RE: [SLE] so OT it hurts...Merry Christmas!

From: William G. Westfall (wgwestfall1_at_hotpop.com)
Date: 12/24/03

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    To: Stephen Villano <steve@LWR.yi.org>
Date: Wed, 24 Dec 2003 01:56:35 -0700

    You didn't read it man... Your reply was in english not german!

    On Wed, 2003-12-24 at 00:11, Stephen Villano wrote:

    > I *REALLY* feel your pain. Especially around the ribs from the belly
    > laughs...
    > Been saying much of the same for years. Probably why I haven't been promoted
    > as I'm not "progressive". I come from a much older Army. The one that meets
    > the enemy and kills the hell out of them, thereby not having any more
    > enemies (or at least the few remaining are sufficiently frightened as to not
    > cause the nation any trouble).
    > That doesn't mean I want to go to war "at the drop of a hat", I'm a
    > professional. As such there must be sufficient reason to wish to break the
    > peace. I'll advise against an ill conceived military action. I will follow
    > orders, but any objection will be quite well documented...
    > Frankly, professional soldiers are the *LAST* people who wish to visit harm
    > against another human. However, once the necessity is present visit said
    > harm with vehemence.
    > I've shaken hands and tipped back a drink with an officer who some
    > years before was shooting at me as we are no longer dire enemies. We were
    > both professionals and acknowledged that past was past, we were both doing
    > our jobs for our respective nations.
    > Has our nation done wrong in the past? Will it do so again in the
    > future? How about a simpler question: Are we human?
    > We'll make mistakes. We made some MAJOR ones in the past, current events are
    > the direct result of some of them. I'm certain we'll make them in the
    > future, we haven't stopped being human.
    > The second biggest test is what we'll do about them in between to prevent
    > another disaster. The biggest test is what we'll do about them if we *CAN'T*
    > prevent another disaster.
    > I've found that you can tell a LOT more about a person NOT when things are
    > at their best, but indeed when things are at their absolute worst.
    > Now if only we could learn as a species to bring the best of ourselves
    > displayed during a disaster forward to our normal existence...
    >
    > Sorry for the long OT bit, just HAD to vent...
    >
    > Closer to topic: 9.0 is the best thing to come out since they put handles on
    > popsicles.
    > I am a bit confused though if the sparc platform is available in a current
    > version...
    >
    > Gonna try playing with the 2.6 kernel as soon as I can shoehorn in some time
    > on my calendar...
    >
    > Happy holidays to all, for those who don't observe our holidays: Have a
    > pleasant, peaceful and prosperous year.
    > And to those few who can't even observe the latter: Welcome to my world...
    > ;)
    >
    > -----Original Message-----
    > From: William G. Westfall [mailto:wgwestfall1@hotpop.com]
    > Sent: Wednesday, December 24, 2003 1:42 AM
    > To: suse-linux-e@lists.suse.com
    > Subject: [SLE] so OT it hurts...Merry Christmas!
    >
    >
    > General speaks out
    >
    > Merry Christmas;
    >
    > I thought that you might enjoy quoting General Hawley over the holidays.
    > This four-star says it pretty well.
    >
    >
    > For those who don't know General Hawley, he's a newly retired USAF
    > 4-star general. He commanded the USAF Air Combat Command [our front-line
    > fighters and bombers]. The Command headquarters is at Langley AFB, VA.
    > General Hawley is now retired and no longer required to be politically
    > correct. His short speech is very much to the point. The following are
    > excerpts:
    >
    >
    > "Since the attack [9-11], I have seen, heard, and read thoughts of such
    > surpassing stupidity that they must be addressed. You've heard them too.
    >
    > "Here they are:
    >
    > 1) "We're not good, they're not evil, everything is relative." Listen
    > carefully: We're good, they're evil, nothing is relative. Say it with me
    > now and free yourselves. You see, folks, saying "We're good" doesn't
    > mean, "We're perfect." Okay? The only perfect being is the bearded guy
    > on the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel. The plain fact is that our country
    > has, with all our mistakes and blunders, always been and always will be
    > the greatest beacon of freedom, charity, opportunity, and affection in
    > history. If you need proof, open all the borders on Earth and see what
    > happens.
    >
    > 2) "Violence only leads to more violence." This one is so stupid you
    > usually have to be the president of an Ivy League university to say it.
    > Here's the truth, which you know in your heads and hearts already:
    > Ineffective, unfocused violence leads to more violence. Limp, panicky,
    > half-measures lead to more violence. However, complete, fully
    > thought-through, professional, well-executed violence never leads to
    > more violence because, you see, afterwards, the other guys are all dead.
    > That's right, dead. Not "on trial," not "re-educated," not "nurtured
    > back into the bosom of love." Dead. D-E --Well, you get the idea.
    >
    > 3) "The CIA and the rest of our intelligence community have failed us."
    > For 25 years we have chained our spies like dogs to a stake in the
    > ground, and now that the house has been robbed, we yell at them for not
    > protecting us. Starting in the late seventies, under Carter appointee
    > Stansfield Turner, the giant brains who get these giant ideas decided
    > that the best way to gather international intelligence was to use spy
    > satellites. "After all (they reasoned), you can see a license plate from
    > 200 miles away." This is very helpful if you've been attacked by a
    > license plate. Unfortunately, we were attacked by humans. Finding humans
    > is not possible with satellites. You have to use other humans. When we
    > bought all our satellites, we fired all our humans, and here's the
    > really stupid part. It takes years, decades to infiltrate new humans
    > into the worst places of the world. You can't just have a guy who looks
    > like Gary Busey in a Spring Break '93 sweatshirt plop himself down in a
    > coffee shop in Kabul and say "Hiya, boys. Gee, I sure would like to meet
    > that bin Laden fella. "Well, you can, but all you'd be doing is giving
    > the bad guys a story they'll be telling for years.
    >
    > 4) "These people are poor and helpless, and that's why they're angry at
    > us." Uh-huh, and Jeffrey Dahmer's frozen head collection was just a
    > desperate cry for help. The terrorists and their backers are richer than
    > Elton John and, ironically, a good deal less annoying. The poor helpless
    > people, you see, are the villagers they tortured and murdered to stay in
    > power. Mohammed Atta, one of the evil scumbags who steered those planes
    > into the killing grounds is the son of a Cairo surgeon. But you knew
    > this, too. In the sixties and seventies, all the pinheads marching
    > against the war were upper-middle-class college kids who grabbed any
    > cause they could think of to get out of their final papers and spend
    > more time drinking. It's the same today.
    >
    > 5) "Any profiling is racial profiling." Who's killing us here, the
    > Norwegians? Just days after the attack, the New York Times had an
    > article saying dozens of extended members of the gazillionaire bin Laden
    > family living in America were afraid of reprisals and left in a huff,
    > never to return to studying at Harvard and using too much Drakkar. I'm
    > crushed. Please come back. Let's all stop singing "We Are the World" for
    > a minute and think practically. I don't want to be sitting on the floor
    > in the back of a plane four seconds away from hitting Mt. Rushmore and
    > turn, grinning, to the guy next to me to say, "Well, at least we didn't
    > offend them."
    >
    > So here's what I resolve for the New Year: Never to forget our murdered
    > brothers and sisters. Never to let the relativists get away with their
    > immoral thinking. After all, no matter what your daughter's political
    > science professor says, we didn't start this. Have you seen that bumper
    > sticker that says, "No More Hiroshimas"? I wish I had one that says, "No
    > More Pearl Harbors."

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