Its sad that this gets ignored by the news, because something like this has happened each month this year since May.
Those JPAC people are to be commended.
Update: mea culpa--I can't do simple math anymore.
fool headlines
A Foolish Headline:
From the Associated Press: "Mideast fight ramps up despite diplomacy."
One might better say, "due to diplomacy." The impending US-French "peace plan" means that a ceasefire demand from the UN will be forthcoming. It is thus increasingly important to all parties to resolve the situation on the ground into something they will find to their advantage in case the ceasefire takes effect. The increased intensity of the fighting is therefore a direct result of the diplomacy.
I know the average reader things diplomacy = peace, but a professional analyst of the events ought to have learned better by now.
Tribes S Iraq
The Tribes Together:
I think this article is an interesting case study. It shows the effect of an authoritarian government on a once-independent tribal structure, and how the fall of that government negatively impacted the tribes. On the other hand, the main tribe discussed here was only too glad to take the risks associated with freedom -- the sheikh ordered no resistance to Coalition forces, and not one shot has been fired by his men.
Though they are still relearning the skills lost during Saddam's regime, the Obide tribes are coming together with the Guerarie, Jabor, and Gueranie tribes to bring renewed prosperity to the south of Iraq. The Iraqi Army, now able to conduct independent operations in many areas, is beginning to have troops they can spare for aiding civil reconstruction missions. Speaking of which, the Iraqi TRADOC has opened, which includes a version of DLI.
The development of an Iraqi TRADOC is an interesting development in and of itself, and it shows that the development of the Iraqi army is full-scale: not just building combat forces to hold the line so the Coalition doesn't have to, but building a fully-independent military capable of developing doctrine and lessons-learned, and coming to its own conclusions about what to do in the future. Rather than simply tying them to US training and doctrine, we've taught them how to build their own.
Another interesting story: the completion of the border outposts in the West of Iraq.
What interests me here is the opportunity to do a little military science. Take a look at the picture of the fort. You can tell from the way a fort is constructed what kind of forces they're expecting to oppose. The high walls and turrets give them the ability to repel attempts to overrun the forts, and provide overlapping fields of fire on any attempt to take any of the walls.
This is a fort set up to repel an infantry attack. It lacks defenses against artillery (such as thick, sloping walls) and heavy cavalry (such as ditches). Given the 20-40 man size of the garrison, they're well prepared to hold off small-scale raids by smugglers or terrorist units, but not heavier opposition.
That's perfectly sensible given the situation on the ground there, and just what you'd expect. I mention it only as an item of interest for readers who are learning about military science, not for experienced hands. There's a great deal to be learned from even a quick snapshot, if you know what you should be looking for.
Christian Muslim
A Christian Muslim American:
Sovay tells me -- and sends a link to back it up -- that our self-described "Muslim American" was a recent convert to Christianity, although he had stopped attending church and turned up at an Islamic center not long before the shooting.
He told the Christian group he'd joined that he'd 'seen too much anger in Islam,' which prompted his conversion. Assuming that statement is accurate, we can read that his community of faith in earlier days was not of the more moderate Islamic type. We all know, having seen it played out in Afghanistan and elsewhere, that the angrier sort of imam declares that apostasy is punishable by death and damnation.
If I were a journalist, and could manage an interview, I'd ask him about this. Was this the act of a man who had been raised to believe that apostates went to Hell -- who then left the faith due to concerns about its anger -- and then began to fear for his soul? What if the old imams were right? Would that prompt him to stop attending those Christian meetings -- to return to Islamic centers -- and then, raised to believe in the angry Islamic way, to try to redeem his soul with blood?
The story also says he had trouble holding a job, and was confusing to those who knew him. It's likely that the main thing behind the shooting was his own instability, rather than Islamic teachings.
On the other hand, we've also seen this model before -- in Palestinian suicide bombers, particularly the female ones. Many times they have (as he had) advanced education and good prospects. They often carry out their attacks mainly because of points of honor -- because they have been raised to believe that only in this way can they remove some stain on their soul.
It would be worth asking if that is the case here. We ought to find out -- if we can -- why he felt he should kill in Islam's name, by declaring himself a Muslim just before he opened fire.
Stories from CENTCOM
CENTCOM Still Cares:
More news stories CENTCOM would like you to see:
Iraqi Army captures four terrorists.
MultiNational Division, Baghdad captures four more.
The latter four were dressed up as Iraqi policemen. Good catch by MND-B.
B-M-Spirit
Body-Mind-Spirit:
The body has several natural defense mechanisms to pain and blows. There are endorphins, adrenaline, reduction of blood in certain areas likely to be affected, and so forth. These mechanisms have developed over millions of years, to make your body able to take a pretty stiff blow without stopping you from doing what you need to do.
However, they do have operational limits. Sometimes, a particularly powerful blow can overcome them -- which is what Mr. Ross is selling. He wants to teach you to hit harder. Good on him, if he can.
But you can also overpower these defenses by hitting more than once. If your best isn't good enough, your best twice or three times could be.
You can test this yourself. Take a hairbrush with a hard back. Hit yourself on the leg with it, hard as you can. Now do it again, same spot. Now a third time.
As you can see, your body's ability to shrug off the pain diminishes quickly. You can take the first blow, and it's a shock. By blow number three, you're not resisting the pain any more -- you get it all. The same principle applies to defensive blows.
(An aside: The Chinese say that life force -- qi -- flows through the body in channels, which flow can be disrupted by strikes along those channels, or at particular points on the channel. Leaving aside the question of whether or not qi really exists or functions as claimed, qi theory also agrees with the multiple-blow thesis. By the third blow, my teacher told me, all the defense is gone, and the body is receiving full damage from the strike. Since it's possible to verify the basic idea empirically (e.g. with the hairbrush), I pass along the information.)
The same idea is at work with firearms. Some people -- like me -- prefer a heavy caliber that hits harder, a .44 Special or .45 Colt. Other people, though, achieve roughly the same result with a light caliber that allows them to deliver multiple shots on target. The body may be able to (temporarily) overcome the shock of a .38 Special wound, but it is not likely to overcome the shock of four of them.
The point here is this: if your enemy doesn't fall to your best shot, that doesn't mean you can't beat him. You can. Hit him again, just as hard, in the same spot if you're able.
This brings me to what I really wanted to write about today.
In every fight between men, there are really three contests going on at the same time: a contest of bodies, a contest of minds, and a contest of spirits. Of the three, the spiritual contest is the one that matters most. The mental contest is second. The physical contest, though not unimportant, is really the least of the three.
The Jake Ross method seems to be focused on the physical. He scorns the importance of the mental contest -- see how his letter is satisfied with citing "a famous 18th century soldier." The source of that quote, readers of Grim's Hall know well, was Clausewitz, whose On War remains one of the most important texts of military science ever written.
If you're serious about teaching people how to fight, you have to teach them how to think about fighting. You have to take that aspect of it seriously. The paraphrase of Clausewitz refers to his doctrine of friction, which is one of the most important ideas ever recognized by military science.
The spiritual aspects are even more important. Mr. Ross is selling by suggesting that you should be afraid -- 'what if he doesn't fall'? That's the wrong attitude to take to a fight. The right attitude is, "Whatever it takes, he's going down."
Mr. Ross wants to teach you to hit harder. Well and good, but it's not the real answer. The real answer is to learn to keep hitting. It's the area of the spirit in which contests are won, whether fights between men in the street, or wars between nations.
Consider the conflict in Iraq, if you doubt it: there is no way that the enemy can defeat the United States physically or mentally, yet it could still win if it exhausts the spirit of the nation to see through to victory. It has always been the case, from the beginning, that the only place where we could be defeated was in our own national will.
By the same token, the United States can clear the field of its foes every time they raise their heads. Yet the real arena of victory has always been the hearts of the populace.
Another of Clausewitz's theories was the culminating point of victory, that point at which a fighting force is excused by the populace for whatever it does, because the populace identifies with it. In Iraq, in spite of the continuing difficulties, we are approaching that point. The population wearies of the militias, of the kidnappings, of the constant danger hanging over their heads. Sunni and Shi'ite alike weary of these things. The Iraqi Security Forces have just promised to handle security nationwide by the end of the year. The people are increasingly placing their faith in those forces, and turning against the militias. When we cross the tipping point on this one, we will at last have stability in Iraq.
The opposite is happening in Lebanon. Israel began with attacks on civilian transportation infrastructure, from naval blockades to attacks on the airport. This, combined with the deaths of Lebanese innocents caused by Hezbollah's dishonorable tactics of hiding among civilians, has led to a resurgence of support for Hezbollah. For the moment, at least, Lebanon identifies with Hezbollah. Israel may be able to achieve strategic goals in the area, as for example reducing the number of rocket launchers and perhaps creating a buffer zone. It will not be able to win an existential fight with Hezbollah at this time, however: for now, Hezbollah is safely across the point at which many of the people of Lebanon will protect and shelter them, and even aid them out of a sense of identity.
(Another aside: this idea of a buffer zone is a doubtful strategum, it seems to me; if the UN sends a force to secure such a zone, as it says it may, why wouldn't Hezbollah simply carry on attacking from that zone? Does anyone think the UN will really be able, to say nothing of being willing, to stop them? If Israel needs to respond, it won't be attacking merely the sovereign territory of Lebanon -- it will be attacking territory guarded by the armed forces of several nations, each of whom will then be interested in reprisals. Hezbollah will be given a safer haven than it has now.)
It is the realm of the spirit that really matters. This echoes through the writings of the greatest martial artists and military scientists alike. Napoleon said that "Morale is to the physical as three is to one." The Chinese general Sun Tzu wrote that "seizing the enemy without fighting is the most skillful." How to do this? Either you have out-thought him, so that there is no point to his trying to fight you from the inferior position into which you have put him; or you have convinced him that he cannot win, and thus defeated his spirit without having to fight his body.
Then there is Clausewitz again. In his writings on what he called the 'trinity,' he said that there were three elements that governed success in war: National will, political strategy, and the sum of the ways that the various skirmishes and other conflicts worked out on the ground according to the wager of battle. The first was the most important, he wrote.
And what is that trinity, but a restatement of the same idea? National will is the realm of the spirit; politics and strategies the realm of the mind; and the conflict itself is the physical realm. The first and most important is the will -- it is the spirit. If we find ourselves flagging, that is what we must turn ourselves to reinforcing.
So, if you are approached by a man you think you may have to strike in self defense, do not fear that you can't knock him down even if you hit your hardest. Resolve, rather, that you will.
Jake Ross, one of Matt Furey's disciples, has a similar business built on the idea of teaching you hand-to-hand combat. I've mentioned that I like the Furey exercise program, which works and works well. Somehow I've gotten on Jake Ross' mailing lists, and I have to say, I have my doubts about his program.
He sent an email out yesterday, one of many he's sent, but a particularly bothersome one:
War is very simple, but the simple things in war are very difficult.I'll start by answering the question he proposes: What happens if you hit a guy as hard as you can, and he doesn't fall? Answer -- hit him again.
To quote a famous 18th century soldier.
And what is a street fight but a war, one guy at a time? So, it's
important that we focus on what makes the biggest difference in street
combat.
Let's think about hunting. The whole point of shooting the prey is to
kill it cleanly. The smaller the weapon, the lesser the energy, the
more difficult the kill. While this may add a certain panache to the
hunt, it's not the intelligent, high percentage way to hunt. So, we see
hunters using weapons powerful enough to kill the prey, with a decent
shot, without taking the chance of a wounding, but not a non-killing,
hit.
So, when you're discussing street defense, the question is always
there, in the back of your mind, like the scent of an old cellar. "What
happens if I give him my best shot and he doesn't fall?"
What, indeed.
So, you need to learn to strike with real power. Enough power to
really damage the person you hit.
Let's talk more about this later,
Jake Ross
The body has several natural defense mechanisms to pain and blows. There are endorphins, adrenaline, reduction of blood in certain areas likely to be affected, and so forth. These mechanisms have developed over millions of years, to make your body able to take a pretty stiff blow without stopping you from doing what you need to do.
However, they do have operational limits. Sometimes, a particularly powerful blow can overcome them -- which is what Mr. Ross is selling. He wants to teach you to hit harder. Good on him, if he can.
But you can also overpower these defenses by hitting more than once. If your best isn't good enough, your best twice or three times could be.
You can test this yourself. Take a hairbrush with a hard back. Hit yourself on the leg with it, hard as you can. Now do it again, same spot. Now a third time.
As you can see, your body's ability to shrug off the pain diminishes quickly. You can take the first blow, and it's a shock. By blow number three, you're not resisting the pain any more -- you get it all. The same principle applies to defensive blows.
(An aside: The Chinese say that life force -- qi -- flows through the body in channels, which flow can be disrupted by strikes along those channels, or at particular points on the channel. Leaving aside the question of whether or not qi really exists or functions as claimed, qi theory also agrees with the multiple-blow thesis. By the third blow, my teacher told me, all the defense is gone, and the body is receiving full damage from the strike. Since it's possible to verify the basic idea empirically (e.g. with the hairbrush), I pass along the information.)
The same idea is at work with firearms. Some people -- like me -- prefer a heavy caliber that hits harder, a .44 Special or .45 Colt. Other people, though, achieve roughly the same result with a light caliber that allows them to deliver multiple shots on target. The body may be able to (temporarily) overcome the shock of a .38 Special wound, but it is not likely to overcome the shock of four of them.
The point here is this: if your enemy doesn't fall to your best shot, that doesn't mean you can't beat him. You can. Hit him again, just as hard, in the same spot if you're able.
This brings me to what I really wanted to write about today.
In every fight between men, there are really three contests going on at the same time: a contest of bodies, a contest of minds, and a contest of spirits. Of the three, the spiritual contest is the one that matters most. The mental contest is second. The physical contest, though not unimportant, is really the least of the three.
The Jake Ross method seems to be focused on the physical. He scorns the importance of the mental contest -- see how his letter is satisfied with citing "a famous 18th century soldier." The source of that quote, readers of Grim's Hall know well, was Clausewitz, whose On War remains one of the most important texts of military science ever written.
If you're serious about teaching people how to fight, you have to teach them how to think about fighting. You have to take that aspect of it seriously. The paraphrase of Clausewitz refers to his doctrine of friction, which is one of the most important ideas ever recognized by military science.
The spiritual aspects are even more important. Mr. Ross is selling by suggesting that you should be afraid -- 'what if he doesn't fall'? That's the wrong attitude to take to a fight. The right attitude is, "Whatever it takes, he's going down."
Mr. Ross wants to teach you to hit harder. Well and good, but it's not the real answer. The real answer is to learn to keep hitting. It's the area of the spirit in which contests are won, whether fights between men in the street, or wars between nations.
Consider the conflict in Iraq, if you doubt it: there is no way that the enemy can defeat the United States physically or mentally, yet it could still win if it exhausts the spirit of the nation to see through to victory. It has always been the case, from the beginning, that the only place where we could be defeated was in our own national will.
By the same token, the United States can clear the field of its foes every time they raise their heads. Yet the real arena of victory has always been the hearts of the populace.
Another of Clausewitz's theories was the culminating point of victory, that point at which a fighting force is excused by the populace for whatever it does, because the populace identifies with it. In Iraq, in spite of the continuing difficulties, we are approaching that point. The population wearies of the militias, of the kidnappings, of the constant danger hanging over their heads. Sunni and Shi'ite alike weary of these things. The Iraqi Security Forces have just promised to handle security nationwide by the end of the year. The people are increasingly placing their faith in those forces, and turning against the militias. When we cross the tipping point on this one, we will at last have stability in Iraq.
The opposite is happening in Lebanon. Israel began with attacks on civilian transportation infrastructure, from naval blockades to attacks on the airport. This, combined with the deaths of Lebanese innocents caused by Hezbollah's dishonorable tactics of hiding among civilians, has led to a resurgence of support for Hezbollah. For the moment, at least, Lebanon identifies with Hezbollah. Israel may be able to achieve strategic goals in the area, as for example reducing the number of rocket launchers and perhaps creating a buffer zone. It will not be able to win an existential fight with Hezbollah at this time, however: for now, Hezbollah is safely across the point at which many of the people of Lebanon will protect and shelter them, and even aid them out of a sense of identity.
(Another aside: this idea of a buffer zone is a doubtful strategum, it seems to me; if the UN sends a force to secure such a zone, as it says it may, why wouldn't Hezbollah simply carry on attacking from that zone? Does anyone think the UN will really be able, to say nothing of being willing, to stop them? If Israel needs to respond, it won't be attacking merely the sovereign territory of Lebanon -- it will be attacking territory guarded by the armed forces of several nations, each of whom will then be interested in reprisals. Hezbollah will be given a safer haven than it has now.)
It is the realm of the spirit that really matters. This echoes through the writings of the greatest martial artists and military scientists alike. Napoleon said that "Morale is to the physical as three is to one." The Chinese general Sun Tzu wrote that "seizing the enemy without fighting is the most skillful." How to do this? Either you have out-thought him, so that there is no point to his trying to fight you from the inferior position into which you have put him; or you have convinced him that he cannot win, and thus defeated his spirit without having to fight his body.
Then there is Clausewitz again. In his writings on what he called the 'trinity,' he said that there were three elements that governed success in war: National will, political strategy, and the sum of the ways that the various skirmishes and other conflicts worked out on the ground according to the wager of battle. The first was the most important, he wrote.
And what is that trinity, but a restatement of the same idea? National will is the realm of the spirit; politics and strategies the realm of the mind; and the conflict itself is the physical realm. The first and most important is the will -- it is the spirit. If we find ourselves flagging, that is what we must turn ourselves to reinforcing.
So, if you are approached by a man you think you may have to strike in self defense, do not fear that you can't knock him down even if you hit your hardest. Resolve, rather, that you will.
Proportionality
Proportionality:
The idea was that every group of people had a unique take on life, and needed its own space so that it could have laws that accorded with that take. Scots needed to be Scots, not ruled by English laws; the same for the Irish. The same for the Slavs. The same, some argued, for the Jews.
When such nations came to exist, they were seen as having a real sovereignity: this is, indeed, why we today view the nation-state as the righteous seat of sovereignty. These nations were viewed as arising from natural law, and a hedge against the horrors of war. Should such a state fall and come to be dominated by others, advocates of nationalism believed, war could be the only result: a righteous war for independence.
Insofar as Israel today can demonstrate that it is facing the destruction of its state, it can therefore justify almost any conduct as "proportionate." It's not just a question of whether you get to go to war; it's a question of what you can do in war. If you're fighting to preserve a nation, you can do most anything -- because the international system views the survival of your nation-state as almost the highest good of the system, the best way of ensuring peace.
What we're seeing in Israel today is just what we've seen ever since these ideas were instituted. Nationalism proves to be a better engine for war than for peace. If every group with a definable ethnic or cultural identity deserves its own nation, what if two of them claim the same piece of land (as in Northern Ireland, where Protestant majorities exist with Irish Catholic minorities who consider the others not Irish but "New English")?
What if there's a disagreement about whether a given group is properly independent, or should properly be subject to a central authority? Consider the case of Taiwan -- definitely ethnic Han Chinese, but wishing to be independent of the People's Republic, which in turn claims to be the rightful government of all Chinese eveywhere.
What if existing borders of states encase several ethnic groups, some of whom later decide they'd prefer their own nation? For example, consider the case of Indonesia, which won its independence from the Dutch and established its borders based on their colonial borders. Now comes the East Timorese, wanting to separate from this new nation -- and now the Papuans.
The system recognizes, in theory, all of these claims -- and justifies almost anything in the name of establishing a free, or protecting the independence of an existing, nation-state for each such group.
This is partially why we find the terrorists getting treated with kid gloves by so-called "international law" types: they are viewed, usually, as valid liberation movements or resistance to colonial oppression. As such, whatever they do is justified.
If you've been wondering what the root of this cancer is, now you know. It's the shattered bones of the last great attempt to find peace on earth.
The Economist has a good overview of what the Just War tradition has to say on the subject, and how it applies to Israel today. They finish:
In the end, some philosophers think, debate about the ethics of war will have to reintegrate two ancient questions— about the right to go to war, and the methods that may be used— which have become artificially separated in modern times. To put it more simply, nobody will be impressed with a line that goes: “We didn't start this war, so our cause is just—but now that it's begun, we'll fight as dirty as we like.” Augustine saw the questions of jus ad bellum and jus in bello as intertwined—and so, probably, should modern man.The Just War reading of proportionality, which began with Augustine, does have a jus in bello aspect which is not mentioned in the article. It is based on the idea of nationalism, which was once an ideal for whom men held great hopes. Like some advocates of democracy promotion today, advocates of nationalism believed that it could bring an end to war -- or at least lessen it notably.
The idea was that every group of people had a unique take on life, and needed its own space so that it could have laws that accorded with that take. Scots needed to be Scots, not ruled by English laws; the same for the Irish. The same for the Slavs. The same, some argued, for the Jews.
When such nations came to exist, they were seen as having a real sovereignity: this is, indeed, why we today view the nation-state as the righteous seat of sovereignty. These nations were viewed as arising from natural law, and a hedge against the horrors of war. Should such a state fall and come to be dominated by others, advocates of nationalism believed, war could be the only result: a righteous war for independence.
Insofar as Israel today can demonstrate that it is facing the destruction of its state, it can therefore justify almost any conduct as "proportionate." It's not just a question of whether you get to go to war; it's a question of what you can do in war. If you're fighting to preserve a nation, you can do most anything -- because the international system views the survival of your nation-state as almost the highest good of the system, the best way of ensuring peace.
What we're seeing in Israel today is just what we've seen ever since these ideas were instituted. Nationalism proves to be a better engine for war than for peace. If every group with a definable ethnic or cultural identity deserves its own nation, what if two of them claim the same piece of land (as in Northern Ireland, where Protestant majorities exist with Irish Catholic minorities who consider the others not Irish but "New English")?
What if there's a disagreement about whether a given group is properly independent, or should properly be subject to a central authority? Consider the case of Taiwan -- definitely ethnic Han Chinese, but wishing to be independent of the People's Republic, which in turn claims to be the rightful government of all Chinese eveywhere.
What if existing borders of states encase several ethnic groups, some of whom later decide they'd prefer their own nation? For example, consider the case of Indonesia, which won its independence from the Dutch and established its borders based on their colonial borders. Now comes the East Timorese, wanting to separate from this new nation -- and now the Papuans.
The system recognizes, in theory, all of these claims -- and justifies almost anything in the name of establishing a free, or protecting the independence of an existing, nation-state for each such group.
This is partially why we find the terrorists getting treated with kid gloves by so-called "international law" types: they are viewed, usually, as valid liberation movements or resistance to colonial oppression. As such, whatever they do is justified.
If you've been wondering what the root of this cancer is, now you know. It's the shattered bones of the last great attempt to find peace on earth.
More Muslim Mayhem
Israel's War Comes To Seattle:
He says: "I’m a Muslim-American. I’m angry at Isreal."
So he shoots six unarmed women.
What courage! What devotion!
Oh, and what skill -- he kills only one of them, even though there was no appreciable resistance and he had the only gun in the room.
I don't want to hear that Muslim-Americans are angry at Israel, so they kill Jewish-Americans. Jewish-Americans are probably angry too. What is supposed to matter, though, is that these are fellow Americans.
It's natural to have a sentiment for the old country, and it's only human to feel more strongly for those whom you regard as brothers (as Muslims do among themselves) than for those whom you don't. Still, America is an idea as much as it is a country: a place where we leave the old tribes behind, and become a new people. E pluribus unum.
In other words, if you're a Muslim who wants to shoot Jewish-Americans in response to Israel's policies, you're not a "Muslim-American." I don't care what your citizenship is. I don't care if you were born in Fargo. You haven't got the idea. You are not one of us.
If you can't leave the old tribe behind -- just enough to avoid killing other Americans who aren't tribesmen, that's all we ask -- you should rethink whether or not you want to be here. It won't be hard for the rest of us to rethink whether or not we want you in the community. We don't strip people of their citizenship in America, but neither are we bound to accept people that make war on our women, or exercise their tribal ideas of religion by shooting up social clubs. We can put you in prison, or we can kill you. We have the death penalty here, and many of us are not unarmed victims.
On which point, I should like my Jewish female readers to note that they are targets. You know who you are. There are people who want to kill you. This guy is said to have been a lone maniac. Perhaps he was. You know there are organized groups that want the same thing. You know this is true.
There is only one way to ensure that this kind of thing doesn't happen to your families. You need to get over whatever aversions you have, pick out a handgun that suits your frame, and learn to use it, more accurately than these people.
Fortunately, that's not a high bar to cross.
You're the only ones who can stop this. The police will not be there. If this isn't to happen where you are, you have to stop it.
The NRA will help you find a teacher here. Wherever you are, they can help you.
Drop me a line if you want to talk about it.
I won't stand by and let people break America, not for Israel and not for Islam. Frankly, neither are worth it in my opinion. She is our common charge. We are the Sons of Liberty. This flame will not die. That is a promise and a warning.
Military Blue States
OP-FOR on NRO:
Can he prove he's not? It's not like proving that you don't have an ulcer. With a real medical condition, they can look and see. You can't "see" a psychological condition. How does this kid clear his name?
The best he can do is find another civilian expert, pay out another grand, and then -- if it goes well, and he doesn't get another anti-military jerk (or some psychologist who feels that young men with such feelings of aggression that they want to join the military need to be medicated and feminized) -- he'll have a "he said / she said" defense. 'Only one of them thinks I'm crazy! And they can't really prove anything one way or the other, so... um, why are you looking at me like that?'
Psychology should simply be banned from federal hiring decisions, and also from court proceedings. It is not a science, it's fortune-telling. We wouldn't let a tarot card reader ruin a kid's life and put something this damaging in his permanent record. We shouldn't let a "scientist" like this do it, either.
John at OP-FOR has a piece at National Review (a good piece, Eric?). He's chastizing, properly, so-called "elite" schools for their treatment of military recruiters, and their discouragement of their students from military service.
Which brings us to the comments at BlackFive, when Jimbo posted about the piece:
True story: I tried joining the Army a year ago and had to get one of those fancy $1,300 psych evaluations that only a professional civilian consultant can do in order to get a waiver at MEPS ["Military Entrance Processing Station" -- the place where you go to get the paperwork done and your medical exams]. Within the first 5 minutes of the interview with the psychologist I convinced him I didn't have any problems. Then instead of ending the interview there, he went on and on for the next 15 minutes about how someone like me shouldn't be joining the military. Apparently I had a 95 on the ASVAB and was doing well in college (3.6 GPA) and he was telling me, to summarize: "You're just going to be cannon fodder in the miltary. You have too much potential. Read some anti-military books to see how much of a mistake joining the military is. Your MMPI-2 results show you can take criticism, but they're going to yell at you in boot camp!"So, basically the psych doctor didn't feel even a little bit bad about getting this poor guy damned as a psycho who couldn't be trusted to serve as a private, in order to keep him out of the military. For the rest of his life, if he applies for gov't service jobs, the kid is going to be asked, "Were you ever refused entry to the military?" and he'll have to say, "Yes, I was found psychologically unsuitable."
At MEPS he faxed over his 1 paragraph evaluation that said because of my goal orientation, and ironically, my ability to handle stress, I wouldn't be fit for the military because I potentially could be insubordinate at Boot Camp. The opposite of everything he said to my face about me. Basically, the guy was your typical smug blue state anti-war liberal who wants to rescue those who don't need rescuing. He rescued two other kids that day with the same evaluation -- he just changed the names at the top of the page.
It's a year later and my recruiter gave me a call saying I can now take another psych evaluation. I'm not really sure what to think. Maybe I'll act dumb and desperate and try failing the evaluation this time?
I get called a chickenhawk by the same kind of people who keep me from enlisting.
Can he prove he's not? It's not like proving that you don't have an ulcer. With a real medical condition, they can look and see. You can't "see" a psychological condition. How does this kid clear his name?
The best he can do is find another civilian expert, pay out another grand, and then -- if it goes well, and he doesn't get another anti-military jerk (or some psychologist who feels that young men with such feelings of aggression that they want to join the military need to be medicated and feminized) -- he'll have a "he said / she said" defense. 'Only one of them thinks I'm crazy! And they can't really prove anything one way or the other, so... um, why are you looking at me like that?'
Psychology should simply be banned from federal hiring decisions, and also from court proceedings. It is not a science, it's fortune-telling. We wouldn't let a tarot card reader ruin a kid's life and put something this damaging in his permanent record. We shouldn't let a "scientist" like this do it, either.
Arganti
Arganti:Praise a day at evening, a wife when dead,
a sword when tried... and beer when it's drunk.
Today I can praise a very good cat, who went by the name of Arganti. She came to me as a kitten out of a hurricane the size of Texas, which left the areas near Savannah filled with wrack. The moment she saw me, her tail shot up, and she started running. Fool that I am, I took her in when she literally followed me home -- and then sent her off to live with Sovay, which she has done in queenly comfort these several years.
Sadly today I hear that she died suddenly, though not without such help as science can offer. She was always good for the things that make cats good: she was temperate toward people, not so to vermin, and she would sit on your shoulder like a pirate's parrot while you walked around.
Farewell, then, to a very good cat. I am glad to have known her. Men and dogs have an ancient alliance both pure and noble, but the cat remains a surprise.
a sword when tried... and beer when it's drunk.
-The Havamal
Today I can praise a very good cat, who went by the name of Arganti. She came to me as a kitten out of a hurricane the size of Texas, which left the areas near Savannah filled with wrack. The moment she saw me, her tail shot up, and she started running. Fool that I am, I took her in when she literally followed me home -- and then sent her off to live with Sovay, which she has done in queenly comfort these several years.
Sadly today I hear that she died suddenly, though not without such help as science can offer. She was always good for the things that make cats good: she was temperate toward people, not so to vermin, and she would sit on your shoulder like a pirate's parrot while you walked around.
Farewell, then, to a very good cat. I am glad to have known her. Men and dogs have an ancient alliance both pure and noble, but the cat remains a surprise.
Web of Trust
"The Web of Trust"
Yet I find that I think he has misread something fairly fundamental to his argument, something he says is coastline rather than map. The idea that "human beings are interchangable" is simply not quite right. The truth is that human beings are not interchangable at all -- each one is individual. This isn't just because of upbringing, as Whittle suggests, and why it isn't is a truth of the same material as the rest of his argument.
Let me explain. Whittle writes:
Yet it is very unlikely that Baby Kopenawa would have grown up to crank out essays of the type and quality of Whittle's own, to say nothing of having his fascination with airplanes. It is not impossible, but it is not likely.
Civilization not only entails the web of trust that Whittle discusses, but it also requires a far greater degree of specialization. Whittle-the-Amazonian would have learned to hunt monkeys because everyone has to hunt monkeys. Kopenawa, by contrast, would have found himself facing a whole array of choices, to which his native intelligence and individual aspects would have inclined him to some and away from others. To succeed, which means to survive, Whittle of the Amazon would have had to do more or less exactly what everyone else did. To succeed, which means to prosper, Kopenawa would have to do what he did best.
What would that have been? There is a fair amount of research, and a great deal of practical experience, that suggests that there really are genetic inheritances that pertain to kinds of intelligence as well as physical attributes. Individual variation is more important than group membership, but if one were to exchange not one baby but thousands of babies, there would be trends that we could identify. One of the consequences of civilization and its specializations is coming to terms with that. As whole nations and peoples become civilized and specialized, the market begins stratifying them according to which intelligences are most marketable. As we understand more about the mechanism, we may wish to think more about whether to try to modify the market's results -- and if so, how we could do so.
As we become more capable of editing genetic traits, new questions arise. These questions will become more rather than less important, and more rather than less numerous, with each scientific success.
Let us say, for example, that one could modify a set of genetics so that you could replace a prediliction for one kind of intelligence (say, the kind that lets you perform a given task without growing bored for hours on end) with another (say, the ability to do higher mathematics with ease and comfort). Now let's say we have a genetic group that tends toward the first kind, and which has therefore (because the market prefers mathematicians and engineers to janitors and clerks) become identifibly poorer than other groups. What do you do about that? Anything? Nothing? Does it matter? Once it becomes in our power to change, ethical issues arise that don't exist when it is beyond us.
We cannot, therefore, adopt Bill Whittle's idea as ideology -- not that he would wish you to do so. He says to look at the coastline, not the map, and that is what we must do. His point that culture is more important than genetics is certainly true. However, as part of the business of civilization, we have to look at the genetics as well.
We should think about these things, because they are the next challenge -- the mental bridge Whittle mentions, to be considered before the first rivet is driven. There is the chasm before us. We had better give it some thought.
Bill Whittle's latest is, as always, a remarkable explanation of the things that underlie our lives. Whittle has mastered the art of seeing what Chesterton saw when writing of the stoplight, called in his day a "signal box":
A great many people talk as if this claim of ours, that all things are poetical, were a mere literary ingenuity, a play on words. Precisely the contrary is true. It is the idea that some things are not poetical which is literary, which is a mere product of words. The word "signal-box" is unpoetical. But the thing signal-box is not unpoetical; it is a place where men, in an agony of vigilance, light blood-red and sea-green fires to keep other men from death. That is the plain, genuine description of what it is; the prose only comes in with what it is called.Whittle sees the poetry in things that few pause to consider, and from that can envision the whole grandeur of civilization. He can see the men laying fiber cables and other men molding plastics, and still more men training for years in the use of inventions like radar -- itself a wonder. And he can put it all together for us, and show us how all that work underlies the business of bringing a plane down to the earth.
Yet I find that I think he has misread something fairly fundamental to his argument, something he says is coastline rather than map. The idea that "human beings are interchangable" is simply not quite right. The truth is that human beings are not interchangable at all -- each one is individual. This isn't just because of upbringing, as Whittle suggests, and why it isn't is a truth of the same material as the rest of his argument.
Let me explain. Whittle writes:
I mean that had Baby Billy been dropped off in the heart of the Amazon rainforest and raised by Yanomami tribesmen (and according to my mother there were times when I was in real danger of this happening), I would have spent my youth learning to hunt monkeys with my bow and 6ft. long arrows, and generally hanging around the shabono sleeping in till almost 6am. Likewise, if Baby Kopenawa had my parents, he’d probably be cranking out online essays at irregular intervals and shooting instrument approaches in experimental canard airplanes.I think we can all agree that it's entirely plausible that Billy Baby could have been given over to Yanomami tribesmen, and grown up to hunt monkeys. There would be nothing strange in that.
Yet it is very unlikely that Baby Kopenawa would have grown up to crank out essays of the type and quality of Whittle's own, to say nothing of having his fascination with airplanes. It is not impossible, but it is not likely.
Civilization not only entails the web of trust that Whittle discusses, but it also requires a far greater degree of specialization. Whittle-the-Amazonian would have learned to hunt monkeys because everyone has to hunt monkeys. Kopenawa, by contrast, would have found himself facing a whole array of choices, to which his native intelligence and individual aspects would have inclined him to some and away from others. To succeed, which means to survive, Whittle of the Amazon would have had to do more or less exactly what everyone else did. To succeed, which means to prosper, Kopenawa would have to do what he did best.
What would that have been? There is a fair amount of research, and a great deal of practical experience, that suggests that there really are genetic inheritances that pertain to kinds of intelligence as well as physical attributes. Individual variation is more important than group membership, but if one were to exchange not one baby but thousands of babies, there would be trends that we could identify. One of the consequences of civilization and its specializations is coming to terms with that. As whole nations and peoples become civilized and specialized, the market begins stratifying them according to which intelligences are most marketable. As we understand more about the mechanism, we may wish to think more about whether to try to modify the market's results -- and if so, how we could do so.
As we become more capable of editing genetic traits, new questions arise. These questions will become more rather than less important, and more rather than less numerous, with each scientific success.
Let us say, for example, that one could modify a set of genetics so that you could replace a prediliction for one kind of intelligence (say, the kind that lets you perform a given task without growing bored for hours on end) with another (say, the ability to do higher mathematics with ease and comfort). Now let's say we have a genetic group that tends toward the first kind, and which has therefore (because the market prefers mathematicians and engineers to janitors and clerks) become identifibly poorer than other groups. What do you do about that? Anything? Nothing? Does it matter? Once it becomes in our power to change, ethical issues arise that don't exist when it is beyond us.
We cannot, therefore, adopt Bill Whittle's idea as ideology -- not that he would wish you to do so. He says to look at the coastline, not the map, and that is what we must do. His point that culture is more important than genetics is certainly true. However, as part of the business of civilization, we have to look at the genetics as well.
We should think about these things, because they are the next challenge -- the mental bridge Whittle mentions, to be considered before the first rivet is driven. There is the chasm before us. We had better give it some thought.
Posts
Things To Read Today:
The discussion, as soon as I have time to sit down and discuss, will be on Bill Whittle's newest piece. Give it a read today, and we'll talk it over tomorrow.
Also, CENTCOM has a new release on a raid north of Balad.
A case of verification. Or sock puppets. Or both.
In this post, Karrde muses on basically "How do we know what we know and how do we know who to trust?" (Or something like that).
An interesting example of trust and credibility has occurred, dissected at great length by Eric Scheie of the blog Classical Values.
Starting here, (actually that may not be the start, its just where I picked it up), and continuing here, and here and here and finally (as of my posting), here Mr Scheie starts digging into the people supposedly working at (and others quoted by) a site called Capital Hill Blues, which is supposedly a sort of newsletter site covering Capitol Hill. Or something like that.
It appears that the whole site may be the work of one guy, constantly inventing new people and quoting non-existant scholars, doctors and so forth, none of them real. Or not real in so much as Google can reveal.
This has affinities with a phenomenon called 'sock puppets' --usually referring to the antic of defending or supporting oneself with a different screen name or email address---for a classic example of sock puppetry, see Ace of Spades HQ and this post on Glenn Greenwald. Actually, there's plenty more there on that affair, and it makes for curious reading.
So, reader beware. If such things are happening, they are happening everywhere.
In this post, Karrde muses on basically "How do we know what we know and how do we know who to trust?" (Or something like that).
An interesting example of trust and credibility has occurred, dissected at great length by Eric Scheie of the blog Classical Values.
Starting here, (actually that may not be the start, its just where I picked it up), and continuing here, and here and here and finally (as of my posting), here Mr Scheie starts digging into the people supposedly working at (and others quoted by) a site called Capital Hill Blues, which is supposedly a sort of newsletter site covering Capitol Hill. Or something like that.
It appears that the whole site may be the work of one guy, constantly inventing new people and quoting non-existant scholars, doctors and so forth, none of them real. Or not real in so much as Google can reveal.
This has affinities with a phenomenon called 'sock puppets' --usually referring to the antic of defending or supporting oneself with a different screen name or email address---for a classic example of sock puppetry, see Ace of Spades HQ and this post on Glenn Greenwald. Actually, there's plenty more there on that affair, and it makes for curious reading.
So, reader beware. If such things are happening, they are happening everywhere.
PJM release
PJM Sends:
The folks at Pajamas Media are proud of their coverage of the Israeli-Hezbollah conflict, and have put out a press release to get the word out. As regular readers know, I have very little interest in the conflict, but given the possibilities for spillover into the Iraq conflict, I have been reading up on this particular engagement. PJM's coverage really has been good, and they deserve the pat on the back (even if it is self-inflicted).
Dollard
JHD Sends:
JarHeadDad wants you to know about Pat Dollard's interviews. "Just WOW!" he writes, which is a pretty good endorsement -- I've noticed you can measure how well he likes something by looking at how few words he uses to describe it. Two words? Pretty great. Five thousand words? He hates it, has written all his congressmen, and is still mad about it.
So anyway, this is a two-word site. Go see the thing.
CENTCOM PR
CENTCOM Sends:
Continuing the regular series of things CENTCOM wants you to know, a press release they sent this morning on Iraqi Security capturing three primary targets during raids. No friendly casualties in the process.
Well done.
There is none
"From the scissors of Delilah, and the tenpenny nail of Jael, to the scimitar of
Goliath..."
Goliath..."
In which the Geek w/a .45 and company give yours truly a hard time in the comments section, due to my inability to resist a severe temptation.
Links
Reader-Sent Links:
A few links that turned up in my email box this morning.
Reader JW sends a link to an editorial that explains US behavior according to computer science models.
CC sends a WizBang piece called "Tell it to the Marines."
MilBlogging.com writes in their weekly newsletter, "I used to think Chuck Norris was a pretty cool guy, but that was before I featured Jack Army." Jack's deploying. Go see why he's cooler than Chuck Norris.
Politics Central:
I am somewhat remiss in not having mentioned the PJM "Politics Central" site, about which Pajamas Media tells me they are most excited.
They would today like you to hear this interview from an Israeli bunker.
Somme
The Somme:
This year is the 90th anniversary of the Somme. Our faithful friend Arts & Letters Daily points us to an article, from The Scotsman, on a new book revising the history.
I link mostly for Eric Blair's benefit, but others may also enjoy it.
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