June 2007 Archives

The popular press has finally fingered Michael Moore as a propagandist. MTV's review of Michael Moore's latest attempt at movie making actually identifies the fact that Michael Moore is not being honest in his presentation of the topic. Kurt Loder does a great job of dispelling Moore's assertion that socialized medicine is what America should be aiming for. Like Loder, I agree that we need something better but Canada, Britain and France are evidence of direction that we need not bother with. In my opinion, Japan might be worth a look.

More significant is the fact that a popular news organization is publishing an article that points out the flaws in Moore's message. I did not see an such articles addressing Fahrenheit 9/11. Yet, that movie had the same issues. Fahrenheit 9/11 was not a presentation of all the facts but rather a careful presentation of only that which supported Moore's political message. Public reception of Fahrenheit 9/11 seemed to treat the movie as a documentary, an attempt to provide a factual record. In fact, Moore's movies are propaganda, promoting and publicizing or popularizing a particular political cause or point of view. As Loder makes clear in his review of Sicko, Moore has little regard for the truth or, is so arrogant as to consider his opinion to be truth.

Ravi Zacharias often makes the point that Western society in general and American society especially has given up critical thinking and rational argument and replaced it with popular opinion. Public reaction to Moore's movie is a prime example of this. The American public is willing to treat Moore's claims as fact without verification or justification. Whether it's Michael Moore, Rush Limbaugh, Bill Maher or Michael Savage it is critical to verify their points before subscribing to their view or regurgitating their message. They all have, first and foremost, a political agenda that they are putting forth. Disseminating truth is slave to that agenda.

aloha

[posted with ecto]

Technorati Tags: philosophy, politics, sociology

Get a box of kleenex before you read this. World War II veterans couldn't talk about it. Neither could those who served in Korea. The guys who served in Vietnam did a little better but not much. Those are the words or the thoughts (or something very similar) of every soldier who has lost a friend to combat. For those who were there when they died, it's worse. I commented the blog entry as well.

aloha

[posted with ecto]

Technorati Tags: life, military, philosophy

I have finished week one at 38B Reclass. So far, the course has been good. Teaching is, what I would call, a modified death by PowerPoint. All of the classes are taught from a PowerPoint presentation as is the Army Standard these days. However, the instructors assigned to our class are interesting and animated. They move through the material as quickly as the we can understand it, which is great. We are presently ahead of the course.

Civil Affairs involves a lot of cross-cultural communication and interaction which is one of my passions. One of my favor parts of being deployed to Kuwait in 2004 was the opportunities to interact with the local culture and population. As a result, I find a lot of the material we are covering in class interesting. I can see a lot of overlap with my own life experiences, living in Japan, as an Asian Studies major in college and as a Localization Engineer over the last twenty years. Those portions of the course that deal with cross-culture and related issues are quite easy. Most other parts are at least interesting.

Three weeks to go. I hope they go by quickly.

aloha

[posted with ecto]

Technorati Tags: life, military

So, today I'm off to 38B Reclass Course held in Fort Dix, New Jersey. I have to admit that given my experience at Warrior Transition Course I am a little anxious about this next step in the development of my Army career. I'm hoping that WTC was an anomaly and Army schools are on par with or better than Navy schools. There is clearly a significant difference in culture between the two branches of service. The Army is far more 'into' respect of rank at least on the surface. Standing at Parade Rest when talking to an NCO senior to yourself, things like that. One of my complaints about the Navy was its disregard for rank. And, within my unit it seems that the respect is genuine. At least until someone breaks trust. However, Navy schools were pretty good. Students were treated like adults. The material was delivered in an expeditious manner, usually in a hands on fashion so that you could really see how things worked. You were expected to bring military bearing to the class, it was seldom if ever a component of any class to teach proper military conduct. Re-education of military bearing and conduct seems to be a core component of Army schools. At least that is the impression I have so far.

The 38B Reclass Course is intended to teach the basic skills of a Civil Affairs Generalist. How to do the basic job in an Area Of Responsibility. It replaces Advanced Individual Training (AIT) for soldiers changing their MOS mid-career and prior service personnel coming over to the Army in the 38B MOS. AIT is typically a continuation of Basic Combat Training for new inductees, with Drill Sergeants, a high degree of control, with lots of molding and modeling the soldier still going on. One of the main problems with WTC is that it tries to emulate that Basic Training environment, at the expense of truly valuable training and activities insofar as I could see. So then, my fear now is that the 38B Reclass Course will be more interested in treating its students in the same manner as an AIT, rather than treating like adults and teaching us what we need to know in the most expedient way possible.

Freedom Journal Iraq covers a lot of the activities of the Civil Affairs Specialists in Iraq. From what I see there, I think that Civil Affairs should be very interesting, making a positive contribution in an environment where positive is some times difficult to find. It should be an interesting experience. My current contract is up at the end of 2009. It'll be interesting to see what I think then.

Technorati Tags: life, military