Afghanistan
Specialization classes
02/December/2009 08:34 Filed in: Weekly
Column
On Tuesday evening President Barack Obama presented
to the American people and the world at large his
war plan for Afghanistan. Those thirty thousand
extra troops will give ammunition to pundits
everywhere to analyze whether that glass is half
empty or half full. Little commentary will focus on
the reality that in this analogy it is half a
glass. The major question that speeches don’t cover
is how you fill up the glass or empty the glass as
time goes on. That is also dependent on whether
there is a hole in the bucket, dear Jacob. Fixing
the bucket will prove more costly and time
consuming than the President and his supporters and
adversaries are willing to admit. This is
especially perplexing when the option of getting a
new bucket is quite impossible.
Spun in more historic terms, is the Afghan War really an attempt at colonization focused upon a people who don’t believe in colonization and don’t particularly want to play the game? What is really at stake is a global conflict basically between Twenty-First century western culture struggling against medieval Islamic adherents. This is not a new war, but we think there are enlightened ways to provide a simple solution for Western Culture to triumph over the bad jihadists. Lots of luck fellows!
In reality if it was not for the victory at the Battle of Tours in 732 and in the Siege of Vienna in 1529 the whole world would be followers of Mohammed. This of course leaves out the Grace of God, as outlined in the Bible of Christians and Jews, as Almighty God. As the Almighty he rules over and controls human destiny. Since Western Culture truly no longer believes in God the words of that Biblical icon Solomon is in order, “Vanity, vanity, all is vanity.” Put is more twenty-first century jargon, Lots of luck fellows! A little history lesson of what followed the Battle of Vienna in 1683 might give some global historic perspective.
Of course twenty-first century Islam is not as overtly organized as medieval Islam. Covertly it seems just as successful especially in that old adversary Western Europe. The radical jihadists while well funded must exercise what command and control they have from the remote areas of Pakistan and Afghanistan. However little command and control is required for attacks such has the recent guerilla attack at Ft. Hood, Texas by Army Major Hasan.
In the last week the threat of further sanctions really had no effect upon Iran. So they are going to install fifty thousand more centrifuges to enrich their only domestic energy needs and alternatives. The Iranian options there have even more salient consequences, none of them easy, none of them cheap, none of them without broad ranging ramifications.
Read More...
Spun in more historic terms, is the Afghan War really an attempt at colonization focused upon a people who don’t believe in colonization and don’t particularly want to play the game? What is really at stake is a global conflict basically between Twenty-First century western culture struggling against medieval Islamic adherents. This is not a new war, but we think there are enlightened ways to provide a simple solution for Western Culture to triumph over the bad jihadists. Lots of luck fellows!
In reality if it was not for the victory at the Battle of Tours in 732 and in the Siege of Vienna in 1529 the whole world would be followers of Mohammed. This of course leaves out the Grace of God, as outlined in the Bible of Christians and Jews, as Almighty God. As the Almighty he rules over and controls human destiny. Since Western Culture truly no longer believes in God the words of that Biblical icon Solomon is in order, “Vanity, vanity, all is vanity.” Put is more twenty-first century jargon, Lots of luck fellows! A little history lesson of what followed the Battle of Vienna in 1683 might give some global historic perspective.
Of course twenty-first century Islam is not as overtly organized as medieval Islam. Covertly it seems just as successful especially in that old adversary Western Europe. The radical jihadists while well funded must exercise what command and control they have from the remote areas of Pakistan and Afghanistan. However little command and control is required for attacks such has the recent guerilla attack at Ft. Hood, Texas by Army Major Hasan.
In the last week the threat of further sanctions really had no effect upon Iran. So they are going to install fifty thousand more centrifuges to enrich their only domestic energy needs and alternatives. The Iranian options there have even more salient consequences, none of them easy, none of them cheap, none of them without broad ranging ramifications.
Read More...
The Failure of Success
25/November/2009 11:37 Filed in: Weekly
Column
As I reflect on this last year I am thankful at a
vast and rapidly increasing number of Americans
have learned the reality of the failure of success.
It is sad that this new knowledge has come, as
broad cross sections of society don’t have a clue
of what this means. So how about a few examples.
Healthcare reform as it is now spun is the most apparent case in point. We will do nothing to increase the real healthcare infrastructure. By that I mean no new hospitals, no more doctors and nurses and tangible things like that. Then we are going to insure at least ten percent more people, and save money in the process. Furthermore the federal government is going to provide a cost effective alternative to the greedy insurance companies that are the only crooks in the house.
While we are at it, we are going to save western culture from the onslaught of foreign and domestic Islamic terrorists. But the politically correct definition of this is no longer termed a war, but human induced catastrophes, or something like that. However this salvation can be done by fighting a decade of wars, halfway around the world, with soldiers who thought they were serving their country, but are now legally committed to see these excursions to the end. This while their fellow Americans think of sacrifice as only being able to turn in one perfectly good vehicle in “cash for clunkers.”
But is it too much to ask if you are going to make Afghanistan the hallmark of your war prowess, perhaps early January after your inauguration would be a good time to start a timely review of theater strategies. Then when you get a recommendation from your commander on the ground you can either tell him you support him, he should retire, or these are the tactics you have determined as the best course of action for the United States.
Starting these deliberations once you get a command recommendation and then dithering about a decision for months until early December is absolutely unprecedented in American history. Any statement to the effect of saying that other things were more important than providing safety for American combat forces is completely indefensible and totally dumbfounding. Sadly, I am at a loss for harsher words. Read More...
Healthcare reform as it is now spun is the most apparent case in point. We will do nothing to increase the real healthcare infrastructure. By that I mean no new hospitals, no more doctors and nurses and tangible things like that. Then we are going to insure at least ten percent more people, and save money in the process. Furthermore the federal government is going to provide a cost effective alternative to the greedy insurance companies that are the only crooks in the house.
While we are at it, we are going to save western culture from the onslaught of foreign and domestic Islamic terrorists. But the politically correct definition of this is no longer termed a war, but human induced catastrophes, or something like that. However this salvation can be done by fighting a decade of wars, halfway around the world, with soldiers who thought they were serving their country, but are now legally committed to see these excursions to the end. This while their fellow Americans think of sacrifice as only being able to turn in one perfectly good vehicle in “cash for clunkers.”
But is it too much to ask if you are going to make Afghanistan the hallmark of your war prowess, perhaps early January after your inauguration would be a good time to start a timely review of theater strategies. Then when you get a recommendation from your commander on the ground you can either tell him you support him, he should retire, or these are the tactics you have determined as the best course of action for the United States.
Starting these deliberations once you get a command recommendation and then dithering about a decision for months until early December is absolutely unprecedented in American history. Any statement to the effect of saying that other things were more important than providing safety for American combat forces is completely indefensible and totally dumbfounding. Sadly, I am at a loss for harsher words. Read More...
Traditional Historic American Values - Part 10: None Dare Call It Treason
18/November/2009 12:24 Filed in: Weekly
Column
After I finished Part 9, of this series a couple of
weeks ago, I thought I was pretty much through with
the concept of Traditional Historic American
Values, at least in the journalistic, or even the
blogosphere sense. The next day with the shootings
at Ft. Hood, Texas, changed all of that. First of
all it must be said that this was a guerilla attack
not a terrorist attack. The only place I have found
that reported properly is in James Taranto’s WSJ
Best of the Web email. In that respect Major Hasan
is to stand trial as a murderer and perhaps for
treason. Furthermore I felt that the President’s
response and later speech in Texas showed
reluctance to address reality that even his
best-prepared remarks could not hide.
I was still struggling with how to prepare this last article of the series for Veterans Day when Tuesday afternoon I received a call from my friend Jim, who accompanied me a little over a year ago, to pick up my motorhome in Texas. He stated that he felt so good after finishing Julia Duin’s book on “Quitting Church” that he just had to call and state it was nice to feel he was not alone.
A guerilla attack on American soil, American church leaders so out of touch that they think Christianity is primarily about making one feel good about a progressively psycho world, and we haven’t even gotten into some serious reality.
Hence between the two concepts and real life in general, I was pretty much at a loss on how to begin to finally conclude this ten part series on Traditional Historic American Values. In some perspective we have an American President who feels very comfortable in being everything to everyone, except the military’s Commander in Chief. This is contrasted with a long term Christian man, who for the now considers himself part of a community that has freed itself from the doctrinal sterility of American Evangelicalism. What are this world and this country coming to?
So the President took off for Asia, while his Attorney General took the heat for bringing the 9-11 true terrorists to New York City for a civilian trial. Don’t they understand that these thugs are not covered by the Geneva Convention? Why are they giving them special rights like, lobbyists, investment bankers, and other domestic terrorists?
In Asia he seems to have kissed away his second major goal, the cap and trade energy tax, in favor of his worst fandango, gross deficit spending, all the while continuing to dither on what to do with Afghanistan, a problem much too small to fit within the global concept of financially too big to fail. Perhaps it is that contrast between New York and Washington DC centered special rights – special interests, and Islamists, who believe that they, the too big to fail cronies, all are atheistic infidels, which forces the dithering reality about the consequences.
To use a constructive metaphor, the President seems to be continually trying to shoot himself in the foot, when the proper response would be just to take out his gun and take aim at the bad guys. The problem that he is finding out however, just as with Major Hasan, the President and his guerilla forces are a definite minority. Furthermore virtually all-successful guerilla wars first capture the countryside before moving to urban centers. In this guerilla war, Obama’s progressive base only hold portions of the right and left coasts and Chicago politics, and the great American fly-over is becoming increasingly agitated with what it sees as not just liberal, leftist, or socialist, but communist underpinnings of his social wealth redistribution plans.
Read More...
I was still struggling with how to prepare this last article of the series for Veterans Day when Tuesday afternoon I received a call from my friend Jim, who accompanied me a little over a year ago, to pick up my motorhome in Texas. He stated that he felt so good after finishing Julia Duin’s book on “Quitting Church” that he just had to call and state it was nice to feel he was not alone.
A guerilla attack on American soil, American church leaders so out of touch that they think Christianity is primarily about making one feel good about a progressively psycho world, and we haven’t even gotten into some serious reality.
Hence between the two concepts and real life in general, I was pretty much at a loss on how to begin to finally conclude this ten part series on Traditional Historic American Values. In some perspective we have an American President who feels very comfortable in being everything to everyone, except the military’s Commander in Chief. This is contrasted with a long term Christian man, who for the now considers himself part of a community that has freed itself from the doctrinal sterility of American Evangelicalism. What are this world and this country coming to?
So the President took off for Asia, while his Attorney General took the heat for bringing the 9-11 true terrorists to New York City for a civilian trial. Don’t they understand that these thugs are not covered by the Geneva Convention? Why are they giving them special rights like, lobbyists, investment bankers, and other domestic terrorists?
In Asia he seems to have kissed away his second major goal, the cap and trade energy tax, in favor of his worst fandango, gross deficit spending, all the while continuing to dither on what to do with Afghanistan, a problem much too small to fit within the global concept of financially too big to fail. Perhaps it is that contrast between New York and Washington DC centered special rights – special interests, and Islamists, who believe that they, the too big to fail cronies, all are atheistic infidels, which forces the dithering reality about the consequences.
To use a constructive metaphor, the President seems to be continually trying to shoot himself in the foot, when the proper response would be just to take out his gun and take aim at the bad guys. The problem that he is finding out however, just as with Major Hasan, the President and his guerilla forces are a definite minority. Furthermore virtually all-successful guerilla wars first capture the countryside before moving to urban centers. In this guerilla war, Obama’s progressive base only hold portions of the right and left coasts and Chicago politics, and the great American fly-over is becoming increasingly agitated with what it sees as not just liberal, leftist, or socialist, but communist underpinnings of his social wealth redistribution plans.
Read More...
Traditional Historic American Values - Part 8: Perspective
28/October/2009 10:08 Filed in: Weekly
Column
In nine short months we have learned the USA is not
a theocracy, not the shining city on the hill. The
church is not the sole author and administrator of
moral law especially in common grace. So now for
the first time, perhaps in all of human history,
the whole world is Ichabod (God has departed).
However two thousand years ago, God saved His chosen remnant of all humanity from their sins, through Jesus Christ alone. So there still is some timeless good news. Furthermore, Americans, God’s common frozen prosperous chosen, have awakened from their debt-induced slumber in this brief timeframe and are beginning to actively participate in a world that passed them by. Definitely a temporal miracle!
Old Testament Israel was conquered through Natural Law by pagans for Israel’s judgment and destruction, because she neglected not only God’s specific revelation, but also Natural Law and common grace. If you invoke law to form an earthly paradise, then you must understand that God’s judgment applies not only to pagan sinners, but also the self-righteous sinners. The United States of America has become no longer a nation of humble grace, but individual, corporate, and community greed and power.
These thoughts provide just a little bit of perspective from history to show that whatever happens as time unfolds in our world, we pretty much have it coming. In the due course of time those societies that think they can prosper with human wisdom alone and without God - quickly learn their folly.
Perspective, along with dithering, are new buzzwords that in the last few weeks have become important for the short-term discussion of America’s future. Dithering was used by former Vice-President Cheney to describe the lack of decision for the Obama Administration concerning sending more troops to Afghanistan. Perspective is the term used by the Obama Administration to describe Fox News, rather than call it a legitimate news organization.
Read More...
However two thousand years ago, God saved His chosen remnant of all humanity from their sins, through Jesus Christ alone. So there still is some timeless good news. Furthermore, Americans, God’s common frozen prosperous chosen, have awakened from their debt-induced slumber in this brief timeframe and are beginning to actively participate in a world that passed them by. Definitely a temporal miracle!
Old Testament Israel was conquered through Natural Law by pagans for Israel’s judgment and destruction, because she neglected not only God’s specific revelation, but also Natural Law and common grace. If you invoke law to form an earthly paradise, then you must understand that God’s judgment applies not only to pagan sinners, but also the self-righteous sinners. The United States of America has become no longer a nation of humble grace, but individual, corporate, and community greed and power.
These thoughts provide just a little bit of perspective from history to show that whatever happens as time unfolds in our world, we pretty much have it coming. In the due course of time those societies that think they can prosper with human wisdom alone and without God - quickly learn their folly.
Perspective, along with dithering, are new buzzwords that in the last few weeks have become important for the short-term discussion of America’s future. Dithering was used by former Vice-President Cheney to describe the lack of decision for the Obama Administration concerning sending more troops to Afghanistan. Perspective is the term used by the Obama Administration to describe Fox News, rather than call it a legitimate news organization.
Read More...