What do Jay Rosen’s public journalism, Edward Murrow, Michael Yon, and John Galloway have in common? How do they help me understand why it is that U.S. and U.K. media are so uncomfortable with the idea of printing the cartoons?

Because they focus our attention on the notion of journalists as citizens.

Watching the U.S. and U.K. media twist themselves into ever-tightening logical circles as they explained why they wouldn’t reprint the Danish cartoons – which would have, rightly, been interpreted as thumbing their noses at the Islamists who stirred the controversy – I’m struck by a simple notion.

As Americans, or as citizens of the U.K., defiance is an appropriate response. You don’t like cartoons of your prophet? Too bad. Hell, we dip ours in piss and sell the photos.

But the media world is somehow above that unseemly response; their goal is to be even-handed parents, balancing the claims of both outraged children, and maintaining their stance as rapporteur, not participant.

It wasn’t always so.

I noted the L.A. Times article on Michael Yon, and the author’s (and, to be honest, most of the audience’s) distaste for Yon’s not-well-considered actions in picking up a rifle and attempting to get involved in a firefight. What journalist would do anything like that?

What journalist would have, as the writer put it,

…ignored the barriers that traditionally separated the press from its subjects. He openly rooted for soldiers and helped them collect the wreckage after roadside bombings.

Well, let me give two examples.

After midnight in London, Morgenthau gave an address on CBS Radio to the American people, which Roosevelt’s speechwriter Robert Sherwood and the CBS London correspondent Edward R. Murrow helped to write. He told his audience that while touring the fallout [sic] shelters, the “principal thought that filled my mind and heart” had been “we must never forget!” It was not enough to hope that postwar Germans and Japanese would “behave themselves as decent people”: “Hoping is not good enough…Germany and Japan must be kept disarmed.”

I’ve cited this before ; but let me bring it up again…Edward R Murrow, the demigod of a courageous press, acting as a flack for a U.S. Government official – worse, actively writing a speech for him. And it certainly doesn’t read like a nuanced one.

Go over and read Joseph Galloway’s memoirs of his experiences in Vietnam – they’re interesting reading in general (he’s an interesting guy – he co-authored ‘We Were Soldiers Once, And Young’).

But he had an idea: We would stay the night at the MACV Adviser compound nearby and get a much earlier start than those day-trippers the next morning. Sounded like a plan. At the gate of the compound a very tired looking American captain greeted us warmly. “We have been on 100% alert here for the last five days and nights. We are exhausted and need some relief. You guys are it.” He hooked me up with Saigon on his old-fashioned telephone switchboard. I was yelling down a bad line to Herndon in Saigon, telling him what we had seen that afternoon, when enemy mortar rounds fell on the South Vietnamese compound next door. I ducked under the switchboard and kept talking. Afterward, the captain handed us an M2 greasegun submachine gun and a handful of magazines. He showed us where we would sleep, in an empty bunkroom full of double-decker bunks. And where we would stand guard, in a sandbagged bunker facing a barbed-wire fence with a road beyond that. Henri would stand guard alone, from Midnight to 3 a.m. My turn was 3 a.m. to daybreak.

I lay there in the dark unable to sleep till Henri shook my arm and gestured at the door. I took the gun and ammo and entered the bunker for the longest night of my life to that point. Midway through my tour the Viet Cong pulled a satchel charge attack on the South Vietnamese compound across the road. No one approached our fence. Finally the eastern sky began to brighten slightly. The night was nearly over. Thank God. Just then a Vietnamese on a bicycle with a huge bundle on the handlebars came into view, pedaling up that road. I leveled the gun, safety off, and told myself if he made one false move he was dead. About then the captain slapped me on the shoulder: “Son, if you shoot that man you are going to have to cook our breakfast. He’s the chef.” Whew.

How’s that for your first day at war?

There’s more…

The Cav also brought along with them their hometown reporter, a grizzled and, to we 20-somethings, ancient World War II veteran Marine named Charlie Black of The Columbus (Ga.) Ledger-Enquirer. We would all go to school on Charlie Black who lived with the Cav 24/7 and loved what he was doing. Charlie would go out with a battalion on operations and stay for a week or ten days or two weeks. When he came back to An Khe he would sit down at a battered old typewriter and write endless dispatches, single spaced, on onion skin paper. His stories were full of names and hometowns. He would find a friendly GI who would frank the letter so it went home airmail for free. His editor would run every line, because his readers included the wives and kids of many of the troops. Charlie was supposed to stay two or three weeks; he ended up staying more than a year that tour. Traded in his return air ticket for pocket money, slept on the ground or in the press tent for free and ate a steady diet of C-rations, also for free. The Cav troops would have happily passed the hat for donations if Charlie had gone totally broke. They loved him, and the love affair was mutual.

And more…

Ray dropped the Huey in rather precipitously to avoid the machine guns. I bailed out, the camp defenders flung some wounded aboard, and Ray was gone, shooting me the bird through the plexiglass. A sergeant ran up and said, “I don’t know who you are, Sir, but Maj. Beckwith wants to see you right now.” I inquired as to which one was the good major. “He is that big guy over there jumping up and down on his hat,” the sergeant replied. In short order I was standing before a man who would become a legend in Special Operations Warfare as the founder of the Delta Forces anti-terrorist teams. The dialogue went something like this: Him: Who the hell are you? Me: A reporter, Sir. Him: I need everything in the goddam world; I need reinforcements; I need medical evacuation helicopters; I need ammunition; I need food; I would love a bottle of Jim Beam whiskey and some cigars. And what has the Army in its wisdom sent me? A reporter. Well, son, I got news for you. I have no vacancy for a reporter but I do have one for a corner machine gunner—and YOU ARE IT! Me: Yes, Sir.

Beckwith took me to a sandbagged corner of a trench and gave me a short lesson in the care and loading and firing f the .30 caliber air-cooled machine gun which sat there, dark, ugly and menacing. He showed me how to unjam it in case of need. How to arm it. His instructions then were simple and direct: You can shoot the little brown men outside the wire; they are the enemy. You may not shoot the little brown men inside the wire; they are mine. For the next two or three days and nights I lived in that corner of the trench, beside the gun. What sleep there was was caught in lulls during the day. One day the Air Force finally managed to air-drop supplies in the right place; in fact right on top of the right place. Huge pallets of crates of ammo and c-rations drifted right down onto the camp, demolishing at least one tin-roofed building and smashing other defensive emplacements. I reached out and grabbed a Newsweek reporter, Bill Cook, and yanked him into my trench right before he was about to be squished by a descending pallet. The snaps of the parachutes billowing all over the camp were pretty good, even if I say so myself.

Finally a South Vietnamese armored column arrived to the rescue. Bob Poos of AP and another old friend, Jack Laurence of CBS, were riding atop the Armored Personnel Carriers. I waved at Poos and asked him where the hell he had been. He gave me the one-finger salute. The North Vietnamese had left by then and the hills were silent for the first time in a week. The air stank with that never-to-be-forgotten smell of rotting human flesh. The hills were ripped apart by the airstrikes brought down on the machine gunners, a stark, shattered landscape. We spent one more night in the camp. Poos was assigned to my machine gun.

Not the AP of this war, I’d suggest.

If there was a turning point, James Fallows covered it, in talking about a 1987 roundtable on ethics with journalists, academics, and the military:

Then Ogletree turned to the two most famous members of the evening’s panel, better known than William Westmoreland himself. These were two star TV journalists: Peter Jennings of World News Tonight and ABC, and Mike Wallace of 6o Minutes and CBS. Ogletree brought them into the same hypothetical war. He asked Jennings to imagine that he worked for a network that had been in contact with the enemy North Kosanese government. After much pleading, the North Kosanese had agreed to let Jennings and his news crew into their country, to film behind the lines and even travel with military units. Would Jennings be willing to go? Of course, Jennings replied. Any reporter would-and in real wars reporters from his network often had. But while Jennings and his crew are traveling with a North Kosanese unit, to visit the site of an alleged atrocity by American and South Kosanese troops, they unexpectedly cross the trail of a small group of American and South Kosanese soldiers. With Jennings in their midst, the northern soldiers set up a perfect ambush, which will let them gun down the Americans and Southerners, every one. What does Jennings do? Ogletree asks. Would he tell his cameramen to “Roll tape!” as the North Kosanese opened fire? What would go through his mind as he watched the North Kosanese prepare to ambush the Americans? Jennings sat silent for about fifteen seconds after Ogletree asked this question. “Well, I guess I wouldn’t,” he finally said. “I am going to tell you now what I am feeling, rather than the hypothesis I drew for myself. If I were with a North Kosanese unit that came upon Americans, I think that I personally would do what I could to warn the Americans.” Even if it means losing the story? Ogletree asked.

Even though it would almost certainly mean losing my life, Jennings replied. “But I do not think that I could bring myself to participate in that act. That’s purely personal, and other reporters might have a different reaction.” Immediately Mike Wallace spoke up. “I think some other reporters would have a different reaction,” he said, obviously referring to himself. “They would regard it simply as a story they were there to cover.” “I am astonished, really,” at Jennings’s answer, Wallace said moment later. He turned toward Jennings and began to lecture him: “You’re a reporter. Granted you’re an American”-at least for purposes of the fictional example; Jennings has actually retained Canadian citizenship. “I’m a little bit at a loss to understand why, because you’re an American, you would not have covered that story.” Ogletree pushed Wallace. Didn’t Jennings have some higher duty, either patriotic or human, to do something other than just roll film as soldiers from his own country were being shot? “No,” Wallace said flatly and immediately. “You don’t have a higher duty. No. No. You’re a reporter!” Jennings backtracked fast. Wallace was right, he said. “I chickened out.” Jennings said that he had gotten so wrapped up in the hypothetical questions that he had lost sight of his journalistic duty to remain detached. As Jennings said he agreed with Wallace, everyone else in the room seemed to regard the two of them with horror. Retired Air Force general Brent Scowcroft, who had been Gerald Ford’s national security advisor and would soon serve in the same job for George Bush, said it was simply wrong to stand and watch as your side was slaughtered. “What’s it worth?” he asked Wallace bitterly. “It’s worth thirty seconds on the evening news, as opposed to saving a platoon.” Ogletree turned to Wallace. What about that? Shouldn’t the reporter have said something? Wallace gave his most disarming grin, shrugged his shoulders and spread his palms wide in a “Don’t ask me!” gesture, and said, “I don’t know.” He was mugging to the crowd in such a way that he got a big laugh-the first such moment of the discussion. Wallace paused to enjoy the crowd’s reaction. Jennings, however, was all business, and was still concerned about the first answer he had given. “I wish I had made another decision,” Jennings said, as if asking permission to live the last five minutes over again. “I would like to have made his decision”-that is, Wallace’s decision to keep on filming. A few minutes later Ogletree turned to George M. Connell, a Marine colonel in full uniform, jaw muscles flexing in anger, with stress on each word, Connell looked at the TV stars and said, “I feel utter . . . contempt. ” Two days after this hypothetical episode, Connell Jennings or Wallace might be back with the American forces–and could be wounded by stray fire, as combat journalists often had been before. The instant that happened he said, they wouldn’t be “just journalists” any more. Then they would drag them back, rather than leaving them to bleed to death on the battlefield. “We’ll do it!” Connell said. “And that is what makes me so contemptuous of them. Marines will die going to get … a couple of journalists.” The last few words dripped with disgust.

What answer would John Galloway or Edward R. Murrow given?

The issue, simply, is that members of the media feel they must put their citizenship aside – or possibly tie to a broader flag – in order to do their jobs.

That has an impact in the coverage we see in Iraq, and it also has an impact in the coverage we see here at home.

Jay Rosen, who (as far as I know) coined the term ‘public journalism’ to describe the notion that news media – newspapers and television stations – had obligations as institutions and citizens of communities to do more than simply report, but to engage and participate.

I think that’s a good thing. I think that the media should be citizens.

I’m not unaware that this pulls the rug out from under many claims – including my own – that media ‘bias’ is damaging the media and out communities; I’m going to need some time to work out a response to that.

But a media that’s struggling to stand impartial between the claims of theocrats and those of freedom is a media that isn’t embracing any concept of citizenship I know.

Journalism is struggling with this issue:

As the Columbus experiment became known within the newspaper industry, a variety of other suspicions were raised. During a panel discussion at the American Society of Newspaper Editors conference of 1992, Howard Schneider, managing editor at Newsday, spoke out. “I think what Columbus did was bad,” Schneider said. “I think the potential for mischief is great. I do not mean only that they had to report on what their editor was doing, but [also] buying into the idea that they are now a part of the community, and the community’s agenda is the newspaper’s agenda, and suddenly we have to make the community feel good. This may be a temptation to sugarcoat some of the realities of the city.”

This kind of criticism would flare repeatedly in the years ahead as others in the news business decided to “leap across the chasm that normally separates journalism from community,” as Swift put it, while many of their colleagues learned of these leaps and drew back in disgust. “Getting involved” became one of the flashpoints for the controversy that surrounded public journalism when it surfaced as a movement after 1993.

In not publishing the cartoons, it seems to me that the media are stepping back from “Getting involved” here again.

And that’s too bad.

[Update: Through sheer coincidence, American Thinker links to an article in Accuracy In Media on exactly this point:

She adds, “It’s OK for them to spill the beans about everything the White House does, but Heaven forbid they should tell the Bush Administration where some of the terrorists are or that they’re having tea and a casual chat” Come on. Now who’s bordering on treason? Al-Jazeera [is our friend] compared to what our own media will do to the United States with our backs turned. It’s a travesty. They should be charged with treason when they do these types of stories and don’t report their sources to the proper officials.”

The December 27 report in question about ‘Commander Ismail’ was narrated by Myers, who said that “In his first interviews with Western media, Ismail brags about killing three Navy Seals this summer, then downing a Chinook helicopter that came to rescue them, killing another 16 Americans.” Myers explained, “NBC News interviewed Ismail in August and again this month. Both times, the Taliban made sure we could not provide their location to the U.S. military.”

]

The LA Times today has a Page 1, Column 1 article on journalist/blogger Michael Yon.

It’s an interesting ‘personality’ article about him; not very deep or analytical – and not much news that those who haven’t followed him in the blogs won’t know.

Pretty unexceptional, I’d say.

Then again, there’s the headline.

Lone Gun in War Reporting

Michael Yon’s blog made him a hero among backers of the effort in Iraq. As his profile grew, so did debate on the quality of his work.

Boy, you’d think the story would go deeply into the wide-ranging debate on the specific quality of his work.
Instead, we get the Carl Prine quote that was widely circulated around the blogs:

“As someone who has seen a great deal of combat in my life and who earns his daily bread as a reporter,” Prine opined on the Internet, “I can assure you that a lot of what Michael Yon writes is misleading, inaccurate and vapid.”

That’s it; that’s the sum of the debate we’re shown in the article.

Look, I know that the author didn’t write the headline, and the article is interesting, if incomplete – there are two fascinating points left untouched by the writer: First, if Yon is the “the reporter of choice for many conservatives and supporters of the war,” what does it say about the gulf between war supporters and opponents and the ways that they look at news? Next, what does it say about the future of journalism that a free agent like Yon can begin to make a living reporting outside the envelope of the media organizations like the Times?

But the headline – and it’s slam on Yon – would be less annoying if the pattern of slams in the Times didn’t lean so clearly in one direction. I’ll sit back and wait for the reaction from Patterico…

I’m thinking hard about this:

From the start, Yon ignored the barriers that traditionally separated the press from its subjects. He openly rooted for soldiers and helped them collect the wreckage after roadside bombings.

I’ll have more to say about this – and it’s relation to the Cartoon War – in a bit.

Jane Harman is my Congresswoman; I’ve had issues with her beginning with a tetchy dialog we had as she was exploring running for the first time. I’ve publicly complained about the fact that she’s the consummate Washington insider, and more, that when she decided to run for the seat again she simply shoved aside well-qualified local candidates.

But you know, it’s past time for me to get over it.

She (along with Gary Hart, Bob Graham and some others in the Democratic policy circle) has founded a national-security PAC – ‘Secure US.’ the stated goal is:

…to invigorate policy development and strengthen the voice of Democrats on critical national security issues facing the United States of America.

Looking at a study on the site, some interesting data pops up, which suggests several intersting things (note the contradiction to the CAP proposals below).

Americans want an activist approach that prevents terrorist acts, not one that merely responds to them. While voters hold our gallant first responders in high esteem, Democratic focus on them may inadvertently undercut our message. By making first responders “our piece” of the war on terror, Democrats may be inadvertently suggesting that we are more interested in responding to the aftermath of an attack than in preventing one. Moreover, by focusing the dialogue on budgets and spending, Democrats lead voters to believe homeland security is just another pork barrel program. Voters are less interested in the amount being spent than in what is being purchased and how that will enhance their security.

and

Below is a broad outline of the conclusions we reached as a result of this research:

* The threats posed by terrorist and rogue countries (especially in the context of WMD) were deemed most serious by our groups

* Participants increasingly viewing national security through the prism of the war in Iraq and not only through the September 11th lens

* Participants clearly identified several steps the government has taken to improve security, from increased awareness to airport security to intelligence gathering, but many expressed skepticism about the efficacy of these efforts, with few of our participants able to articulate America’s current anti-terror strategy

* Americans are looking for a strong, intelligent leader when it comes to national security – one who can clearly articulate his or her vision

* Many focus group participants viewed Democrats as indecisive, a party of protest, and without a plan to address national security, while they viewed Republicans as stronger, but also unrealistic and arrogant

* The contrast between perceptions of Democrats and Republicans comes clear when participants are asked to define major differences between the two parties on national security – Republicans were generally viewed as strong and aggressive, while Democrats were viewed as more laid back and willing to negotiate

* Immigration emerged as a major theme in thinking about national security, with participants reasoning that if poorly educated job seekers could easily get into the country, sophisticated terrorists could have an easy time of it

* Beyond immigration, participants were divided over whether the U.S. should take a more diplomatic or a more independent approach

This is useful information for all sides of the national security debate.

First, because it will, hopefully lead the Democrats to get over the “we have great policies, we just can’t explain them to anyone” problam they have today. No, you don’t.

Even Arianna agrees with this:

There are many disturbing aspects to this story — including why, as Atrios and Matt Stoller have pointed out, any sentient Democrat would talk to Nagourney. But hands down the most disturbing takeaway is the fact that Democrats are still iffy about the importance of taking on Bush and the GOP on national security. Are there really Democrats — as Evan Bayh suggests — still “arguing that the party should focus only on domestic issues and run away from national security, since that has been the strong suit for this White House since the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11”? Say it isn’t so! (Did someone let Bob Shrum and Stan Greenberg back into the building?)

I’ve said it again and again and again — and I guess I’ll have to keep saying it: the Democrats will never become the majority party until they can convince the American people that they can keep the country safer than the Republicans. All together now: It’s the national security, stupid! And if I sound like a broken record, so should the Democrats.

Now while I agree with Arianna’s diagnosis, her prescription is I believe, deeply misguided and wrong:

Again, at the risk of turning blue in the face, let me help them out: they should follow Jack Murtha’s lead and, as he’s done in letters to Congress and to the president, show how Bush’s imperial adventure in Iraq has had devastating consequences on the real battle at hand — keeping us safe and secure.

The evidence is everywhere: neglected ports and railways. Underfunded first responders. A tripling of terror attacks worldwide. Poor and failing grades from the 9/11 Commission. Osama still on the loose. Iraq as a breeding ground for a new generation of terrorists. Al-Qaeda making a comeback in Afghanistan. Depleted troops. Shaky allies. Emboldened enemies.

But at least it’s a position that can be debated. I think it would flunk the test presented by the focus group families above, but it’s better than the ‘two-positions-a-week’ I think we’re seeing now.

And to the readers from the right who are rubbing their hands at the Democrat’s disarry, I suggest not so damn fast. We (you and I) probably agree that we’re in the opening stages of a long war.

What we do in the next year or two will have profound impacts on how long a war, and how painful and costly a war. If – as a nation – we’re paralyzed and divided, we won’t do much. If you believe we’re at war, you have an obligation – a duty – to work to build a national consensus on this. You won’t do it standing aside and letting half the country stagger from position to position as it’s torn between the Jane Harmans and the Cindy Sheehans.

Wednesday nights at Casa de Armed Liberal are “boy’s nights.” Tonight Littlest Guy and I are finishing the DVD of ‘Into The Woods,’ one of my favorite Sondheim musicals. He & his brothers have enjoyed Sondheim since they were small children; Biggest Guy called my tape of ‘Sunday In The Park With George’ “man singing,” and it was one of his favorites.

Tonight, we’re watching the moving finale, and as the cast moves into the climactic “You Are Not Alone,” 9-year old LG says “You know, I think this is going to make me cry. I’ve never watched something that made me cry before.”

That made me misty.

In keeping with my emphasis on looking for a Democratic security policy, I found (on Blue Force) that the Center for American Progress has released a proposed Democratic Quadrennial Defense Review (QDR) (note – pdf).

It’s interesting; the core is really three points:

First, rescaling the Administration’s ‘1-4-2-1’ policy (1 x defend the United States; 4 x deter aggression in 4 regional centers; 2 x regional combat operations; 1 x decisively win one of those two) into a ‘1-1-2-3’ policy, which they define as “a military that gives first priority to protecting the homeland, can fight and win one major regional conflict, can engage in
two simultaneous substantial peacekeeping and stabilization missions and can deter conflicts in three regions.”

Second, aggressively limiting the U.S. Nuclear arsenal. I don’t know nearly enough about the current U.S. nuclear status or policy (yet) to opine.

Finally, aggressively planning to use the military for domestic security – both pro-actively and in response to possible terrorist actions.

I’ll suggest that the key is “The Pentagon must reintroduce elements of a “threat-based” model that guided its thinking in the immediate post-Cold War period.” Basically, this reads as though the goal is to throttle back the Defense budget and re-enjoy the “peace dividend.”

I hope that’s not what they’re really suggesting…

I do – firmly – agree that we need to think hard about the kind of military we are going to have four years from now.

And I agree with them (CAP) that we need to look hard at Cold-War type programs. They list:

* F/A-22 Raptor stealth fighter jet, which is an unnecessary and costly
supplement to the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter.

* SSN-774 Virginia class submarine, which offers few technological
advantages yet substantially higher costs in comparison with existing
submarines.

* DD(X) Destroyer, which suffers from innumerable technological
difficulties and ballooning costs without offering any true advantage
over the Littoral Combat Ship.

* V-22 Osprey, which has caused numerous training deaths and
excessive cost overruns and which suffers from unresolved
development issues while offering only marginal advantages over
existing helicopters.

* C-130J transport aircraft, which provides no additional capabilities over
existing transport aircraft and suffers from severe technological flaws.

* Offensive space-based weapons, which can be easily disrupted, are of
no use in low-tech asymmetric conflict, and are far more expensive than
existing technologies while offering few additional strike capabilities.

* Further deployment of the National Missile Defense System, which
offers unproven technology at exceptionally high costs to defend against
a highly unlikely nuclear missile strike against the United States.

I’m not entirely sure about offensive space-based weapons – it depends a bit on how they are defined. I definitely agree that a National Missile Defense System should not be deployed – until it’s passed a lot more tests. I fully support continued research, and eventual deployment of a demonstrably effective system.

The reality is that what we will need in the future decade looks a lot more like Kagan’s ‘Imperial Grunts’ and the civil affairs folks we have in Iraq than the massive, technologically cutting-edge systems we deployed against the industrial and technoical might of the Soviets.

Kagan describes it:

An approach that informally combines humanitarianism with intelligence gathering in order to achieve low-cost partial victories is what imperialism in the early twenty-first century demands.

The Basilan operation was a case of American troops’ applying lessons and techniques learned from their experience of occupation in the Philippines a hundred years before. Although the invasion and conquest of the Philippine Islands from 1898 to 1913 became infamous to posterity for its human-rights violations, those violations were but one aspect of a larger military situation that featured individual garrison commanders pacifying remote rural areas with civil-affairs projects that separated the local population from the insurgents. It is that second legacy of which the U.S. military rightly remains proud, and from which it draws lessons in this new imperial age of small wars.

The most crucial tactical lesson of the Philippines war is that the smaller the unit, and the farther forward it is deployed among the indigenous population, the more it can accomplish. This is a lesson that turns imperial overstretch on its head. Though one big deployment like that in Iraq can overstretch our military, deployments in many dozens of countries involving relatively small numbers of highly trained people will not.

But the Basilan intervention is more pertinent as a model for future operations elsewhere than for what it finally achieved. For example, if the United States and Pakistan are ever to pacify the radicalized tribal agencies of the Afghan-Pakistani borderlands, it will have to be through a variation on how Special Forces operated in Basilan; direct action alone will not be enough.

The readers of this site may not support the exact plans proposed by CAP; they propose a military repurposed to defend and clean up afterwards when the defense breaks down.

But neither can we afford a military unable to project the kind of force and nonlethal presence required to win the kinds of wars we are likely to face in the next decade, ragerdless of the neat systems and contracts that it may own. The CAP proposal is a step toward a national dialog defining that kind of military; we ought to extend that discussion here and try to come to a conclusion of our own.

Between planning nuclear wars, burning embassies, plain old blaspheming, and accusing each other of being stupid, dishonest, or deranged, the quality of discourse has been strained somewhat.

I’d rather we laughed at ourselves and each other – it’s a good way to get over ourselves. Frequent commenter Daniel Markham is doing something about it.

Call for Authors

Tired of having the same old argument every day with your left/right war/antiwar conservative/liberal friends? Able to make a joke? How about writing some political humor?

I’ve started a new blog www.news2lose.com which is going to be political satire. I don’t care what side of the political fence you are on, if you are able to laugh at yourself and others we’d like to hear it! A spirit of self-deprecation is required — if you want to bash Michael Moore or Dick Cheney have fun with it, but have some class too.

Email me at DanielBMarkham AT hotmail.com for a tryout. If you can write some funny stuff, or at least something different, maybe folks will like hearing about it. This is NOT a commercial venture, just a place to play and have fun. If we can write a few stories a week that make fun of the political climate we are in, maybe we all can loosen up a bit.

I’ll drink to that, as Groucho would have said. And yes, I am a Marxist…Groucho, Harpo, Chico AND Zeppo. There. I’ve admitted it.

Mark Kleiman and friends are having an interesting discussion on Iran from the left side of the plate.

Check out Kleiman here, Sabl’s reply (the term ‘batshit crazy’ is used), then Kleiman again, then Teles. It’s an intelligent and interesting discussion, and if the hawkish folks here ever want to build a consensus for action, you’ll need to find a way to reach out and engage the guys writing over there.

I’ve been watching the ‘Blue Force‘ blog for a while, figuring “hey, maybe theres an ally here.”

I’m not thrilled so far, because the emphasis seems to be less on how to develop a genuine Democratic set of policies around the conflict we’re in (the one that’s broader than the war in Iraq), than in figuring out ‘framing’ exercises for Democratic candidates that inoculate them against the issue – i.e. the Iraq and Afghanistan vets running for office as Democrats.

John Kerry was a genuine soldier – whether you think he was a hero or not, he certainly served credibly – and his handlers made the same mistake, thinking that a service record alone would wrap a Democratic lack of coherent policy in a uniform and make it look strong.

That’s kind of like putting a big spoiler on an economy car and thinking that makes it a race car.What’s needed is an independent effort by Democrats to think through and create a set of policies to address the challenges we’re facing today. These policies need to go past the Jimmy Carter apologetics, to some understanding of how we address the simple fact that people in the world are perfectly prepared to use force and violence against us.

What’s also needed – both from a policy perspective, and a politics one – is to make it clear that these policies are being identified and proposed not for partisan advantage, but because we think they are the best policies to follow.

Which is why I was so deeply disappointed today to see this post:

Unnecessary Worrying About Iran’s Nukes
Submitted by Jason Sigger on Mon, 02/06/2006 – 3:50am.

One might understand the right wing’s concern about Iran’s nuclear weapons and the Bush administration’s rhetoric about not being able to accept a nuclear-armed Iran, but the question has to be asked. Why are the left-wing bloggers at Washington Monthly and Daily Kos echoing the administration’s lines?

Boy, this is wrong on just so many levels.

On a basic one, let me propose this: if the core of Democratic foreign policy and military policy is to be devised to oppose Bush, and make him look bad – as opposed to opposing our enemies and making them look bad – the right-wing point that the progressives see Bush as a bigger enemy than Bin laden is just proved again. By the same people who have taken on themselves the nominal responsibility of creating a national-security policy for the Democratic Party.

I’m working on a longer post about just such a policy, but somehow I don’t think I’ll be quite as interested in what these guys have to say about it. I know commenter Chris won’t be happy about that…

I may not be an expert on football, but watching the Super Bowl at my brother’s house seemed to – most of all – have been a potentially great (i.e. close and exciting) game marred by horrible officiating. He is an expert in football, and he was apoplectic.

The Steeler’s first touchdown – questionable. The Seahawk’s first touchdown called back for pass interference – not questionable, but a bit of a BS call. The Seahawk’s second touchdown called back for holding – where? – a horrible call. The Seahawk’s QB called for clipping when he was really tackling – bad call. We agreed that if the Seahawk’s QB’s loss of the ball in the 4th quarter (it popped out when he hit the ground on a run) was called a fumble, we’d turn off the game. Fortunately, the call was reversed on review.

Annoying, at best.

Here’s a conference that will revolutionize your thinking about software development and organizational development as well…Waterfall 2006:

After years of being disparaged by some in the software development community, the waterfall process is back with a vengeance. You’ve always known a good waterfall-based process is the right way to develop software projects. Come to the Waterfall 2006 conference and see how a sequential development process can benefit your next project. Learn how slow, deliberate handoffs (with signatures!) between groups can slow the rate of change on any project so that development teams have more time to spend on anticipating user needs through big, upfront design.

Sessions include:

* Pair Managing: Two Managers per Programmer by Jim Highsmith
* Two-Phase Waterfall: Implementation Considered Harmful by Robert C. Martin
* User Interaction: It Was Hard to Build, It Should Be Hard to Use by Jeff Patton
* FIT Testing In When You Can; Otherwise Skip It by Ward Cunningham
* The Joy of Silence: Cube Farm Designs That Cut Out Conversation by Alistair Cockburn
* Making Outsourcing Work: One Team Member per Continent by Babu Bhatt
* User Stories and Other Lies Users Tell Us by Mike Cohn
* Defect-full Code: Ensuring Future Income with Maintenance Contracts by Kay Pentecost
* Pragmatic Project Chores: How to Do Everything Manually, Over and Over Again by Mike Clark
* The Role of Governance in Process Maturity: We’re Lawyers, and We’re Here To Help by Jackie Chiles
* If It Was Good Enough for Shakespeare: A Fresh Look at the Need for Talent in Software Engineering by Rob Styles

I haven’t been able to register yet…

We’re sorry but registration is not yet ready. Our software developers have a really wonderful design. They’re almost done entering it into it a UML tool. They’ve told us not to worry and that finishing it will be “trivial” because “all that’s left is the coding.”