Lot's of different pics of this sign.

Lot's of different pics of this sign.
"I don't make hell for nobody. I'm only the instrument of a laughing providence. Sometimes I don't like it myself, but I couldn't help it if I was born smart."

1st Sgt. Milton Anthony Warden.
"From here to Eternity"

Paul Valery

"You are in love with intelligence, until it frightens you. For your ideas are terrifying and your hearts are faint. Your acts of pity and cruelty are absurd, committed with no calm, as if they were irresistible. Finally, you fear blood more and more. Blood and time."

The Wisdom of the Ages

"When a young man, I read somewhere the following: God the Almighty said, 'All that is too complex is unnecessary, and it is simple that is needed',"

Mikhail Kalashnikov
"Here lies the bravest soldier I've seen since my mirror got grease on it."

Zapp Brannigan

Saturday, July 21, 2012

I Weep for the Future

Over the past six years or so, there's been one garritrooper who has always put me in mind of this cartoon. 
Likewise, there have been many times that same fella, one George "Madogre" Hill has made me remember it fondly.
Well our boy, in a miracle of shitty timing (Not intentional. It's just that the next day, some yahoo shot up a theater in Colorado), wrote this missive: "Humans are a Violent Species".
Of course, there's no correlation nor am I trying to imply one. Just really, really bad timing.
George put his thinking-cap on and pondered humanity and violence.
What may best sum up his core thesis:

"The scriptures say someplace that the “Natural Man is an Enemy of God.”  Well, that’s unfortunate because Violence is in our Core Programming."

I don't know, the more I hear from Mormons, the more I think it's just Scientology with more birthdays.
I have no clue what scripture Georgie is referring to ("Reference is not a verb. Never has been) but I think it may have been this one:

I Corinthians, 2:14
"But the natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God: for they are foolishness unto him: neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned."

He could have just Googled. That's what I did. I didn't even have to bust out the Strong's Exhaustive which I could have done, easily since it's no longer merely adding three inches to the height of my monitor but is now on a shelf within arm's reach.
For the record, I have such latent Christer tendencies that I knew the verse already; I only Googled to get the citation.
Speaking of the Google, I ran dim-bulb's quote by it and, guess what?
It's a scripture as well (Using the term loosely)!
It's just that it's in the Mormon, Jesus-the-wild-west, "bible"; Mosiah 3:19.
He could have sounded more forceful and actually offered a source with minimal effort but then everyone would know his solid rationale came from the pretend bible.
Pretty weak, George but I digress.
In rationalizing his own, unfulfilled violent urges, he runs down the ways in which we humans have shown our predisposition toward head-thumpin' and the like.
Being who he is, most are references to pop-culture in its various forms along with some perceived desire to slow down when passing car crashes.
I slow down but only because there are cops, flares and flashing lights. Only a sick, juvenile twit looks for the gore.
Additionally, he cites the fact that we have canine teeth.
Yes we do. We have four of them, George.
But, being that they're mostly vestigial, they're often lumped together with incisors.
You want canines, look at a baboon.
Look at the skull of that same baboon and you'll see a cranial ridge and a large zygomatic arch.
The cranial ridge is where jaw-muscles anchor, the zygomatic arch is the tunnel they go through on their way to the jaw.
You probably can't fit two fingers through a human arch.
We have weak jaws, omnivore jaws, scavenger jaws. Minus the brain-power we'd have gone nowhere.
Then old George gets into more familiar territory; the inherent - and superior - violence of Americans.

"As a Nation, America is the best when it comes to violence.  Victors of World Wars.  We even had or own Civil War.  Other countries can be violent, sure.  Murderous and Genocidal… but they don’t compare to the level of Violence that America is capable of."

George... capitals are for proper nouns. You're fine with "America".
"Victors" I'll give you because it begins a sentence - which isn't a really sentence but we'll say that that was a decision based on style. I get it.
"Murderous" falls into that category as well but two, stylistic deviations from the norm - only a sentence apart - take a grammar course.
I know that you feel that "nation", "world wars", "genocidal" and "violence" are the important words in this paragraph but STOP FUCKING CAPITALIZING THEM.
Show their importance with context. It's what people who know how to write do.
Off the rails again.
Indeed, we numbered among the victors of those world wars but, especially in the first one, we showed up late and took way too much credit.


And George, are you suggesting that our little attempt to destroy our Union with our bloodiest war ever - fought over an issue that everyone knew was going to be settled eventually no matter what - is something we should be proud of?

"We're so bad-assed (How bad-assed are you?) that our costliest war in terms of death and mayhem... was with ourselves. We're THAT bad-assed!"

Okay, the boy's winding down.

"As a Nation we have a great deal of tension built up… muscles taunt and ready to throw a swing.  We are just waiting for that bell to ring."


But George... you never have "thrown a swing" unless you're counting grade-school where you pissed-off the custodian by wrapping the chains around the cross-arm.
To that last sentence: Whaddaya mean "We", white-man?
Okay, the dumbass is reaching his conclusion by now and it's really a solid wrap-up of his thinking.

"We’ve been at “Peace” for too long and these police actions in Afghanistan just isn’t doing it.  We need a real enemy that we can duke it out with.  We need the Germans to rise up again and get us going.  We need an adversary.   Someone to really fight."

Andy, if you're still coming here, what's your feeling on this sorry little "police action" you were involved in?
Wouldn't it have been better if it had been against a "real adversary"?


The Dénouement: George Hamilton Hill IV joined the Utah National Guard in 1988, served honorably and was discharged six years later.
Since my Guard service and his overlap (Me: 1984 - 1991), I know that, had he wanted, he could have gone to participate in Desert Storm. I know I could have and I was just a pissed-off, short-timer, supply-sergeant.
Not dissing him in the least because he didn't go. I wouldn't have. Fuck Kuwait. It ain't like they can't afford an army of their own.
But... beating the drum so that other schmucks, who are less protective of their asses along with other body parts than you were, should go out and fight a "real enemy"... Seriously?
George, start drinking. I mean it. 
Folks are a lot more willing to write-off such mind-numbing stupidity as this if you do.
Poser.

Video I watched last night through the miracle of NetFlix:
"Knuckle".
Offered without comment other than that George and his buddy Larry Correia ought to go look these guys up.
It's nothing but positives. They'll come home with headaches and some loose teeth but - they will have actually gone to another country.

Recommended reading:
"Why they Kill" by Richard Rhodes.
"On Killing" by Lt Col. David Grossman.
"Blood Rites" by my homegirl (Raised in Butte) Barbara Ehrenreich.

4 comments:

Andy said...

Dan, I can't believe how much effort you wasted on lonesome George. He works in a gunshop for crying out loud:-)

Dan brock said...

"Wasted?"
Do you mean to deprive me of one of the few joys of my increasing age?
And the shop he works in:
IS A REALLY BIG ONE!

Andy said...

Oops spaced your question. Wasn't even a police action, we were there for KBR...

Dan brock said...

And KBR loves you for it.

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