Liberty Island - All Blog Posts

Posted Mon Jun 9 2014 11:08

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I had been looking forward to seeing the new Tom Cruise movie Edge of Tomorrow for quite some time.

A couple years ago I came across an un-produced screenplay by a writer named Dante Harper titled "All You Need Is Kill." Based on a Japanese novel by Hiroshi Sakurazaka, it follows the story of 20 year old Private Billy Cage. Cage is drafted into service in the United Defense Forces to fight the Mimics, alien creatures who land on earth hell-bent on eliminating the human race. The Mimics always seem to know where the UDF will attack and the more battles they're in, the better the Mimics get at killing humans.

Cage isn't a good soldier, in fact he's barely trained in how to operate the Exo-suit the UDF infantry use to fight (think Starship Troopers, the book, not the godawful movie). After he's killed minutes into his first foray into combat, a confused Cage wakes up in his barracks the next morning and thinks it is all a dream. Until it happens again. Cage realizes he's caught in a time loop and quickly figures out - like a video game - that the more chances he gets the better he becomes at killing Mimics. During the course of hundreds of loops, Cage transforms into a warrior legend not unlike Sergeant Major Rita Vrataski, the hero of a battle some years ago and now seen on recruiting posters everywhere.

Cage and Rita meet and he soon learns that she was once caught in a time loop like the one he is experiencing. Together they figure out how to destroy the Mimics. They hatch a plan that, at the end, comes down to an agonizing choice. The writing is brilliant. The story, for all its similarities with Groundhog Day, is compelling. There's only one problem.

Tom Cruise can't play a 20 year old Private.

So what happens when one of the biggest movie stars on the planet - ever - wants to play a role written for someone half his age? The script is re-written.

From the first frame to the last, this causes problems. In the opening sequence we learn that the aliens landed in Germany and have since taken control of almost all of Europe, recreating, in effect, the European theater during World War II complete with allusions to Verdun (actually a WWI battle) and the D-Day invasion - the 70th anniversary of which coincided with the film's release. Cruise's Cage is no longer a new recruit, he is a middle-aged Major charged not with fighting the war, but with selling it. We see him on CNN (who watches CNN anymore?) extolling the virtues of the exo-suit and bragging about Rita Vrataski, the "Angel of Verdun". Cage even explains to General Brigham, played by an obese Brendan Gleeson (another poor choice), that he inspired millions of people to join the Army.

Say what? An alien race is attempting to take over planet earth, killing every human being in the process, and you have to convince people to fight them? In Hollywood even the end of the world needs a communications strategy.

When General Brigham orders Cage to "sell the invasion," Cage balks at the thought of physically participating in the war. After a brief blackmail attempt, Brigham orders Cage arrested, demoted, and sent to a line infantry unit with orders made up out of thin air saying he is a deserter.

All of these silly plot points are necessary only because Tom Cruise is playing Billy Cage.

Once he's dumped into a line unit, Cage meets Master Sergeant Farell, played by Bill Paxton. Paxton disappoints in this role, wasting some great dialogue by delivering it as a cheery, smiling, born again Christian stereotype. His role is greatly reduced from the original screenplay, and for that we can be thankful.

After fighting and dying several times - sometimes in comedic ways - Cage decides to find Rita, played exceptionally well by Emily Blunt. The pair, along with a scientist she befriended after her own experience in a loop at Verdun, plot to defeat the Mimic horde. It is here the movie becomes much more enjoyable, especially if you've ever wanted to see Tom Cruise get shot in the head over and over and over again.

But this is also where the movie makes yet another poor choice. Right before killing Cage, Rita tells him that there is only one rule - he must die every day until the Mimics are defeated. She explains that she got out of her loop because she didn't die and woke up in a field hospital after receiving an infusion of someone else's blood.

Movies, it's been said, have to teach the audience how to watch them. We often don't know the rules of the world that's been created, especially one as fantastic as this, and once explained those rules can't be broken without a good reason. Without giving away the ending I'll simply say that the rule Rita lays out isn't followed, and there is no explanation.

There are a few other strange choices in the film - including cameos of both General Tommy Franks and Colin Powell - and in the end not much remains of Harper's original screenplay, likely why he's not credited as a writer. Despite that fact, I found myself entertained for two hours. It's a fun, action-filled movie.

But I've seen this movie before - and so have you. It's Groundhog Day meets Starship Troopers fighting the Sentinels from The Matrix in the setting of Saving Private Ryan. It's Tom Cruise winning the battle, saving the planet, and getting the girl. In 1986 that was the formula for a blockbuster movie which launched his career into the stratosphere. In 2014, it's a formula for a good movie that will largely be forgotten in a couple weeks.

Which is a shame, because the story as originally written had the potential to be much, much more.

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Michael Sheldon

We Remember

Today is the anniversary of D-day and I'm sitting on the back deck thinking about the many things I have to be grateful for.

Posted Fri Jun 6 2014 23:01

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Ellie and I just got back from Hawaii where we spent every day snorkeling--just on the local beach and not some special "spot." The profusion of marine life is extraordinary (the fish seem to like me) and the water is clean. It's hard to see how humans are poisoning the planet.

Back home it's the most perfect evening in Seattle. T-shirt weather, ~~sipping~~ slurping a Dark'n'Stormy, watching Ellie prune her rose bushes. A little piece of paradise.

I have no doubt that I owe this modest tranquility to men of conviction who fought in World War II, and every other battle from the time of the Magna Carta to the ongoing War on Terror. When I say "men of conviction," I don't exclude women. Until recently it was understood that men and women were partners, with women providing the guidance, the inspiration, and the stamina that brought out the best in men.

Over the last three or four generations, that arrangement has shifted--along with the nature of the work that we do. Women took the position that they wanted a leadership role beyond the family. They said, "anything you can do, I can do better"--and that applied to education, business, government, and even the military. And, by and large, men in our culture with Western values and upbringing, said, "That sounds reasonable. Go for it."

It didn't happen overnight. But it didn't take all that long in terms of revolutions. Biology, instinct, nature, culture, history, tradition all had to be turned upside down. Yet it happened with virtually no spilling of blood. This is the most remarkable revolution in the history of mankind. Yet men of the western world get no credit for being the willing partner to this transformation.

Today my daughter is attending college and the ratio is nearly 60% women to 40% men. (In my day, women would complain it wasn't fair because more places were allotted to men; now they say it isn't fair because the competition's fiercer among women, whereas men have it relatively easy.) Studies show that wages are virtually identical when they accurately account for experience levels and other variables. Possibly there's a glass ceiling for women striving for the highest positions in large corporations. But it's a rare breed that's suited for those roles, and are they really that desirable? No doubt this too will even out in time.

Yet in politics we hear that there's a "War on Women." In academia, they teach the One Truth, that everything's the fault of white guys: The patriarchy. White male privilege. In a recent NY Times article, Ross Douthat quotes at length from an abominable screed that includes this sexist slogan: "Traditional masculinity has to die." And we are treated to a movie like Her that shows exactly that--a near future with no masculinity.

I've never understood how people on the left can be so enamored with the Gueveras, Castros, Lenins and Stalins of the world. On any given day you can see someone wearing a Che t-shirt or a Hamas headscarf as a fashion accessory; these are the same people who scorn those willing to sacrifice themselves for our country's values and call them "entitled." I expect these folks will be having a bit less fun when the patriotic men and women are gone and they find themselves "serving" in harems and gulags.

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David Churchill Barrow

Stops Along the Road To Our Well-Ordered Liberty, Part VII

The Boston "Massacre."

Posted Thu Jun 5 2014 18:17

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In the dark, Pvt. Hugh Montgomery could not tell who among the crowd confronting him threw the four-foot long piece of birch cordwood, but it knocked him back and made him stumble in the packed snow. Pain and anger thus mixed with fear and humiliation as he rose, pulled the hammer of his Brown Bess back to full cock, and squeezed the trigger; while at the same time yelling "Fire!" in an attempt to get his comrades to do the same. In ragged succession, half a dozen other muskets went off, each one sending two .75 caliber balls into the assembled citizenry. Four instantly expired, one was mortally wounded and several others were wounded in varying degrees. The Redcoats instantly reloaded and presented, and were only stopped from firing a second volley by their officer, Capt. Preston, who knocked up their barrels shouting "Stop firing! DO NOT FIRE!"

Even before the soldiers dropped their hammers church bells had been ringing, turning out the townsfolk as if to a fire. A tar barrel had been made ready on Beacon Hill (which was called that for this reason) to summon the militia from surrounding towns. Had it been lit, the American Revolution could well have started five years before it did. Acting Governor Hutchinson moved quickly. The balcony of the Townhouse (now the Old State House) faced the crowd, and from there he proclaimed "Let the law have its course!... I will live and die by the law!" The crowd dispersed, probably due more to the news that the soldiers, along with their captain, had been arrested and would be put on trial for their lives before a jury of colonists than to any exhortations from Hutchinson.

Ah, but who could be found to defend these most unpopular clients, and risk the wrath of the crowd themselves? There were a couple of young "legal eagles" bold enough to take a shot at it, but neither of them would do so without a senior counsel of impeccable credentials, not only at the bar, but with the "Sons of Liberty" themselves. That man was John Adams.

Why would HE take such a case, and risk not only his good standing in the town, but his own safety and that of his young family? The high-minded reasons usually given were certainly in play. Adams' legal principles had been marinated in the Magna Carta for over five hundred years, and the Mayflower Compact for a 150 years. (See previous stops.) He most likely knew the Latin of the former by heart: Nullus liber homo capiatur vel imprisonetur... nisi per legale judicium parium suorum vel per legem terre. "No freeman shall be arrested and imprisoned... except by the lawful judgment of his peers or according to the law of the land," even Redcoats. He had other more practical concerns as well. The town of Boston would be on trial along with the soldiers. A defense centered too much upon the acts of the citizenry would condemn the town, but so would some farcical proceeding followed by a lynching, making Boston a disgrace throughout the English speaking world.

Much to the horror of the soldiers, Adams shrewdly separated the trial of Capt. Preston. His would be the easier task. All that needed to be done was to point out that he would've been an idiot - and no officer - to order his men to fire while they were at the half-cock with charged bayonets (i.e. butt at the hip with the bayonet angled forward) and WHILE HE WAS STANDING IN FRONT OF THEM. Did any witness testify hearing the command to present? Umm... no...

The soldiers' trial was where he had to tread lightly. When one of his young proteges was about to introduce evidence as to exactly whom had riled up the crowd in the first place (probably William Molineux, a well-known "Son of Liberty") Adams quickly shut him down. No, no, he argued, the mob was "...most probably a motley rabble of saucy boys, negroes and mullattoes, Irish teagues and outlandish jack tarrs." Clearly not the sort of folks a member of proper Boston society would have to afternoon tea circa 1770. He summarized as follows:

I will enlarge no more upon the evidence, but submit it to you - Facts are stubborn things; and whatever may be our wishes, our inclinations, or the dictates of our passions, they cannot alter the state of facts and evidence: nor is the law less stable than the fact... On the one hand it is inexorable to the cries and lamentations of the prisoners; on the other it is deaf, deaf as an adder to the clamours of the populace.

All but two were found not guilty, and those two were convicted only of manslaughter, with a brand on the thumb as punishment.

The father of modern conservatism, Edmund Burke, was sympathetic to the American colonists because he did not see them as firebrands out to turn the world on its head, as he would view the French. The Americans, he said, were "...not only devoted to liberty, but to liberty according to English ideas and on English principles." And a nation, like the one we would become, "... is an idea of continuity, which extends in time as well as in numbers and in space. And this is a choice not only of one day, or one set of people, not a tumultary and giddy choice; it is a deliberate election of ages and of generations; it is a constitution made by what is ten thousand times better than choice; it is made by the peculiar circumstances occasions, tempers, dispositions, and moral, civil and social habitudes of the people, which disclose themselves only in a long space of time." From such thoughts came the inspiration for this series.

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David S Bernstein

Support Whittaker Chambers Film Kickstarter Campaign

Posted Tue Jun 3 2014 11:23

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"When Edith Murray [his black maid] first sat down to table
with us--and we were the first white people who has ever asked her to sit at the
same table with them--she showed fear, then embarrassment. I will not presume to
say what her final feeling was. In any case, what we had to give her was not a
place at our table. What we had to give her was something that belonged to her
by right, but which had been taken from her, and which we were merely giving
back. It was her human dignity. Thus, by insisting on acting as Communists
must, we found ourselves acting as Christians should."

-Whittaker Chambers,
Witness

With those poignant words, Whittaker Chambers proffered the
best explanation of the socialist impulse--what motivates otherwise intelligent
and well-meaning people to fall in lust with radical and dehumanizing ideologies.
It is, simultaneously, Utopian hopefulness for the future coupled with profound
disillusionment with the present. At its root, though, it is something more raw,
more immediate: the human impulse to be repelled by hypocrisy and cruelty.

If you've ever read the autobiographical Witness, you know
that the book is full of profound insights into human nature, both individually
and collectively. If you haven't ... I urge you to pick it up today (as well as
the definitive collection of Chambers' other writings, Ghosts on the Roof).
Alongside his deep pessimism about mankind's future Chambers presents an uplifting
vision of what we can, and should, achieve.

All of this is prelude to pointing attention toward a
project that is worthy of your support. Liberty Island Contributing Editor Mark
Judge is working on a screenplay of Chambers' life. If you're not familiar, it's
a true-life story worthy of an epic spy novel. We can't think of anyone better
than Mark, who has a terrific visual and literary sensibility, to bring this
project to life. Chambers is someone the younger generation should study if
they are to understand the mistakes we made in the past so we don't once again
fall prey to the temptations of radical socialism.

If you're able, please support Mark's Kickstarter campaign
here: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1818359616/whittaker-chambers-screenplay

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Tom Weiss

Bergdahl

Posted Mon Jun 2 2014 08:59

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Before this weekend, the last time I saw SGT Bowe Bergdahl's face it graced the screensaver of my military computer in Paktia Province, Afghanistan. It was a reminder that the United States had but one prisoner of war, and he had gone missing about an hour away from where I was sitting.

I heard rumors about the circumstances surrounding his disappearance, but never put much stock in them. I was confident the real story would emerge someday, and when it does that story is usually more complicated than the rumor mills suggest.

That may not, however, be the case with SGT Bergdahl. I want to stress that I have no first hand knowledge of him or his disappearance. But two things I've read in the last few days have convinced me that he has some questions to answer. Eventually.

This piece by Jake Tapper gives a very good overview of the argument, including this telling paragraph:

"A reporter asked Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel Sunday whether Bergdahl had left his post without permission or deserted -- and, if so, whether he would be punished. Hagel didn't answer directly. "Our first priority is assuring his well-being and his health and getting him reunited with his family," he said. "Other circumstances that may develop and questions, those will be dealt with later."

What might those "other circumstances" be? This soldier who allegedly served with SGT Bergdahl has an answer. He tells his story in tweets - such is the state of social media today - but once you get past the typos and misspellings it sounds extremely compelling. If @CodyFNfootball isn't the real deal, he's one hell of a charlatan.

Any remaining questions about SGT Bergdahl's actions that morning can be answered very simply. Where were his sensitive items?

A soldier doesn't go on patrol - or anywhere on the FOB/COP/OP - without his weapon or night vision device. There is a common phenomenon among soldiers for a few weeks after they return from combat. Walking around in uniform, you suddenly notice that you don't have your weapon with you - you can't feel the weight, it's like something's missing - and a huge wave of anxiety hits you until half a second later you realize you're at home and you're not supposed to carry your weapon. Then you laugh at how silly you were. This is how deeply the idea of never leaving your weapon in ingrained in you - it stays for weeks after you're home.

If SGT Bergdahl was captured without these items, then his disappearance was a purposeful, planned act. Based on the accounts of his fellow soldiers, along with a tacit admission by the SecDef, this appears to be the case.

The context matters, of course, because a DUSTWUN essentially shuts down all other operations in the area. We do not leave men behind. Dozens, perhaps hundreds of men were either killed or wounded in the search for SGT Bergdahl. And his ultimate release was secured by the freeing of five dangerous residents of Guantanamo Bay.

I want to know why.

The inevitable press interviews and magazine features and book deals will likely focus on his time in captivity - a valid subject, of course - but they should be focused on the chain of events which landed in him captivity in the first place. Why did he walk away? What did he hope to accomplish? What did he accomplish? And having seen the murderous Haqqani network up close for nearly five years, what has he learned?

SGT Bergdahl's father, in an interview two years ago with Rolling Stone reporter Michael Hastings, said "Ethics and morality would be constant verbiage in our conversations...Bowe was definitely instilled with truth. He was very philosophical about perceiving ethics."

We shall see, in the months and years to come, if the son lives up to the father's depiction.

UPDATE: Great article here by Brad Thor. It puts forth another theory behind Bergdahl's disappearance, and also raises a point I'd missed. Bergdahl was held by the Haqqani network, but the terrorists we released were almost all Taliban. Why?

Read the whole thing. There are many more questions that should be answered.

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Tom Weiss

Got my 6?

Posted Thu May 29 2014 16:11

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George Will, in response to a query about how he is able to write so prodigiously, will invariably say that the reason is the world irritates him at twice a week. Perhaps it's my (relative) youth or my naivete, but I don't get irritated nearly that often.

Today is an exception. I came across this story from Breitbart: "Hollywood Vows to Honor Veterans by Normalizing Them in Movies, TV."

On it's face, it seems like there's nothing wrong with this. My formative years were spent watching 80s television and movies, where both the big and small screens were dominated with portrayals of dysfunctional Vietnam veterans. From Rambo to Magnum P.I. to Hawkeye Pierce - who is actually driven insane by the end of MASH - it was hard to find a well adjusted veteran portrayed on screen. I remember being shocked to learn that my uncle had served two tours in Vietnam, because he seemed so, well,normal.

But something nagged at me about the Breitbart article so I decided to check out the "Got your 6" campaign referenced in the piece. I found this, from their About tab:

"The Got Your 6 campaign ensures that [veterans] return home to be seen as leaders and civic assets...Many Americans may not feel connected with military and veteran culture, nor do they know what steps to take to show their respect and appreciation of those who have served our country in uniform."

I have a sneaking suspicion that only in Hollywood or New York City (or perhaps on campus) would there be a need for a campaign like this.

On the way back home from my first tour in Iraq, our plane landed in Bangor, Maine. It was something like 6AM on a Sunday, and the flight crew let us all off to stretch our legs. I didn't expect there to be a soul in the airport but was surprised almost to the point of tears to find about a hundred people, lined up on either side of the jetway, waiting there to greet us as we came home. They didn't need a campaign to tell them to do that.

On mid-tour leave I once flew into Atlanta and was embarrassed by the reception as almost the entire terminal erupted in spontaneous applause as our planeload of soldiers walked through. I don't think any of them had ever heard of Got Your 6.

In San Antonio I was so moved by the support of the local community that I wrote an Op-Ed for the San Antonio Express-News.

I understand my experiences are different than most. Born a military brat I've spent almost all of my life immersed in that culture. If they had a Got Your 6 campaign for actors or journalists I would probably benefit because I think most of them are nuts.

But here's the thing, I think the premise behind Got Your 6 is born of a culture in which John Kerry's 2006 statement (or gaffe, take your pick) rings true: "You know, education, if you make the most of it, if you study hard and you do your homework, and you make an effort to be smart, uh, you, you can do well. If you don't, you get stuck in Iraq."

I also suspect there's a little bit of statism baked into the Got Your 6 cake. They're partnered with the Clinton Global Initiative and the website talks about "building communities" and "continuing to serve."

If the organization does nothing else but reduce or eliminate the "dysfunctional veteran" Hollywood stereotype from the Vietnam era, then perhaps it is worth the effort. But at the same time there are plenty of people in flyover country who would look at this initiative and shake their head, wondering what all the fuss is about.

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Kurt Duncan

"If It's Not Baroque..."

Posted Wed May 28 2014 10:45

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I wonder who came up with serif fonts. I suppose they were inspired by the Baroque period. Baroque is a style in which an object -- art, sculpture, music, rap, whatever -- is adorned with many little doo-dads and hoo-haws to make it look... well... silly I guess. But it's a thing.

So, somebody, somewhere, took a look at the perfectly good Latin character set, and decided it needed some doo-dads and hoo-haws added to it. I suppose they wanted credit for being creative, or artistic, or whatever.

The point is, it was entirely unnecessary. Serif'd fonts are hard to read. Harder than nice sans-serif fonts. Why do we use them, then? Because somebody, somewhere, decided on our behalf, that Times Roman was the font everyone should use. And thus, we all fell into line like little sheep bleating about how amazing the sun is, how green the grass is, and how glittery-special Times Roman is.

And they added it to computers. Computers don't need doo-dads and hoo-haws. Computers need this:

01001001

They can do almost anything in terms of managing data, presenting media, or controlling external devices, using nothing but an amazing array of ones and zeroes (or if you want to be picky about it, circuits which are either on or off). Baroque is simply non-essential for function.

Form, however, is a different story. Computers were boring and dull and hard to use, until they suddenly aquired Times Roman. From that point forward, they were awesome productive engines fueling the creative class, and making the world spin.

All because the characters, translated from ones and zeroes, acquired doo-dads and hoo-haws, and became harder to read.

Why do so many people prefer Times Roman over functionality? I don't know, but I suspect it lies behind the tendency of Liberty-minded people to vote, over and over again, for Authoritarian, Baroque politicians, who simply cannot leave a working system alone without adorning it with useless doo-dads and hoo-haws which look nice, but accomplish nothing.

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Erich Forschler

Elevator Music

Posted Tue May 27 2014 19:31

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In the wake of the unfolding Veteran's Affairs book-cooking scandal, several thoughts float to the top of my cranial soft tissue, riding pulsating waves of vanilla-flavored elevator music. You know, music that sounds like someone tried to recreate the tin-needle ecstasy of an old music box with an 80's model Casio keyboard. See, I had a few experiences dealing with the VA a few years back. Most of my elevator music memories probably stem from waiting on hold with the education department, but that doesn't mean the medical side of things was smooth. I just don't remember which "sitting on hold" marathon came from what. Details.

So, my thoughts float on that elevator music, and two separate bunches of thoughts form two separate memories. And then there's a third thought about healthcare in this country, in general.

The first memory that comes to mind is not from the VA but from my time on active duty. I spent my first two years in the Air Force wandering around southern Wyoming, western Nebraska and northern Colorado. Well, one day I was wandering around Ft. Collins, Colorado, enjoying my weekly day off by going downtown to listen to horrible music in dimly-lit rooms where sweaty co-eds from Colorado State University tried to inspire the primal urges of one another through ritualistic displays of inebriated kinesthetics. Anyway. Before I went inside such darkened rooms I usually chewed some form of mint-flavored gum, understanding that true vanity is a pretty comprehensive regimen. However, one night, the gum was exceptionally sticky, and as I was walking from my car to the bar, said gum somehow dislodged one of the fillings in a back molar. I only have two fillings in there. Never even had a cavity until I was 19. But that's beside the point, I guess.

I called the base dentist the next day to schedule an appointment. It was a little disconcerting to walk my tongue across the back row of teeth and feel a gaping hole where that filling had once been. But the worst part was that the dentist couldn't get me in to re-fill the hole for another month.

A whole damn month.

Then, I finally get in there and the captain who filled it in called me names and made jokes about how little tooth I had left. I mean, that's cool, but usually I had to do something stupid to piss off an officer enough to earn a good peg-knocking. I guess my presence was enough for this lady. Hard to say if she was simply socially awkward or just downright malicious, but the effect was the same. She also seemed to revel in the fact that she could be as abusive as she wanted without fear of any recourse. After all, I was just a lowly airman, and if I called her by the name I had secretly given her in my head I would have found myself standing at attention before my supervisors. I'm sure she's proud of all the teeth she saved now, though.

I also remember my experiences with the VA after separating. On my two deployments to Iraq I was extremely lucky. The worst of my injuries included nagging pains in muscles and joints - nothing combat related. I get tinnitus in both ears. A muscle in my back has been aching ever since 2005, after wearing the vest, plates, ammo, etc., etc., for 12 hours straight. And my wrist has never really been the same ever since something "popped" while loading .50 Cal ammo cans into the back of a Humvee. But I've never filed a claim for any of this stuff. None of it is that bad. However, the VA came into the picture when some other vets informed me that Iraq and Afghanistan veterans could get five years of free healthcare through the VA.

Sweet, right?

Well, I decided to take them up on the offer just in case I could fix my back or wrist problems with physical therapy. The initial appointment was a month out from when I called. No big deal. I go in to a local clinic and talk to a doc for five minutes. I think they drew blood and asked me if I had AIDS and all that. Then I was sent home and told to wait for a notification from the VA hospital in Augusta, Ga. About a week later a letter came: the appointment was two months out. Cool.

The day rolls around and I drive two hours to get to Augusta, sit around and wait a little while despite the fact I had an appointment, and then I finally get seen by the physical therapy folks. The lady was very nice and all that, but she made me squeeze things with both hands and then told me that something was wrong with my wrist. Yeah, like I said. So she sends me to radiology. I waited there for about 45 minutes before getting my wrist X-rayed. And that took less than five minutes.

By the way, there were only a few other people in the waiting room, and they never moved.

And that was it. The next appointment was scheduled four months out. Four months. In the meantime, I was supposed to do the cool stretches and exercises contained on a sheet they printed out for me with cartoon pictures of a guy standing in weird positions. I did the stretches but life is what it is and I forgot about the appointment. When I tried to reschedule, they made it another four months out. That wouldmake it10 months between the initial clinic visit and my first physical therapy session. Needless to say I didn't go back to Augusta.

Granted, my situation was not life-threatening, but it brings me to my third thought:

Single. Payer. Health. Care.

If you want to know how this country would manage a single-payer system, then look no further than the VA or military systems. Everything is a macro-view, devoid of understanding. You are either a "1" or a "0" in some type of spreadsheet or matrix or whatever fancy tools some lowest-bidder contractor pulled out of his nethers and sold to a panel of numerophiles who've never worked a day in the medical world. (This is partly my imagination, perhaps?)The management ethos hinges on questions like, "what is most cost-effective?" or "which does the least amount of political harm?" Seriously, think about it. It really doesn't matter what you or your doctor decide.

The way the system is set up begs for abuse and abusive personalities. I didn't even tell you about the time I had walking pneumonia and the base clinicians said they couldn't see me and diagnosed me with "a cold" over the phone.

"Take some Motrin. Drink orange juice."

Awesome. Never mind the part (and yeah, I told them this) about how I can't sleep at night because I'm too busy coughing up blood. Sure, Motrin and O.J.

Anyone who wants single-payer healthcare needs to consider the reality of the human element. No system can be perfect, and when you create one that insulates the operators within it from liability (like the dentist who knew I had no choice but to sit there and take the abuse), and when it is managed from the perspective of business-suited actuaries who live miles away from the actual patients and doctors, you will end up with a healthcare system just as superficial as that music they make you listen to after asking you to "hold."

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Kurt Duncan

Politically Incorrect Take on Memorial Day

Posted Tue May 27 2014 18:04

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The hot dogs have been eaten, the hamburgers burnt. Tents taken down and washed, paper plates returned to the cupboard. Our nation has dutifully spent its one minute of silence honoring those who gave all for this nation, and we return to our regular lives.

This post isn't going where you think it is.

Dia de muertos - Day of the Dead - is a holiday celebrated in Mexico (and spread across the world), with origins in Aztec civilization, so says the ever-believable (but I sarcast [which is totally a verb - I just made it one]) Wikipedia. Of course, the idea of celebrating the departed is not an Aztecian original. Consider the ancestor worship practiced in the east, or even the practice of visiting the grave of a departed family member. Or consider the most-recently-concluded holiday, conveniently named Memorial Day.

The point is, most cultures (all?) have some tradition of honoring or remembering their dearly departed.

The process of grieving for the departed is different - it is a response to what is (hopefully) a recent event, and it is the subject of a subset of psychology. It is, perhaps, the immediate response to loss, whereas the memorial celebrations are the long-tail release of the reaction spike of grief. They are two related, and common, reactions to loss.

Generally, we expect the grieving period to occur, last a short time, and give way to the memorial period. We grieve briefly, then remember, and honor the memories -- without the grieving part -- for a long time thereafter.

That is how it is supposed to work. Sometimes a person, for whatever reason, gets stuck in the grief. That's where the psychology comes into play.

Now, what does that have to do with the most recent holiday, and how is that politically incorrect?

For the last week, my News Feed on Facebook has been full of admonishments to properly honor our veterans. They are heart-tugging, thought-provoking, and I refuse to link them here. Regardless of the motivations of the various people who dutifully posted, copied, shared, and reblogged the images, the result was to guilt-shame anyone who dared to consider celebrating the holiday with a bit of relaxation and fun.

How dare you enjoy cooking out, when so many people died to preserve your right to do so? And there-in lies a dichotomy, which I think needs addressed.

Consider the various Holidays:

Valentine's Day: How dare you celebrate a holiday which promotes the evil male patriarchy?

Easter: How dare you try to mention anything remotely Christian in polite company? Besides, it's all about a rabbit.

(or) How dare you celebrate by hiding eggs, when the entire Holiday is about what Jesus Did For Us?

Memorial Day: How dare you celebrate and cook burgers (adding carbon to the air) and drink beer, when so many soldiers (sons, fathers, brothers) died on foreign soil?

Independence Day: What are you thinking? This marked the beginning of the evil United States of America (or, how dare you cook out and play games when you should be sombering at the thought of all those who gave their lives for freedom). And don't set off fireworks - they're dangerous.

Labor Day: Cook out? This day should be marked and celebrated to honor the victory of the common worker over evil Capitalists.

Halloween: Don't you dare make light of the totally legitimate pagan religionists. And don't say "ists."

Thanksgiving: No celebration. Instead, spend every day thinking of something you are thankful for. Alternatively, complain bitterly about how the Pilgrims treated the noble savages.

Christmas: Don't even go there. And it was totally stolen fromthe druids anyway. Even though the date was set long before anyone knew what a Druid was.

So, given all of the above, I have one question.

When the hell are we supposed to celebrate?

...waiting...waiting...waiting...

Exactly.

What I am wondering, and I apologize for taking this long to get to my point (no I don't, actually, apologize for it. Deal with it), is whether all those admonishments to forego our celebrations for somber memorials, aren't simply a mild form of psychopathy. Remember, we grieve for a season, but we honor forever.

"Right! Right!" you say. "That's what I mean."

No, that's not what you mean. "It's about this (the dead), not this (the cookout)" has been all over my news feed. And it's wrong. It's about both - It's about honoring those who died, specifically so that we could celebrate, cook out, drink beer, and just generally enjoy the heck out of life. Ask them (if you have a medium handy) -- they'll likely say "Knock it off with the sombering - go have fun - that's why I gave my life!"

I don't mean to discard the ultimate sacrifice given by so many. But I note that they did so to protect Liberty - and among many aspects thereof, these two (aspects of Liberty) spring to mind:

* As mentioned, the Liberty to cook out, eat whatever I want, drink a beer, and enjoy life (try that in many Middle Eastern countries)

* The right, and the privilege, to speak freely to anyone who wants to try to persuade me to forego the above, by posting guilt-shaming pictures to try to make it seem to me (and all my friends) that I'm a bad person if I cook a hot dog.

And so, given the above, my response to all those who have posted the pictures and screeds and posts and tweets:

Go cry in your own pillow. I'm going to celebrate the heck out of every Holiday that comes around. I'm going to cook hot dogs, drink beer, camp out, and just generally enjoy life. I will honor the memory of those who have gone before, but I refuse to curb my own desire to life life fully, and abundantly.

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Tom Weiss

On Memorial Day

Posted Sun May 25 2014 19:12

1 of 1 liked this

Memorial Day is our nation's most solemn holiday. On this day we honor those who gave their lives in the service of our country.

Like every veteran of Iraq and Afghanistan, I have a personal story about far too many of those who made this ultimate sacrifice. Today I'd like to honor one of them.

I first met SFC Johnny Polk in late 2000 at Fort Hood, TX. I was taking command of a M109A6 Paladin Battery in the First Cavalry Division and then-SGT Polk had the confidence - or audacity - to approach me and say he wanted a gun. He wanted to be a howitzer section chief.

For those unfamiliar with a Field Artillery battery, the guns are where it's at. Everyone wants to be on a gun, no one wants to be in support of one. Not only did SGT Polk want to man a gun, he wanted to be in charge of one. Two months later when one of my section chiefs moved to another post, he got his chance.

SGT Polk was a wonderful non-commissioned officer. Mission focused, the word "can't" was not in his vocabulary. He worked his soldiers hard and demanded much from them, but he was always fair. I worked with him for close to two years before I unfortunately had to leave the Battery and move on.

Years later, after leaving Fort Hood but eventually being sucked back into the First Cav, I bumped into now SSG Polk once again. About a month before another Iraq deployment, he walked into my office smiling - he always had a smile on his face. He, too, was back at Ft. Hood and assigned as a Platoon Sergeant in our Headquarters Battery. We reminisced for a half hour before I let him go, and felt confident that our team had just gotten much stronger.

We saw each other sparingly over the course of the next nine months, but I kept tabs on him and the reports were always stellar. He was leading his platoon almost daily on patrols in the streets of Kirkuk, Iraq. He helped to train and mentor the local Iraqi police, participated in operations to detain insurgents, and most of all he gained the trust and confidence of the men in his platoon.

On the 23rd of July, 2009, I got a call. A truck had been hit with an RKG-3. I heard a battle roster number. I prayed it wasn't him.

I made it to the ER seconds after the patrol pulled in. The soldiers were running on adrenaline. Didn't know what to do. SSG Polk was breathing when they brought him in. Now it was up to the doctors and the Lord above.

I had been in that emergency room several other times before, and I'd be there only one more time after. We soon learned SSG Johnny Polk's heart was still beating - he was strong, an athlete, football player - but he was brain dead. An RKG-3 had taken his body. The Lord now had his soul.

After some time the medical staff laid him in an adjacent room and told us we could say goodbye. By then word had gotten out and the line to say goodbye was long. Johnny touched quite a lot of people.

My last memory of SSG Johnny Polk is of him lying in peace, breathing, eyes closed, with person after person walking, one at a time, into the room to pay their final respects. I stood there until I couldn't take it anymore, then I paid my last respects.

His heart still beating - Johnny was strong - he flew to Landstuhl, Germany. I vaguely remember that they were trying to keep him alive long enough so his family could say goodbye, but I don't know if that mission was accomplished or not. Less than a week later I was in Landstuhl myself en route to San Antonio with two broken legs and a broken neck. I have a drug addled memory of someone telling me he was there at the same time I was, but I could be mistaken.

Johnny never wore the rank of Sergeant First Class. The Army approves a promotion request for anyone who has been selected but has not yet pinned on their new rank when killed in action. SSG Polk was to become a SFC because of his outstanding performance and his leadership potential. He was already performing at that level when he died.

He was truly one of our finest Americans, and I'd like to end this tribute to him by quoting the first stanza of the poem "Bivouac of the Dead", portions of which can be found inscribed on placards throughout Arlington Cemetery.

The muffled drum's sad roll has beat
The soldier's last tattoo;
No more on Life's parade shall meet
That brave and fallen few.
On fame's eternal camping ground
Their silent tents to spread,
And glory guards, with solemn round
The bivouac of the dead.

Rest well SFC Polk. We'll see each other again someday in Fiddler's Green.

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