tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-31246093.post1487163368332347441..comments2024-03-28T12:29:39.157-07:00Comments on Graphic Firing Table: Buzz cuts, longhairs, and the bouffant puffFDChiefhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10607785969510234092noreply@blogger.comBlogger14125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-31246093.post-51983242720470839192011-10-17T07:12:40.939-07:002011-10-17T07:12:40.939-07:00Dear Chief,
Re. Habitat, it depends upon the buil...Dear Chief,<br /><br />Re. Habitat, it depends upon the build. If a future homeowner is having a full construction, then yes, they put in sweat equity. In our case, it was simply home repair of an already existing structure.<br /><br />...per your verse, very much so:) {eliciting a sigh, and a sly smile}.<br /><br />Per the middling state, yes, we seem to be fast approaching a nosedive from which we will not achieve altitude, again. The bifurcation of society was foreseen a few decades ago, and the dismal disenfranchisement is here. In the place of revolution will be fighting amongst one's group.<br /><br />In my neighborhood (not a bad one), we've had two car burglaries and a stolen vehicle in one week. These are new behaviors.Lisahttp://www.rangeragainstwar.blogspot.comnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-31246093.post-35264905358599199832011-10-17T05:41:03.457-07:002011-10-17T05:41:03.457-07:00Dear Chief,
Re. Habitat, it depends upon the buil...Dear Chief,<br /><br />Re. Habitat, it depends upon the build. If a future homeowner is having a full consrtuction, then yes, they put in sweat equity. In our case, it was simply home repair of an already existing structure.<br /><br />...per your verse, very much so:) {eliciting a sigh, and a sly smile}.<br /><br />Per the middling state, yes, we seem to be fast approaching a nosedive from which we will not achieve altitude, again. The bifurcation of society was forseen a few decades ago, and the dismal disenfranchisement is here. In the place of revolution will be fighting amongst one's group.<br /><br />In my neighborhood (not a bad one), we've had two car burglaries and a stolen vehicle in one week. These are new behaviors.Lisahttp://www.rangeragainstwar.blogspot.comnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-31246093.post-82591188490387745152011-10-16T20:15:16.629-07:002011-10-16T20:15:16.629-07:00"I really do think something's gotta give...<i>"I really do think something's gotta give, lest we flow into a middling mucky state."</i><br /><br />I'd opine that we're ALREADY in that "middling mucky state", our treasury depleted, our honor lost, our national character a sorry mess of ambition, distraction, uglification, and derision. We have willingly given our nation to the malefactors of great wealth and now wonder why we are in such a sorry state, begging for largesse from the Great and Powerful Oz - whose charlatanism, greed, and foolishness are not hidden behind the threadbarest of curtains - while being content to receive his boot in our face instead and snivel our gratitude for his contempt.<br /><br />While we've never been the nation of proud yeomen and mechanics that the Founders imagined, we're well on our way to becoming the nation of milling serfs at the bottom and idle rich at the top that nearly exploded at the turn of the 20th Century. So I fear not so much the mucky middle as the murky bottom, the America of the 99%, and the alternatives of violent revolution or dismal disenfranchisement.FDChiefhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10607785969510234092noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-31246093.post-23551012530175699892011-10-16T20:08:22.903-07:002011-10-16T20:08:22.903-07:00Lisa: I guess I'm a little shocked - I thought...Lisa: I guess I'm a little shocked - I thought that Habitat REQUIRED the future homeowners to pitch in. I think if I was out hammering siding or stapling shingles in the 100-degree heat while the layabouts were inside watching "Dancing With The Stars" I'd be tempted to use the nailgun on their effing skulls...<br /><br />And my dear, you wouldn't need a latte...or black garters. A book or poems underneath a bough...and your dark hair shining above your shining eyes.<br /><br /><i>"Love is too young to know what conscience is, <br /> Yet who knows not conscience is born of love?<br /> Then gentle cheater urge not my amiss,<br /> Lest guilty of my faults thy sweet self prove.<br /> For thou betraying me, I do betray<br /> My nobler part to my gross body's treason,<br /> My soul doth tell my body that he may,<br /> Triumph in love, flesh stays no farther reason,<br /> But rising at thy name doth point out thee,<br /> As his triumphant prize, proud of this pride,<br /> He is contented thy poor drudge to be,<br /> To stand in thy affairs, fall by thy side.<br /> No want of conscience hold it that I call,<br /> Her love, for whose dear love I rise and fall."</i><br /><br />Placetne, magistra?FDChiefhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10607785969510234092noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-31246093.post-74686418690113702462011-10-15T22:43:54.477-07:002011-10-15T22:43:54.477-07:00Chief,
Alright Mr. Tiger Island, how about I just...Chief,<br /><br />Alright Mr. Tiger Island, how about I just seduce you over a latte with my effervescent wit ;)<br /><br />I think this is a profound observation, and have a few thoughts on the topic I may develop: <br /><br /><i>"But now I think it's gotten to the point that we will either have to FORCE ourselves to re-integrate...or we're going to DISintegrate"</i><br /><br />Of course, AEL will think it's all whips and black garters, but I really do think something's gotta give, lest we flow into a middling mucky state.Lisahttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08839236994990699117noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-31246093.post-25053578351570676902011-10-15T22:37:15.162-07:002011-10-15T22:37:15.162-07:00Ael,
Please! This is not an etiquette or moral t...Ael,<br /><br />Please! This is not an etiquette or moral trial; it is a question of fairness and democracy. It is also a question of national need. With a crumbling infrastructure and a dearth of jobs, why not national service? It worked once, and well.<br /><br />If you look at university today, <b>volunteerism is all but compulsory</b>, not only for admission but as a graduation requirement. Call it socialism, call it slavery -- it's here in the finest academic institutions in the good ole USA.<br /><br />Do you object to your offspring doing weekend duty with the unwashed in Habitat for Humanity? Then why begrudge the training when it goes the other way? <br /><br />On a personal level, having participated in a Habitat build, I can say it was rather peculiar to have the folks whose house we were patching sit inside watching t.v. Sweat equity in your own home is not slavery. Two years of national service remunerated in some fashion is not slavery.Lisahttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08839236994990699117noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-31246093.post-4285321710673595562011-10-15T09:53:08.586-07:002011-10-15T09:53:08.586-07:00basil: When I think back to my own young-adulthood...basil: When I think back to my own young-adulthood I'm sorry that I wasn't required to put in some sort of 2-year "service" requirement. I don't know if I would have chosen the Army, though I think I would. But instead I went to college WAY too callow, spent the first two years dicking around and ended up with a C-average that hurt me badly when looking for work. I think if I'd have been more mature I would have done a lot better - my experience with grad school tends to suggest that I would.<br /><br />Again, I don't suggest this lightly; I tend to agree with Ael that forcing citizens to do things is evil with a small "e". But I think that since the 1950's a combination of social forces has fragmented American society to the point where we've all but lost the sense of community needed for ANY society. We've always tended to be a "dog-eat-dog" society - and the rich dogs have always eaten the poor dogs, and we have seldom bothered to do anything to moderate that. But now I think it's gotten to the point that we will either have to FORCE ourselves to re-integrate...or we're going to DISintegrate. And that's not going to be pretty, and it may be even worse, given the economic hard times we're going to face.<br /><br />Lisa: See? Told ya' I was Mister Sexytime of Tiger Island. Go ahead, I will do my Barbie Girl Dance if you stuff twenties in my cutoffs...<br /><br />And as noted above, nations sometimes have to do things against individual good to benefit the public weal.<br /><br />Ael: OK, I'm game. Tell me those "other ways", and why as a nation we've not just ignored them but actively evaded them. <br /><br />I'm watching my country become ever-more stratified by wealth and class. Even in the "People's Republic of Portland" we have an entire region of the city that is increasingly mired in under-education, under-employment, under-hope and under-everything...and the reaction of the middle- and upper-class has been to flee it and ignore it.<br /><br />As East Portland becomes ever-more dark-skinned, poor, inbred, neglected, and hopeless, our local elites sit happily in their enclaves like Laurelhurst and the West Hills. Even in the public schools their kids go to the plush Grant, Lincoln, and Wilson while the sad-sack East Portland kids get run-down Madison or the blackboard-jungles of Parkrose. The kids of the Southwest and Beaverton go to Reed or University of Portland while the kids from East County get shuffled into Portland Community College.<br /><br />Try and find an East Portlander in the City Club, at the Portland Development Commission. Look around the New Century Club and see if you can meet someone with a Lents zipcode. Or at the trustees at a Ducks game.<br /><br />The military draft was never as egalitarian as it could and should have been...but it was one of the few places where a kid from a "good family" could rub shoulders with a kid from the projects. They didn't have to like each other...and they often didn't...but at least they got to see that one wasn't a poof and the other wasn't a brute.<br /><br />Now? We're segregating back into a Gilded Age level of social division - almost a semi-feudal society, and show little or no interest in these "other ways" of returning to a more egalitarian level. That's BAD for a democracy, and I'd consider whips and chains a very modest proposal to reverse the trend.FDChiefhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10607785969510234092noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-31246093.post-41018274328394041282011-10-15T06:44:06.784-07:002011-10-15T06:44:06.784-07:00Boy, you folks sure resort to slavery awful quick....Boy, you folks sure resort to slavery awful quick.<br /><br />I volunteered for the army and I met a lot of different types of people. It improved me as a person in many different ways. However, that doesn't mean that I want to push my kids and their peers into involuntary servitude in the vague hope that it will improve them (and society in general).<br /><br />Might there be some other way to get people to meet others outside their own "class"? Lets try them before pulling out the whips and chains.Aelhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10788190394672505925noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-31246093.post-69774788528049407502011-10-14T19:46:22.275-07:002011-10-14T19:46:22.275-07:00[bad typos what made me delete ...]
Chief,
I do ...[bad typos what made me delete ...]<br /><br />Chief,<br /><br />I do agree with you about the inherent fairness of a draft. Not to be pro war, but as you say, the republic demands many things of us.<br /><br />In fact, in the service of preventing senseless wars, a draft would be most beneficial. I also agree with basil re. a compulsory, 2-yr. post-secondary national service. A broadening experience in the way that, say, a family trip to Saint-Tropez would not be. Also, would it not serve a national need?<br /><br />BTB, I think you look smashing :) Cutoffs were de rigueur in the 80's - 90's, and I have always loved wearing boots with shorts.Lisahttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08839236994990699117noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-31246093.post-49690548900824141242011-10-14T19:44:08.018-07:002011-10-14T19:44:08.018-07:00This comment has been removed by the author.Lisahttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08839236994990699117noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-31246093.post-73744678820625682982011-10-14T16:30:10.264-07:002011-10-14T16:30:10.264-07:00If I ran the country and what I said goes, I'd...If I ran the country and what I said goes, I'd have some sort of national service requirement for any type of post-secondary education. The pay-back would be some sort of federal or state funding for continuing education, or start-up $ for business or whatever. Military or service overseas, Peace Corps, Service to America, something where an individual could get to see how others in the country or world live, for a couple of years.<br /><br />Since he's smart, I agree with Jim about the "pro military".<br /><br />This country is too full of ignorance, so too the rest of the world, but they could follow our lead.<br /><br />bbAnonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-31246093.post-83088918047992035642011-10-13T06:06:35.156-07:002011-10-13T06:06:35.156-07:00Chief,
I'm apologetic-i didn't know that w...Chief,<br />I'm apologetic-i didn't know that was you in your glory daze.<br />jimrangeragainstwarhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02126542922536584950noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-31246093.post-3179649892780614412011-10-12T14:33:33.288-07:002011-10-12T14:33:33.288-07:00You like that look?
My wife calls that my "H...You like that look?<br /><br />My wife calls that my "Honduran queerbait" look. I was the hottest thing in Tegucigalpa.<br /><br />And no argument about the problems inherent in a professional military in a republic.FDChiefhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10607785969510234092noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-31246093.post-1532627009843044292011-10-12T05:49:00.083-07:002011-10-12T05:49:00.083-07:00Chief,
At my 40th college reunion it was just the ...Chief,<br />At my 40th college reunion it was just the opposite. All my non-ROTC classmates were drafted and did their duty. Only 1 of us didn't serve and he was a ROTC grad/finished the program but his heart was enlarged and ergo no service/call up.After all big hearts are not needed on AD.<br />At unit level i knew a lot of draftees and i liked them a lot. Everybody had a story and were just marching in place which is what Armies generally do.<br />I DO NOT FAVOR A PRO MILITARY, and even ROTC has become a lifer type organization with a separate cmd structure under TRADOC. The rotc cadets are lifers before they get into ms 3, and i've written on this at RAW.<br />Is the dude in the shorts and boots one of the village people?<br />jimrangeragainstwarhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02126542922536584950noreply@blogger.com