You’ll appreciate this… true story.

We were visiting relatives (rural Ohio) and dinner was completed and things were being cleaned up. Phone rang. A “nice young boy” coming over to fetch “nice young daughter”.

My uncle observed the phone call and asked when Nice Young Man would arrive. As the appointed time approached Uncle brought out his ammunition press and proceeded to sit there pressing ammo. Nice Young Man was duly brought into the house when he arrived and spent five or ten minutes amiably chatting with Uncle while Aunt and Younger Brother tried to keep from laughing aloud in the next room.

As I recall, Nice Young Man brought Nice Young Daughter home safe and sound at the expected time.

I assume you’ve seen “Ten Rules for Dating My Daughter”.

“Also, I thought the Russians had stopped building they. They have to be idiots to increase nuclear proliferation. Haven’t they noticed that Al Qaeda and the Chechens are very good buddies, with Al Qaeda soldiers sent to Chechnya to be blooded? ”

And the French had to be idiots to side with the Islamofascists against the US, given their long-term demographic troubles. Didn’t stop them, did it? Money, both in the form of commercial interests and direct bribery seems to be the reason.

Even here in the US we have a big problem with Saudi money and the State Department.

So now imagine how much further Arab oil money goes in Russia!

There’s nothing like meeting the “nice young men” while doing maintenace on your firearm collection. Having a 3/4 empty bottle of JD sitting next to the cleaning kit can be helpful too. Ask’em if they’d like to see your shooting trophies before they leave.

I don’t know if you have ever caught my background…eight years a Marine, mostly in Artillery FDC/Survey. Secondaries in marksmanship, embarkation, NBC, training/ops, and some other esoteric pursuits…

Cecil -

I turned down an alternate slot at the University of Rochester for an NROTC scholarship after failing to make the cut at UT, A&M, and Baylor. I got out of football as a junior and my GPA was only 3.1. I didn’t want to go to school out of Texas (yes, my dad called me a fool) and enlisted. I scored a final GT of 130 at MCRD San Diego.

Now there’s an object lesson that IQ has nothing to do with common sense, eh?

Note I said “…if she decides to go that way”. There’s too much of me in her for me to pretend she’s going to listen much past her junior year in high school, at least as far as what course in life she will choose. I want her to follow her dreams.

The dad in me would like to see the likelihood of combat exposure reduced. There are no true rear areas on a battlefield anymore…but the Air Force comes pretty close most of the time. That’s endemic in their mission and equipment, NOT a reflection on their character, bravery, or competence. Not nearly. Selfish? Yep, sue me.

She’ll do well at whatever she chooses. I THINK the wife and I have done a reasonable job of teaching our kids about some serious mistakes to avoid…alas, by example, but they both seem to love us just the same. We talk a lot about life. It’s amazing to watch them evolve; just last week it seems I was changing diapers. Now we are dealing with “nice young men.”

I was a nice young man. Bastards.

I concur with everthing execpt China Lake. There is no Lake in China Lake.

I was homeported out of the Sub base in San Diego and spent my last few productive months helping NOSC set up some science projects on the Tang.

NAVBASE Coronado

NAVBASE Point Loma

NAVBASE San Diego

NAF El Centro

NAVBASE Ventura County

NAWS China Lake

NSWC Corona

NWS Seal Beach

There are, of course, some other attractive locals. Does Pearl Harbor ring any bells? Those sailors, it must be admitted, are often quite clever about selecting where to put their favored ports.

And someday, perhaps soon, Med cruises will be as prized as they once were.

Let’s not forget it is very hard to play a round of golf at 300 feet below the surface.

I served on the 563 Class (Trout SS 566) Nukes are pukes….

“…the Left is convinced that the root cause is NOT “over there,” but is instead over here.”

I think you hit close to the mark. The anti-war left is convinced that all enmity for the US is a result of the US not being agreeable enough. They really believe that the root causes of terrorism are things like (to quote Michael Moore):

“He [Bush] withdraws from the Kyoto agreement, walks us out of the Durban conference on racism, insists on restarting the arms race.”

They really believe that American companies paying low wages in 3rd world countries makes people in those countries poor (and makes them hate us). They really believe that Iraqis hate what has been done “to their country” – despite the testimony of thousands of soldiers and a large number of Iraqi bloggers.

Why? Because they can’t believe otherwise. The Iraqis have to hate us, the “insurgency” must be a popular uprising secretly supported by most Iraqis, because if this were not the case then an “arrogant” Republican president started a war that liberated millions of people who are happy about that, and war might be good in some cases, and that’s dangerous thinking if you are committed to a worldview in which war is always the worst of all possible outcomes, or at least such a bad outcome that we should only go to war when the President is a Democrat who can be trusted to always act altruistically. Republicans have ulterior motives.

They’re still searching for the nefarious motive behind the war – Haliburton didn’t hold up, conquering the country to secure its oil reserves didn’t work either. The “war to ensure reelection” idea is belied by history and the timing of the war. But they are certain that the motivation was anything but legitimate – it can’t have been that intelligence suggested the existance of WMDs and links to terorist groups, it can’t have been liberation from a tyrant. The motivation must have been the good of the few, not the good of the country, or of the oppressed Iraqis. All evidence to the contrary has to be suppressed.

There is a great line in the movie “Crimson Tide” where the CO, played by Gene Hackman, tells his crew before going to sea that “if you didn’t want to give your best you would have joined the Air Force” It sent this Navy family rolling on the floor.

“Go ‘Bama…Roll Tide”

(Sounds better then “Go Trout…Go fishing”