While I respect your right to make an ass of yourself, I reserve (and exercise) my right to point out that you have done so. Mr. Arkin, you are an ungrateful ass.
If you truly were concerned for the well-being of our misguided mercenary army, you would write a column expressing the following:
- Concern that our mercenary army has been hamstrung by being forced by politically correct armchair generals to fight a brutal, barbaric enemy that hasn't a care for the rules of war with one arm tied behind their own backs.
- Frustration that our mercenary army has been stretched thin by a civilian authority that refuses to allocate the manpower necessary to provide the overwhelming force needed to subdue the enemy.
- Angst, because of the public perception (driven by the media and academia) of our mercenary army is that a military career is a career choice of last resort; and that an army, of any kind, is just a necessary evil that should be done away as soon as we humankind figure out how to 'just get along'.
- Awareness that, until such time as someone takes positive action to withdraw from the hostilities, our mercenary army is doing what we have asked and paid them to do.
- Resentment of those who hypocritically criticize our mercenary army for doing what we have explicitly or implictly told them to do.
- Realization that If we want our mercenary amy to stop doing what they're doing, we should resolve to bring them home. In our government, there are two ways to do that. The President says 'Come on home, boys' or the Congress says 'We're not paying for this anymore, so if they want to stay, it's on their dime'.
So, Mr. Arken, until one of those two actions is taken, shut the hell up and let them do what we've all tacitly agreed to tell them to do.
For more info on this, visit Wizbang! here.
