Eight Million Ways to Die

The neighbor ... shot at the dog from an upstairs window
 with a bow and arrow. 
The dog’s owner ran back into his house 
and came out with a Walther P-38,
a World War II souvenir.
The neighbor also ran outside with his bow and arrow,
and the dog’s owner shot him dead 
--Eight Million Ways to Die, 
Lawrence Block 

In modern war ...
you will die like a dog for no good reason
--Ernest Hemingway

He who has a why 
can bear any how
--Victor Frankl

______________________

Recently, we participated in a local initiative of our mayor's office, a community dinner called "The Longest Table". It actually takes place around a lot of 6-10 person tables at venues throughout the city. The purpose is to allow community members to voice their opinions on various topical matters, and to enjoy a civil evening of hopefully provocative sharing.

Last year was our first in attendance, and each table had its own monitor to facilitate discussion and note commonalities and differences. Sadly, this year's event was more of an ad hoc affair, and lacked that direction. (Perhaps because our Mayor Gilllum's office is currently involved with an FBI investigation.)

As a result, it was interesting to see how opinionated and righteous people can be, sans helpful direction. However, most people are not professional mediators, thus can be forgiven their indiscretions.

Moreover, in today's wired world, it is a small blessing when people actually unwire from their 24/7 media feeds in order to communicate face to face. That said, the comedown in empathy was palpable at the event. Mostly, participants opted out of dialog on anything of any import, probably because they know how quickly fever-pitch would be attained.

At our table, discussion was opened by a self-proclaimed former service member who began the usual rant regarding the badness of our current president. No one took the bait, to their credit.

But Ranger did engage with the man's second concern regarding societal violence; particularly, youth crime.

Ranger observed that extreme and life-like violence was a part of many young people's lives on video and computer, and that when young minds are bathed in this toxic brew there must be some causal relation between time spent and exposure to this extreme violent depictions, and possible anxious, anti-social or violent behavior in the consumer.

A young woman, a recent college graduate, insisted there was no research to prove such a linkage. Since we had no data before us, further speculation on the topic was D.O.A.

But let us consider the matter further here. Has the opposite been proven?

Is there research showing that prolonged exposure to violent media produces sound mental health and a sense of equanimity? Perhaps, it facilitates calm and reasoned thinking?

Shy of that, is there any proof that there is no effect from repeated and early exposure to such violent images and sounds? Have we even lived this "lifestyle" long enough to have a meaningful longitudinal study?

Everyone's favorite traveling protest show --the Parkland (FL) student marchers -- are  weekly  calling for a ban on and confiscation of all semi-automatic rifles. This would mean that 100-year-old rifles would be confiscated to quell the emotional demands of the teeny-boppers and their elder fellow travelers.

Okay. So we ban semi-auto rifles. What then about semi-pistols? Does this ban extend to our police? Or do they remain as armed and dangerous as a U.S. Army rifle platoon?

Let us not be goose-steppers here at Ranger, and take our collective heads out of the ground of public boilerplate.  

To wit: Toronto and London, both sites of recent terrorist killings, have draconian gun control laws. Yet the criminally crazy may still murder and maim en masse.

Just rent a van and mow them down. No aiming, no choosing a good site position. Sure, it lacks finesse and is as brute as murder can be.

But dead is still dead, whether via a slug from an elegant Walther PPK or under the tires of a moving van, dead like a dog in the street.

Outlawing any class of individually owned firearms will not stop the killing. While Ranger is not an NRA member, he acknowledges the correctness of their position that Americans are not crazed killers, and the U.S. citizenry is not the enemy.

When one is intent on committing an act of mass violence, the means for doing so are manifold. Remember that the last 16 years of war began with the commandeering of another means of of conveyance, the airplane, to kill thousands of people. There was no move to ban planes.

Banning semi auto or black rifle clones will not eliminate the problem. There is no simple solution to these episodes of violent crime.

We have a puritanical history, so banning things that can be abused always seems like a good idea. (Though it is odd that Democrats like this approach, as it has such a patriarchal, Big Brother overtone.)

But the holes in this argument to ban-as-solution are so big you can drive a truck through them. Our own Temperance movement and the subsequent 18th Amendment (and it's subsequent repeal with the 21st) is a good example. If you want it and cannot buy it legally, you will get it another way.

In addition to alcoholism, obesity in the U.S. is a huge problem today. Big Pharma must love the profits, but the medical system is weighted down caring for the manifold illnesses consequent to a life spent in a state of Type II obesity-triggered diabetes.

So how do we change this poor behavioral pattern of overeating bad food choices?

Do we ban sugar? If we did, there are substitutes in defilade which still trigger the insulin response, and which would probably produce even worse bodily results.

Remember the Good Thing that liberals espouse, namely, that we are one world and irrevocably interconnected? If isolationism is not a good, and not even possible, then how can a ban on transnationally available goods work?

And yet, for a determined person, banning things within our borders begs only the simple question: how then do we get it here? Whether it is a moonshiner or an importer, someone will gladly oblige, if the price is right.

How does a waiting period to take possession of a legally-purchased firearm a measure that improves our security posture?

A resourceful mind can weaponize many objects. With any will, there is a way. Therefore, limiting access to discrete objects are not where the solution is to be found.

Guns, knives, planes, trains and automobiles are not the problem we are addressing when considering the problem of mass killings.

Daeshing

--Gangster State,
Arend Van Dam 

Everybody talks about a new world in the morning
A new world in the morning so they say
I myself don't talk about a new world in the morning
A new world in the morning that's today
--New World in the Morning,
Roger Whitttaker 

Pity the nation divided into fragments,
each fragment deeming itself a nation 
--The Garden of the Prophet,
Kahlil Gibran

______________________

The commentariat is full of banter about the nature the Islamic State (IS), its structure, motivations and use of terror tactics, the latter of which violates the Rule of Land Warfare.

Be that as it may, how have their actions differed from those of Lawrence of Arabia in World War I? As the differences are minimal, why is IS so exasperating to our Western sensitivities? No one cared about the atrocities under Lawrence because they were killing for us.

One obvious difference is the destruction of antiquities being conducted by IS. To them, however, it is not a desecration. Instead, it is a destruction of blasphemous relics, and by way of the destruction an eradication of the blasphemer, and isn't that the Roman way of war?

Mainly, the atrocities matter to us when they are conducted against us.

That is the difference between an ally and a terrorist.

That's All Folks

 The blundering history of the human race
is always given coherence by power elites
and their courtiers in the press and academia
who endow it with a meaning and coherence it lacks.
They need to manufacture national myths
to hide the greed, violence and stupidity
that characterize the march of most human societies. 
--Our Mania for Hope is a Curse, 
 Chris Hedges 

I shouted out,
"Who killed the Kennedy's?"
When after all
It was you and me 
--Sympathy for the Devil,
 The Rolling Stones 

The people who burned witches at the stake
never for one moment thought of their act as violence;
rather they thought of it as an act
of divinely mandated righteousness.
The same can be said of most of the violence 
humans have ever committed 
--Violence Unveiled, Gil Bailie
 _____________________

For the Ralph Peter's crowd, the Phony War on Terror (PWOT ©) is a legitimate given, not to be questioned or deconstructed. As he said with the manly swagger of the armchair FOX warrior in a recent NY Post piece, "Sorry folks, but that's war (it's not dainty)." His view complements that of people like Mr. Rumsfeld who saw democracy in the rubble (war smells like democracy in the morning?)

But the United State's actions in Afghanistan and Iraq defy the logic of war. The actions of ISIS in the region make more military and political sense than anything exhibited by U.S. policy to date.

The purpose of war is to achieve a peace. The PWOT © has not in any instance led to peace. Military violence -- whether theirs or ours -- is not war, but simply violence unrestrained, unjustified and lacking an achievable strategic military goal. This violence is merely criminal activity.

The media shovels us the "Good News" when the Iraqi forces (or some semblance of them) "regain territory previously held by ISIS," as though the conflict was about terrain. What it is about is a millennial struggle within Islam for hegemony of the combatants, the different stripes of Islam.

The violence in Iraq and Afghanistan is not about terrain or body counts [though body counts are de rigueur again, thank you Mr. McNamara.] It is about which side is the true and divine representatives of their god here on earth. 

That is pretty simple and, if true, U.S. participation in the rodeo violates our core belief in separation of church and state for as members of Western society we are not supposed to kill for religious reasons. That behavior is so Middle and Dark Ages.

So why is the U.S. funding and conducting military violence to support sectarian violence?

If we fail to confront this basic reality, we are doomed to live our military and political lives as if they were violent video games, which is but a poor simulacrum of real life.

[cross-posted @ milpub.]

Mission and Objective

 

--War, Agony in Death, Hans Burkhardt (1939)

 Chaos, control. Chaos, control. 
You like, you like? 
--Six Degrees of Separation (1993) 

Sometimes you're better off dead 
There's gun in your hand and it's pointing at your head
You think you're mad, too unstable
Kicking in chairs and knocking down tables 
--West End Girls, Pet Shop Boys

War is the spectacular and bloody projection
of our everyday life, is it not?
--Think on These Things,
J. Krishnamurti
_____________________

The terms "mission" and "objective" are easily confused, especially since the military uses them interchangeably. But they are different words, y'know, with different meanings.

The common reaction to the Islamic State (IS) in the Middle East is emotional and unfocused. If the United States intervenes with a greater military air campaign, then this would be the mission. However, the objective of the mission remains unstated.

Since 1898 the U.S. has used violence in the objective of winning wars. Today, we have substituted generalized violence as an objective, sans mission. We use violence and bombs to force our will upon the enemy, but the bombing campaign has no significance or national purpose without a quantifiable and reasonable objective.

Today violence is both mission and objective, sans any achievable and delineated objective. However, reactive vindictiveness is neither a military concept nor an objective.

Assuming that following the bombing campaign these countries roll over -- then what? Have we not learned in 120 years that, while violence can force people to bend to our will, the effect is always short-lived? Violence does not necessarily produce long-term stability (unless that is a desire of the subdued people.) So is the resultant temporary cessation of violence worth the outlay (in manpower, lives and money)?

If U.S. national policy now relies on bombing campaigns, that is somewhat akin to using assassination as a political tool. Without a plan, we have become the violence, and are merely a participant in the relentless destruction. 

We live in a violent and troubled world, and should ask how our actions are helping to mitigate or contribute that violence.

Violence is a dead-end unless a greater good is the mission.

[NOTE: Neither we nor Krishnamurti are saying "the West is to blame for all of this." The burden of the violence within is harbored by all. The only difference is in the outward wealth accumulated by the players.]

Terrortory

I am a cautious bureaucrat, attended by a fanatical warrior,
fighting for the freedom of my blood, which is my birthright
--Adolf Eichmann

You've got to accentuate the positive
Eliminate the negative
And latch on to the affirmative
Don't mess with Mister In-Between 
--Accentuate the Positive, Johnny Mercer

They tried to make me go to rehab,
I say, "no, no, no"
--Rehab, Amy Winehouse

__________________

The think tank RAND Corporation has identified the problem in Iraq. Could beefing up the Iraqi Army's self-esteem keep them from dropping trou and running? RAND analyst Seth Jones says, "It's just an open question right now whether morale has improved significantly." (Cue up Bing Crosby singing the Johnny Mercer hit in blackface.)

But how to accomplish this squidgy task? Send them to a Dale Carnegie seminar? Perhaps an Oprah This is Your Life Weekend? Prescribe reading Dr. Phil, or have Tony Robbins deliver a buck-up talk? In a world where the U.S. Secretary of State Kerry gets frisked before entering a conference with Egyptian officials, perhaps it is time for a new motto for the 99 percenters: "We Are Rodney Dangerfield" (he of the "I can't get no respect" shtick.)

Perhaps the slippery slope which brought us to this point is when everyone started getting a gold star in elementary school -- "everyone's a winner" (except, that is not how the world works.) Gone were the red, blue and silver stars which slotted a preschooler as an average -- or slightly below -- performer. So it was inevitable that today's think-tankers see the problem with the Iraqi Army as being one of "low self-esteem".

In addition to the "I'm OK, You're OK" school came the calls to identify and purge bullying (as though it were possible to re-engineer human predilections in a generation.) Through the bullying periscope -- the "bullyscape" (?) -- the logical response is given by NYT columnist Roger Cohen in his recent "Here There Is No Why": Islamic State represents the counterhuman. The human has no alternative but to fight back.

Here is an otherwise intelligent man feeding at the trough of pure emotion. Of COURSE the members of the Islamic State are human (though their behavior be repellant to most modern Western minds.) Human, all too human.

As Rep. Alan Grayson wrote recently, You Can't Defeat Somebody with Nobody.

[excerpt]:

"(Y)ou acknowledge that the government of Iraq is unable to control its own territory, which is the most basic function of any national government. Under the auspices of the UN and the Arab League -- both of which have already authorized military action against ISIS -- you then assemble an international Sunni fighting force and deploy it against ISIS.

Now, let's suppose that the neighboring Arab League countries refused to provide such a force. What does that tell us? Why should we defend them, when they won't defend themselves?

But that's unlikely, because three Sunni Arab countries already have said that they would populate such a force, and with prodding from the United States, more would join. That force largely would consist of soldiers who speak Arabic, who look like the Sunnis in Iraq and Syria, who understand the religion and the customs, and who would not be regarded by the locals as invaders. Unlike the Iraqi Army, they have responsibilities other than cashing paychecks and looting from the locals, and they would be able to keep their own casualties down to what modern military forces view as acceptable levels.

That is how you defeat ISIS.

Meh, maybe. But really, it is not our job to defeat ISIS. ISIS will do as ISIS does in its own neck o' the woods. The concern of the United States is to protect its own territory.

Staunch the bleeding here, and do not even think to proselytize for democracy elsewhere, for that is fascism, too. A people come to democracy or not. One man's meat is another's poison. Let the people of the region duke it out for themselves, as we did in our Civil War. The land claimed by Al-Dawla Al-Islamiya fi al-Iraq wa al-Sham, or the Islamic State of Iraq and al-Sham, is neither ours for the taking, or reforming.

Improving the lot of our own is Job #1.

Which Way is the Front Line From Here?

--WSJ Breakfast Briefing w/ 
Sebastian Junger

 Third boxcar, midnight train
Destination...Bangor, Maine.
Old worn out suits and shoes,
I don't pay no union dues 
 --King of the Road,
 Roger Miller
___________________

"Happy Birthday!" cried the four old grandparents as
Charlie came into their room early the next morning.

"Charlie smiled nervously and sat down on the edge
of the bed. He was holding his present, his only present,
very carefully in his two hands.
WONKA'S WHIPPLE- SCRUMPTIOUS 
FUDGEMALLOW DELIGHT, it said on the wrapper."
--Charlie and the Chocolate Factory,
Roald Dahl
___________________

[Happy Birthday, to me.]

Mr. Junger has created a moving homage to his friend and fellow film maker, Tim Hetherington, in his Which Way is the Front Line From Here? screened yesterday at the third annual FSU Student Veteran Film Festival.

I see his film Restrepo differently from Ranger, however. The  documentarian's hand was subdued but quite visible in scenes like that of the flummoxed village elder before a Capri Sun drink packet; the frustration of the Captain with the tribal elders he felt were misleading him, and the relentless view into the soldier's faces as they appeared many leagues away from the camera's lens. As Junger said yesterday, the role of the film maker is not to tell you what to think, but rather, what to think about.

The relationship of Mr. Hetherington and Mr. Junger to the wars they covered is complicated, as they say. Mr. Junger's book War covers some of this ground. He looks at war from a sociological viewpoint, and seems most fascinated by the connections between soldiers and the even finer interstitial zones therein. He explained why soldiers miss war in an NPR interview, arguing that understanding is key to their successful reintegration into society.

Hetherington, who died from a mortar round while covering events in Libya in 2011, shared Mr. Junger's interest in the group dynamics of the men who carry out the war policies of their nation or tribal affiliations. In one outtake from the film, Restrepo, Hetherington had labeled that rocky outpost stripped of any civilizing luxuries as a "Man Eden", and we hear a voice over saying that regardless of a man's status or achievements off of the COP, if he's not shoveling sand into a HESCO, he's nothing. There is no "man-caving" to compare to the adrenaline of battle.

While Junger admits this, he said he decided to stop covering war within the hour of hearing of Tim's death. He says that he and Hetherington understood that by the act of documenting these tragedies, they were also playing a part in them. Though both had a goal of understanding how and why men commit these atrocities, they realized that they were at once outside of the action and yet also somehow complicit.

Perhaps Junger understood that though there would always be a new conflict to record, it would simply be a reiteration of the same actions in a new town, with men wearing different uniforms and perhaps toting different weapons; the urge to war always emanated from the same impulses, the bonds between the soldiers would remain. His work will continue now off the front lines.

In recognition of the freelance journalists who will continue the field work -- often without any sponsorship due to the extreme cutbacks in foreign news bureaus -- he has launched the non-profit  Reporters Instructed in Saving Colleagues (RISC) to help train reporters gratis in basic life-saving procedures. He formed it in response to Hetherington's death, which might have been prevented had someone in his group known basic triage procedure.

Junger's next project involves a cross-country tour of the United States following railroad lines which he took with a couple of ex-soldiers. They lived off the land and gathered perspectives from individuals encountered along the way vis-a vis war.

We wish him luck in his continued endeavors to reveal and heal fractured peoples.

Violence is Here to Stay

--Lisa and Paul

_______________________

[Ranger has lots of meaty posts regarding recent events ... but as we're on the road for the holidays, posts will be meted out in a helter-skelter manner.]

Today, we enjoyed lunch with Ranger's friend Paul Longgrear and he shared his thoughts on the most recent shocking (sadly, no) school shooting.  What follows are Paul's written thoughts on the matter:

The evil, demonic-inspired massacre at the Newtown elementary school is a terrible thing, but we can prevent it from happening ever again.

Am I angry about all those dead kids? Yes, and I want a real solution.  The question is, do we want to prevent the next occurrence?  Do we want to protect innocent children and their caregivers?  Do we want them to come home unscathed at the day's end, or do we want to keep an assault rifle out of the hands of an evil nutcase?  The two are not commensurate; the first is almost 100% doable; the latter is not.  While the matter is juggled as a political hot potato, more lives hang in the balance.

In the 1950's and 60's Muslim terrorists targeted Israeli schools and children on field trips.  Yet it has been almost 40 years since the last school massacre at Ma'alot.  The Israeli's attacked the problem, not the origin of the problem. Israel saw the problem as endangered children, not assault rifles in the hands of their enemies.  

They fenced in their schools and stationed armed guards at the gates.  It is embarrassing that we do not have a politician to front this immediate solution.  The guards could be trained soldiers in civilian clothing.  It is not an impossible solution, and is one fairly quickly emplaced.


Pragmatism demands we decide: Do we love our political agenda more than we love the immediate preservation of life?  We can play politics with guns, or protect our children.  We have never been able to ban drugs, so why think we can ban anything?  You can criminalize it, but once people are dead, you cannot make them undead (no matter how many zombie films you watch.)

If you are in the first camp, brace yourself for the consequences of your inaction: decades of violence while "assault" weapons (possibly) work their way out of the system due to obsolescence.

If you want your children safe, petition you elected representatives and declare that you want their schools protected.

--Paul Longgrear, Col. USARMY (ret'd)

addendum:  Paul proposes stationing armed guards outside the school at the exterior entrances. He does not propose placing armed guards in school. LF
_______________

Ranger would add:

We already have metal detectors at most schools, but they are worthless once someone breaches the detector.  We also have Officer Friendlies on the school campus, so the idea of police has already been integrated into the culture.

The next logical step (which does not encroach upon our civil rights but DOES protect our right to self preservation) would be to secure the entrances to schools with an armed guard, either at the entrance or at a remote post.  The logical personnel for this position would be retired military veterans or Homeland security personnel.

Take some HSA personnel out of the airports and put them on-task to do a necessary job -- protecting Americans from their own.  This is the real and present danger ... not frisking citizens who might be carrying more than 3 ounces of shampoo or handing out Ziploc baggies.

Asymmetrical Awards

___________________

The military loves buzzwords like asymmetrical warfare, but often fails to examine the words beyond their simplest, most useful meaning.

If our wars are asymmetrical, then are our soldier's heroism and awards also become asymmetrical? Can asymmetrical warfare produce symmetrical valor and asymmetrical awards for this valor (i.e., medals)? Unlike Napoleon, the U.S. Army does not travel on its stomach but rather upon its awards and decorations. While we do not win many wars lately, but the awards sure do look good.

The Phony War on Terror (PWOT ©) is so insubstantial, unquantifiable and insignificant that the suffering and valor of the fights -- though real -- seem diminutive and illusory compared to symmetrical war standards. While our soldiers are exemplary, the so-called wars and battles are devoid of any meaning beyond the violence.

The awarding of medals for valor rests upon the assumption that the violence has a legitimate purpose. Medals try to reassure us that combat is not the same as a drive-by shooting or a barroom brawl. Our medals add dignity to an undignified endeavor, but one which it is presumably undertaken in order to reestablish some more positive order to society. All combat soldiers understand the undignified part of the equation; the only possible salvation is the idea that there is a larger purpose to the brutality.

A brief trip through past award winners gives an idea of what is being suggested:

Lew Millet led a company-sized bayonet assault against a dug-in and fortified Chinese main line of resistance. Contrast this against Staff Sergeant Robert Miller's death struggle; the substance is lacking (with no disrespect to Miller.)

Contrast Lt. Murray's Medal of Honor (MOH) to Gene Ashley's at the Battle of Lang Vei, or Franklin Miller's in Studies and Observations Group (SOG). Think of Crandall's MOH at LZ X-Ray, or Commando Kelley at Anzio. Think of Sergeant York. Think of the magnitude of these past battles.

Assuredly Lt. Murray met the standard for the award, but the scenario lacked military logic. One must ask: Why are we expending valor for no recognizable purpose?

Compare recent MOH winner SSG Salvatore Giunta to Captain Donlon's award, the first of the U.S. Vietnam War. Think of SSG Basilone on Guadalcanal. If Basilone had caved, the perimeter of a Regiment would have been fractured. One man prevented the collapse of a front, while SSG Guinta saved two men. Again, SSG Giunta acted with courage and valor, but it is a flavorless meal leaving no sense of fulfillment.

Perhaps that is why SSG Giunta was angry upon being interviewed after receiving his award. Perhaps he understood the essential insignificance of the losses his unit incurred, for it is there where he put his emphasis -- on the loss, rather than the gain.

The award is real, but the circumstances are like wisps of pipe smoke in nature.

{SFC Smith's MOH is not mentioned because this was a force-on-force battle on a conventional battlefield, and was not asymmetrical warfare.}

The actions of all of the Medals of Honor from Iraq and Afghanistan pale to insignificance when viewed historically. This is not a criticism of our soldiers but rather of our political leadership which puts brave men in untenable circumstances. It should be noted: All of the awards in Vietnam, Iraq and Afghanistan did not add up (will not add up) to victory.

Valor is too precious to expend frivolously. It is apparent that our soldiers are now pawns and targets in incomprehensible and unjustifiable conflicts, and all the sound bytes and awards cannot justify the non-military complexion of the violence.

[RAW will occasionally re-post relevant entries which received no play during their original postings.
Asymmetrical Awards is a re-post of 12.7.10 entry.]

Big Boys Don't Cry

--Maria Datsykova

Thou shall not kill
Thou shall not steal
Thou shall not take the Lord's name in vain
Thou shall not cause thy children pain
--The Eleventh Commandment,
Collin Raye

Little child, looking so pretty
Come out and play, I'll be your daddy
Innocent child, looking so sweet
I'll rape your mind and on your flesh I'll eat
-- Daddy, Korn

The sexual abuse and exploitation of children
is one of the most vicious crimes conceivable,
a violation of mankind's most basic duty
to protect the innocent
--David Walsh

Children are the world's most valuable resource
and it's best hope for the future
--John F. Kennedy

But Jesus said, Suffer little children,
and forbid them not, to come unto me:
for of such is the kingdom of heaven
--Matthew 19:14
__________________

I know four men who were sexually assaulted when they were young.

Four, and I do not that many people intimately. I am not a counselor, nor have I ever solicited such information; how could one? Yet it is true: four men have confided in me of their abuse at the hands of relatives, headmasters or other trusted adults. Their response varies from melancholy and confusion to fury. Some have married, some never will. For each, it is a heavy burden.

It is unforgivable to break the innocence and trust of a young person via sexual exploitation -- to my mind, it is one of the highest moral offenses (ignoring the criminal aspect.) We all get to feel the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune soon enough, but sexual exploitation corrodes straight through to the core of a young person's identity. It can never be set aright, though one can hope -- if the victim is fortunate enough and resilient enough -- that the accretion of a lifetime of compassion may help eventuate some measure of healing.

In my limited experience with these four, they are the more sensitive and thoughtful among us; probably, they were the more trusting. All the more pity their abuse.

Poseur "Bishop" Eddie Long -- self-proclaimed imperfect man and accused child molester -- is back in the news last week after taking a sabbatical from his post at the mega church Atlanta New Birth Missionary Baptist after his wife (who held a position at New Birth via "divine ordination") filed for divorce. Apparently the divination decree did not extend to her marriage vows.

People like Mr. Long cannot earn a seat hot enough in hell, IMHO. Long, married father of four, settled in a non-disclosure agreement in May with five young men who accused him of sexual coercion, and though "[d]etails of the settlement were to be kept secret, people with knowledge of the case have put it at several million dollars paid over a period of years".

One can only be re-born so many times. A suggestion for Bishop Long's next incarnation (if not an incarceration based on new embezzlement charges) would be as a Gospel Clown, doing a perpetual atonement schtick before any ministry willing to listen to such a fraud. Not very funny, but one thing Long is eminently qualified to do.

Equally vile is the unfolding case of Ex-Penn State coach Jerry Sandusky and the now dozens of sexual abuse charges he faces. Many of the young men Sandusky is accused of assaulting were predated upon over a period of years and were procured via his Charity, the Second Mile. Complicit in the tragedy are police, university administration, probably Sandusky's wife, and many others.

How can this happen? Surely some of all of these people subscribe to a religion and presumably believe in the protection of the flock, no? Some say in the case Sandusky, it is a cabal of secrecy which surrounds profitable athletic programs. For those in the employ of the church, they have a ready-made cover.

But really, the issue is power. Children have no voice, and especially children of need. Layered upon that is guilt, and a sense of shame and culpability, and you have victims who nicely feed into the cabal. Shame may be one of bedrock human emotions, one not easily extinguished.

Oh that the perpetrators were able to access their own sense of shame, and minister to it accordingly, as only an adult is able to do. Until they do, the repercussions of violence and assault eddy outward. And we continue to feign naive shock when we hear of the latest shipwreck as we plod on the endless march of stupidity, cruelty and idiocy that is the worst of what we call a life.

If we cannot extinguish cruelty in a personal transaction, we will not be able to halt it on a more universal level. Thinking of the multifold abuses that occur in the silence of the church, one wonders if religion enables poor behavior by facilitating or accommodating our primate nature. Through the Confessional, indulgences, prayers and baptisms, one gets a sort of endless mulligan.

But what if there were no do-overs, and one could only sit in the welter of whatever it is they thought was a good decision at the time? What if one did not have recourse to some kind of divine or cosmic forgiveness, and one was stuck with the reality of his actions and the repercussions upon those whom he acted. Might that change our impetuous, self-gratifying nature? Is conscience capable of rising to the fore for the average person? Not as long as social institutions hand out free passes for feeble excuses called the School of Life.

Unless one is dealing with a true psychopath, it is usually not hard to find the genesis of aberrant behavior. The Sandusky's and Long's of the world are probably not ex nihilo.

• More than five children die every day as a result of child abuse.²
• It is estimated that between 50-60% of child fatalities due to maltreatment are not recorded as such on death certificates. ³
• More than 90% of juvenile sexual abuse victims know their perpetrator in some way. ⁴
• Child abuse occurs at every socioeconomic level, across ethnic and cultural lines, within all religions and at all levels of education.
• About 30% of abused and neglected children will later abuse their own children, continuing the horrible cycle of abuse. ⁵
• ^{Almost 500,000 episodes of child sexual molestation are reported annually in the U.S.}
• 14% of all men in prison in the USA were abused as children. ⁷
• 36% of all women in prison were abused as children. ⁷

(U.S. Statistics from ChildHelp.org)

National Insanity

Those who would give up a little liberty
for a little security would lose both and deserve neither
--Benjamin Franklin

This is supposed to be a happy occasion.
Let's not bicker and argue about who killed who
--Monty Python and the Holy Grail (1975)

robot trainers earn their pay
as mutant kids go out to play
it's such a pretty pretty day
with orange nights and days of gray
--Cold Life, Ministry
__________________

Further reflections on the Tucson shooting, our violent culture and rush to abdicate civil liberties, and blindness to the implications of both:

Democracy requires citizen participation in what is already a strained relationship, as the electorate is far removed from the reality of its governance. A probable reactionary security protocol will further isolate the electorate from the elected. The more isolated the voters, the less informed their decisions; the more meaningless the gesture of voting.

To what purpose or benefit are we becoming a security state? Our leaders could be as delusional as the wanton shooters in our midst and we would not know, and the shooters are not some unimagined aberration; they represent the fringe just as the elected generally represent the privileged. There is no solution to this bifurcation.

The U.S. will close the barn door once again. But whatever the reaction, crazies will always breach the perimeter because they are unpredictable and there is no 100% security posture if we chose to remain a free society. If we became secure we would no longer be free. Safe, maybe, but not free. Further, the threat would have to be clearly identified: Safe from what?

The Phony War on Terror (PWOT ©) is supposedly keeping us safe from crusaders, as law enforcement protects us from criminals, but how to protect ourselves from crazies? It seems we will always be vulnerable to crazies, whether they be the lone desperado or entire posses, like the gang in the George W. Bush administration which fostered indefensible invasions, torture, secret prisons, illegal renditions, et. al. Taking this view, the acts of the lone gunman pale in comparison to the institutional insanity to which we are collectively held hostage.

What we sow, we reap. We vote symbolically and get screwed realistically, and we are so distracted and hypocritical we weep for the apparent aberrant violence while giving a pass to the institutional.

The Land of Rape and Honey

One of these days I'm gonna
change my evil ways
Till then I'll just keep riding on
--Ride On, AC/DC

far below original sin
far below the state I'm in
far below malicious crimes
far below her for the time
far below
far below
far below is the place you'll go, ho!
--Revenge, Ministry

Jesus loves the little children
All the children of the world
Red and yellow, black and white
They are precious in his sight
--Everything is Beautiful, Kalb and Stevens

Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to violence,
the word and the act
--Faster, Pussycat! Kill! Kill! (1965)
____________________

Ranger Question of the Day [RQOD]:

Why do we fly the flag at half-mast when white,
well-to-do folks get shot by a gunman,
but ignore shootings in L.A. barrios, Washington D. C. slums
and all the other free-fire zones we call "inner cities"?
Are some deaths more worthy of sorrow than others?
____________________

If the Phony War on Terror (PWOT ©) were real, why do our congressional representatives travel freely and unabashedly among the populace? The lack of security around our Senators and Representatives suggests that foreign terrorism is a conjured bogeyman which gives the military and government something to do and with which to distract the people.

Meanwhile, though terrorists cannot get to our unprotected VIPs, our indigenous crazies can do so with impunity. What is the actual threat when foreign crusaders and criminals cannot outperform our own nut jobs, of which there is no shortage?

Ranger attends gun shows and often comments on the bat-shit crazy philosophy and hatred promulgated by the National Rifle Association and associated groups which subscribe to the Glenn Beck Truth Ministry. The annual NRA convention is a bacchanalia of Right Wing paranoia parading as patriotism, deep-fried in all things red, white and blue.

Yet somewhere between the NRA and Congress reside the bulk of U.S. citizens, but how to define them? Surely most would say we are a peace-loving nation, but since 1847 every generation of Americans has fought a major war. We travel with death and are comfortable killing people, presently raining it down surgically from Predator drones, never shedding a tear or taking a moment to reflect upon the need / needlessness of such actions, but shootings in Tucson sure do cause a lot of wailing and gnashing of teeth.

Soldiers win medals for killing. This archetype is so powerful that even the best-selling video games want a cut of the action. "Medal of Honor" and "Call to Duty", for example, show nothing but unadulterated, unabated violence. How many hours in a day does the average young person spend participating in such spectacles, wielding such ersatz power to destroy? "I oughta kill you" need no longer be hyperbole.

Our entertainment is filled with violent heroes who kill with weapons. Beloved modern directors like the Coen Brothers or Quentin Tarantino show realistic shootings up close and personal. Any attempt to attenuate the violence by calling it Pulp Fiction is lost on the more disturbed, or more determined, among us. When Sheriff Rooster Cogburn vaporizes a guy's head with his trusty Colt 45, this is heroic; possibly a defective mind conflates and mimics this action by shooting a congressperson. If shooting people is heroic in wars, games and movies, then it must be o.k. on Main Street right?

If your tastes do not run to the art house, there is always cage fighting, World Wide Wrestling, boxing and pro football for your amusement. What is the effect upon those whose minds are unable to differentiate between symbol and reality? Our lives are supersaturated with violence, yet we are befuddled when we see people who fail to differentiate reality from fantasy and pop a cap on someone's head.

We have become inured to violence and killing, and are blase to its ubiquity. Of course, other national traits feed these actions: We are fiercely individualistic, praised in some circles for "going rogue" and for "letting it all hang out". We gain too-easy accolades from grade school on up, and political correctness demands "everyone is beautiful, in his own way."

We are a culture of violence. While we can legislate gun restrictions and medicate for depression, we cannot criminalize insane behavior, the latter which seems to be a growth industry in America.

Asymmetrical Awards

_____________________

The military loves buzzwords like asymmetrical warfare, but often fails to examine the words beyond their simplest, most useful meaning.

If our wars are asymmetrical, then are our soldier's heroism and awards also become asymmetrical? Can asymmetrical warfare produce symmetrical valor and asymmetrical awards for this valor (i.e., medals)? Unlike Napoleon, the U.S. Army does not travel on its stomach but rather upon its awards and decorations. While we do not win many wars lately, but the awards sure do look good.

The Phony War on Terror (PWOT ©) is so insubstantial, unquantifiable and insignificant that the suffering and valor of the fights -- though real -- seem diminutive and illusory compared to symmetrical war standards. While our soldiers are exemplary, the so-called wars and battles are devoid of any meaning beyond the violence.

The awarding of medals for valor rests upon the assumption that the violence has a legitimate purpose. Medals try to reassure us that combat is not the same as a drive-by shooting or a barroom brawl. Our medals add dignity to an undignified endeavor, but one which it is presumably undertaken in order to reestablish some more positive order to society. All combat soldiers understand the undignified part of the equation; the only possible salvation is the idea that there is a larger purpose to the brutality.

A brief trip through past award winners gives an idea of what is being suggested:

Lew Millet led a company-sized bayonet assault against a dug-in and fortified Chinese main line of resistance. Contrast this against Staff Sergeant Robert Miller's death struggle; the substance is lacking (with no disrespect to Miller.)

Contrast Lt. Murray's Medal of Honor (MOH) to Gene Ashley's at the Battle of Lang Vei, or Franklin Miller's in Studies and Observations Group (SOG). Think of Crandall's MOH at LZ X-Ray, or Commando Kelley at Anzio. Think of Sergeant York. Think of the magnitude of these past battles.

Assuredly Lt. Murray met the standard for the award, but the scenario lacked military logic. One must ask: Why are we expending valor for no recognizable purpose?

Compare recent MOH winner SSG Salvatore Giunta to Captain Donlon's award, the first of the U.S. Vietnam War. Think of SSG Basilone on Guadalcanal. If Basilone had caved, the perimeter of a Regiment would have been fractured. One man prevented the collapse of a front, while SSG Guinta saved two men. Again, SSG Giunta acted with courage and valor, but it is a flavorless meal leaving no sense of fulfillment.

Perhaps that is why SSG Giunta was angry upon being interviewed after receiving his award. Perhaps he understood the essential insignificance of the losses his unit incurred, for it is there where he put his emphasis -- on the loss, rather than the gain.

The award is real, but the circumstances are like wisps of pipe smoke in nature.

{SFC Smith's MOH is not mentioned because this was a force-on-force battle on a conventional battlefield, and was not asymmetrical warfare.}

The actions of all of the Medals of Honor from Iraq and Afghanistan pale to insignificance when viewed historically. This is not a criticism of our soldiers but rather of our political leadership which puts brave men in untenable circumstances. It should be noted: All of the awards in Vietnam, Iraq and Afghanistan did not add up (will not add up) to victory.

Valor is too precious to expend frivolously. It is apparent that our soldiers are now pawns and targets in incomprehensible and unjustifiable conflicts, and all the sound bytes and awards cannot justify the non-military complexion of the violence.

Bugger All

--Eddie Long, heady with power

I've run a twisted mile
I'm a stranger in the eyes of the Maker
--The Maker, Daniel Lanois

Women are for children, boys are for pleasure
--Afghan saying

Christianity might be a good thing
if anyone ever tried it
--George Bernard Shaw

The only way I can lose this election is
if I'm caught in bed with either a dead girl or a live boy
--Edwin Edwards

... After a few seconds' pause to give muscles, intestines,
anus, rectum, due time to assume their orthodox positions
once again, there invaded him that intimate rejoicing
at a duty fulfilled and a goal attained,
that same feeling of spiritual cleanliness
that had once upon a time possessed him as a schoolboy
at La Recoleta, after he had confessed his sins
and done the penance assigned him by the father confessor
--In Praise of the Stepmother,
Mario Vargas Llosa

And Jesus, when he had found a young ass,
sat thereon
--KJV, John 12:14
__________________

Sunday Meditation: Buggery.

What is it with all the buggery in the media? Though this topic seems sexual in nature, it is actually about power, violence and violation, personal behaviors which parallel war in the macro sense.

We have long read of the offenses in the Catholic church (buggery-cum-pedophilia), and recently a civil suit was brought against the minister of Atlanta mega-church Baptist New Birth, Eddie Long, for sexual offenses against several young men in his LongFellows (stop the chortling) Youth Academy, a story which will probably disappear into a hefty out-of-court settlement.

Aside from his breach of trust, it galls that those who would condemn homosexuality are often among its more avid participants: "In 2004, Long led a march to Martin Luther King Jr.'s grave site in support of a Georgia constitutional amendment banning same-sex marriage" (Eddie Long Isn't Practicing What he Preaches).

Cultural critic Susie Bright says, "One thing that's interesting to me is that even when that hypocrisy is exposed, it doesn't seem to do much to change the minds of their followers." Long likens himself to the Biblical David fighting Goliath. Please! Why when people are outed do they take recourse to cries of persecution? Just because the jig is up doesn't mean you've been persecuted.

When one lives in contradiction, the two paths are feign to join at some point. But for the New Birthers, there will always be a new birth. The lord loves a sinner. It is a win-win. Is there ever a comeuppance?

Long will artfully and remorsefully spin the young men as envious and power-hungry, and himself as an unwitting participant, lured in by youthful artifice. He will wail and throw himself upon the mercy of the congregation, and they, practicing their Christian mercy, will welcome him back, fallen and even stronger. He will wear a black veil for a time, wringing all the drama the situation can bear.

And what of the young men? Their faith and identities shaken by a very powerful, older spiritual adviser? What reward for them? Some paltry monetary recompense, out of court, never to speak of the shameful incident again. And that is how it goes in this great land, with such a magnanimous God and such overflowing plates.

But for men (and women) who have been used in such ways, there is no easy forgiveness, no return to unsullied time. Their abridged faith will always be worn as a rent in their soul -- for how do you undo betrayal?

And then there are the young dancing boys kept by many Afghani men for their hinder pleasures:

"For centuries, Afghan men have taken boys, roughly 9 to 15 years old, as lovers. Some research suggests that half the Pashtun tribal members in Kandahar and other southern towns are bacha baz, the term for an older man with a boy lover. Literally it means boy player. The men like to boast about it" (Afghanistan's Dirty Little Secret).

So American and NATO soldiers are fighting and dying to protect tens of thousands of pedophilic sodomists engaging in what a State Department report called a "widespread, culturally sanctioned form of male rape." And thousands of boys will grow up damaged in the process, with no redress at all.

But like so many Western males on the down low, these Afghan men don't consider themselves homosexual as they claim they do not love the boys. But it is hard to presume they do love their wives.

Why do men bugger other boys and men in secrecy, and yet have women as their societal mates? Surely there is a disconnect here, unless we are willing to say that a man cannot be satisfied with a female mate, in which case the whole argument for biological perpetuation of the species falls flat and man becomes some sort of genetic mutation maladapted for survival.

And William Saletan joyfully reports in Slate that a recent sex study shows more women than ever are engaging in anal sex. He calls it a triumph for variety's sake, and quotes the stat that 40% of women between ages 30 and 40 have tried it. He seems to want to convince us that, um, women really love it. It's not just for paid porno stars, anymore.

But the stat is misleading as it does not equate to continuing experimentation, and only 3-4% of women participate in the practice in any given month. (Saletan later backtracks in his enthusiasm and reports the dangers involved.)

Why the gleeful reportage? This is a factoid, like any other; statistics gleaned from a self-survey, and neither good nor bad. Could it be a back-door way of saying there is nothing too aberrant about buggery, ergo, nothing's wrong about homosexuality? A "look, everyone's doing it" sort of thing? Given Saletan's celebratory presentation, it would be easy to see it that way. Or it's a thumb's up for pornographers everywhere (*wink*wink.)

I don't know how or if this would play into the satisfaction of the men who are coveting their fellow's bottoms. It is just interesting to juxtapose it with the other reality. Do some women consent because it would make them more enticing to certain men, and is that good or bad?

What if some of us really are licentious, libidinous, lascivious pansexual apes? Religion, or laws or whatever hold back the floodgates, but what if we could speak the truth? Maybe those pansexual types could couple up accordingly, rather being "un-gayed" in the Christian camps, ultimately leaving trails of human flotsam in their wake. What if we could admit the truth: That this behavior is not as aberrant as we would like to think.

Homosexuality is a biological dead-end (unless you're into parthenogenesis), so why does it persist? If it were due to only occasional genetic mutations, it would not continue in such numbers. It is because men like Bishop Long here has four kids, in addition to his tangential matings.

For the conservatives, a great way to find out if homosexuality is by choice versus nature would be to sanction same-sex marriage. If no one coupled heterosexually out of family or church obligation, and no offspring ensue, one would presume eventually a reduction in homosexuality's incidence in the population. It is as good a theory as any: If homosexuality is biologically determined, then some gay genes are being propagated through enforced heterosexuality.

A conundrum for the Family Values crowd.