David Brooks, the New York Times' token conservative (and a brilliant writer and speaker) had occasion recently to visit China's Sichaun Province, where just months ago, a devastating earthquake killed 70,000 people. Expecting to find trauma, grief, tears and kvetching, he found tough, optimistic people, thankful for the help they've gotten and generally positive about the future.
Where were the grief counselors? Where were the Chinese versions of the great American grief merchants? Where were the government provided debit cards? Brooks found none of this, and wonders aloud at the end of his article whether we aren't a nation of whiners. Uh, yes, we are.
I mean, can you imagine the miasma of grief that would accompany the deaths of 70,000 Americans? Hell, we lost less than 2000 in Katrina nearly three years ago, but we still listen to the victim industry complaining about how forgotten New Orleans has been (don't get me started on this one).
Friday, August 15, 2008
Army Magnanimity
I wonder if there is another army on earth as magnanimous to its opponents as the US Army. We have forts named after vanquished generals of the other side (Lee, Jackson, AP Hill to name a few--and yes, these were in fact enemies of the US Army), I drove on "Geronimo Avenue" on the base here, and the suite I'm staying in is the Quannah Parker Suite--the last warring Comanche Chief.
Dispatch from Fort Sill, OK
Fort Sill is, as virtually all Army bases are, remote but tidy. I am staying here to bear witness to the Brigade Colors Uncasing Ceremony of the 31st Air Defense Artillery Brigade. This brigade was recently moved here from the home of the ADA at Fort Bliss, Texas, a move mandated by the Base Re-alignment and Closure Commission (BRAC). My good friend Colonel Dan Karbler presided over things and the whole event went swimmingly.
This was the first big military event I've been to since retiring. Therefore, it was the first time I've heard the complete national anthem played without rendering a salute, the first time that have heard honors rendered to a general officer in which I did not also salute, and the first time that as the national ensign passed in front of me, I did not salute its passage. It was the first time that I have been around a bunch of people in the military in which the great majority of them were forced by tradition and regulation to salute me, and I by tradition and regulation to return the salutes. It was a bit weird, sort of like what I imagine it must be like to visit the material world were one to be a ghost.
It was odd to see my friend Dan strut confidently out there to assume his spot in the center of the parade field, a man now in command of several thousand soldiers and billions of dollars of US Army equipment and ammunition. Heck, Dan and I once shared an office, once made daily runs to the bagel shop, made much of the proximity of our birthdays. He's just a regular guy for heaven's sake....but he's not just a regular guy. He is one of the greats, one of the people who has sacrificed an enormous amount of personal time and fortune to serve his country in war and peace. As I looked out at the soldiers assembled on that field today, I could not help but smile, knowing that I (and you) sleep confidently at night, knowing that these people and others like them are out there keeping us safe. They are only modestly compensated, they spend large chunks of their lives away from kith and kin, and they all volunteer to do so.
I am amazed at how similar the areas surrounding military bases are. Doesn't matter if you're talking the Navy in Virginia, the Army in Oklahoma, the Marines at Lejune or the Air Force in Illinois...lots of fast food, lots of auto sales, lots of tattoos, and a sprinkling of low-end service economy businesses that amaze me with their durability. Driving down Cache St. in Lawton OK today was no different than the thousands of times I've driven down Hampton Blvd in Norfolk. Eerie.
A few comments on the Army uniform. Today, they were in their digital cammies (green version). I like seeing the Army in cammies....I didn't like the old days at the Pentagon (old for me, that is) when they wore their more formal pants with shiny shoes. I want them looking like they are ready to kill someone. And the beret, the infamous black beret. A few years ago, the Chief of Staff of the Army (General Shinseki) shocked the whole Army by decreeing that the black beret (to that point, the purview of the vaunted Army Rangers) would be worn by the whole Army. Lots of reasons for it, but what I was interested in was that he would do something like that. Just say "I've thought about it, I'm the boss, here's the change". I LOVED that approach. My God, there was whining when he did it...the Rangers did manage to keep their own color berets, as did some other elite Army units, but they eventually all shut up and did what the Chief said. And they look great in them.
Army Generals...man, I think there is a production facility somewhere that just spits 'em all out, one after another. The General at today's ceremony, a one-star, started his remarks by saying "Good mornin', Y'all". Love it. Navy Admirals don't talk like that (love that too, by the way), but Navy Admirals are different. Army Generals all sound and look like high school football coaches. Except General Shinseki, who looked and sounded like a Navy Admiral....
This was the first big military event I've been to since retiring. Therefore, it was the first time I've heard the complete national anthem played without rendering a salute, the first time that have heard honors rendered to a general officer in which I did not also salute, and the first time that as the national ensign passed in front of me, I did not salute its passage. It was the first time that I have been around a bunch of people in the military in which the great majority of them were forced by tradition and regulation to salute me, and I by tradition and regulation to return the salutes. It was a bit weird, sort of like what I imagine it must be like to visit the material world were one to be a ghost.
It was odd to see my friend Dan strut confidently out there to assume his spot in the center of the parade field, a man now in command of several thousand soldiers and billions of dollars of US Army equipment and ammunition. Heck, Dan and I once shared an office, once made daily runs to the bagel shop, made much of the proximity of our birthdays. He's just a regular guy for heaven's sake....but he's not just a regular guy. He is one of the greats, one of the people who has sacrificed an enormous amount of personal time and fortune to serve his country in war and peace. As I looked out at the soldiers assembled on that field today, I could not help but smile, knowing that I (and you) sleep confidently at night, knowing that these people and others like them are out there keeping us safe. They are only modestly compensated, they spend large chunks of their lives away from kith and kin, and they all volunteer to do so.
I am amazed at how similar the areas surrounding military bases are. Doesn't matter if you're talking the Navy in Virginia, the Army in Oklahoma, the Marines at Lejune or the Air Force in Illinois...lots of fast food, lots of auto sales, lots of tattoos, and a sprinkling of low-end service economy businesses that amaze me with their durability. Driving down Cache St. in Lawton OK today was no different than the thousands of times I've driven down Hampton Blvd in Norfolk. Eerie.
A few comments on the Army uniform. Today, they were in their digital cammies (green version). I like seeing the Army in cammies....I didn't like the old days at the Pentagon (old for me, that is) when they wore their more formal pants with shiny shoes. I want them looking like they are ready to kill someone. And the beret, the infamous black beret. A few years ago, the Chief of Staff of the Army (General Shinseki) shocked the whole Army by decreeing that the black beret (to that point, the purview of the vaunted Army Rangers) would be worn by the whole Army. Lots of reasons for it, but what I was interested in was that he would do something like that. Just say "I've thought about it, I'm the boss, here's the change". I LOVED that approach. My God, there was whining when he did it...the Rangers did manage to keep their own color berets, as did some other elite Army units, but they eventually all shut up and did what the Chief said. And they look great in them.
Army Generals...man, I think there is a production facility somewhere that just spits 'em all out, one after another. The General at today's ceremony, a one-star, started his remarks by saying "Good mornin', Y'all". Love it. Navy Admirals don't talk like that (love that too, by the way), but Navy Admirals are different. Army Generals all sound and look like high school football coaches. Except General Shinseki, who looked and sounded like a Navy Admiral....
Children, Parents, Work, Guilt, Life....
I skate knowingly onto thin ice today in talking about marriage and children. Those who know me are already aware that I am childless, and that my only foray into matrimony was not a resounding success. I have though, watched the institutions of marriage and parenting from the sidelines for my adult life and have occasionally dipped my toes into the pool in relationships with women who already had children (including my engagement to the Kitten, who comes with two girls of her own). This article--and a conversation I had on the plane last night--have got me doing a lot of thinking about these great building blocks of the American way of life, and how they are under siege because of choices we are making every day.
Let's start with the conversation. As the plane filled with those joining up in Dallas (I was flying from BWI to Oklahoma City), one of the very last people to get on the plane was an attractive woman who looked to be not quite 30. Naturally, a cruel and ironic God chose to seat her next to me. I generally do not engage in conversation with strangers (see #8), but I tend to make exceptions in the case of attractive women. Actually, she apparently made an exception to her "no talking to lecherous looking older men rule", but I digress.
It turns out that this woman is a pharmaceutical rep who does a good bit of traveling throughout the innards of our great nation. (On a side note, I would wager that 5 of 10 attractive women you meet in airports and on planes are pharmaceutical reps. They seem to have cornered that market). She is the mother of two children, boys 1 and 3, and was married to a guy she deemed a "great father". During the course of our conversation, she began to tell me about how busy she and her husband were, each with jobs and parenting duties. She used the word "guilt" several times to describe the trades she has to make every day between time with her children, work, time with her husband and time for herself. She talked about how virtually every minute she is awake and not working is devoted to her children.
Again, I have observed the world she describes largely from without, much like the posture one takes while observing the big cat exhibition at the zoo. I respect their world, but I don't necessarily want to climb over the wall into the cage with them. In my time observing the phenomena she described, I have come to conclude two things: 1) that these harried, two working parent, shower attention and time on the Dauphins and Dauphines at night and weekends arrangements are bad for husbands and 2) that they are bad for children.
I have spent my entire adult life among adult men...at work and in recreation. And if there is one refrain I have heard more than any other from the husbands/fathers with whom I've associated, it is that "...I've lost my wife. She's a great Mother, but I don't have a wife anymore." These are the guys at the water cooler, at the cookout, along the sideline at the game. They are everywhere. Perhaps they are you. So I took the opportunity to talk to my attractive seatmate about this, wondering aloud (since we were so chummy and all) if she had heard or seen anything of this among her friends and relations. She admitted to it, fully. But her answer contained more honesty than I was perhaps ready to hear. She said, "well, that's just the way it is. Husbands have to get over the fact that it's not all about them. Things change when you have children." She wasn't saying it wistfully or regretfully; she seemed to say it with pride.
I was dumbfounded. There it was, the other guy's (girl's) playbook, right out there in the open like an old Brady Bunch episode. I wondered to myself how many guys would really...and I mean really...go for the whole act of fatherhood if they knew that this was the path. Stay with me here folks...I'm not trying to infer that having kids shouldn't or doesn't change a marriage. What I'm saying is that I think men wish that it changed things less. The men I talk to want to be fathers, they want to go to the school events, the tae-kwon-do sessions, they want to ensure their children have rich, interesting lives...but they also want to have a wife and partner and friend.
What I'm getting at here is that the two-income family has taken a recessive gene in women and made it a dominant one. Whereas the beauty and wonders of motherhood in a 1950's home provided the room and space to be both wife and mother, the rise of the working mother and our economy's reliance on the liquidity and productivity it provides has squeezed out the space available on the female hard drive for those functions associated with being a "wife". "Mother" is a role that will not be squeezed, as its biological strength and magnetism are well understood. Men however, seem not to have bought fully into this. There doesn't seem to be a diminished appetite among men for marriage, partnership, and all that comes with it. Either their hard drives are bigger (shocking!) or, the father functions are not quite as all encompassing (more likely).
I know this all sounds very pop-psychology, but that's the only psychology I know. I remember a few years ago, when I was getting serious about a girl who had a son, I asked my father what it took to be a good Dad. His answer was short, perfect, and obvious---"Love your wife". Make her and the relationship with her the center of your personal life. The rest will follow. This is the essence of my thinking here (sorry to have rambled so long)--that today's parents have largely forgotten who is the center of their lives. They have shifted (mostly women) that part of their available energy that was at one time devoted to the marriage to the new central focus of the American family, the children. And it is this focus that I believe is ultimately not good for the independence and character of the children it produces.
In a recent article in the Weekly Standard, Joseph Epstein wrote about this phenomenon in what my brother Tom calls "the most important article" he has read in some time.
The concentrated, relentless attention showered upon the children raised within this new, two working parent paradigm has created an entire generation of dependent, entitled children (and a concomitant legion of frustrated Dads/Fathers). The article cited earlier from AOL, in which employers are increasingly having to deal with the parents of employees, reflects this paradigm. Also, though I am rarely one to support the whining of modern educators, parents of these children can be particularly annoying to teachers trying to educate these ADD-addled children. The "attention deficit" isn't an inability of the child to pay attention, so much as it is a child's reaction to having a deficit of attention paid to him!
Which brings us back to the cute pharma-rep sitting next to me. By the end of the flight, I had extracted from her a promise to schedule a quarterly date night with her husband. One date every 90 days. She really wrestled with this. They had never had a babysitter before (who wasn't a visiting grandparent). She wasn't convinced it was even a worthwhile goal. One lousy night.
I'm not saying we should go back to the 50's and women shouldn't work. I think work outside the home is all things considered, a benefit. What I am advocating is more balance...don't worry so much about making sure Junior has an unending palate of activities laid out for him on the weekend. Don't give in to the pressure to be like the other Moms and Dads. Maybe we can turn the corner on this generation of entitled kids and frazzled parents if we just let kids be kids.
But then again what do I know. I'm a childless divorced guy.
Let's start with the conversation. As the plane filled with those joining up in Dallas (I was flying from BWI to Oklahoma City), one of the very last people to get on the plane was an attractive woman who looked to be not quite 30. Naturally, a cruel and ironic God chose to seat her next to me. I generally do not engage in conversation with strangers (see #8), but I tend to make exceptions in the case of attractive women. Actually, she apparently made an exception to her "no talking to lecherous looking older men rule", but I digress.
It turns out that this woman is a pharmaceutical rep who does a good bit of traveling throughout the innards of our great nation. (On a side note, I would wager that 5 of 10 attractive women you meet in airports and on planes are pharmaceutical reps. They seem to have cornered that market). She is the mother of two children, boys 1 and 3, and was married to a guy she deemed a "great father". During the course of our conversation, she began to tell me about how busy she and her husband were, each with jobs and parenting duties. She used the word "guilt" several times to describe the trades she has to make every day between time with her children, work, time with her husband and time for herself. She talked about how virtually every minute she is awake and not working is devoted to her children.
Again, I have observed the world she describes largely from without, much like the posture one takes while observing the big cat exhibition at the zoo. I respect their world, but I don't necessarily want to climb over the wall into the cage with them. In my time observing the phenomena she described, I have come to conclude two things: 1) that these harried, two working parent, shower attention and time on the Dauphins and Dauphines at night and weekends arrangements are bad for husbands and 2) that they are bad for children.
I have spent my entire adult life among adult men...at work and in recreation. And if there is one refrain I have heard more than any other from the husbands/fathers with whom I've associated, it is that "...I've lost my wife. She's a great Mother, but I don't have a wife anymore." These are the guys at the water cooler, at the cookout, along the sideline at the game. They are everywhere. Perhaps they are you. So I took the opportunity to talk to my attractive seatmate about this, wondering aloud (since we were so chummy and all) if she had heard or seen anything of this among her friends and relations. She admitted to it, fully. But her answer contained more honesty than I was perhaps ready to hear. She said, "well, that's just the way it is. Husbands have to get over the fact that it's not all about them. Things change when you have children." She wasn't saying it wistfully or regretfully; she seemed to say it with pride.
I was dumbfounded. There it was, the other guy's (girl's) playbook, right out there in the open like an old Brady Bunch episode. I wondered to myself how many guys would really...and I mean really...go for the whole act of fatherhood if they knew that this was the path. Stay with me here folks...I'm not trying to infer that having kids shouldn't or doesn't change a marriage. What I'm saying is that I think men wish that it changed things less. The men I talk to want to be fathers, they want to go to the school events, the tae-kwon-do sessions, they want to ensure their children have rich, interesting lives...but they also want to have a wife and partner and friend.
What I'm getting at here is that the two-income family has taken a recessive gene in women and made it a dominant one. Whereas the beauty and wonders of motherhood in a 1950's home provided the room and space to be both wife and mother, the rise of the working mother and our economy's reliance on the liquidity and productivity it provides has squeezed out the space available on the female hard drive for those functions associated with being a "wife". "Mother" is a role that will not be squeezed, as its biological strength and magnetism are well understood. Men however, seem not to have bought fully into this. There doesn't seem to be a diminished appetite among men for marriage, partnership, and all that comes with it. Either their hard drives are bigger (shocking!) or, the father functions are not quite as all encompassing (more likely).
I know this all sounds very pop-psychology, but that's the only psychology I know. I remember a few years ago, when I was getting serious about a girl who had a son, I asked my father what it took to be a good Dad. His answer was short, perfect, and obvious---"Love your wife". Make her and the relationship with her the center of your personal life. The rest will follow. This is the essence of my thinking here (sorry to have rambled so long)--that today's parents have largely forgotten who is the center of their lives. They have shifted (mostly women) that part of their available energy that was at one time devoted to the marriage to the new central focus of the American family, the children. And it is this focus that I believe is ultimately not good for the independence and character of the children it produces.
In a recent article in the Weekly Standard, Joseph Epstein wrote about this phenomenon in what my brother Tom calls "the most important article" he has read in some time.
The concentrated, relentless attention showered upon the children raised within this new, two working parent paradigm has created an entire generation of dependent, entitled children (and a concomitant legion of frustrated Dads/Fathers). The article cited earlier from AOL, in which employers are increasingly having to deal with the parents of employees, reflects this paradigm. Also, though I am rarely one to support the whining of modern educators, parents of these children can be particularly annoying to teachers trying to educate these ADD-addled children. The "attention deficit" isn't an inability of the child to pay attention, so much as it is a child's reaction to having a deficit of attention paid to him!
Which brings us back to the cute pharma-rep sitting next to me. By the end of the flight, I had extracted from her a promise to schedule a quarterly date night with her husband. One date every 90 days. She really wrestled with this. They had never had a babysitter before (who wasn't a visiting grandparent). She wasn't convinced it was even a worthwhile goal. One lousy night.
I'm not saying we should go back to the 50's and women shouldn't work. I think work outside the home is all things considered, a benefit. What I am advocating is more balance...don't worry so much about making sure Junior has an unending palate of activities laid out for him on the weekend. Don't give in to the pressure to be like the other Moms and Dads. Maybe we can turn the corner on this generation of entitled kids and frazzled parents if we just let kids be kids.
But then again what do I know. I'm a childless divorced guy.
Thursday, August 14, 2008
I Love TSA...ok, so I'm Lying
So I'm going through the security stuff at BWI today, and as usual, I (and my titanium right hip) set of the detector. As usual, I was ushered forward into the protective glass booth to await the "male assist". Usually, one is then ushered to another area for the inspection and pat-down, after the "male assist"-er picks up your carry on belongings from the conveyor. Here though, the inspection went down in the glass both where one usually just waits (it was a little roomier than the standard). The TSA official asked me to identify my bags on the conveyor, which I did.
He then proceeded to inspect me while bags from other passengers pushed mine further and further out of view, finally to the point where they reached the end of the table...and then went crashing 3.5 feet to the ground, as there was no one there to watch this and no raised lip on the table.
I was livid. I said to the inspector, "Why did that just happen? Why was no one watching? I am required to stay here in this booth and no one brought my luggage to me, so what measures to you have in place to see that this does not happen?" Just at this point another TSA agent came strolling by--large, female, spends too much time in the salon--and she instructed me that it was not their job to watch my stuff on the conveyor, it was mine. At which point I asked what would have happened if I up and bolted from my inspection to save my computer...would that not have caused an alarming security situation? She said it might, but that's not their job and you can talk to the supervisor about it.
Which I did. He was sympathetic, but clueless. The computer works, the system doesn't.
He then proceeded to inspect me while bags from other passengers pushed mine further and further out of view, finally to the point where they reached the end of the table...and then went crashing 3.5 feet to the ground, as there was no one there to watch this and no raised lip on the table.
I was livid. I said to the inspector, "Why did that just happen? Why was no one watching? I am required to stay here in this booth and no one brought my luggage to me, so what measures to you have in place to see that this does not happen?" Just at this point another TSA agent came strolling by--large, female, spends too much time in the salon--and she instructed me that it was not their job to watch my stuff on the conveyor, it was mine. At which point I asked what would have happened if I up and bolted from my inspection to save my computer...would that not have caused an alarming security situation? She said it might, but that's not their job and you can talk to the supervisor about it.
Which I did. He was sympathetic, but clueless. The computer works, the system doesn't.
Off to Fly-over Country
I'm headed off to Fort Sill, OK today to witness the "unfurling" of the colors of my good friend (and shipmate!) Colonel Dan Karbler's Air Defense Artillery Brigade. The ceremony is tomorrow morning, and if my friends in the US Army remain consistent, it will be something to behold. America's Army is the best in the world, made in no small part that way by intelligent, tough and dedicated leaders like Dan Karbler.
Conservative Writers Take on the Obama Myth
This story from the Post this morning has me thinking on two levels about recent efforts to debunk the Obama myth.
On one level, I am uncomfortable with the concept of hit jobs on Obama based on his father's character, his mother's taste in men, or on some loony perception of his religion or how he practices it. The article focuses quite a bit on these kinds of attacks in Corsi's book, and to the extent that they are contained therein, it cheapens the work.
On the other hand, taking on the Obama bio is fair game, because Barack himself made it that way. When ALL you have to run on is your story and your voice, you've got to expect that investigative journalists will attempt to reconcile your version of your story with others. Obama's thin resume and unspectacular performance in the Illinois Legislature are fair game, and I know that David Freddoso's book is focusing on these aspects of the Senator in his book.
Laying Obama's scanty record on the table is not a hit job; insulting him because of his father is.
On one level, I am uncomfortable with the concept of hit jobs on Obama based on his father's character, his mother's taste in men, or on some loony perception of his religion or how he practices it. The article focuses quite a bit on these kinds of attacks in Corsi's book, and to the extent that they are contained therein, it cheapens the work.
On the other hand, taking on the Obama bio is fair game, because Barack himself made it that way. When ALL you have to run on is your story and your voice, you've got to expect that investigative journalists will attempt to reconcile your version of your story with others. Obama's thin resume and unspectacular performance in the Illinois Legislature are fair game, and I know that David Freddoso's book is focusing on these aspects of the Senator in his book.
Laying Obama's scanty record on the table is not a hit job; insulting him because of his father is.
DC Teacher Pay
The courageous, china-breaking Chancellor of the DC School System Michelle Rhee continues to bedevil the old guard in the DC teacher's union. Her proposal to set up a new compensation system has ruffled a few feathers among the old bulls (and cows) in a union dedicated to the status quo and to less than mediocre student performance.
By agreeing to pass up tenure and submit to increased standards of student performance, teachers will be able to command up to $100,000 per year (whoops, per 3/4 of a year) at the 5 year mark. Of course, the union is against this idea, as the popularity of the proposal seems to be tied to teacher age and experience. Younger teachers see the risk as worthwhile, older teachers see it less so.
I applaud Chancellor Rhee (once again) for bringing market forces to bear on teacher performance and compensation. I would love to see how Senator Obama feels about this proposal, given his allegiance to the teachers unions in whose pockets he is so deeply tucked.
By agreeing to pass up tenure and submit to increased standards of student performance, teachers will be able to command up to $100,000 per year (whoops, per 3/4 of a year) at the 5 year mark. Of course, the union is against this idea, as the popularity of the proposal seems to be tied to teacher age and experience. Younger teachers see the risk as worthwhile, older teachers see it less so.
I applaud Chancellor Rhee (once again) for bringing market forces to bear on teacher performance and compensation. I would love to see how Senator Obama feels about this proposal, given his allegiance to the teachers unions in whose pockets he is so deeply tucked.
Delicious but Destructive: Solar Energy vs. Environmentalists
Great piece here on the battle between solar enthusiasts and environmentalists. Although I do sit back and smirk a bit at the irony here, solar energy is a viable and important part of a comprehensive energy strategy. Governor Schwarzenegger's comments at the end of the article (made at Yale, no less) are fantastic.
One thing at work here is the commoditization of solar; that is, when solar was all about VW bug driving hippies throwing some panels on their roofs to create their own little power station....solar was cool with the left. As the market begins to recognize the benefits of solar, the fact that business will be involved and that people will make money seems to turn off elements of the left. So what.
One thing at work here is the commoditization of solar; that is, when solar was all about VW bug driving hippies throwing some panels on their roofs to create their own little power station....solar was cool with the left. As the market begins to recognize the benefits of solar, the fact that business will be involved and that people will make money seems to turn off elements of the left. So what.
Why Can't the US Win in Men's Soccer?
Thirty-six years ago, I moved from one town in New Jersey to another. In the new town, a visionary man with a lot of energy was pushing a new sports league for kids...a soccer league. Pele was at that time nearing his stint with the NY Cosmos, and all around were the signs of an explosion of soccer in the US.
For the past 36 years, I watched as more and more kids play soccer, and I watched as the US has become dominant in women's soccer. Yet millions and millions of kids later, we are still terrible in men's soccer. I can't seem to figure it out.
Some friends say that it is the fact that our kids have so many other things that they can do. While this is true, it is also true that it is hard to find any kids these days who have at not played at least a few seasons of youth soccer. The game is ubiquitous here, it just isn't very good.
I'd like to open it up to the floor; why aren't we better at this sport? Yes, I fully expect a goodly share of anti-soccer comments....but for those who aren't opposed to this sport....what's going on here?
For the past 36 years, I watched as more and more kids play soccer, and I watched as the US has become dominant in women's soccer. Yet millions and millions of kids later, we are still terrible in men's soccer. I can't seem to figure it out.
Some friends say that it is the fact that our kids have so many other things that they can do. While this is true, it is also true that it is hard to find any kids these days who have at not played at least a few seasons of youth soccer. The game is ubiquitous here, it just isn't very good.
I'd like to open it up to the floor; why aren't we better at this sport? Yes, I fully expect a goodly share of anti-soccer comments....but for those who aren't opposed to this sport....what's going on here?
Wednesday, August 13, 2008
Let's Go Nationwide!
Looking at the Blog's stats today, we're up to 275 folks having checked us out (a total of over 1500 times), from 37 states.
How bout letting your friends in (Oregon, Montana, Wyoming, Alaska, Hawaii, North Dakota, Oklahoma, Louisiana, Mississippi, Kentucky, West Virginia, Connecticut, Vermont and New Hampshire) know about the site.
Can't be sure though, that we haven't gotten visitors from some of these states....I sorta think Sally is from Wyoming, so for some reason that's not registering with Google.
Oh, and don't forget to click through to the Advertisements!
How bout letting your friends in (Oregon, Montana, Wyoming, Alaska, Hawaii, North Dakota, Oklahoma, Louisiana, Mississippi, Kentucky, West Virginia, Connecticut, Vermont and New Hampshire) know about the site.
Can't be sure though, that we haven't gotten visitors from some of these states....I sorta think Sally is from Wyoming, so for some reason that's not registering with Google.
Oh, and don't forget to click through to the Advertisements!
Parents Starve Child to Death; Sue City for Not Stopping Them
Brother Pat turned me onto this story from my old stomping grounds of the City of Brotherly Love. This lovely couple starved their 14 year-old cerebral palsy suffering child to death (well, that's not entirely true; the mother did, the father simply abandoned her) while the family was subject to the oversight of social services. Both the parents and members of the city's social services team have been charged with felonies, but the parents have brought civil suit (seeking financial damages) against the city for failing to save the child.
At first, the parents were party to the suit. After righteous indignation from the never reserved Philly community, the parents have removed their own names from the suit, hoping nevertheless to gain some financial benefit for little Danieal's siblings.
Unreal. I'm amazed that we have to register to vote, take tests to drive, get fingerprinted to buy a gun....but producing children has no qualifications.
At first, the parents were party to the suit. After righteous indignation from the never reserved Philly community, the parents have removed their own names from the suit, hoping nevertheless to gain some financial benefit for little Danieal's siblings.
Unreal. I'm amazed that we have to register to vote, take tests to drive, get fingerprinted to buy a gun....but producing children has no qualifications.
China's Terror Problem
Let's meet the Uighurs, shall we. Nestled in western China, the Uighurs are Turkic peoples who have never been too comfortable under the yoke of Beijing. They also happen to be Islamic, and they have been committing acts of terror against their Chinese masters with increasing frequency.
When I was working on strategy for the Navy, we considered an alternative future in which the threat of Islamic terrorism brought the US, Russia, China, Europe and India closer together to fight a common foe. In this future, the Islamists overplay their hand and create this concert of power designed largely to dispatch this threat.
I don't think we're moving quite in this direction yet, but I continue to look for signs. I also look for some different methods of dealing from this problem from the Chinese, especially after the Olympics. One wonders if a Chinese judicial system would grant these terrorists the palate of rights that our Supreme Court has....
When I was working on strategy for the Navy, we considered an alternative future in which the threat of Islamic terrorism brought the US, Russia, China, Europe and India closer together to fight a common foe. In this future, the Islamists overplay their hand and create this concert of power designed largely to dispatch this threat.
I don't think we're moving quite in this direction yet, but I continue to look for signs. I also look for some different methods of dealing from this problem from the Chinese, especially after the Olympics. One wonders if a Chinese judicial system would grant these terrorists the palate of rights that our Supreme Court has....
The Airlines: We Get What We Pay For
So JetBlue is going to charge for pillows and blankets now, and USAIR for water and soda. And so, the great democratization of the skies continues. Air travel was once for the elite, people dressed up to fly. Air travel was heavily regulated and fares were very high compared to where they are now.
But then came the days when people asked good questions, like why aren't the airlines competing with each other? Why is it that air travel only seems to be for the rich, while all taxpayers help to subsidize their operations? And so, de-regulation occurred, and it was good. Airlines had to compete for your business, and fares plummeted. Air travel was no longer something simply for the elite; it was for everyone.
You want pillows and drinks? Fly business class. Fly Singapore Air or Cathay Pacific. You want bare bones transportation at the lowest price possible? Fly domestic US carriers in coach. Ladies and gentlemen, we have gotten what we wanted, and we are getting what we pay for. The days of frills and extras are gone, and the days of bus travel in the sky are upon us.
But then came the days when people asked good questions, like why aren't the airlines competing with each other? Why is it that air travel only seems to be for the rich, while all taxpayers help to subsidize their operations? And so, de-regulation occurred, and it was good. Airlines had to compete for your business, and fares plummeted. Air travel was no longer something simply for the elite; it was for everyone.
You want pillows and drinks? Fly business class. Fly Singapore Air or Cathay Pacific. You want bare bones transportation at the lowest price possible? Fly domestic US carriers in coach. Ladies and gentlemen, we have gotten what we wanted, and we are getting what we pay for. The days of frills and extras are gone, and the days of bus travel in the sky are upon us.
Mad Cow Disease Threatens Designer Baby Industry
I don't know where to begin. This story lays out the utter desperation of one Julie Peterson of North Carolina and others presumably like her who are frustrated in their desire to create a new master race of Nordic Gods (note the gauzy glam portrait in the article). Because of our government's desire to protect our population from Mad Cow disease, certain, shall we say, effluents are no longer deemed safe for use in the creation of six-foot tall warrior queens. This has forced Ms. Peterson back to the Geheimstadt, whoops, homeland, to tap the keg of he who previously supplied the "essence" in the creation of her first "...beautiful Viking baby..." As luck would have it (or perhaps the biology of a 43 year old woman), her latest injection was unsuccessful.
Let's start with the obvious. Ms. Peterson's quest derives from two main influences...the first, to create yet another Viking baby. The second, is to ensure that her next child would have the same father as the first.
I'm generally in favor of efforts to bring babies to infertile couples. I realize I may deviate from some visions of conservatism here, but that's the way it is. I am however, very disturbed by the growing craze of women simply having babies on their own, deeming the presence of a father as unimportant. Let's face facts; we all know someone who has grown up without a father or with an uninvolved father, and many of them are healthy, well-adjusted people. That said, we tend to marvel at such people because of what they have overcome. All things being equal, children grow up healthier and better adjusted in two-parent families. Starting a child out from the get go with no father immediately stacks the deck against them. That such a decision is reached primarily due to the selfish desires of the mother (immortality through children!) reflects poorly upon these women. That such a child would be conceived according to some genetic plan for visual attractiveness bespeaks a shallowness in the mother matched only by her selfishness.
People in this world face real problems. Julie Peterson isn't one of them--though I imagine her daughter might someday be....
Let's start with the obvious. Ms. Peterson's quest derives from two main influences...the first, to create yet another Viking baby. The second, is to ensure that her next child would have the same father as the first.
I'm generally in favor of efforts to bring babies to infertile couples. I realize I may deviate from some visions of conservatism here, but that's the way it is. I am however, very disturbed by the growing craze of women simply having babies on their own, deeming the presence of a father as unimportant. Let's face facts; we all know someone who has grown up without a father or with an uninvolved father, and many of them are healthy, well-adjusted people. That said, we tend to marvel at such people because of what they have overcome. All things being equal, children grow up healthier and better adjusted in two-parent families. Starting a child out from the get go with no father immediately stacks the deck against them. That such a decision is reached primarily due to the selfish desires of the mother (immortality through children!) reflects poorly upon these women. That such a child would be conceived according to some genetic plan for visual attractiveness bespeaks a shallowness in the mother matched only by her selfishness.
People in this world face real problems. Julie Peterson isn't one of them--though I imagine her daughter might someday be....
Tuesday, August 12, 2008
A Victory for Property Rights
Among the most despicable decisions by the Supreme Court in recent years was the Kelo decision, in which a 5-4 majority ruled that eminent domain could be interpreted to mean that the government could take private property from one party in order to transfer it to the private property of another party...as long as there were a "public good" to be gained.
This story tells of a successful effort to fight such a "taking" by the City of Long Branch New Jersey.
Kelo simply made it legal for municipalities to do this; it did not mandate it. It will be up to the states to make laws that remove this power from themselves and municipalities.
This story tells of a successful effort to fight such a "taking" by the City of Long Branch New Jersey.
Kelo simply made it legal for municipalities to do this; it did not mandate it. It will be up to the states to make laws that remove this power from themselves and municipalities.
Debunking Drilling Myths
Boffo editorial in the Post today taking on some of the scurrilous charges the environmental lobby throws at the concept of increased offshore drilling. In addition to the generally favorable tone (toward drilling), two things caught my eye.
The first is the slavish adherence to the "No Drilling in ANWR" line. For some reason, this one has been bought hook, line and sinker by even thoughtful observers.
The second is the Post's depiction of the downside of increased drilling. The argument goes something like, if we increase drilling and take pressure off supply, prices will stabilize and then the pressure of higher prices will be gone....so then no one will do anything important to wean ourselves off of dependence on oil. I am sympathetic to some extent to this argument, and that is why I want ANY relaxed drilling to be embedded in a COMPREHENSIVE energy strategy that speaks to solar, wind, nuclear, biofuels, battery technology, hydrogen, compressed air.....you get the picture. COMPREHENSIVE.
The first is the slavish adherence to the "No Drilling in ANWR" line. For some reason, this one has been bought hook, line and sinker by even thoughtful observers.
The second is the Post's depiction of the downside of increased drilling. The argument goes something like, if we increase drilling and take pressure off supply, prices will stabilize and then the pressure of higher prices will be gone....so then no one will do anything important to wean ourselves off of dependence on oil. I am sympathetic to some extent to this argument, and that is why I want ANY relaxed drilling to be embedded in a COMPREHENSIVE energy strategy that speaks to solar, wind, nuclear, biofuels, battery technology, hydrogen, compressed air.....you get the picture. COMPREHENSIVE.
Excellent Navy Blog
Many of you wonder why I spend so little time blogging about that which occupied so much of my previous life....the US Navy. Mostly because I don't think too much about it, but also because there is another blogger covering that beat very well. Take a look at Information Dissemination if you are interested in keeping up with issues at the heart of our Navy and Marine Corps.
Galrahn (the blogger) is a smart person with a lot of background in the Navy. He or she wasn't terribly kind to the Maritime Strategy, but their criticisms were fair and well crafted. I highly recommend this blog (it is in my site list to the left) for those of you who want to keep up.
Galrahn (the blogger) is a smart person with a lot of background in the Navy. He or she wasn't terribly kind to the Maritime Strategy, but their criticisms were fair and well crafted. I highly recommend this blog (it is in my site list to the left) for those of you who want to keep up.
Monday, August 11, 2008
Capitalism Update
Well, I've had ads on my blog for five full days now, and according to Google, I've made $2.42. I'm pretty psyched to get some cash (no matter how meager) from this effort. But at about two hours a day devoted to blogging...my hourly rate isn't too impressive!
Thanks for continuing to click my on my sponsors pages!
Thanks for continuing to click my on my sponsors pages!
Obama: No Income Taxes on Seniors?
This guy is too much! His latest idea--to relieve seniors with less than $50,000 of income annually of ANY income tax burden--is pure political genius. Bad policy, good politics.
Our Seniors are already a very well looked after group in the tax code. Lobbing another entitlement at the AARP crowd (an unbelievably entitled group) just doesn't make sense, especially when we figure out who will pay for it. That's right, young people.
If you're a senior making less than $50 grand in EARNED income, you're probably not paying much income tax as it is. If your $50 G's is the income of your investments, you've got a pretty fine nest egg there spinning off income, so I have no problem with your being taxed.
But it SOUNDS good...the key to Obama's success thus far.
Our Seniors are already a very well looked after group in the tax code. Lobbing another entitlement at the AARP crowd (an unbelievably entitled group) just doesn't make sense, especially when we figure out who will pay for it. That's right, young people.
If you're a senior making less than $50 grand in EARNED income, you're probably not paying much income tax as it is. If your $50 G's is the income of your investments, you've got a pretty fine nest egg there spinning off income, so I have no problem with your being taxed.
But it SOUNDS good...the key to Obama's success thus far.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
Posts
