Pajama Pilots Attack! (with Free Patches!)

[I looked to see if this had been diaried but let me know and I'll pull if so.]

A fake sailor/star voyager wants you! to join his newly formed flotilla/space wing in the fight against evil liberals who do what conservatives used to: Take what government says it's doing in your name with several grains of salt.

Head on over and get your free patch.

Captain Ed has a nice bit of exposition on how the chickenhawk is a noble bird n' all, cuz, well, it's got "hawk" in the name so, y'know, it must have claws and predatory fierceness and whatnot.

--take the jump for some barnyard etymology and some art. sqwawk!--

Cap'n sez:

When we looked into it, it turns out that the chicken hawk is a pretty impressive predator. It's the largest of its family. This species vigorously defends its territory, getting even more aggressive when the conditions get harshest. It adapts to all climates. Most impressively, it feeds on chickens, mice, and rats.

Make of that what you will.

Oooh, touche! A mortal wound from a nod to the old freeperism Demon-rat or DemocRAT. Sure. I get it. Keep your day job, Cap'n.

Of course (and no surprise), the Admiral might want to do a little more digging. The reason chickenhawks came to be called chickenhawks is probably very close to the heart of a nervy conservy guy like the Wing Commander:  chickens were once what folks considered their property. That is, we all had layers and roosters skittering around somewhere on the back 40 or in the back yard -- yardbird was the downscale southern vernacular, I believe. (Yeah. Fresh eggs are not the brainchild of Safeway or A&P.)

And guess what? Chickenhawks took a liking to those feathered cholesterol factories. Chickenhawks made off with grandma's Rhode Island Reds. And her rabbits too. In the eyes of that fine hard workin American Icon called "the farmer," a chickenhawk was a nuisance on par with a fox or a coyote. An stealthy opportunist. A thief.

And those rats? Hello, Kitty.

So, we have opportunism, stealth and theft. Those are all pretty good examples of words many use to communicate a somewhat transient relationship with risk, commitment or hard work. To be fair, opportunism and stealth have been used to decribe wise battlecraft since Sun Tzu alll the way up to 4th Gen Warfare true worthies like John Boyd, too.  Problem is, guys since Sun Tzu have also said things like

7. It is only one who is thoroughly acquainted with the evils of
war that can thoroughly understand the profitable way of
carrying it on.

Hmmm. Pesky details. And we're back to the fact that a whole bunch or armchair Pattons expended whole giga-battalions of electrons telling nellies like me that we didn't get this boom-boom gig.  Sorry, that fox didn't and won't hunt. I don't much like it when our troopers are getting whacked by IEDs powered by 300+ tons of contraband High Explosive we should have confiscated March '03  in Al Qaqaa, but didn't, because that was viewed as an unsexy shit detail by politicals and one- and two-stars on the make for Baghdad and career polish. I'll spare us all the boring list of how so many have been so right and yet been so pathologically browbeaten for their presence of mind and suspicion of government claims.

Cap'n, I've got yer logo/patch

What gives me the right to design your kit, sir?

It's only proper. And it's been in the can for sometime. Because I can see the future, Cap'n. We knew you were coming. We made lists. And our intel is better than yours. Why? Cuz ours isn't faith based. And, yeah, ours comes true:

Thursday, October 28, 2004

The things we will learn in the next 6-18 months

* How much Iraqi looted explosives made it to Chechnya and Palestine and small Mediterranean ports.
* How many permanent Bases we have built in the western desert of Iraq and their unfavorable lease condtions.
* What Paul Bremer, Jay Garner and Colin Powell really thought of Operation Iraqi Freedom.
* What was left out of the Taguba Report on Abu Ghraib, and where there 2, 3 or 4 more "Abu Ghraibs"?
* What Donald Rumsfeld thinks of George Bush.
* How "cordial" where Cheney's 3 or 4 visits to Langley and what resulted.
* What did NSC staffers really think about Condoleeza Rice.
* Who leaked Valerie Plame's CIA NOC status to Robert Novak.
* Where all that missing walking-around/greasing-Iraqi-skids money for occupation forces went.
* What the EPA didn't tell us in the WTC environmental impact study.
* What the Mediare Prescription Drug Bill really costs.
* Who was at the Bush Administration's secret energy policy meetings conducted by Cheney and what did they talk about.
* How much the Pentagon was undercounting dead and wounded--ours and theirs.
* What really happened and what did we give away to have our Navy Recon plane and crew released by the Chinese in early 2001.
* How much well-vetted intel passed through NSC, State and DoD about North Korea's fast-tracking of plutonium conversion beginning mid- to late-2001.
* How deeply was Ahmed Chalabi aligned with Iran's Intelligence Services and how obvious, in hindsight, was it?
* How many times Tony Blair had to talk George Bush down off the ledge.
* How much DoD money was given to Pakistan, Afghanistan, Turkey, Jordan, Syria
* How deeply known, and how high, was the WMD McGuffin known as such and, how surprisingly early.

and last but not least:

* How many of Bush's notable business and political supporters were "truly and deeply" concerned about his volatile imbalances and decision-making, but were "afraid to say anything."

Enjoy the art, Admiral, and call if you need more. It's already done. And so are you.