Thursday, January 31, 2002
Wednesday, January 30, 2002
Tuesday, January 29, 2002
Sunday, January 27, 2002
Saturday, January 26, 2002
Marine Corps Wisdom
Basic Laws of Combat
1. You are not superman.
2. Suppressive fires -- won't.
3. If it's stupid but works, it isn't stupid.
4. Don't look conspicuous -- it draws fire.
5. When in doubt, empty the magazine.
6. Never share a fighting hole with anyone braver than you are.
7. Never forget your weapon was made by the lowest bidder.
8. If your attack is going really well, it's an ambush.
9. No plan survives the first contact intact.
10. All five second grenade fuses will burn down in three seconds.
11. Try to look unimportant, because the bad guys may be low on ammo.
12. If you are forward of your position, the artillery will fall short.
13. The enemy diversion you are ignoring is the main attack.
14. The important things are always simple.
15. The simple things are always hard.
16. The easy way is always mined.
17. If you are short of everything except enemy, you are in combat.
18. When you have secured an area, don't forget to tell the enemy.
19. Incoming fire has the right-of-way.
20. No combat ready unit has ever passed inspection. (Note: No peacetime unit has ever failed a combat readiness inspection, which suggests peacetime inspections are to readiness as messhall chow is to fine cuisine).
21. If the enemy is in range, so are you.
22. Beer math: 37 men times 2 beers each equals 49 cases.
23. Body count math: 3 bad guys plus 1 probable plus 2 pigs = 37 enemy killed in action.
24. Friendly fire - isn't.
25. Things that must be together to work usually can't be shipped together.
26. Radios will fail as soon as you need fire support desperately. (Corollary: Radar tends to fail at night and in bad weather, and usually during both).
27. Anything you do can get you shot -- including doing nothing.
28. If you make it too tough for the enemy to get in you can't get out. (Note: This is design technique for Soviet BMP and Bradley infantry fighting vehicle, both of which nicely package the troops in armored boxes for group destruction).
29. Tracers work BOTH ways.
30. The only thing more accurate than incoming enemy fire is incoming friendly fire.
31. If you take more than your fair share of objectives, you will have more than your fair share to take.
32. When both sides are convinced they are about to lose, they're both right.
33. Professional soldiers are predictable, but the world is full of amateurs.
Friday, January 25, 2002
U.S. President George W. Bush leaves the White House January 25, 2002 on his way to Andrews Air Force Base for a trip to Portland, Maine. Bush is carrying a book titled "Bias," by former CBS employee Bernard Goldberg, which is one person's view of a claimed liberal bias in the news media. REUTERS/Win McNamee
Have you ever, and I mean EVER, seen a book disclaimed in a photo description?!!!!
BWAHAHAHAHA!!!!!!!!
Name Dropping!!!!!
Thursday, January 24, 2002
Wednesday, January 23, 2002
Tuesday, January 22, 2002
Monday, January 21, 2002
Benicke knows the issue from both sides. In the '80s and early '90s she advocated abortion. After all, she'd had one herself.
"Women come here and tell me that their friends say abortion is no big deal," she says. "And that's what I used to say. 'It was the best decision for me at the time,' I would tell people. My boyfriend threatened to leave me if I didn't have the abortion, and I had just started a wonderful new job. It was 'the wrong time' to have a baby.
The boyfriend and career both disappeared, but she insisted for a long time that she had made the right decision. And she knows why.
"The only alternative to defending abortion," she says, "is to face up to what you've really done. You've paid someone to kill your child."
Benicke pauses. "I know I have God's forgiveness," she says after a moment, "but I still struggle with forgiving myself."
Sunday, January 20, 2002
Did ya have to wake me up from my nap? I mean, whaddaya want to do here, depress me?
It seems that each day or so brings a little joy, and a lot of woe. I feel like Fox Mulder sometimes... "I want to believe!" I have a fingernail's hold on the hope that all will be well, but the abyss of inevitability yawns wide and hungry below me.
We'll be fighting in the streets
With our children at our feet
And the morals that they worship will be gone
And the men who spurred us on
Sit in judgement of all wrong
They decide and the shotgun sings the song
Say it ain't so!