I love cows

Deal with it.

Embrace the suck

Good stuff over at Argghhh!!! for those that need some lift. Here is a taste;

... I like that they seem to be attracted to Iraq as a place to come and visit violence on we Americans. We have fine American fighting men and women in Iraq who can shoot them in the face. This is, on balance, preferable to them coming to Hoboken to blow up shopping malls and then lawyering up.

Please don't contribute to the negativism. Courage. Life sucks, but
we're Americans, and that's still as good as it gets.

Marketing defeat

Jim Wooten in the AJC puts the point home. He starts with a poem by The American poet Archibald MacLeish, who served in World War I and later as Librarian of Congress, wrote a poem that expresses clearly the stakes for this generation in Iraq. It’s called “The Young Dead Soldiers.” The poem:

The young dead soldiers do not speak.

Nevertheless, they are heard in the still houses: who has not heard them?

They have a silence that speaks for them at night and when the clock counts.

They say: We were young. We have died. Remember us.

They say: We have done what we could but until it is finished it is not done.

They say: We have given our lives but until it is finished no one can know what our lives gave.

They say: Our deaths are not ours; they are yours; they will mean what you make them.

They say: Whether our lives and our deaths were for peace and a new hope or for nothing we cannot say; it is you who must say this.

They say: We leave you our deaths. Give them their meaning.

We were young, they say. We have died. Remember us.

And he closes with a scathing assault.

Their deaths mean what we make them. Those who drive the intellectual and political engine of the Democratic Party’s drift to pacifism and appeasement define Vietnam’s deaths as the product of misdirected adventurism. Abandon Iraq now and the lives of young dead soldiers are debris on the desert floor, for the worth of their sacrifice will be defined, as Vietnam was, as misguided adventurism or worse, the product of lies.

This is not a party— the one that coalesced in this nation in the days leading up to last Tuesday — that can be allowed to succeed.

No matter the marketing terminology, no matter the soothing reasonableness of their assurance that they are advocating something other than surrender, no matter their blissful assurance (for they believe it sincerely) that diplomacy and understanding can satisfy the dragon, the policies they advocate keep this nation at risk.

I highly recommend that you go to the AJC article to read the whole thing and read the comments.

Respect the position, not the man

Classic. Unquestionably a perfect example of the title of this post. 'Nuff said.

Illinois Senator Barack Obama warns citizens at his 50th Town Hall meeting about gas guzzling, WPSD-TV reports.

It was among many points made to the standing room only audience at the Metropolis Community Center. Obama spoke on everything from DC politics to global warming.

He says part of the blame for the world's higher temperatures rests on gas guzzling vehicles. Obama says consumers can make the difference by switching to higher mileage hybrids.

Today the Senator said, "It would save more energy, do more for the environment and create better world security than all the drilling we could do in Alaska."

"After the meeting... Obama left in a GMC Envoy after admitting to favoring SUV's himself," claimed local News Channel 6.

MORE

Tommy Vietor, Senator Obama's press secretary, explains: "What Senator Obama has long advocated is the use of vehicles that are more fuel efficient, including but not exclusively hybrids.

"The vehicle senator obama travels in while in illinois is a Flexible Fuel Vehicle (FFV), which can run on e85, a blended fuel made of 85 percent ethanol.

"So he in fact was practicing what he preached at the town hall meeting in Metropolis yesterday when he said we must drive fewer gas-guzzling vehicles."

But it does not appear that GMC's Envoy is E85 ready.

Well, maybe a little question. How can one say that they understand the needs and asperations of Americans who descend from former slaves from West Africa (if you know his history, you know he plays that angle all the time), when their mother is of European extraction and their father was a lapsed Muslim immigrant from Kenya and spent much of his formative years in Hawaii, went to Columbia and Harvard? Just asking, because there are some Indian Casinos out there that I think I need my share of....

My dear Senator, I respectfully recommend your staff check out this. That would be leading from the front.

Hat tip Drudge.

Goose-a-paloosa!!!!

One little thing can get you rolling. Over at Slate, there is a good bit on the fact that all the bad guys like to goose step. Think about it. It isn't just the Pax Germanica folks either.


...but there is so much more out there - and they didn't all march with that uber-putz, hypocrite, commie-loving, smug Glass either.

North Koreans, Iranians, Syrians, Russians, Chinese, and even the folks from Peru. Who else is part of the Podiatrist Full Employment Union?

Of course, no goose-stepping is complete without my favorite scene from Eurotrip. If you don't want to watch the video, then take the story and the best movie theme music from 2004, Scotty Doesn't Know (not that Scotty, wherever he is).




Hat tip Rachael guest blogging at PolitoburoDiktat.

Painful. To. Read.

Kind of like reading about when the British decom'd their last big deck carrier and its outstanding strike aircraft....right before the Falklands. We may not be as lucky as the Brits.

Two Osprey-class coastal mine hunters were decommissioned June 15 in formal ceremonies at Naval Station Ingleside, Texas.

USS Osprey (MHC 51), the lead ship in the Osprey-class, was decommissioned during a ceremony beginning at 10 a.m. USS Robin (MHC 54), was decommissioned during a ceremony beginning at 1:30 p.m.

“This ceremony marks the end of the life of a warship that served its country proudly,” said Cmdr. Keith A. Knutsen, during the Osprey decommissioning ceremony. Knutsen commands both Osprey and Robin.

That isn't the painful part. This is the painful part.

“However, I see this ceremony as something more than marking the end,” Knutsen added. “I see it also as the beginning - the beginning of a new era of mine warfare. Osprey and her sisters’ retirements are making the way for a new class of warship known as the littoral combat ship or LCS.

“LCS will continue where Osprey leaves off by carrying on and refining the Navy’s critical mission of countering mine threats to this nation,” he said.

Brother Keith; oh, my dear Brother Keith. That is the worst spin I have read in so long. You know, that we know, that you know, that we know, that the statement about the LCS Mine Warfare module is years, if ever, ready to hunt and find mines. While we are running these much needed warships off for sale or reserve - or keeping pierside because they cannot pass an INSURV - who is going to sweep the Arabian/Persian Gulf of mines if needed next week? Next month? Next year? Next decade?

Hat tip Eagle1.

Fundamental Failures

One tough, rough INSURV is bad, but par for the course - two failures is a trend. Add that to yesterday's lament - and we need to talk about what other fundamentals are we not seeing because we are not focused on mission.

If Iran had decided earlier this summer to close off the Persian Gulf by placing mines in the Strait of Hormuz, the Navy’s best mine warfare ships would have been unavailable to deal with the problem.

Instead, the Ardent and Dextrous were in port at Bahrain, all but unable to get underway. Even if they had managed to cast off, the extensive mine warfare suites in each ship were not functioning, hampered by cracks and leaks in equipment, damaged wire cables, faulty indicators and exposed electrical wiring.

Why are they there?

The two MCMs have been stationed at Bahrain since 1996, when the U.S. decided to establish a permanent mine force in the region. The threat was real — Iranian-laid mines struck a Kuwaiti tanker in 1987 and nearly sank an American frigate in 1988. Iraqi mines damaged two U.S. warships during the 1991 buildup to Operation Desert Storm, helping dissuade the coalition from mounting an amphibious assault on Iraqi forces in Kuwait.

Iraq laid an estimated 1,300 mines in the northern gulf before the 1991 allied invasion, and it took months of efforts by an international group of minesweepers to clear them.

Results?

“Cascading casualties occurred [during the inspection] because of poor maintenance and operating practices,” read the report on the Ardent, prepared by the Navy captain who led the inspection of the ship from June 27 to July 1.

“There was a demonstrated lack of knowledge and familiarity among watchstanders with shipboard engineering systems, equipment operation and maintenance requirements,” read the report on the Dextrous, prepared by the same officer after the ship’s June 21-24 inspection.

The multiday INSURV inspection is intended to detail the material condition of ships and not meant as a test, although crews are rated for their ability to assess their ship’s condition and detail its problems. The inspection includes an underway period during which ship systems are demonstrated and a pierside portion during which a detailed physical assessment is made.

The assessments are notoriously rigorous, and high scores are rare. MCMs generally receive “below par” assessments, one former senior mine warfare officer said.

“You probably have four or six minesweepers a year that get INSURVs,” the officer said. “Almost every INSURV, you’re a little embarrassed because they turn up something you didn’t anticipate.”

The Dextrous crew received a “satisfactory” rating for its overall self-assessment ability, although the engineering department was rated “unsatisfactory.” Ardent’s crew was evaluated as “marginal” in this area and received an “unsatisfactory” rating for auxiliaries and environmental protection. But the Ardent crew got a “satisfactory” for its “ability to resolve significant material issues during the inspection,” although the engineering department was evaluated as “unsatisfactory.”

Is SeaSwap part of the problem (no shock here)?

“INSURVs are always ugly,” O’Donnell said. “But it’s like a perfect storm over there. You have crew swap, you’re dependent on the ability of port engineers, maintenance people are distracted doing other things. Then you get INSURVs like that.”

The former senior officer saw another aspect.

“Crews train on identical ships at Ingleside, fly to Bahrain, take over a ship and are supposed to be proficient from day one,” he said. “What bothered me most [about the reports] was the engineering department not being able to operate their own equipment.”

But the officer also saw issues with Sea Swap in the inspection reports.

“When I read the INSURV, the first thing I thought was that this is a failure of the Sea Swap program to pay enough attention to the ownership issues associated with rotating crews,” he said.

Ooohhhh, lookie what makes a show...the Little Crappy Ship.

“There may be some longer-term implications for the new Littoral Combat Ship,” the former senior mine officer said.

The Navy plans to deploy its LCS vessels in a manner similar to the Bahrain minesweepers. The ships will be based in forward areas and crews will swap out about every six months. The first ships will have Blue and Gold crews in the same manner as ballistic missile submarines, with the two crews rotating. But as the number of LCSs grows, crews will not be tied to a particular ship. Four or five crews might be responsible for three ships, for example.

The San Diego-based Naval Surface Force is developing the crewing and operating concepts for the LCS, and final details are being worked out.

But the implications of problems in the MCM INSURV reports could provide lessons for the LCS program.

“LCS is pretty much in the same category,” one former mine officer said. “I’m really concerned about the mission packages, the training.

“They’re going to have to be ready at a higher level than I think people are thinking about.”

We need to put down the B-school Cliffs Notes, put down the PPT, walk away from the latest missive from the insecure bullies at the Diversity Commissariat, and put on the coveralls and remember what we are all about. Mission, Ship, Sailors. Rinse, repeat.