Posted Reply to Elizabeth Brandt's Baby Boomers - The Angriest Generation thread

See:

http://angriestgeneration.wordpress.com/2009/07/27/youre-decrepit-greedy-narcissistic-luddites-plus-you-have-cooties-play-golf-bake-cookies-and-turn-over-the-country-to-us/


Well, several things here…some of us may not actually remember the worst features of our generation – our determination to shove our parents and their values aside, our lust for power, our disorderly and presumptuous protests, our philistine ignorance of history and culture, our arrogant trashing of the nuclear family and traditional social mores, and our rejection of religious institutions. Would it be presumptuous to say that we are getting our just desserts by having our children feed us some of our own dogfood ? Certainly, we’re not fooling our children – they know where and how much we have cheated them out of what they really deserved: a secure childhood, in a stable and relatively prosperous home, with two loving parents in the house.

Now, it is certainly the prerogative of parents to brace their kids from time to time, and tell them that they’d better shape up if they’re going to amount to anything. And it is just a fact of life, one that our generation tried and did not entirely succeed in flaunting, that in a democratic and meritocratic society, one has to work one’s way up from the bottom.

The simple fact is that even in our broken families, we are all on the same team with our children, and we seek to advance their interests over those of their peers and not outs. So, while my own children are no different – Obamite lemmings like all the rest – the Old Man still has a few moves left to teach them, a few useful contacts left in his Rolodex, a few dollars left in his bank account. I do trust my kids to take better care of me, when I can no longer take care of myself, than I trust my Uncle Sam. But in the meantime, as Rudyard Kipling stated so forcefully in “An Imperial Rescript”

http://pages.prodigy.net/krtq73aa/kipling2.htm

There’s a girl in Jersey City who works on the telephone;
We’re going to hitch our horses and dig for a house of our own,
With gas and water connections, and steam heat through to the top;
And W. Hohenzollern, I guess I shall work till I drop.

And an English delegate thundered:–”The weak an’ the lame be blowed!
I’ve a berth in the Sou’-West workshops, a home in the Wandsworth Road;
And till the ’sociation has footed my buryin’ bill,
I work for the kids an’ the missus. Pull up! I’ll be damned if I will!

—-

Quite so. The response to the “angriest generation” ought to be,

“Your old man was right after all. You want to work forever, you lazy bum ? Well, get on to it, and quit your whining.”

I think our children would like it if that is what we did.

Bill R.

Comments on Andrew Krepinevich’s essay (The Pentagon’s Wasting Assets) on Small Wars Journal

A few days ago, I read Andrew Krepinevich’s essay “The Pentagon’s Wasting Assets" in Foreign Affairs magazine. I've been stewing on it ever since. Well, then I picked up on this piece in the online "Small Wars Journal" blog:

http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog/2009/07/krepinevichs-essay-implies-dis/index.php

and could not help but make the following comments about the whole thing:

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The most disturbing thing about Krepenevich's Foreign Affairs article is that it purports to be about power projection, but in fact fails to address the hard problems of projecting power even into the Eurasia littoral, much less the Eurasian depth. He identifies problems, then shrugs them off with policy choices that amount to at least a partial strategic withdrawal out of our admittedly
extended positions in Iraq and Afghanistan. But how far backwards is too far back ? This tradeoff is not even discussed, much less fairly considered.

I made this point to Mearsheimer at APSA a few years ago - and he didn't get it, either. If you reduce or eliminate your ground force presence in these places, you end up back in 1978 debating the mission and structure of the Rapid Deployment Force. Now we have these Stryker brigades and at least the current C-17 inventory, but deferring the FCS ground vehicles and killing the C-17 production line is hardly the way to improve the strategic mobility of US ground forces. Krepinevich does not even bother to argue the point in his article - he ignores the issue altogether.

And Krepinevich applies the same Alice-in-Wonderland logic to EFV and F-35 as well. These programs, which are based on clearly defined and well understood roles and missions, are attacked as developing "wasting assets". Now, if you pull enough ground forces out of forward bases in Eurasia, you may in fact have to conduct an early entry operation, and you may need to see if the Air Expeditionary Force concept works. And while we certainly do need to concern ourselves with the survivability of our aircraft carrier force - the very backbone our our sea dominance as well as our capability to project forces along the Eurasian littoral - Krepinevich's recommendations do not match his problem statement. If he thinks the F-18 can handle the strike mission job, he needs to come out and say so. You don't get more capability by buying less...I'm reminded of Loren Thompson's brilliant quip, "Smart power begins with hard cash". Boy, I wish I had made that one up.

There is a very dangerous "go-it-alone, we can handle this job" attitude growing up within the special operations and intelligence communities. While resorting to special operations as a leading element of national power can be a decent economy of force strategy in times when the USA needs to conserve its strength and prepare to fight another day, the record of Eisenhower's "New Look" as well as the Reagan Doctrine reveals that the "small war" LIC strategy builds up negative externalities that have to be redeemed in blood and treasure later on. Thus, Eisenhower's abandonment of limited wars made it necessary to fight one in Vietnam a decade later. Reagan's willingness to support insurgencies and unwillingness to engage in counterinsurgency led to the rise of Al Qaeda and the Taliban. Clinton tried and failed to destabilize Iraq using the CIA alone, leaving Bush 43 with the task of regime change using a combination of conventional and unconventional means.

Obviously, with very stringent budgetary constraints and declining political support, the Pentagon must use the resources it is given as wisely as possible. But overpromising and overreaching leads to serious structural inequities and programmatic chaos. A more modest and practical long-term vision would be a welcome change on K Street and throughout Washington. We know how this ends when the chickens come home to roost.

Posted Response To DoD Buzz Article Critical of Army Planning

Here is a response I posted to the article below:

http://www.dodbuzz.com/2009/07/24/army-planning-for-last-war/

=====================================================================================

I have a good friend and colleague who is being redeployed. Like myself, this guy is a history buff. As we talked the other day, I spotted on his bookshelf this very interesting book on the post-Korean War Army, a book written by Bacevich in the mid-80s:

http://www.ndu.edu/inss/books/Books%20-%201980%20to%201989/Pentomic%20Era%20-%20July%2086/PENTER.pdf

“The Pentomic Era: The US Army Between Korea and Vietnam”

This book is a classic. It is filled with quotes from heavy hitters like William DePuy and Jack Cushman, from a time when those men were field grade officers. Change the names and the circumstances, it could be front line news as to what is happening to the U.S. Army today.

We do need to understand why it is that the U.S. Army is particularly subjected to each stroke of the electoral cycle, and why it is forced to engage in radical transformative ventures, why it is compelled to continuously redefine its business model. No other army in the world does this. The Marine Corps and the Air Force do not have to wage a continuous battle to justify their existence – or their acquisition programs. They do not junk their doctrine and rewrite it from scratch every 8-10 years.

Part of it, I believe, is that the U.S. Army is always overextended; part of it, I think, stems from an intrinsic American dislike of standing armies. And then there is our national tendency, only partly muted since WWII, to fall into military disrepair and unreadiness during times of (relative) peace. How would we mobilize if we needed a much larger army ever again ? This is not a new problem. The Army’s end strength in the 1950s fell into the 800K range for only 14 divisions of 11K men apiece. Pathetic force generation…just pathetic. But then, this was an army of draftees. Conventional ops ? No, that was outmoded Cold War thinking – the Army was to break with the past, with the last war. The Korean War. We would never be fighting a war like that again.

What the record shows is that in the 50s, the Army went over the top in designing a force supposedly optimized for high intensity conflict, under Eisenhower’s New Look, with SecDef Charles Wilson foreshadowing Rumsfeld and Gates in browbeating the Army leadership. Replace the Crusader, the AGS, and the FCS MGV with the T113 (the prototype M113) and the story is the same. Megabucks for missiles (the latest fad in the inventory), pennies for ground combat vehicles.

After Kennedy’s election, the pendulum swung towards low intensity conflict. Many of the arguments the Army made to counter the New Look came back to haunt it during the 60s. It was only after the Vietnam debacle, under the leadership of Abrams and Depuy, that the Army rediscovered its center. Nonetheless, the strategic tension remained, as many of us well recall; Bacevich reveals himself in the 1986 book to be as pro-LIC as he is today. He actively opines that the US should have declared itself to be an international police force on the model of the Roman imperium back in ‘55.

I do find it difficult to fault the Army leadership for this situation; Truman and Eisenhower ended the careers of Douglas MacArthur and Matthew Ridgeway. Bush and Obama ended the careers of Shinseki and McKiernan: what, pray tell, has changed ? Conclusion: while Goure’s premise is correct, his evaluation of the problem’s cause is flawed.

In a proliferated world, what makes us think there is no room for pentomic divisions ? If anything, we should reflect that the pentomic era’s operational motto of flexibility, mobility and depth prefigured our Air Land Battle tenets of agility, initiative, depth and synchronization – words that I now understand to have been buried at Fort Leavenworth.

There are warriors in the ranks of the generals. Men of common sense and toughness, the Tex Goodspeeds of my generation. The Army of the Future awaits their lead, when all this has played out.

Klotzen, nicht kleckern.

Posted to the Yahoo Episcopal Group Mailing List" Tweeting Like Crazy

See: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/episcopalchurch/message/42396

GC 2009 is at this very moment debatting Resolution D025, which if adopted, will
for all intents and purposes repeal B033, and remove all prohibitions, if not
outright encourage openly practicing homosexuals to be ordained into all three
clerical orders. My diocese, the Diocese of Virginia, once again is publishing a
newsletter, the Center Aisle, which is dedicated to the fiction of a compromise
solution on all matters, including and most importantly pertaining to human
sexuality. You can find the special edition of Center Aisle which includes the
text of D025 here:

http://www.centeraisle.net/Issues/Sunday_July12_issue.pdf

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The Resolution in Question: D025, Commitment and Witness to Anglican Communion

Resolved, the House of Bishops concurring, That the
76th General Convention reaffirm the continued participation
of The Episcopal Church in the Anglican Communion;
give thanks for the work of the bishops at the Lambeth
Conference of 2008; reaffirm the abiding commitment of
The Episcopal Church to the fellowship of churches that
constitute the Anglican Communion and seek to live into
the highest degree of communion possible; and be it
further

Resolved, That the 76th General Convention encourage
dioceses, congregations, and members of The Episcopal
Church to participate to the fullest extent possible
in the many instruments, networks and relationships of
the Anglican Communion; and be it further
Resolved, That the 76th General Convention reaffirm
its financial commitment to the Anglican Communion and
pledge to participate fully in the Inter-Anglican Budget;
and be it further

Resolved, That the 76th General Convention affirm
the value of "listening to the experience of homosexual
persons," as called for by the Lambeth Conferences of
1978, 1988, and 1998, and acknowledge that through
our own listening the General Convention has come to
recognize that the baptized membership of The Episcopal
Church includes same-sex couples living in lifelong committed
relationships "characterized by fidelity, monogamy,
mutual affection and respect, careful, honest communication,
and the holy love which enables those in such relationships
to see in each other the image of God" (2000-
D039); and be it further

Resolved, That the 76th General Convention recognize
that gay and lesbian persons who are part of such
relationships have responded to God's call and have
exercised various ministries in and on behalf of God's
One, Holy, Catholic and Apostolic Church and are currently
doing so in our midst; and be it further
Resolved, That the 76th General Convention affirm
that God has called and may call such individuals, to any
ordained ministry in The Episcopal Church, which call is
tested through our discernment processes acting in
accordance with the Constitution and Canons of The
Episcopal Church; and be it further

Resolved, That the 76th General Convention acknowledge
that members of The Episcopal Church as of
the Anglican Communion, based on careful study of the
Holy Scriptures, and in light of tradition and reason, are
not of one mind, and Christians of good conscience
disagree about some of these matters.

----------------------------------------------------------------------
My comments are confined to these. I have actively followed five General
Conventions now, since 1997, and seen the unending appeasement
of sin and error by the same old people, and the continued building of one
resolution upon the other, if and only if it supported the end objective of
legitimizing conduct which is pretty clearly condemned in both the Old Testament
and the New Testament. My own position has been, well, (1) consistent in
opposition to this trend and (2) generally condemnatory against those who seek
to sweep the issue under the rug, mitigate the temporal and eternal consequences
of sin, and engage in a form of causistry that makes exceptions to be the rules.

A few minutes ago, I tweeted out a retort to the "Episcopal Cafe" - an typically
liberal twitter site demanding the following answer as to the standard to be put
in place by D025. Is the incoming standard to be the "Jeffrey John" standard:
openly homosexual and professing celibacy in a committed relationship, or the
"Vicky Gene Robinson" standard: openly homosexual, and not professing celibacy
in a committed relationship ?

I believe that the language of D025 is not at all unclear on this point...what
is being asked of the Episcopal Church is to accept and embrace the "VGR
standard", and to caste all semblance of Christian sexual morality to the wind,
once and for all. And it will be argued in response to the wounded consciences
of those who are acknowledged to disagree that "General Convention has spoken".
Causa finita est.

I usually get to this point at least once per General Convention. That is, when
things are looking very bad, I usually give out a little pep talk about how God
is in control and things work for good for those who love the Lord and are
called according to His purpose. I need not overly reiterate those sentiments,
and in fact my blog talks to this theme in my response and rebuttal to the PB's
opening remarks.

But I cannot help but note that I believe that the Episcopal Church is, in this
particular resolution, passing the point of no return. Yes, there have been many
such points suggested - at least for the past nine years, if not the last 15-33
years. But I do think this is it. It is difficult to imagine any scenario
whereby the Episcopal Church, and very possibly the Anglican Communion, can
recover from the passage of this resolution in the form it now stands. The
contradictions, which many have gone great lengths to deny (I recommend reading
the Center Aisle for that kind of thinking), will simply become too obvious to
ignore or deny.

As always, and as companies warning during their quarterly earnings
presentations, I hesitate to predict the timing and scope of the consequences
that will inevitably result. In the past, I have managed to retain 100% accuracy
in predicting that the consequences, simply put, will be negative, without going
into hyperbole as to their severity. Selling the Episcopal Church short has been
a kind of superogatory ritual done in three year cycles, but what doth it profit
the soul thereby. Nonetheless, this year, I am taking an unusually bearish
approach: I am predicting a kind of spiritual market crash, with correlated
financial results, if GC 2009 "breaks out" of B033 as the D025 strongly
suggests.

As they say on the Street.com - this is the "news you need".

Bill Riggs
Fredericksburg, VA

Response Posted to Center Aisle Blog

This was a comment on John Ohmer's blog entry at:

http://centeraisle.wordpress.com/2009/07/09/a-parish-priests-perspective-a-lovers-quarrel/#comment-12

I agree with yofiki. The Diocese of Virginia has for much too long been committed only to noncommitment. That is really why we lost all those parishes in the ADV schism. Nobody wants to admit it. It is rude to suggest it. Our bishops especially cannot concede that it is true. You have people like Mary Ailes and Phil Ashey who used to belong to our diocese blogging away as outsiders. And their voices will only be heard from the outside. We need to look for the problems in increasingly wider circles from our own selves.
Now - as far as the issue in question...you might have pointed out that even bishops in states where same sex marriage has been legalized have taken different approaches to the question. Even the Bishop of El Camino Real put out a letter that expressly forbid what is being proposed after the first California Supreme Court decision. This was at least a consistent approach to addressing the canonical question, given the state of secular law. This is no small issue for us in Virginia, since our state is not likely to ever legalize same sex marriage on its own, but there will be demands for canonical recognition of civil marriages if the Supreme Court ever overturns DOMA and the state statutes on 14th Admendment grounds. You can read the letter I wrote to Ted Olson on my blog at http://billrsblog.blogspot.com/2009/05/email-sent-to-ted-olson.html

A Response to the Presiding Bishop

In her address to the Episcopal Church's General Convention 2009,

http://ecusa.anglican.org/78703_112035_ENG_HTM.htm

Presiding Bishop Katherine Jefforts Schori made the following remarks

'"When I was growing up, my mother often reminded us of what my grandfather used to say to her and her siblings when they were in trouble, 'We’re going to have words, and you’re not going to get to use any of yours.' Well, we’re going to have words."

and more notoriously:

"The crisis of this moment has several parts, and like Episcopalians, particularly the ones in Mississippi, they’re all related. The overarching connection in all of these crises has to do with the great Western heresy – that we can be saved as individuals, that any of us alone can be in right relationship with God. It’s caricatured in some quarters by insisting that salvation depends on reciting a specific verbal formula about Jesus. That individualist focus is a form of idolatry, for it puts me and my words in the place that only God can occupy, at the center of existence, as the ground of being. That heresy is one reason for the theme of this Convention."

"Ubuntu doesn’t have any 'I's in it. The I only emerges as we connect – and that is really what the word means: I am because we are, and I can only become a whole person in relationship with others. There is no 'I' without 'you,' and in our context, you and I are known only as we reflect the image of the one who created us. Some of you will hear a resonance with Martin Buber’s I and Thou and recognize a harmony. You will not be wrong."

Now, in reading what the Presiding Bishop stated as carefully as possible - for in all cases like this one when she has said something controversial, her opponents and her supporters immediately go to their spin lines, with the opponents citing this as yet one more instance where she has transgressed against Christian orthodoxy, her supporters complaining that she has once again been misunderstood, her opinions distorted, her meaning misinterpreted.

A couple of nights ago, I had dinner with a Roman Catholic friend of rather impeccable conservative credentials, bewails the PB's latest offense to Christian belief and practice. Interestingly, he didn't quite get the point. And that is exactly the point about Katherine Jefferts Schori...neither does she. Her Catholic roots betray her. She does not in fact understand Protestantism. She really doesn't know, and certainly does not acknowledge that there is any difference between individualism and selfishness. Whether deliberately or unwittingly, her words exacerbate the very crisis that is the focus of her speech. Later in this same speech, the Presiding Bishop speaks of "subsidiarity", which might be described in secular terms as "home rule". One might be tempted to ask, "If subsidiarity is a good thing, why not autonomy" ? For this Presiding Bishop has done more than any other preceding her to crush out autonomy as a governing principle with the Episcopal Church, at least where the rights and prerogatives and parishes and dioceses are concerned.

What the Presiding Bishop entirely fails to recognize is those very local realities that have brought schism to the Episcopal Church. This is the reality of bishops and priests who for years have misinformed and failed to inform their flock on those actions taken by General Convention and in some cases, the diocesan conventions as well. This is the reality of deferred protest, of ineffective dissent,of talk without action. It is the reality of property laws, court decisions, and litigation funds. It is the reality of bishops refusing to ordain ministers from conservative seminaries and refusing to accept ministers whose opinions challenge theirs. It is the reality of individuals, parishes and dioceses gradually and discretely terminating financial support for institutions and programs that are morally unsupportable and in some cases poorly managed.

Although Bishop Schori managed to get through her entire address - it can hardly be termed a "sermon" - with not a single biblical passage, Holy Scripture itself provides a stronger and clearer response than any other words. In Leviticus 5:17 we find the following passage:

"If a person sins, and commits any of these things which are forbidden to be done by the commandments of the LORD, though he does not know it, yet he is guilty and shall bear his iniquity."

This is not group sin, and it is not group atonement for sin. There are passages in the Mosaic Law, in Leviticus 4 and 5 that do deal with group atonement for the sins of a group as a whole, where the priest and the ruler performs a sacrificial rite on behalf of the "assembly", but this verse and others like it deal In Job 13, tempted by Satan and hounded by his hypocritic friends, Job exclaims:

Though He slay me, yet will I trust Him.
Even so, I will defend my own ways before Him.
He also shall be my salvation,
For a hypocrite could not come before Him.
Listen carefully to my speech,
And to my declaration with your ears.
See now, I have prepared my case,
I know that I shall be vindicated.
Who is he who will contend with me?
If now I hold my tongue, I perish.

These are not the words of Ubuntu, or Martin Buber's I-Thou relationship, or Jack Spong's "depth psychology". These are the words of a human being, who knows good and evil, and who understands the difference. This is the voice of the suffering virtuous; the person who believes in spite of all. To such a person, the Presiding Bishop has no message of hope, indeed, no message at all.

In Psalm 19, King David declaims:

Who can understand his errors?
Cleanse me from secret faults.
Keep back Your servant also from presumptuous sins;
Let them not have dominion over me.
Then I shall be blameless,
And I shall be innocent of great transgression.
Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my hear
Be acceptable in Your sight,
O LORD, my strength and my Redeemer

This is the humility the Episcopal Church lacks. This is the salvation it needs, both individually and as a whole. Psalm 38 records how David responded - and how we should respond - in times of crisis:

For I am ready to fall,
And my sorrow is continually before me.
For I will declare my iniquity;
I will be in anguish over my sin.
But my enemies are vigorous, and they are strong;
And those who hate me wrongfully have multiplied.
Those also who render evil for good,
They are my adversaries, because I follow what is good.
Do not forsake me, O LORD;
O my God, be not far from me!
Make haste to help me,
O Lord, my salvation!

When we can say, in one breath hat "my sins are every before me", but "I follow
what is good", that is the place to be. God goes with us on our journey, where ever we are and if indeed we, the sum of all the "I"s do indeed follow what is good, we need not worry about where God takes us and we will not get lost.

In Ecclesiastes 9, we find written:

13 This wisdom I have also seen under the sun, and it seemed great to me: 14 There was a little city with few men in it; and a great king came against it, besieged it, and built great snares[b] around it. 15 Now there was found in it a poor wise man, and he by his wisdom delivered the city. Yet no one remembered that same poor man.
16 Then I said:

“ Wisdom is better than strength.
Nevertheless the poor man’s wisdom is despised,
And his words are not heard.
17 Words of the wise, spoken quietly, should be heard
Rather than the shout of a ruler of fools.
18 Wisdom is better than weapons of war;
But one sinner destroys much good.

Clearly, this heresy, this ideology of the individual, it has the deepest of roots. And we have just barely scratched the Old Testament, not even referring to the prophets, all of who proclaimed God's truth - as individuals. And one need not mine deeply into Paul's letters, to find such heretical ideas. In Acts 10, Peter preaches the gospel to Cornelius's househlold, as follows:

"And He commanded us to preach to the people, and to testify that it is He who was ordained by God to be Judge of the living and the dead. 43 To Him all the prophets witness that, through His name, whoever believes in Him will receive remission of sins.” While Peter was still speaking these words, the Holy Spirit fell upon all those who heard the word. 45 And those of the circumcision who believed were astonished, as many as came with Peter, because the gift of the Holy Spirit had been poured out on the Gentiles also. 46 For they heard them speak with tongues and magnify God. Then Peter answered, 47 'Can anyone forbid water, that these should not be baptized who have received the Holy Spirit just as we have?' 48 And he commanded them to be baptized in the name of the Lord."

And this incident of mass conversion is consistent with the Great Commission found in Mark's gospel, for which source traditionally was Peter himself.

And He said to them, “Go into all the world and preach the gospel to every creature. 16 He who believes and is baptized will be saved; but he who does not believe will be condemned."

Individual faith, grounded an individual decision empowered by God's grace - the gift of the Holy Spirit - resulting in the salvation of all the individuals who, collectively, form the Holy Catholic Church.

We are near to Calvin's birthday. There are many, and unfortunately an apparently increasing number - and the Presiding Bishop appears to be one of them, who deny humans the gift of free will, of the exercise of any role at all in the order of salvation. The PB is herself accused of Pelagianism on account of her high view of human nature and the dignity of man. But the path of free will in obedience to God is that narrow Via Media which she has missed, which many who seek to justify themselves by good works - or no works at all. And this spiritual plight lies at the heart of what plagues the Episcopal Church: for its evangelical wing was always arguably as Arminian as Calvinist or even Lutheran. All three of these Protestant evangelical traditions are in peril today across Anglicanism and within the Episcopal Church, but it is the Wesleyan tradition that stands under the harshest assault today.

I had originally intended to haul out my favorite quote from St. Augustine on compassion for the dying - and this comprehends all who are threatened by spiritual death, but in this context, I woul prefer to let John Wesley say the benediction:

From Sermon 14 (The Repentence of Believers:

http://wesley.nnu.edu/john_wesley/sermons/014.htm

"By the same faith we feel the power of Christ every moment resting upon us, whereby alone we are what we are; whereby we are enabled to continue in spiritual life, and without which, notwithstanding all our present holiness, we should be devils the next moment. But as long as we retain our faith in him, we 'draw water out of the wells of salvation.' Leaning on our Beloved, even Christ in us the hope of glory, who dwelleth in our hearts by faith, who likewise is ever interceding for us at the right hand of God, we receive help from him, to think, and speak, and act, what is acceptable in his sight. Thus does he 'prevent' them that believe in all their 'doings, and further them with his continual help;' so that all their designs, conversations, and actions are 'begun, continued, and ended in him.' Thus doth he 'cleanse the thoughts of their hearts, by the inspiration of his Holy Spirit, that they may perfectly love him, and worthily magnify his holy name."

Posted Comments on GC2009 to Ruth Gledhill's Blog

Ruth Gledhill of the London Times is covering GC 2009 in absentia, since the Church of England General Synod is also going on concurrently at York. Her surrogate put up the following report here:

http://timescolumns.typepad.com/gledhill/2009/07/ecgc-spiritual-earwax-at-anaheim.html

This is the followup comment I posted to that site:

The Presiding Bishop was nothing but massively insensitive, and perhaps deliberately antagonistic to evangelicals and to protestants from other denominations with that crack about "western heresy". Shje seems not at all to care about the soteriological mission of the church; for her, the social gospel is the only gospel there is. While the reports coming out of Anaheim are dismaying to many of us, I do find that these meetings are occasions to reiterate our faith in God's mighty purpose, and to remember that the triumph of the Church over sin and despair is not conditioned by individual or even mass group apostasy - even that of a Presiding Bishop and her flock.

Farewell to Realism: Reviewing "Power Rules" by Leslie Gelb

Well, I finished Leslie Gelb's “Power Rules: How Common Sense Can Rescue American Foreign Policy” this morning. This was a book that I bought with eager anticipation, and liked less and less the more I got into it. Indeed, while I was generally predisposed to Mr. Gelb on the basis of his reputation and his deep experience, I have to admit that he simply lost me in the last two chapters of the book. Far from restoring common sense and realism, I find that the entire project, like so many other books on American foreign policy and national security that have emerged in recent years, is deeply unrealistic, and only serves to communicate the prejudices of the US foreign policy establishment, of which Mr. Gelb is such a distinguished and often erudite representative.

A naive reader might align Gelb's world view to that of Henry Kissinger, and to the power realism of Dr. Kissinger and Hans Morgenthau. Closer examination reveals this to be false. Although the title of the book suggests an interest in power politics, and its apparent purpose is to rebalance American foreign policy in the direction of Realpolitik, Gelb cares little to nothing about maintaining the balance of power, and demonstrates no grasp whatever of equilibrium in the realists' conceptual model. Gelb believes that American power is declining – and bewails this as an unfortunate and a reversible condition, one that will best be met if US foreign policy makers attend to his recommendations. In the penultimate paragraph of this book, he writes:

“Every great nation or empire ultimately rots from within. We already see the United States of America, our precious guarantor of liberty and security, beginning to decline in its leadership, institutions, and physical and human infrastructure, and on the path to becoming just another great power, a nation barely worth fearing or following.”

Do tell. What is wonderfully amazing here is that these are the words of a self-described moderate, who is in the process of trying to convince the leadership of his nation to adopt a somewhat less ambitious set of policies, grounded in common sense and pragmatic thinking...no grand designs or overarching principles here, thank you very much. And Mr. Gelb is of a piece with other K Street graybeards – he invokes a previous book cowritten by Brent Scowcroft and Zbigniew Brzezinski – who have been saying much the same things about America's commitments and strategy in places like Iraq and Afghanistan. While Gelb is reasonably well balanced in his critique of past administrations' policies – none are entirely spared, not Clinton and Carter, nor Reagan or Bush the Elder. But the angriest rhetorical jabs and least objective comments are levied against the former George W. Bush administration. K Street graybeards like to be consulted, and Mr. Gelb's own war story concerning Operation Iraqi Freedom is an interesting bit of historical drama: just following the overthrow of the Baathist regime in Baghdad, Gelb attempted to form an advisory group that included the American Enterprise Institute (AEI): a neoconservative think tank – and the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS): a think tank that Gelb describes as “moderate” to assist and make recommendations on the path forward. Discussions were held with Condoleeza Rice and Stephen Hadley at the White House; in the end, nothing came of this. Gelb's claim is clear: US policy was made and executed without the wisdom of the wise men in the K Street think tanks, and the disastrous results speak for themselves.

Perhaps it is this subtext, rather than any ideological affinity, that causes Gelb to invoke the memory of Nicolo Machiavelli in this book. In the earlier portions of the book, Gelb compares what he intends to accomplish this book to Machiavelli as he makes his policy recommendations and details his unprincipled principles (or maybe in Gelb's cases, they are unprinciples) to President Obama, as he addresses Obama in the second person. Now, Machiavelli's book, “The Prince” is reputed to be a kind of extended job application, an elaborate writing sample of the kind that Washington hiring managers sometimes demand of job-seeking supplicants. While Mr. Gelb is probably too old to seek an adminstration position for himself, the subliminal message to the incoming Obama Adminstration from the K Street graybeards is the only truly Machiavellian thing about this book. That message, if it could be put into words is, “We run this town. Nothing can succeed without us. If you want your foreign policy to be successful, you need to listen to us.”

While common sense and a willingness to listen to a wide range of opinions are by no means despicable in any administration that seeks a well-grounded and successful foreign policy, in the end, Gelb says nothing new, makes no bold or striking proposals, seeks no structural innovation to make the formulation and execution of US foreign policy more efficient or effective, identifies no looming trend that has not been analyzed to death in the pages of the foreign policy journals and in the K Street think tanks for nearly a generation. Gelb offers to a administration dedicated to the promise of change – more of the same old approaches recast to address many of the same old problems. Example: as an old Cold Warrior, Gelb has a fondness for deterrence, and he cites it as a praiseworthy approach several times in this book.

Now, one of the saving graces of this book is that it is attentive to past practice, and true pragmatism never throws away something that worked simply because it has grown old and out of favor. That said, one reads little in this book on how one would really apply a deterrence model to actually dissuade one's opponents from taking an action one wishes to stop. The problem here is that Gelb is committed to deterrence as a bluffing tactic - indeed he states that military power is mostly desirable when used as a threat, not as actualized force – an approach that begs the question as to what “rules” the US should adopt when faced with the necessity of backing up the threats it makes. Gelb does perhaps justly criticize the George W. Bush administration for excessive sabre-rattling, but his insinuation that US should abandon its military endeavors in Iraq and Afghanistan, but should be prepared to make its threats credible by acting them out when necessary is nothing but hollow rhetoric.

In the end, Gelb's book only underscores the demise of the realist dimension of US foreign policy and the elite class that exercises influence on that policy. He is less bullish on America than John Mearsheimer, who argues that America remains unchallenged in its latent power resources, despite its blundering abroad – but this does not convert itself to an approach that differs from Mearsheimer on any subject other than US policy towards the Arab-Israeli conflict. While this book has much to commend itself in regards to diplomatic tactics – Gelb patiently lays out his approach to power together with his critique of such common buzzwords as “smart power” and “soft power – it lacks a strategic world view consistent with the author's estimation of American decline. While it attempts to reset Henry Kissinger's “rules of the game”, it neither limits nor defines the proper sphere of American power and interest. Thus, while Gelb wryly notes that Islamic peoples do not like American forces operating within the geopolitical territory of the Ummah, Gelb fails to deal with the question as to whether or not America has or does not have legitimate interests that require the US military to stay put where it is, or alternatively, to mount a strategic disengagement to less controversial territories (and potentially return if needed). In other words, while Gelb demands that choice be restored to US foreign policy, it is the range of choices and their consequences that he is least willing to entertain in this book.

What he does envision are a range of long term policies that might be definitive of neoliberalism today: reduce dependence on military options, pull back on demands for democratization and liberalization – particularly when other interests are at stake, seek to gain greater energy independence, improve our relationship with our allies and make better use of multinational institutions. The problem is that most of these recommendations deal with the means to accomplish American foreign policy goals more effectively, rather than a consideration of the ends to be achieved. We continue to wait in vain for the savior of the realist school to appear.

Money Matters

One of our perennial gold bugs on the Conservative Coffee house mailing list posted these two depressing links:

https://www.newsmaxstore.com/nm_mag/free_mischief.cfm

Advertisement for Milton Friedman's last book, written before his death.

and http://english.pravda.ru/opinion/columnists/107459-0/

More or less your standard post-Soviet Russian sour grapes. How these people hate us - and what did we do to them ? As for the person who posted this informatsia, I see that his hatred of central banking has pushed him out into the deep end, even more than usual. I suppose we'll soon be treated to his occasional homilies on the importance of returning to the gold standard, or the gold exchange standard, whatever.

Now, I'll grant you that under Bernanke's chairmanship, money is pretty worthless right now. Indeed, if Bernanke did actually put in a negative discount rate, it would be less than worthless, it would be a negative asset. And, yes, lenders are reacting to all this by putting a premium on interest rates, essentially demanding a higher yield for the money they lend you, This is not a good time to be in debt, at least if you hold undsecured debt. As far as secured debt is concerned, there is a deep problem for those whose jobs are threatened, and whose equity positions have eroded. I would be one of those people. Still, if you can just hang in there, there are good deals to be had - unless inflation wipes out the restructuring of these markets. This is true in housing, it is true in stocks. Not true in bonds, which just are not a good investment right now. I admit it is tempting to try and hide one's money in commodities, but there is no way to shield your money from speculative forces. Jim Cramers rules are the best - if you want to buy something. make sure that something is what you really want. Don't sell short unless you need to do so, and you know it is the right thing to do.

So, is there no long-term effect, no hangover ? Well, I will not go that far. There will be winners and there will be losers from these "adjustments". Mostly, China is in the catbird seat. I see in the news today that the Russians, through the Canadian firm Magna, just sealed the deal for GM Europe aka Opel. Merkel needed to get this done so as not to expose German assets to the bigger raid on GM by the US government and the UAW, so this happened just in time - however there is risk that Opel jobs will be moving east to Russia; maybe some of the Turkish Gastarbeiter can move with the trade, but this is the best deal the Germans could get. VW is likewise embroiled in Eastern Europe - they invested all over the place, and now have a good bit of overcapacity and too many brands to worry about.

Anyway, back to the Keynesian front along Connecticut Avenue. Bernanke is out of runway. He cannot drop the discount rate without causing serious damage to the dollar, and to the US economy. Oil prices are rising, and it is clear that OPEC thinks it can now continue to fleece the golden goose without killing it. As far as the Treasury is concerned, I've never seen such a nightmare. In theory loose fiscal and loose monetary policy is the most stimulative possible policy - a real full court press. As is well known, it will take some time to burn down all this pork and it will not burn cleanly. Obama's policies on defense and the environment will result (at best) in structural unemployment and (at worst) create recessionary forces that cannot help slow the economy. Add health care restructuring to the mix and you have a real mess on your hands. These guys, even if some of their goals are laudatory, are off trying to do too much, too fast. So if you thought the Bush 43 administration had no sense of limits and boundaries, the Obama adminstration makes them look like pikers. Guys like Kudlow and Cramer are out there every day reporting what is happening to the markets, but the political reporters are rather - slow on the uptake. But even they cannot completely ignore what is happening, even if it is not in their range of expertise. It was fun watching Paul Krugman squirm on the Stepanapoulos panel today as all the other members gasped in horror at what is going down with GM. But this is serious stuff, and nothing you do is risk-proof, so:

I did find a hedge fund for all you doomsayers out there. They call it the "Black Swan" fund:

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB124380234786770027.html#mod=rss_whats_news_us

As for the rest of us...

Fac fortia et patere (Do brave deeds and endure)

Bill R.

Email Sent to Ted Olson

Below is an email I sent to Ted Olson in response to a Reuter press article, entitled:

Bush v. Gore lawyers take on gay marriage ban

I am writing this email to express my very strong displeasure with your efforts to legalize same sex marriage nationwide. Many of us who have followed this issue closely recognize the 14th Amendment implications of unilateral state actions,
first within state courts and more recently within state legislatures, to change the state of the law on this matter. Indeed, my own support for the Federal Marriage Amendment and disagreement with those conservatives who take a high view of
state sovereignty is grounded in my own federalist convictions that, eventually, this issue will become a matter of national concern. That said, the very worst thing that possibly could happen would be for the Supreme Court to impose a decision on the nation at large on the basis of 14th Amendment arguments, or even full faith and credit. This has horrible consequences for both our nation and for the families and individuals impacted by such a decision.

First and foremost, it poses a real challenge to the legitimacy of the constitutional structure that is so very vital to our survival as a nation of free people. At the age of 55, I have seen this national drift farther and farther apart into a maze of party politics, ethnic strife, class warfare, and disintegrating families. While some argue, indeed some do not even bother to argue, that
such a loosening of civil society is the price of equality, and that the ends justify the means, I do not think it is questionable that there are limits to the ability of the courts to mete out fairness at will. The current controversy over Judge Sotomayor and Ricci v. DeStefano stands as an example of what happens when the courts exceed their proper sphere. (On this subject, I am not criticizing
Judge Sotomayor's position, only pointing out that the expansion of judicial power only leads to more litigation and increasingly complex cases.) As a federalist conservative who ranks Alexander Hamilton, Henry Clay and Theodore Roosevelt among his political heroes, I cannot abide the misutilization of the 14th Amendment to achieve a result that will inevitably degrade the public's respect for our form of
government, further demoralize our citizenry, and exhaust all branches and levels of government in the making, enforcing, and interpreting of laws that are increasingly unjust, unenforceable, and unintelligible.

Secondly, I believe that the advocates of same sex marriage ignore the practical consequences of its legalization. There are many areas where the state of the law with respect to inheritance rights, adoption, and child custody would be impacted by a Supreme Court ruling to legalize same sex marriage in all states. State law is in no way consistent across the nation in these areas, and I believe that a Supreme Court decision to legalize same sex marriage would throw the state of the law on these matters into massive disarray, in a way that would cause even greater inequity than would result from accepting the current rather unsatisfactory situation
in which state law differs on same sex marriage. There are also matters turning on church-state relations, since many of the Protestant churches are deeply divided on this subject, and a significant change in the state of civil law will deepen this schism, as well as impose inequities in cases where these churches remain divided within a single ecclesiastical structure.

As you may note, I do not find it appropriate here to argue this issue on grounds of morality or on a theory of natural law. But there is a tension that exists between an ethical position that defines morality as the will of the society as reflected in the opinion of the majority, and a moral view that makes good and evil to be independent of custom or tradition. My position as a federalist and a conservative is simply that if the state must make moral choices and ignores the opinions of the majority of its people, or even a substantial minority, it places its legitimacy at risk and inevitably is reduced to the rule of force rather than reason to uphold its sovereignty and the integrity of its laws.

Therefore, sir, I must confess the anger I feel towards you and the role you are playing, since I cannot believe that you have failed to think these matters through before choosing to act. These are very trying times in which we live as Americans today. We face many challenges to the integrity, freedom, prestige and well-being of our nation. We do not need this.

Regards,

William C. Riggs
Fredericksburg, VA

Considering Sonjia

One of the key challenges to being the loyal opposition is knowing when and where to pick your battles. There is a lot of useless, manipulative and contrived tabletalk going on these days that loosely corresponds to this problem, inasmuch as it affects the Republican Party. But I do have the ugly suspicion that we are getting spun...why else would Colin Powell come out of the woodwork and do a bellyflop on Limbaugh and Cheney, if he were not in some sense providing top cover for the Obama Administration. No matter...such "fifth column" tactics will cut no ice water among the 35-40% of Americans who remain strongly affiliated with the Republican Party.

Just looking at the first returns on the Sotomayor confirmation, there would appear to be much more smoke than fire out there. One immediate impression I have is that the Democrats seem to be doing a good bit to make these process more difficult than it needs to be. Here is a basically centrist judge, who was first put on the federal bench by George Bush the elder and than elevated to appelate judge by Bill Clinton. She actually ruled in favor of the Bush 43 adminstration policy on restricting foreign aid money so as not to support abortion. She has a very limited track record on controversial social issues. She started out her legal career as a prosecutor; while she's no John Roberts or Samuel Alito, she seems tough on crime, reasonably observant of legal precedent, not particularly inclined to activism from the bench, and a good example of good old GOP values: a rags-to-riches story of hard work and individual excellence. Morever, when she gets slammed by The New Republic for insufficient intellectualism and disrespected by Jonathan Turley for a “a lack of depth" in her legal opinions, one must sit up and take notice. Might this woman be somehow infected with common sense, of the kind that repels liberals ? What is not to like about all this ? Do we Republicans imagine that we're likely to get a better deal from this White House ? Is there profit to be had, or fools gold, in selling Sonjia Sotomayor short ?

Taking stock of thee situation, one is indeed tempting to follow Fred Grandy's advice...kick up a little dust. Go through the motions. Take a little time with this nominee, see if the Administration makes a mistake here and there - not an unlikely outcome, particularly with this accident-prone White House. Just seeing Mr. Gibbs twist in the wind on a sensitive issue like this is indeed worth the entertainment value.

So, what is the problem here...if this nomination is the one-time-good-deal it is alleged to be, why wait to get onboard. Why not sign onto the Sotomayor bandwagon and get this over quickly ? Both Clinton nominees, Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Stephen Breyer, sailed through the confirmation process with hardly a dissenting word from the then-majority Republicans in the Senate. One would think that this confirmation would be a slam dunk...and therein lies the problem.

For some reason, rather than giving the Senate Republicans the space to quietly consent to Sotomayor's nomination, along with the presumptively unanimous Senate Democrats, Sotomayors supporters seem bent on cramming the loyal opposition, as if their candidate was flawed or had something to hide. Why bother just winning when you can railroad this thing through ?

When it comes to demagogery and manipulation, one can always rely on Chuck Schumer, and he does not fail us here.

http://hotair.com/archives/2009/05/26/schumer-to-gop-oppose-sotomayor-at-your-peril

"I think Republicans oppose her at their peril..,in some sense this is a referendum on the future of the Republican Party...she's written some very strong tough-on-crime opinions."

Thanks for your input, Chuck. In this business. we call that leading with your chin.
If this candidate is so moderate, nay conservative, if she's as tough on crime as, say, Sam Alito - why would the "hard right" not like her more that the looney left ?

Barack Obama took a rather higher note in his nomination speech:

"Well, Sonia, what you've shown in your life is that it doesn't matter where you come from, what you look like or what challenges life throws your way, no dream is beyond reach in the United States of America."

"And when Sonia Sotomayor ascends those marble steps to assume her seat on the highest court in the land, America will have taken another important step toward realizing the ideal that is etched about its entrance: Equal justice under the law."

This is all very nice, and only a moron would not be touched by what is, after all, the very inspiring success story of an extraordinary woman. But Democrats only play these notes for their own. If they view "equal justice under the law" as "proportional representation of Hispanics in high office" - remember Michael Estrada ? Where was the equal treatment, where was the justice there ? Apparently, it is not necessary to act justly towards the "hard right".

I don't listen much to David Frum these days, but he does make an interesting point about Sonjia Sotomayor's persona:

http://www.newmajority.com/ShowScroll.aspx?ID=2f0218a8-be6c-4380-9a44-f533327c01d4

"Obnoxious, but in a good way", eh, David. Well, one expects obnoxiousness from New Yorkers, so there is no reason respond in kind. Rather than damn this woman with faint praise, feeding her already bloated ego - actually, since she is a long-time divorcee - this will be a first..she'll be the first cougar to make it onto the Supreme Court.

Ahh, be that as it may, my advice to Republicans is to ignore the Democrats. Don't take the bait, don't let them lure into the trap. Fred Grandy is right. Do like Brer Rabbit, scream and shout loudly to the Democrats, not to throw you into this briar patch. And then you just let this nomination go through, chalk up the win, and count your profits, boys.

Bill R.

Tweeting at Ruthie

I posted the following reply to this Ruth Gledhill article, on our usual obsession, which you can read here:

http://timescolumns.typepad.com/gledhill/2009/05/presbyterian-minister-in-antigay-nazi-sermon-rant.html

My reply:

I beg to differ. The United Methodist Church has maintained peace in the church by not giving ground on homosexuality. Yes, there are dissenters from that policy, and yes they are vocal, and yes, some of them are bishops. Nonetheless, those who think that one can gain peace and ecclesiatical survival by just lightening up and being nice - are demonstrably in error.

DR Show Watch - Unthinking About the Unthinkable

Liberal public radio talk show host Diane Rehm had one Joshua Cooper Ramo of Kissinger Associates on her show this morning, reviewing his recent book "The Age of the Unthinkable: Why the New World Disorder Constantly Surprises Us And What We Can Do About It ". Now, of course, it is antinomious to think about unthinkable things...among the antinomies that Mr. Ramo exposes in the interview is his rejection of the strategy of deterrence. Older readers might remember this quaint Cold War era concept - the idea that if one prepared to impose unacceptable consequences on one's adversary, that adversary could be dissuaded from taking actions unacceptable to oneself. This worked in a bipolar world, with the distressing proviso that both sides must prepare to annihilate each other, and barring that, be prepared to limit the stakes in any direct confrontation within certain "rules of the game". This was thinking about the unthinkable, circa 1965, and Mr. Ramo's boss Dr. Kissinger was one of the primary thinkers about these unthinkable things.

But the irony cuts a bit deeper - for Henry Kissinger was and remains the most successful exponent of Hans Morgenthau's realist school in international politics. In realist theory, the material cause is power, and efficient causation is rendered by the balancing of power. While realist theory does not have a very strong teleology, its systemic goal is the maximization of power for individual (state) actors, but an equilibrium of power for all actors. Now, such an equilibrium could be multipolar (as was the case in Europe for most of the 18th century), bipolar (under the conditions extant during the Cold War), or unipolar - the much overrated US "hegemony" following the downfall of the Soviet Union. The policy bias for Kissinger and those who have followed in his train, therefore, has been to favor whatever status quo exists at any given time...although realist theory does not quite require state actors to underwrite the status quo, actions by states that seek to overturn the status quo are regarded as suspect, destabilizing, dangerous - irrespective of their moral worth. It is not that deterrence, retaliation, all the methods of "hard power" are not worth the cost, are not ineffective...they are simply not enough. Adequate security against terrorism requires defensive measures, measures that can and do impinge on the life of civil society, as any air traveler will attest. As Frederick the Great said, "he who defends everything, defends nothing", so even here, strategic choices must be made, and achievable ends matched to affordable means.

Ramo turns realist theory on its head, citing the intended consequences of state actions, such as the War on Terror, and claiming his ideas to be based on chaos theory as applied to international politics. Thus, rather that a policy of deterrence - and certainly not preemption - Ramo recommends that the US learn to roll with the punches, to react more effectively to unforeseen events - such as 9/11, the global financial crisis, and swine flu. I have to say, that in my own thinking about how to deal with 9/11, I had similar thoughts. While I generally supported President Bush's actions abroad, I felt that the whole "Department of Homeland Security" effort was misguided, the creation of a bureaucratic monster rather than the adoption of a sensible set of long term measures, with a strategy to mitigate the threat of terrorism against targets that by their nature cannot be fully protected in all possible scenarios.

Problem: if one takes Ramo at his word, systemic change is not controllable, even though it is unpredictable. For in chaos theory, system dynamics are deterministic even though they appear to be random. This, by definition, is a problem for policy makers, especially in democratic governments in which the officials of the state are at least formally responsible to the citizens of the state. If a butterfly causes Hurricane Katrina, is it the President's fault that New Orleans is devastated ? Ramo's response to this problem is ambiguous. On the one hand, he wishes to see a radical restructuring of government and perhaps a rethinking of its role - to the point of creating a "Department of Resiliance". On the other hand, in his interview with Diane Rehm, he stated that resiliance is an attribute that individuals must acquire, and he went on to praise the importance of religious faith as a means of sustenance under adversity. What are public policy makers supposed to do with all this ?

Neither Bill Clinton nor George W. Bush nor Barack Obama could be fairly tagged as "realist" in their approach to foreign policy. Clinton and Obama campaigned on a platform of change rather than the status quo. George W. Bush's detractors attack his policies as being neither realistic nor morally acceptable in the idealistic tradition of Kant. It would not be unthinkable to posit the notion that the United States has adopted the role of Tsar Alexander's Russia, the "revolutionary" power in Kissinger's "A World Restored", in contrast to the balancing efforts of Castlereagh and Metternich, who Kissinger praises and exalts for having restored Europe's political equilibrium at the Congress of Vienna. Reasonable persons may indeed argue whether the United States has asserted its power to the point where it is not the butterfly that causes the hurricane by flapping its wings, but the giant gorrilla whose roar - what effect does it have ? Well, in chaos theory, it is virtually impossible to know, as first order effects evolve into second...third..nth order effects, whose true propagation is difficult, if not downright impossible, to estimate.

As a died-in-the-wool realist in international relations, I think one ought to give Mr. Ramo his due - for even in a strictly realist model, deterrence is not the only option for an autonomous and self-interested actor. However, one does gain the impression that Mr. Ramo, in concocting his - new ? - theory ? - has somewhat tossed the realist baby out with the idealist and constructivist bathwater. No doubt, a Carteresque foreign policy who primary feature is its inefficacy would not suffer the consequences of externalities caused by Yin resulting from executing the politics of Yang to their logical conclusion. But this is really just power politics on the cheap. Those who advocate "smart power" will need to invest more in the way of blood and treasure, to authenticate their investments at an acceptable level of risk. In this regard, Mr. Cramer's mad money rules are as worthy a strategic guide as Clausewitz's Principles of War.

I am not - quite - willing to leave the matter in this somewhat unsatisfactory state. The antithesis to Ramo is not, in my view, to be found in the writings of Kissinger or Morgenthau, but in a perhaps unexpected place - in the writings of another relic of the 20th century, Sir Karl Popper. For Popper's writings, particularly in "The Open Society and Its Enemies" (OSE) and "The Poverty of Historicism", attack determinism as such. Now, to a certain extent - and I am still exploring this question - Popper's complaint about historicism seems to be grounded in ideology, in the realm of preferred values, rather than fact. Like Ramo, Popper deals with change; Popper advocates change, demands change, does everything in his power to remove barriers to changes he regards as humanitarian, within the legitimation of Kant's authority. To a degree perhaps less clearly than Popper, Ramo also denies the universality of historical thought- deterrence was a fine paradigm during the Cold War period, not for today. In like manner does Popper reject the philosophies of Heraclitus and Plato: too static, too conservative, opposed to change. Unlike Ramo, Popper offers a middle way between revolutionary change and status quo conservatism. Given that the world is uncertain, our theories imperfect, and the consequences of our actions unpredictable, Popper offers an approach derived from Fabian Socialism - what he calls "piecemeal social engineering". Popper contrasts his approach to that of utopianism thus:

It is

"the difference between a reasonable method of improving the lot of man, and a method which, if really tried, may easily lead to an intolerable increase in human suffering. It is the difference between a method which can be applied at any moment, and a method whose advocacy may easily become a means of continually postponing action until a later date, when conditions are more favorable. And it is also the difference between the only method of improving matters which has so far been really successful, at any time, and in any place, and a method which, wherever it has been tried, has led only to the use of violence in place of reason, and if not to its own abandonment, at any rate to that of its original blueprint".

Now, perhaps Sir Karl was indeed being a bit polemical here, as he is found to be in many places in OSE. But what he advocates, despite its clear neoconservatice overtones, does strike me as being much more rational and humane and pragmatic than Ramo's recent accretion to the corpus of postmodern thought.