Author: VD

TK writes: Vox,Big fan — read your column every week. This week, man, you’re just wrong. As a ten-year veteran of the Marine Corps (a grunt and a veteran of the first Gulf War), I don’t know where you came up with the notion that “it’s been clear for years that women cannot measure up to the physical requirements of military duty.”If that were the case, then the whole controversy could be solved by requiring all military personnel to take the same Physical Fitness Tests and discharging anyone, male or female, who didn’t pass them.

TK is correct, the controversy could be easily solved that way. And it would be solved by eliminating nearly every woman from the military, if the old Physical Fitness Tests were used. There’s a reason that they were modified and special female versions were developed, after all. As the Center For Military Readiness reported, the tests were modified as part of the Gender Integrated Basic Training program instituted in 1994, involving: “Re-defined or lowered standards, gender-normed scores, and elimination of physically demanding exercises so that women will succeed.”

A few women would pass, the vast majority would wash out. I’d be delighted with TK’s solution, but the champions of women in the military would go ballistic in opposition – that should be all anyone needs to know in order to determine the truth of the matter.

I was pretty psyched to see this cinematic version of the Iliad. But Briseis kills Agammemnon? Are you kidding me? No Cassandra? No Patroclus? A sensitive Achilles, fine, but one in love with his battle booty? I don’t think so.

The arrogance of film directors is simply incredible. You’d think they would have learned something from the massive success of The Lord of the Rings and The Passion of the Christ: stick to the story as closely as you can and you will be hugely rewarded. I mean, face it, directors, if you were really storytellers, you’d be writing novels, you wouldn’t be directing movies.

I watched the making of Van Helsing one afternoon, and Space Bunny and I were cracking up at the ludicrous concept. How on Earth do you manage to go wrong with Dracula, a huge budget and Kate Beckinsale? There are so many great stories out there, and all a filmmaker has to do is embrace and execute the vision of the writer and he’ll likely be very successful. Never have so many been so richly rewarded for so little.

Diana West writes on Townhall: When the White House promised to punish the murderers who sawed off Nicholas Berg’s head, a spokesman said the crime “showed the true nature of the enemies of freedom.” Wrong. Or, rather, not wrong, but vague, and perilously so. It’s not every enemy of freedom who shouts, “Allahu akbar (God is great)!” while committing murder in front of a video camera….pulling the political veil over the face of the enemy is not just a fashionable nod to political correctness. Failing to unmask the brutal face of modern jihad is a possibly suicidal lapse of logic and nerve that has dangerously obscured the wider war on “terror” — which, of course, is the euphemism of choice for Islamic jihad.

I have been arguing for a while now that George Bush is a poor commander-in-chief; while I was initially vilified for saying so, it’s interesting to see how Republican champions of the administration are beginning to have their doubts about the competence of those responsible for the war effort. The rumors now beginning to float of an early pull-out by the occupying coalition are probably nothing more than just that, rumors, and certainly it would be very surprising to see a president admit a mistake of this magnitude in an election year.

There are also some signals that the war is going to be significantly expanded after November 4th. The rumblings of a draft, the three giant bases being constructed in Iraq and Debka’s reports that Germany, Russia and the UK have already signed off on the plan for the next stage – whatever that is. Perhaps the administration has finally woken up to the fact that the jihad will expand as long as the Wahhabists in Saudi Arabia are funding it. The recent onslaught of jihadist activity in Thailand, of all places, proves this.

The biggest blunder the administration has made is not the cynical decision to pretend to engage in nation-building while laying the groundwork for the next stage, (if that is indeed the case), but in foolishly attempting to deceive the American people about the nature of the enemy and the scope of the war. There is no answer that will lead to peace as much as we might want it.

There are two choices. Retreat to Fortress America, root out the jihadist disease within, get serious about the borders and hope that the jihad will burn itself out as it has before. Alternatively, strike at its heart, then systematically pursue the limbs. Both are real options, and there are serious risks to American rights and liberties on both paths – given the Law of Unintended Consequences, the first path is probably safer, if less emotionally satisfying. Unfortunately, the current administration lacked the resolve to pursue either, and so appears to be caught in a trap of its own making.

Even more unfortunately, the other major party has an even lower capacity for dealing with the challenge. But it would be nice if at least one leader in either party would be willing to address the situation honestly.

Almost two-thirds of 1.6 million civilian full-time federal employees received merit bonuses or special time-off awards in fiscal 2002, according to an examination of federal records obtained by the Washington Post.

I’m sure this profligate system of rewards is encouraging these employees to subscribe to a philosophy of smaller government. As I wrote a few weeks ago, there are both pragmatic and philosophical reasons to object to the renewed Republican embrace of stronger and larger central government.

All names, places, titles, and work related information have been changed for the sake of security and privacy. The following article is NOT a textbook for stealing/shoplifting. The following article IS a resource for all security personnel to use as a means of training and defense against social engineering. I decided to work a short day today so I only had time to make my attempts on two stores. I met the District Loss Prevention Supervisor (Charles) at 7a.m. in Middleville and asked him a few questions before I got started. He told me that he and a few of his plain clothed security guys had done this in the past and one of them held the record in the district for getting out the door without getting stopped with a $400 DVD player. I assumed that it must have been a while since that happened if the price was that high. What I said to him next really peaked his interest. “Man, I’m about to walk out that door with $4000 worth of merchandise and I’ll stop and talk to a cashier on the way out.”

Of course, if this guy was really sharp, he would have first negotiated a deal that would allow him to keep whatever he managed to successfully get out of the store. I was shocked that he didn’t.

Franger writes: Vox your article makes the simple and flawed assumption that since you are a ‘christian’ libertarian, the left does not share your views, and neither does GWB, therefore GWB is left and it is stupid of the left not to realise this. But GWB’s governance is not of the left, it is crony capitalism. As a left/liberal I can realise that GWB doesn’t conform to the ideals of many of his own supporters, but that doesn’t put him in my camp.

I’m glad to hear that the American Left no longer supports a vast increase in federal spending and central government power. It’s wonderful that they are not interested in establishing new federal entitlements. I’m pleased to hear that they abjure the handing over of national sovereignty inherent in LOST. I think it’s great that they are no longer interested in having the US act as the military arm of the pretenders to global governance known as the United Nations. Oh, wait, they do support all that, don’t they….

Granted, the tax cuts aren’t a left/liberal’s cup of tea, but even the secular socialist saint John Maynard believed that taxes should be cut as spending is ramped up in times of economic slowdown. Personally, I suspect that if George Delano would declare that he doesn’t really believe in all that Jesus nonsense and start making overtures to the baby-killing crowd, the left would warm to him in a heartbeat. The far-left only doesn’t like the Iraqi occupation because it is the US who is nominally doing the occupying. Once Iraq gets turned over to the global centralists, they’ll argue that we should be funding it down to our last tax dollar.

And left-liberals are warming to George Bush. They call themselves 9/11 Democrats. They support big government AND war. Gee, that’s a new political paradigm.

Had a good time conversing with the NA crew. I’m a little surprised that there is still such a strong bent in favor of nation-building among the conservative crowd, especially considering that very few conservatives supported the concept in Bosnia when Clinton was leading the charge. I’m not opposed to the goal of expanding freedom and liberty around the world, I’m just extremely pessimistic about the likelihood of success as well as the opportunity cost. This is one of those areas where the Law of Unintended Consequences is almost guaranteed to bite you in the posterior in some manner you’d never considered.

We were more in accord on the women in the military issue, although I’m not sure that some of the guys had really thought about it all that much. Three callers this time, two opposing my view on nation-building and a Navy Persian Gulf vet offering anecdotal support for my contention that women don’t belong in the military.

I’m looking forward to the next time.

One season, 38 games, no defeats. Incredible. And I’m pleased to no end that my favorite player, Dennis Bergkamp, should turn out to be the hero of the final game. Sure, it’s not the Treble, but being the first team to go undefeated in the Premiership since 1889 is an astounding feat of sporting prowess.

2004 Arsenal

26 wins

12 draws

00 losses

73 goals for

26 goals against

From The Nation: Interviews with an array of conservative thinkers and policy-makers reveal a rising disquiet on these matters among people who have spent most of their lives proudly identifying with the Republican Party and the philosophy for which they’ve long assumed it stood. At the root of their discomfort is a feeling not that the Bush Administration is too conservative but that it has forsaken the guiding principles of conservatism–prudence, caution, restraint–to pursue an agenda that is messianic and radical. To these dissenters, it is an agenda that seems less a fulfillment of classic conservative principles than an exercise in hubris reminiscent of the ideological excesses of another era, the 1960s, only with the shoe on the other party’s foot.

You won’t often hear me praising The Nation, but this article by Eyel Press, entitled “Even Conservatives Are Wondering: Is Bush One of Us?” is one well worth reading. I tend to be an early bird and left the GOP years ago, and I fully expect many, many Republicans to join me in exiting the party as it transforms itself into a ruling strong government institution.

It is not uncommon that one’s opponents have a clearer view of one than one does oneself. This article should seriously trouble anyone who still clings to the hope that the president is a conservative. The problem isn’t just that the administration’s agenda is messianic and radical, but that it is a left-leaning messianic and radical agenda. The fact that much of the left doesn’t recognize this only demonstrates how deeply stupid most of it is.

DS writes of Wednesday: What’s your opinion? Today looked like a close well below 10,000 and the 200 day MA. Then off like a rocket. Hadn’t seen that pattern for a while. Perfect straight line. Almost like a computer was doing the buying.

Ah yes, one powerful sign that the rally has lost its steam is that the Plunge Protection Team begins to poke its nose into the markets. While their actions last summer were successful in prolonging new life into the rally – in coordination with the newly low rates – any activity on their part tends to be a nice set up for shorts as we saw on Thursday afternoon and Friday. There is no PPT, officially, but there is certainly a Working Group on Financial Markets. I don’t think they have any hope of staving off a decline, not now, but they can hope to let the air out in an orderly manner.

Mike Hartman of Financial Sense Online wrote: The Working Group on Financial Markets was created for a reason, and I believe we saw one of them yesterday. The Dow looked like it was headed for a 300-point meltdown day, but that couldn’t be allowed to happen for a few reasons. For one, it could have jeopardized our already fragile economic recovery. Second, we are in an election year and third, the U.S. Treasury was right in the middle of their three-day auction to get some badly needed cash to pay back old debt and to finance the growing federal deficit.