visit of U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice. The demonstration, organized by two hard-line Muslim organizations, Hizbut Tahrir (HTI) and Pembela Islam (FPI), featured a procession of speakers who denounced the United States and Secretary Rice as "anti-Muslim" and "terrorists."

The protest lasted three hours, and ended without violence.

Shirley Temple

A Shirley Temple:

TC Override and FbL have posted the "Shirley Temple" photo featuring Uncle Jimbo. Jimbo's a good sport.

Coal. for Darfur

The Coalition for Darfur:

Stephen "Feddie" Dillard, founder of Southern Appeal, has a coalition blog with liberal blogger Eugene Oregon that is organized around trying to track the massacres in Darfur. The Coalition for Darfur is thus a doubly noble effort, both in that it is directed at the relief of human misery, and that it is one of the last remaining efforts in which liberal and conservative Americans are still working together towards a common good.

Feddie would like you to be aware of it, in case you are looking for news from there.

Don't Tease Rangers

Please, Don't Tease The Rangers:

I went hiking today in the Shenandoah National Park. I took the wife and little boy, and we went out from Elkwallow down the Jeremy's Run trail, out towards Neighbor mountain. We did a small part of the Appalachian trail as well.

We'd originally planned a hike farther south, but when we got to the park, they'd posted signs noting that a hiker had gone missing. We redirected our hike in part to aid the search and rescue operation underway. The fellow was an older gentleman with Alzheimer's disease, who had (sensibly enough under the circumstances, I thought) gone off into the deep wilderness by himself for a while. "LOST" is an honorable way to go; a straw death at the hospital, unable to recognize or speak to your family? No, a wilderness hike seems just the thing.

In any event, we went about four miles, and didn't find any sign of the fellow. We did find fully six Search and Rescue Teams (SRTs) climbing around the mountains. The thing about SRTs is that they are pulled in from all over the area when there is a lost hiker. As a result, none of them had been on these trails before. Every single team but one stopped us to ask for directions.

I dutifully directed them to where they needed to be to link up with the rest of their operation, but I have to admit that I started to find it funny. These guys in emergency gear and impressive badges, several of them with search dogs, would stop and pull out maps, and beg for some idea where they might be.

The sixth team I directed, we were already most of the way back up to Elkwallow and they were just starting down. I gave them the directions faithfully, but I couldn't resist adding this: "And if you get lost, don't worry. There's a whole bunch of search and rescue teams down there."

The guy looked totally offended. "We don't -get- lost," he huffed, and he and his team pushed down the mountain.

It's unkind to laugh at people out doing good work. I tried not to, without much success.

Cowboy Obits

Cowboy Obituaries:

The life of the American cowboy is alive and well -- as proven, in abundant irony, by a pair of this week's obituaries. We lost a couple of men this week, both of whom had chosen the Western way as their life.

The first one was only a youth, killed while practicing for a rodeo. Stuart Mazanec took his mortal wound when a bronco rolled on him, bruising his heart. He was seventeen -- a young man who loved coyote hunting and riding. Tex Ritter wrote his eulogy long before he was born, poor fellow, in Blood on the Saddle. Sudden death has always been a part of the life, a life which therefore only honors the young men brave enough to choose it.

The other was Joe Beeler, the last of the founders of the Cowboy Artists of America. His creation lives on, and is doing quite well for itself. Mister Beeler died at the age of seventy-four, and he died well: suddenly, in the saddle, while helping a neighbor at branding time.

As always at such times, with such men, we mourn and celebrate at once.

Post Coverage

Post Coverage:

I see from this morning's Washington Post a piece of very good news in Iraq: the killing of al Qaeda's emir in Samarra.

U.S. troops tracked Hamadi al-Takhi al-Nissani, al-Qaeda's "emir" in Samarra, to a safe house north of the city Friday morning, the U.S. military said in a statement. As the soldiers approached the house, Nissani fled and was killed. Two other armed insurgents in the house were also killed, according to the statement.

Police in Samarra who spoke on condition of anonymity gave a slightly different account, saying that the house was east of the city and that the three men were running to a getaway car when fire from an American helicopter killed them.

Either way is fine, really.

On Thursday night, U.S. troops also arrested Abdul Qadir Makhool, another al-Qaeda leader in Samarra, and released a police officer who had been kidnapped by the group, Maj. Jamal Samarraie, an officer at the provincial Joint Command Center, said in an interview.

The U.S. military referred to capturing an armed insurgent in a statement on Friday but did not give the man's name or say precisely when he had been captured.

Good job, Post. Now, here's the bad news:

A) This article comes from page A10. On page A1? A story about difficulties training the Iraqi army.

B) Also on A1, there's this article on State Department statistics showing a spike in terrorist attacks in 2005. The spin on this is that it is bad news, and that Iraq represents about a third of all worldwide attacks.

Yes, it would be better if there were fewer terrorist attacks, because everyone simply put down their weapons and stopped fighting us. On the other hand, a rise in terrorist attacks -- if coupled with a sharp drop in other kinds of attacks -- can signal that the enemy has lost the strength to fight in any other way.

In 2003, we saw combat in Iraq featuring armies; in 2004, uprisings in cities and regions across the country, including both a Shi'ite insurgency led by Sadr and an al-Qaeda led insurgency in the west. Neither survived the US military, and in 2005 we saw mostly terrorist attacks and snipers.

That's the missing context. That is why a "spike" in terrorist attacks is not a sign of an insurgency waxing in its strength. It is the sign of an insurgency that is losing strength.

This is a major complaint with war reporting. We get the numbers -- the number of dead troops, the number of attacks, etc -- but no context for understanding the numbers.

COUNTERCOLUMN has yet more context for the situation.

Fran's

Fran O'Brien's:

I haven't said much about the Fran O'Brien's story, because quite a few of the major MilBloggers seem to know a lot more about it than I do. I would like to point out, however, that this is the day on which a resolution is to be expected one way or the other.

Our friend FbL has done a lot of work on the issue, and I expect that Mr. and Mrs. Greyhawk will be tracking developments with their usual devotion. (Andi, who certainly deserves some credit here, says she's traveling today.)

Keep an eye on those sites, and if there's anything we can do to help at the last minute, I expect it'll be posted there.

Bill Roggio & Afghanistan

Bill Roggio:

One of the bloggers I finally got to meet at I MBC was Bill Roggio. I've dealt with Bill enough online to consider him a friend, so it was good to have the chance to shake his hand.

I think we've all been impressed with the quality of his writing, and his embed in Iraq was of great use in getting a better picture of how things are going there. Now, Bill's wanting to go off to Afghanistan, either with the Marines or the Canadians.

One of the things about not being a "journalist" is that you don't get paid. You want to go off for a few months to do this kind of embedded blogging, you pony up the cash. For the trip, and for your family while you're away (and for the life insurance policy you'll want, just in case).

We've been talking about ways to improve our communications efforts. Bill is one of those ways. If you'd like to help him get to Afghanistan, and back to Iraq again later this year, he wouldn't mind your help.

Crossing America

Crossing America:

Also at Kim's place, an interesting thought experiment. It's a repeat of an old game he played, which was popular. The rules are as follows:

You have the opportunity to go back in time, arriving on the east coast of North America circa 1650, and your goal is to cross the North American continent alone, taking as much time as you need. When/if you reach the opposite coastline, you’ll be transported back to the present day.

Your equipment for this journey will be as follows (taken back in the time capsule with you):

-- enough gold to buy provisions for the first five days’ travel;
-- a small backpack containing some clothing and toiletries;
-- a winter coat, raincoat and two pairs of boots;
-- waterproof sleeping bag;
-- an axe;
-- a box of 1,000 “strike anywhere” waterproof matches;
-- a topological map, binoculars and a compass;
-- a very small toolbox, including a firearm cleaning kit and a few spares for your firearms;
-- and a U.S. Army First Aid kit.

Weapons:

-- ONE long gun (and 800 rounds, but no scope)
-- ONE handgun (and 1,000 rounds)
-- TWO knives
plus of course holsters/scabbards for them all.

Once you arrive at the starting-point, which can be on either coast, you’ll be given a horse, a mule and a dog—and apart from that, you’re on your own. Remember: you’ll be traveling through deep woods, open prairie, desert and mountains. You may encounter hostile Indian tribes and dangerous animals en route, which should be considered when you answer the following questions (and only these):

1. What long gun would you take back in time with you?
2. What handgun?
3. Which knives?

There are only a couple of rules.

1. Multi-caliber long guns are okay (drillings, combos, etc), but you’ll still only be allowed 800 rounds in total for that firearm. The mix is up to you.
2. Email your response to kim -at- kimdutoit dot com; subject: Crossing America II.
3. Try to keep your responses short.

Now, it's always dangerous for a married man to put down on paper answers to questions that could be translated, "What two guns and two knives do I think are all a man might need?" If that were all you needed for such an undertaking, you might find yourself invited to dispossess yourself of the rest of your collection -- in some moment of financial strain, perhaps.

I wasn't going to play, therefore, but Doc wanted my opinion on one of the knives, and so I found myself thinking it through. For what it's worth, I think Doc's almost exactly right on the firearms -- I would prefer a Ruger Vaquero or New Vaquero to a Single Action Army, because with the transfer bar safety system you can carry it with six rounds instead of five (in the old style Colt, you need to leave an empty chamber under the cylinder to avoid accidental discharges). The Rugers have an excellent reputation for durability, as well -- they are apparently indestructible.

I told Doc what I thought about the knives over at his site. I won't repeat the comments here, in part because you should go read his answers too.

Now, here are three additional questions, which I'm going to tack on because they're at least as interesting to me as the weapon considerations:

1) What kind of horse would you pick for the journey?
2) What kind of dog?
3) What kind of mule?

The answers to these questions will be as revealing as any gun-related ones (which you should email to Kim instead of me, anyway).

Heart of Darkness notes:

The guys over at OPFOR noticed this bit of news the other day: President Robert Mugabe is inviting those white farmers he ran off to ummm....come and farm the land they were run of of.

I'll bet that works out.

They also note that Algeria is buying billions of dollars worth of combat aircraft from Russia and wonders why.

I'll take a stab at an answer: Russia. Needs. Cash.

And while we're on the subject of supplying arms;

Trudy Rubin, a columnist for the Philadelphia Inquirer, has written a column about the ongoing mess in the Darfur.

She asks: "Can an individual do anything to stop a genocide?"

I think so.

1. Get a gun.
2. Go to the Darfur.
3. Shoot janjaweed militiamen dead when they show up to rape, pillage and burn.

Three simple steps.

but nooo....Trudy says: "What's needed now is grassroots pressure on the White House. One million postcards, and one million people in the capitol April 30 might motivate the Bush team to lean harder on the AU, Sudan, China and Russia to approve a U.N. force."

Right. A UN force. Given the recent UN shenanigans in the Congo, I'm thinking that a UN force is going to be less than effective.

I say send them guns. Help them to help themselves.

Sexy Poll

A Poll on Sexy:

We don't do sex on Grim's Hall much, but since I made an exception for the last item, I suppose we might as well get it out of our systems today. Cassidy links to this poll at the New York Post on the topic.

Some points:

"Only thirty percent of men prefer makeup on their mates; 50 percent would rather they ditch the lipstick and go unadorned."

Grim's comment: And rightly so.

"What is sexier on a woman.. great looks or a great personality?"

The results: "67 percent of men who own a gun place a premium on personality, compared to 61 percent of gun-free men."

Grim's comment: With a possible exception for certain foreign countries, there is no such thing as a gun-free man. Reference the question comparing lumberjacks to "metrosexuals" for a restatement of this concept.