War's Gone YouTube
Who here is shocked that soldiers peed on enemy corpses? Who here thinks it hasn't happened many times before?
Smart blog item by Robert Wright in The Atlantic on the corpse-urinating soldiers:
If you had asked me a few days ago, before news broke that American soldiers have urinated on Taliban corpses, whether American soldiers have ever urinated on Taliban corpses, I would have said: Probably.You send hordes of young people into combat, people whose job is to kill the enemy and who watch as their friends are killed and maimed by the enemy, and the chances are that signs of disrespect for the enemy will surface--and that every once in a while those signs will assume grotesque form.
He adds that hatred is now a more dangerous thing -- and Islamic hatred is especially lethal:
The growing lethality of hatred, like the growing transparency of war, is a product of technology. New information technologies make it easier for people who share a hatred to organize around it. Witness the global recruiting reach of even ragtag terrorist groups. And once hateful groups are organized, they stand a better chance than a few decades ago of getting their hands on massively lethal technologies--not just a nuclear weapon but, increasingly, biological weapons.In other words, though radical Islam is the current example of how dangerous grassroots hatred can now be, the danger itself has grown for more generic reasons. So the change is fundamental: In the old days national security could be had by making sure all foreign governments either liked you or feared you; now national security requires (among other things) that as few people as possible hate you.
Wright is a goof... The worst kind of lefty. He's not kidding, OK? He really thinks the enemy is "hatred"... A human feeling.
He's proud of this insight. He thinks it's novel... Presumably, the product of his own unprecedented decency and clarity... As if he just thought of it a few years ago, and no one had ever considered it before.
And presumably, he'd like to collect enough authority to do something about it. Y'know, take enough control over people's lives to make us stop "hating"...
Because of technology! As if communication doesn't encourage love and interconnectedness as much as hate and "disrespect".
If you've ever seen him try to corner someone in an argument, you might think this is a little ironic. Spittle flies from his lips. He stacks sentence fragments like cordwood, and they block out the sun. It's as if he's the smartest person who ever lived... And if he can just anticipate every single response you could possibly make as he states his position, and suck all the air out of the room while doing so, you'll eventually appreciate his mania as munificence instead of ego. Find a video: Wright only snickers with cynicism and sarcasm, and never laughs with unguarded mirth. This is a dark guy. I think he really does know things about hatred that other people don't know.
But civilization's fragility isn't increased by technology. Yeah, eventually some primitive dork is going to get a hold of some bad material, and people will be hurt.
Meanwhile, technology is making more and more lives go better than ever, and showing ever more of us how we can be helpful to each other. Specifically, civilization has chosen the path of optimism... And it's working out pretty well.
The whole globe will have a role to play, but the United States will be the pivotal nation for bringing the last third of the world into modernity. This is not the time to let bitter, scolding schoolboys lecture grown men and woman about the parameters of human decency with such condescension.
There's nothing new under the sun. If Wright thinks there is, we're going to need a lot more evidence than his teenlike snark about hurt feelings. Modern civilization demands sacrifices, but we've not yet found a sector of humanity that doesn't think they're worthwhile once they learn how it works. Wright doesn't know more about hatred (or love) than you & I do.
Crid [CridComment at gmail] at January 14, 2012 12:29 AM
Amy Alkon
http://www.advicegoddess.com/archives/2012/01/14/wars_gone_youtu.html#comment-2914966">comment from Crid [CridComment at gmail]But civilization's fragility isn't increased by technology. Yeah, eventually some primitive dork is going to get a hold of some bad material, and people will be hurt. Meanwhile, technology is making more and more lives go better than ever, and showing ever more of us how we can be helpful to each other. Specifically, civilization has chosen the path of optimism...
Absolutely. I'm not worried about people's fear of what technology does -- and yes, it does help recruit to Al Qaeda and more -- because there's no turning back from technology. And I sure don't want to turn back from technology, because I agree with what you wrote above about technology's massive benefits.
But, just think of all the inventions that could have been invented and lives saved if various Jews weren't killed in Israel by Muslims commanded to murder them by the Quran. Jews are, disproportionate to their percentage of the population, inventors, scientists and doctors curing diseases.
Progress spreads due to technology but so does hate. Think about all the videos like this:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sZnP2z1VmSM
The reality: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sabra_and_Shatila_massacre
More:
http://atlasshrugs2000.typepad.com/atlas_shrugs/2011/08/kosovan-muslim-incited-to-kill-us-soldiers-in-frankfurt-airport-by-devout-german-jihad-is-a-duty.html
Crid, I don't want to take your technology away and I don't want mine taken away, but let's get real: Technology spreads calls of violence farther and faster.
Amy Alkon at January 14, 2012 12:41 AM
> I don't want mine taken away, but
> let's get real:
Well, what do you want to take away by "getting real"? No one, left or right, ever talks that way without imagining some helpful little constraint on our liberty, or on our involvement with the rest of the world. Wright wants more from us than a moment of humble reflection, I'm certain... But I don't think he should have it, and soon enough, we'll wish we could have that moment back.
> Technology spreads calls of violence
> farther and faster.
...And spreads "calls" to participation and enrichment just as quickly.
Beyoncé had a baby last week, and it was world news. She's an essentially unremarkable human being, and her fans know this. Her whole life is a "call" to modernity and erotic empowerment. And it's the kind of call that lonely, illiterate hooligans in mountain hideouts will want to consider before they watch the new video from whatever Al Qaeda leader we haven't yet shot through the skull. [Yes yes, Dear Commander, but before draining the batteries, let's watch the new video from the woman with the hips, OK?]
(But if you're looking for irony...)
You will always, always be able to pull up ugly clips of people on the internet. So what?
(PS - I asked Amy to fix a typo in the original comment, and she did. It didn't change the meaning or she wouldn't have.)
Crid [CridComment at gmail] at January 14, 2012 1:12 AM
Beyoncé's kid is of interest to those who spend their miles driving with a cell phone jammed in their ear, so she's clearly over-reported.
Technology? For the last 45 years, the USA has had the ability to hit anyplace on Earth, however defended, with a hydrogen bomb - and that number today is down to about 20 minutes. "Your outdoor barbecue arrives in 20 minutes or it's free!"
So it's obvious we don't really, really hate anybody.
Ugly clips of people? Hey, another place technology shines!
Radwaste at January 14, 2012 4:42 AM
Any kid who was ever bullied or saw a bully knows how stupid Wright's thesis is.
Wright probably forgot Bin Laden's weak horse quote before writing this. They might hate us for being strong (and un-muslim) but they attacked us because they thought we were weak. Wright's free to convert and become a muslim if he likes, I like bacon and beer too much for that to be an option.
MarkD at January 14, 2012 5:10 AM
Blaming technology for how you or anybody else acts is stupidity. So now we have instant communication from the North Pole to the South Pole; from Greenwich, England to Darwin, Australia.
The level and speed of communication has changed, but the messages have changed very little. The ratio of good to bad messages needs to be changed.
If you look at the 1760's to 1800 -- they had the printing press, but the founders were still writing with quills and arranged a whole revolution that way.
And blaming the technology for the level of barbarism is also a fools game. The rifled musket and breech loaders were the prominent weapons of the Civil War. At least 618,000 people were killed.
I still hold these Marines accountable for their actions. Do I think it has not happened before or since? No. But part of being a member of the U.S. Military is having a grasp of the Uniform Code of Military Justice (UCMJ). Nowhere in the UCMJ is pissing on the dead enemy listed as a suggested act. Something was broken in that chain of command. It may have just been a squad level NCO or it could have been at the command level. This is a descent to a level of barbarism. Not a we defeated you.
Jim P. at January 14, 2012 7:45 AM
-Crid-
The Radioactive Boy Scout was an incredible story, one I've never heard of before.
Awwww sht! A bovine terrorist stampede!!
http://www.ebaumsworld.com/video/watch/81891966/
Ohhh dude. :-)
Eric at January 14, 2012 8:38 AM
pissing on dead cavemen? Really? Who gives a shit. I could teel you far worse stories from korea and vietnam (you remember, collecting ears?). Please people, get a life. War is hell, really bad things happen. Kids see their buddies blown apart by IEDs and a little disrepect is to be expected. Move along, nothing to see here.
ronc at January 14, 2012 9:19 AM
What we've got here is a failure to communicate, and forgetfulness of a basic truth that was given to us by General George S. Patton: "The object of war is not to die for your country but to make the other bastard die for his." In this case, as in many others, our soldiers pissing on taliban corpses is not nearly as devestatingly bad as some of the things that Al-Qaeda has done to our soldiers' coprses, inlcuding skinning them (and sometimes our soldiers were alive during the skinning). What bothers me is the idiots calling for our soldiers to be punished for pissing on those corpses. War is war people, and oftentimes, atrocities occur, perpetrated by both sides. Either you're punishing both sides for their atrocities, or neither. But war in itself is an atrocity. Until we figure out another way to settle our differences, this is what we've got. Accept it, deal with it, or find another way to rid us of menaces like the taliban and Al-Qaeda. And if you can't be bothered, shut the hell up. Especially you, Hillary Clinton. There is no need to hold OUR soldiers "accountable" for being human.
Flynne at January 14, 2012 9:32 AM
Amy Alkon
http://www.advicegoddess.com/archives/2012/01/14/wars_gone_youtu.html#comment-2915440">comment from Jim P.Blaming technology for how you or anybody else acts is stupidity.
People are responsible for their behavior but it's just a fact that primitive people use technology to further the goals of their murder-of-others-demanding totalitarians system (masquerading as a religion).
Amy Alkon at January 14, 2012 9:50 AM
>> pissing on dead cavemen? Really? Who gives a shit.
I do. Dead cavemen, gooks, ragheads, camel fuckers, Charlie, Sandanistas, Panamanians, etc. all had families and never were a threat to me or my family. I'm willing to go out on a limb and suggest most of the victims of our wars were just defending their own countries or happened to be in the way.
I am more appalled at the still ongoing indiscriminate murder than this desecration.
http://www.nomorevictims.org/
Eric at January 14, 2012 9:50 AM
"The growing lethality of hatred...is a product of technology. New information technologies make it easier for people who share a hatred to organize around it."
There was no internet or YouTube in Rwanda in 1994. The most sophisticated technology the genocidaires used to spread their call to exterminate the Tutsi cockroaches was radio, which had been patented in the 19th century. Despite that, 800,000 Rwandans were slaughtered in just a few months, and most of this killing was done with primitive weapons - machetes, clubs, etc.
It only took a few months for the Black Death to spread from the port of Venice to France & Germany. And everywhere it went, Jews were rounded up, tortured till they confessed to spreading it, then thrown down wells or burned at the stake. No iPhones were needed to spread the plague or the hatred & scapegoating of Jews.
The Muslim calendar begins in the year 622 AD. Within 100 years, Islam had spread by the sword from Spain in the west to India in the east. The original jihadis needed no modern technology whatsoever.
How far back in history do I have to go to show that Wright is full of shit? How about AD 64, when Nero blamed Christians for starting the Great Fire? In no time at all, Christians were being crucified, burned alive, and thrown to the dogs all over Rome.
Tribal hatred has been part of the human condition since humans evolved. It is not a disease caused or spread by modern communications technology.
"now national security requires (among other things) that as few people as possible hate you" If only Robert Wright had been around 70 years ago to tell FDR & Churchill that what they needed to win WW2 was to make sure as few Nazis & Imperial Japanese as possible hated them.
Martin at January 14, 2012 10:01 AM
> I'm willing to go out on a limb and suggest
> most of the victims of our wars were just
> defending their own countries or happened to
> be in the way.
We are the Leviathan. That's how it works. To be the most powerful nation on Earth, and to enjoy the kind of liberty we enjoy, is to have the responsibility for dealing with these kinds of problems. Our wars have more beneficiaries than "victims".
The traders at Cantor Fitzgerald who worked on the top floors of Own World Trade Center just "happened to be in the way" of the monsters who were using Afghanistan as a hideout, right?
Crid [CridComment at gmail] at January 14, 2012 10:05 AM
IOW--- Yes, the Taliban IS a threat to your family. We don't have the option of pretending it's 11th century. When primitive countries can host monsters who can access modern transport (etc.), they're a threat.
Crid [CridComment at gmail] at January 14, 2012 10:08 AM
Do you really think Wright is serious about, as you seem to see it, actually taking measures to see that people don't hate us? This is just impossible and anyone with an IQ over freezing knows it.
Amy Alkon at January 14, 2012 10:11 AM
(I meant One World Trade Center, not Own World Trace Center.)
> A bovine terrorist stampede!!
You laugh, but....
Crid [CridComment at gmail] at January 14, 2012 10:17 AM
Seriously... If you object to footage like that, try to understand that even thought we can't get the X-15 into the sky after spending $400 billion, but cheaper solutions are being used.
And the people who operate those solutions are in places like Indiana, where —after an attack of a herd of cattle on the other side of the globe— they stop for Pizza Hut on the way home to watch Dancing with the Stars.
They say the drone controllers were literally design to operate like the video game controllers these warriors have been using since childhood.
Crid [CridComment at gmail] at January 14, 2012 10:22 AM
I meant X-35, not x-15.
Sorry, generational thing.
Crid [CridComment at gmail] at January 14, 2012 10:40 AM
That might be one of the stupidest statements of all time.
As many people as want to hate us can hate us to whatever degree they want.
National security requires they be prevented from attacking us or that they be severely and publicly punished if they do.
"It may be true that the law cannot make a man love me, but it can stop him from lynching me, and I think that's pretty important." -- Martin Luther King Jr.
=========================
Eric, those "victims of our wars" were people who supported and abetted the lynchers.
On 9/11 far too much of the Muslim world erupted in celebration and expressions of joy as people leapt from the towers.
After 9/11 Osama became the most popular name for Muslim boys.
They weren't "just defending their own countries" and didn't happen "to be in the way."
Saddam Hussein promised a $25,000 bounty to the families of suicide bombers.
Parents encouraged their children to martyr themselves against the infidel.
Streets and babies were named after suicide bombers.
The folks who encouraged and celebrated these things sowed a whirlwind of violence and hatred.
Reap the whirlwind.
=========================
And, Eric, don't dare put us on the same level as they've put themselves.
We express shock and dismay when our military is caught doing something like this. We hold the perpetrators accountable.
Would the Iranian navy or coast guard have risked its personnel rescuing American mariners? Would they have fed them afterward? Or given them their boat back and sent them on their way?
=========================
We may stumble along the way a few times.
However, the world has seen that a US Navy skilled and lethal enough to dispatch kidnapping pirates and global terror leaders into the great beyond is the same US Navy that rescues imperiled mariners and secures the sea lanes for the use of all.
Conan the Grammarian at January 14, 2012 10:48 AM
Really Eric? What world do you live in? Other than Iraq, I firmly believe that every war this country has involves in was justified. The taliban shielded and supported al qaeda. They deserve every death we can give them. If you believe they are victims, then please check yourself into the local pysch ward.
ronc at January 14, 2012 10:55 AM
>> those "victims of our wars" were people who supported and abetted the lynchers.
That's silly and sticking your head in the sand. Most of the casualties of every war since our civil war have been innocent civillians.
>> On 9/11 far too much of the Muslim world erupted in celebration and expressions of joy as people leapt from the towers.
I have written about my own experience in London on 9/11 with this, so I won't bore you. Them celebrating doesn't justify us invading them, does it? (PS- There was a public candlelight vigil of grief in the Tehran soccer stadium soon after 9/11, if that helps to even it out.)
>> the world has seen that a US Navy skilled and lethal enough to dispatch kidnapping pirates and global terror leaders into the great beyond is the same US Navy that rescues imperiled mariners and secures the sea lanes for the use of all.
I agree completely. Precision military targeting is quite different than invading.
>>What world do you live in?
One in which my country outspends the rest of the world for the military. Seriously, do you think we can just keep all this stuff on the shelf?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_military_expenditures
>>Other than Iraq...
Well, there's a hundred thousand or so folks that would be happy to be able to hear that. Crikey. Our bad.
(I'd love to stay and play with you all but I got some hikin' to do. Them bald eagles ain't going to photograph themselves. Having friends over tonight for my b-day, making steak fajitas, go Patriots! I do fucking love America!)
Eric at January 14, 2012 11:18 AM
>> those "victims of our wars" were people who
>> supported and abetted the lynchers.
> That's silly and sticking your head in the sand.
Point to Eric- It's indisputably true that we've killed thousand and thousands of innocent people.
(But "civilians" means nothing in this context. From now on, almost all our enemies will not be soldiers in any formal sense. That part of human history is over.)
> Them celebrating doesn't justify us invading
> them, does it?
No, it doesn't.
> Precision military targeting is quite
> different than invading.
I'm not so sure... Not when our targeting is this promiscuous. I'll post some links after work. Short version: We're at the point where the president (and an unknown number of other authorities) can write a name on a slip and paper and drop it into the machinery. It doesn't matter where in the world that name lives. Within ten minutes, the target will have been identified, tracked located, and remotely killed. (Half-hour, maybe. Afternoon, worst case.)
> bald eagles ain't going to photograph
> themselves. Having friends over tonight for my
> b-day, making steak fajitas, go Patriots! I do
> fucking love America!
God damn, I envy you.
[1.] Please email pic of the eagles. (I saw one outside my window in WLA once: Freak animals. They're MASCULINE.)
[2.] And check back for links and comments late tonight, I got more for you to read.
Crid [CridComment at gmail] at January 14, 2012 11:32 AM
I just see the hypocracy of being in the modern military. To morally be ready to kill the enemy on orders, but not alowed to insult them or think bad about them.
SO moral to kill someone bad to insult them.
Joe J at January 14, 2012 12:18 PM
"They say the drone controllers were literally design to operate like the video game controllers these warriors have been using since childhood."
Could be worse Crid. I heard that back in your day soldiers were issued rifles designed to operate almost exactly like the ones kids would use when they went hunting. And jeeps and airplanes that work just like the vehicles the public has been exposed to.
Why should the military reinvent the wheel when the video game industry has spent 3 decades refining input control for increasingly complicated software? It'd be dumb of them not to use something like a modified XBox 360 controller.
Elle at January 14, 2012 1:17 PM
> Why should the military reinvent the wheel when
> the video game industry has spent 3 decades
> refining input control for increasingly
> complicated software?
Short answer: Because we're killing people.
When I was a little boy playing 'soldier' in the sand dunes of Lake Michigan, we at least had to negotiate each afternoon to see which side of the street was going to bite it. Sometimes we eastsiders would repel the Nazi menace, and the invaders would die like the grade-school dogs that the were. Sometimes the westsiders would prevail, and we'd fall down the slopes with as much drama and flailing as we could muster. BUT WE HAD TO NEGOTIATE FIRST. And sometimes those Smith kids from the corner could be real cunts about it.
Video games aren't even THAT sociable. It's not cool to have a generation of killers who think wars is all pixel projections, without even the need to return from enemy territory.
I think Eric's wrong about these wars, but he's not wrong to be distressed about the morality.
Crid [CridComment at gmail] at January 14, 2012 1:57 PM
Man, I'm in Typo Hell today.
This is the link bungled earlier:
http://news.slashdot.org/story/12/01/10/132246/almost-1-in-3-us-warplanes-is-a-drone?utm_source=slashdot&utm_medium=twitter
This is just about the worst of all possible worlds: We're spending half a trillion for warplanes that can't fly. And we're making up that warmaking capacity with less-expensive robots that remove human participation in the killing.
If you're a peacenik, you shouldn't be any less appalled by this than you were by Viet Nam or any operations which have followed.
Crid [CridComment at gmail] at January 14, 2012 2:08 PM
Who said that we shouldn't kill them. And having hate, anger, and loathing for the enemy is understood.
Now you have killed them. You won. But after they are no longer a threat -- let them alone.
At some point we are going to have step back and not be in active combat with them. So unless you kill every friend and family member of the dead person, you will have someone who hates you.
That leaves you in a pattern of recurring, perpetual wars.
Jim P. at January 14, 2012 3:42 PM
Hate to break this to you, but civilians were routinely slaughtered in medieval wars, too. The idea that civilians should be left alone in a war is a modern one ... and a good one, in theory.
The problem in modern war is what constitutes an "innocent" civilian. Economies in this day and age are much more complex than medieval economies.
Armies no longer live off the land and take what they need. William Sherman was roundly condemned for burning his way through Georgia, but the reality was that those areas were vital to the Confederacy's ability to wage war. Protected by distance, Georgia supplied most of the food for the Confederate forces in Virginia. Modern war is ugly.
If you're actively supporting the government that incites violence in an undeclared war, are you truly innocent of its violence?
If you're only a cog in a belligerent government's war machine (factor worker, bureaucrat, etc.), you're still an element in that government's ability to wage war and, unfortunately, a legitimate target.
By the way, this is always a difficult issue because even at their most popular the Nazis had the support of less than 40% of the German population. And not everybody who worked in the factories that were bombed were supporter of the Nazis.
However, when you're naming your streets and kids after suicide bombers; celebrating the murder of civilians in pizza parlors, in shopping malls and on cruise ships; and even encouraging your kids to martyr themselves, you are not innocent. WIth those actions, you've contributed to and expanded the culture of violence. You are, at best, a passive participant in the resultant violence.
And, despite the concern about the indiscriminate use of targeted killing, the US has done more than any other country to contain the violence of war to the active participants.
=========================
No one said it does.
However, it limits my sympathy for them when the violence whose start they celebrated and embraced goes badly for them.
Conan the Grammarian at January 14, 2012 4:33 PM
> But after they are no longer a threat --
> let them alone.
Jim, not saying this about you in particular, but when lefties say things like that, they don't seem instructively compassionate... Which is the tone they want to strike. They seem detached and naïve.
Our soldiers are often kids. They've been dodging IED's for a year or two. They're very very far removed from the burger parlors where the were hanging out and the steakhouse kitchens where they were washing dishes before they signed up. They're in a land where warlords torture little girls, a place where men wipe with the left hand. I mean the left hand, because the right hand is for clean chores, like greeting American soldiers.
The enemy isn't a theoretical spreadsheet calculation to them. He's a guy. It's personal. It's about individual people. Our soldiers have seen friends lose a limb or lose their lives.
You think they'd be demonstrating nobler morality if they didn't piss on the corpses. I'm not at all sure that's true...
But I never had a new, close, precious friend have his skullcap blown off, either. Goodnight, Achmed. Don't go to bed thirsty....
Crid [CridComment at gmail] at January 14, 2012 4:57 PM
>> pissing on dead cavemen? Really? Who gives a shit. -ronc
I do. Dead cavemen, gooks, ragheads, camel fuckers, Charlie, Sandanistas, Panamanians, etc. all had families and never were a threat to me or my family. I'm willing to go out on a limb and suggest most of the victims of our wars were just defending their own countries or happened to be in the way.- Eric
Feel free to join up then, and show em how its done. Put up or shut up
lujlp at January 14, 2012 6:47 PM
Luj, not sure what your point is, but I have two kids in this show. One has two purple hearts, the other needed to be consoled when he killed his first man. I despise people who question the morals of our military when it goes out if It's was to reduce innocent casualities
ronc at January 14, 2012 9:23 PM
Dayum... I can't find the great article from last year, but this is a pretty good one:
[…]When that happens, and maybe it already did, Eric is going to be both a pain in the ass and perfectly correct.
I don't mind having the world's largest defense budget... It's NICE to be so strong that no one would even think to strike at you directly. Here's how it worked---
First, the United States got extremely powerful.
Then in the 1980's (essentially), we won the Cold War. Suddenly there was no more threat of that kind of conflict, because no other state could put together that much muscle, either in a single nation (which costs a crazy amount of money and social cohesion) or by aligning a constellation of proxies (which also costs a crazy amount of money).
Then in the 1990's, we threw Saddam out of Kuwait, and the incidence of neighbor-wars plummeted, too. People decided they weren't worthwhile if some clown in the White House could turn it around almost on a whim.
So here's how it works now: If there's a war going on anywhere in the world, it's happening because the United States permits it to happen.
Otherwise, the only thing that's left to deal with is low-level conflict... Terror in primitive cultures, simmering tensions, guerrilla stuff...
Crid [CridComment at gmail] at January 14, 2012 9:33 PM
...And, y'know, the Norks. But maybe Beijing would have taken care of that already if the Pentagon hadn't been so financially motivated to pretend that we're going to go to war with China someday.
The rest of the civilized world should be helping us with the smaller stuff. It's a better planet than it was 20 years ago, even if all those same nukes are still out there, and even if our risk from them is nearly as high. When the strike comes, wherever it comes, it will be much more difficult to argue that it demands a proportional response to another (entire) nation. Mutual Assured Destruction no longer applies: Be grateful.
This guy has changed my understanding of all this stuff in the last few months. (He hasn't yet spoken directly to the morality of drones, or to the morality of economic integration with nations which arrogantly suppress women.)
Crid [CridComment at gmail] at January 14, 2012 9:34 PM
I generally never take your posts as directed at me. I'm glad you can understand that I'm trying to put forth logical, cogent, rational arguments. I don't hew to a side, but to the logic.
I haven't either.
The other half of the issue is that while these may be "kids" the chain of command should have stopped this. I couldn't tell the ranks of the individuals involved. Once you make Corporal (E-4) you are considered an NCO. You really can't make E-4 short of three years. Two at a minimum. That takes them out of the kid range.
Once you become an NCO you have generally attended, at minimum, one course on how to be an NCO. Part of the training, even in the USAF, was how to act in a combat zone. That there NCO's didn't stop it leaves me totally cold.
I'm sure by now you've seen A Few Good Men. The "You can't handle the truth" is the famous quote. But the quotes that were ignored were the most pertinent* the comment between Downey and Dawson after the conviction. This is a paraphrase: "We are responsible for protecting the weak." You had a command structure that is lacking respect for its own troops. Then you extend that to the enemy and you have these results.
We had the same thing happen in Vietnam.
* -- I can't find the quote online. But it is most telling
Jim P. at January 14, 2012 10:11 PM
Dooood! You're not the first one to recite dialog from that movie on this blog. A few years ago a guy quoted the entire "I would prefer you just said thank you" speech twice within a month. He was kinda nutty. You aren't like that.
Dueling movies? Consider the establishment of the beachhead in Saving Private Ryan. Minutes after gathering on the dry side of the sand (IIRC), officers watch a raging soldier shoot an undefended prisoner at close range... And as I remember the blocking of the scene, they didn't even turn away, because they hadn't bothered to watch for the atrocity as the moment approached. It's a war, and these aren't emotions that get switched on and off by command: The kid had just seen a few thousand Allied forces shredded without mercy, so he might have been kinda cranky. Soldiers have to be permitted to maintain sanity and a grasp of justice in that moment, right?... And how they sleep for the rest of their lives is their own beeswax. They won't start phoning up their sergeants ten years later at three in the morning... These kids were carrying their own weapons, after all.
Ahem. Movies are fun, but I usually prefer romantic comedies... Neither genre has much to do with real life. (I was born in 1959 and never even had to register for the draft... By the time I was 18, the nation was so appalled by Viet Nam that they weren't even collecting names. An older brother was in the lottery, and that was a gruesome thing to hear discussed at the dinner table.)
But with only a meager imagination to work with, I try to imagine who I'd want beside me in the foxhole or the Humvee. In only part of the daydream do I picture a supersane automaton who fights without glandular response. More often I call to mind a person who forgives my fuckups as I forgive his, and who defends himself and my ass with dynamism and passion... A friend who angrily resents the corpse of the man who kills me.
Crid [CridComment at gmail] at January 14, 2012 11:20 PM
At this hour, the whole freaking film is online, which is hard to explain.
Crid [CridComment at gmail] at January 14, 2012 11:21 PM
Here's a short movie.
The public TV producers seem to want to use the wartime anxiety of the drone operators only as another argument against killing, rather than as an exculpatory argument for remote warfare.
They may well be right....
Crid [CridComment at gmail] at January 14, 2012 11:28 PM
"Mutual Assured Destruction no longer applies: Be grateful."
No, don't.
During the Cold War, clearly identifiable enemies existed. With the breakup of the USSR, custody was lost at several weapons sites. After this breakup, what has been the case for decades became more clear: if you cannot identify the source of a nuclear burst, you cannot retaliate.
America's totally porous borders make it a slam-dunk that if someone worthy has decided that a population or administrative center has to go, a smuggled A-bomb is the best tactic. Not only would you not know if one is in place nowadays, you also would not know if one was discovered, because it would both panic the entire USA but pose questions American leaders are not ready to address.
NEST searches constantly, and they do not tell you when they do.
Radwaste at January 15, 2012 4:58 AM
Twaddle. The risk isn't increased in any unexpected or practically avoidable way... Proliferation was going to happen no matter what. If you enjoyed the idiot logic of the Cold War, you were either [A] criminally childish or [B] professionally invested, the kind of monster for whom "retaliation" is a wet dream.
Crid [CridComment at gmail] at January 15, 2012 6:14 AM
"Short answer: Because we're killing people."
Short reply: How the hell is playing soldiers with the neighborhood kids in any way relevant to this discussion?
At what point do you stop the march of technology and say "No. The moral implications are too heavy to be worth keeping our soldiers out of harms way. We're too efficient at killing the people who want to kill us." How are bombers acceptable, but drones are not? Because drones are controlled with what are essentially video game controllers? Would you be more comfortable if they were controlled WASD style with keyboard and mouse? Or do you have to develop some entirely new kind of input because kids are too familiar with that? At what point do you stop giving soldiers tools that are intuitive and easy to use?
They're using Silly String to find trip wires for IEDs while they search buildings now. Lots of them probably know how to use it from childhood parties. Or is this use okay because it saves soldiers' lives instead of killing their enemies?
Elle at January 15, 2012 7:27 AM
> At what point do you stop the march of technology
You don't "stop the march of technology", you make choices. Over the last twenty years the United States has disassembled her neutron bombs and forsworn their further deployment... And I'd bet you haven't even missed 'em.
> We're too efficient at killing the people who
> want to kill us.
No, we're too removed from the process of selecting and burying people who've been mysteriously identified as our enemies. I think Eric is over the top in his presumption that everyone is just a loving family man that means us no harm... But drone deaths are turning into invisible paperwork. Without flesh of our own on the line, these killings are not a matter of public interest.
> At what point do you stop giving soldiers
> tools that are intuitive and easy to use?
I think the amusement of children and the taking of lives require difference scales of "intuition."
> Or is this use okay because it saves soldiers'
> lives instead of killing their enemies?
There's more to life (and killing) than efficiency. Until now, I'd assumed that was our enduring lesson from the Second World War.
Crid [CridComment at gmail] at January 15, 2012 8:15 AM
And it should have not have happened. But that is a simple murder. He should have been placed under close confinement and referred for a Courts Martial. But where in Private Ryan did you see them pissing on corpses.
I found the quote I was looking for:
Judge Randolph: Corporal Dawson and Private Downey. Of the charge of murder, the members find the accused -- not guilty. On the charge of conspiracy to commit murder, -- the members find the accused not guilty. On the charge of conduct unbecoming a US Marine, -- the members find the accused guilty as charged. You are sentenced to time already served, and to be dishonorably discharged from the Marines. This court-martial is adjourned.
Downey: What did that mean? ... Hal? ... What did that mean? Colonel Jessep said he ordered the Code Red. What did we do wrong?
Dawson: It's not that simple.
Downey: We did nothing wrong!
Dawson: Yeah, we did. We're supposed to fight for people who can't fight for themselves. We were supposed to fight for Willy.
Jim P. at January 15, 2012 8:56 AM
"There may be nothing in the laws of war saying combatants must be willing to put themselves in harm’s way, but some find creepy the idea of a UAS pilot stationed in Nevada driving home for supper with the family a few hours after surgically killing dozens of people in Pakistan."
Meh. Old story. People said the exact same thing about bomber pilots prior to WWII. And before that, it was artillery gunners. And it was probably archers before that. This "you're not a true soldier if you don't engage in hand-to-hand combat" business is macho bullshit. Not that I don't have respect for the guys who *do* engage in hand-to-hand combat, but the days when you could win a war that way ended when the slingshot was invented.
And as they found out in WWII, being a bomber pilot is not all that safe. There are such things as saboteurs and sappers. If I were a Predator pilot, I would not want too many people to know that.
Cousin Dave at January 15, 2012 9:06 AM
> that is a simple murder.
Only a movie... But I think you got weird ideas about what constitutes "murder" and what constitutes "simplicity."
And that line you quote was the precise moment when America came to understand that it shouldn't take moral instruction in shallow, pat, smugly preaching skits from people known to them as "Meathead".
Blech-ptooie.
Crid [CridComment at gmail] at January 15, 2012 9:15 AM
>> Feel free to join up then, and show em how its done. Put up or shut up.
What a ridiculous, stupid comment. The military isn't going to change because I want it to. The political system isn't going to come around to my way of thinking, which is strict adherance to the rules for going to war set forth in our Constitution. Using your logic, only those in the military should have an opinion and a vote.
Eric at January 15, 2012 9:15 AM
... I mean, like, gag me with a spoon. I remember the hideous acting in that scene. The actors were embarrassed by their material... They understood that theater patrons were going to be asking for their money back as they passed the box office on the way out. It was flesh-crawlingly bad drama.
> If I were a Predator pilot, I would not want
> too many people to know that.
Consider this photograph: Note the text on the the nose of the aircraft.
Crid [CridComment at gmail] at January 15, 2012 9:21 AM
>> I think Eric is over the top in his presumption that everyone is just a loving family man that means us no harm...
When did I say or imply that? Look, if Norway or Sweden invaded America, and promised us all the wonderful things their societies have, the vast majority of Americans would still rush off to fight and destroy the enemy. Does that make those patriotic Americans suddenly terrorists? Of course not. Does that make the otherwise politically uninterested Iraqi a terrorist? I would argue no.
I have no problem with telling Saddam he's pissing us off, have the President go to Congress and get an authorization to act, and blow up Saddam and his top echelons of government at our earliest convenience. Same with the Iranian nukes, using no fly zones and keeping open the straits of Hormuz.
The Constitution, our Founding Fathers, and even one of our greatest Generals/President warned about the dangers of an "adventurous military" and the dangers to our democratic ideals by becoming a military industrial complex.
Eric at January 15, 2012 10:01 AM
Guess what girls. The Marines weren't just pissing on the garbage. They were just washing down the pig nuts that they put in their mouths. At least that is what I hope they were doing.
I hope you non combat pussies get over your vapors. You don't know shit about what it is like to live in a combat soldiers shoes.
If you think war is inhumane stop having them. I'll be out back working on my piratemobile.
Dave B at January 15, 2012 10:16 AM
"I think the amusement of children and the taking of lives require difference scales of "intuition." "
Video games are not just the amusement of children anymore. They are used to train doctors, emergency services personnel, and yes, combat tactics. They're also used to figure out how proteins fold to help develop a cure for AIDS. It's been utilized in both Galaxy Zoo projects to document and even discover things about our universe we didn't know before. The CDC uses data gathered from some games to research how a plague might spread. Even as far as entertainment goes, the average player of video games is close to 30.
And honestly, what's more intuitive than a gun? It's a simple point-and-click interface. It's intuitive enough for a toddler to pick up a stick and say "bang" long before he's ever held a Wiimote.
I'm appalled at the dim view you have of our soldiers, considering them unable to tell the difference between a game and reality.
"No, we're too removed from the process of selecting and burying people who've been mysteriously identified as our enemies."
And that's not a problem with technology. That's a problem of policy, politics, and a lack of transparency in the way our government works. That's a problem with the way the president can bring us into a conflict without having congress declare war. That's a problem with the Patriot Act and the NDAA. That's a problem of a media that no longer has the drive or resources to dig up stories where people in power don't want them to dig.
Elle at January 15, 2012 10:34 AM
Just curious, Dave B- what combat duty have you seen?
Eric at January 15, 2012 10:35 AM
Vietnam - '66 - '67
Dave B at January 15, 2012 11:30 AM
all righty then.
Eric at January 15, 2012 12:47 PM
> When did I say or imply that?
Yonder:
> Dead cavemen, gooks, ragheads, camel fuckers,
> Charlie, Sandanistas, Panamanians, etc. all had
> families and never were a threat to me or my
> family.
Thar.
> Look, if Norway or Sweden invaded America...
First, consider precisely how far you've had to reach for that example. For your entire lifetime (or somewhat earlier and for probably well beyond), those countries thrived in the shelter of the United States' military umbrella. Their neighborhood has enjoyed two generations of peace for the first time in hundreds of years. (And they're welcome.)
Second, you're attracted to those as examples because they're modern states... Tidy little bundles of Western cohesion, with handsome resumes of post-Enlightenment achievement. And because of our success described earlier, nations like those aren't going to be the problem anymore. It's the same reason we should resist chatter about "civilian" deaths.
The sources of trouble nowadays aren't running enough of a government to have hired an army, flown them down for training at Fort Whatever, issued uniforms, prepared MRE's, and arranged for education benefits after their tours of service. The closest you get is the Norks (whose ground forces could probably be taken out by a scout troop from Atlanta) and Somalia (whose Shanghai'd pirates plunder out of naked desperation). We haven't fought an existential threat since WWII. We can't think about this in 19th-century terms anymore.
> warned about the dangers of an
> "adventurous military"
Yep... But here we are. The whole world is counting on us to be the guys with the hammer. The hammer is the first tool when you're doing a knock-down real estate acquisition, which is what we're talking about when it comes to bringing the last third of the world population into the global economy. After that you need a whole bunch of other tools. But first you need a big, mean hammer to clear off the foundation without a lot of incidental distress.
That's the role we're going to play from now on. It the role history's prepared us to play by wealth and character, and it's the role the Chinese have paid us to play when they bought all the debt from us.
As far as being "adventurous", you're right. I resent Obama's participation in the Libyan insurgency. It's precisely the same problem Bush had: No infrastructure, or influence, or even plans to offer once the shooting's stopped.
The good news is that we're out of fucking money. There's no reason to give a rat's ass how the United Nations feels about anything. From now on, we should just go to the G-20 to arrange the financing for these takedowns... And they'll be insisting that some script be written for the second act of the show... Or those nations will be writing it for us.
Again, I stole all this from Barnett. You should read him.
Crid [CridComment at gmail] at January 15, 2012 2:06 PM
> Video games are not just the amusement
> of children anymore.
Well, y’know, actually they are. It it were about proficiency, I’d want the games modeled on the weapons and not the other way around. But proficiency ain’t the issue. We have other needs from war, most importantly to be moral about it.
> They are used to train doctors
Well, not like that... I’ve never heard of a remote surgical controller that was designed to fit in the hand like an Xbox. Little boys aren't practicing for tight neurological reconstruction: They're blasting stuff.
> That's a problem of policy, politics, and a
> lack of transparency
Right. It always is, even in the places we need to fight nowadays. Including warlord-riddled Hellholes like Afghanistan: They have grave difficulties with political transparency, which is why OBL wanted to hide there.
Crid [CridComment at gmail] at January 15, 2012 2:13 PM
"We have other needs from war, most importantly to be moral about it."
Either I do not comprehend that statement or I do not wish to follow it. I'd prefer to be home enjoying life, my family and pets - and the freedom to do so. I want the enemy to shit in his pants when he hears I'm coming, drop his weapons and plead for mercy.
The only morality is not to kill innocents on purpose. In today's battles that is difficult enough since we are the only ones that wear uniforms and don't send our women and children to fight or to hide behind.
Thanks to Amy's recommendation of DiSalvo's Brain book I am much more clear about this.
Dave B at January 15, 2012 3:35 PM
> Either I do not comprehend that statement
> or I do not wish to follow it.
Guess which I choose.
Crid [CridComment at gmail] at January 15, 2012 4:26 PM
"I’ve never heard of a remote surgical controller that was designed to fit in the hand like an Xbox."
From the wikipedia article on laparoscopic surgery:
"..... the "Da Vinci" system, which uses a console located away from the patient, with the surgeon controlling a camera, vacuum pump, saline cleansing solution, cutting tools, etc. .... The surgeon uses two PlayStation-type controls to manipulate the devices."
How did you think they controlled the devices used in such surgeries? A flight console?
Progress is also being made on robots that can be controlled from off-site so that surgeons can be hundreds of miles away from the patients they're working on. Probably they'll be using something very similar to game controllers to operate those as well.
The virtual reality trainers they use for practicing this type of surgery probably use a physics engine developed by a video game company. Got a keyhole surgery scheduled? Make sure your doctor plays video games: you'll be under for a shorter amount of time and he's less likely to make mistakes.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/4685909/ns/technology_and_science-games/t/surgeons-may-err-less-playing-video-games/#.TxNywPlsh8E
Elle at January 15, 2012 4:59 PM
Using your logic, only those in the military should have an opinion and a vote.
Posted by: Eric
Every one can have their opinion, but if I had my way the only people allowed to vote would be those who have served but are no longer active duty. At least they have demonstrated the willingness to sacrifice themselves for the good of scociety
lujlp at January 15, 2012 6:11 PM
> How did you think they controlled the devices
> used in such surgeries?
I want pix! I wanna see the dubya-shapped thing with the two-D rocker on one wing and the clutch of buttons on the other. I wanna see it OLD SCHOOL. Gimme the links!
Crid [CridComment at gmail] at January 15, 2012 6:37 PM
Ah, like no Xbox I ever saw. Perhaps this is the why...
Crid [CridComment at gmail] at January 15, 2012 7:31 PM
...Over-reliance on Wiki is discouraged.
Crid [CridComment at gmail] at January 15, 2012 7:32 PM
"If you enjoyed the idiot logic of the Cold War, you were either [A] criminally childish or [B] professionally invested, the kind of monster for whom "retaliation" is a wet dream."
Well, you havent lost your talent for ignoring what was said and substituting your own idea.
What was said is that the risk is higher now, for an unidentified nuclear strike, than it once was.
Fact.
Radwaste at January 15, 2012 8:25 PM
A friend of mine that is a marine reservist told me a story in which he admitted to doing the same thing. A couple of his guys went in to clear out a building, they succeeded but one of his friends was shot in the head. They took the corpse of the offender out into the open, attached C4 to his chest, blew him apart, and pissed in his skull.
I don't blame them. If someone shot one of my friends in the head in front of me, I'd be tempted to do that same thing. Assuming it's something I could get away with.
I don't see how pissing on a dead enemy is immoral either. They're dead, it's not like they know the difference. So if it makes a couple of marines feel a little better about the violent death of their squadmate by giving out golden showers to corpses I say piss away. Torturing them while they're alive is a different story.
Mike Hunter at January 15, 2012 9:00 PM
Fact, Raddy! Fact!
Fact.
Crid [CridComment at gmail] at January 15, 2012 11:14 PM
You think the end of MAD is bad news, I think it's fuckin' wonderful. A paying agent of Blue Heron fact!
Crid [CridComment at gmail] at January 15, 2012 11:15 PM
In a previous lifetime I worked on a device for controlling small UAVs. You could sort of say it was the same basic idea as a game controller, but the requirements were far more demanding. Xbox controller designers don't have to worry about whether their devices will need to work at -50F, or three-way processing redundancy, or whether or not the screen can be read by someone wearing night vision goggles. Also, a lot (not all) of UAV flying consists of the operator selecting maneuver sequences, e.g., circling a target with a specified turn radius and airspeed, at a given altitude. And for the tactical UAV guys, air traffic control is extremely demanding because the UAVs are mixed in with manned aircraft, weapons, and lasers all operating in the same airspace.
Cousin Dave at January 16, 2012 8:22 AM
Back in the day, before the comet came and took out all the dinosaurs, we used to use controllers like this and this for 3D effects on television news (etc).
It wasn't really like a playstation. But if you're writing an article for Wikipedia, then you'll say it's like a game controller, because that's the only context you have for real-time 3D manipulation.
Crid [CridComment at gmail] at January 16, 2012 9:23 AM
Well, Crid, it's never mattered to you what's real. It only matters what you think, evidence be damned.
One more time: I did not say the end of MAD was wonderful. You did, making things up as is your habit. You should not be grateful (at the end of MAD) because what has taken its place is worse. This should be obvious, but you're busy barking.
The Soviet nuclear weapon inventory was corrupted with their economic collapse. It even produced several minor releases from abandoned nuclear power plants, notably naval units, when power was interrupted because assorted utilities didn't get paid by their Navy. Anyway. A conventionally delivered nuke's source can be identified - thus, the deterrent effect. A bomb shipped by UPS will not be - at least until its traces can be collected, and then it's not the fiction of CSI or a Clancy novel, that you can tell from the smoking remains of your neighbors where the bomb came from.
This isn't about proliferation. It's about accountability.
Please, please start up with the "paying agent" nonsense of yours again. I can't wait to link back to show others how carelessly you post.
-----
By the way - everyone: What would make you think the MAD concept does not apply? The establishment of trade between Russia and the USA?
If so, you've been cheated of an education. Germany and Russia were major trading partners before WW2, even conducting military drill together. So that's no obstacle.
Radwaste at January 16, 2012 3:53 PM
MAD (Mutually-Assured Destruction), as a deterrent, works when both parties fear the negative effects of the other party's missiles on their infrastructures, economies, and lives.
The Russians running the USSR did not want to die. The Americans did not want to die. As crazy as it sounds, despite brinksmanship and the occasional brushfire war, MAD actually kept the peace for 40 years.
The problem with terrorists getting the capacity to deliver nuclear destruction is the target for reprisals is difficult to determine and even more difficult to justify... and the terrorists know it.
The problem with a true believer like Ahmadinejad getting the capacity to deliver nuclear destruction is that he isn't afraid to die and actually desires the ensuing chaos - which he believes will hasten the return of the 12th Imam (the Mahdi) and the ascension of the true believers into Heaven (which, by virtue of his initiation of the chaos and resulting martyrdom, will include him).
Conan the Grammarian at January 16, 2012 4:41 PM
Crid [CridComment at gmail] at January 16, 2012 5:32 PM
> I did not say the end of MAD was wonderful.
Christ, you're blithering. (Our materials are in the best of hands...)
MAD continues to the apply in the modern world... But in the modern world, who gives a fuck? France has nukes: Nobody cares. Pak and the Norks and the other new kids in the nuclear club would be completely overwhelmed in an existential conflict whether they went nuclear or not. Ten years ago, Bush turns to the world and asks everyone to pick a team, us or them, and essentially everybody picks us... Everybody with enough coherent political machinery to strike a pose chooses to side with American modernity and global commerce. So we still have MAD in case the French get antsy? Fabulous.
Meanwhile, we have to worry about idiot actors, superempowered individuals a la 9/11. And one day, one of them it going to light up Long Beach or Seattle or someplace. And we won't be able to fry Moscow in response, much as we might want to.
That breaks your heart, because yours is the culture of 20th-century centralized authority (and government careerism). I think we should celebrate the fact that superpower conflicts are less likely to be the source of millions of deaths. And you say "No, don't." Then you instantly restate a clear position, and bungle it.
If you need to be a woundedly oppositional guy, can't you at least be quiet about it?
Crid [CridComment at gmail] at January 17, 2012 5:44 AM
So there I was, driving into work this morning, goin' the long way, and I come upon this intersection. This was before dawn, y'understand.
It's a freeway exit. (That building on the right is the old RIAA headquarters. Boo! Hiss!) See that patch of white next to the "Wrong Way" sign? Well, some feller took it upon himself to spraypoint "KEEP PISSING MARINES" on that wall.
This is not a neighborhood with a lotta graffiti. Sad to say there are no Google Street views that show what the houses are like in this area... this doesn't really show how elegant and tidy it is. Sometimes you see a Ward Cleaver ranch-style house sitting beside some futuristic Ziggy Stardust/HumanityPod™ architecture. This place, the edge of Santa Monica, is what everyone imagines when picturing the California middle-class lifestyle; i.e., it's a place of fantastic wealth. These are some of the most coddled, insular people in the world.
So here are a couple things to consider when you see "KEEP PISSING MARINES" spraypainted on that wall.
First, the graffiti is sarcastic. Like Robert Wright, the person who wrote that message can't express their outrage without being all teenage-hurt about it: Humor is always about superiority, never humility.
Second, the graffiti disproportionate. West Los Angeles is a fabulous place, but an imperfect one. In fact, there've been a few bloody murders in the area in recent months, and any number of gruesome financial scandals in the region's governance. To feel such distress over a minor wartime desecration on the other side of the globe is displaced anger, at best... A failure of humility. These people are just not that decent. And they're enjoying an obscenely high standard of living by the grace of the soldiers who fight in places like Afghanistan.
I took a cell pic, I'll try to link it later.
Crid [CridComment at gmail] at January 17, 2012 7:37 AM
According to this article, the Norwegians are very upset about this incident, calling Americans uncouth and barbaric.
http://frontpagemag.com/2012/01/17/urinegate-spurs-anti-american-hysterics/print/
Comments on a Norwegian article the author references suggest that in World War II "Most of the Germans followed the rules and fought a civilized war" and that America "is way worse [than] Nazi Germany ever was."
This is mighty rich stuff coming from a people whose ancestors terrorized Europe and set the process of civilization back a few hundred years ... until they were converted to the very religion their descendants so readily mock today.
Does this mean Obama will have to give his Nobel Peace Prize back?
Conan the Grammarian at January 17, 2012 5:52 PM
I'll give you fifteen minutes, no Google, no reference works:
Fuckit, I'm feeling generous!—
Ahem. (Miscellaneous sarcasm excised from comment.)
Bruce Bower has said some things I liked over the years.
Crid [CridComment at gmail] at January 17, 2012 7:51 PM
"That breaks your heart, because yours is the culture of 20th-century centralized authority (and government careerism)."
Nope. Again, you merely make things up.
Wish I'd seen this earlier.
It's important that people see the limits of your talent: great writer, completely oblivious to anything contradicting what you've already decided.
Radwaste at January 27, 2012 4:41 PM
Leave a comment