South Texian

The Essential American Soul

noreply@blogger.com (Mike LaRoche) — Mon, 12 Dec 2011 08:31:00 +0000

"...is hard, isolate, stoic and a killer."

So wrote D.H. Lawrence, and so is Wes Stauer, the main character in Tom Kratman's Countdown: The Liberators. The first book in a new series, Countdown: The Liberators is also Tom Kratman's first venture outside of the science fiction genre, this particular story taking place in a near future (I had the year 2014 in mind as I read it) where America's influence is on the wane. Stauer is a retired soldier living a comfortable but less-than-satisfying life in San Antonio with his beautiful girlfriend Philomena "Phillie" Potter. Stauer's dissatisfaction is neither borne of a dislike of the Alamo City or of Phillie, but of a frustration at seeing his country decline into socialist mediocrity and at having his hard, isolate, stoic soul confined in retirement.

Stauer's deliverance comes when on one evening, an old friend from Sudan named Wahab arrives on his doorstep with an irresistible offer: assemble a private mercenary force, with all expenses paid, to rescue the kidnapped son of Wahab's wealthy tribal chieftain. What unfolds is an adventure that takes Stauer, Phillie, and a host of other vibrant characters to such far-flung locales as Guyana, Chad, Burma, and South Africa as Stauer assembles an international all-star team of soldiers, airmen, and sailors to staff his private military enterprise and reach deep into the deserts of northeastern Africa to affect a seemingly impossible search and rescue.

As is the case with all of Kratman's novels, this story is filled with observations and commentary on present political and social realities. The most poignant and humorous of these come from one of the story's primary antagonists, an older, world-weary gentlemen named Labaan who spent his youth in the United States and learned to detest one group of Americans he believes irredeemably beyond hope: Californians. One of many examples can be seen with this passage from the sixth chapter, taking place in N'Djamena, Chad as Labaan and his fellow kidnappers, along with their hostage, disembark from a broken-down aircraft:

There was a youngish white man, tall, muscular, tanned, blond, and bearded, waiting for the Kenya Airways flight as the hatch opened. The white's sweat-stained shirt was unbuttoned halfway to his navel.

Labaan took one look and thought, God...no! Not one of them, not here?

"Dude," the white said,as Labaan reached the foot of the debarking steps, "the plane...it's bogus....it's broken."

God save me from Californians, Labaan thought. It wasn't enough to have to go to school with the mindless twits. Even here, without a surfable beach for over a thousand miles, they find me to blight my existence and insult their own language.

Amidst his despair at having to deal with Caifornians, Labaan also laments the destruction wrought by Western charitable aid across Africa. Such rich, complex, interesting characters like Labaan populate Kratman's story from beginning to end, giving additional opinions on subjects ranging from the aforementioned benighted Californians to "green" automobile technology to post-apartheid South Africa and to the global scourge of transnational progressivism. But ultimately, one wonders: does Stauer recover the Sudanese chief's kidnapped son? Does the honorable enemy Labaan, along with his dry wit, live to fight another day? Within the pages of Kratman's taut adventure, the answers await.

Rise of the Valkyries

noreply@blogger.com (Mike LaRoche) — Fri, 09 Dec 2011 08:37:00 +0000

It has been quite a while since I reviewed one of Tom Kratman's novels on this blog. Not because of any lack of production on his part, but rather because of a lack of production on mine...at least where blogging is concerned. As happens with many of us inhabiting the blogosphere, real life has a way of reasserting itself and limiting one's time online. Such has been the case with me for most of the past year, resulting in just three previous posts in 2011. Not that I have anything to complain about, mind you. Since relocating up here to Lubbock in August 2009, my career and life have improved markedly. But sacrifices have had to be made, and my rate of blog posting has been among them. That said, with a few moments of time to spare this late December night, what follows is my brief review of Tom Kratman's The Amazon Legion, six chapters of which I posted on this blog back in March 2010.

Set in the same universe as three of Kratman's other novels: A Desert Called Peace, Carnifex, and The Lotus Eaters, The Amazon Legion takes place five centuries into the future on Terra Nova, a planet colonized by humans and with nations not too different from our own. The story centers around a young woman named Maria Fuentes, living in a small Spanish-speaking nation known as the Timocratic Republic of Balboa. After being disowned by her wealthy parents for becoming pregnant out of wedlock and having to raise her young daughter in abject poverty, Maria has a chance encounter with Patricio Carrera, the founder and leader of the Balboan military: the Legion del Cid. Carrera, much to the chagrin of the Republic's Senate, has conceived a radical idea: integrate gays and women into all levels of military service (including combat roles) by creating specific regiments for each - the Tercio Gorgidas for the former and the Tercio Amazona for the latter. Much of the novel chronicles Fuentes' journey through basic and subsequent special forces training. Members of the Tercio Gorgidas are used to train the initial members of the Tercio Amazona, as Carrera has determined than straight men will simply not be up to the task. Kratman himself, in this interview from 2008 with Blake "Laughing Wolf" Powers of the military blog Blackfive, expounds upon that point when describing the novel in its initial form, then titled The Amazon's Right Breast:

The chapters describing the training of Fuentes and her fellow recruits are among the grittiest, most brutal, but also most compelling passages that I have ever read. Doubtlessly, Kratman drew upon some of his own Army Ranger training experiences when crafting them. But the violence therein is not pointless. As with all of Kratman's novels, larger themes are explored. In this case, such themes include not only the aforementioned feasibility of women and homosexuals serving in combat, but also further ruminations upon the nature of timocracy (detailed even more extensively in The Lotus Eaters) and the value of loyalty and self-sacrifice, traits that have tended to wither in liberal democracies.

The tribulations of Fuentes and her Amazona compatriots are set against a larger geopolitical drama on Terra Nova, wherein a large and powerful confederation of nations called the Tauran Union (think the European Union with teeth) have occupied much of Balboa with the intent of controlling the Balboa Transitway, an above sea-level canal linking Terra Nova's two largest oceans, the Shimmering Sea and the Mar Furioso. As for how the Amazonas fare in the struggle to rid Balboa of the Tauran presence, you will have to read the novel yourself. But be advised, it's one hell of a ride.

After the Downfall

noreply@blogger.com (Mike LaRoche) — Mon, 07 Nov 2011 01:18:00 +0000

Lin’s revenge. That thought kept recurring as I read Flashback, the latest novel by the inimitable Dan Simmons. Who is this “Lin” of whom I speak? Lin Zexu: a scholar and law enforcement official in Qing Dynasty-era China, assigned to the city of Guangdong as an imperial commissioner in 1838 to halt the sale and distribution of illegal drugs, namely opium. Lin was remarkably successful in doing so, and he not only went after Chinese distributors, but Western ones as well. It is estimated that more than two-and-a half million pounds of opium were seized and destroyed as a result of Lin’s activities. He was, essentially, a Chinese version of Eliot Ness.

The British, however, were none too pleased with this development and responded violently, initiating what became known as the First Opium War (1839-42). China was defeated, Lin was exiled, and the Chinese people remained awash in opium, helplessly seeing their country dismembered – carved into spheres of influence – by a multitude of foreign powers over the succeeding decades.

It is a similar scenario which Simmons presents to his reader within the pages of Flashback. The year is 2032, and the Union has been dissolved. Oh, there is still a United States of America, but it is bankrupt, reduced in size, and governed by a select group of “foreign advisors” in concert with a weakened federal government. At least four states have left the Union: Hawaii (subsequently annexed by a resurgent Japanese Empire), Arizona and New Mexico (which along with southern California are part of a new country named Nuevo Mexico), and Texas (once again an independent republic). Even worse, the vast majority of Americans do not care. 87% of the population is addicted to a cheap drug called flashback, which enables its users to relive cherished memories as their society crumbles around them.

The main character of the novel is a flashback-addicted ex-cop, living in Denver, named Nick Bottom. The reader meets Bottom as a broken man, haunted by the death of his wife six years prior, estranged from his teenage son Val, and frustrated by an unsolved murder investigation that destroyed his career. But things change when the Japanese federal advisor in Denver – whose son was the murder victim in the aforementioned investigation – calls Bottom out of his involuntary retirement to revisit the case as a private investigator.

The other viewpoint characters in the story are Nick’s son Val and Nick’s father-in-law Leonard Fox, an emeritus professor of English retired from UCLA, with whom Val lives in a Los Angeles torn apart by ethnic strife. As Nick revisits his old investigation and finds that his deceased wife may have had something to do with the murder, Val and Leonard take flight from LA as the city descends into anarchy, braving the nearly-impassable American Southwest to reunite with Nick.

Along the way, both with Nick’s investigation and with Val and Leonard’s desperate flight, Simmons slowly reveals his broken, dystopic America to his readers. Simmons’ imagined America of the future is a place where every negative socioeconomic and political trend of the present has been taken to its most negative result. I’ll not spoil matters by revealing further details on that point, but as I read through the novel I kept asking: how plausible could Simmons’ dystopia really be? The unsettling answer: very. It *could* happen here because it *did* happen there. The China of the past may well be the America of the future.

I’ve gone on longer than I intended, but before concluding I must take issue with what a gaggle of leftist commenters have been posting on the Amazon page for Flashback. They are unjustly, dishonestly, and maliciously smearing Simmons as a xenophobe and a racist. That characterization is absolutely false, but all-too-typical of the adherents of a bankrupt ideology that can only defend their faith with hatred and invective. Anyone who is a regular reader of the novels of Dan Simmons knows that he is neither a racist nor a xenophobe. But don’t take my word for it. Read his novels Hyperion (1986) and Black Hills (2010) and you will see I am correct.

Flashback is Simmons’ coming-out-conservative novel, and it is well worth your time to read. With an ending that is evocative of Pedro Calderon de la Barca, it is a story you will not soon forget.

Carlyle Reconsidered

noreply@blogger.com (Mike LaRoche) — Sat, 28 May 2011 04:29:00 +0000

In this post, Claire Berlinski considers the words of Thomas Carlyle - this sentence specifically: "The History of the world is but the Biography of great men." Here's my take: I find some truth in that statement. Presently, social history dominates much of the historical profession. Within social history's paradigm, the accomplishments of prominent men (and women) are cast aside in favor of perceived broad social trends; the paradigm is ultimately rooted in the belief that circumstances dictate outcomes, and that the influence of individuals is, at best, minimal. It is a proposition that implies inevitability.

And inevitability in history is a proposition with which I strongly disagree. Individuals matter. Individual decisions matter. Nothing is inevitable. And on many an occasion, the determination of a single person has changed the course of a war, a nation, and a people.

Consider the case of Oliver Hazard Perry and the Battle of Lake Erie, one of the key battles of the War of 1812. On September 10, 1813, Commodore Perry inspired his men to a decisive victory over the British Navy's Great Lakes fleet, flying a naval standard from his flagship, the USS Lawrence, which read "Don't Give Up the Ship." During the course of the battle, the Lawrence suffered severe damage and Perry was forced to transfer his command to the USS Niagara - carrying his naval standard with him. But despite this setback, which might have turned the tide against them, Perry and his men fought on and ultimately dealt the British war effort in North America a mortal blow, effectively ending the possibility of an invasion of the Ohio River Valley. Perry then related the news of his triumph to General William Henry Harrison with this terse message: "We have met the enemy, and they are ours."

Perry enjoyed his subsequent fame for only six years. In 1819, on an expedition up the Orinoco River in Venezuela, he contracted yellow fever and passed away. He was survived by his younger brother, Matthew Calbraith Perry, who in 1853-54 led a diplomatic naval expedition to Japan, successfully convincing that country's government to to begin engaging in open trade with the United States (and subsequently, the rest of the Western world). Since the early 1600s, Japan had maintained a policy of strict political and economic isolation - its only contact with the Western world being with a handful of Dutch traders allowed to visit Nagasaki (and re-supply a handful of Dutch merchants living at the nearby island of Deshima) once a year.

Returning to the subject of Oliver Perry and his naval standard, the phrase "Don't Give Up the Ship" had been coined just three months earlier by Perry's friend, Captain James Lawrence of the USS Chesapeake. On June 4, 1813, the Chesapeake engaged the British frigate HMS Shannon off of the Atlantic coast, and during the fight Captain Lawrence was mortally wounded. As he lay dying, Lawrence allegedly said "Don't give up the ship! Fight her till she sinks." Nonetheless, shortly thereafter the Chesapeake was stormed by a British boarding party and the vessel hauled off to Halifax, Nova Scotia. But Lawrence's brave words lived on, inspiring Perry to achieve the victory that had been denied to his friend.

Though it is not always so, in this case history was most definitely the biography of a great man. Just as Horace noted that even Homer sometimes nods, occasionally even an "insufferable windbag" like Carlyle can make a valid point.

In the Arena

noreply@blogger.com (Mike LaRoche) — Thu, 31 Mar 2011 06:20:00 +0000

Finding a truly good movie to watch can seem a Herculean effort these days, but I was fortunate enough to finally get around to seeing The Matador, a documentary recommended to me by Ricochet member MLH in the comments to this post by Joe Escalante.

The Matador is about a Spanish bullfighter named David "El Fandi" Fandila and his quest to become only the thirteenth matador in the entire history of bullfighting to complete one hundred matches in a single season. The film centers on the 2003, 2004, and 2005 bullfighting seasons as Fandila struggles mightily to realize his dream. The viewer sees Fandila evolve from a promising, talented rookie into an experienced, battle-hardened veteran trying to fight off despair as his goal continually eludes him.

In addition to a portrait of Fandila in the arena, directors Stephen Higgins and Nina Gilden Seavey also show his life outside of the arena; the anguish of his mother and father, torn by pride in their son's achievements and mortal fear every time he steps into the bullring, the frustration of his fiancée whom he hardly ever sees, and the loyalty of his older brother who gave up a promising career in professional skiing to serve as David's second.

The directors also address the bitter controversy over the morality of bullfighting - interviewing those who wish to see the proud Spanish tradition of the corrida ground to dust. Though the filmmakers do not endorse either the pro- or anti-bullfighting side, the bullfighting critics come off as shrill and self-righteous, much like the larger movement of international socialism to which most of them are attached. One wonders if it was such tin-eared utopian universalism that motivated Spanish nationalists like José Sanjurjo and Francisco Franco to react and take up arms so many decades ago.

One of the film's most compelling scenes takes place when Fandila is attempting to complete six matches in a row before an adoring crowd in his hometown of Granada. Fandila is gored in the third match but manages to complete it. However, the injury is serious enough to require immediate surgery. Rather than ending his afternoon right then and there, Fandila insists that the stadium physician perform his surgery without any anesthetics so that he can return to the bullring within an hour and perform the remaining three matches.

Does Fandila return and complete his matches that day? Does he attain his goal of performing one hundred matches in a single season, and thus take his place alongside the greatest bullfighters of all time? For the answers, you will have to watch this wonderful, awe-inspiring documentary.

A North American Afghanistan?

noreply@blogger.com (Mike LaRoche) — Fri, 24 Dec 2010 20:22:00 +0000

Not the most pleasant thought to be reading this Christmas Eve, but a couple of recent news items have reminded me of how the U.S.-Mexico border continues its descent into anarchy, courtesy not only of Mexican narcotraficantes, but also of the incompetent, self-serving, corrupt behemoth that is official Washington. First, there is the case of Border Patrol agent Brian Terry, who was shot and killed last week in Arizona near the Arizona-Mexico border in pursuit of criminals, after which the following unfolded (h/t Darleen Click at Protein Wisdom):

Department of Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano yesterday attended the funeral of Border Patrol agent Brian Terry who was fatally shot while pursuing a gang last week in Arizona. In a phone call where Napolitano offered condolences to the family, the father of the murdered agent, angry that the border is still not secure, told her “you gotta wake your man up in the White House” and she allegedly responded “he’s done more in the last two years than any other president.” However, to the Terry family such sentiment represented “empty words.”

Empty words indeed, for the violence continues apace along the Texas-Mexico border as well. From today's San Antonio Express-News:

BROWNSVILLE — When the rattle of gunfire and pop of grenades woke Rene Cardona from his dorm bed at the University of Texas at Brownsville/Texas Southmost College, he brushed it off as another drug war battle across the Rio Grande in Matamoros, Mexico — a short distance away but in another country.

But when he looked out to see Border Patrol, security guards and police forming a frenzied phalanx along the river, he felt fear.

“The way they were acting, the way the police were arranged all around the entrances and above the border wall, it kind of freaked me out,” said Cardona, a junior majoring in journalism. “I felt that they were scared about something bigger happening.”

In September 2009, bullets from “the other side” grazed a campus building. No one was injured, but something had changed.

Fifteen months later, the rat-tat-tat across the border has become a familiar sound.

The problem gets worse and worse, and official Washington does nothing. Furthermore, we are told by the Obama administration and an array of lobbyist and advocacy groups that the problem really isn't that bad, the border is safer than it it has ever been, the problem is being exaggerated by anti-illegal immigration and other "extremist" groups, and on and on. Horse baloney. The Ruling Class (to borrow Angelo M. Codevilla's term) and their hangers on care nothing about the fate of Americans living along the border.

Regrettably, that callous attitude even includes some elected representatives from border states so affected - not just Democrats, but Republicans as well. I've seen it first-hand. I've long hesitated to share this story for obvious reasons, but now - sixteen years after the fact - I think it bears repeating. Back during the summer of 1994, after I had completed my freshman year of undergraduate studies, I interned in Washington, D.C. at the office of a now-former Congressman from Texas, a Republican, who shall remain nameless. One day, as I was answering phone calls from constituents, I received a call from a border-area rancher who was distraught about the worsening problem of illegal aliens and drug-runners trespassing upon his land. Per office protocol, I proceeded to try to forward the call to the legislative assistant who handled such issues. But instead of taking the call, the legislative assistant in question told me to take a message, because he was otherwise occupied washing his coffee cup. I then had to tell the rancher that the appropriate legislative assistant couldn't help him because he was "otherwise occupied" but could leave a message. Bitterly and dejectedly, the rancher left his contact information and the call was ended.

I felt (and still feel) horrible for having had to handle the rancher's call that way, and it was an eye-opening moment revealing just how those on Capitol Hill really think of those whom they purport to represent. I have no idea of what became of the rancher, but I have little doubt that the staffer who rejected the call later went on to have a lucrative career as a lobbyist, which is what eventually happens with many in the employ of members of Congress. As the above episode with Secretary Napolitano shows, little has changed in sixteen years.

Message: talk to the hand.

***

On a less-unpleasant note, I'd like to wish everyone a very Merry Christmas. Again, apologies for the very slow pace of blogging, but times are busy. Right now, though, I am managing to enjoy some down-time, visiting family in San Antonio. For your entertainment pleasure, here is a video sent to me by Tom Kratman last year, recounting Christmas on the Western Front in 1914 during World War I. The song is "Christmas in the Trenches" by John McCutcheon (1989):

Simply magnificent.

Makes a Majority

noreply@blogger.com (Mike LaRoche) — Fri, 05 Nov 2010 14:00:00 +0000

The 2010 mid-term elections have come and gone, and the Republican Party, the amorphous Tea Party, and the American people have emerged triumphant. As the election returns came in and the Republican victories accumulated, I remembered a prediction I made back in March of 2009:

As I write this blog post, a quarter past midnight Central Daylight Time on March 28, 2009, I will venture to make two political predictions: Rick Perry will be re-elected Governor of Texas in 2010 and Barack Obama will not be re-elected President of the United States in 2012.

The first part of my prediction has come to pass. And so will the second. But two years is an eternity in politics and there is much work to be done. Fortunately, with this past election, the ranks of Congress and numerous state governments have been filled with an impressive line-up of new public servants dedicated to correcting the depredations of Obama and his gang of elitist democratic socialists.

Two years ago, we conservatives were told by our putative betters that we had no hope. The Republican Party was said to be suffering from near-irreparable "brand damage", conservatism was allegedly discredited, we ourselves were said to be mere ignoramuses, wistfully clinging to our guns and religion. Obama and the Democrats were said to have compiled an enduring 40-year Democratic majority. To add insult to injury, there were those supposedly on our side - David Frum, David Brooks, Ross Douthat, amongst a gaggle of others - who said the Republican Party needed to abandon the principles of conservatism and adopt a more "pragmatic" approach.

But some, like the redoubtable Rush Limbaugh, would have none of it. Early in 2009, Limbaugh spoke four words that drew a virtual line in the sand against the statists and pragmatists: "I hope he fails."

Another great American - Andrew Jackson - once said: "One man with courage makes a majority."

But Rush Limbaugh was not just one man. He was one of many.

Marco Rubio, the senator-elect from Florida: one man. Brian Sandoval, Nevada's new governor-elect: one man. Susana Martinez, New Mexico's new governor-elect: one woman. Bill Flores, a ninth-generation Texan just like me, and the new representative of the 17th congressional district of Texas: one man. Francisco "Quico" Canseco - a native Laredoan whose late father, the prominent physician Dr. Pancho Canseco, delivered my mother and four of her five brothers - and who is himself now the newly-elected congressman from the 23rd congressional district of Texas, having defeated the detestable Ciro "Zero" Rodriguez: one man. Blake Farenthold, newly elected representative of the 27th congressional district of Texas, and grandson of the legendary Sissy Farenthold: one man. And Sarah Palin, who has endured the most brutal of personal attacks against herself and her family, but whose determination and true grit defeats her hateful detractors at every turn: one woman.

And, most importantly of all, those of us who individually made it all happen: each of us one man, one woman - but together, an army of one.

The war, however, is far from over. There will be setbacks, and the struggle will seem thankless and unforgiving at times, but should we stand strong, adhere to the principles of conservatism and classical liberalism, and ensure our nation's continuing exceptionalism, victory will be ours once more.

It seems fitting that I close with a video I first posted a year-and-a-half ago, a video of Ted Nugent performing to an enthusiastic audience - of which I was a part - back on April 15, 2009 at the San Antonio Tea Party:

"We have met the enemy, and they are ours."

The Brat's Last Sigh

noreply@blogger.com (Mike LaRoche) — Sat, 30 Oct 2010 13:00:00 +0000

When I first started writing this post on Thursday night, I'd intended it to be a review of John Varley's Rolling Thunder. But there really isn't much to say about it. I believe G.K. Chesterton summed it up best:

"A good novel tells us the truth about its hero; but a bad novel tells us the truth about its author."

Such is what came to mind as I read Rolling Thunder, a science fiction novel which is less a continuation of the inspiring story Varley began with Red Thunder in 2003 than it is a thinly-veiled screed against the alleged depredations of Red State America: that dark, savage land of fascistic, science-denying Jesus-freaks who dream of repealing the First Amendment and of publishing textbooks that claim Moses rode dinosaurs. Come on, John, everyone knows that it was Abraham who loved to saddle up a brontosaurus.

In sum, the story is a waste of time to read and, as I said years ago about another bad novel, to call the characters in Varley's novel one-dimensional is an insult to stick figures everywhere.

Moving on...

As for the title of this post, those familiar with Spanish history will recall an event - which may or may not have actually happened - called "the Moor's last sigh." According to legend, when the city of Granada - the last bastion of Moorish power in Spain - fell to the invading Christian armies of King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella, King Boabdil fled through a mountain pass high in the Sierra Nevada. As he did so, he looked back upon the city and his beloved Alhambra and wept in shame. At this, Boabdil's mother said: "Weep for like a woman what you would not fight for like a man."

Centuries later, and in a land far removed from late medieval Spain, Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, a putative Republican, finds herself similarly distraught as she tries desperately to hang on to the Senate seat bequeathed to her by her father Frank in 2003, when he was Alaska's governor. It was an act of rank nepotism never before seen in American politics, and despite electing her to a full term in 2004, Alaskans in 2010 decided they had seen enough. On August 24, 2010, Murkowski was defeated in the Republican primary by Joe Miller, a former Army officer, graduate of the United States Military Academy at West Point, and Yale Law school alumnus who was endorsed by the Murkowski family's long-time rival, former Alaska governor Sarah Palin.

Murkowski did not take the loss well, and after a failed attempt at getting the Libertarian Party of Alaska to endorse her, she decided to opt for a write-in re-election campaign, not willing to accept the verdict of her fellow Alaskans. Since then, Joe Miller has been subjected to a barrage of personal attacks and outright lies about his character, and not just from the usual suspects on the left. Even Ben Stein, a usually charming, witty conservative writer whose monthly diary in The American Spectator is a joy to read, penned a column for the anti-Palin hate site Alaska Dispatch calling Miller "stupid" and a would-be latter-day Erich Honecker. Murkowski herself has questioned Miller's personal honor. Indeed, a jumped-up daddy's girl has questioned the integrity of a man who won the Bronze Star for valor shown in combat.

However, as bad as all of that is, the worst came on Friday, October 29 when Murkowski threatened and intimidated KFQD an Anchorage radio station, into suspending talk-show host Dan Fagan after he encouraged his listeners to sign-up as write-in candidates for the U.S. Senate as a protest and act of civil disobedience against Lisa Murkowski's desperate attempt to cling to power. Fagan's action was neither illegal nor an attempt at electioneering as Murkowski and her toadies have claimed, yet, fearing a lawsuit, KFQD suspended Fagan pending a review on Monday.

On Friday evening, Sarah Palin issued a blistering statement via Facebook, titled "Lisa, are you going to shut down my Facebook page for writing this?" Therein, Palin writes:

Yesterday, Lisa Murkowski’s hired guns threatened radio host Dan Fagan, and more importantly, the station that airs Fagan’s show, with legal action for allegedly illegal “electioneering.” The station, unlike Murkowski, who is flush with millions of dollars from vested corporate interests, does not have a budget for a legal defense. So it did what any small market station would do when threatened by Beltway lawyers charging $500 to $1000 an hour – they pulled Dan Fagan off the air.

Does all this sound heavy handed? It is. It is an interference with Dan Fagan’s constitutional right to free speech. It is also a shocking indictment against Lisa Murkowski. How low will she go to hold onto power? First, she gets the Division of Elections to change its write-in process – a process that Judge Pfiffner correctly determined had been in place without change for 50 years. She is accepting financial support from federal contractors, an act that is highly questionable and now pending before the FEC. And today, she played her last card. She made it clear that if you disagree with her and encourage others to exercise their civic rights, she’ll take you off the air.

The concept of “electioneering” involves several issues, but typically refers to campaigning at the polls, which is appropriately banned. Under federal law, it can also mean paying for advertising on broadcast media during a federal election cycle, and it requires disclosures if done by groups and corporations. Fagan used satire to mock Murkowski’s write-in efforts and encouraged Alaskans to run as write-in candidates. That is not illegal. That is free speech.

But what came shortly thereafter caused me to do a double-take:

Dan Fagan has not always agreed with me, but I will gladly defend his right to speak freely on his radio show, which he has often used to criticize me. In fact, Fagan has actually used his radio show to attack and insult me, my husband, my children, and my family in just about every way possible. He was especially insulting to my son, who left for a war zone to defend Fagan’s right to attack our family. But when I was his governor, I never would have dreamed of threatening his right to free speech. I support him in this fight because this D.C. Beltway thuggery, as exemplified by Lisa Murkowski’s latest threat, is ruining our country.

That's right, on the grounds of free speech Palin is defending the rights of a man who, in the past, has personally attacked her. That shows character, integrity, and a type of commitment to classical liberal principles that Murkowski and her band of mewling fanboys will never display nor even comprehend. There certainly is a would-be Erich Honecker in this race, and it is not Joe Miller.

Hopefully, this Tuesday will bring not only the brat's last sigh, but the last sighs of many statist politicians who have brought this great republic to the brink of collapse over the past two years.

Don't give up the ship!

Crazy

noreply@blogger.com (Mike LaRoche) — Fri, 22 Oct 2010 22:31:00 +0000

Yesterday I wrote of NPR's disgraceful firing of Juan Williams because of his allegedly "bigoted" views of Muslims. But I didn't tell the whole story, as at the time of my writing all had not yet been revealed. Evidently, NPR had been seeking to dismiss Williams for some time because of his long association with Fox News, which dates back to 1997 (predating his association with NPR, oddly enough). Furthermore, on Thursday the CEO of NPR, Vivian Schiller, went so far as to question Williams's sanity in remarks given at a conference in Atlanta:

The key line comes in around the one-minute mark, where Schiller says that "his feelings that he expressed on Fox News are really between him and his psychiatrist." That is an important point, though not for the reasons Schiller intends. As soon as I heard that remark, I thought of this comment that I posted back on October 17 over at Ricochet:

The ghost of the execrable Richard Hofstadter lives on. The Paranoid Style in American Politics (1964) is the effective playbook of contemporary left-elitist snobbery. The rubric established therein is simple: those who disagree with liberalism are either crazy or stupid. Try as they might to sanitize the historical record, the source of left-elite hate and condescension is still available for all to see.

To which David Limbaugh (yes, that David Limbaugh) added:

or "scared." But don't blame us, "because we're hardwired not to always think clearly when we're scared." BHO

Left-elitists like Schiller do not see those with whom they disagree as human. We, the great proletariat of heartland/fly-over America, are just mindless fanatics in love with our M-16s and eagerly awaiting the Rapture. Even Juan Williams, with whom Schiller likely agrees with ninety percent of the time when it comes to politics, could no longer be accommodated because of his association with those dirty proles over at Fox News.

This is all reminiscent of something that another Schiller, Friedrich Schiller, once wrote: "Against stupidity, the gods themselves labor in vain." With our putative transnational progressive overlords, the Almighty certainly has His work cut out for Him.

New Commenting System

noreply@blogger.com (Mike LaRoche) — Fri, 22 Oct 2010 04:41:00 +0000

Just a note to point out that I've installed a new commenting software on this blog called Disqus, which has restored the trackback function that I lost when HaloScan shut down earlier this year and I had to switch over to Echo. Older comments posted under HaloScan/Echo have been imported into the new system, but I'm not sure how long it will take for them to start showing up in the blog entries where they were originally posted. So bluepitbull, Serr8d, Danger, and pd buttons, just be aware that your recent comments were not deleted, but might have been lost in the shuffle.

As for blogging in general, real life is pretty busy for me at the moment. But I haven't forgotten about this blog or my few, faithful readers. Hopefully I will be able to post more often, but until then please bear with me.

And God bless Texas!

The Real American Taliban

noreply@blogger.com (Mike LaRoche) — Thu, 21 Oct 2010 08:00:00 +0000

Via Darleen Click at Protein Wisdom comes news that Juan Williams, a liberal pundit who frequently appears as a guest on The O'Reilly Factor - and occasionally guest-hosts the program - has been fired from his position as an analyst for the taxpayer-supported leftist propaganda outlet National Public Radio (NPR). The reason for his offense? This remark he made on The O'Reilly Factor earlier this week:

My, my, we certainly can't have anyone expressing a sentiment that a majority of Americans - myself included - share regarding the ongoing clash of civilizations between the Western and Islamic worlds. And such a sentiment coming from a black man who dares cut against the grain of leftist orthodoxy? Too much for the pearl-clutchers at NPR to handle.

Of course, it is hardly surprising that leftists think little of minorities - blacks and Hispanics especially - who express conservative or other politically incorrect opinions. Remember how they treated Alberto Gonzales? Or Clarence Thomas? And then there is the case of Marco Rubio, Republican nominee for the U.S. Senate in Florida, who was asked by a clearly non-Hispanic moderator in a recent debate about his "anti-Latino" political beliefs:

As one who is partially of Hispanic (Tejano) descent, or as I identify myself in the comments at Protein Wisdom - a half-honky, half-frito bandito, mackerel-snapper, heteronormative Texan imperialist - I find such a question to be patronizing, asinine and quite revealing of the person asking it. Kudos to Rubio for handling the matter with class.

I vaguely recall that there was a time when this was a free country, when people could feel free to speak their political beliefs without fear of retaliation. But that has not been true for a long time. Evidently, we fought Communism abroad just to turn around and impose a more subtle version of it at home, along with perverting the very Constitution of this nation, which as Jeff Goldstein explains, is rooted in the perversion of language itself:

irongrampa asked why people can take from the text [the Constitution] what the text (as a product of some intending agency) never intended. The answer is, because we’ve broken the link between intent and meaning, declaring the former irrelevant while declaring our own providence over the latter.

All it takes, then, are enough “reasonable people” — that is, an interpretive community that has been empowered to do so — to insist something means what it was never meant to mean.

We still have certain rules, of course: the meaning they create must seem plausible based on the wording of the text (or, if not, based on some ancillary text written in a letter to Dansbury Baptists, etc.), so that they can claim that no, of course they aren’t simply trying shoehorn their own desires into the text, but rather that the text, if you turn it just so (and if you bracket what its writers and ratifiers intended) says exactly what they say it does, and therefore must “mean” what they say it means.

It’s an idea based on a faulty understanding of language. And once it was accepted, the end result was inevitable.

Perhaps on November 2, we can begin the process of restoring some level of sanity to public life - and original intent to our Constitution - by sweeping the elitist, socialist Democratic Party from Congress. But that will only be the beginning of a much longer struggle, and there are no guarantees of ultimate success. For all of my Texas nationalism, which I have frequently expressed on this blog, I still believe that the American republic is still worth saving. So too should you.

Memories

noreply@blogger.com (Mike LaRoche) — Mon, 30 Aug 2010 14:00:00 +0000

A book I recently had the occasion to read is Hitch-22, Christopher Hitchens's relentlessly engaging and intriguing autobiography. As far as format goes, the book is fairly typical of it's genre. Hitchens begins by describing his reserved, but caring naval officer father and his mother, whose Jewish heritage she concealed from her husband and two sons for the entirety of her life. He also relates his experiences in English boarding school and at Oxford, which lay the foundation for his later career as a journalist. But in my view, what gives Hitch-22 an indispensable quality is Hitchens's recounting of his ideological evolution, ranging from his days as a student political radical in the 1960s through the War on Terror in the 2000s.

Some months ago, a reviewer in National Review remarked on the book's recurrent theme of Hitchens relentlessly insisting on being his own man. Indeed, it is this quality that separates Hitchens from his compatriots on the political left with whom he worked during his days as a writer for The New Statesman and later The Nation. Despite his assertion that he is no longer a "man of the Left," Hitchens's overall political orientation is still left-of-center, though not dogmatically so. The greatest point of difference with his former leftist compatriots has been his fundamental belief in the just cause of the free and democratic West against the rise of Islamic radicalism over the past three decades. While most on the left have effectively held to a position of anti-Americanism, regardless of the intentions of America's antagonists, and largely rooted in the belief that America is an impediment to the ever-ephemeral socialist paradise, Hitchens has come to understand the truth that freedom and liberty are laudable ends in themselves that must be protected from dogmatism of all stripes, secular or religious. Thus, as regards the War on Terror, Hitchens has found himself aligned with those pejoratively described as "neoconservatives" - a term which once had significant political meaning but has now been reduced to a mere schoolyard taunt, often shortened to "neocons".

But if Hitchens's leftist credentials have been undermined by his pro-American, pro-Western stance against Islamic barbarism, they remain perfectly intact when it comes to the matter of religion. Christopher Hitchens is now, more than ever, an avowed atheist who, per the subtitle of his recent book god is not Great, believes that "religion poisons everything." That is, of course, a narrow-minded, facile understanding of religion and faith, one which Tom Kratman refuted in a manner far beyond my abilities in his afterword to The Tuloriad.

Religion, faith, spirituality, whatever term one may use to describe human metaphysical inquiry, is as old as humanity itself. It attempts to provide an explanation to the age-old question of why we are here, and whether our lives have a greater meaning beyond our mundane day-to-day existences. It is a point I ponder on this particular day, because it was today, three years ago, that my brother passed away at the age of forty. His passing pains me still, and I continue to wonder why it was that he, a man with a family of his own, suddenly departed from this earth at such a relatively young age. Why is it, as Woody Guthrie once wrote in his ode to the USS Reuben James nearly seven decades ago, that the worst of men must live while the best of men must die?

It is a question that may never be answered to my satisfaction. But one answer that I will never accept is that his life meant nothing - that he was, like many an atheist believes all of us to be - little more than a cog in some great evolutionary machine constructed by mere chance.

God hold you in His heart, Richard, until we meet again.

You Can't Hide

noreply@blogger.com (Mike LaRoche) — Sun, 04 Jul 2010 13:00:00 +0000

...your Lion Eyes. Such is the title of Claire Berlinki's not-quite-sequel to Loose Lips. The character around which the plot of Lion Eyes is centered is not Selena Keller, the protagonist of Loose Lips, but rather Claire Berlinski herself, or more accurately, a fictional version of her.

Set in 2004, a year after Loose Lips has been published, Berlinski is living in Paris and continuing her career as a writer and novelist when she receives an e-mail from a mysterious Iranian professor of archaeology named Arsalan Safavi. Arsalan (whose name means "Lion" in Farsi) asks for a copy of her novel, as none are available in his home country. Berlinski responds by e-mailing him a PDF file of her novel and then later follows that up by inadvertently sending Arsalan an e-mail wherein she laments a recent break-up. Thus begins a sequence of events taking her to Istanbul and into the heart of Middle Eastern realpolitik.

For as the fictional Berlinski soon discovers, Arsalan is not just any archeologist, he is one whom may have access to knowledge of Iran's emergent nuclear program. The CIA soon gets involved, but the agency's mishandling of the situation, in addition to Belinski's deepening affection for Arsalan, adds a layer of complication. Also complicating matters is Arsalan's neurotic cat, Wollef, whom he has inherited from his recently deceased mother.

As with Loose Lips, Berlinski weaves together a compelling tale populated by fascinating characters, human and, in Wollef's case, nonhuman. I especially liked Imran Begum, an obsessively punctual clinical psychotherapist living in London with whom the fictional Berlinski e-mails with frequency. The ability to devise a multitude of rich, contextual characters is a rare talent, and it is just one aspect of what makes Berlinski's novel so fascinating and enjoyable.

Another aspect of Berlinski's novel I liked was its showcasing of a lifestyle, a world with which I had a passing personal familiarity when I resided in Tokyo what seems like eons ago: that of the American expatriate. Perhaps someday I will return to that lost world, but for now reading delightful stories like Berlinski's will have to suffice.

***

Of course, today being the Fourth of July, I wish a Happy Independence Day to all. I leave you with this video clip of a Marine Corps veteran singing the second verse to The Star-Spangled Banner":

A Headache Tomorrow (or a Heartache Tonight)

noreply@blogger.com (Mike LaRoche) — Sat, 26 Jun 2010 13:00:00 +0000

"Loose lips sink ships." Such was an old World War II-era slogan imploring soldiers to not divulge compromising information when writing home, and it is from that slogan that the title of Claire Berlinski's novel, Loose Lips, is derived.

The main character of the story is a young woman named Selena Keller. Shortly after earning a doctorate in Oriental Studies from Columbia University and not wishing to become mired in the fever swamps of academia (a sentiment I understand well), Keller answers a CIA employment ad and soon finds herself being interviewed for possible admission into the agency's Clandestine Service Trainee program. Thus begins an adventure that takes Keller through the rigorous interview process, subsequent paramilitary training, and a challenging series of courses wherein she learns how to spot, vet, and recruit foreign agents. Along the way she also falls in love with a fellow trainee named Stan. Once her training is complete, though, Keller finds herself the target of CIA Special Investigations Branch inquiry that may derail her fledgling career as an intelligence officer.

Readers expecting a Tom Clancy-style techno-thriller will be disappointed, but those fond of witty stories of romance, interpersonal drama, and humor will be delighted. But whatever one's literary preferences, one thing seems certain: either Berlinski herself or someone close to her must have gone through some or all of the CST program, so believable is the tale.

For my own part, I loved the novel. As was the case with the main character, my own emotions varied throughout, ranging from wistfulness, to apprehension, to sadness, and then to relief. Not to beat an oft-used phrase to death, but Berlinski's novel truly is a tour de force. And speaking of cliches, I enjoyed reading the conversation between the author and her brother, related in the book's appendix, about whether or not another well-worn phrase should have been included in the story's dialogue. I was instantly reminded of some lines from a favorite song of mine: "A Headache Tomorrow (or a Heartache Tonight)" by Mickey Gilley, off of his 1981 album You Don't Know Me:

The sun goes down,
the blues come around,
and the choice is black and white.

Low down and lonesome,
high as a kite.

When you can't win for losing,
you know it's just not right.

It's a headache tomorrow,
or a heartache tonight.

For those unfamiliar with the song, here is a video:

It is a hauntingly beautiful tune, much like the story that reminded me of it. It is also a song of regret, of opportunities lost, of futures uncertain. It is a song Selena Keller would understand well, were she a Texan and a fan of Urban Cowboy Era country music. As for me, my only regret is that I did not read this novel, and enjoy its sentimental comfort, when it was first published seven years ago.

Are We Doomed?

noreply@blogger.com (Mike LaRoche) — Mon, 21 Jun 2010 13:00:00 +0000

John Derbyshire certainly thinks so. In We Are Doomed: Reclaiming Conservative Pessimism, Derbyshire laments that all is lost, American conservatism is in its death throes, and Western civilization faces a long, dark night from which it may never emerge. Assuming that Derbyshire was writing this book in 2008-2009, as Americans voted into office the least qualified, least experienced presidential candidate in this nation's history, who subsequently proceeded to dig this nation further into trillions of dollars of debt, Derbyshire's pessimism is not without foundation.

But Derbyshire's gloominess is not limited to politics. Across the board he sees a nation in full decline, from growing racial and ethnic balkanization that threatens national cohesion, to the devolution of politics into a grotesque sideshow that has transformed "public service" into obscene, mandarin-like money and power grabbing, to the cheapening of sex and the stagnation of a culture (high and popular) that presently produces little of value, to the growing behemoth of educational bureaucracy philosophically rooted in the nonsensical notion that more education is the cure to all of our society's woes.

The last category mentioned, education, strikes a particular chord with me because for better or worse (mostly worse), academia has been my profession for a decade. Derbyshire quotes New York Times reporter Deborah Solomon's claim in an interview with eminent sociologist Charles Murray that if "given the opportunity, most people could do most anything." That notion is complete horse baloney. Billions of dollars have been wasted on primary and secondary public education for children and tens of thousands of dollars of loan debt have been incurred by millions of young adults based upon the foolish notion that education for education's sake is the key to prosperity in life.

It is not. Referencing former National Review contributing editor Steve Sailer, John Derbyshire identifies this type of thinking as the "Yale or jail" syndrome, the underlying assumption being, Derbyshire writes, that "if you don't have a college degree, you are not good for much of anything other than selling crack." Thus, millions of kids who would be better off pursuing more productive (and lucrative) career options are instead shoehorned into a one-size-fits-all educational system that for many of them is a complete waste of time. As fellow blogger Carol Minjares of Missoulapolis wrote in a recent post: "Modest proposal: Any student who says 'How will I ever use this [math, science, English, etc] in real life?' should be sent for CNA training."

Another topic of interest which Derbyshire hits upon is religion. Derbyshire is an atheist, and I have written of his atheism before on this blog. I have little doubt that Derbyshire's atheism underlies much of his pessimism, for if we are little more than overly intelligent apes who came about as the result of billions of years of chaotic random chance, what true meaning or higher purpose do our lives have? If the answer is none, Derbyshire's comprehensive pessimism is not only understandable, it is incontrovertibly logical. However, despite how much its adherents may argue otherwise, atheism is, at its root, a belief in nothing. And people won't fight for nothing. Hence, the sad spectacle of post-Christian Europe being overrun by unassimilable Muslim barbarians while the continent's elites fiddle away carefree. As a writer whom I often quote on this blog has written, "never go to a gunfight without a gun and, if you intend to win, never go to a religious war without religion. You'll lose."

John Derbyshire believes the battle to already be lost. With respect, I disagree. Perhaps it's a cultural difference between the English-born Derbyshire and I, because Texans don't give up the fight so easily. We've lost? I say, "come and take it, you dirty bastards."

Carrera Returns

noreply@blogger.com (Mike LaRoche) — Mon, 24 May 2010 13:00:00 +0000

In his latest novel, The Lotus Eaters, Tom Kratman revisits the saga of Patricio Carrera, the protagonist of his novels A Desert Called Peace and Carnifex. Some eight years after the events in Carnifex, Carrera has settled into a somewhat settled, but troubled life. He is still haunted by the death of his first wife Linda and their children, as well as by the brutal, but effective way in which he ended the war against the Salafists in Pashtia. There is, however, much trouble in the present as well. The Tauran Union maintains its occupation of Balboa's Transitway, propping up the corrupt rump government of President Manuel Rocaberti while the rest of the country is governed by Carrera's allies, led by President Raul Parilla. With the power of Carrera's Legion del Cid - and by extension the government of free Balboa - growing by the day, the Tauran Union faces a dilemma: risk starting a costly war with Carrera and his legion now that might bring in the Federated States of Columbia in on Carrera's side, or simply stand by while Carrera and his allies prosper and grow stronger.

There are, in the novel, three viewpoint characters: Patricio Carrera, Marguerite Wallenstein (the new leader of the United Earth Peace Fleet), and General Janier (the head of the Tauran Union's forces occupying the Balboa Transitway). Wallenstein is seeking to reform the Peace Fleet so that it can become an effective deterrent to the increasingly expansive Terra Novans, all of whom are still unaware of how far Old Earth has fallen under the rule of the Consensus. Janier, understanding the aforementioned crisis facing the Taurans in Balboa, is pushing his superiors to act against Carrera and the Legion del Cid sooner rather than later.

In addition, Carrera's young son Hamilcar (born to his second wife, Lourdes) is beginning to come into his own. Revered by a tribe of Pashtians who consider him to be the avatar of their god Iskandr, Hamilcar is guarded day and night at his home in Balboa by tribal warriors, pledged to defend him to the death. The Pashtian tribesmen prophesy that Hamilcar will some day become a great military leader in his own right, with a legacy that will surpass that of his father.

Interspersed within this story are excerpts of a book titled Historia y Filosofia Moral, written by two prominent characters from the previous novels - Jorge and Marqueli Mendoza. Within these excerpts, the philosophical nature of Balboa's timocratic republican government is discussed. What is a timocracy, you ask? The term derives from the Greek words timē - meaning "honor" - and kratia - meaning "rule". Written of by various ancient Greeks like Solon, Plato, and Aristotle, a timocracy is essentially a government where political power derives from the degree of honor that rulers hold relative to other members of society. In the timocratic republic of Balboa, this honor is acquired via miltary service. The characters Jorge and Marqueli Mendoza argue the case for timocracy thus:

The military mind is rapacious, but that rapacity has limits. It may force life to subordinate itself to the practical needs of war; it will rarely, or never, on its own, force life to subordinate itself to mere fantasy or high sounding theory...

The need for civilian control over the military is not, in any case, based on any presumption that the civilian mind is, on average, wiser or more creative or more moral than the military mind. Indeed, human history provides no unambiguous evidence to support any such proposition. Rather, the moral imperative of civilian control is based on two related factors. One is that, will they, nil they, civilians will be affected, will suffer, from the decision to go to war. This, if nothing else, entitles them to a say in some form, though that say may be no more than the option to have a say, with conditions. The second is that, without adequate civilian support, every serious war effort is ultimately doomed to failure. Failure in war is, of course, the height of immorality.

In any case, civilian control of the military does not mean that those who never served are best suited to exercise control. Rather, those who have never served are not clearly morally fit to control the military. Neither are those who have enjoyed it and made a life. Conversely, those who have served and, duty done, left service, have shown a willingness to do that which they do not like, for the common good...

It is a thought-provoking notion that Kratman puts forth, and one which I enjoyed reading amidst the novel's action and drama. Kratman is clearly well-read in classical history and philosophy, something I've known since our discussions of Thucydides and Victor Davis Hanson on this blog two years prior.

I should also point out that The Lotus Eaters is Kratman's first novel since A State of Disobedience to lack an afterword. However, the aforementioned discussion of timocracy within the novel's pages more than makes up for its absence. While awaiting Kratman's next addition to the series, be sure to check out the excerpts of The Amazon Legion posted on this blog - a story set in the Carrera universe, to which there are a few oblique references in The Lotus Eaters.

Reading is Really Super Swell

noreply@blogger.com (Mike LaRoche) — Sun, 23 May 2010 22:31:00 +0000

Well, it is unless you're a dishonest liberal Democrat activist trying to keep people in the dark so as to see your agenda either enacted or remain unchallenged. Via Mike Wendy at the Polisonic Blog, here is the first example: Texas state representative Mike Villareal (D-San Antonio) on the changes being implemented by the Texas State Board of Education to the social studies (ugh) and economics curricula of public schools:

"They have ignored historians and teachers, allowing ideological activists to push the culture war further into our classrooms," said Rep. Mike Villareal, a San Antonio Democrat. "They fail to understand that we don't want liberal textbooks or conservative textbooks. We want excellent textbooks, written by historians instead of activists."

Villareal's statement is fundamentally deceptive, for he is relying upon people not being aware that many, if not most academic historians are activists themselves, in belief if not always in action. Put the state's history curriculum in the hands of the kind of "historians" of which Villareal speaks and you will get a curriculum with a leftist slant, guaranteed. But Villareal and his ideological ilk are counting on the majority of the general public being unaware of this - and are using this lack of awareness to construct a dichotomy whereby the conservative board members, who are correcting decades of ideological imbalance in the curriculum, are portrayed as extremists ignoring the studious work of apolitical scholars.

So go over to Mike Wendy's blog and read the information at the links he has posted. Villareal's dishonesty is made manifest. Such rank fakery is the norm with liberals and Democrats these days, who love to portray themselves as intellectually superior to conservatives and Republicans while relying upon the naivete of youth and the ignorance of the slums to maintain political power.

As for the second example, consider the avalanche of dishonesty that has been spread about Arizona's recently enacted immigration law, which can be read here. If you take the time to skim through it, you'll be well ahead of many ill-informed Obama administration officials who would prefer that American citizens die along the border due to the violence of illegal immigrants and drug cartels and have the President of Mexico - a joke of a country that is just half-a-step above Somalia on the banana meter - insult the United States of America on the floor of the House of Representatives.

To that end, here's some advice from Governor Jan Brewer of Arizona:

Don't expect such advice to be followed, though. For the present administration, ignorance is bliss...and the path toward retaining their illegitimate authority.

Natural High

noreply@blogger.com (Mike LaRoche) — Tue, 11 May 2010 07:38:00 +0000

Natural High (Merle Haggard)
- Watch more Music Videos at Vodpod.

I was reminded of that song - recorded by Merle Haggard back in 1985 - when reading Dan Simmons's Black Hills. That was probably due to the constant reference to the Sioux as the "Natural Free Human Beings" in the novel, that supposedly being the literal English translation of what the Sioux people call themselves. But I digress.

The novel, Simmons's latest, revolves around a character named Paha Sapa - a name meaning "Black Hills" in the Sioux language - who at the age of seventy is carrying within him an incredible burden: the soul of Lt. Col. George Armstrong Custer. The novel follows two timelines, alternating chapter by chapter. The first one begins in 1876 with an almost eleven-year-old Paha Sapa navigating his way through the chaos at the Battle of Little Bighorn, whereupon he comes across the body of a dying Custer, laying hands upon him and receiving his soul at the moment of death. From there we are taken through Paha Sapa's young adulthood, marriage, birth of his son, up until a meeting with Custer's widow in New York City in the 1930s. The second time line is set in 1936, when Paha Sapa is seventy years old and working as a chief powederman at Mount Rushmore, where Gutzon Borglum is putting the final touches on his sculptural masterpiece, and where Paha Sapa intends to commit a devastating act of enormous destruction to avenge his people.

As is often the case with Dan Simmons's novels - and I have reviewed several of them on this blog - the historical research he puts into the story to surround his fictional characters with an aura of realism is nothing short of remarkable. Along with Custer, other historical figures making a appearance are Custer's wife Libbie (Elizabeth Bacon Custer), Crazy Horse, Doane Robinson, and Henry Adams, among others. He also, towards the end of the novel, seemingly ties the story in with his Hyperion universe - not an entirely surprising development considering that Simmons has used his characters in different stories in the past.

I hesitate to say more as I don't wish to spoil the story for those of you who might wish to read it. I recommend it highly, just as I have done with other books of his reviewed here.

***

Well, today marks the beginning of a few weeks of much needed vacation. I hope to blog more often during my time off. There will be at least one more book review coming: The Lotus Eaters by Tom Kratman. Sorry for being late to respond to comments and e-mails during the past couple of weeks. My readers, though few, are never far from my mind.

A Late Night Symposium

noreply@blogger.com (Mike LaRoche) — Fri, 23 Apr 2010 08:07:00 +0000

On Thursday night I was reading this post by Robert Stacy McCain, in which he gave a stirring defense of his Southern heritage against a despicable group of leftist jackals who, per usual, love to run down the ancestry of those who don't inhabit their insular, rarefied echelons.

Therein, quoting a blog post of his from back in 2009, McCain wrote:

I have frequently described the widespread prejudice against the South as boreal supremacy, the belief that everything about the North is superior to everything about the South. Such prejudice against the South is so common that some people don’t even notice it, but I do, and I resent the hell out of it.

Confronted with the assumption of Northern superiority, some Southerners will react by attempting to ape Northern ways and adopt characteristically Northern attitudes, and start “putting on airs,” as Alabama folks would say. . . .

When I think of my own ancestors — hard-working people who toiled from dawn to sundown on the red clay hills of Alabama — I am quite naturally filled with pride. The suggestion that I should be ashamed of my ancestors is an insult I deeply resent.

In the comments, I responded thusly:

No man should be required to spit on the graves of his ancestors. And I cordially invite anyone who suggests that I do so to get well and truly stuffed.

Blunt, to be sure, but an apt summary of what I think of those who demand that I renounce my heritage and birthright in favor of an ephemeral transnational progressivism. Indeed, that is what many of the Northerners to whom McCain refers truly are: transnational progressives, or "Tranzis" as popularized by the weblog Samizdata and the writer Tom Kratman. Tranzis hate the very notion of tradition, the practice of venerating one's ancestors, of showing pride in one's nation. Their only loyalty is to a homogenized vision of the global community, a vision of a world where the parochial nationalisms of old have been swept away in favor of a limitless, enlightened global progressive state. It is, in short, the vision of such men as Karl Marx, Josef Stalin, Adolf Hitler, Benito Mussolini, and Mao Zedong.

It is an ideal which I despise with every fiber of my being.

In response to my comment above, McCain wrote this accurate observation:

Indeed. I’ve long observed that nothing so bespeaks low character as the habit of routinely speaking ill of one’s parents.

You see this atrocious habit — a mixture of impudence and self-pity — quite commonly among spoiled, selfish youth. And the kind of person who derogates his own family is unwittingly indicting himself. Either (a) they’re as bad as he says they are, in which case, the apple doesn’t usually fall far from the tree, or else (b) he’s cruelly slandering them.

Either way, he’s a bad person whose companionship ought to be avoided as much as possible.

Yes, those who run down their parents and families are implicitly untrustworthy, and crashing bores to boot. Characteristics often shared by many a progressive.

Another commenter, Joe, added:

Now that is well said. We should honor our ancestors.

Frankly I am rather beyond regionalism, however, because so many of us move so often it does not mean that much anymore. I love traveling because I keep finding amazing places every time I do so. If we are really lucky, we find a community where everything clicks and we can raise our families.

Joe makes a good point, for increasingly the divide these days seems to be less along regional lines and more along ideological ones, as evidenced by leftist disdain for the Tea Party movement.

Roxeanne De Luca, though, questioned whether some Northerners be asked to do some grave-spitting of their own in the future:

The way that people in the North look down on their Southern counterparts is nauseating, as is the way that they are utterly apathetic to the suffering that happens someplace outside of a major metropolitan area. The same people who want to throw billions of dollars at every inner-city crack whore would rather disembowel themselves before giving any of their precious government funds to a coal miner’s kids in rural Appalachia. They sneer at Southerners for being racist, but miss the irony that they are doing so from communities that are 99% white.

On a side note, one only wonders if, generations from now, Northerners will be expected to spit on their ancestor’s graves for their fervent support of child-murder – support that went not just to legalisation in their own states, but outright prohibitions on allowing the South to protect human life.

Another good point to consider, I believe.

Finally, McCain himself concluded by sharing this fascinating comparison of Winston Churchill and Robert E. Lee:

Winston Churchill was an ardent admirer of Robert E. Lee, and I think it was because both were men who sought to redeem a family name tarnished by misfortune.

Lee’s father, Light-Horse Harry, had ruined his fortune through reckless business endeavors and involvement in political controversy, which seems to have inspired Lee at an early age to strive for an honorable reputation. Churchill’s father Randolph had also suffered disastrous embarrassment in politics and, as a result, Winston was keenly desirous of recovering for the Churchills the ancient glory of their famed ancestor, Marlborough. I think Churchill took inspiration from Lee in that regard and, of course, succeeded magnificently.

Indeed, the fate of Richard Henry "Lighthorse Harry" Lee is a sad one. I recently came across a vivid account of it in the conclusion to Long, Obstinate, and Bloody: The Battle of Guilford Courthouse by Lawrence E. Babits and Joshua B. Howard. Lighthorse Harry Lee was a veteran of the bitter defeat at Guilford Courthouse. Afterward, following the American Revolution's ultimate success, Lee carved out a successful political career for himself, but after leaving the House of Representatives in 1801, his fortunes declined. Lee went bankrupt and was sentenced to debtors prison in 1807 and was released in 1810. Two years later, on a business trip in Baltimore, Lee was attacked by an enraged mob of Democratic-Republican party supporters after having tried to save a friend of his from their wrath. According to Babits and Howard:

The ruffians beat Lee senseless, inflicting serious injuries to his internal organs and head. The wounds to his face severely limited his speech, and Lee, disfigured, discredited, and despondent, fled to the West Indies. While returning to the United States in 1818, he was shipwrecked off the Georgia coast. He appeared, physically demolished and thoroughly drunk, on the doorstep of [Nathanael] Greene's summer home, Dungeness. He died there, age sixty-two, in the care of his former commander's daughter on 25 March, ten days after the thirty-seventh anniversary of Guilford Courthouse.

I have little doubt that Lighthorse Harry's miserable fate made an indelible impression upon his then 11-year-old son Robert. But Robert E. Lee worked diligently to restore his family name, and did so successfully. We should all be moved to honor our forebears so.

This coming Sunday, however, I will be honoring a milestone of my own - my 35th birthday. It's been an interesting but fruitful year since my last one. I hope my good fortune continues, and I hope to be blogging more often soon. But in the meantime, the demands of my "real world" life must be met.

Until next time...

Who is Truly Progressive?

noreply@blogger.com (Mike LaRoche) — Tue, 06 Apr 2010 13:00:00 +0000

A couple of weeks ago I posted a comment at the Polisonic Blog - which is run by Mike Wendy of the Progress and Freedom Foundation - referencing an old quote by Calvin Coolidge. In light of the federal government's recent move to nationalize America's health care industry, I have grown angry and frustrated at how proponents of this horrible, liberty-destroying abomination have portrayed it as progressive and forward thinking. Some eighty-four years ago President Coolidge, speaking of the Declaration of Independence, had some choice words in response to the notion that liberty is regressive and socialism progressive:

“If all men are created equal, that is final. If they are endowed with inalienable rights, that is final. If governments derive their just power from the consent of the governed, that is final. No advance, no progress can be made beyond these propositions. If anyone wishes to deny their truth and their soundness, the only direction in which he can proceed historically is not forward, but backward toward the time when there was no equality, no rights of the individual, no rule of the people. Those who wish to proceed in that direction cannot lay claim to progress. They are reactionary.”

Indeed they are. Furthermore, calls for economic “equality” are merely a cover for leftist politicians who want to restrict political competition to the greatest degree possible. In a free-market economy where one can gain wealth freely without excessive taxation or other disincentivizing penalties, people will generally be in a far better position to challenge entrenched political authority. Socialism is little more than a way of calcifying a class-system that has been molded to the liking of the political left.

Conservatives are not reactionary, their opponents are.

Update:

Thanks to Bob Reed at Piece of Work in Progress for the kind mention!

The Easter Conspiracy

noreply@blogger.com (Mike LaRoche) — Sun, 04 Apr 2010 22:33:00 +0000

A couple of years ago, a mysterious person named "Whitley Strieber is God" appeared in the comments to one of Nancy Catmull Matocha's blog posts and posted this disturbing story:

The Easter Bunny.

Just harmless little old Peter Cottontail, right? A symbol of cuteness and innocous happiness? Or, rather, the figurehead of an insidious marketing plan by one of the world's largest and most devious industries?

Prior to the mid 1950's, aside from greeting cards, stories, popular songs and children's toys, the Easter Bunny was virtually unheard of by the general public. That was all about to change.

The candy industry was in a record slump. The popularity of television had eaten into their sales, and they had no idea how to turn the tide. They needed something to combat this new invention, or else the production of would end forever. There had to be a hook, something to get the kids "turned on" to their product. For, if Big Candy could get new users early, they'd have them for life.

Harmless furry mascot? Or insidious corporate shill? You be the judge.

The usual tactics weren't working- including baseball statistic cards with gum, producing multi-colored "lollipops" to appeal to simple-minded children, gum which could be inflated without the use of air tanks, etc. Sales continued to plummet.

Then, when things appeared darkest, in February of 1954, a young executive with the Metzger Confectionary Product Company of Woechester, Mass. hit upon an idea that would creep its way into the minds of children for decades to come. Instead of eggs, why couldn't this "The Son Of the Creator Raising From The Grave Anthropormorphic Rabbit" (as it was known then) be renamed? Something catchy- "The Easter Bunny," perhaps. And maybe, just maybe, instead of eggs in that basket, why not candy?

The heads of the candy syndicates were ecstatic. They were sure that this concept, this icon of a big friendly bunny bringing candy -their precious candy- to millions of children, would be the savior for their industry. Millions were poured into an adveritsing and promotional blitz. Powerful industry lobbyists convinced Congress and the Catholic Church to make Easter a holiday. Ads were run around the clock on television, whose programming day usually ended at 8 pm, allowing for nothing but candy/Easter Bunny propaganda for twelve hours a day. Men in Bunny suits were dispatched to department stores to occupy the seat where Santa had held court only months before. In a bit of a marketing coup, Paul Harvey even mentioned this "Easter Bunny" on his radio program in the weeks before Easter.

It paid off. Sales of candy that Easter quintupled even the most optimistic expectations that the Big Candy executives had made. The industry was saved. But, more importantly, a powerful industry had created a powerful icon, a juggernaut. A great big furry stooge that could be used at their whim.

Everyone wanted in- the American Dental Association, lobbyists for diabetes drug manufacturers, the celophane industry- you name it. The candy companies welcomed them with open arms. Everyone shared in the big candy money pot. Money that funded weapons to Iraq, two Pat Buchanan bids for the presidency, the assassinations of countless Central American dictators and god knows what else. Money that comes from millions upon millions of people who buy candy each and every year. The evil has only come to light in the last year, with states such as Florida and Montana filing lawsuits against the candy companies on behalf of residents who have lived with decades of tooth decay.

So, this year, before you pick up your Easter Bunny greeting cards, your Easter Bunny pictures to hang around the house, the Easter Bunny dolls for the kids, the "basket" and the candy to fill it- remember what that smiling, flop-eared guy represents. The evil behind those cute, cute bunny eyes.

Remember.

So, do remember to keep an extra eye out for any mysterious critters on this fine Easter Sunday. The truth is out there...way out there. ;)

When You're Hot, You're Hot...

noreply@blogger.com (Mike LaRoche) — Wed, 31 Mar 2010 05:35:00 +0000

...and when you're not, you're not. So said the poet and country music singer Jerry Reed more than three decades ago. And Jeff Goldstein has been on fire lately, continuing to write pointed and eloquent analyses of the fate of classical liberal thought in modern-day academe. On March 29, Goldstein posted an entry titled "Progressivism means never having to say you're sorry", wherein he referenced this New Yorker article by Jill Lepore. Goldstein's entry and Lepore's article concern eugenics and political progressivism, both of which were closely linked in the early decades of the early twentieth century. Lepore is distraught at the fact that critics of progressivism, like Jonah Goldberg, have noted this embarrassing linkage, and are incredulous that contemporary progressives like Lepore disingenuously try to tie eugenics to modern-day conservatism, even though early twentieth-century conservatives were staunch opponents of such racialist pseudo-science. Lepore writes:

It has become a commonplace, on the right, to label eugenics “progressive” (in order, presumably, to make the word “progressive” as ugly a smear as “liberal”). Eugenics dates to the Progressive Era, when it was faddish. Early on, and particularly before the First World War, it was embraced by reformers on the left, from Jane Addams to Woodrow Wilson, but the movement that lasted was, at heart, profoundly conservative, atavism disguised as reform. After a while, but nowhere near soon enough, the disguise got pretty flimsy. In “The Eugenics Cult,” an essay that Clarence Darrow wrote in 1926, a year after defending Scopes, he judged that he would rather live in a nation of ill-matched misfits and half-wits than submit to the logic of a bunch of cocksure “uplifters.” “Amongst the schemes for remolding society,” Darrow wrote, “this is the most senseless and impudent that has ever been put forward by irresponsible fanatics to plague a long-suffering race.”

Goldstein responds:

How an eventual repudiation of eugenics by progressives means that the discipline of eugenics is itself therefore conservative in nature, is never addressed. Presumably, we’re simply to accept that what progressivism is ultimately against, that being (by its own definition) the opposite of progress, must of necessity be “conservative” and supported by conservatives and conservative ideology. Which, while it is certainly convenient to define your political enemies by your own ideology and policy mistakes and lapses in judgment, doesn’t mean having done so is proof of the argument’s plausibility, particularly in the absence of evidence supporting the assertion, and in direct contradiction to the preponderance of evidence that shows such an argument to be absurd on its face.

In short, Lepore is arguing that since eugenics was eventually (and rightly) determined to be foolish and immoral, it must therefore be "conservative". Such an argument is simplistic, ahistorical, and unbecoming an academic of Lepore's stature, yet it is accepted without question amongst the academic left-elite.

So the larger question, from my own standpoint, is this: why do prominent and accomplished academics like Jill Lepore, whose The Name of War is a classic of American cultural history, manage to write such tripe as the aforementioned New Yorker article without any hint of embarrassment?

In another entry posted on March 30, Goldstein provides a stellar answer:

...from the perspective of the modern academy, the only legitimate politics — bracketing out the hoary old conservatism of, say, Burke, which is studied as a curio — is the politics of “social justice,” that is, the politics of modern left-liberalism or “progressivism.” Being on the “right,” therefore, is not considered being “political” at all — except in the pragmatic sense that those on the right somehow, maddeningly, are still allowed to vote, and so upset the inexorable path of “cultural evolution” toward a progressive singularity. Instead, classical liberals, non-libertine libertarians, and conservatives — more often than not referred to simply as “right wingers” or (and this is one and the same nowadays) “the far right” — are cast as a populist nuisance, a collection of rabble controlled by the basest of impulses, from racism to nativism to homophobia to xenophobia. They are, in effect, outside politics proper — which is now cast as a system in which the State is guarantor of rights and “justice,” included in which is a move toward equality of outcome (and so, like it or not, socialism) — and are dealt with only as a rock in the shoe of the climb toward social Utopia.

To be on the left, then, is (by the rules of the modern academy) to be “political” — and being political carries with it the heady suggestion of being a serious thinker. Whereas to be on the right is to mark yourself as someone in need of re-education, at best — and should that fail, as someone to be either punished or, ultimately, shunned.

Precisely. And yet, despite encountering such out-of-hand dismissals of conservatism from my own colleagues, over the better part of a decade, I persist in trying to carve out an academic career in the social sciences and humanities, where revelation of my own right-of-center thought could be a potential, probably likely, career-ender. I must be insane.

But some battles are worth the fighting for.

In at the Death

noreply@blogger.com (Mike LaRoche) — Sun, 28 Mar 2010 05:30:00 +0000

So much for academic freedom, not that it has ever really existed in my lifetime. It has been dead for some time now. On Friday, Jeff Goldstein posted an entry titled "The Lie of the Liberal Arts Education," telling of his recently being contacted by a former professor who demanded to be removed from the "about" page of Protein Wisdom (Goldstein's blog), where Goldstein lists his educational background and former affiliations. Evidently, the good professor is not happy that one of his former students is posting political rhetoric which he finds "alarming". Now what sort of political rhetoric would that be? Goldstein writes:

I checked over my recent entries, and I saw a discussion on the expansion of the commerce clause by Scalia; a discussion of “process” and how it dovetails with the content of thought; a bit on language; a repudiation of the idea of cultural evolution as a move toward some progressive singularity; a discussion of the potential longterm political ramifications — particularly, the growth of a client class — that could arise in the wake of a law that nationalizes healthcare; a short fiction; a Leif Garrett post; and a couple of Corey Haim dispatches from the after life.

What also alarmed the professor was that Darleen Click - one of Goldstein's co-bloggers on Protein Wisdom - posted a political cartoon about what Barack Obama and his ilk did to our liberties with the recent vote to nationalize America's health care industry. The professor seems to think that the cartoon reinforces some taboo racial stereotype - a reaction which is, of course, a common and predictable leftist response to any criticism directed at Obama. Again, Goldstein writes:

His position seems to be that allowing Darleen’s comic to stand — the President raping lady liberty “is not a political cartoon and you know it,” he told me — was sick and irresponsible, the abetting of a civil evil that is far worse than, say, drawing Bush as Hitler, or insinuating an American President manufactured a war and sent men and woman off to die so he could expand his portfolio.

Indeed, the professor's avenue of alarm is a decidedly one way street: free speech for me, but not for thee. That attitude has effectively brought about what Goldstein calls a "soft civil war", or what William Gibson refers to as a "cold civil war" in his novel Spook Country. There is no longer any true common political ground in this country between right and left, and the implications of that fact are truly frightening.

If you are employed in certain professional fields, like academia, you no longer have freedom of speech, only the freedom to parrot what your leftist colleagues say lest your career be put in jeopardy. That is no way to live, and it is why any love or respect I ever had for academia died long ago.

The long, cold night approaches, and dawn is but a distant dream.

Lady Liberty Down

noreply@blogger.com (Mike LaRoche) — Tue, 23 Mar 2010 12:00:00 +0000

With the dreadful vote by the House of Representatives on Sunday night to nationalize our country's health care system, America's days as a military superpower may be coming to an end. The annexation of one-sixth of the economy is going to cost money that the federal government does not have, and higher taxes will not be enough to make up the difference. There will be cuts in the defense budget should this travesty be fully implemented, putting American lives at risk to subsidize the Democratic Party's growing constituency of dependent ne'er-do-wells.

But here is the real killer: there will be no one to bail us out of this disaster as we bailed out Great Britain when they made their ill-fated decision to journey down the road of medical Bolshevism back in 1946. China now has the opportunity to reclaim the position of world preeminence that it mysteriously threw away during the Ming Dynasty after the voyages of Cheng Ho. Hu Chin-t’ao and his technocratic Marxist confederates will seize that opportunity as soon as they are able. To think otherwise is to fool oneself.

Now, given that this blog is run by an admitted Texas nationalist, there is the unavoidable question that must be addressed: is it time to restore the Lone Star Republic? Tom Kratman and I have discussed the issue here and here. The matter of secession is not one to be considered lightly. As I mentioned last December, Thucydides wrote in his History of the Peloponnesian War that those Greek states which suffered worst were ones like Corcyra, riven by revolution. Once a Greek naval power second only to Athens herself, civil war brought "every form of iniquity" to Corcyra and caused it to crumble:

Words had to change their ordinary meaning and to take that which was now given them. Reckless audacity came to be considered the courage of a loyal ally; prudent hesitation, specious cowardice; moderation was held to be a cloak for unmanliness; ability to see all sides of a question, inaptness to act on any. Frantic violence became the attribute of manliness; cautious plotting, a justifiable means of self-defense. The advocate of extreme measures was always trustworthy; his opponent a man to be suspected.

So is secession the answer? Not yet, but we are a few minutes closer to midnight.

I suspect that some who read this might think me some sort of extremist for bringing up the s-word. Hardly. Secession is not an extremist position in Texas - even our governor likes to invoke it from time-to-time - and it is quintessentially American, as evidenced by the man who wrote these words:

When in the Course of human events it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.

But we are not yet out of options - the monstrosity known as ObamaCare can be repealed. The first step is to oust the Democratic Party from power in Congress this coming November,which is an achievable and increasingly likely goal.

The second is to ignore the poseurs and consistency freaks who make a habit of blaming "neocons" for anything and everything, usually as a thin cover for their own biases and inadequacies. Politics in an open society entails coalition building, get over it. Why should consistency be considered such a great political virtue anyway? Flies are consistent: all they do is eat, defecate, and bother people.

The third is to take back the White House from the socialist tyrant Barack Hussein Obama in 2012. This final step will not be easy, and there will be heavy resistance from the Jonestown left, but it is not an unreachable objective.

With politics, as with history, nothing is inevitable. To believe that transnational progressivism is an immutable, unstoppable global trend trend is an ahistorical, defeatist outlook pushed by the very type of people who a generation ago claimed the Soviet Union was a permanent geopolitical fixture. If America ceases to be a great nation, it will be because its people choose sloth, indolence, and mediocrity. That is a choice that I, for one, will never accept.

The Amazon Legion (Chapter 6) by Tom Kratman

noreply@blogger.com (Mike LaRoche) — Fri, 12 Mar 2010 09:20:00 +0000

Navigation Links for The Amazon Legion:

Prelude & Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6

Chapter Six

May all our citizens be soldiers, and all our soldiers citizens.

--Sarah Livingston Jay

Maria:

They couldn’t give it to us; it had to come from inside; inside ourselves.

I can’t speak for everybody; not for all the Amazonas. I can only tell you what I felt; what happened to me.

You remember how Centurion Garcia had made a bunch of us “pregnant,” making the rest of us carry their gear. Well that was imposed; we hated him every step of the way. And most of us, by this stage in our training would almost rather drop down dead than “get knocked up.” Certainly we wouldn’t ask to see the medics over little discomforts, as we might have if some other women hadn’t had to carry our load for us if we did.

I wonder, though, if we’d have been so reluctant if there had been some young men around to carry our gear for us. It’s just possible they wouldn’t even have minded, stupid boys. I sometimes think that men are overgrown babies whose spoiling of us often keeps us from quite growing up ourselves.

Or maybe we keep each other from ever quite growing up.

One impossibly late night after another impossibly long day I went to bed (not a real bed, of course, just my tacky air mattress under a strung out poncho). I was feeling a little poorly, nothing definite, just a general feeling of inner rottenness. But by morning I really was sick: dizzy, throwing up, a fever, too. I still don't know what it was that got me, influenza, bug bite, or reaming rod of randomness.

Unfortunately, we had another road march – heavy packs – scheduled for that morning. To add injury to insult, I had to carry the machine gun. I couldn’t; I just couldn’t.

The cadre had been dropping girls right and left of late. Less than half of those who had started were still with us. The rest were, like me, pretty much at their limit.

Curiously, again like me, it had also become extremely important to all but a tiny number of those remaining to complete training. Whatever it was: unwillingness to go home as failures, a real need for the benefits that went with service, some stirrings of pride in being soldiers, I don’t know.

In my case I had to finish training...for Alma’s sake.

I think Marta noticed me first, throwing up outside the perimeter. She came up and asked me, gently, what was wrong. I threw up again and started to cry for Alma; and for the life I’d hoped to build for us. I knew I’d never make the march. I’d be a failure. And they’d boot me out.

She held me a minute or two, kissed my forehead. She told me it would be all right. Then she took my machine gun, throwing it up on her shoulder with a grunt. In a few minutes Inez Trujillo came up, she and the rest of the squad. With hardly a word they took my pack apart; splitting up my gear among them. They hung the empty pack on my back. Trujillo told two of the girls – Isabel and Catarina – to help me. They got on either side of me and put my arms over their shoulders.

If Garcia even noticed or cared he never let on. He just called us to attention, gave us a “left face,” took his position at the front, and ordered us to march.

The first few miles were bad, but I still had a little strength in me; just enough to keep going. The next nine or ten miles were worse, because I didn’t have that strength left by then, but I couldn’t drop out after having let the other girls put themselves through hell having to carry me for the first few miles. Funny thing, pride, no?

I don't like to think about that march too often. It was bad. Half the time I was nearly delirious. Most of the rest I was puking. The girls helping me didn’t say a bad word even when I threw up right on them, though the stench made them start to gag, too.

Now you might say those women did nothing special; that if they hadn’t taken my gear willingly, Garcia would have made them. That’s true, they had to carry my equipment if I couldn’t.

But they didn’t have to carry me. That they did on their own.

It’s hard not to love a group like that.

*****

There was a funny upshot of that incident. Without a word of explanation Garcia had us turn in those miserable poles, the “pricks,” the next day. They were carried away on a truck. He never reissued them. We never gave him cause to.

Fortunately, we spent the next four days in the same general area, learning how to conduct raid, ambush and reconnaissance patrols. We did make some cross-country moves, but they were fairly short moves; without heavy packs.

Mostly, they left me behind to help secure the Objective Rally Point, or ORP. That’s the last position where your patrol – usually squad or platoon sized – stops, short of the actual place where you set up the ambush or do the recon or raid.

If I hadn’t been sick, it might have been fun. I know most of the other girls thought it was. Though, by then, they would probably have to be considered a little weird. Being in the ORP wasn’t so bad. Still, I was usually alone.

Actually, I hoped I was alone. There was always the chance of a snake showing up to keep me company. I hate snakes. And the antaniae? The moonbats? I am frankly scared to death of them. The thought of one crawling into my sleeping roll with me is enough to pull me to my feet, shivering, no matter how tired I am. As soon as I was remotely able to keep up I insisted that I not be left behind in the ORP anymore. If the other girls thought that was because I was tough, I did nothing to disabuse them of the notion.

*****

It was early one morning, following a less than fully successful ambush and while we waited for chow, that I cornered Trujillo. The others, especially Marta, Cat and Isabel, I’d already expressed my gratitude to.

“Inez...thank you,” was all I said.

She just shook her head, as if she didn’t quite understand.

“For carrying me. For getting the others to carry me.” I looked down at the ground, ashamed, actually.

“Wouldn’t you have done the same for us?”

I don't know if I would have before, I really don’t. But I nodded, as if I was certain I would have.

“So what’s to thank? We’re in this together. We help each other.”

The subject was a little uncomfortable. I changed it. “Why are you here, Inez? I mean...I joined to try to build a better life for myself and my daughter. But why did you join?”

“I thought it was the right thing to do,” was all she said.

“There was a man,” I reminded her, “back when we first got on the hovercraft to come here. He was something special to you? A boyfriend? A lover?”

She looked confused for a minute, then started to laugh. “Lover? Ricardo is my brother! He’s in Third Tercio. He’s probably at Centurion School now.”

“Are you going to try for that? Centurion, I mean.”

“I’ll take what they offer me, if they offer me anything,” she answered.

“They will. You’re different from the rest of us, different from me, for example.”

“Maria,” she said, with a subtle smile, “do you think we carried you and your gear because we thought you were worthless?”

I really didn’t know what to say to that.

*****

Somewhere nearby artillery was falling and exploding. Garcia paid it no mind, though it made the rest of us pretty nervous.

He said, “Many armies spend an inordinate effort, I understand, on limiting the effects of friendly fire. We don’t spend much. We’re soldiers. We’re there to be killed if the country needed us to be killed. We’re there to win, even if doing so gets us killed.

“You might not expect it to be true, but it is true, that the infantry only inflicts twenty or thirty percent of all casualties in battle. We take, on the other hand, about ninety percent of the casualties. Who kills us? The enemy artillery. Who among us does the killing? The machine guns. What kills or suppresses the machine gunners? Your own artillery.”

Garcia pulled a tetradrachma coin from his pocket and flipped it to illustrate. “Now you have a choice. You can stay so far behind your own supporting artillery that there is no chance of any of your own being hit by it. If you do, the enemy machine gunners will be up and firing when you attack. Two years into the Great Global War, there was an attack. Twenty-five thousand Anglians were killed, as many more wounded, on the first day alone, by a few dozen machine gunners that hadn’t been suppressed or destroyed by the Anglian artillery.”

He flipped the coin again. “On the other hand, you can follow your own artillery so closely that you take some losses in dead and wounded from your own side. Quality control at the factory – or lack thereof – ensures that if you follow a barrage closely, some shells will fall short among your own troops. But then, you can be on top of the machine guns, shooting, stabbing, hacking and blasting before they have a chance to mow your people down.”

His face took on a somber, serious cast. “How sad for those killed by their own side’s artillery.” The frown disappeared, replaced by a rare and ghastly grin. “How grand, however, for those likely much larger numbers not killed by the enemy machine guns. And the dead don’t really care what killed them.

“We go in for the second approach, taking losses to ‘friendly fire’ somewhat more philosophically than the world norm. It takes a lot of discipline, though, and that means a lot of training. Some of that can be inferential training, general discipline building. It’s better, though, if the training is a little more direct and pointed. Move out.”

*****

I was scared to death. Garcia wasn’t just flapping his gums about following a barrage closely. He wanted us to do it.

“Madre de Dios! Did you see that?” Marta stopped short, slack-jawed, to see a woman sail about fifteen feet into the air, arms and legs fluttering. The woman landed, stunned, it appeared, but otherwise fairly whole, a few meters from where a delay-fused shell had gone off not too far from under her feet. The woman was lucky the shell had missed her head before burying itself in the ground.

“Don’t think about it,” Cristina Zamora shouted. “Just keep marching forward. Forward!” Zamora was acting platoon centurion for the exercise.

About seventy-five meters ahead of where Marta and I stood, a wall of flying dirt moved relentlessly up a steep hill. They were firing delay fuses, but that was the only safety measure I could see, that kicked up a visually impressive amount of dirt and rocks with each burst.

We resumed walking forward, firing short bursts either from the hip or, shoulder held, aiming with the F- and M-26’s neat little integral optical sight. Look, anything you can throw at the enemy to keep his head down is worth the effort. Besides, walking is a lot faster and less exhausting than doing little three second rushes. In battle, an exhausted Amazona is a fear-filled and useless Amazona.

As we neared the top of the hill, the shell fire shifted a last time and redoubled in intensity. Zamora spoke into a radio, then shouted, “Wait for it!”

The delay fused high explosive was replaced by a dozen rounds of white phosphorus. A cloud of smoke enveloped the hilltop.

“Adelante las Amazonas!” We charged, screaming and firing all the way.

*****

For whatever reasons, and each of us probably had her own, we did develop something like esprit de corps. Or, rather, most of us did. A few couldn’t. Life for them became very hard, because, as the overwhelming bulk of us still remaining bonded together, the others were left out in the cold. Some were encouraged into the group by that. Others just shut down before being washed out.

Probably no one suffered more from this than Gloria. I guess she was so used to being the center of attention that she just couldn’t take being cut out. Cut out, however, she certainly was. Oh, she tried to pretend that she felt what we felt. I’ll tell you something, though; we women are much better judges of character than men are. Gloria fooled no one.

She took to hanging around one of the Corporal-Instructors, Corporal Salazar. Salazar’s partner, Sergeant Castro, noticed, eventually. I remember a screaming match that ended only when Centurion Franco knocked them both silly.

It was about that time that Gloria stopped being put on shit detail.

I guess Salazar wasn’t entirely gay. Eventually, he and Gloria were caught engaged in...shall we say...an indiscretion. Maybe the worst part is that Castro’s the one who caught them. Maybe, if Castro hadn’t been so upset, he might have kept it to himself. He was a good man, ordinarily, a lot kinder than most.

Some of us were selected to sit in on the courts-martial, just to witness, not to sit the board. Salazar just sat, mute. Gloria kept begging for the chance to resign. It was too late. Castro wept a lot, as quietly as he could. I felt sorry for him.

The two were each charged with mutiny and aggravated fraternization. Salazar was further charged with aggravated abuse of office (improper sexual relations) and adultery; Gloria with conduct tending to contribute to the demoralization of the Legion and adultery. (Did I mention that the partnerships in Gorgidas were treated as legal marriages in the Legion?)

The evidence was pretty damned overwhelming. Castro had seen them. There was some semen from Salazar on Gloria’s uniform. It had obviously not been rape, though Gloria tried to claim it had been. I think what ruined that defense is that Gloria still had her teeth and, under the particular circumstances, could have been expected to use them to considerable effect, had it really been rape or, more technically, forcible sodomy. Besides, we were supposed to be real soldiers, ready to fight and die. How could one of us hope to claim rape if she’d been conscious but hadn’t fought to death or, at least, incapacitation or been physically overwhelmed by sheer brute force? What was true of civilian women could never really be true for us.

Mutiny? When two or more soldiers combine to suborn good order and discipline in the armed forces, that is mutiny. Salazar and Gloria made two. They were certainly...ah...combined, at the time. The predictable effect of sexual relations between people of substantially different ranks is to suborn good order and discipline. We are responsible for the predictable effects of our actions just as if we intended them. There was no evidence put on that Salazar or Gloria had any defensible reason to believe this would not be the effect if discovered, nor that they would not be discovered (though disbelief in discovery was no defense anyway). So: Mutiny.

The penalty is death. As a matter of fact, failure to report or suppress a mutiny by any means – including summary execution – is also punished by death. I guess poor Castro didn’t have a lot of choice. If he’d shot them both on the spot he’d probably have been commended.

Unfortunately, he didn’t. When the verdicts and sentence came back they were, “Guilty on all counts” and “Death by Musketry,” respectively. It took less than twenty-four hours for Carrera to confirm the sentences. There was no appeal, certainly not to an ignorant civil court. The President of the Republic could have intervened, had he so chosen. He did not so choose.

We made up the firing squads ourselves, for Gloria, while the Tercio Gorgidas provided the one for Salazar. They were picked, not volunteers. None of us would have volunteered, even if we didn’t like Gloria. We couldn’t refuse the order, either. Some tribune from Gorgidas that I’d never seen before commanded both. The firing squads stood nervously in ranks as the prisoners were marched out of their cells. I understand that of the twelve rifles, two had only blanks in them. That was so the girls and gays who’d been picked to execute the sentences could console themselves that – just maybe – they hadn’t really been shooting.

The sky was that shade of deep blue you see just before sunrise. Many times in training I had thrilled to wake up, stand and stretch, and feel the planet come alive around me at just that hour. I didn’t feel any thrill now, though. Those of us not in the firing parties stood in formation to one side to witness. I shook. I doubt I was alone.

Salazar took it fairly well. He marched out to the wall under guard but also under his own power. He stumbled, once, but that was just the darkness. Salazar shook his head “No” when he was offered the blindfold (a mistake, by the way; people who are going to shoot you in cold blood get nervous if you’re looking at them. Nervous people don't shoot well.).

Gloria had to be carried; tied, and screaming all the way. While Salazar was allowed to stand, and given a cigarette to smoke (yes, we really do that for these things), Gloria was trussed up to a stake. She kept squirming, though. A sergeant pasted aiming markers over each of their hearts, after bending his head to listen for the heartbeat. Salazar shouted out to Castro, “I’m sorry!”

Some large flood lights were lit on the order of Tribune Silva. The Gorgidas tribune shouted, “Ready,” and the firing squads lifted their rifles parallel to the ground... “Aim,” and the muzzles shifted imperceptibly...then “Fire!” There was a sound like a single shot, but longer.

I saw fluid (blood, I suppose) and bits of flesh shoot from out of their backs to spatter against the wall behind them. Salazar was thrown back against the stake, then fell to the ground. The impact of the bullets twisted Gloria half way around her stake. She slumped against the ropes that bound her to it. They were both still breathing; we could see that by the flood lights. Salazar seemed unconscious but alive. Gloria was trying to scream, but only blood and an occasional faint “coo” that was probably her best effort at a shriek, came out of her mouth.

The junior tribune ordered the firing parties to, “Order arms.” Then he marched to Salazar and shot him, once, in the back of the head, behind his ear. Unlike the members of a firing squad, there are no blanks for the officer commanding them. If you can’t kill you have no business being an officer. Salazar convulsed, then stopped breathing. The tribune walked a few more steps, took aim, and shot Gloria the same way. Her body shuddered violently but the cooing that passed for shrieking stopped. It was a mercy.

Garcia marched us away. We didn’t sing as we marched. I know I felt sick. I doubt I was alone in that. That night Marta cried herself to sleep on my shoulder.

Castro hanged himself from the limb of a tree a week later.

Was it right, what they did to those two? I’ve asked myself that question for many years now.

It was such a small thing in itself; what Gloria and Salazar did, I mean. Oh, sure, one or two of us might have pulled an extra shit detail because Gloria had been selling herself for consideration. (Or maybe it would be better said – more charitably said – that she’d been given consideration for giving herself. Didn’t matter, the effect was the same in either case.) Still, I’d have gladly pulled an extra detail or two if it would have spared me having to watch their deaths. I didn’t like the bitch, not even a little bit, or Salazar either. But I sure didn’t want them dead.

Franco called us together after Castro hanged himself, to talk to us. He was ready to puke himself; you could see that. Maybe he was talking to convince himself; I wouldn’t know. But there were tears in his eyes. I am certain of that.

“I remember an old line,” he began, “something about military justice being to justice as military music is to music. It’s both true and false. For one thing, military music can be of a fairly high artistic order, if art is that which causes emotional catharsis. Listen to Beethoven’s Yorckische Marsch sometime, if you don’t believe me; or Boinas Azules Cruzan la Frontera played on war pipes.

“The saying is true, though, in another respect. Military music serves primarily the cause of battle and so does military justice. It is concerned with the rights and privileges of individuals only to the extent that they may also serve the cause of battle. Battle in turn serves the cause of the country. The country, too, has an interest in winning as cheaply as possible, in terms of human life. Next generation’s quota of cannon fodder has to come from somewhere, doesn’t it?

“Well doesn’t it?” He sounded imploring. I think maybe Salazar may have been a friend. Or Castro…maybe both.

“So maybe the question isn’t whether it was just to have shot those two for such a trivial affair. Maybe the question is whether it would have been injustice to the country – which is to say, injustice also to the country’s soldiers, which is to say you and I – not to have shot them.

“Maybe you think the Court should have been lenient. Let’s suppose the court-martial board had been lenient. Suppose – despite the evidence – it had not found them guilty of mutiny. They could have received sentences of between twenty-five years, for Gloria, and forty years, for Salazar, on the other charges alone; all of that, by the way, being at hard labor, or until they died of it. Prison in this country is roughly analogous to state slavery, after all.”

Franco paused, as if not sure to continue. He did continue, though.

“Well, maybe Salazar wasn’t the only one of your trainers capable of having an interest in a woman. Hell, I used to have a girlfriend myself. Yeah, it was a long time ago. These things are often relative, not absolute. And maybe Gloria wasn’t the only one of us who might have...given herself for consideration. So, don’t you see? We had to shoot them. We had to.”

I thought about that then…I do so still. Truthfully, I don’t know that I wouldn’t have done what Gloria did. Yes, it was that rough sometimes. In fact, the only ones in my platoon I am sure wouldn’t have were Inez Trujillo and Cristina Zamora – they were just too completely soldierly and decent – and Marta. Though she had her own reasons.

“Does it matter,” Franco continued, “if a leader is sleeping with a troop? Does it make a difference to an armed force that its leaders are treating some of its troops unfairly because they are sleeping with others? Will those troops being discriminated against have equal faith in their leaders when they suspect that those same leaders care a lot more for some other troops than they do for them? When we’re talking about instincts and feelings, does it even matter if the suspicion is valid or merely conjecture?

“There is some justice in equally shared dangers in war. How does a soldier take it when she might be going on an exceptionally dangerous night patrol so some other troop can warm his or her squad leader’s bed that same night? How about the third or fourth time they have to go on a really bad mission that ought go to the squad leader’s playmate?

“Oh, yes. Of course, once a war starts we’ll forget all the unofficial lessons we learned in peacetime about our leaders and the way they do business. Right. Of course.

“And I’m the Queen of Anglia.” Franco shook his head.

“No, Salazar betrayed you and us, both. It was maybe a small betrayal, but it was real. And you would have lost faith not just in him, but – to an extent – in all your leaders, then and in the future, if he’d gotten away with it.”

I suppose he was right about that. No, I know he was.

“And the woman? She was actually fairly capable in a lot of ways. She was quite bright. Her political instincts were obviously pretty high, too. She’d sure known where to give – or sell – herself to the greatest effect. Imagine if she’d actually made it past training. Imagine a unit of the tercio led by her. Who might have been next on her list of acquisitions? What would the rest of the girls have felt if Gloria had made high rank based on de facto prostitution while they struggled along just trying to be good soldiers? How long would the rest of you have kept trying, do you suppose?

“Then, too, she’d also betrayed Castro, another soldier; a comrade, who had a right to expect loyalty from any other soldier in the Legion. Forget about Castro killing himself a week later. Even if he hadn’t committed suicide, he would never again have been the same soldier he had been.

“A pretty good one, by the way. A decent human being, too.”

*****

I think about those executions quite often, even now. I’m sorry they had to be done. I’m not sorry they were done.

Of course, the Legions have nothing against sex, per se. I have it on pretty reliable authority from a woman who knew Duque Carrera in much his younger days that he was something of a satyr. Presidente Parilla was worse. Most male leaders are married and many keep a mistress, too. There’s no law against it. Most Amazon leaders are married or living with someone of an appropriate rank. And the Legions absolutely only care about adultery that really is to the detriment of good order and discipline; with a comrade’s spouse or partner, typically, or an underling. A trooper can screw the world and the Legion won’t care unless it hurts the Legion.

Get caught screwing someone you oughtn’t, however, and go to the wall. No excuses.

And if there’s no chance of your ever going to go into a battle, you have as much right to comment on that as a man does to comment on a woman’s right to an abortion. Some, not much.

So, yes, we can play, more or less like real people. That doesn’t mean someone can play with us without permission, though.

*****

Last of all the clothing issues they made to us, we were issued our parade dress uniforms. The uniform is still the same, even after all these years. Kilts.

I’ve always thought that made sense. They’re warlike. It can’t be said that kilts are really either masculine or feminine. They look good on both sexes. And they are distinctly more flattering to women than shapeless skirts or baggy trousers. I understand Carrera (one of his aides, I imagine, on his – our – behalf) applied all the way to Taurus for a particular tartan – that’s the pattern of plaid – for us. Carrera even went ahead and changed our unit name from Thirty-sixth Tercio Amazona to Thirty-sixth Tercio Amazona (Montañera) in case the Highlanders might object to kilts on other than highland troops.

We did, by the way, get some mountain training, though we honestly weren’t anything like as capable as Fifth Mountain Tercio. I’m sure there are women out there who could match the Montañeros, or even outdo some of them, in mountain climbing, just as there are women who can run, ski, swim, what have you, better than the average man. Do you have any idea how much time those world class women athletes, or any women who excel at some physical activity, have to spend on their sports? Even the naturally gifted ones we like to hold up as examples spend most of their waking hours in exercise. That just isn’t practical for a soldier; there’s too much else to do.

The other thing is that kilts – light ones, like ours – are very practical and healthy for women in a hot, muggy climate like we have. The uniform included all the other items of regalia that go with kilts, basket weave handled dirk high among them.

Towards graduation from basic we were allowed a couple of thirty-six hour passes. It isn’t generous and isn’t intended to be. What it really is, is a half reward and half re-assimilation into civil life for those not going to go on to a leadership school. None of us knew, as of yet, who would be going on- and upward, though we made some educated guesses.

A thirty-six hour pass doesn’t get you much. You’re not allowed to leave the island, even though you could make it to the City and back in theory. But you can catch a movie that isn’t either propaganda or training, you can eat a civilized meal at one of the three or four little towns on the island, you can visit the museum at the main cantonment area. You can go swimming or sunbathing on one of the beaches. You can even go dancing, there are a couple of clubs for the recruits, beer only. You can phone home, if you’re willing to wait an hour to get to a pay phone.

I called Porras to speak to Alma.

She asked me in her little voice, “Mommy? Is it really you?”

“Yes, Baby,” my heart leapt, “Yes it’s me.”

We couldn’t talk long, there being a long line of women behind me waiting to phone their own loved ones. But I did get to find out that Alma now knew her ABC’s, could add up to five plus five, and really, really wanted to know if the Gonzalez children could live with us when I came home.

*****

A half dozen of us elected to go dancing one Saturday night. Trujillo was somewhat reluctant, but went along to keep an eye on us. She was like that.

We boarded a bus – one ran around “Perimeter Road” every fifteen minutes – and headed for Main Post, near the airfield. It stopped probably thirty times outside one or another of the little camps, like Botchkareva, that littered the island. The bus dropped us off right outside the Enlisted Club there on Main Post.

There was a kilted Amazona that I didn’t know except by sight waiting outside. She wasn’t in tears, but you could tell by the sound of her voice that she really wanted to be, and might have been but for her training. Inez asked what was wrong.

“I came here by myself,” she said. “And they...grabbed me” – she pointed to her buttocks and breasts – “and laughed about it. Bastards.”

“I see,” Inez said, without inflection. “I see.”

She turned towards the main door to the club, took a deep breath, and walked forward. We followed her in. She must have known we would.

Do men really act that way with a little beer in them? There were two long lines of staggering drunkards, one on either side of the hallway. Through some wide doors I could see a number of privates lined up along the top of the bar. They were making gestures and echoing commands that, I’d guess, were what troops about to jump out of airplanes did. Not far from the bar someone had pushed together four tables in the shape of a shallow ‘T’. A chair sat on the leg of the ‘t’. One really inebriated sot – he was probably eighteen or nineteen – was waving napkins in his hands. One by one a bunch of the others, arms outstretched like airplane wings, would run up to the long top of the ‘t’ and either do a belly flop and slide along it (someone had thoughtfully poured beer over the surfaces of the tables to make them effectively frictionless) or veer off and rejoin an almost unbelievably stupid looking circle of others, all of them likewise imitating planes.

I really shouldn’t criticize those boys. I once, years later, took my girls to a male striptease. Women can be, if anything, at least equally silly under the right circumstances.

I’d guess that the word had gone out that the Amazonas were on pass. The boys along the corridor were waiting for us. I won’t repeat their comments, they were demeaning and, under the circumstances, very, very unlikely.

The boys began to chant and clap their hands in time. Unfazed, Trujillo walked forward as if they weren’t even there. She walked, that is, until one of them tried to reach a hand under her kilt. (Old joke: Is anything worn under a kilt? Answer: No, everything is in perfect working order.)

I’m pretty good with a knife. Inez was something else. She had drawn her dirk and slashed the boy’s arm nearly to the bone in far less time than it takes to tell about it. One-armed, she pushed the gasping boy against the wall, then pinned the offending hand to the paneling with the dirk. Then she stood there in the middle of the hallway, arms folded and calm as could be, and asked, “Who’s next, boys? You?” she pointed at one with her chin. “How about you two? Why not all at once? Come on, you’re big and strong, you can take on little ol’ me. Of course, it might get a little messy.”

By that time the rest of us had our dirks out, stroking them, and were standing close behind Inez.

I have never seen so nonplussed a group of slack-jawed, bug-eyed men in my life. It must have come as quite a shock.

Finally, one of them, maybe a little less drunk than the rest, said “Cortizo, get an ambulance for Hernandez. Don’t call the MP’s.”

To us he said, “You are obviously not who we were waiting for. Pass, Ladies.” His voice added the capitalization.

Inez pulled the dagger from the wall, cleaned it on the boy’s uniform, and resheathed it. He fell to the floor when she released his shirt. Then we walked into the dance area unmolested.

Barbaric, no, having to actually fight for one’s dignity? Why shouldn’t Inez have left it to the law to preserve minimal respect for our persons? Weren’t we entitled?

Sister, in this world you’re not entitled to anything that isn’t bought and paid for, and then only if you can defend it. I have no doubt that we could have called the MP’s. I also have no doubt that we could have ruined the lives of some young men whose only fault was stupidity and immaturity. (I’m glad we didn’t. A number of those boys gave all they had, later on, for our good and the country’s. You can forgive a lot in someone who died for the country...and for you.)

Then, too, if we had, they would have despised us for it. Maybe that boy Inez slashed and pinned hated us afterwards. Or maybe not, men are funny about wounds. They often don’t mind a scar or two. And they’ve got a sense of justice, most of them, that can accept being slugged when they deserve it. But hated or not, those boys at least knew we were like them, soldiers, warriors.

I think Inez did more for us in that moment than anyone ever had or would.

The dancing itself was pretty uneventful. Only a few boys had the courage to ask one of us. I can’t recall that any of us declined. But, much like them, we were mostly too bashful to ask. Silly, no?

Some of them had a drinking contest going on, off in a corner. They didn’t invite us and we had no interest in joining. We did, however, watch as – one by one – the boys passed out, semi-comatose. I didn’t envy them their hangovers in the morning.

Though the spirit of the competition I found intriguing. We didn’t do that sort of thing.