ailment

Ah the sound of liberal hurt feelings:

This is just the crisis to make themselves seem relevant again within the GOP—even if they’re undermining the commander in chief at a pivotal moment.
— Why Neocons Love the StrongmanMichael Tomasky, The Daily Beast

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It’s likely, then, that the J-20 no more represents the end of US air superiority than did Cope India or the T-50’s debut. What it does represent is the world’s second economy finally joining a club of nations long-accustomed to designing, building and operating advanced fighter aircraft.
— China’s Over-Hyped Stealth Jet, David Axe, The Diplomat.

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Meanwhile, it remains to be seen how much the J-20’s design changes matter and indeed how effective an aircraft it is. But it is evident that the plane’s flight testing, at least, is far more than just a publicity stunt.
—Stealth Changes for China’s Stealth FighterGERRY DOYLE, NEW YORK TIMES. Gobssmacks David Axe.

It must hurt when reality overtakes liberal fantasy.

For decades the left’s orthodoxy was that the West was to make peace with Russia/The USSR, China and that “the tide of war was receding”.

Russia is INVADING the Ukraine. They used TBM’s on Georgia. China is building a modern networked force.

And yet, Michael Tomasky makes current events be all about the left and how those meanie Neo-cons runied everything.

Lest we forget, the media and the left (I repeat myself) went easy on Putin, Hugo Chavez and China. David Axe seems to think that the US military sucks and we have nothing to fear.

So when real life starts to hurt them, they either face reality (and start crying) or escape to fantasy.

President Obama’s foreign policy is based on fantasy.
— Washington Post, Editorial Board

And so it begins.

Armies

“This isn’t 1940. Moreover, as an instrument of coercion, that smaller army would be more lethal than the much larger one that helped defeat Nazi Germany and imperial Japan. Given a choice between a few hundred of today’s Abrams tanks and a few thousand vintage Shermans, Gen. George Patton would not hesitate to choose the former.”
—

Do we really need a large Army?By Andrew J. Bacevich, Washington Post.

This is the same paper that whitewashes the drone strikes. George Bush would never have been given an article titled “5 myths of the Iraq war”.

And yet the “argument” for cutting the military persists.
This Ain’t Hell skewers Tom Rick’s argument for “going to a cadre-like military, with only two Army divisions kept at high readiness”.

The left believes that troops are stupid. Just draft the bodies you need, buy the tanks, trucks and planes and then send them off to war. Lefties won’t go of course, the draft dogers of the 60’s became to leaders of today.

No they want to cut to the bone and keep cutting. there is talk of a new round of BRAC. Closing MORE bases, gutting civilian towns, eroding the defense industrial base. All for more spending on “domestic programs”.

Once the troops leave, their expertise is gone forever. You can’t draft leadership, tribal knowledge or hours in the cockpit.

“In the meantime, the world, from East Asia to the Middle East, is “unsettled” and becoming ever more so. Does anyone doubt that the decision in Washington to slash its defenses has been fully noted in Moscow, Beijing, Pyongyang, Tehran, and North Waziristan? Like Jeremiah, we say judgment is inevitable. Unless the present course is reversed, the wages of weakness will be paid in increased instability, crises, and ultimately conflicts that might well have been avoided.”
—
“Deeply Unsettling“, Gary Schmitt and Thomas Donnelly, WeeklyStandard.com

It’s 1938 all over again.

UPDATE: Told you so…

I called it!

Every year we have some leftie intellectual murder electrons to say that “technology is ruining our lives!!11!!1!”

He dares to say the MLK couldn’t get his message out? How stupid does he think his readers are? If Youtube and Twitter were around back then, Bull Conor, George Wallace and the rest would’ve folded. TV was the the “info superhighway” of the 60′s. It made MLK a household name and buried the Jim Crow era.

We went from pony express to the telephone and telegraph, then to radio. Soon television and then the internet. From wooden airplanes to laning on the moon 60 years after the Wright Brothers first flight.

And this ^%$##% thnks technology is bad?

No he’s just another usefull idiot giving the Democrats cover for the lackluster ACA rollout.
Chockblock on January 17, 2014 at 4:45 AM

That’s from my comment on the politico article “How technology killed the future”.

Yeah, it’s actually titled that. It’s a rambling screed on how technology and the information age has made society less civil, politics more mean and……*yawn*…..

Sorry the left’s stock excuses bore me…

So Prof. Reynolds says:

This is just a tech-themed version of the “America has become ungovernable” columns I predicted some time ago. It’s not that Obama’s incompetent! It’s that technology has made us ungovernable!

Posted by Glenn Reynolds at 9:00 pm

All proceeds as he has foreseen however.

Excuses are all the left has these days.

Boeing, Boeing

So this happened:

SEATTLE (KING) – Boeing machinists have voted to approve Boeing’s latest eight-year contract proposal, securing assembly of the company’s new 777X airplane in Washington state.

Thousands of union members cast their ballots – some waiting in line for hours outside of the union hall in Everett – in Friday’s crucial vote.
— “Seattle machinists approve Boeing 777X production contract“, Ksdk.com

So Kshama Sawant must be spinning, she called for Boeing workers to “Take Over” their plant if Boeing left. Yeah, talking like a Batman villain makes all kinds of sense…

Boeing’s workers have working brains. Their Union doubled down and lost. Boeing could move to those “right to work” states. The voted to keep their jobs. Hopefully they will vote new union leadership.

“Good Year for a Great War”

“Will 2014 bring another Great War? My bet is almost certainly not, but with a note of caution. Claims that war is “inconceivable” are not statements about what is possible in the world, but rather, about what our limited minds can conceive. The fact that Presidents Obama and Xi understand that war would be folly for both China and the US is relevant but not dispositive. None of the leaders in Europe of 1914 would have chosen the war they got and that in the end they all lost. By 1918, the Kaiser was gone, the Austro-Hungarian Empire dissolved, the Tsar overthrown by the Bolsheviks, France bled for a generation, and England shorn of the flower of its youth and treasure. Given a chance for a do-over, none of the leaders would have made the choices he did.”
— 2014: Good Year for a Great War?, Graham Allison, The National Interest.

As this decade seems to mirror the last century I’m not surprised that someone is making a comparison to the “guns of August”. I am miffed that it took’em long enough.

With the fall of Saddam and the death of Bin Laden, too many think that we’re “at peace”. Americans want out of Afghanistan. The left drools over “Obamacare” and more domestic spending.

Meanwhile the world is slowly burning, Asia is full of disputes over territory. The Middle East is in revolution and Europe is broke.

August 1916 or Spring 1938? Either way the next few years could bring a nasty surprise.

And now a stealth insult from BREAKING DEFENSE

Because a soldier’s child under the knife would actually be true.

For the most adamant, personnel costs are about to eat the entire Department of Defense budget, reducing it to just a welfare agency and leaving the United States at the mercy of its enemies. Since the creation of the All-Volunteer Force, spending per servicemember has risen inexorably. The Department—as with the rest of the country—has watched its healthcare costs dramatically outpace inflation. Since the defense budget started expanding in the late 1990s, Congress has consistently heaped largesse on defense personnel. It repealed the retirement reform passed in the 1980s just before it kicked in, let former military members double dip by taking their military retirement pay while drawing a full civil service salary, allowed retirees to keep both their retirement and disabled pay, created the $10 billion-a-year TRICARE for Life Medicare supplement, and expanded eligibility for both healthcare and retirement benefits.
—Budget Deal Proves That Congress CAN Take On Military Pay & Benefits Costs , Russell Rumbaugh, BreakingDefense.com

I’ve said before that personel costs are NOT eating the DoD alive.

If anything it’s a ploy to keep the big projects going. SO the recent budget deal screwed vets 62 and younger. Their COLA (cost of living adjustment) is slightly below inflation. Ouch. Pensions are fixed and for some who can’t work it’s their only income. Oh it is supposed to save $1 billion a year but future budget numbers are always 1 part projection and 2 parts fantasy.

This Rumbaugh clown thinks that pay and benefits are some luxury to be “cut”. No there is no personnel vs. readiness battle. During the 90’s the problem was cuts across the board. Now we have things like ARMY FAMILY COVENANT:

The pledge states simply: You are changing your life for the Army, so it seems that a bond should be formed that lets you know this is not a commitment taken lightly. The Army will look out for you, your soldier and your entire family. For we are all one family in the Army and should act accordingly.
— via GoArmy.com

So what does Rumbaugh use to illustrate this?

A picture of a pet in a vet clinic.

There isn’t a middle finger big enough.

You have spat upon every child, spouse and retiree who’s had to go under the knife, see a doctor, pay for food and balance a budget. Pet care is an OUT OF POCKET EXPENSE YOU DIPSTICK!!!

Ahem. Child care isn’t free either, service members pay on a scale based on rank and/or income.

Health care, pay and the tax free food and clothing sales keep service members in uniform. You should know that Rumbaugh, you were in the Army in the 90’s when people were on food stamps due to low pay. I noticed several references to the “All Volunteer Force” like it’s a bad thing. I’m starting to suspect that this is another stealth call to bring back the draft because a drugged out, unprofessional military is cheaper somehow…

According to MOAA calculations, a service member who retires as an E-7 would see an average loss of more than $3,700 a year in retired pay by the time he or she reached age 63, while an O-5 stands to lose more than $6,200 a year.

“A 20 percent reduction in retired pay and survivor benefit values is a very substantial cut in military career benefits, and does not represent good faith to our men and women in uniform,” MOAA president and retired Vice Adm. Norb Ryan said.

William Thien, the Veterans of Foreign Wars national commander, said the provision puts the all-volunteer military in jeopardy.
—Levin: Proposed COLA reduction to get second look

Good for the veteran advocates and military associations, we need to push back before the idiots and arm chair generals ruin the military.

tl;dr – join MOAA or AUSA to keep the benefits and pay you’ve worked for.

Dirty Jobs Mike Rowe on College

All over America there are jobs waiting to be filled. Many trades are losing experienced people because a generation is getting old. Lefties told children “go to college or you’ll flip burgers!”

And what are they doing? Flipping burgers deep in student loan debt.

Instead we should invest in vocational training and skills to get jobs instead of massive debt.

Accountability is for Little People [tm]

Dere’s little stealin’ like you does,
and dere’s big stealin’ like I does. For de little
stealin’ dey gits you in jail soon or late. For
de big stealin’ dey makes you Emperor and
puts you in de Hall o’ Fame when you croaks.
— Brutus Jones, The Emperor Jones

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Maryland exchange director resigns, was on Caribbean vacation when it imploded.

More thoughts at This Ain’t Hell:

For millions of them, their previously acceptable health care insurance has been converted without their consent, or even any opportunity to express their concerns, into a catastrophic insurance policy that would have, prior to Obamacare’s passage, been available to them at a fraction of the premiums they will now have to pay.

–“America’s New Millions of Uninsureds“

If this was a private program, people would be going to jail.

Chew On This: As the World Burns….

Chew on these tasty links (they are a little spicy, beware):

• China dispute with Japan heightens tension: Opinionline USA Today looks at the big dispute in Asia that could draw the US in.
• “Thai Prime Minister says protesters’ demands unacceptable as violence continues” Fox News has the latest on Thailand’s unrest…
• Unrest continues in Ukraine as protesters block government offices…as Legal Iinsurrection’s Mandy Nagy covers the Ukraine’s unrest.
• China’s Carrier Killer: Threat and Theatrics, Air Force magazine looks at China’s carrier killer.

So what is the government doing? What is the priority?

The Colorado Springs Gazette reports that the Air Force Office of Special investigations (OSI comparable to the Army’s CID and Navy’s NCIS) has been running confidential informants among the student body at the Air Force Academy;
— “Snitching on classmates at the Air Force Academy“, This Aint’ Hell

Oh yeah, those informants are “disavowed” afterward.

…

The Afforadable Care Act’s web portal still isn’t working so sayth Instapundit.

The DoD is “floating” a plan to close Commissaries based in the US. Mind you, those are where many service members redeem their EBT (foodstamp) and WIC bennies. Cause we’re paid too much or something.

RSM gives is them gem from the New York Times:

Got that, troops? “Tough choices,” your compensation is “on the table,” because defending your nation isn’t really anything special.

On the other hand, says New York Times columnist Paul Krugman, something must be done for America’s real heroes, retail clerks:
—Ask NY Times Who Deserves More Pay: America’s Troops or Fast-Food Workers?, The Othermccain.com

So as the world burns, the DoD wants to focus on spice smokers and the Media wants to cut our benefits.

Really? At a time when we need the men and women in uniform the most they want to focus on things that don’t matter or view us as a liability.

The last time(s) we did this bad things happened. In the 30’s the military was ragged and understaffed with wooden guns, flour sack “bombs” and jeeps with wooden signs that said “tank” used in exercises. In the 70’s, the drugged out, worn out military was barely able to keep up with the USSR. Thief and drug abuse was rampant as the military was ignored, there were military familes on food stamps. In the 90’s, service members were on food stamps (again), all four services bled numbers. Worse, pilots, senior NCO’s and officers left in droves taking years of combat experience with them.

In the wars that followed, the men and women in uniform paid the price as lack of training, lack of support and bad gear bit us in the ass. We got lucky in Desert Storm, but after the Gulf War the cuts just kept coming (see above).

The post 9/11 era brought enough money to expand the military and I get that there has to be a contraction. But the cuts to pay and bennies AND cuts to training and readiness will lead to a hollow force. A hollow force just as the world isn’t getting peaceful.

It’s getting worse.

We can’t repeat the 30’s and the 70’s.

There are still service members’ families on food stamps. College, medical, dental and other “costly” benefits keep qualified people in the ranks. We can’t draft experience and esprit de corps. We can’t fly, drive or sail ragged rusted out tanks, planes and ships.

Either we are committed to Allies or it’s just empty talk. Either we fight for our principles or accept a world dominated by countries that hate us.

The world won’t wait for us to dither.

Don Gomez knocks the draft arugement out of the park

Via Hotair.com:

“The most important point in arguing against bringing back the draft is that we don’t need it. That is, the armed forces are currently having no problems with recruiting, and in most cases, are recruiting over 100% of their target goals. To bring back the draft, the military would have to do one of two things in order to make room for the conscripts: increase the size of the overall force or partition off a certain quota of positions to be made up of conscripts. Considering the current economic situation and the planned reductions in troop numbers, increasing the size of the overall force is a nonstarter. Given the military’s current recruiting success, partitioning off “slots” for draftees could work only by turning away otherwise qualified recruits. Then, there would still only be a tiny portion of the armed forces that were draftees in a mostly all-volunteer force.“
—Why Bringing Back the Draft Makes No Sense Don Gomez, Small Wars Journal

Given that the Army has gone from a high of 500,000+ to a low of 470,000 and dip below that, why on earth do we need to put Americans who don’t want to join into the service?

I suspect that it’s part of the left’s plan to gut the military to pay for more social welfare. Lefty policy wonks want draftees so that they can scream about “skin in the game”. Sorry this isn’t football.

Most positions in the military are combat service and support, not shooting or kicking down doors. Most draftees would wind up fixing trucks and mopping floors. The old school Keyensian economics numbskulls think that’s a good idea. Reality is that it’s a bad idea and will turn the clock back to the hollowed out force of the 1970’s.