Way Out There in the Blue
Today is Friday, 19 September 2008.
Sorry to have been so quiet this week. I’m still recovering from my worst experience of asthma and allergies in some time. I’ll withhold comment on the astonishing financial events a bit more, since other significant chickens are likely to have their heads chopped off and be sent running around DC soonest. However …
The recent actions of the Cheney-Bush regime through the Treasury Secretary and Federal Reserve head are exemplary of the regime’s character. Head in the sand until tail-feathers are on fire, then a series of barely-coordinated kneejerk reactions as walls tumble.
Iraq policy, anyone?
Which, to my mind, raises the question of the training and psychology of fighter pilots, given that Bush, Rumsfeld, and McCain were all trained as such.
Such combat pilots love to boast of their split-second decisions “straight from the gut”, an “instinctual” sure grasp that eliminates the need for all that intellectual thinking foolishness.
Consider, however, the reality of fighter pilot training. First, the basic principles of aerial combat are drummed into the brain in a classroom environment. This may be reinforced by computer or trainer simulation experience. Finally, intensive and repetitive training in executing those tactics in actual aircraft.
Classic behaviour modification.
Combat decisions do not issue from some mysterious and mystical “gut”, but from training which is so drilled into the consciousness that pattern recognition is greatly speeded up, and the time necessary for the brain to perceive and process variables is greatly reduced. (Compare the reaction times of well-educated drivers when confronted with an unexpected emergency.)
Only the ignorant and/or superstitious can attribute this process to a divinely-given “intelligence” of the “gut”.
Consider this in the light of national security and foreign policy. Even decision-makers with vast and deep educations, coupled with extensive practical political experience, require much study and pondering to arrive at policy conclusions, and, even then, they are frequently wrong.
When such as Bush, Rumsfeld, and McCain claim their decisions of national policy derive from their non-existent “gut”, they only reveal they are ruled by their prejudices, ignorance, and fantasies.
And people die senselessly.
___________________________________________
I today received the following spam. Please be assured it does not originate with The Museum of the Bourgeois or any of its affiliates:
Dear beloved Friend and Investor,
Du to a sityuationss beyond our control, the American International Museum ofd the Bourgoeis Group (tticker symold: MOBEDUP) finds our selves in a financial embarrassement and with our pant down.
Thus, Mr. Poolson, Sectry of the US Treasury, has extgened to us a crdit line in amount of $85 billion US dollars.
Happy 4 U!
This disbursement happens through your bank accounts!
4 happinvess to happen, please send iimediate your vital statistics, inclduding Social #.
U get 10%!
Ieeee,, 8.5 billion dollarsss US!
Sin-cerelym,
Companee Prexadent
Sorry to have been so quiet this week. I’m still recovering from my worst experience of asthma and allergies in some time. I’ll withhold comment on the astonishing financial events a bit more, since other significant chickens are likely to have their heads chopped off and be sent running around DC soonest. However …
The recent actions of the Cheney-Bush regime through the Treasury Secretary and Federal Reserve head are exemplary of the regime’s character. Head in the sand until tail-feathers are on fire, then a series of barely-coordinated kneejerk reactions as walls tumble.
Iraq policy, anyone?
Which, to my mind, raises the question of the training and psychology of fighter pilots, given that Bush, Rumsfeld, and McCain were all trained as such.
Such combat pilots love to boast of their split-second decisions “straight from the gut”, an “instinctual” sure grasp that eliminates the need for all that intellectual thinking foolishness.
Consider, however, the reality of fighter pilot training. First, the basic principles of aerial combat are drummed into the brain in a classroom environment. This may be reinforced by computer or trainer simulation experience. Finally, intensive and repetitive training in executing those tactics in actual aircraft.
Classic behaviour modification.
Combat decisions do not issue from some mysterious and mystical “gut”, but from training which is so drilled into the consciousness that pattern recognition is greatly speeded up, and the time necessary for the brain to perceive and process variables is greatly reduced. (Compare the reaction times of well-educated drivers when confronted with an unexpected emergency.)
Only the ignorant and/or superstitious can attribute this process to a divinely-given “intelligence” of the “gut”.
Consider this in the light of national security and foreign policy. Even decision-makers with vast and deep educations, coupled with extensive practical political experience, require much study and pondering to arrive at policy conclusions, and, even then, they are frequently wrong.
When such as Bush, Rumsfeld, and McCain claim their decisions of national policy derive from their non-existent “gut”, they only reveal they are ruled by their prejudices, ignorance, and fantasies.
And people die senselessly.
___________________________________________
I today received the following spam. Please be assured it does not originate with The Museum of the Bourgeois or any of its affiliates:
Dear beloved Friend and Investor,
Du to a sityuationss beyond our control, the American International Museum ofd the Bourgoeis Group (tticker symold: MOBEDUP) finds our selves in a financial embarrassement and with our pant down.
Thus, Mr. Poolson, Sectry of the US Treasury, has extgened to us a crdit line in amount of $85 billion US dollars.
Happy 4 U!
This disbursement happens through your bank accounts!
4 happinvess to happen, please send iimediate your vital statistics, inclduding Social #.
U get 10%!
Ieeee,, 8.5 billion dollarsss US!
Sin-cerelym,
Companee Prexadent
posted by HH at 8:25 AM
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