Vietnam Vets and Kerry

The Washington Post carried a story today on Rolling Thunder, a group of mostly Vietnam vets who road through DC on Harleys today and yesterday. Instapundit has pictures and some comments courtesy of a guy who was there. Bush met the leaders of the group to take advantage of the fact that the group has endorsed him instead of "highly decorated Vietnam veteran" John Kerry. Why would they endorse Bush when, as Rhoads says, Bush used his connections to avoid going to Vietnam while Kerry volunteered to serve along side them? Perhaps because they know that serving in the Air National Guard is not avoiding service, and because Kerry came back and turned on his fellow soldiers. Seems these guys remember that. From the Washington Post story:

Bob Nowak, 52, a retired Navy man from Aroda, Va., who did two tours in Vietnam, said veterans such as himself despise Kerry for his decision to protest the war in the early 1970s.

Nowak remembers returning from Vietnam in 1973 aboard an aircraft carrier loaded with thousands of sailors in their dress whites. "As we passed under the Golden Gate Bridge, there were people waiting for us. And they threw garbage on us," Nowak recalled. "That was about the time Kerry was throwing his [ribbons] away. It's kind of hard to forget either of them."

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Rhoads' response
Sorry it has been so long since I posted on CwR.

Bob, if you choose to ignore the fact that George W. Bush used political influence to avoid going to Vietnam, then you go right ahead. The fact is, he did use his father's influence, and there is plenty of evidence that he only paid lip service to the "service" he did perform.

That said, I can certainly understand why some Vietnam Vets were upset by John Kerry's protests against the Vietnam War upon his return. However, that does not mean that he was wrong to lodge those protests. The USA did lots of horrific things in Vietnam because, well, we weren't used to losing a war. And I for one don't think that trying to bring those thin-gs to light is such a bad thing.

Bob's reply
Rhoads wrote: "if you choose to ignore the fact that George W. Bush used political influence to avoid going to Vietnam" and "The fact is, he did use his father's influence". It wouldn't shock me if Rhoads is right, but I've never seen any evidence that Bush Sr intervened to keep Geroge W. from going to Vietnam. Perhaps Rhoads could provide a source for this fact.

We do know that George W. served in the National Guard. He did not go to Vietnam. Was the former a way of achieving the latter? Probably, but it wasn't the best way. George W. could have gone straight to graduate school or to Oxford like Clinton did. Instead he signed up for the Guard, specifically with the 147th Fighter Interceptor Group in 1968, which in 1966 was named the most combat ready unit in the Guard. Furthermore, the 147th had fighter pilots (Bush trained as a fighter pilot) in Vietnam (participating in "Palace Alert") at the time he joined and trained. [first of many Google hits that confirm the above.]

Of course this isn't really about facts. We should be able to resolve those disputes, provided Rhoads coughs up some sources. I'm perfectly willing, if the evidence shows it, to accept that George W. Bush used political influence to avoid serving in Vietnam. What this is really about is my assertion (not factual, just an opinion) that military people overwhelmingly, veterans, reservists, and active duty, don't much care for Kerry. Sure, Rhoads likes Kerry. But Rhoads isn't a military guy.

Libertarian Weirdness

Borrowing a phrase from Eugene Volokh, I've recently described my political views as "presumptively libertarian". After reading about the Libertarian Party's nominee for president, I may have to come up with a description that does not include the word libertarian.

That may not be so easy. What simple, descriptive words remain? I'm in favor of way too much change to call myself conservative. Socialists in the U.S. have permanently borrowed the term liberal and the Libertarian Party has made a mockery of the term libertarian. Virginia Postrel uses the term "dynamist" and I think I'm probably a "Hayekian". Unfortunately the terms dynamist and Hayekian aren't useful since they don't communicate anything to 99.999% of the people who might ask my political viewpoint.

"My I have some fat with those onions?"

As obesity becomes the new tobacco, the classic Charleston diet may become extinct. Rhoads may someday soon be asking his Uncle Sam if it's OK to eat fat and onions. Tolerance just cannot extend to what and how much people eat, I guess.

Memories

Christopher Hitchens is defending Ahmad Chalabi in his latest column in Slate. Here's the first paragraph:

I first met Dr. Ahmad Chalabi in the spring of 1998, a year when George Bush was still the governor of Texas and when Bill Clinton and Al Gore were talking at a high volume about the inescapable necessity of removing Saddam Hussein from power because of his continuous connection to terrorism and his addiction to weapons of mass destruction. (Remember ... ?) It was also the year that the Senate passed, without a dissenting voice, the Iraq Liberation Act.

Sounds like Hitchens remembers the connections between Iraq and terrorism that Al Gore and others have conveniently blocked out during this election cycle.

Iraq and al Qaeda

No connection, you say? Read this and see if you still feel so strongly that there was never any connection between Iraq and al Qaeda.

It looks to me like the connections go back a long time and were pointed out by the Clinton Administration. As I've said before, maybe this is why Bill Clinton has been so quiet as his nutty VP and others claim that Iraq was not tied to terrorism, not tied to al Qaeda, and had no WMD or WMD programs.

Thanks to Roger L. Simon for the link. No, Roger, you cannot have your Gore 2000 vote back. Luckily it didn't swing the election.

BASIS School Kicks Butt

Here's a Washington Post story on a charter school in Arizona devoted to AP courses. Beginning in ninth grade the kids take AP courses, well not just take them, but ultimately must pass them to graduate. Quoting from the story:

To graduate, a BASIS student must pass AP English Language & Composition, AP English Literature, AP Calculus or AP Statistics, AP European History, AP American History and two of the three available AP science courses in physics, chemistry and biology. There are also AP courses in computer science and foreign language. The three-hour AP tests at the end of each course are not required at most high schools, but at BASIS students must take the test at the end of at least five of the required AP courses. The middle school students are also accelerated, all of them finishing first year algebra by seventh grade, to prepare them for early AP.

The school was started by a couple of immigrants, a former educator and a University of Arizona economics professor. Half the kids' parents don't have college degrees. It's an amazing and inspiring story. We need more, way more, schools like this.

For years now I've wondered if we're getting enough bang for our buck when it comes to education spending in this country. Stories like this make me think we can do much better than we're doing. Maybe I'll start the "Bob School" on a shoestring budget. Rhoads could me help with the teaching (though I think the role of teachers is 1) overrated, and 2) all wrong in schools as the plan for the Bob School will make clear). The Bob School would be a return to the old one-room schoolhouse. Lots of kids of all ages (I don't think the age segregation of modern schools is a good thing) would be in the same large room doing math problems, reading books, and writing essays. The teacher (Rhoads or me) would be in the room doing the same thing, doing math problems, reading, writing (blogging) or debugging software, in addition to reading the students' essays. Reading and correcting the students' essays is pretty much all I'd ask of the teachers. The learning is up to the kids. The room would be quiet. The only entertainment for the kids would be the math problems, the interesting books, and the writing.

How much do you think such a school would cost? I bet we could "educate" the kids in that setting for a fair bit less than the $5,000-10,000 per pupil per year that most schools spend now.

IPCC Report on Global Climate Change

In this post from February 14, 2003 Daniel Dresner summarizes some statistical flaws exposed in the IPCC report on global climate change. I knew that the scientists who contributed the papers to the report did not agree on all the conclusions in the executive summary (prepared by non-scientists), but I was unaware of the methodological flaws in the IPCC report.

Withdrawal

I response to my earlier post A Marine's View Rhoads asked "Who is calling for withdrawal?" According to this report from Tom Curry of MSNBC the largest anti-war coalition in the U.S. is calling for just that:

Win Without War, the country’s largest anti-war coalition, called Thursday for a date certain for withdrawing U.S. troops.

“There is no military solution in Iraq,” said Win Without War, which comprises 42 groups, in its statement. “We therefore call upon our government to end the military and economic occupation of Iraq and to withdraw our troops by a date certain.”

Tom Andrews, Win Without War's National Director and former Democratic member of the House, told MSNBC.com Thursday, "Setting a date certain would be a critical step forward because it would indicate a change of course in our Iraq policy."

Asked about his group's discord with Kerry on the possibility of sending more troops, Andrews said, "The argument for increasing troops is based on the idea that our troops are a source of stability and security in Iraq. We believe that they are not. We believe they have become a source of instability and insecurity."

The presence of American troops in Iraq, he added, "is fuel for international terrorists around the world. More troops are not going to reverse this very dangerous direction we're going in, namely losing the hearts and minds of Iraqis."

The Win Without War coalition includes the NAACP, the National Council of Churches, Greenpeace, Moveon.org, and the Sierra Club.

The Sierra Club has endorsed Kerry for president, while Moveon.org has run TV ads attacking Bush and urging his censure by Congress and his defeat in November.

Hey, wasn't MoveOn.org the same group Al Gore was getting all the applause from in his nutty speech? But MoveOn.org and the others listed above aren't alone. Going to Win Without War's website turns up a complete list of members. I see Sojourners, one of Rhoads favorites is part of the coalition calling for withdrawal. I guess Rhoads missed that.

One more interesting tidbit in the same MSNBC piece. The section I reprinted says that Kerry is in favor of sending in more troops. That's a change in viewpoint since September 2003:

Yet last September in a debate with other Democratic contenders in Albuquerque, N.M, Kerry emphatically opposed sending more American troops to Iraq. “We should not send more American troops,” he said on Sept 4. “That would be the worst thing. We do not want to have more Americanization, we do not want a greater sense of American occupation.”

Darned if that wasn't just after Sandy Berger had said that Kerry was amazingly consistent on the matter of troops in Iraq.

Gore Speech Comes to Life

Junkyardblog turns Al Gore's MoveOn.org speech into a compaign ad for Bush. JYB won't be the last. Taliban overthrown, Iraq liberated, and Saddam captured. Disaster, you say? For whom?

(Thanks to Glenn Reynolds for the link. I should make that part of my template.)

Liberal Case for War in Iraq

Well I got the time to read this piece in The American Prospect by Richard Just. The lumping in of all the social engineering projects that liberals so love with the liberation of people abroad gives me pause, but overall I think the piece is well written and well argued. The lumping in of other liberal policies gives me pause because as I've written before, I think the building of societies and of great programs for improving societies is fraught with peril, and due to the overwhelming complexity of civilization usually leads to unanticipated results. But I can't see how freeing people from tyranny can be seen as not the liberal, and right, thing to do. That doesn't mean in every case (or even in the case of Iraq) it is necessarily right to do so. Costs must be weighed against the benefits of "doing the right thing". The ultimate rightness or wrongess, the morality if you will, seems to me to be independent of the practical and pragmatic considerations.

Oddly I heard echoes of Rhoads' argument to me in the piece.

They have noted that Saddam Hussein may be evil but that there are plenty of other evil people in the world. [check] Or that conservatives are in it for the oil.[check] Or that there are risks involved. [check] Or that containment could prevent the dictator from ever using nuclear weapons.

Well, I don't think Rhoads mentioned the success of containment, but three out of four ain't bad. Richard Just responds better than I could:

All those arguments may well be true.

But not one of those arguments will lead to the liberation of a frighteningly Orwellian society based on fear and torture. Not one of them will protect the citizens of the Middle East's democratic nations against future attacks with weapons of mass destruction. Not one of them could lead to a beachhead -- however small -- of democracy in the Arab world. Not one of them will help resolve the Israeli-Palestinian standoff. Not one of them will allow America to take initial steps toward addressing the "root causes" of terror. Not one of them is worthy of the deeply moral traditions of Woodrow Wilson and Franklin Delano Roosevelt. And not one of them will lead to progress in the Middle East -- yet these objections are apparently all most "progressives" have to offer.

As I've alluded to before, a foreign policy of protecting and spreading democracy around the world was the view of this county's liberals. Richard Just points that out and notes the irony in the flip flop in positions between Al Gore and George W. Bush on America's role in the world since the 2000 election. I'll have to go to the Google machine and see if Mr. Just has any more current reactions to his man Gore's (he voted for Gore in 2000) latest rants.

UPDATE: Richard Just is a Princeton man. Go figure. Here's a brief bio:

Richard Just is the editor of The New Republic Online. From September 2002 until December 2003, he was editor of The American Prospect Online. He graduated cum laude from Princeton University in 2001, with a degree from the Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs. At Princeton, he was the editor-in-chief of The Daily Princetonian.

Moral Bankruptcy

In a phone conversation with me today, Rhoads tried to explain the concept of a "moral imperative". Here's the context. I was trying to get him to admit that freeing the people of Iraq from torture and oppression was the moral thing to do (regardless of the legality or the costs of doing so, either of which might prevent or dissuade us from doing what is morally right). He countered with the argument that if it's the moral thing to do in Iraq, then it's the moral thing to do in Sudan, Iran, North Korea, and a host of other places. That was easy for me to accept. I think freeing the people of all those countries from tyranny, torture, and oppression is the moral thing to do.

So I said count me in. But Rhoads said that since we couldn't afford to free all those people, freeing them couldn't be a moral imperative. If we can't do something (or do something everywhere it's called for) then it can't be a moral imperative, according to Rhoads. That's where he lost me. So off I went in search of meanings.

I thought I'd better head to the Google machine to see if I couldn't find a definition of "moral imperative".

Well, I found this piece at The American Prospect titled "Moral Imperative: Any self-respecting liberal ought to support an invasion of Iraq". It looked interesting, but I was really just after some quicker definition of "moral imperative" so I moved on.

I didn't see any quick definition, so I turned to Dictionary.com to look up each word.

moral (adj) : Of or concerned with the judgment of the goodness or badness of human action and character.

imperative (n): An obligation; a duty.

There were other defintions of each word, but these seemed to suit the general thrust of Rhoads' argument.

So moral refers to goodness and imperative refers to a duty or obligation. So if we have a moral imperative we could say that we have an obligation on the grounds of goodness to do something. I still don't see how having the resources to actually do the thing enters the picture if we're talking about a moral imperative. We may have a duty or an obligation to do something good (a moral imperative) but lack the resources for doing it. How does the lack of resources affect the moral imperative? Gives new meaning somehow to the phrase "moral bankruptcy" I suppose.

If Rhoads gets the time, perhaps he can explain where I've gone off track in my analysis here.

Totten Shreds Buchanan

To my knowledge I have never before linked to a good, old-fashioned Fisking. Well it's my pleasure to do so now. Michael J. Totten serves up a devastating Fisking of Pat Buchanan. As a commenter to Totten's post points out, Buchanan left the Republican Party when he sought the Perot Party (or whatever the heck that thing is called) nomination. I tend to think of Buchanan as emblematic of what's wrong with part of the Republican Party. I think I'll have to amend that thinking. Buchanan does not represent or belong to the Republican Party any more. That's good news for the Republicans, I think.

Stanford Prison Study

Over thirty years ago a study was conducted at Stanford University regarding the behavior of prisoners and prison guards. Before you go thinking that the behavior of the U.S. guards at Abu Ghraib was somehow unpredictable, think again. The behavior of the prison guards in the study strikingly similar to that found at Abu Ghraib:

If the authoritarian situation became a serious matter for the prisoners, it became even more serious and sinister - for the guards. Typically, the guards insulted the prisoners, threatened them, were physically aggressive, used instruments (night sticks, fire extinguishers, etc.) to keep the prisoners in line and referred to them in impersonal anonymous, deprecating ways: "Hey, you," or "You [obscenity], 5401, come here." From the first to the last day, there was a significant increase in the use of most of these domineering, abusive tactics.

Like the Milgram experiment before it, the Stanford Prison Experiment shows how bad good people can be in certain circumstances.

Unfortunately scenes like those now being shown over and over again from Abu Ghraib are all too common at prisons all over the world right now, including at prisons in the United States. Abu Ghraib doesn't demonstrate the shortcomings of the U.S. or of the individuals involved at Abu Ghraib. It reminds us of the shortcomings of human nature.

France, Russia, China, Germany

As usual James Lileks has some entertaining and insightful comments on the goings on in Iraq.

Rockin' VP

I'll take this guy over Al Gore. Heavy Metal rocker John Schaffer looks to have a better grasp on reality than our former Vice President. Schaffer administers a pretty good slapdown to a 22-year-old Canadian Chomsky fan. Not that that's tough.

Great Collection

There's simply too much good stuff at the Belmont Club lately to link to all of it in separate posts. Instead I'll just link to the blog and recommend the series of posts on The Wedding Party, the single post on An Intelligence Failure, and the most recent post titled The Global Battlefield which addresses the expanding theater of war.

Happy Birthday

Rhoads celebrates his birthday today. I won't say how old he is, but let's just say that before lighting the candles on his cake this evening somebody should notify the fire marshall. They should probably make sure the fancy drapes are pulled back out of the way and the other customers at the restaurant are aware that there may be a moment of very intense heat before the candles are put out.

Repugnant Human Being

I called Al Gore a lunatic and a moron for his remarks to MoveOn.org the other day. The Boston Herald editorial staff clearly thinks I was too soft on Gore. Here's their first paragraph:

He never mentioned Nicholas Berg. Or Daniel Pearl. Or a single person killed in the World Trade Center. Nor did former Vice President Al Gore talk of any soldier by name who has given his life in Iraq. And he has the audacity to condemn the Bush administration for having "twisted values?''

And their last sentence:

The real disgrace is that this repugnant human being once held the second highest office in this great land.

My comments earlier were admittedly premature. I had read the exerpts from Gore's speech, but not the whole thing. Now I've read the whole thing. Perhaps if I'd heard Gore deliver the remarks with all the hollerin' and stuff I'd be more upset. It is disgraceful that a former V.P. behaves that way in public. But I think my characterization of the man was accurate. Gore comes across as both a lunatic and a moron. He's a lunatic for the reasons cited by the Boston Herald. He's a moron because he misunderstands the Geneva Conventions and pounds away at the Bush Administration repeatedly with erroneous assertions about the nature and purpose of those Conventions. Either he doesn't understand the Geneva Conventions (a moron) or he's deliberately misleading his audience (a repugnant human being). I'll go with moron, but I realize that may be charitable.

UPDATE: More reactions to Gore here, here, here, here, here, and here. They're all less charitable than I was, I think.

UPDATE II: Jesse Walker of Reason's Hit & Run blog says the Boston Herald editorial lied in its editing and characterization of part of Gore's speech. Walker is right on this one. The passage he quotes from Gore's speech is not nutty at all, at least not in my opinion. I read the speech, but not closely enough to catch the Boston Herald's mischaracterization. Good catch, Jesse.

Bill Whittle on Freedom

The second essay in Bill Whittle's collection SILENT AMERICA is titled Freedom. It starts with this story:

When I was a little kid, I asked my dad about an image I had seen of really huge numbers of prisoners being marched to their execution in a forest clearing, guarded by perhaps five or ten men with rifles. I wanted to know why they didn't just rush the guards? I mean, it's one thing if they were heading to another crappy day at work camp, but these people were being led off to be killed. I mean, for God's sake, what did they have to lose?

I was six. My dad looked at me. He had served in the latter days of WW2 in Europe as a U.S. Army intelligence officer. No parachuting onto the decks of enemy U-Boats at night to steal Enigma machines --- just newly-minted, 2nd Lieutenant grunt work. He'd been to the camps though, seen some horrible things. When I asked him why they didn't fight back or run for the woods, he said, without any arrogance or contempt or jingoism, "I don't know Billy, I can't figure that one out myself." Then there was a long moment. "But I can't imagine Americans just walking off like that, either."

Why couldn't Billy and his father imagine Americans just walking off to die? Read the essay to find out.

Some Lessons from History

Richard Brookhiser writes in the New York Observer that certain qualities characterize all conflicts: childish fantasies, unstable coalitions, deadly endgames, doubtful homefronts, and tempting liberty. He elaborates on each one using references from the Revolutionary War through Gulf War I.