MatthewMaynard.net

Dear President Ahmadinejad,

Yours of November 29th was received yesterday, and greeted with a dismayed concern not normally felt in these parts.

However much I appreciate the salutation, I believe you misunderstand the American character and reveal your misunderstanding in your word choice. “Noble” is not a word historically used to describe Americans, and is generally avoided as a courtesy to our belief that all men are created equal. Your attempt to appear magnanimous comes across as clumsy, in light of our aversion to inherited title.

Let me cut to the chase: I grow weary and frustrated by attempts by foreign interlopers to manipulate the American public against our government. Our government, quite unlike yours and many others around the world, including many muslim countries, is a government of consent, led by the people, for them, and of them, answerable to them. Your cheap attempts to divide us fall on deaf ears, and your tacit threats are less so than you might imagine.

You refer to the source of government authority on page 3 – “Legitimacy and influence [of a government] reside in sound logic, quest for justice and compassion and empathy for all humanity.” You are entirely wrong, sir. Government authority derives from a mandate from the masses, not from some farcical claim of a quest for justice, compassion, and empathy. Your argument might have more weight if your compassion extended to Jews as well – predicting they will be wiped off the face of the Earth is not conducive to your claim of legitimacy.

You ask, apparently expecting an answer, if there is a better way to govern than that of the Republicans. There is, no doubt. They could be more agressive in prosecuting the war against you and those you support by proxy. They could spend less on what government should not do and more on what it should. They could be less fearful of consequences and more concerned with doing the right thing vis a vis protecting us. But regardless, their effectiveness is not your concern. It is ours, and to my dying breath I will act to make sure it remains exclusively so.

Towards the end of your letter you write “It is possible to provide welfare and prosperity without tension, threats, imposition or war.” Again, sir, you misunderstand our culture and our government. Our Constitution delcares that it is the government’s job to “promote the general Welfare” – not provide it. Your temptation away from our Constitution is more than tasteless – it is offensive.

Let me refer to the words of one of the most famous residents of these parts, Thomas Jefferson. On his headstone he requested the words “… Author … of the Statute of Virginia for religious freedom …”. I know Islam looks down upon memorials and markers to the dead, but it would be wise to read the words of my town’s most famous citizen:

“Well aware … that to compel a man to furnish contributions of money for the propagation of opinions which he disbelieves, is sinful and tyrannical … be it therefore enacted by the General Assembly .. that all men shall be free to profess, and by argument to maintain, their opinions in matters of religion, and that the same shall in nowise diminish, enlarge, or affect their civil capacities.”

Though it was written by a lawyer, it is easy to summarize, and indeed, translate, into another language:

With a hope for conveyed clarity, I remain,

a member of your most vehement opposition,
Matthew Scott Maynard
Charlottesville, VA
Attached: The Virginia Act For Establishing Religious Freedom

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The Virginia Act For Establishing Religious Freedom
Thomas Jefferson, 1786

Well aware that Almighty God hath created the mind free; that all attempts to influence it by temporal punishments or burdens, or by civil incapacitations, tend only to beget habits of hypocrisy and meanness, and are a departure from the plan of the Holy Author of our religion, who being Lord both of body and mind, yet chose not to propagate it by coercions on either, as was in his Almighty power to do; that the impious presumption of legislators and rulers, civil as well as ecclesiastical, who, being themselves but fallible and uninspired men, have assumed dominion over the faith of others, setting up their own opinions and modes of thinking as the only true and infallible, and as such endeavoring to impose them on others, hath established and maintained false religions over the greatest part of the world, and through all time; that to compel a man to furnish contributions of money for the propagation of opinions which he disbelieves, is sinful and tyrannical; that even the forcing him to support this or that teacher of his own religious persuasion, is depriving him of the comfortable liberty of giving his contributions to the particular pastor whose morals he would make his pattern, and whose powers he feels most persuasive to righteousness, and is withdrawing from the ministry those temporal rewards, which proceeding from an approbation of their personal conduct, are an additional incitement to earnest and unremitting labors for the instruction of mankind; that our civil rights have no dependence on our religious opinions, more than our opinions in physics or geometry; that, therefore, the proscribing any citizen as unworthy the public confidence by laying upon him an incapacity of being called to the offices of trust and emolument, unless he profess or renounce this or that religious opinion, is depriving him injuriously of those privileges and advantages to which in common with his fellow citizens he has a natural right; that it tends also to corrupt the principles of that very religion it is meant to encourage, by bribing, with a monopoly of worldly honors and emoluments, those who will externally profess and conform to it; that though indeed these are criminal who do not withstand such temptation, yet neither are those innocent who lay the bait in their way; that to suffer the civil magistrate to intrude his powers into the field of opinion and to restrain the profession or propagation of principles, on the supposition of their ill tendency, is a dangerous fallacy, which at once destroys all religious liberty, because he being of course judge of that tendency, will make his opinions the rule of judgment, and approve or condemn the sentiments of others only as they shall square with or differ from his own; that it is time enough for the rightful purposes of civil government, for its officers to interfere when principles break out into overt acts against peace and good order; and finally, that truth is great and will prevail if left to herself, that she is the proper and sufficient antagonist to error, and has nothing to fear from the conflict, unless by human interposition disarmed of her natural weapons, free argument and debate, errors ceasing to be dangerous when it is permitted freely to contradict them.

Be it therefore enacted by the General Assembly, That no man shall be compelled to frequent or support any religious worship, place, or ministry whatsoever, nor shall be enforced, restrained, molested, or burdened in his body or goods, nor shall otherwise suffer on account of his religious opinions or belief; but that all men shall be free to profess, and by argument to maintain, their opinions in matters of religion, and that the same shall in nowise diminish, enlarge, or affect their civil capacities.

And though we well know this Assembly, elected by the people for the ordinary purposes of legislation only, have no powers equal to our own and that therefore to declare this act irrevocable would be of no effect in law, yet we are free to declare, and do declare, that the rights hereby asserted are of the natural rights of mankind, and that if any act shall be hereafter passed to repeal the present or to narrow its operation, such act will be an infringement of natural right.

Now our money will start to have even more variation than it used to. Collectors will rejoice at the possibility of getting every. last. variation.

Too bad the Government’s drunken sailor routine is preventing it from having more value.

Ever read the Confederate Constitution? Now you can, and compare it to our own.

Ever so interesting what you can learn when you read something.

Happy birthday to me,
Happy birthday to me,
I’m. 30. years. old. today.
Happy birthday to me.

Given the current lack of cable in our household right now, TV options are rather thin. Two nights ago we watched a show (on PBS, of all channels) about the WW2 Dambuster raid. Most of it was about the engineering that went into the attack, so I found it fun and entertaining, but it gave a good overview of the mission as well.

Towards the end, there was an interesting comment (paraphrased, but they key part is italicized):

“Only 11 of the 19 bomber crews returned. Despite this, the raid was considered a success.”

The goal of the mission was to knock out electrical power to Germany’s industrial network, and the raid accomplished that. It killed approximately 1000 Germans, as well, destroying the support structure for Germany’s war plants in the region.

The interesting thing about the writer(s) is that he apparently thinks that success in war is measured by the amount of lives you don’t lose. This means, to his way of thinking, that an attempt to knock out a bridge that fails but returns the pilot to his base is a success, while an attempt that succeeds but results in the loss of the pilot is a failure. This argument starts from an ignorant perspective and proceeds into error quickly.

Military service is an inherently sacrificial thing. Someone who gives of their time, career, and sometimes life to it understands that losses are part of war. In a volunteer military, such as ours, service is of greater value than self, and the recruit emerges from basic training understanding and believing that if they are lost in the pursuit of a mission, their loss has meaning, because it was for something they value more than themselves.

But what happens when the mission is a failure and lives are lost?

At that point the pacifist, obsessed with counting lives and not results, quits, declares the whole thing a failure, and throws up the white flag. Realists are at least willing to give it another run or two. Fanatics are those who won’t change no matter the result or the loss. I would guess that we have more of the second than the first or third in this country, but given what I hear from some on the left I sometimes think that first group is in charge of things.

The real problem with the pacifist, though, is that they are all too willing to declare a result before an attempt is finished. On the dambuster raid the bomber’s alignment, speed, and altitude were critical. One of the bombers had to make ten passes before everything was right and they could release their bomb (all while being shot at rather vigorously). If a pacifist had been on board, they would have quit after the first pass failed to line up correctly on the target. In short, Pacifists prejudge a military situation because they have a preference against military situations. Once the fight is joined, they cannot be judged to evaluate it fairly, because their instinctive reaction will be for retreat. And so we come to Iraq.

In Iraq we have that almost-unique combination of factors we haven’t seen since Vietnam – a military that is triumphant on the ground, a press that hates the endeavour, an executive that seems unable to convey the need for success and our ability to deliver it, and a legislature that can’t seem to shake the need to investigate why we’re failing, without quite defining what failure or success looks like. And all the while the veterans are saying “we can win this, if you just let us do our job.”

So when do you say that a thing can’t be done? That is, to borrow an overused metaphor, when do you let your inner pessimist come out of the closet? After one year? Two? Five? How long did it take us to restore Germany and Japan after World War 2? The pessimistic pacifist would say the two situations aren’t comparable, that Germany and Japan were completely leveled by Allied bombing. But bombs aren’t the only thing that can destroy a country’s infrastructure, neglect over long periods can do just as effective a job.

Iraq is not a failure – yet. If we leave, it certainly will be, but if we stay, we can give justification to those who gave their last full measure. We need to be highly resolved that those dead shall not have died in vain. We need to deny our inner pessimistic pacifist, much like those honored dead denied themselves. Though theirs is the greater sacrifice, it will be a senseless one if we quit.

Once upon a time, the United States decided to implement regime change. The target was a small, economically insignificant region known for its backwards ways and remarkably low quality of life among its poor. It was run by an elite party, which oppressed the poor as a matter of routine.

The justification for this regime change attempt was that they posed a mortal threat to the existence of the United States, though this was disputed among the educated class in the New England states. Many who sympathized with the regime, despite its barbarism, called the President a monkey, idiot, and other less elegant insults.

The biggest trouble with the regime change war was that the casualties were horrible. It made the nation feel bad and made the President, as well as his generals, look incompetent and worse. And it was worse – not only did the casualties mount up, but for a very long time it looked like there was no progress, and instead, only regress. In one case, the same battle was fought twice on the same ground and the result was the same. The war began to stagnate, and the President needed victory, but couldn’t find it. He even changed his justification for the war in the middle of the fight, and lots of people started saying “hey, we didn’t support this war for that cause!” He made the claim that with the Army’s progress, freedom would come to the land. This riled many Democrats in Congress, and some began questioning their patriotism. There was even international pressure to end the war and bring the troops home, people saying nothing could be done in that region, and that they wouldn’t know what to do with democracy even if they had it.

With all this loss and failure, many began calling for the President to end his war, cut his losses, withdraw, and leave the region to its own ends. Yes, there were occasional successes, but generally speaking, no progress was made. In his obstinancy, the President refused. In fact, he stubbornly refused, putting his goals of staying the course and finishing the job above the pressures of public opinion. There were some that said that if he did cut and run, the US would only end up at war with them again, but they were few and grew fewer as the bodies came home. The President continued in his war, and the casualties continued to mount.

Eventually, we won the Civil War, but only because Lincoln, enabled by generals like Grant and Sherman (who ignored the casualties and realized it could be won if they just kept destroying the enemy), persisted in his quest for freedom and union.

Its amazing what 145 years will do to a country.

Click for 847kb, 2288×1712 pixel larger image.

I’m shocked! Shocked! To find nuclear enrichment going on in here!

Your bomb, sir.

Oh, thank you, very much. EVERYONE OUT AT ONCE!

Behold, a Phoenix may yet rise from the ashes of defeat. If JD Hayworth overcomes his 6000 vote deficit (and he may very well do so, with over 100,000 votes yet to be counted) the Democrats will still control Congress, but they will have lost one of their more important races. His was one of their more desired seats, and if Hayworth retains it, things will be all the better for the border. Border Security was (and is) Hayworth’s top issue. If he goes back to DC, it will be evidence that Conservatism really does trump Republicanism.

Go, JD, go. Oh, and if he does win, it will be the legal slugfest I was expecting had the Democrats lost the election overall. There will be a blizzard of lawsuits to shovel through, and an avalanche of recount demands.

Hey, I just went from one end of the metaphorical temperature extreme to the other in one post!

I feel like crap this weekend, due to an untimely stomach bug that I mistook for food poisoning. But that doesn’t mean I can’t thank the veterans in my life. Better late than never, this post was intended for Saturday, then Sunday. Oh well.

Philip Maynard, father, Air Force
Dan Estes, friend, Navy
Katie Estes, friend, Navy
Bridgette Estes, friend, Navy
Ron Weyenberg, uncle, Army
Clyde Russell, in-law, Navy

Thank you. You deserve the thanks and gratitude of the nation and those you helped liberate. You are not forgotten.