Dave, with my my comments in ***

I know I’m getting repetitious about the *** bit, but I keep hoping we have NEW readers:

When I was a kid I staked the new kid down to an anthill. I still remember how enjoyable it was to be able to hear all that wailing and screeching more than a mile away.

*** Many years ago my brother and I were sitting watching his three little girls at play. Everything they were doing, the least hazardous of which was hanging by their legs six off the ground, seemed calculated to make them paraplegics. But every time one of us took them out of a dangerous position, they got into a worse one.

*** Finally we gave up. We sat down and my brother leaned back and said, “You know, Bob, it is statistically impossible for any child to survive to the age of ten.”

*** Little boys are worse. They do the same thing, but to other little boys.

*** I am the last person on earth wants any new International Commissions on anything.

*** But many a time, watching cheerful, innocent children at play, it has occurred to me that we might need to apply the Geneva Convention to THEM.

Later when I was collared a preacher was called to save me and said: “Someday, conscience will hold you to account”. Was that preacher ever right because when I grew up I got shanghaied into sitting on a “Board of Ethics”. You never want that to happen to you.

*** You had a problem because you were the only person sitting there who was not a sociopath.

*** Ethics are easy for sociopaths.

*** The few priests or preachers who actually BELIEVE have the same problem.

Everybody started talking about “conscience” and it immediately took flight. The yapping got pretentious quick and then more and more pretentious until someone noticed and then they started yapping about pretentious yapping until the yapping got to such craziness I was sorely tempted to tune them all up with a baseball bat, an anthill not being handy.

*** That’s EXACTLY the way I have been feeling about The Greatest Generation since before I read that comic book I mentioned at the age of ten.

These politicians who are “positioners” are like the people who lay “conscience” on us in a Board of Ethics. They are crazy, pure and simple. That’s why BW is such a cool drink of water, he understands.

*** I sure do. And it wasn’t water I drank to cure it.

Comment by Dave

Joe has some commentary on Pontifex Maximus, which I am stealing here for my blog.

My replies, as always, are in ***.

From now on, Bob wrote it.

I can’t find much to disagree with except to make it clear that I have wholy different attitude.

You see, despite our similarity in age, Joe is a mean old cynical bastard whereas I am still a sweet model of personal diplomacy.

To put that last sentence into English:

“A lot of times Joe said what I would LIKE to say but I prefer to blame it on him.”

Joe says,

Not spam. Is it not amazing the egotism of the human being? As if your essence and what you are called are the same thing. King, Emperor, Queen, Duke….. the whole idea of “first among equals” is pure nonsensical egotism. As if the name, the title, makes a difference in the humanity. So much for the title. Titles are misleading and fraudulent. Is it not amazing the crap men feed each other with their stupid titles? I think it is. It’s pomposity, pridefulness, theft of truth.

*** Fortunately I am far too perfect to be pompous. ***

I didn’t expect this piece to move from human titles and egotism to politics and gangsterism (same thing) but I should have expected it to do just that. They do rather go together when they get organized.

From this background you have moved to the concept of chastity in America which I have seen you mention on previous occasions. I have never seen any of this chastity that you speak of here in the mountain country. Obsession with chastity? Not here, Honcho. Not in West Bygod. Ain’t seen no chastity here much less any obsession with it. No, I haven’t even seen it brayed about in the churches. Not here. Home of miscegenation. Sorry, no chastity here. Anything but. Hey, I’m just passing through, Honcho. These ain’t my people.

*** You have observed enough preachers and priest to know that an OBSESSION with chastity in a sociopath has very little to do with the real thing. ***

Yo Daddy was right! An atheist SHOULD know his Bible. He might find himself in a trench someday.

I read Mein Kampf. It took me a long time to read it because I was taking notes as I read it. When I was done I was thoroughly convinced that there were and are incredible similarities to the time that was being written about and our situation in America today. I was not reading anything into it. The damage the media had done to the country that Hitler was writing about is only one of the similarities that I saw. It’s almost as if the story is being written again.

I agree with you, Bob, that history is crucial. I did say earlier on this blog (over a year ago) that there is such a thing as historical revisionism. It’s one thing to say “I know” and it’s another thing to actually know. How much stock can we put in what we have been told? That’s the question as far as I’m concerned. Economic history, military history, religious history. Maybe we ought to talk about it. As I understand it, economics is your forte. Why don’t we start with that? Isn’t that what they call the “dismal science?” What science? It falls under “social science” as far as I know. What kind of science is that?

Comment by joe rorke

*** This last paragraph requires a separate article. You are working my butt off today, Joe. ***

Not Spam

My martial arts instructor once told me to never ask a talented person to show you how to do the thing they’re talented at, because often they don’t know exactly how they manage their feats of genius.

That’s what talent is, a natural propensity or ease in doing something. A classmate of mine who was also a dance major, tried to teach me a few dance steps once. She was talented. So her instruction consisted of telling me: c’mon, it’s easy- just use your body. So I still can’t dance.

I think the trick amounts to finding out the one thing you were born to do. It’s a very hard trick if you’re naturally competent at many things.

And of course our shcools would never teach such heresies as heredity is destiny.

I wish I could say something useful about your podcast Bob, but the site seems to be down.

Maybe you offended somebody.

Comment by Antonio Fini

MY REPLY:

Offended somebody?

Me?

You and Joe make me furious. You both actually TRAINED for fighting. I went into the shooting not only without basic training, but as a presumed expert and leader.

Everything I ever did was not chosen by me and I always was expected to be an expert when I got there.

I wrote about education and was a professor, so I was appointed of Oversight on Education and Labor for House of Representatives. I hadn’t even HEARD of most of the issues I was suddenly an expert on. I was suddenly an international aviation negotiator. I could tell the difference between a DC-3 and 747 and that was about it.

When I was head of a staff on the Ed and Labor Committee, my boss was also ranking Republican on the House Sellect Internal Security Committee — I’m not even sure I got the name right. Since he knew all about my intelligence background, he used me a lot on that.

I tried to explain to him tha my knowledge of intelligence policy was on the level of my expertise that Joe described as “things military,” that is, I could sympathize with the squirrel that I shot the bee-bee right in front of, I had beena lot of places pretending to be a soldier, but he was asking a private about generalship. It scared the hell out of me when he called me about Ed and Labor, but it REALLY scared me when he wanted to discuss security issues.

Seriously, I think he kept calling me in because nobody else really knew much about either subject either, and I was loyal and had common sense.

All my life I have envied people who started in an occupation and STAYED there.

In fact, maybe I fit into the modern world better than most people do. Nowadays almost any field you are in changes so much in a decade you have to keep hopping around and learning the way I did.

Joe says:

Not spam.. Minor error. Working in OR out of your league does do squat for your ego: it keeps it intact. That’s what causes people unnecessarily to need a pat on the back.

Comment by joe rorke —

In your case, not mine.

Joe, I guess I’m just a girly man. I have fought a lot of battles alone and I don’t LIKE it. A lot of times I need moral support and I have learned to ASK for it.

You never need a pat on the back.

I do.