Major Mike’s Musings

There has been a flurry of talk radio comments, blog posts, and news discussions regarding the practice of waterboarding for the purpose of gaining information from captured terrorists. Many say that this is a horrible torture that should be banned by any nation that claims to be humane and decent.

Folks, waterboarding is no big deal. U.S. military students going through Survival, Escape, Resistance, and Evation (SERE) School are routinely waterboarded. I was waterboarded during my prison camp training and, believe me, though it’s scarry, it’s not dangerous.

The practice is to place a person “upside-down” on a board that’s inclined about 20-30 degrees from horizontal. Then a wet cloth, in my case, my tee shirt, is stretched over the subject’s face. Then water is poured onto the cloth. The subject can still breathe, but the subject’s mind fools the subject into thinking that he’s drowning. Thinking you are drowning makes it scary; breathing makes it not dangerous.

I wouldn’t volunteer to do it again, but I wouldn’t withhold the practice just because it seems scary or because some incorrectly claim it’s inhumane. I say prevent the next attack on the U.S. homeland.

“Not all chemicals are bad. Without hydrogen or oxygen, for example, there would be no way to make water, a vital ingredient in beer.”

Day before yesterday, Barnes & Noble opened a big store in The Villages.

From the comic strip “Crankshaft” by Tom Batiuk and Chuck Ayers (10/25/06):

Barber: When you watch the political dealings in Washington…sometimes you just have to laugh.

Crankshaft: You’re right… Politics is too important to be taken seriously.

Last week Grey’s Anatomy topped C.S.I. as the most watched show on television. I must say that one of those viewers is not me. I quit watching in the middle of last season when I concluded that the only purpose of the show was to unrestrained sexual behavior as many times as possible in each hour of programming.¹

I watched one partial episode this year and found nothing had changed.

I can’t help but wonder whether the show reflects our culture or is trying to influence our culture. I think a little of both.

It reflects our culture in that it no longer seems to be a big deal for couples to engage in copious amounts of meaningless sex. Grey’s, of course, is not alone, just the most excessive, at least of the programs I’ve seen.

It influences our culture, too, along with a host of other TV programs and movies and novels. Here is a very unlikely situation often depicted: Man and Woman meet at a party (bar, cafe, church, you name it). They have a good time. Man sees Woman home. They pause at Woman’s door, each with an air of uncertainty. “Should we kiss or not?” Cautiously, almost adolescently, they approach each other, gazing in each others’ eyes. Their lips somehow finally meet… Immediately they begin ripping each others’ clothes off and the next thing you know they’re waking up after a night of “sensational,” unrestrained sex. When does that ever happen? Maybe I’m sheltered.

What’s the deal? This seems so wrong on so many levels.

1. I don’t know why it took me that long to wake up: The pilot opened with a post-coital repartee. [↩]

Mark, Laura, and Olivia Waltz

Yesterday we had a great day. Turns out our good friends from way, way, back, Mark Waltz, Pastor of Connections at Granger Community Church and his lovely and lively bride, Laura, were on a roat trip for Wired Churches. One of their stops was to Church @ The Springs in Ocala, FL, just 18 miles north of us.

We met for lunch and coffee and catching up. When I say, “good friends,” I really mean it. For 20 years we’ve had a connection that’s rare. Though after the first few years of our friendship, we have lived hundreds of miles from each other, every time we meet, it seems like we’ve been neighbors all along. So when we found out that Mark and Laura were going to be nearby, we knew we’d have to do whatever it took to see them. Fortunately, they had a four hour break in their schedule.

The visit could only have been improved by the presence of their beautiful, funny, and personable daughter, Olivia, who remained at home in Indiana. We missed you Liv. We love you Mark and Laura.

One of the characters in Law and Order (I think it was) said this: “He treated me like a mope with a muck stick.”

Made me laugh.

So how do we keep politicians from running the country?

Just a followup on my previous post on the same subject. Here is a quote from the Key Judgments of the National Intellingence Estimate. The bold and underline emphases are mine.

We assess that the Iraq jihad is shaping a new generation of terrorist leaders and operatives; perceived jihadist success there would inspire more fighters to continue the struggle elsewhere.

• The Iraq conflict has become the “cause celebre” for jihadists, breeding a deep resentment of US involvement in the Muslim world and cultivating supporters for the global jihadist movement. Should jihadists leaving Iraq perceive themselves, and be perceived, to have failed, we judge fewer fighters will be inspired to carry on the fight.

Those who claimed “Spy Agencies Say Iraq War Worsens Terrorism Threat” (New York Times) and “Spy Agencies Say Iraq War Hurting U.S. Terror Fight” (Washington Post) by citing selected sentences from the classified document (portions of which are now unclassified) just got it wrong. That was not the assessment at all.

One also has to wonder why, when both Republicans and Democrats in congress had this report since April, the “selected sentences” were leaked in late September. Is there an election coming?

Can one also ask why the full quote didn’t appear on the front pages or lead stories of the mainstream media like the excerpt did? Hmmm?