jdhill

Are they on trial? Did they have an obligation to tell the family, yes. Did they have an obligation to tell the rest of, no. From what has come out, it still appears to be a fog-of-war kinda thing... should it have happened, no... were mistakes made, absolutley. Was it to the point of being "criminal", it doesn't sound like it... But like I said... this is an issue for the family and the military to deal with, not the general public. J All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing. - Edmund Burke

The fact that it was fraticide has been out for a long time... if they did not release the full details of the incident, how is it lying? J All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing. - Edmund Burke

This has been part of our war fighting doctrine for a long, long time... just look at operations in the Balkins. Stop loss was meant to maintain manning during times of crisis, and has been used on several occations since GW-I, usually on a selective basis. And remember, those being "stop-lossed" still have service obligations as part of their contracts. Call up of members of the IRR has also been part of our doctrine for a long time... and has been used on several occations during various operations, again, usually on a selective basis, for specialized skills... that is why it exists... If you don't want to get called, get out of the IRR... if you can't get out its because you still have an obligation, it was part of the contract you signed. I disagree that those two items are proof, in and of themselves, that we are spread too thin. These were always intended to be used in times of conflict. Now, having said all that, I agree that the current OPTEMPO is begining to stretch the military, if not the soldiers, then the families, and that affects readiness... but that has been the case since we reapped the "peace dividend" after the wall came down... J All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing. - Edmund Burke

They have what went in to conference, but not what has come out. Link J All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing. - Edmund Burke

Well lots of people have been arguing that the hold our repbulicans should stop holding up intel reform, but how many have read the legislation the Senate passed? Kennedy has a similar question running about the House verson, so I wondered what folks thought about the senate verson... For those that are saying "stop holding up this important legislation", why do you think this is a good bill? Is it change for change's sake, or is it really the right thing to do? J All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing. - Edmund Burke

Just to be clear... all of the jobs you listed have the ability to, have been required to, and will be required to in the future, kill people in the course of their duties as a soldier, sailor, airman, or marine If someone chooses to join the military, with any job except Chaplain, they should expect to have to go to war and have to kill someone. It may never happen, but it is part of the package. J All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing. - Edmund Burke

Someone who was there saying it, and someone who was not are two very different things... If Prof. K was there, than another vet may not take offensively... otherwise, a vet might feel a kiwi injection was in order. J All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing. - Edmund Burke

Do you mean the minimum standards for recognition and issuance? Or is there a true National ID proposed? If the later, which section is it in, because I did not see it in the version of the bill I have. If its the former, I think the minimum standards are appropriate. J All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing. - Edmund Burke

Not knowing what has happened in the conference committee its hard to say where things are now... HR-10, as passed and forwarded to the Senate, looks like a much better bill than S.2845... I still do not it provides enough protection for battlefield use of national assets, or clearly separates the levels of intelligence assets with DoD that would be under the NID's purview. Reform for reform's sake is not good... it took over 40 years to fix the National Security Act of 1947... take the time to get it right... Again we don't know what has been done to HR.10 or S.2845 in committee, but if what went in from the senate side prevails, we have the potential of being in a worse position than we are now. J All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing. - Edmund Burke

The remainder are already in country, and are being extended. J All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing. - Edmund Burke

How do you know its only 3? There has not yet been a full vote... If it is only 3, then it is 3 that are in the right positions to block a bill, and they are in those positions because their peers put them there, presumable for their judgement and leadership abilities (I know there is politics and senority involved too) The Speaker of the House could bring it to a vote, but he hasn't... Perhaps he has reservations about the bill in its current form. You mentioned in another post that this has been ongoing for a year... well it hasn't... the 9-11 report made its recommendations in July, and the bill was introduced at the end of September, so this has only been in the works for a little over 2 months. I think holding it up the the driver's license thing is inappropriate. While I think such legislation is a good idea, Driver's Licenses have nothing to do with intel reform, and the issue should be addressed with its own legislation. EDIT TO ADD: There is a bunch of other crap that does not belong in an Intel Reform bill... stuff that belongs in revisions of the PA, and/or their own bills. Authority over military intelligence programs, particularly at the joint and tactical levels, are something quite different. The 9-11 Comm. Report recommendation for the NID specifically called for Joint and Tac. intel to be unaffected by their suggested reform... The bill specifically puts those two items under a joint responsibility of the NID and SECDEF... Tasking authority not even addressed, which has the real possibility of a suit in Washington telling a battlefield commander that they cannot have the resources they need... that is a good reason to kick this bill back into conference. J All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing. - Edmund Burke

What did the Patriot Act pass by? I think a lot of the left, center, and even some of the right think that was knee-jerk in retrospect... reform for reform's sake is not always a good thing, and more government is almost never the right answer. J All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing. - Edmund Burke

While the reasons these two Reps are delaying may not have the highest of purposes, I'm not sure that the result is holding up valuable legislation. I agree intelligence reform is badly needed, I do not agree that the creation of another intelligence bureaucracy is the way. From what I can tell, the legislation in question is 214 pages of more government to tell the members of the intelligence community to do what they are already tasked to do... Kinda like DoHS. The reason there are so many different intelligence organizations, why the CIA doesn't do it all in the first place, is because all of the parent organizations have different priorities and needs. Taking control away from those "customers" may not result in better intelligence, more probably worse. Does there need to be a way to have efforts coordinated? Absolutely! But I'm not sure this legislation even accomplishes that. J All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing. - Edmund Burke

I think there is a division growing in the HP canopy world... some are going to go as small as they can, because they want to go fast... others, particularly on the competion side of the house, have realized that optimum performance does not mean as small as you can walk away from... some of this is due to more experiance, some is from evolution of the competitions themselves. There are even some people who are getting bigger canopies, then putting on weight to get to the "right" wingloading... J All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing. - Edmund Burke

The Parabellum name comes from ancient Latin saying Si vis Pacem, Para bellum - if you want Peace, prepare for War. It was then name of the pistol of the Luger type, and then it stuck to the ammo... when you go buy a box of 9mm the box usually says 9mm Luger or 9mm Parabellum. J All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing. - Edmund Burke

For the poll, meaningul reform of the makeup or processes... My personal opinion, the internal systems, procedures, and controls need serious reform All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing. - Edmund Burke

Inspired by PK's post... What do you think? J All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing. - Edmund Burke

I've had a G4 powerbook for about 3 years. It great, but if you plan to do a lot of editing you will run out of HD fairly fast unless you have someplace to move your data to. J All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing. - Edmund Burke

Funny, I watched a documentary on either the history channel or the discovery channel about the event, and it did not mention those findings. All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing. - Edmund Burke

Bombers are not the only threat to a ship... the USS Stark was hit by a missile launched from a Mirage 2000, also a fighter... BTW, F14's can also be configured to drop bombs. You think the Admiral knew, maybe he did, maybe he had to agonize over the decision to shoot down that appears to be civilian airliner, but also appears to be threatening the ship... as we have seen, an airliner makes an effective guided missile... why did the plane turn toward the ship? The US has made mistakes, plenty of them... this may have been one of them. But there were lots of things in the chain of events that were not done by the US that led to the engagement. J All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing. - Edmund Burke

The US fired the missile, that hit the jet, which then broke apart... Was it the jet's fault? In part yes... it was not on a comercial route, it was not flying a comercial flight profile, it was warned to change course away from the ship or it would be fired upon, it turned toward the ship instead... there was further speculation that these actions were done on purpose to create the encounter and a bad PR event for the US... the speculation was fueled by the irregularities noted in the "victims" that suggested they were dead before they were put on the plane... the speculations were never proven though. J All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing. - Edmund Burke

Yes they did... an airliner that was warned to change course and did not, and was flying an atypical flight profile for a civilian airliner... I also found it rather odd that all the bodies in the water were naked (and showing no evidence of their cloths being burned off)... which dose not seem consistant with other examples of midair aircraft breakups (TWA 800, KA 007). J All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing. - Edmund Burke

Its not a problem of research, (but what are the researching?) but rather that they want to change and agreement they only made a week or two ago... J All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing. - Edmund Burke

Anyone surprised? J All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing. - Edmund Burke

Lets see... we could develope alternatives to buying oil from OPEC (other types of energy, drill in ANWR)and leave the middle east to burn itself down... but that doesn't solve the global problem and would be "selfish", and I don't think it would work anyway Genocide would work, but that's not PC... Oh wait, I've got it! We should all become muslim... that is what the extremists want, and that is the only thing that might turn their hate elsewhere. There is no easy or catch all answer... We need a situation where no government tolerates terrorists, and populations don't tolerate it either... sadly I doubt that will ever happen. [whiney] Why can't we all get along? [/whiney] J All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing. - Edmund Burke