The Russian Navy has named the 4th of its Borei class SSBNs after a saint — Santa Claus to be exact. The Strategy Page says, “no one has ever named a nuclear submarine after Saint Nicholas before.” What could be more ridiculous than naming a boomer after Santa Claus? How about calling a health care “reform” bill a “a core ethical and moral obligation” and likening it to a religious crusade even as senior clerics of the Catholic Church denounce it as a Trojan horse for taxpayer funded abortion? The New York Times says: Some Catholic Bishops Assail Health Plan. By that they mean this:
The bishops’ opposition — published in diocesan newspapers, disseminated online by conservative activists, and reported in a Roman Catholic newspaper to be distributed this weekend at churches around the country — is another setback for Mr. Obama’s health care efforts. His administration has been counting on the support of Catholic leaders to help rally believers behind his health care plan. Just last week, he held a conference call with 140,000 religious voters to appeal to what he called their “moral convictions.” …
In an Aug. 11 letter to Congress, Cardinal Rigali of Philadelphia, head of the bishops’ anti-abortion efforts called the proposed division of funds “an illusion,” arguing that taxpayers would still indirectly help cover abortion. He urged lawmakers to block the current House legislation from coming up for a vote unless it can be amended to expressly prohibit financing for the procedure.
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Gee, do you think? Things aren’t always what they seem. If “personal is political”, the religious can be political too. The lines criss-cross and nothing has to make sense. If today’s progressive cause needs to invoke religious authority where yesterday it eschewed it, if it invokes feminism at one instant and rejects it the next, then so what? Situational ethnics means never having to say you’re sorry. Rightgrrl recalls how the apparent religious, political and feminist contradictions that played out in the Monica Lewinsky case were only apparent. Those on the Left intuitively understood that Bill Clinton got a pass on anything because his politics were correct.
“I’d be happy to give him [oral sex] just to thank him for keeping abortion legal.” Those were the enlightening words uttered by former Time contributor and White House correspondent Nina Burleigh in an interview in Mirabella magazine, as reported by Howard Kurtz in a Washington Post Article. However, it was learned on 07/16/98 that her comment was a little different from that. Nina Burleigh has now filled in what word she really used in the spot the Post bracketed and revealed her next sentence to Kurtz, that he did not share with readers.
Her full quote: “I would be happy to give him a blowjob just to thank him for keeping abortion legal. I think American women should be lining up with their presidential kneepads on to show their gratitude for keeping the theocracy off our backs.”
Winston Churchill used to say ‘The Hun is always either at your throat or at your feet‘. Today politicians are on their knees to get things off their backs. None of this is madness; just politics. The Russians have gone off and named a nuclear missile sub after Santa Claus but who’s to say there won’t be federally funded abortion clinic named named after another saint. Ridiculous? Don’t count on it.
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In Russia, Saint Nicholas is renowned for saving drowning sailors.
Well, here’s lifting a glass to the hope it sinks upon launch, giving ol’ St. Nick a chance to really prove himself.
What could be more ridiculous than naming a boomer after Santa Claus?
I wonder whether some people in the Russian Navy might also have been thinking of Nicholas II, who is regarded as a saint in some parts of Russian Orthodoxy– similar to the way in which some Anglicans revere Charles I as King Charles the Martyr.
Details on the canonization of the Romanovs, for those who are interested:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Romanov_sainthood
well, Santa Claus also punishes the naughty children (with the help of Black Petes)
actually some RAF songs used Santa Claus image for dropping bombs on Germany, that’s maybe why Russians took the referrence and named their submarine after SC
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sinterklaas
A related video that comes up after Monster a Go Go is The Thing that Couldn’t Die. Considering the next thread and the theme of this one, could this administration put Rahm Emanuel in charge of “The Ministry of Love?” Will Emanuel’s brother, Dr Kevorkian, find a future running “Information Retrieval?” http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z64bNZgK4GY&feature=related Where is our Harry Tuttle?
Personally, I am glad to see the Church Hierarchy pipe up. I have been seeing socialist tropes bizarrely creep “soto voce” into homilies, public prayers and discussions roughly since Obama was inaugurated. The term “social justice” keeps coming up, which gives me fits. I have ruffled more than a few feathers about this, and have sought formal complaint.
Now I do realize that they have a rather different compliant than I do, but it does help people like me oppose the Left’s attempts to co-opt The Church. I do fear, however, that the next Pope with me some sort of Socialist one worlder, perhaps from the Third World.
I really do believe that there is a new push by the Left to corrupt the churches, with a particular focus in the Catholic Church. They are well funded and are clever propagandists. It is difficult to fight. Thus far we have had strong and articulate Popes with broad moral authority stand up to it and this has been a sound bulwark. I fear the generational succession that must come, though. The Vatican has a large cohort of Boomer aged, EU socialist one worlders bidding their time, IMO.
It is becoming more difficult for openly conservatives in the RC Church these days.
This brings to mind a Monty Python piece in which a special force of troops are formed, “The Walker Brigade” based upon a obscure provisions in international law that forbids shooting anyone using a medical appliance.
So the troops are equipped with walkers and charge ashore holding them out in front – and are gunned down.
Maybe the Ruskis think that no one would ever sink a sub named after Santy Claus. I mean how would that look on your resume?
Guess we will have to name a couple of attack subs “Hope” and “Change” to secure similar immunity.
Please, RWE, don’t go giving them any ideas.
Not really ridiculous. By long tradition the Christmas figure in Slavic culture is Grandfather Frost, who comes on New Year’s Eve. Remember this is the Orthodox Church. The customs surrounding Grandfather Frost are not like those of Santa Claus and he is not St Nick.
If St Nicholas is the patron saint of sailors (I didn’t know this before) seems pretty appropriate to name the sub thus, especially given the state of much of Russian military hardware.
St. Nicholas the Wonderworker of Myra is the patron saint of travellers, so I assume sailors are in that mix as well. And Grandfather Frost is not identified as St. Nicholas in Russian Orthodox tradition.
Canonization of the Romanovs is also a possible namesake. The Russian Army might draw on Soviet era traditions, but when it comes to the Russian navy, it’s all back to the Tsarist era, with the blue and white cross jack of St. Andrews (that itself an allusion to the Kievan Rus rather than Scotland, since both places claim that the Disciple visited them, in a perhaps ahistoric fashion). Tsarist Russia may not have been liberal but it wasn’t an enemy of the USA. Teddy Roosevelt negotiated the peace treaty between Nicholas II’s Russia and Japan, which the latter were not so pleased with after their victory in the Straits of Tsushima and perhaps created some grievances that Tojo exploited later.
FYI when Patriarch Alexey II reposed last December, the Russian defense ministry channel Zvezda showed the General in charge of Russia’ s Strategic Rocket Forces giving a eulogy for the Moscow Patriarch while shedding tears. I don’t know if that is a comfort to Belmont Club readers to know that the man tasked with pushing the Button if his commander in chief orders it is an Orthodox Christian (at least publically) or not. BCers dicussions of modern Russia tend to be dominated by old fart Cold Warriors rather than those who see the Russians as potential allies against Islamists and Chinese expansionism.
There is a curious sort of doublethink out there among professional critics of Russia whereby the country is simultaneously reviving the USSR (witness the anthem which the recently deceased Mikhailkov wrote in 2000, after writing two others for Stalin and Kruschev) and becoming an Orthodox theocracy. Only Glenn Beck could get away with saying that Putin was “building mosques” while at the same time insisting that only the ROC was a permitted religion in Russia. In reality, Beck with his notoriously short attention span forgot those comments when he favorably cited Putin’s warnings against excessive state control over the global economy at Davos in January 2009.
“What could be more ridiculous than naming a boomer after Santa Claus?”
I’ll take that one Richard! How about naming an attack submarine “Jimmy Carter”? Now THAT is not just ridiculous, that’s pathetic!
Saint Nick is news to me. We threw our coins to Neptune. Whatever brings you home.
Did not the US Navy have a minor controversy when naming one of it’s submarines Corpus Christie?
Based on the safety record of their subs, this was probably done so that when things start glowing, they can just say it is Rudolph’s nose.
“”"”"” Situational ethnics? “”"”"”
Actually, there is such a thing. For instance, both O.J. Simpson and Michael Jackson each reverted to “blackness” to save their sorry asses in tight situations.
“”"”" Her full quote: “I would be happy to give him a blowjob just to thank him for keeping abortion legal. I think American women should be lining up with their presidential kneepads on to show their gratitude for keeping the theocracy off our backs.” “”"”"”
So Whiskey, in all his rantings, is essentially correct. How ’bout dat?
“”"”" Did not the US Navy have a minor controversy when naming one of it’s submarines Corpus Christie? “”"”"
It should be controversial if it was “Christie” rather than “Christi.” They named it, of course, for a Texas city.
10. John Hendrix:
Naming an attack sub after Jimmy Carter…
I can see their ship’s plaque now.. adorned with an attack Easter Bunny… eggs and all.
tomw
An attack boat named Jimmy Carter is a curious thing indeed. There was a recounted incident between a junior officer named Jimmy Carter and Admiral Rickover. Carter was being interviewed by Rickover for a position in the nuclear sub fleet. The version of the story I learned at officer training school was that the interview concluded with Rickover swiveling his chair so that only the back of his chair was presented to Carter. The final question put by Rickover had been something to the effect of, “Have you ever not given your job the best of your ability?”. Of course, while Rickover’s interviews with prospective nuke sub drivers were legendary, I have never seen that incident recounted other than there so I cannot vouch for it’s veracity.
Another Monty Python skit awaits.
“Kapitian! We are under attack. It appears to be the American attack sub we were warned about, the USS Peter Cottontail. However, it might be the other one that was heading toward this area, the USS Mickey Mouse.”
SJN/9; –quick tip re effectiveness: your comment had been building before you knocked it all down with the “notoriously short attention span”. Had you said “despite his usual focus” you might have called less attention to the converting of anecdote into principle, and thus have advanced rather than retarded your thesis.
So anyway, here’s another anecdote –regarding the “old fashioned Tsarist Russian Navy” –the effort to blame the Kursk disaster on an American/Nato deliberate sabotage attack, which would have been an act of war, of course, being endorsed so wholeheartedly by so many respectable officials that a Russian kid has no chance not to grow up with the thought of it engrained.
Regarding Corpus Christi: The wikipedia entry is consistent with the story I experinced growing up in the RC church.
“USS City Of Corpus Christi (SSN-705), a Los Angeles-class submarine, was the second ship of the United States Navy to be named for Corpus Christi, Texas, though she is the only one required to bear the “City of” prefix (added to placate protesters who pointed out that it was improper to name a warship “the body of Christ”, which is the meaning of the phrase “Corpus Christi”). “
PA Cat said:
“I wonder whether some people in the Russian Navy might also have been thinking of Nicholas II, who is regarded as a saint in some parts of Russian Orthodoxy– similar to the way in which some Anglicans revere Charles I as King Charles the Martyr.”
I think PA Cat hit the nail on the head. I know the Germans have a different Christmas tradition, i.e. “Nikolaustag” which is celebrated on 6 December. I should know this but what is the Russian (Christian Orthodox) Christmas tradition concerning the “gift bringer”?
The German tradition of Nikolaustag has an amusing aspect:
St. Nikolaus (Santa Claus) would come from Spain riding on a white horse during the night of 6 December. Children would leave a shoe outside their bedroom door and Nikolaus would leave a present (typically candy) in their shoe IF the child was “good”. However, Nikolaus had a companion (a black guy) who rode on a black horse. If the child was “bad” then on the night of 6 December, the bedroom door would be kicked in and the child receive a terrible beating or worse be carried back to Spain for prolonged punishment. It’s my understanding that during the Cold War, black American GIs could make some money in German Christmas parades riding on a black horse behind Nikolaus amd putting the Fear-of-God into the hearts of naughty children.
Also, the use of patron saints is not unheard of in the US military. The Army has the Order of Saint George and Saint Barbara for the armour and artillery branches.
There was IMHO no contradiction whatsoever between feminists and their support for Bill Clinton. The “theocracy” (i.e. repressive Islamism) is in fact an ally of Western Feminists. Who back them at every turn.
What feminists find as the enemy is a culture and religion that draws limits to women sharing powerful, aggressive, “correctly situated” men. Such as Bill Clinton. Or John Edwards. Who is not dead in politics, but rather will rise like Bill Clinton did.
The very fact that Clinton, Kennedy, Dodd, Edwards, Villaraigosa, and Newsome behaved abominably towards women of lesser power, stature, social connections, and wealth than they possessed, makes them IRRESISTIBLE to women like Burleigh, who seek raw power with only fashionable views added to it.
There was no contradiction. Clinton was a powerful man who took advantage of a young subordinate, and women like Burleigh found that … sexy. So naturally they defended him and do so to this day. After all, they (feminists and powerful Alpha men) have a common enemy — Christian ethics that seek to restrain male Alpha and female sexuality, in a “spread the wealth” fashion.
Once upon a midnight dreary
Conning tower wet and slick
Santa rested, sad and weary
Bundled up like old Saint Nick
Seas a-pitching, quite precarious
Sack askew, his step unsure
Reindeer smirking, how hilarious
Periscope a distant lure
“Hold on there, boys,” the old man cried
“I’ve barely time to have a look
Though goodness knows I’ve tried and tried
To find that gosh darn address book!
This sure ain’t no forsaken roof
I think we’re on a submarine
Just look about you for the proof
I’m getting soaked and getting mean”
For warmth the reindeer stamped their feet
And shivered lightly in the rain
For hours now they’d faced defeat
As Santa tried the hatch in vain
“I’ll get in now, and I do mean
I’ll get in now, by Jiminy!
The problem is, a submarine
Just doesn’t have a chiminy!
They need a house,” he cried aloud
His arms thrust upward to the sky
“A house of which they can be proud
The best that gold can freely buy!”
Up popped the hatch, up popped a head
“I surely know the very one!
There’s lots of room,” the stranger said
“And lots of early morning sun!”
“And who are you?” the old man asked
“And how did I get on this tub?”
“Why I’m the man who’s rightly tasked
To captain now this lovely sub
So come aboard, it’s Christmas Eve
The crew and I are waiting
We heard you land, could not believe
And started celebrating
Just follow me right down this hatch
Be careful with your prizes
I see your bag has quite a batch
Of wonderful surprises”
“Can Santa down a hatch go, boys?”
The old man asked his reindeer
“Is it fair wide for bags of toys
And Santa’s favorite, Cane beer?”
The reindeer pawed, their heads they shook
They didn’t know the answer
“Why don’t you just go have a look?”
Piped up the one named Dancer.
He did just fit, though it was snug
And clambered down the ladder
He gave his beard a gentle tug
And said, “It doesn’t matter
It’s Christmas Eve and every one
Is eager for some cheer
I’ve something for each mother’s son
Including some good beer”
Then through the missile room he stepped
Amid the crew’s hubbub
As Christmas morning slowly crept
And blessed their little sub
Wrichard writes: “who’s to say there won’t be federally funded abortion clinic named named after another saint. Ridiculous? Don’t count on it.”
Not ridculous. Predictable:
via “First Things,” in “The Public Square (J. Bottum)—
• Abortion is a holy blessing, says the new dean and president of the Episcopal Divinity School in Cambridge, Katherine Ragsdale. And thereby, not surprisingly, abortionists are saints. From a 2007 speech Ragsdale delivered to the Texas NARAL chapter:
“And when a woman becomes pregnant within a loving, supportive, respectful relationship, has every option open to her, [and] decides she does not wish to bear a child; and has access to a safe, affordable abortion—there is not a tragedy in sight— only blessing. The ability to enjoy God’s good gift of sexuality without compromising one’s education, life’s work, or ability to put to use God’s gifts and call is simply blessing.”
“These are the two things I want you, please, to remember—abortion is a blessing and our work is not done. . . . I want to thank all of you who protect this blessing—who do this work every day: The healthcare providers, doctors, nurses, technicians, receptionists, who put your lives on the line to care for others (you are heroes—in my eyes, you are saints); the escorts and the activists; the lobbyists and the clinic defenders; all of you. You’re engaged in holy work.”
“And when a woman becomes pregnant within a loving, supportive, respectful relationship, has every option open to her, [and] decides she does not wish to bear a child; and has access to a safe, affordable abortion—there is not a tragedy in sight— only blessing. The ability to enjoy God’s good gift of sexuality without compromising one’s education, life’s work, or ability to put to use God’s gifts and call is simply blessing.”
So, let me get this straight: If a woman wants the child, it is considered a separate human being growing inside of her, but if she doesn’t want it, through some miracle of secular transubstantiation, it becomes a pair of tonsils?
Santa Claus versus the Martians!
Things things that we saw when we were kids keep coming back to us. Hard to believe that my parents sat through it in a movie theater with us kids.
Santa Claus Conquers the Martians
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-2260027996690730318
Mystery Science Theater 3000 Santa Claus Conquers the Martians
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-8394482045230280195
Mark, Thanks for the information about Ms. Ragsdale in your post #24.
I wanted to write to her after reading some of her sermons and statements, but on reflection, I concluded it would be a waste. Seemingly, she’s long since concluded God is just some delusion being foisted on the culture by a bunch of backward rightwing idiots.
In the late 1980′s in a bookstore near the university in Cincinnati I chanced on a Spanish newspaper with an article describing a study of the first ten years of abortion in New Delhi, India. The study revealed that 99.9 percent of all abortions following the determination of the gender of the fetus by any method, were done to female fetuses.
I have searched repeatedly since that time to find some comment on that phenomenon in US domestic mainstream news journals.
So far, I have not found any article acknowledging this, except in foreign journals. A handful of feminists I found to have lamented this in their writings, but without making any concession that abortion is anything but the absolute right of a woman, devoid of any moral consequence to any other being.
What I find most disturbing about Ragsdale’s logic on the subject is that it supports the general notion that the universe is merely what we say it is. If we don’t like the restrictions chafing us, all we need to do is re-define the terms, and suddenly moral consequence falls into line with our preference.
Euthanasia, abortion… kill the inconvenient.
Concern for the innocent?
Screw it.
“Do what you want; we’ll find a way to make it legal.”
The thing that ties these themes together is the “disconnect” between action and consequence, between delusion and reality, between the present dilemmas and much-studied historical parallels.
Russia is building new subs, showing a renewed interest in commanding the circumstances of her fate belied by the cultural suicide proceeding among the once-dominant ethnic Russians. Abortion and “sex-without-consequence” among young people preoccupied with living the fantasy life they see depicted in Western media combine with chronic massive alcohol abuse – in other words, static or negative birth rates combine with increasing morbidity – resulting in a distinctly shrinking population. Meanwhile, the populations of the restive former states of the CCCP are expanding rapidly.
Any chart graphing population growth against infrastructure development and resources for the region, when projected out only a generation or two, will project Russia massively outnumbered, and probably outgunned by its former subjects.
My bitty little reading of history makes me think of how the Black Death of the 13th century is supposed to have objectively improved life for the survivors of the plague.
Following the deaths (in places) of up to two-thirds of the former inhabitants, survivors were able to take possession of cottages, homes, estates, entire villages, that had been depopulated. Coins became a much greater medium of exchange for daily transactions. Fancy clothing previously the mark of aristocracy came within the reach of middle class merchants. Common laborers found themselves able to command substantially improved wages and concessions, because of their relative scarcity.
Russia doesn’t seem to be enjoying any such benefits; the loss of population is much too gradual.
However, here in the U.S., o seems to have a plan to make dramatic reductions in excess population. This will allow a subsequent redistribution of wealth without historical precedent.
What a guy.
The Order of Saint Barbara is an honorary military society of the United States Field Artillery. Both U.S. Marine and Army field artillery along with their military and civilian supporters are eligible for membership. The order is managed by the U.S. Field Artillery Association and two levels of recognition exist. The most distinguished level is the Ancient Order of Saint Barbara and those who are selected for this honor have achieved long-term, exceptional service to the field artillery surpassing even their brethren in the Honorable Order of Saint Barbara. The order links field artillerymen of the past and present in a brotherhood of professionalism, selfless service and sacrifice symbolized by Saint Barbara.
BCers dicussions of modern Russia tend to be dominated by old fart Cold Warriors rather than those who see the Russians as potential allies against Islamists and Chinese expansionism.
There is a reason for that, son.
Who do you think taught the Islamists terrorism?
The Chicoms and the Russkies are in it together. Have been all my life.
Cannoneer No 4 #30, I have to disagree with you sir. AlQueda was incubated in Afghanistan under St Reagan’s watch. At that time the Americans swallowed the entire anti-Communist line of the Islamists. The chumps thought that the Saudis, Pakis and Afghans all loved liberty like Ben Franklin. The Islamist pipers lured the Americans with the same same tune again in Yugoslavia. I am sorry but the US was one of the leading midwives of Islamic terror and its associated apologetics.
The Ivans are back at the Belmont Club and Georgia is surrounded. I expected this weeks ago but maybe something will happen before campaign season ends. There is of course no truth at all in the KGB fantasy that the CIA created Osama and Co. CIA support went elsewhere. The seeds of the Islamist terrorists were sown by the KGB. They are shocked that the monster came back to haunt them. Regarding Serbia, Milosovic and Karadzic behaved so brutally that any grievance they may have had got erased by their own misdeeds. In terms of culpability for the suffering they brought upon themselves the Serbs resemble the Palestinians who have no legitimate claims any more. Whatever issue they could have made in theory has been washed away in blood.
http://www.financialsense.com/stormwatch/geo/pastanalysis/2007/0525.html
This is either the rambling of a madman –or not. And by the date it was written, author did not yet have the info –claimed by a high defector –that what had made Alexander Litvinenko dangerous enough to assassinate (and wasn’t the Polonium 210 a message from the killers saying “i want you to know who I am”?) was that Litvinenko had been in the process of releasing proof that AQ#2 Amin al-Zawaheri had been trained by KGB. Another thing that had not yet happened by the May 2007 date of the link, is the elevation to the Duma –and its automatic protection from extradition –of the suspected assassin, Andrei K. Lugovoi.
the author blames Aldrich Ames for our inability to compete with KGB –however Frank Church may be the more to blame.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ayman_al-Zawahiri
(snip, ellipses and bolding mine)
…on a trip to Chechnya…arrested within hours of entering Russian territory and spent five months in a Makhachkala prison awaiting trial…April 1997, the trio were sentenced to six months, and were subsequently released a month later and ran off without paying their court-appointed attorney Abulkhalik Abdusalamov his $1,800 legal fee citing their “poverty”.[45] Shehata was sent on to Chechnya, where he met with Ibn Khattab.[44][45][46][47] However, some have raised doubts as to the true nature of al-Zawahiri’s encounter with the Russians: Jamestown Foundation scholar Evgenii Novikov has argued that it seems unlikely that the Russians would not have been able to determine who he was, given their well-trained Arabists and the obviously suspicious act of Muslims crossing illegally a border with multiple false identities and encrypted documents in Arabic. [48][49] Assassinated former FSB agent Alexander Litvinenko alleged, among other things, that during this time, al-Zawahiri was indeed being trained by the FSB,[50] and that he was not the only link between al-Qaeda and the FSB.[51] Former KGB officer and writer Konstantin Preobrazhenskiy supported Litvinenko’s claim and said that Litvinenko “was responsible for securing the secrecy of Al-Zawahiri’s arrival in Russia, who was trained by FSB instructors in Dagestan, Northern Caucasus, in 1996-1997.”[52]
(end snip)
–note soon after appeared the 1998 bin Laden declaration of Fatwa on “Jews and Crusaders”, widely thought to’ve been written by Zawahiri.
much much more, search [ Ayman al-Zawahiri kgb fsb ]
33. luddy barsen:
“the author blames Aldrich Ames for our inability to compete with KGB –however Frank Church may be the more to blame.”
Yeah, this crap started a long, long time ago.
At least the Dems have staying power, and lots more than do the Country Club Republicans.
RCM/35; that staying power reminds of system order law –how a chaotic subsystem plus time will disorder the system itself and make chaos the new system order –
while the old system order becomes the new chaotic subsystem.
Hellenes tried to solve for stability by giving themselves to disorderly emotional Dionysus one season out of the four with the other three going to Apollo the orderly intellect. Practical Greeks!
nowadays that movement in the mind takes us to organize along a line that either ends of which are commie-nazis solving for system-order by forcing sub-system shrinkage, and democratic republicans solving by allowing whole-system expansion.
really kind of a night to day, plus/minus, pos-neg, light in dark, good and evil, god or devil, kinda thang we seem to be involved in here on our little blue orb-fantastic.
Uh, in Russia, St Nicholas and Santa Claus are not the same. You’re drawing conclusions based on incorrect assumptions. And it’s not the first time Russia will have named submarines after saints: The Alexander Nevsky comes to mind.
Actually, we Americans missed a bet in not naming a ballistic missile submarine “Santa Claus”. Think of the laconic humour that American politicians could have made during the Cold War, e.g. “The Soviets had better be less naughty and more nice or Santa Claus will send them a present.”