| Wednesday,
December 31, 2003
Happy New Year
Dr. Pournelle:
Re: the naked man found in the chimney at Uncle Hugo's
Science Fiction bookstore
Uncle Hugo's is at least regionally well-known as a
science-fiction bookstore, so I paid attention when a news crew showed the
roof of the building. The would-be burglar had broken down the top of the
chimney to roof level. The resulting square hole in the roof measured 11" x
11"--it's amazing that the guy managed to even get inside.
The police and fire departments had to break apart a
lot of brickwork in the basement to get him out, so he'd somehow managed to
get completely inside the chimney.
JM
======================
"Dr. Pournelle, I can't resist pointing out that
there's an even easier way to get into the Administrative Tools part of
the Control Panel, and that is to right-click on "My Computer" and select
"Manage"..."
Easier yet, after a one-time setup:
* Right-click Start and choose Properties on the
context menu * On the Start Menu tab, click the Customize button, then
choose the Advanced tab * Scroll to the end of the "Start menu items" list
and under "System Administrative Tools," select either "Display on the All
Programs menu" or "Display on the All Programs menu and the Start menu" *
Click OK twice to dismiss the dialog boxes and apply the change
You can now reach all Admin tools, not just the
Computer Management tool, with one less mouse click.
Noel Hyman
That one I knew and never bothered with since I
do management so seldom. But the right click on My Computer is handy.
Thanks
=========================
Dear Dr. Pournelle,
Mr. Mangles is just plain wrong in one
aspect: the traditional date of the Regifugium is 509 BCE, not 590 BCE.
So using his other dates of 44 BCE for the end of the Republic, 27 BCE for
the beginning of the Empire and 476 CE for the end of the Empire, the
Republic lasted for 465, not 564 years. Empire, clear winner.
I'd also challenge his other dates -- the fall of the
Republic ought to be dated as no later than Sulla's dictatorship (if the
"restoration" of the Republic after death counts, well, consuls were still
being "elected" into the 6th century CE), and Byzantium could be considered
Roman into the reign of Heraclius I (unless one takes the radical viewpoint
that the East was never successfully Romanized, and that Byzantium, Persia,
and the Caliphate and its successor states down to the Ottomans were just
different masks on the same "Magian" civilization), but that IS the sort of
thing that you probably don't wish to take up space with.
------------------------------------------------ John
W. Braue, III <braue @ratsnest.win.net> http://www.win.net/ratsnest/
"Gold cannot always get you good soldiers, but good
soldiers can always get you gold" -- Niccolò Machiavelli
I tend to agree that the Republic tottered in the
wars of Marius and Sulla, but I think it did not quite die. Cicero in
particular tried to restore it and his use of the Ultimate Decree and
summary execution in the interests of safety and restoration were precedents
for the lists of proscription -- including Anthony's which caused his death.
Julius Caesar spared most of his opponents, and I
think (an opinion based on his writings and his actions) would have rebuilt
many of the Republican institutions, curbing the power of the Optimates to
do as they would with Populares they didn't like -- starting with the
Gracchi but going right on into Ciceronian times -- while also curbing the
wilder tendencies of the Populares (of which he was hereditary and actual
leader). Caesar had definite ties to both classes. Think Bobby Kennedy,
perhaps. Or if Ted Kennedy had fewer moral and intellectual flaws
Constantinople was Christian, which in itself
precludes it being Magian. The Magian fire worshippers were the bane of
Islam, and you can see traces of the hatred it inspires in the Thousand
Nights and a Night as well as other Islamic literature. And they took their
religion seriously, as in the famous quip about asking and innkeeper for the
price of a room and getting a lecture on Monophysite doctrine...
==================
Your site, particularly Mail, is my first and last stop
each day. The tone you set with your comments and filtering makes it
enjoyable and a great resource.
Several months ago I saw mention in Mail of english
language Iraqi blogs and browsed them at that time. I have gone back
every few days to keep up on Iraqi attitudes and expanded my list as more
have appeared. Naturally, those with a knowledge of english likely are
pre-disposed toward the West, so I don't take the expressed attitudes as
necessarily representative, but they are a useful gauge of progress there,
nonetheless.
Iraq the Model (http://iraqthemodel.blogspot.com/) has
been the most interesting with Omar doing the posting but getting input
from his friends Ali and Mohammed. He has a great story about his jitney
ride with several strangers from Baghdad to Al-Kut (170 km) in yesterday's
post (Dec 30) where he reported their conversation. In the competition
for Best Iraqi Blog at the Asia Blog Award 2003, it looks like he will win
(to be announced Jan 3).
All the other Iraqi blogs are linked on a sidebar on
these sites.
Friends of Major Gregg Softy (Armor Squadron S-3 of the
1-1 Cavalry Regiment, 1st Armor Division, stationed in Baghdad) have
created a site at
http://www.iraqischools.com/ to help him gather school supplies for
Iraqi schoolchildren. A very well done site with a wealth of material for
anyone interested.
Cheers,
Bill Mackintosh
Thanks. And see Jenny's
pictures from last week.
================
Joanne Dow's Iraqi tirade:
Subject: What's this "anti-war" crap anyway?
OK, we had a war. It may have been wrong. (How often
have I said this?) We're having trouble organizing the peace, because the
war is not really over. The opposition is not shut down. That is the usual
definition of an end of a war as I understand it.
Needless to say we have a tiger by its tail. I hear
"anti-war" people complaining about how unjust the war was and all that.
They declare "This war is a bad thing, so we should pack our bags and
baggage then leave for home." We admit defeat, and leave a job unfinished.
How utterly modern American that is. We have a 20 minute attention span and
once things get difficult we want to go bury our head in the sands or soil
of our homes forever damn the consequences.
Today, I don't give a damn whether the war was just or
unjust. What I care about is finishing a job we undertook. If we leave Iraq
what does it mean to the population of Iraq? Under Saddam they lived in a
horrid tyranny. It was one Saddam installed and operated. *WE* did not have
anything material to do with this. BUT, now we have stepped in and in effect
taken responsibility for the Iraqi people. If we walk out leaving a huge
power vacuum then every "victim" if a new tyranny within that country is on
our hands for not finishing the job properly. (By that theory the British
have been VERY derelict in loco parentis to that entire region of the world.
They left a horrid mess that has devolved into tremendous amounts of blood
on their hands.)
Furthermore, if we walk out leaving a festering boil
of hatred, please explain to me how energy independence is going to protect
the US from suicide bombers in small air craft stuffed with explosives and
aimed at places of public gathering like the new Disney concert hall? How is
throwing up our hands and saying to that part of the world it's their pigpen
and they can play in it as they will going to keep some terrorists from
contaminating our water supplies? How will burying our heads in the home
sands and pretending the world does not exist going to prevent suicide
bombers from detonating themselves near or inside a school during the school
day? How is ignoring the fact that people who are at war with us originate
and are financed from that part of the world going to prevent a devout
terrorist from driving a truck loaded with some modest explosives and a lot
of a biological agent from detonating himself and his cargo a little south
and east of Santa Monica while a friend does the same about where the old
Renn Faire site was out in Venture County just as the evening winds blowing
to the East come up to disperse the agent from the beaches to San Bernardino
and beyond?
We CANNOT reach energy independence by fiat. We cannot
achieve it by magic without an interim energy source for a decade or two.
And even if we do, what the freaking flying fubar is it good for? It may
stop NEW income for the Saudis. They are still sitting on MONEY, gobs and
gobs of money. Their oil is incidental. If they see oil revenues going away
they invest in terrorism on a larger scale to bribe us to keep paying them
for oil we no longer need. They dig into their coffers and pay for billion
dollar terrorism rather than the ten thousand dollar terrorism we've
experienced. How is energy independence going to stop the terrorists from
that part of the world? It's a smoke screen.
The same can be said for just packing up and leaving
Iraq. We'll get the stunning effect of leaving Viet Nam to its own devices
and not supporting the government because the war was already won so they do
not need it. We can pull out of Iraq and turn a potentially very significant
victory into an utter defeat. I am sure this will be a good thing for the
American psyche. We'll be forced to learn some proper humility that the
Euro-cretins insist we utterly lack and need to learn while they hide behind
our backs lest the nasties in the world hurt them.
I hear a lot of whining about how unjust this war is
and how we should just get out and generate energy independence or some
other magical shibboleth. I DO NOT SEE ANY OF THESE PEOPLE ADDRESSING WHAT
WE SHOULD BE DOING TO STOP THE TERRORISM *O*V*E*R* *T*H*E*R*E* WHERE IT
ORIGNATES RATHER THAN INFLICTING TSA AND PATRIOT II ON OURSELVES.
If somebody wants us to get out of Iraq then let that
person lay out a plan in some detail for what to do instead, why, what it
will accomplish, and how will it free us from the terrorist threat. Until
then it's all twaddle and trash talking by people with a "CAUSE" as dirtily
founded as "environmentalism" and no solid basis in analysis.
And yes, I do think you have been guilty in this
regard, too.
We get out.
What do we do next?
We invent instant energy independence from the Arabs.
What does this buy us in detail and how does it free
us from the bin Ladens of the world?
We get bombed again by someone like bin Laden.
What do we do as we count our pointless casualties?
Do we again pretend it's just an isolated bunch of
religious crackpots and turn our cheeks again? Soon enough we run out of
cheeks.
Then what do we do?
Or do we simply nuke that region of the world into a
glowing cinder of glass because we don't need the oil anymore?
Then what do we do with all THAT blood on our hands?
*WHAT DO WE DO NEXT?* *WHAT DOES THAT BUY US IN TERMS
OF GETTING RID OF THE TERRORISTS IN THE LONG TERM?*
Interestingly enough Iraq provides us with a slim
chance to accomplish something positive with regards to terrorism and
interim oil supplies for when we tell the Saudis to go get their heads and
attitudes repaired or else. (Note, WE can probably do that today and thumb
our noses at the Saudis. We HAVE our oil supplies more or less. The
Europeans would have instant energy shortages on a huge scale. So if we tell
the Saudis to get off their terrorism support and the Saudis turn off the
oil we will find ourselves fighting the world's other big nuclear power,
Europe. Isn't that a fun thought?)
{^_^}
Great exposition of feelings. Precious little on
what to do.
I will address one question: "How will energy
independence make us safer from [a long list of possible operations]"
It does so by getting us out of that area of the
world. You could ask the same question about anyone, including the Vatican
City (certainly no great friend of Islam) or Canada (certainly decadent by
Wahabi standards) or a great number of places.
It is one thing to hate the United States. It is
quite another to generate enough emotional appeal to get young people to
risk their lives going to the US to do harm. It's a lot easier to recruit
suicide bombers for defense of your home and homeland -- the Kamikazi pilots
come to mind -- than it is to recruit them as a weapon of Islamic expansion
or cultural retaliation. Few Palestinians come to New York with mass murder
in mind: they have targets closer to home. Distance and non-involvement are
the keys to a certain measure of "safety" : you want the people who are
willing to die for their cause to have someone other than you to attack. I
make no doubt that if the US were not in Mesopotamia, the suicide bombers
would find others close to home as targets: they aren't likely to come to
the US.
Historically, patriotism is a better motivator than
religion among the educated; and of religious martyrs, most have died in
direct defense of their faith, usually in defiance of demands that they
repudiate the faith or desecrate its symbols. Bin Laden's crew were
motivated by the presence of the US in the Middle East, not even by US
support for Israel, if you can take Bin Laden at his word.
Another answer is that there is no safety. You can
only do the best you can. But do you truly think that if the United States
had no armies on foreign soil we would be the first targets of those who
think of themselves as patriots? The Old Man of the Mountain is dead,
and his sect of Islam has become the pacifists led by the Aga Khan. You seem
to believe bin Laden has revived the Assassins, but I rather think not. The
number of people who can fly airplanes and who truly believe that if they
fly that airplane into a building they will be instantly transported to a
paradise they experienced in a hashish dream is rather small in this
century.
As Joel Rosenberg points out below, suicide bombers
take a lot of management. Getting them to go to a foreign country and do
their job isn't easy. It's a lot simpler to get someone worked up against
the troops who just dynamited your house or shot your cousin. And Iraq,
being about the best educated country in the Middle East, has far fewer
people who hate the West because it is the West than other Arab nations do.
As to what we owe the people of Iraq, that is
another matter. We exhorted them to rise up against their monster, and then
abandoned them, and now their marshes are drained, and many are buried in
mass graves. Does Bush II owe reparations for the actions of Bush I? For
reparations is the best name for the $80 billion we are to pour into Iraq.
Congress wanted to make it a loan, but the Administration insisted on making
it a gift from the American taxpayers.
I wonder what a referendum restricted to those who
pay $100 or more a year in Federal Income Tax (and excluding those who pay
nothing or receive a negative income tax) on whether we ought to give Iraq
$80 billion to rebuild would decide?
We also insist on acting as if Iraq were a nation,
which it is not. The Arab sections are all dominated by clan loyalties: it's
the Baathists who tried to build nationalism. I don't know where most of the
sabotage and bombers come from in Iraq -- it's not my job to know -- but if
I were in Military Intelligence there I would be looking at the clan
structure of those who attack us. But how we build a nation out of a
territory created by the British foreign office largely as a place honorable
enough for the Hashemites to rule once they had been deprived of their
hereditary position as Protectors of Mecca I do not know, and I doubt you
know either.
A winner take all election in Iraq with the oil
revenues at stake?
I have no desire to cut and run, but I don't think
I deserve to be screamed at for asking what I think are obvious questions.
And I would still prefer to spend $80 billion on
energy sources in the US than on rebuilding Iraq. I didn't install their
dictator, and while I may feel some moral obligations to try to make things
right after Bush I raised a rebellion he wouldn't support, there are limits
to that obligation.
And I continue to believe that the best thing the
United States can do is be the best United State we can be, and once we have
set the proper example, we can let our citizens go forth as missionaries...
And see Greg Cochran below
====================
And now Joel Rosenberg on
everything:
First and foremost: Happy New Year to you and yours.
Libya: It's hard to see the recent Libyan cave-in as
anything but a victory for both sanctions and implicit military threats.
Arguably, the sanctions could have done the job by themselves -- but the
cave-in happening in sync with the Iraqi/Afghani adventures is, if it's a
coincidence, an awfully remarkable one. I think your concerns about the
American Empire are still well-taken -- and while I tend to come down on the
other side of the issue, the problems that you've been pointing to are
provably there -- but it's clear that at least some things are working.
Syria: Probably the place to watch over the next year
or so. Between the Iraqi recidivists who have fled there -- along with their
bank accounts and possibly WMDs -- and the decreasing number of safe havens
for Arab terrorists to operate more or less openly, it's going to be the
problem that the Administration will need to deal with. Assad Jr. is clearly
perceived, locally, as being as ruthless as Daddy was -- he hasn't had to
prove it, yet, just because of that.
Saudi Arabia: is the Bush Administration's test case
for constructive engagement of the jihadis and their supporters. My gut
feeling is that that's going to continue to be a failure; it doesn't much
matter if the whole conflict between the kinder, gentler Wahabbi supporters
and the bad cop Wahabbiists is more or less a good cop/bad cop thing for
Western consumption, clever local politics by the Saudi family, or some
combination -- what it is is clearly insufficient to cut out both the
financial and institutional support for Islamofascism, which, after oil, is
the Saudi entity's largest export. Interestingly, though, it hasn't been a
big seller in Bosnia.
Russia: well, so much for democracy. Not that I didn't
have a lot of it already, but watching what's been going on there gives me
even more respect and gratitude for the Founders here. Is it possible, in
the modern age, to go from dictatorship to democracy without hanging the
correct number of officials/supporters from the ancien regime? Too many, and
you get France under the Jacobins; too few, and you get Putin and the
oligarchs. Which, of course, leads to
Iraq: a mess. Not nearly as bad as even mainstream
critics predicted, but we're seeing the problems with having US troops
relying on local informants to purge the significant remnants of the old
regime. It'd be terribly handy if the supposed pace of democratization in
Iran would speed up, as that would make the dismemberment of Iraq a lot
easier -- if the Shiites in the south wanted to unify with a democratic
Iran, that would be a much easier sell, and a more stable situation, than
even the dismemberment that I think ought to happen.
US: as somebody who used to be a Jackson (Scoop, of
course, not the loathesome Jesse) Democrat, there's some perverse joy in
watching the Gore/Dean wing (the Bike Path Fundamentalist wing of the
Democratic Party) seize control of the party just long enough to swerve it
into the iceberg. Be interesting to see who picks up the pieces, although my
money's on Hillary. I'm not at all fond of her, mind, but I respect her mind
-- she's a very canny politician, and, unlike her husband, appears to think
with the head on top of her neck. Getting to the right of President Bush on
Iraq was a brilliant example of triangulation, as was encouraging Clark to
go out as a stalking horse and get pasted. Not admirable, particularly, but
a very canny political calculation. She didn't want to run against a
incumbent Bush -- her husband did it successfully, but at the right part of
the economic cycle -- and has both good positioning, good relationships, and
a bully pulpit to make the call as to whether or not to go for what's likely
to be a competitive campaign in 2008.
I don't think she can win, mind; she'll be a hard sell
as a Southerner, and it's hard to see how a Democrat can win without
breaking the solid hold on the South that the Republicans have spent a
generation working toward.
Terrorism: well, despite the fact that so many of the
things we see on a day-to-day basis are, at best, utterly useless, there's
some conceptual things happening to deal with yesterday's threats. (I had a
student in one of my carry classes who is one of the few pilots who can now
carry in the cockpit. Stubborn guy; given the trouble that the authorities
have gone through to make it difficult to qualify, it's not surprising that
there's only a handful who have jumped through the hurdles.) Far too much
symbolism, of course -- the key to preventing airplanes-as-weapons is the
mindset of the passengers, after all. Smuggling a gun on a plane wouldn't be
much of a challenge for anybody with an average IQ and a decent home shop;
strip-searching elderly Norwegian grandmothers suspected of wanting to
travel to Omaha isn't what's stopped that.
Hijacked airplanes are yesterday's threat --
tomorrow's probably includes bombs shipped in airplanes, simultaneous
low-level attacks at high-PR soft targets (I live awfully near the Mall of
America, frex), although probably not a lot of suicide bombers in the US.
The Israeli experience shows that the shahids-to-be need a lot of management
up until they detonate, as a not-insignificant number change their minds if
left alone long enough, and end up ratting out the rest of the cell. But OKC
showed how inexpensive and effective such a thing can be, and the US is
filled with soft targets.
Gun stuff: Minnesota went "shall-issue" this year, and
Missouri and Wisconsin are awaiting, respectively, a court challenge and a
veto override. The big untold story, over the past dozen or so years, is the
changeover from shall-issue laws going from being a marginal thing to a
mainstream one. I don't think that it's being suppressed, mind; it's just
that major news organizations are very East Coastal, and TV in general is
Californian -- the only big states not to go "shall issue" are New York, New
Jersey, and California. The silly "assault weapons ban" shows every sign of
sunsetting next year, and the Democrats, rather than being the party of "gun
control", are combining changing the pitch to "reasonable gun laws", "gun
safety", but, mainly, changing the subject.
On the other hand, all of the other longterm trends
are negative.
Well, so much for 2003. On a professional note, my
Everything You Need to Know About (Legally) Carrying a Handgun in Minnesota
book is in its second printing, and I'm working on the Missouri version, and
probably shortly on the Wisconsin one; Baen reprinted the first Guardians
omnibus, with the second one coming this year; I've got my second mainstream
mystery coming out next year, as well as my honking big fantasy novel (it
takes place several centuries after Mordred supplanted Arthur the Tyrant,
establishing the Pendragon dynasty, splitting the Church several centuries
early -- and for better reasons than the English King needing to get a
divorce -- allowing for even more rapid expansion of the Abassids, although
in different directions) and I'm working on the sequel (definitely a stretch
for an agnostic Jew to be writing from the POV of various sorts of believing
Christian knights, almost all of whom take matters of salvations not only
seriously, but important on a day-to-day basis).
And, with that, once again, a Happy New Year to you
and yours,
--------------------------------------------------
Joel Rosenberg 612.824.3150 AACFI-certified Carry Permit Instructor and
Certifier BCA-validated Minnesota Carry Permit Instructor NRA-certified
Range Safety Officer, Pistol Instructor, Home Firearms Safety Instructor,
and Personal Protection Instructor http://www.ellegon.com/homepage.phtml
=================================
Last day or so, reference was made to McNamara -giving
us the F-11 aircraft, it was actually the F-111, by General Dynamics. I may
be one of the few to have worked them both- the F-11 in the Navy, mid 60's,
when they served as training aircraft in the Naval Aviators training
program. As designed and used they were quite decent, short-legged but
decent. Then after retiring in 1986 I have worked as an Equipment Specialist
for the Air Force- the first aircraft was the F-111 in several variants
including the EF- Raven version. They were always worthy of any scorn heaped
on them, some versions could perform their mission, but always at a huge
cost in logistics-both human power and material assets. I have always
considered that McNamara probably kept us from several incremental but
effective upgrades of then current aircraft, and possibly a new one or two
by diverting brainpower and $$$ into the F-111, which was never quite given
a name, other than 'Aardvaark'. Given the situation to return via a time
machine to have to work on either- I would pick the F-11 Tiger with no
hesitation. Hugely enjoy your website.
Thomas Cantrell
Misprint. I worked on the Boeing TFX proposal
(which became the FB-111) and we used the TFX affair in The Strategy of
Technology as an example of what's wrong with "systems analysis" and the
figure of merit fallacy.
The F-111 eventually became a reasonable
interdiction/recce-strike aircraft after many modifications. Did it
never have a name? I had forgotten that.
==========================
Joel Rosenberg is moved to say more:
Argh. Joanne Dow's tirade makes me
want to write something more....
To whit:
I'm not at all sure that I buy into your view as to
how significantly energy independence would be able to allow the US to
withdraw from dangerous foreign involvement. Absolutely, it would let the US
get out of supporting the Saudi entity; I'll accept, at least for the sake
of argument, that it would let the US stop paying both Israel and Egypt for
Egypt not attacking Israel. The big one, though, would be the ability to let
the Gulf go its own way, and that would be a good thing.
Still doesn't solve the nuclear proliferation problem,
though, and that's both heating up (North Korea, Iran, Pakistan, India,
Israel) and cooling down (Iraq, Libya). Deterrence only works for those who
will be deterred, and it's a two-edged sword. If the Really Terrific Leader
were to roll south into South Korea, grab it, and announce that any attempt
to expel his troops would be responded to by letting ICBMs fly, would the
President throw US forces into that pot? (Assuming that there are US forces
to throw in.) Hell, would it have been rational to escalate if the Soviets,
back when there were Soviets, were to roll through the Fulda Gap over the US
divisions there? It was certainly rational to persuade the Soviets that we
would, but would it have been rational to actually do it? (I'm not sure,
either way. Not something to forget about; we may still be dealing with an
expansionist Russia during our lifetimes.)
And there would still, even absent oil issues, be
people who would be willing to throw US troops at genocide in the Balkans --
me, for example -- or in Somalia (not me; I'm not happy about it, but I've
come to the conclusion that Kim du Toit is right about Africa). Or, perhaps,
at a North Korean invasion of the South. (It's hard to argue that the South
Koreans and Japanese wouldn't be willing for the US to throw troops at a NK
invasion of SK.)
The big win of energy independence would be, well, the
energy independence. The supplementary benefits -- like telling the House of
Saud to go ahead and drink their oil -- would, it seems to me, be just
lagniappe. I don't think we'd be seen as inconsequential as Canada, even
minus our huge military and huge involvements damn near anywhere.
As to domestic terrorism, it's clear that my 20-20
hindsight is as good as such things are, and that, so far, the much-vaunted
Arab outrage seems to dissolve in good jobs, Big Macs, and . Whether it's
Arab immigrants, or domestic White Separatists, the authorities are
demonstrably effective, most of the time, at rolling them up. It's largely,
I think, a matter of paying attention. The real hard terrorists to find are
folks like the Unabomber -- unconnected, untalkative, and more interested in
killing his chosen targets than anything else -- or the DC snipers would
have been, if they'd been more interested in continuing to murder than they
were in trying to get a $10 million dollar payoff; it wasn't the killings
that rolled them up -- it was their insistence on communicating with the
authorities.
Truth is, we live in a vulnerable world. Not exactly a
new thing, but it's a new realization for a lot of folks, and it is
something that we're just going to have to live with. Melioration through
energy independence is, IMHO, a good idea, but it's not the cure-all (not
that you've said it would be; that's a caricature of your position, not a
characterization), as there isn't any.
How to handle Iraq, obviously, something that
reasonable people can disagree on. But the issue shouldn't, it seems to me,
be Ms. Dow's how-should-we-feel-about-it , but
if-we-do-this-or-don't-do-that what are the costs and benefits?
As to terrorism, that's simple, whether we leave Iraq,
stay in, or (some magic required:) turn it into the world's first Arab
democracy: we're just going to have to learn to live with this horror.
--------------------------------------------------
Joel Rosenberg 612.824.3150 AACFI-certified Carry Permit Instructor and
Certifier BCA-validated Minnesota Carry Permit Instructor NRA-certified
Range Safety Officer, Pistol Instructor, Home Firearms Safety Instructor,
and Personal Protection Instructor http://www.ellegon.com/homepage.phtml
Precisely: little will make us safe. But do not
underestimate the difficulty of recruiting suicide bombers who are willing
to stay focussed long enough to come to the US and do their mission. It's no
so easy to get people to do such things.
And I still say we are important in Europe and the
Middle East because we are there; were we not there, someone else would be,
and that someone else would be the target. Better them than us.
Regarding intervention in Bosnia, last time I
looked that was Europe, and the whole thing was a territorial dispute in
Europe, and we were warned that getting involved in those would be costly
not only in money but in our liberties.
Liberty shrinks in war time. Always. And it is
seldom all given back. I would say never, but someone may think of an
example in which the population of a republic which won a war had as much
freedom after that war as it did before it. I suppose put as baldly as that
someone will think of an example, but I see none offhand.
Regarding the mention of Africa,
see below.
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