Instant Gradification & War

It may be that the greatest fault in the USA and what is left of Western Civilization is the drive for each persons instant gratification of desires. There is an ever decreasing number of persons who are willing to take the “long view”, putting off pleasures until they can be maximized as the least risk to self and to the “common good” (The last a term which seems to have gone out of use and usage).

This unsettling aspect of our society first came to my attention as a common characteristic of the criminals and criminal thinkers I met during my 30-plus years of professional work in a State Department of Corrections. In fact, the desire for instant self-gratification was once almost a defining characteristic between “common” criminals and either law abiding citizens or more sophisticated criminals. HOWEVER, I began to notice the spread of this self-defeating attitude to others---Noting first that weakness in the American stockholder of corporations who became more-and-more unwilling to look beyond the last or current financial-quarter's earnings and consider the possibility of growing companies by short term losses in exchange for long term gains. This attitude has spread to the world of news reporting where “breaking news” is more important than gathering all available facts and looking for the deeper meaning of such. This is specially noticeable as to the reporting done on medicine and science where every new research report, even if it can not be determined to be “reliable (By some independent repetition of it) and valid (As having real meaning and application to the scientific problem or question addressed)”OR is considered “politically correct” or, to some politician, “politically useful pork”.

This growing need for instant or short-term gratification is of great importance as we consider the war-against-terrorism—Especially that part being waged in Iraq!

As an alternative view I offer Winston Churchill's “blood, toil, tears and sweat” plan for the defeat of Nazi terrorism and the long term and great sacrifices made by America's “greatest generation” against those Nazis, Imperial Japan and foolish Italy.

Had today's attitude, for short term satisfactions, been in place in the years 1939-1945 our world would be one of gas chambers, “comfort women” for imperial troops and the other horrors of that age. If that attitude had prevailed during the “Cold War” the USA would be, at best, an isolated island in a Marxist sea and at worst a land where the speaking of Russian or Chinese would be mandatory.

Today's Members of the Congress (Including at least one ex-Marine who has forgot why and how he fought) journalists and others, with a basically “common criminal mentality”, are all taking a short term view toward the war in Iraq. (My own, more radical, position is that they are taking a very, very, short term view as to a 1500-year old war with Islam OR, at the least, that large proportion of Muslims who strictly hold to the teaching of Mohammed that there is a perpetual state-of-war between Muslims and all others who have not “submitted” to Islam.)

Certainly we cannot win any short term war in Iraq OR a longer war against the more generalized terrorism of our age OR (Again, in my more radical position) any successes in the 1500-year long war with Imperial Islam by any hedonistic attitudes for immediate gratification-of-desires. To win we must be able (As rational, strategic and balanced thinking beings) to invest “blood, sweat, toil and tears” to preserve our “common good” (And must bring that term back into use and effect), personal security and national safety.

A Soldier On Freedom & Sacrifice

Ends Justifying The Means

To anyone who ever had the gall to doubt your own country….or freedom.

Sure Fire says,

Mom,

Be my voice. I want this message heard. It is mine and my platoon’s to the country. A man I know lost his legs the other night. He is in another company in our batallion. I can no longer be silent after watching the sacrifices made by Iraqis and Americans everyday.Send it to a congressman if you have to. Send it to FOX news if you have to. Let this message be heard please…

My fellow Americans, I have a task for those with the courage and fortitude to take it. I have a message that needs not fall on deaf ears. A vision the blind need to see. I am not a political man nor one with great wisdom. I am just a soldier who finds himself helping rebuild a country that he helped liberate a couple years ago.
I have watched on television how the American public questions why their mothers, fathers, brothers, and sisters are fighting and dying in a country 9000 miles away from their own soil. Take the word of a soldier, for that is all I am, that our cause is a noble one. The reason we are here is one worth fighting for. A cause that has been the most costly and sought after cause in our small span of existence on our little planet. Bought in blood and paid for by those brave enough to give the ultimate sacrifice to obtain it. A right that is given to every man, woman, and child I believe by God. I am talking of freedom.

Freedom. One word but yet countless words could never capture it’s true meaning or power. “For those who have fought for it, freedom has a taste the protected will never know.” I read that once and it couldn’t be more true. It’s not the average American’s fault that he or she is “blind and deaf” to the taste of freedom. Most American’s are born into their God given right so it is all they ever know. I was once one of them. I would even dare to say that it isn’t surprising that they take for granted what they have had all their life. My experiences in the military however opened my eyes to the truth.

Ironically you will find the biggest outcries of opposition to our cause from those who have had no military experience and haven’t had to fight for freedom. I challenge all of those who are daring enough to question such a noble cause to come here for just a month and see it first hand. I have a feeling that many voices would be silenced.

I watched Cindy Sheehan sit on the President’s lawn and say that America isn’t worth dying for. Later she corrected herself and said Iraq isn’t worth dying for. She badmouthed all that her son had fought and died for. I bet he is rolling over in his grave.

Ladies and gentleman I ask you this. What if you lived in a country that wasn’t free? What if someone told you when you could have heat, electricity, and water? What if you had no sewage systems so human waste flowed into the streets? What if someone would kill you for bad-mouthing your government? What if you weren’t allowed to watch TV, connect to the internet, or have cell phones unless under extreme censorship? What if you couldn’t put shoes on your child’s feet?

You need not to have a great understanding of the world but rather common sense to realize that it is our duty as HUMAN BEINGS to free the oppressed. If you lived that way would you not want someone to help you????

The Iraqi’s pour into the streets to wave at us and when we liberated the cities during the war they gathered in the thousands to cheer, hug and kiss us. It was what the soldier’s in WW2 experienced, yet no one questioned their cause!! Saddam was no better than Hitler! He tortured and killed thousands of innocent people. We are heroes over here, yet American’s badmouth our President for having us here.

Every police station here has a dozen or more memorials for officers that were murdered trying to ensure that their people live free. These are husbands, fathers, and sons killed every day. What if it were your country? What would your choice be? Everything we fight for is worth the blood that may be shed. The media never reports the true HEROISM I witness everyday in the Iraqi’s. Yes there are bad one’s here, but I assure you they are a minuscule percent. Yet they are a number big enough to cause worry in this country’s future.
I have watched brave souls give their all and lose thier lives and limbs for this cause. I will no longer stand silent and let the “deaf and blind” be the only voice shouting. Stonewall Jackson once said, “All that I have, all that I am is at the service of the country.” For these brave souls who gave the ultimate sacrifice, including your son Cindy Sheehan, I will shout till I can no longer. These men and women are heroes. Their spirit lives on in their military and they will never be forgotten. They did not die in vain but rather for a cause that is larger than all of us.

My fellow countrymen and women, we are not overseas for our country alone but also another. We are here to spread democracy and freedom to those who KNOW the true taste of it because they fight for it everyday. You can see the desire in their eyes and I am honored to fight alongside them as an Infantryman in the 101st Airborne.

Freedom is not free, but yet it is everyone’s right to have. Ironic isn’t it? That is why we are here. Though you will always have the skeptics, I know that most of our military will agree with this message. Please, at the request of this soldier spread this message to all you know. We are in Operation Iraqi Freedom and that is our goal. It is a cause that I and thousands of others stand ready to pay the ultimate sacrifice for because, Cindy Sheehan, freedom is worth dying for, no matter what country it is! And after the world is free only then can we hope to have peace.

SGT Walter J. Rausch and 1st Platoon
101st Airborne Division (Air Assault)

NO Islamic-Other "Clash Of Civilizations"

There is NO “Class Of Civilizations” between the West and Islam for the very simple reason that “Islam” is not a civilization nor is it civilized. Some maintain that Islam had its own “golden” age. If so, it was built on the foundations of Indian, Egyptian, Greek and the pre-Islamic Middle-Eastern thoughts and accomplishment---An as such as did flourish was destroyed by those who insisted on a return to Mohammed's teachings as based on war, murder, rape, genocide, robbery and all of the other horrid practices taught by that desert bandit, liar and sexual predator.

Although all real civilizations (Please see below) have had their times-of-horrors (eg The “religious” wars of the 1600s, the thuggee in India and Mao's abuse of the Chinese People), only Islam declares the practice of evil as an unalterable article-of-Faith, claiming such teachings to be the word of God (ie Allah).

What are the lasting and true civilizations of this world? They appear, by many proofs, to be that of the West, of China and, perhaps, of India. These are the root sources of retaining old knowledges and of creating new knowledge. These are the sources of art, music, science, non-theological political theory and experiments and other like, creative, gifts of the human mind and spirit.

Since I know the West best, it is easy to point our the basis of its civilization in the thoughts of the Jews, classical Greeks, the Christian founders of the West's universities (The first and only true model for that force-of-thought, with their very Christian philosophies) and the practical borrowings from outside of Europe. The languages of the West, from the exactness of Greek and German to the poetry of Iberian languages to the incredible flexibility of English have all contributed to the success of the West as an economic, military and exploring (Lands AND ideas) culture and civilization.

China's intellectual, artistic and, for a short time, technological creativity are all based on the family-as-the-basic-unit concept so much emphasized by Confucius---And, only slightly modified by the potential compassion and “right thinking/actions” of Buddhism, the mysticism of Taoism and the materialism of Mao (After Marx). The Chinese languages seem to lend themselves, in a special way, to the study of Physics and related arts and sciences. Certainly, the Chinese have given us some of the greatest art and crafts in human history and have, in recent years, integrated their rich musical history with that of the West.

I know far less about India and its culture(s?). However, the rich music, art, philosophies and other gifts of that sub-continent are well known to most.

The West, China and India are all true civilizations. They may compete economically or in other manners; But, they do NOT clash.

Islam has only taken (Too often by force) from others, creates nothing but hate and cannot be considered a civilization—Clashing or otherwise competing with real civilizations.

Rebalencing Law & Attorney Power

I think it well past the time to rebalence the now too great authority of attorneys in the USA and the “Several States”. If you consider that lawyers (Reasonably) control the Courts, are most of the Members of the Congress and Legislatures and, too often, the heads of Administrative agencies you begin to see the impact of only one, self-interested and self-protecting (When did you last hear of an attorney having his/her license revoked rather than merely suspended?) sub-group of Americans upon the rest of us and the Common Good (A term and concept largely forgotten in this self-centered, “individual rights are everything” society).

If you add to this the fact that there are too many judges “making law from the bench”, often in direct opposition to the legislatively expressed will of the People AND the like mis-use of “administrative tricks” by lawyer-dominated/abused administrative agencies, you begin to “get the idea” that attorneys have seized control of this land---And, often not in a manner for, again that term-and-concept, “the common good”.

The horridly over-large fees paid to lawyers (Sometimes even when they claim to be doing free, pro bono, work) is a tax on all of us never approved by our elected representatives, but enforced by the “old boys club” of bar associations and the (Lawyer dominated) three branches of government.

Well then---What should be done to return the basic power of the government to the
non-attorney citizens?

My first and very radical proposal is that, after the year 2050 and by Federal and State Constitutional Amendment, that no attorney should be allowed to be a member of the Congress or the States' Legislatures AND that any attorney who wishes to sit in such a body must first give up his/her law license and post bond in the sum of $10,000,000 that s/he will never again practice law or work for a law firm.

In addition, every state should required that any attorney found guilty of certain crimes (Any felony, any assaultive crime and any theft or misuse of a client's property) shall have his/her law license permanently revoked and that such a law should make any para-legal work done by such a person a felony.

I will not “hold my breath” to see such laws or constitutional provisions in place OR even seriously considered. Well---I can hope.

Lessons From The Past . . .

As Americans we began to pay the PRICE of blood and self-sacrifice in 1776 at Concord and Lexington. Small payments were made, in spreading this nation (Which now has more Native Americans than in 1776) from coast to coast up to 1860 when many (Mostly White) Americans paid to define the unity of this nation as, for better or worse, The United States rather than These United States and, as a perhaps unintended result, the freedom of many slaves from White, Native American and Black slave holders.

In 1898 the USA began to “mount the tiger” of world leadership through our low blood investment in defeating Spain and taking over, at least for awhile, Cuba, Puerto Rico, The Philippines and many other smaller islands. World War I began the true role, if not intended as such, of the USA as a world leader and power and, thereby, the payment of a considerable PRICE in the pain, bleeding, gas-rotted lungs and death of our troops.

Of course, the greatest PRICE was paid by this land's “greatest generation” during what we call World War II and some view as a continuation of the 1914-1918 war. How many Americans were killed in combat or training or civilian and military support operations? I doubt that, even today, the exact number of deaths, physical-and-emotional maiming and other injuries are known. We do know that the blood-and-suffering had some and very positive results, TO WIT:

1. The truly anti-civilization forces of Imperial Japan, Nazi Germany and foolish
   Italy were stopped from their genocidal and enslaving programs;
   Many women were saved from being “comfort women” in Japanese military
   brothels and others humans saved from being treated as trash and burnt up in
   German ovens;

2. The boundaries between the freed nations and Soviet aggression were set, sometimes by physical walls built by the USSR or its slaves—Thus, allowing for the eventual destruction of that horrid regime; And, most of all,

3. Our military began the path towards its present, knight like, professional
   capabilities.

The Korean War PRICE paid was frustrating as our best generals (And I do NOT mean Douglas MacArthur) were not allowed to use the full force of our weapons. But, this war began our instruction in the importance of military technology (Which has “paid off” in many civilian and life-saving applications).

The Viet Nam War taught us the essential wrongness of political micro-management of military operations and the need to “win the People”--Both in the USA and where we are fighting. Of course, committed communists and dedicated followers of Mohammed (Especially the more aggressive Sunni fanatics and all followers of the Wahabi school of Islam) are well beyond reason and the only solution to those people is to “put them out of action” and “liquidate” them as quickly as possible.

The “cold war”, of which I was a part as I served in the US Navy form 1956 to 1959, was won by maintaining our guard against foreign enemies, demonstrating the essential inefficiencies, technological backwardness and economic wrongness of all “socialist states”. If you think no PRICE was paid during the “cold war”, you are ignorant of the facts. (eg During my two years of sea duty on an aircraft carrier, over 20 lives were lost to aviation mishaps or other accidents. Deaths by murders committed by North Korean troops against our troops and that of our allies should be better known.)

The first Iraq war should have taught us the old lesson that compromise with evil is a defeat. It was with Hitler and was there by not finishing off the genocidal government of Saddam Husein when we could---And, be dammed to the limp-wristed twits in the UN and our State Department.

The first phase of the second Iraq war clearly demonstrated the technological and moral supremacy of the forces of the USA and its allies. We are still attempting to learn how to fight the war of ideas and that against the fanatics of Islam.

Since the Spanish-American War of 1898 the USA has not asked for any more land than was necessary to bury our honored dead. We have given to our time-to-time enemies wealth, the services of our citizens and our good will to the extent that we may have all but economically destroyed ourselves in our ongoing efforts to be the most charitable and civilized of nations. Those of our troops who do not behave in a truly knightly manner are punished for their offenses. Our people do not “dance in the streets” when our foes are killed as did so many Muslims upon hearing the dreadful news of “9/11”.

We are still paying the PRICE to maintain civilization in lands where it existed and where, as in Iraq, where it did not exist---At least for the centuries since the hate-filled ideology of Mohammed has been in place.

. . . And For The Future

We must remember that being a world power and leader requires the ongoing payment of the PRICE. The people of this time are not responsible for the USA “mounting the tiger” of world leadership; But, are finding it impossible to be in any other position and would not wish to be an inferior nation unable to project power (See below) against all who would destroy us and our defense of what is left of Western civilization.

We have must remember that it is far better to have our enemies concentrated, where we can “neutralize” them, far away (Such as in Iraq and Afghanistan) rather than in our homeland---A strategic and tactical situation made possible only by our technological advantages, military power and our willingness to pay the PRICE for a trained, experienced, knightly and effective military---The PRICE being paid by actual combat, assassinations bu Muslim fanatics OR the sometimes deadly risks of realistic military training..

We must remember that there is such a principle as the common good and that there is a difference between good-and-evil, two ideas which the secular humanists and other opponents of civilization would have us forget.

We must remember that compromises with evil are, in themselves, wrong and, as to geopolitics, eventually lead to the payment of a greater PRICE than otherwise (eg With Hitler at Munich)..

On All Saints Day---The Armed Saints

At tonight's All Saints' Day mass my pastor gave a homily in which the great saints of old were mentioned and the great numbers of such Holy Ones marching forward through time was presented to the people.

In my mind's eye, I found myself seeing many columns of God's saints marching behind their special patrons: All the brown-robed Franciscans and those of that persuasion behind St. Francis of Assisi and St. Claire of that same town; Dominicans and many saintly scholars behind St. Dominic, St. Thomas of Aquino and St. Albert the Great; Those attorneys who, somehow, have become saints behind St. Thomas More; All good pastors (Including our beloved John Paul II) behind his countryman St. John Kanty; And, so forth---Each behind her or his leader in the march to glory.

As for myself, I hope to someday (If that term has any meaning in eternity) take my very, very, humble place behind St. Bernard of Clairvaux (Doctor of the Church and author of De Laude Novae Militae). My view of his column of saints puts the Knights of The Temple (Knights Templar), with their swords used and bloody wounds suffered in the defense of the Holy Land against the followers of that false prophet Mohammed, first behind him. Following them are such as: The Spanish Crusaders who drove those Muslims out of Iberia; King Jan of Poland and all the Poles who suffered, died and yet were victorious at the gates of Vienna and many other places against the Muslim-Turkish hords; Don Juan of Austria and all of the brave seamen who sent the Turkish fleet to the deeps in defense of Christianity and true Civilization; And, the true Crusaders of today who battle the false, Muslim, prophet Osama bin Laden and his ilk throughout the world.

We should not forget the other false prophets such as the Imperial aggressors of World War I, Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan & Italy of World War II and the atheist communist and very false leaders, Lenin, Stalin Pol Pot, Mao and all of that evil lot against whom many stood guard and many more suffered and died. In defense of my nation, Christianity and Civilization I served for three years in the US Navy, my only claim to be a follower of St. Bernard and his holy troops---Among which are those who suffered and died at such places as Flanders' fields, the Bataan Death March, Normandy's beaches and hedgerows, upon and under the the too-hot and too-cold mountains of Korea, the jungles of Viet Nam and all the other places where evil is confronted, by true knights, throughout history and the world.

TO THOSE WHO MAINTIAIN THAT THERE ARE NOT JUST WARS AND THAT THE BATTLES FOUGHT, EVEN TODAY. AGAINST THE FOLLOWS OF SUCH FALSE PROPHETS AS MOHAMMED AND OSAMA BIN LADEN WILL BE UNLIKELY TO BE AMONG THE FOLLOWER OF ST. BERNARD ON THE ROAD TO GLORY.