This ain't Hell, but you can see it from here

Author: Zero Ponsdorf

  • For Sunday: Thoughts on The Grey Man

    Much of what is written about TGM has to do with staying under the sheep’s (and LEOs) radar while being prepared to be a sheepdog if needs be.

    If you haven’t heard of the concept here is a great intro:

    The Grey Man is always invisible in plain sight.

    The Grey Man is totally aware of his environs, his own capabilities or lack thereof, his weaponry and his levels of competence with that weaponry. He constantly strives to improve upon both his capabilities and competence. In public, he is always respectful, even to the point of obsequiousness if the situation calls for it. He always appears to be just a little confused by what is happening around him, while in reality he is alertly doing a tactical assessment.

    If the Sheep, Sheepdog, and Wolves metaphor is new to you here’s the canon:

    If you have no capacity for violence then you are a healthy productive citizen: a sheep. If you have a capacity for violence and no empathy for your fellow citizens, then you have defined an aggressive sociopath–a wolf. But what if you have a capacity for violence, and a deep love for your fellow citizens? Then you are a sheepdog, a warrior, someone who is walking the hero’s path. Someone who can walk into the heart of darkness, into the universal human phobia, and walk out unscathed.

    (more…)

  • Irony, Thy Name is Iran

    Many years ago I witnessed an odd thing. A coupla neighborhood kids got into a scuffle. After a few minutes of the usual childish attempts at bluster and mayhem the apparent loser decided on discretion and took off running. Over his shoulder he breathlessly yelled out, “if you catch me I’ll beat the shit out of you”?

    Fast forward…

    A few days ago Iran was threatening our Navy  over control of traffic through the Straights of Hormuz and the Persian Gulf.

    Today we have: Iran thanks US for naval rescue operation

    In a rare display of praise for the West, Iran on Saturday applauded the US’s rescue of 13 Iranians held hostage for weeks by pirates in the Arabian Sea, calling it a “humanitarian and positive” act.

    The rescue operation took place on Thursday by the same US aircraft carrier group that Iran warned not to return to the Gulf.

    Speaking with Iran’s Arabic-language broadcaster Al-Alam, Iran’s Foreign Ministry spokesman Ramin Mehmanparast said that  “we consider the actions of the US forces in saving the lives of Iranian seamen to be a humanitarian and positive act and we welcome such behavior.”

    “We think all nations should display such behavior,” AFP quoted him as saying.

    My emphasis added.

  • Reality Check

    I seem to be at nearly 100% accurate at stating the obvious.

    Well, obvious to most readers here, at least. My only saving grace is that I’ve been doing it for quite a while.

    Aside: I rarely watch videos on-line because I’m on a satellite ISP.  So have probably missed someone already posting this here?

    Got this from MaryAnn on FB.

    Krauthammer: Obama military reforms a ‘road map of American decline’

     “This budget strategy is a road map of American decline,” Krauthammer said. “It is going to reduce our capacity. It does exactly what the president had said he was not going to do, which is it will adapt our capacity and our strategies to fit a budget.”

    One of the premises of the Obama strategy is the notion that the United States won’t be involved in another large-scale ground war. Krauthammer noted that such wars aren’t always planned for.

    “Sometimes a Pearl Harbor happens or an invasion of South Korea or a 9/11. Then ground war is thrust upon you. It’s not as if it’s a choice,” he said. “This is a budget that is going to reduce American capacity. It will make it extremely hard to carry on the role that we have for 70 years.”

    I sometimes earnestly disagree with Krauthammer, but not this time.  On the other hand? YMMV!

  • Another Book I Won’t Read

    Hollywood seems to lack for new ideas; how many movies are re-makes, sequels, or prequels? Our news media (as Jonn notes) certainly lacks perspective and originality as well.

    Us geezer types are often accused of lusting after “The Good Old Days” while the REAL hypocrites like the antiwar crowd, and OWS, are trying to recapture their own imagined “Good Old Days”.

    Rarely is this hypocrisy quite so blatant as in this book (no direct link from me!)

    A review: In “The Operators,” Michael Hastings, the man whose Rolling Stone interview doomed the career of Gen. Stanley McChrystal, offers up dispatches from Afghanistan.

    During the Vietnam War, the generation of David Halberstam and Neil Sheehan transformed America’s mainstream media into a hotbed of antiwar and antimilitary muckraking. By the time a major war effort returned, in 2003, that generation had grown too old to visit the trenches, allowing the emergence of Generation X reporters like Dexter Filkins and George Packer, who did not share their predecessors’ contempt for the military. Most Americans welcomed the change.

    Not so Michael Hastings, as we learn in “The Operators,” his account of events in Afghanistan from 2008 to 2011. Mr. Hastings asserts that this generational change drove him to write “The Runaway General,” the Rolling Stone article of June 2010 that doomed the career of Gen. Stanley McChrystal, commander of coalition forces in Afghanistan. With characteristic acerbity, Mr. Hastings laments that his press colleagues have abandoned the spirit of Vietnam, when “war had been exposed as the Giant Lying Machine, in Halberstam’s words.” Instead, he says, they write glowing profiles of generals and other officials in the hope of gaining greater access to sources.

  • What Matters…

    Got this via Kriste Gerhard on FB.  Spending some time with our commenter Doc Bailey had reminded me about some non-trivial stuff.

    Screw politics – the rubber does meet the road!

  • Two Fun Things in One Post.

    Been busy AND having some local technical difficulties. Gonna see if this works?

    Ron Paul has been at it again, and our own USN has been testy. The author of the piece does a nice job, but misses a coupla salient points.

    This essence is that our Navy has declared that Iran CAN NOT close the Straits of Hormuz. What can go wrong?

    And Ron Paul says it’s our fault anyway. What can go wrong?

  • Good News, Bad News… In WVA

    Finally got a few minutes to look for new news and found this.
    Arrest made in museum break-in

    The ugly bit:

    PARKERSBURG – Law enforcement officials have made an arrest related to last week’s break-in at the Mid-Ohio Valley Veterans Museum.

    Parkersburg police reported William Joseph Kerns, 24, 506 34th St., Apt. 5B, Vienna, was arrested on a charge of possession of stolen property. Officials discovered Kerns in possession of one firearm and two knives, both confirmed to be property from the museum, police said.

    Around $10,000 in artifacts four rifles, a pistol, 10 battle dress uniforms, bayonets and 47 knives for the gift shop – were stolen from the Seventh Street museum on Dec. 20. Among the items taken was a Beretta recovered on Utah Beach during D-Day in World War believed to have belonged to a German officer.

    The bit that makes me proud:

    “Whoever did this is probably about the most hated person in the Mid-Ohio Valley,” Farris said. “Everywhere I go; to the post office, the bank; I have had people stop me in the grocery store.”

    “If this was the old west those guys wouldn’t be in police custody,” he said.

    Emphasis added with a smile.

    Parkersburg is my home town. Got family there both above and below ground. But I haven’t been over there in years, and I’ve never been to the museum mentioned. Looks like a road trip is in order?

  • The Nanny State – Damn Details!

    Via Don Surber:
    Fire hazard fears over compact fluorescent lamps – after they’ve stopped working

    Compact fluorescent lamps, which will gradually replace traditional incandescent bulbs, are a fire hazard that could burn down your home, experts have warned.

    The lamps (CFLs) use electricity to heat an element in the lamp’s base that leads the mercury vapor gas in the coils to emit light. 

    But when a CFL can no longer produce light, the electronics in its base will still try to function, sometimes leading to overheating, smoke and fire. 

    Let us not forget the mercury in the things.

    Don’t worry folks, they mean well.