Rich Hoffman's Blog, page 412
April 5, 2014
War Gaming Tactical Entertainment: Birthday joy at Nostalgic Ink
It’s not quite my birthday, but usually my family makes a big deal about it always leaving me something to look forward to. This year, because of my interest in the game Star Wars X-Wings Miniatures we all gathered at Nostalgic Ink in Mason to play a series of games. My daughters brought their husbands and a tray of Chick-fil-A chicken nuggets and we had a blast. The highlight of the evening was when the owner of the popular comic book store came back to watch our game overhearing a South Park reference that we had been talking about and performed a perfect reenactment of it. It sounded just like this!
That is typical in these gaming environments, there is such a love of creativity and boundless imagination which I find refreshing. Comic book stores are great places to recharge after all the dread of reality has done its best to erode away logic. Some of the best people I have known over the years find solace in those kinds of places, so it was nice to celebrate my birthday there with my kids.
I can’t say enough about the X-Wing Miniatures game. As often as I reference it, it continues to impress me. Nostagic Ink had on hand an impressive array of Y-Wings, and X-Wings. The Y-Wings have been mostly sold out on Amazon because players buy them up for their durability during combat and Ion Turret ability. My son-in-laws’ had their Imperial Aces on the table for the first time which was a sight to behold. Those new Imperial ships have a curving barrel roll effect that is really valuable and is yet another wrinkle in an otherwise highly imaginative and innovative game that is ever-changing forcing constant adoption.
Way back when I was 13 to 14 I was involved in military war simulations which were tabletop games that I found very stimulating, intellectually. Back then, West End Games was producing some great stuff and eventually the realistic simulations of actual World War II battles, and Civil War engagements gave way to a game called Assault on Hoth, which was a Star Wars strategy game done in the spirit of those battle simulations. It contained a map with the traditional game hex-and-counter mechanic and played well. Imperial Walkers attacked the Rebel base on Hoth and Rebel Snowspeeders had to meet them to prevent the shield generator from being destroyed. During the early days of our marriage my wife and I played it three to four times a week and it set a pace for our relationship that would last for decades.
When I learned war gaming as a young man I quickly learned that much of what was being studied were battle tactics no different from what military generals had been taught at West Point for generations—only without all the politics of the position. By role-playing battle field formations set against values players had to make the same kind of decisions that military generals had to make in wars from the past. In this modern age of gaming—for the first time in the history of the world, war gaming wasn’t regulated to the military elite—but to hobbyists and history enthusiasts. Of course the emotion of the battlefield is not present, and the threat of death not a factor, but the same types of decision-making that George Washington had to make during Revolutionary War battles, or General Lee had to make during the Civil War were available to anybody curious enough to play a game. Most modern war games are very sophisticated and take into account the many factors which are required for such strategic thinking.
Nostalgic Ink has in the middle of their store an entire section of these military war simulations that are much better than the ones I played as a kid. They are fascinating and players routinely set up in the back of that store to play them. But for me, Fantasy Flight Games has changed the entire field of miniature war gaming with Star Wars X-Wing. It has all the battlefield tactics of many of those traditional war games, but it has the added element of flight. I find myself thinking about that game all the time these days.
This is a good thing because real life often requires the same kinds of hard decisions that X-Wing forces players to realize. American society has the Second Amendment to protect themselves from an overzealous government. But it also has freedom of thought, and this has given rise to a culture emerging in these comic book stores where tactical decisions are available to regular people outside of any orthodox political class. For instance, this year’s FFG world champion is Paul Heaver a software engineer from Northern Virginia who is married with two kids. He plays online CCGs and computer games, but X-Wing Miniatures is the first game of its type that he’s gotten really serious about. Before going to the World’s competition—where literally people from many countries all over the world came to battle it out in Minnesota during February of 2014, Heaver paid close attention to the battle reports on the game forums and saw that Tie Swarms were dominating tournaments so he calculated a strategy of using two low pilot value X-Wing fighters and two moderate pilot rating B-Wings to slowly whittle away at the low pilot rating Tie Swarm strategy. The effectiveness of this approach can be seen below in the video of his championship game. If you watch the video it has the visual quality of a golf game. People cheer when ships are destroyed the same way an expert golfer sinks a long birdie. The same skills that Heaver used to win the Worlds championship at FFG are the same skills it takes to manage large companies, run military maneuvers, and run countries. I would put Paul Heaver against Vladimir Putin any day and I’d put my bets on Paul. But in this emerging X-Wing popularity there is Paul Heaver types popping up everywhere and this is a very good thing. There are a lot of very smart people coming up in these gaming circles.
The tactic that Paul used to win his championship will be destroyed with all the new ships and rules coming out quickly, like the new rules involving the Imperial Aces ships. They can now barrel roll out of a firing arc and right into the side of a targeted ship taking away their shot, while performing theirs with deadly effectiveness. So what works today may not work tomorrow, which is why I love X-Wing. It is why I spent my early birthday with my kids at Nostalgic Ink eating chicken nuggets and playing tactical table top warfare. Back when I was introduced to these miniature war simulations I learned from a Green Beret who was so obsessed with military tactics that these war games were the only way he could experience battlefield excitement, that the only real difference is that you don’t hear the bullets whizzing by your ears and possess the obvious knowledge that every breath might be your last. Otherwise, this is what it is like. Fantasy Flight has done with X-Wing Miniatures something that is new—it has turned up the heat considerably and no longer is reliant on the Star Wars brand to sell the game. It’s great by itself as its own thing. Tactically it is complex, and is a wonderful way to pass the time for those obsessed with strategy. And that would be me. It is my ideal of a fun time and how I prefer to spend my leisure because all too often real life calls on those skills—and because usually what we do in our recreational time directly contributes to how we conduct ourselves professionally. And because of Star Wars: X-Wing, the future looks very bright to me.
Rich Hoffman www.OVERMANWARRIOR.com
April 4, 2014
Rick and Morty on Adult Swim: The future of a new generation
Watching Bill O’Reilly lately, with his support of Tesla Motors, government bailouts, yet maintaining strong traditional stances against socially downward trends, I had the feeling I’m was watching a generation’s excuses for bringing socialism to America. O’Reilly represents a majority American opinion for those above age 35, which is why he is so popular. However, there is a tremendous undercurrent that is coming under this age barrier and they think radically different from the generation of Bill O’Reilly about most everything. These are people from a generation that does not understand what it meant to have a mother in the home. They had the “state” in charge of most of their education, and they don’t have great prospects for social monetary gains, and they are not particularly happy about it. I associate with these people in gaming circles. They are often Star Wars fans, Doctor Who fans, and they play a lot of video games—hours and hours of video games. They don’t know or care who their politicians are—because they don’t trust them. The system has let them down in every way possible and they are well aware of it. They will likely support Rand Paul for president, but otherwise have quit the real world—because to them—it sucks—and lacks opportunity. They are not like Bill O’Reilly’s generation, and have no desire to be.
Adult Swim on the Cartoon Network traditionally puts out cartoons intended for adults, and it is a favorite channel in my house. Cartoons I find are able to tackle complex adult problems without the pretense of serious drama—so I find them very enjoyable. I was a fan of The Simpsons until the direction of their show moved too far to the political left, I enjoy The Family Guy in spite of their obvious progressivism, and I love Robot Chicken. There is a lot of imagination and creativity in adult oriented cartoons that speak honestly about the direction of human civilization. But I have a new favorite it’s called Rick and Morty and aside from the gaseous expulsion jokes, I absolutely love it.
Rick and Morty is an American animated television series created by Justin Roiland and Dan Harmon that premiered on December 2, 2013 on Cartoon Network‘s late-night programming block, Adult Swim. Roiland voices the eponymous main characters: Rick, a scientist and alcoholic, and Morty, Rick’s grandson. The series was announced during Adult Swim’s 2012 Upfront presentation, and has been picked up for 10 half-hour episodes; the series has been renewed by Adult Swim for a second season. The show has received critical acclaim.[1]
Rick is a mentally-unbalanced but scientifically-gifted old man who has recently reconnected with his family. He spends most of his time involving his young grandson Morty in dangerous, outlandish adventures throughout space and alternate universes. Compounded with Morty’s already unstable family life, these events cause Morty much distress at home and school.
Cast and characters
Rick Sanchez (Justin Roiland) – A genius scientist whose alcoholic tendencies are the source of concern for his daughter’s family over the safety of their son Morty.
Morty Smith (Justin Roiland) – Rick’s good-natured but easily influenced 14-year-old grandson, usually dragged into his misadventures.
Jerry Smith (Chris Parnell) – Morty’s insecure father, who strongly disapproves of Rick’s influence over his son. His marriage is jeopardized by Jerry’s poor relationship with father-in-law Rick. Jerry works at a low-level advertising agency.
Beth Smith (née Sanchez) (Sarah Chalke) – Morty’s mother, Rick’s daughter, and a cardiac surgeon for horses. Level-headed and assertive, she struggles with her husband over his ego, which thrives in defiance of his proven mediocrity.
Summer Smith (Spencer Grammer) – Morty’s older sister, a more conventional teenager who values her image and constant access to cell phones. She occasionally expresses jealousy that it is Morty who gets to accompany Rick on his inter-dimensional adventures.
http://video.adultswim.com/rick-and-morty/special/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rick_and_Morty
Of course I relate most with the grandfather Rick, except when he belches, farts, and drinks. The kind of physics stories that the show is tackling correctly identifies the topics of concern that America is currently facing. I have covered here the predictions that the world will experience over the next 20 years, and Rick and Morty is right on track to help the minds of this new generation deal with those complex issues.
I simply love the story lines. They are some of the cleverest topics I have seen attempted by a television show with the exception of Doctor Who, only this show goes a few steps further. There is an episode where Morty convinces his grandfather to buy him a sex robot while traveling to an intergalactic pawn shop which was truly bizarre, but as I watched it I couldn’t help but think that the future of the sex trade industry was being shown. The human race is only a few decades away from these very issues, and that same episode dealt with extremely difficult subject matter centering on problems with feminism—and the nature of life. In spite of the crazy over-the-top conduct of the show, it was very intelligent and well written. If it wasn’t so controversial, it would be nominated for an Emmy because it is actually dealing with hard topics that most writers would avoid like the plague.
It doesn’t happen often, but Rick and Morty is one of those rare exceptions on television that is well worth watching. It certainly took me by surprise. The goodness of it is not so much in what it is now, but in what it will be as the Bill O’Reilly generation fades off into the sunset with all their 60’s hippie rhetoric, big spending debt, and labor union stagnation—yielding to a new generation that will have to solve cures for cancer, their own mortality, and new issues involving the mind-bending discoveries about our universe that will come directly from the computation services of modern artificial intelligence being hatched before our very eyes. Many of the problems that Bill O’Reilly deals with nightly will soon washed away like high-tide striking a sandcastle on a Florida beach. This is the attitude of Rick from the show, where he protests to his granddaughter, Summer that now he has to take over a planet because of her boobs. I don’t understand Bill O’Reilly’s support of Tesla Motors. But I do understand the grandfather Rick, and that is why Rick and Morty is a breath of fresh air seen only on Adult Swim on the Cartoon Network.
April 3, 2014
Obama’s April’s Fool’s Day Joke: Obamacare is a “success”
Miraculously, there was a “surge” of enrollment in the closing days of Obamacare March 31st 2014 leaving President Barack Obama to announce a total of 7,041,000 during a Tuesday April’s Fool’s Day a press conference, heralding it as proof that the Affordable Care Act was successful and here to stay. Only Obama never said………”April’s Fools.” He actually expected to sell that line to the public and to not be questioned about it. After months of avoiding hard numbers, the moment The White House got the figures they were looking for they took them expecting as all Keynesians do, to use belief and faith to make fiscal assumptions.
The White House had not provided answers to key questions about the numbers, including how many enrollees were previously insured, how many Americans have actually paid their first month’s premium or how many Americans have seen their costs increase. They just took the target number of enrollees off their website, held a press conference and declared victory without having any idea if they had in fact had a victory of any kind.
The big problem for Obamacare is that the numbers from the RAND Corporation study reportedly has suggested that just 23 percent of enrollees had no insurance previously. Further, the study reveals about just 53 percent of previously uninsured Americans have actually paid for their new plans. If the numbers hold, the actual net gain of paid policies among Americans who lacked medical insurance in the pre-Obamacare days would be just 858,298, the Daily Mail reports. That is hardly a victory considering that for such a system to work, more people have to pay into it for it to be sustainable. It’s not hard to give away free things. But it is hard to get people to pay money so that other people can have free things—and The White House has simply ignored the hard task and taken the figures off the easy task. What the Obama White House has done is essentially give away health care on a street corner and considered that everyone who took it was a viable vote in favor of success—and the truth is far from it.
What is more troubling is that people operating at such a high level of authority with so many eyes about the world watching them are so easily willing to deceive the public. The press conference about Obamacare on April’s Fool’s Day was quite aligned with the spirit of that Holiday, but had nothing to do with the truth—and that should be troubling to everybody. Obama and his supporters wanted to see good news about their socialist health care mandate so they did everything but give away the kitchen sink to get people to sign up for it. Their hope is that by preserving the law, future presidents and congressional houses will restore the portions of the law that Obama had to give up on in order to get the numbers where they wanted them.
The goal of The White House was not to provide a health care system, but to enroll enough Americans so that repeal of the law would be difficult. Their entire goal in this whole fiasco has been to make the law stick and let future law makers figure out how to make it viable. Their goal was to simply change American culture toward socialized medicine, not to actually fix health care. That is the deceitful application of their manipulative forecast numbers and why they have been so disingenuous.
If Obama and his supporters will lie and cheat on such small and obvious issues—just imagine what else they are lying about. When it comes to really big topics that are much murkier, just imagine the level of manipulation they are willing to pursue to preserve themselves. That is why it is so shocking that obvious con artists are in such positions of power and voters are so apathetic to it. Obama believes, because he does not respect the electorate—that he can give press conferences on Obamacare and nobody will question him—because nobody really has the courage to stick to the real issue of their intentions—the alteration of American culture further down a path of socialism at the expense of economic viability. And it’s no April Fool’s joke.
Rich Hoffman www.OVERMANWARRIOR.com
April 2, 2014
Russian Economy GDP is only $2 Trillion: The tragedy of following Karl Marx
There seems to be much surprise that Russia is acting so aggressively toward the outside world. The illusion of global unity has been officially shattered and it frightens people who otherwise were unaware of any potential threats. Russia is not acting aggressively just out of lust for power, it is out of necessity as their former commitment to communism, and current statism has destroyed their economy. The only way out for such parasitic and inept economies like Russia’s is to steal the wealth of other nations so to save themselves and is the primary reason for the Russian aggression of retaking the nations which were formally part of the Soviet Union. Having the largest landmass of any other country—including all of Europe put together, the GDP of Russia is only a pathetic $2 trillion dollars. The United States GDP is by comparison $17.4 trillion as of January of 2014. Below are the GDP data points of particular interest comparing the two nations. Pay particular attention to the productivity per capita. Russian productivity is dismal in this category. In the United States this even accounts for the 100 million plus who are part of the welfare culture and are negative GDP contributors. The per capita value among the truly productive is just staggering by comparison.
Russia
GDP
$ 2.022 trillion (2012, IMF) (nominal; 8th) [1] $ 2.015 trillion (2012 WB[2]) (nominal; 8th) $ 2.053 trillion (2012 CIA[3] and RIA[4] ) (nominal; 8th)$ 2,513 trillion (2012, IMF) (PPP; 6th) [5] $ 3.380 trillion (2012 WB [6]) (PPP; 5th)
GDP growth
3.4% (2012) [7] (1.33% Jan-Sep. 2013) [8]
GDP per capita
$ 14,247 (2012) (nominal; 47th) $ 17,698 (PPP; 55th) (2012 IMF)$ 23,549 (2012 WB) PPP; 43rd [9][10]
GDP by sector
agriculture: 4.4% industry: 37.6% services: 58% (2012 est.) [11]
Population below poverty line
11.2% (Rosstat March 2013 on 2012) [12]
The United States
Rank
1st (nominal) / 1st (PPP)
Currency
US$ (USD)
Fiscal year
October 1, 2012 – September 30, 2013
Statistics
GDP
$17.4 trillion (Jan. 2014)[1][2]
GDP growth
2.5% (Jan. 2014)[1]
GDP per capita
$54,609 (Jan. 2014)[2] (8th, nominal; 7th, PPP)
GDP by sector
agriculture: 1.2%, industry: 19%, services: 80% (2011 est.)
Inflation (CPI)
1.5% (2013)[3]
Population below poverty line
14.8% (2013)[4]
Gini coefficient
0.48 (2011) (List of countries)[5]
Labor force
155.6 million (11.26 mil. unemployed) [6]
Labor force by occupation
farming, forestry, and fishing: 0.7% manufacturing, extraction, transportation, and crafts: 20% managerial, professional, and technical[ disambiguation needed ]: 37% sales and office: 24% other services: 18% (2009)[note: figures exclude the unemployed]
Unemployment
6.6% (Jan. 2014)[6] (0.1%)
Average gross salary
$48,872 (December 2013)[7]
Main industries
Highly diversified, world-leading, high-technology innovator, largest industrial output in world; petroleum, steel, motor vehicles, aerospace, telecommunications, chemicals, electronics, food processing, consumer goods, lumber, mining
Ease of doing business rank
4th[8]
http://www.ask.com/wiki/Economy_of_Russia?o=2800&qsrc=999&ad=doubleDown&an=apn&ap=ask.com
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economy_of_the_United_States
This data is the real issue between America, the rest of the world, and Russia. The evidence that capitalism is vastly superior to statism, communism, and socialism is due to the ability of the comparatively small United States to so drastically out produce such a large country as Russia. Really, Russia has everything physically going for it, they have vast natural resources, tremendous fishing in the North Atlantic and Arctic regions, and vast sums of unused land for production, manufacturing, and innovation. They are unable to use those tools properly because of their commitment to collative salvation. Russia has had two decades to dig out from under the communist failures of the past and they have failed to do so—because they are still quietly committed to Soviet era communism—now in the form of conservative statism. The Japanese did recover after World War II. They adopted forms of capitalism to become one of the largest economies in the world contained to a small island. This is the number one reason that the current communist Chinese are eying domination of Japan and Taiwan, not out of revenge for past atrocities during war, but for Japanese economic power. Russia is an empty vessel looking to be filled. The trouble is, as quickly as they can steal the wealth of others, they consume it because the nature of their entire country, raised under repressive communism, does not understand how to be productive.
There is no peace process through The United Nations which can prevent Russian aggression into Europe. They need money and Russia does not have it, or possesses the ability to make it. If Russia were a capitalist country, it is likely they could out produce The United States by three to four times—but they aren’t capitalist. They are essentially still a communist country that has not fully let go of their past restrictions. They are still committed to that ridiculous Karl Marx pamphlet called The Communist Manifesto. That book has destroyed so many millions upon millions of lives and has forced trillions of people into poverty. It is the dumbest and most idiotic book ever to hit the human race because of its detrimental impact to low quality life. Communism is the cause of the measly $2 trillion dollar Russian economy. The Russian people were bred under communism and are now lifeless shells of their true potential.
Like drowning victims in the cold icy waters around a sinking ship, the Russian people are trying to grab on to anything and everything to keep them floating just a minute longer. This is why they want to attack Ukraine and any other nation with access to ports, and productivity. Unable to generate that productivity on their own, they have to steal it from those who can.
It is that simple. It’s no mystery, but to the minds who don’t understand how these types of things impact the big picture of the global economy and why free people out produce conquered people suppressed under the foot of statism, the only option for a country like Russia is to steal the productivity of others.
The cause of much world misery is not having enough money, yet for most, they have complete control over this issue. Being productive means making money, a productive person is seldom poor unless they are experiencing a debilitating illness. Lazy people who are seeking the productivity of others will look for political and economic systems centering around collectivism to sustain their lives. Russia has so many troops because they have a lot of people without real jobs. So they are in the Russian military. The greatness of the American military is not how large it is, but how it has been built and maintained as a surplus of American capitalism instead of a deficit driving detriment. At over $17 trillion dollars in GDP America can afford a military as a luxury. In Russia, at only $2 Trillion, it is a way of life—because there isn’t anything else to do. Russia in no capacity is equal to America. The people may breath the same, they may eat the same, they may enjoy the same types of recreational activities, but they do not think the same. One has a collectivist mentality based on their communist roots, and the other is a capitalist nation built on productivity. Russia’s aggression is purely out of self-preservation for their economy and nothing else, but the unspoken reason is that their economy is so terrible because they have a society of people who were molded with socialism and communism living under current statism—and that does not infuse wealth into a country’s GDP. It’s not a mystery, or a failure in talking between nations, it is from what people believe or don’t believe which makes all the difference in the world. And when it comes to Russia, it is why they are failing to provide their people with a robust economy. They simply think the wrong things for all the philosophic reasons that led them down a bitter, and broken path—the teachings of Karl Marx.
April 1, 2014
Defiance is Key to American Success: Why history should remember Claire Lee Chennault
A few days ago I introduced you dear reader to a book that is very close to my heart, Way of the Fighter by Claire Lee Chennault, the famous World War II general and leader of the valiant Flying Tigers. There are times when I go to Wright Patterson Airforce Base just to sit next to the P-40 on display there. It reminds me of what America should be, instead of what it has become. I am also glad to report that the Tri State Warbird Museum down the road from my house have successfully restored a P-40 from New Zealand. They restored the P-40 to the paint scheme of the ace pilot that had flown it, which does not have the famous mouth on the front. But that P-40 to me is special to behold. Every morning that I ride my motorcycle in the cold putting on my U.S. Wings leather jacket to battle the elements it reminds me of the old fighter pilots from the early days of aviation, which was a specifically American invention. The Germans, the Japanese, and the British copied off American designs and tried to improve upon them, but it was America that developed aviation, and pushed each new technical break-through. The P-40 is a representation of this early period between the old bi-planes and the much faster and durable planes like the Mustang and Corsairs that would follow. On a previous article that I did on this topic there is video of the Tri-State Warbird Museum firing up its big Allison 1,12 hp 12 cylinder V-1710 engine. My wife and I had the privilege of being inside this aircraft early in its restoration, and it is delightful to see it completed and functional. Of the 13,738 P-40’s of all variants produced between 1938 and 1944 only around 85 exist today—one at Wright Patterson and one at the Tri-State Warbird Museum. I am so proud to live within 40 minutes of those two famous planes.
The plane represents more than military service, reliability, and World War II patriotism. It was how the plane came about, and how it was used in tactics developed by Claire Chennault which reached every corner of the world by 1942 that tell the largest story and point to a particular secret of American ingenuity and the benefits of capitalism. Chennault as a military commander had in common a trait that I love in the NFL football coach Sam Wyche of the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, Bill Gates when he left college to start Microsoft, George Lucas when he moved out of Hollywood to create Star Wars, and Steve Jobs in pushing to create Apple—what they all have in common is that they got where they did not by complying to authority, but by challenging it—and often defying it. The P-40 is more than just an airplane; it is a symbol of why America was so superior to other cultures, and why defiance is the American way over blind compliance to ridiculous authority.
When General Stilwell came to China where Claire Chennault was the proven authority—yet outranked the Flying Tiger leader, the expectation was one where Chennault was expected to bow to authority and respect the chain of command, which of course didn’t happen. If Stilwell had his way America would have lost in China and Japan would have occupied and dominated Asia. When Chennault was called from China at the end of the war it was then that communists overtook the country. Chennault wanted to stay and fight the communists after the Japanese were defeated but American command wouldn’t allow it—and their folly cost America its soul from the Korean War to present. Of course the Soviet Union was pushing the Vietnam War advancing communism which was overtaking all of Asia and was also feeding the counter-culture movement at American schools through KGB subversive penetration. The “hippie” was a KGB creation and they are largely forming American foreign and domestic policy to this very day as they are now of age to be in senior management positions. The pinnacle mistake that sent America on a downward spiral was when the defiance of Chennault was removed and the bureaucrats got their way. That is when the problems started for The United States. The key to American success is in defiance. When that defiance is suppressed, America is just as worthless as every nation that does exactly what they are told by pinheaded fools and worthless politicians.
In the 1986 film Heartbreak Ridge by Clint Eastwood the film opens with his character in trouble with the law—particularly for urinating on a police car. This is to establish that Eastwood’s character is defiant, and something that American movie audiences can relate with. In that film, Eastwood was essentially playing a variation to the kind of leader the real life Claire Lee Chennault was. For a long time I wanted to write a novel about The Flying Tigers and have Eastwood play the role, but he’s too old now, and I am still working out the story details. I don’t want to just write another World War II novel, I want to explore this theme of American defiance as the most important ingredient. I would say that defiance is as important to American success as sugar is to cookies—it is a must have.
The rest of the world struggles because they are too structured, too compliant, and too obedient to worthless bureaucrats. The reason that communism, socialism and every big government attempt does not work, is because institutional systems produce too many people like General Stilwell and not enough like General Chennault. If General Patton had done as his superiors had instructed him to do, World War II would have been lost in Europe. Britain, France, and all of Africa would have been dominated by the Italians and Germans. It was Patton’s defiance that made him great, not his ability to follow orders.
In American music we like our artists defiant to the rules—that is because it is deeply inherit to the American psyche. We do not admire compliance. American heroes are not good soldiers who go down with the ship of sacrifice—but the ones who bark back at their chain of command and do what they think is right as individuals, not cogs in the wheel of society. There are a lot of competing ideals floating around which confuse the issue, but for me it is quite clear whenever I see a P-40 Curtiss-Wright airplane what the key to American success was, and continues to be. It is defiance like that of the Flying Tigers who were terribly outnumbered, and up against superior airplanes to paint that gaping mouth on the front of their planes to represent the swagger of American ingenuity, and defiance. The Japanese would have never done anything like that to the planes of the Emperor. German pilots would have never conceived of defacing the planes of Das Führer. And even American pilots under Stilwell would have been frowned upon if Chennault had not let his men express themselves creatively before his arrival. Chennault had set a standard that carried over into just about every branch of service for the next 60 years, as orthodox military generals frowned upon it.
I have told many stories about the original Pirates of the Caribbean led by Henry Morgan, another personal favorite of mine. The privateers in early Jamaica were really no different from the Flying Tigers of China, the Henry Morgan pirates were essentially hired guns by the English Crown to prevent Spain and France from acquiring too much Aztec gold. Morgan let his men be as free as possible and the results were staggering. America was born on Morgan pirate vessels as Thomas Paine observed the antics first-hand and how much gold the King of England received from Morgan’s adventures. The key again was in defiance. The real Pirates of the Caribbean were so bold, and able to win against impossible odds because they were fighting for profit, and spitting in the eye of compliance.
I love the Flying Tigers and specifically the P-40 airplanes they used, because it is the most obvious example of why capitalism, defiance and free thinking destroy the rigid chain of command adhered to by the rest of the world. There have been other successes since—many, and they all share an element of pushing against authority, not yielding to it. Statistically, there isn’t any real evidence that any other way of thinking but that of the American is successful time and time again. It is the only proven method of achievement that has a real track record of success. So the million dollar question, or otherwise, the $17 trillion, which is the current U.S. debt, is why would America copy off the rest of the world’s stupid submission to authority—because time and time again those authorities are corrupted with human error and not qualified to make the best decisions at the best times? Why do we teach our children to follow orders, when they should be taught to give them? Why would we teach blind submission to compliance when history proves that is the quickest way to personal and national destruction? And why would we teach military generals to be more like Stilwell when they should be more like Patton and Chennault? The answer is that we shouldn’t. We need to rethink our entire thought process in America and start with following what works, while setting to drift that which doesn’t. Compliance to authority will not take anybody where they need to go and this needs to be embraced openly for the first time in American history instead of around the edges of our movies and music. It is time that our schools teach defiance, our colleges teach conservative capitalism, and our businesses seek the renegade manager who wears business suits without soaks and has no interest in being in charge—except for the freedom to execute their individual visions and follow their blissful passions to the ends of the earth running over all the opposition that gets in their way. It is time to admit that this is what it means to be an American, and to embrace it fully for the first time without the shameful judgments by the idiots who run the rest of the world.
Rich Hoffman www.OVERMANWARRIOR.com
March 31, 2014
Save Money by Voting NO on Liberty Township Police Levy: Cops are like weeds in a garden
Police put out their signs for the upcoming May 6th replacement levy vote trying to convince homeowners to further accept high taxation as an acceptable means of community management of resources. To be honest, I have lived in Liberty Township for most of my 46 years, give and take a decade or so here and there, and have never had to call the police except to file a report. So long as I have the Second Amendment, they don’t do anything for me except show up after a crime is committed. I noticed that the big tax local Rino Republicans like Christine Matacic are supporting this tax along with my old friends the Terrys at the Carriage Hill development. They are conservatives of convenience. Carriage Hill is openly trying to bring in more people to the community so they can make money off them. Those outside investments enjoy police cars sitting around especially if those voters come from California or the New England states—it makes them feel safe. And Matacic is running for Butler County commissioner and wants the backing of the FOP in whatever form she can get it. But that doesn’t mean the rest of us should pay for their desires. This is what I submitted to the Today’s Pulse as a “Letter to the Editor” which should appear in the upcoming weekend edition on the matter.
Save Money; vote “NO” on Liberty Township Police Levy
There have been some complaints about how high the taxes are in Liberty Township especially after the Lakota levy took effect in 2014. Sheriff Jones supported that levy saying that some of the money gained from levy approval would go toward police in Lakota schools. Now just a few months’ later Liberty Township trustees are supporting a “replacemet” levy to pay for those same additional Lakota police officers coming up on the May 6th ballot. The signs from the police are already up.
Of course the argument is that taxes will not increase but will in fact cost $94 per $100,000 in property assessment to fund $2.5 million in projected spending for the 2014 police fund. Clearly the police and the school are double dipping in their projection numbers. The sheriff lives in Liberty Township and since he came out in favor of the Lakota levy, then it should be his task to figure out how to provide police coverage for his community without additional taxes.
This time they won’t be able to say that the tax is “for the kids.” This election is a chance to take back some of the money wrestled away from us during the Lakota election of November 2013. It is a chance to lower our taxes during a time when that’s what most everyone needs. I will be voting a big, “NO.” Elections have consequences and by voting NO, voters have a chance to let the police shoulder that burden instead of the homeowners.
Rich Hoffman
When politicians and developers support more police, they are essentially stating that they want police to sit on the side of the road and write tickets which costs us more money in taxes through fines and fees, so they can get an indirect benefit specific to them. They also indicate that this levy is to pay for the 20-plus detectives who are still looking for the student who left the shooting threat letter in the girl’s bathroom just days before the Lakota levy election of 2013—which they still have not found. CLICK HERE TO REVIEW. The police haven’t been very successful—so what have they been doing?
Lt. Morgan Dallman is the division commander for Liberty Twp and stated in favor of the levy that deputies responded to 16,000 calls for service in 2013, so to justify all the needed police activity. That comes out to approximately 43.835 calls per day in little bitty Liberty Township covering every domestic violent episode, every car wreck, every kid who tries to burn down their house with their parents in it, every bomb threat, every vandalism case–everything. What he failed to point out was that many of the calls probably went something like this, “hey Bill, where are you?” Bill answered professionally on his radio leaning in to his left shoulder looking very serious, “I’m at United Dairy Farmers getting a milk shake.” The caller then says, “Hey, some of the fire guys down at the 747 south house have a good game of Call of Duty going. You up for it?” Bill looked at the cashier hoping she didn’t hear, which of course she did, because she told me about it hoping that I’d write a story in Overmanwarrior’s Wisdom. “I’ll be right there,” Bill says making his voice sound urgent and professional. The cashier holding back a smile gives him back his change and the cop leaves as the UDF attendants break out laughing. That is just a sample of the 16,000 calls mentioned by Lt. Dallman. Sometimes the call is for Halo, or Madden football—so it’s not always the same thing—to be fair.
My friends down in West Chester are doing it right. The trustees down there have already told voters not to pass a tax increase for their police department because the cops make too much money. In response, the police are suing the president of the West Chester trustees. CLICK TO REVIEW. In Liberty Township there is no such courage. Instead, they just lay down and let the FOP run right over them making up facts, inflating their statistical numbers to include every cat rescued, and every time a neurotic levy supporting husband and wife fight over the television remote. When it comes to actual crime, there isn’t any because bandits have come to learn that Liberty Township residents—at least the older ones tend to paint their cars with the blood of criminals. Later the police show up to file a report—but they certainly aren’t the deterrent to crime. Gun carrying homeowners are, and there is a LOT of guns in Liberty Township. A lot of GUNS. Enough to equip a small army if needed. Word gets around and it will stay that way unless the police actually drop off criminals hoping to instigate crimes to gain support of a levy. I’ve seen it done in Mason, so it’s certainly not beyond imagination.
I doubt people will vote themselves a tax savings on May 6th 2014. Liberty Township has too many new—weakened, neurotic, insecure parents who are still in their early 30s doubting their ability to handle the Second Amendment the way it was designed, so they look toward the police to protect them. But this is a chance to actually take back some of the tax money stolen from us through past manipulations if enough people would stand up for themselves. We’ll see, I know how I’ll be voting—and it won’t be for more police. Too many cops around isn’t good for anybody but their union numbers. They are too expensive, always behind the action, and simply represent the arm of politics and their authority—which is obviously deeply flawed. Cops are like weeds in a nice garden, the more you water them, the more of them you get until eventually they overrun the beauty of all the nice flowers and trees planted there. One of the reasons that Liberty Township is so nice is that there are fewer cops—weeds. Giving them more money will just make more of them and that isn’t good for Liberty Township’s future, or the people who live here.
March 30, 2014
Ragnar Danneskjöld Played by Eric Allan Kramer: Why the modern pirate never gets caught
Eric Allan Kramer, is playing the pirate Ragnar Danneskjöld in “Atlas Shrugged: Who is John Galt?.” The footage below shows what to expect from Kramer in his rendition of the unique pirate from the very popular American literary classic Atlas Shrugged. I volunteered to play Ragnar to producer Harmon Kaslow because I was worried that it would be hard to find the right actor who could do such a character justice—because getting that part right means a lot to the overall story of the third Atlas Shrugged film. But after seeing this interview from Eric Allan Kramer, I am no longer concerned. Ragnar Danneskjöld is a key role to understanding Atlas Shrugged, he is a pirate built on philosophic principle. He does not loot for the right to steal from others to gain for himself the way a typical progressive sees the world, instead he loots to take back what is stolen and gives it back to those who truly produce.
Read more at http://www.galtsgulchonline.com/posts/67d29d1/meet-ragnar-danneskjold#Br92Za8JkLaC2zRe.99
Ragnar Danneskjöld was born in Norway, the last son of one of its first families. His father was the Catholic Archbishop of Norway. When he was sixteen, his father sent him to study at the Patrick Henry University, in Cleveland, Ohio[1] (not to be confused with the real-life Patrick Henry College in Chesapeake, Virginia).
Ragnar Danneskjöld studied physics and philosophy—a highly unusual double major. While at PHU, he made two lasting friendships that would change his life forever, though he did not know it at the time. One of these friends was Francisco Domingo Carlos Andres Sebastián d’Anconia, who also was an aristocrat of sorts, though Latin American rather than European. The other was John Galt, who was anything but aristocratic, and came to PHU with barely a penny to his name. These disparities in background and circumstances did not matter to any of these three. All three shared a love of the natural world, how it actually worked, and how one should function within it.
When they graduated, each made a different plan. Francisco d’Anconia planned to take over his father’s great copper company, D’Anconia Copper SA of Argentina. John Galt at first earned his master’s degree in physics and began work on his Doctor of Philosophy degree, until events impelled him to leave university life and go to work as a commercial engineer and inventor. Ragnar earned his master’s degree in philosophy and stayed on to earn his doctorate.
Of the two Chairmen who shaped his life, Hugh Akston, Chairman of Philosophy, stayed true to the ideals that attracted Ragnar and the others to him. Robert Stadler, Chairman of Physics, did not. Stadler’s decision to endorse the establishment of a State Science Institute, impelled John to leave. If Dr. Akston discussed John’s rather acrimonious break with Stadler with Ragnar, neither man said anything about it to any other character.
Though each of the three began to implement his respective plan, all three would receive a rude interruption.
Six years after the three received their bachelor’s degrees and when Ragnar was on the cusp of becoming a PhD himself, Ragnar received a summons from John Galt to meet him, not at his home in Starnesville, Wisconsin, but in a garret apartment in a run-down brownstone in New York City. Francisco d’Anconia received a similar summons. John Galt then told his two friends what had happened to him.
Galt had gone to work for the Twentieth Century Motor Company in Starnesville, named after Gerald “Jed” Starnes, the company’s founder. There he had built the prototype of the first-ever practical electrostatic motor. But Gerald Starnes had died, and his three children inaugurated a plan to have everyone at the factory work according to his ability, but be paid according to his need. Ragnar probably recognized that principle at once, from The Communist Manifesto by Karl Marx.
John Galt had refused to work under such a plan. He not only quit the factory, but also announced to the three heirs that he would “stop the motor of the world.” He began, of course, by wrecking his prototype and carrying away with him those portions of his notes that would enable any future investigator to duplicate his work. And now he was asking his two friends to join him in what he called the strike of the men of the mind, and recruit others to do the same. The rules were simple: anyone having savings to retire on, would do so; the rest would take the lowest jobs that they could find, so that they would not give society the benefit of their talents.
The next morning, Francisco accepted John’s strike call. Ragnar accepted that afternoon. Francisco set out to implement his own strike plan: to assume the guise of a playboy, while systematically destroying D’Anconia Copper. Ragnar and John traveled to Cleveland, where Ragnar told Dr. Akston that he was quitting his graduate studies, and why. Before the evening was over, Dr. Akston not only accepted Ragnar’s decision but vowed then and there to hand in his own resignation, and for the same reason.
Ragnar found the overall strike plan elegant and logical—but incomplete. In truth, Ragnar was infuriated with what John Galt had told him. Or perhaps the business plan of the Starnes children struck Ragnar as a prize example of a much larger social and political problem. This problem had long filled him with righteous indignation, and now this indignation boiled over. As Ragnar saw it, society was guilty of armed robbery—and if that society would not police itself, then the men of the mind must not only withdraw from it, but make war against it to reclaim what was rightfully theirs. Ragnar decided then and there to fight that war and carry it directly to what all three called “the looters.”
Ragnar Danneskjöld’s solution came from the heritage and tradition of his Viking forebears. Ragnar had a fast ship that nevertheless carried guns capable of bombarding either another ship or a shore target at long range. Ragnar also had at his disposal at least one aircraft: a cargo carrier with which Ragnar would later transport large quantities of the gold he collected in his activities.
Ragnar set out at once to assemble a crew of demobilized Navy officers, petty officers, and seamen. These men told him that the US Navy planned to retire one of its most famous aircraft carriers, and the one having the longest flight deck in history: USS Enterprise CVN-65. Ragnar had other plans: he hijacked the ship at sea, and this was the occasion in which he suffered his one and only combat wound. So he became a privateer, and in fact became known as the scourge of the high seas (chiefly the Atlantic Ocean and occasionally the Caribbean Sea). (In fact, the name Enterprise, as the name of a ship, might have appealed to him on this specific account: a privateer under license to the Second Continental Congress during the American Revolution also bore that name.)
He was careful never to kill a member of another ship’s crew if he could avoid it; if he ever had to sink another vessel, he would put the crew adrift in lifeboats. One such sailor described Danneskjöld’s face as terrible to behold, because it showed no feeling whatsoever. It did not even show hatred; it was cold and hard. It was the face of one who, having a job to do, did it and did not waste time emoting about it.
He never directly attacked any naval vessel, unless said vessel attacked him first. He never attacked any private vessel, nor seized private property. With one exception: at Francisco d’Anconia’s specific request, he attacked D’Anconia Copper ships and sank them with their loads. This was in keeping with Francisco’s own strike plan to destroy D’Anconia Copper systematically, so that no one would benefit from his talents or those of his father and grandfather and ancestors.
Ragnar’s actual targets were what he called the “loot carriers.” These were “humanitarian” cargoes paid for with taxpayers’ money and sent by order of the Bureau of Global Relief. This was the best method available to Ragnar to recover the substance that was taken from men of the mind by force. Eventually, not a single such cargo could ever sail from an American port to any of several “People’s States” throughout the world and hope to reach its destination. Ragnar Danneskjold was always waiting, and always found his targets. From the description given of some of his other activities, one may infer that he had an espionage network unrivaled for effectiveness and avoidance of compromise.
Ragnar would take these cargoes to various smugglers throughout Europe (whether he ever penetrated the Straits of Gibraltar with one of his prizes, the novel never says) and sell them. He also found a market for some of his plunder in the United States—a black market, which eventually became the only market available. He always demanded payment in gold. The most likely black market is in fact Midas Mulligan himself, and Ragnar would then be the “safe channel” by which Midas could purchase any goods the men of Galt’s Gulch could not produce on their own.) He would never accept any fiat currency, be it Federal Reserve notes or the scrip of any People’s State.
He began his career in privateering very early into the strike. He was wounded only once (see above), and never thought of that wound again, unless John Galt reminded him of it. Ragnar thought of his wound as a necessary lesson that an amateur must learn before he can call himself a true professional. He quite often told John, Francisco, and (later on) the others who joined the great strike to quit worrying about him. He ruefully observed that they never listened. By the last year of the strike, Ragnar easily captured every prize he set his sights upon, and had lowered his casualty rate to zero.
http://conservapedia.com/Ragnar_Danneskj%C3%B6ld
There is much more to Ragnar, but that provides a brief history. Out of all the Atlas characters it is Ragnar which I most closely identify with, and why I volunteered to play the part in the movie. After the poor reception of the first two films I was worried that career actors might avoid being added to the cast for fear of blacklisting, but Kaslow and Aglialoro actually had no problem. When Eric Allan Kramer was added to the list, my concerns quickly alleviated. There is a reality to Ragnar Danneskjöld which is explored no place else. His ability to travel the world with the military might of every nation peeking at his doorstep might seem ominous to most, but to my experience is very realistic and it looks like Kramer pegged the role.
Over this last weekend a young man asked me why I wasn’t worried about assassination attempts, and political harassment for the things I get involved with. As I tried to explain why I did not worry about such things to him I could only think of Ragnar Danneskjöld. Readers here know that I have been involved in friendships with hit men, I have known members of crime syndications well, I have been a property repossesor, a body guard, a bouncer, and have been in many conflicts. I have known prominent judges representing the highest order of the law who looked like nice family guys who were deeply in bed with crime families doing really bad things so I have some very good experience and the bottom line is this; the NSA, the big banking families, the FBI, CIA, Muslim radicals, communists, socialist, labor unions, crazed lunatics and fanatical collectivists of the world taken together cannot for the life of them find their way out of a paper bag without proper leadership to help them. They are, taken at their collective intelligence, incompetent. As individuals, there are very competent people in those organizations—but as long as they function as a collective unit they are only as strong as the weakest links and are paralyzed with inaction. They can literally do nothing. The experience of Ragnar Danneskjöld in the novel Atlas Shrugged is reality. He was too competent to be captured by collective fools—which is a contrary message shown on cop dramas on television. In real life bullets don’t often fly as straight as people think, nor do they do as much damage upon impact. This is similar to when you punch someone in the face—they do not immediately go down like they do in the movies. If a person is bold, competent, and more intelligent than his rivals—he will win no matter what the odds and no matter what the number and this is something only a handful of people in the entire world understand.
I do not worry about my home being surrounded by “authorities” and I do not worry about them tracking my statements or watching my every move. They should not have the right or ability to do so—but I do not worry about it either because they are incompetent to act on what they witness. Ragnar Danneskjöld’s world view and experience is more accurate to reality than anything ever put on CSI, Magnum PI, or Miami Vice. Collective authority is incompetent against a quality individual—Ragnar would easily be able to outmaneuver all the armies of the world for as long as he wished simply because he as an individual was better than their cumbersome intellectual capacity weighed down by the brain dead weak links of their institutional thinking. Atlas Shrugged as an American novel was one of the first works of art in the world to even explore the concept of quality versus quantity.
The popular assumption which Atlas Shrugged challenges is that masses trump minorities—in this case, not reflective of skin color or sex, but of ability. Few people actually posses quality ability and this cannot be solved by the looting by the many of the few for the sustenance of all. Ragnar was fighting against this trend and even with all the efforts of every government and military against him, nobody could beat him. This is a hidden reality that is probably the best kept secret of the modern age. The NSA can collect every bit of data about every human being, insect, and cell structure ever known to exist on planet earth, yet they cannot overcome this glaring fact. As I said to the young man, so what if they watch me, so what if they want to dispose of me, so what if they listen to and read every word that comes from my mind—what would they do with that information? They are incompetent and are paralyzed to act—so what would there be to worry about? Just because “they” desire something does not mean that they can magically whip up competency to execute the task. A lot of people want to cook good food, fix a car, and install air conditioning units on homes, but only those with the skills to do so can hope to achieve such a thing. And often, not just anybody can do these tasks when trained—there are some cooks better than other cooks, some mechanics better than other mechanics and so on—but without the basic skills at a particular quality level, nothing happens.
Governments hope that by bringing in all kids of different minds that the collective will of the institution will benefit equally, but what they discover is that once those of quality are looted by those without quality that their few good people among their ranks stop contributing leaving the weak and clueless to perform the tasks. It doesn’t matter if the organization is large or small, once individual contributors realize that their efforts will not be rewarded, they stop working. This is why characters like Ragnar Danneskjöld were able to travel the world unchecked and unstopped by even the most technically proficient governments, because the minds behind those governments are incompetent to action because of group consensus.
Ragnar Danneskjöld is really the first pirate of his kind, and audiences won’t know quite what to think of Eric Allan Kramer’s performance if they have not yet studied the novel Atlas Shrugged. While critics of the premise of Ragnar will scoff at the reality of such a pirate, what their protests really indicate is a deep insecurity at the truth behind the character. Ragnar Danneskjöld is a character that properly identifies a flaw in human nature which the pirate Blackbeard exploited several centuries ago. Blackbeard would have continued to have success as a pirate if he had not grown so power hungry, and arrogant. The English navy couldn’t stop him, and they were the most powerful in the entire world at the time. Jesse James is another example of such a personality. The might of the United States military could not stop the guy—it took an individual assassin of some level of competency functioning outside of the bureaucracy of the law to perform the task. For a character like Ragnar, he does not have the personality flaws of such outlaws—he’s a man of goodness which makes him much more difficult to deal with. And that is why Ragnar Danneskjöld is the Atlas Shrugged character that I most identify with and the moment things go sour where American society no longer functions—could very well be my own potential future. It wouldn’t take much for me to go pirate. All that stops me from doing it now is the hope that using the First Amendment can stop the spread of collectivism before The Second Amendment is needed. But the moment that there is no First Amendment, it will be a pirates life for me, and the world will note be able to stop it—for all the reasons that Eric Allan Kramer’s performance of Ragnar Danneskjöld will display.
Rich Hoffman
March 29, 2014
The Way of the Fighter: American rebellion against rigidity, command structure and orthodox behavior
Please watch at least this first video for context and background on Claire Lee Chennault:
This isn’t the first time I have revealed a personal passion that I have for the American Volunteer Group who fought in China under Claire Lee Chennault. CLICK HERE TO REVIEW. What the A.V.G. did in just a few months in China against the vastly superior Japanese is the epitome of American ingenuity and exhibits the true benefits of capitalism. There is a reason that the A.V.G was so dramatically successful against the Japanese airforce and made the allied Royal Air Force seem like stumbling fools in comparison. The A.V.G were soldiers of fortune who were unorthodox and despised authority. They were not only in China for the right and ability to fight an enemy against all odds, but they were there to get rich. The Chinese government attacked by the Japanese from the East and the communists coming out of the North paid American pilots flying outdated hot rod P-40’s $500 per kill—unofficially—making some of the best A.V.G. aces quite wealthy. But that wasn’t all, it was the mechanics and ground crew which kept the planes flying using innovation that only America had shown an ability to perform that eventually tipped the scales of war toward the A.V.G. There are very important lessons that were on display over China during the early days of World War II that were every bit as real as the John Wayne classic—and favorite film of mine, The Flying Tigers. It was in this film that I first learned about Claire Chennault. But as heroic as the Flying Tigers were portrayed by Wayne in that film, the reality was actually much more spectacular. One of my most treasured books is the rare one written in 1949 by Chennault himself called Way of the Fighter which went into great detail about the A.V.G. and how eventually General Stilwell would screw everything up in Asia—after World War II.
Chennault as leader of the A.V.G. produced a group of fighting men who were charismatically over-the-top with valor, but were deadly accurate as fighting men. Once America officially entered the war, Stilwell was in charge and the A.V.G. was dissolved into official military control, and their kill ratio declined rapidly. Chennault was so critical of Stilwell, and the American government that the book Way of the Fighter was removed from print quickly and to this day is very rare. To get a copy, it costs anywhere from $150 to $300 dollars for a beat-up copy. The book is a treasure of American spirit and is a key to the kind of talent and drive which makes The United States so unique.
The Flying Tigers, according to the Way of the Fighter was predicted by military experts to not last three weeks in combat against the Japanese. Instead over a 7 month period over Burma, China, Thailand, and French Indo-China the A.V.G. destroyed 299 Japanese planes with another 153 most likely destroyed but unaccounted for. All this with just 12 P-40’s lost in combat and 61 on the ground from Japanese strafing missions. Only four A.V.G. pilots were killed in air combat; six killed by antiaircraft fire; three by enemy bombs on the ground; and three were taken prisoner. Ten more died as a result of flying accidents. The Flying Tigers were so hated by the Japanese because of the tremendous kill ratio against them that they promised on their radio broadcasts to shoot A.V.G. prisoners as bandits on sight. But the three captured pilots were treated with respect indicating the enemy’s genuine admiration for Chennault’s organization.
There were two keys to this success, the first of which was capitalism. The pilots were the best there was and wanted to make a lot of money shooting down Japanese planes. The money attracted the best pilots that were available during the prewar times leading up to World War II. The other of course is Claire Lee Chennault himself. He would eventually become a military general but during his A.V.G. days he was simply a hired strategist for the Chinese who desperately needed a creative, “western” mind to protect them from the invading Japanese. Chennault was extremely unorthodox. In some respects he was very strict; in others he was very lenient. He knew when to apply pressure and when not to, which is a distinctly American trait that military leaders all around the world scoffed at—including The United States. But it was because of Chennault’s manner that the A.V.G. was so incredibly good.
Chennault would train his soldier of fortune pilots relentlessly saying, “You will face Japanese pilots superbly trained in mechanical flying. They have been drilled for hundreds of hours in flying precise formations and rehearsing set tactics for each situation they may encounter. Japanese pilots fly by the book, and these are the books they use.” Chennault would then dump the books into the laps of his star pilots. “Study them, and you will always be one jump ahead of the enemy.” Chennault would stand still for effect, peer at the pilots ruthlessly then say, “They (Japanese) have plenty of guts but lack initiative and judgment. They go into battle with a set tactical plan and follow it no matter what happens. Bombers will hold their formations until they are all shot down. Fighters always try the same tricks over and over again. God help the American pilot who tries to fight them according to their plans. The object of our tactics is to break up their formations and make them fight according to our style. Once the Japanese are forced to deviate from their plan, they are in trouble. Their rigid air discipline can be used as a powerful weapon against them.”
Chennault would present charts, graphs, maps, and hours upon hours of practice flying personally mentoring each of his pilots drilling them, building them up as individuals—treating each of them as though they were the star quarterback on a football team, and they performed for him spectacularly. Once he had their trust, and their ears he would say, “You must use the strong points of your equipment against the weak points of the enemy. Each type of plane has its own strength and weakness. The pilot who can turn his advantages against the enemy’s weakness will win every time. You can count on a higher top speed, faster dive, and superior firepower. The Jap fighters have a faster rate of climb, higher ceiling, and better maneuverability. They can turn on a dime and climb almost straight up. If they can get you into a turning combat, they are deadly.” Chennault would then pull his finger across his throat to drive home the point as the heat of the Toungoo airfield poured in from a tent flap letting in the summer sun, sweat dripping off the fighters as they listened attentively.
“Use your speed and diving power to make a pass, shoot and break away. You have the edge in that kind of combat. All your advantages are brought to bear on the Japanese deficiencies. Close your range, fire, and dive away. Never stay within range of the Jap’s defensive firepower any longer than you need to deliver an accurate burst. You need to sharpen your shooting eye. Nobody ever gets too good at gunnery. The more Jap’s you get with your first burst, the fewer there are to jump you later. Accurate fire saves ammunition. Your plane carries a limited number of bullets. There is nothing worse than finding yourself in a fight with empty guns.”
The Flying Tigers would become part of the official American military under the United States Army Air Forces’ 23rd Fighter Group. The effectiveness of the A.V.G. pilots declined quickly under the regimented military life insisted upon by Stilwell. However some ace pilots like Tex Hill would stay on and help train other American pilots in the ways of the famous A.V.G. and Chennault’s battle tactics would migrate from aircraft carrier to carrier throughout the entire Pacific allowing America to gradually beat back the Japanese and eventually dominate them. The victories in the Pacific theater were not a result of General Stilwell or MacArthur, but rather because of Clair Chennault. Without Chennault, America would not have won in the Pacific and Japan would have taken China months before the bombing of Pearl Harbor. This would have given them access to numerous natural resources that would have allowed them to dominate the entire continent of Asia. World War II really came down to two generals who broke official rules of orthodox command, Patton in Europe took Trier with only two divisions sarcastically replying to his furious commanders who instructed him otherwise that he would “give it back,” if they didn’t approve of his methods, and of course Chennault’s epic battles with Stilwell—Stilwell obviously jealous of Chennault denied him of supplies and manpower secretly hoping it would end the winning reputation of the former A.V.G. commander. The victories in the Pacific and in Europe were won by soldiers of fortune, and unorthodox command. It was not just won by bravery, or equipment, but by people who knew how to use the strengths of their equipment against the enemy and were not afraid to upset the command structure of their superiors. That is the “American” way!
On the other hand the allies, particularly the R.A.F. out of England with their Spitfires had a much more difficult time. For instance, in the battle over Rangoon, the R.A.F had losses comparable to the Japanese while the American A.V.G. had a 15 to 1 kill ratio fighting right alongside them all. This is because the A.V.G. were unorthodox freedom fighters combating for money and adventure while the R.A.F and Japanese pilots were regimented military fighters who would follow orders to a fault, and could be counted on to die if needed for the greater good.
After America defeated the Japanese, Stilwell, foolishly advised command that there was no other need for America to guard China from any hostile threat in that region even though Claire Chennault was practically jumping up and down begging America to stop the push by communists into China from Russia. Chennault warned that there would be more war, likely in Korea and Vietnam if America did not continue to defend China. Truman, and American military command ignored Chennault with the same institutionalized swagger that they professed that the Flying Tigers would be destroyed within three weeks. They blew off Chennault’s warnings, blacklisted his book, Way of the Fighter, and assumed that they had won the Pacific war based on their West Point educations. They were wrong. Within a few years America was back at war with Korea, then a few years after that with Vietnam. But at that point communism had already affected the collective based cultures of Asia and had even gone to work in America under the counter-culture movement starting at colleges within The United States.
Few people would believe that the slow slide into such an abyss of global communism and socialism began when America won World War II and stopped listening to General Claire Lee Chennault. But it did. Too many Americans at the time did not see communism as a threat but did see Japan as a threat because of their obvious hostilities toward the outside world. However, as Chennault published his book, Way of the Fighter, Chinese communists were taking over the country violently torturing the kind of people the A.V.G. fought so valiantly to defend, leaving them alone and defenseless. Communist China then moved against Tibet and America did nothing about it. Just that fast the entire land mass of Asia was under communist control and quickly seeping into all of Europe through the less offensive term of socialism. Communists did to the world what Chennault did to the Japanese pilots, they exposed the rigidity of American politics and picked off their enemies one by one over a long period of time—just as Chennault had warned.
The lessons should be clear, freedom, capitalism and innovation beats rigidity, command structure, and orthodox behavior. And it isn’t group consensus that wins wars and defends nations, but ultimately solitary minds, valor, and raw courage that is more unpredictable then structured. And thus, that is the Way of the Fighter, and the way that nations prosper.
Rich Hoffman
March 28, 2014
The Endless Imagination of Fantasy Flight Games: New releases of X-Wing Miniatures
I love technology as much as anybody, but when I want to relax, technology is often not part of the experience. I will always love a real book in my hands because I don’t like looking at a lit up screen to read, and I will always prefer physical activity to computer play. But with the NSA concern in reading every email, watching all online traffic, and all the privacy concerns involved, I love Star Wars X-Wing Miniatures more and more—because of the low tech, yet complex game play. I play the game as much as I can because it has all the multifaceted strategy of a video game, the intellectual muscle flexing of chess, and the unlimited creative potential of miniature model building incorporated into a non-technical exercise that is a true vacation from the many prying eyes of our modern world. The video shown below is from a couple recent games that I played displaying the creative potential behind the game. The models are very detailed, and provide creative stimulation for boundless imaginations, and the terrain such as asteroids and star field backgrounds surprisingly pull the mind into the game world effectively.
The depth of the game is something to truly behold, but for me it is the lack of technical involvement that is most attractive. When playing, the technical outside world is turned off. However, perhaps even better the creative potential of the game is limitless, and the company Fantasy Flight Games has really overachieved as an organization. Prior to 2013, they already had a championship caliber game that would live on for many years as a crowd favorite. But they didn’t stop there. Instead, they worked on making 2014 one of the most exciting in the short life of the game with a whole range of new additions. Every game addition mentioned below is something that I am very eager to experience and will hit the marketplace within a few months of this writing. These will make the video shown above that much more exciting, and complex, and will fill many evenings with great joy. Fantasy Flight Games is one of the most innovative and forward thinking companies in existence. I wish they were not applying these great skills to just entertainment, but in the field of aerospace, manufacturing science, and research and development. But in the world of gaming, they are simply the best there is at this point in time. Here are just a few of their releases over the next couple of months that I am most excited about.
The GR-75 Medium Transport
First unveiled as a prototype at Gen Con Indy 2013, the iconic GR-75 Rebel transport is most famous for its critical role in the Rebellion’s evacuation from Hoth. However, the GR-75’s role in the Rebellion’s efforts extended far beyond that pivotal conflict.
GR-75 transports were used mainly to transport supplies, equipment, or troops, but some were modified to serve as fuel tankers for long-range starfighter missions. Relatively inexpensive, the GR-75‘s hulls couldn’t be penetrated by Imperial sensors, and the Rebel Alliance often enhanced this feature by outfitting the starship with sensor jammers. Indeed, the Rebel Alliance made such common use of the GR-75 that it was often called the Rebel medium transport.
http://www.fantasyflightgames.com/edge_news.asp?eidn=4628.
Rebel Aces features one A-wing and one B-wing miniature, both of which come with alternate paint schemes. You’ll also find four highly skilled unique, new pilots; thirteen upgrade cards; maneuver dials; and all the tokens necessary to launch these starfighters into the thickest action of your space battles against the evil Galactic Empire. It also includes a new mission, which thrusts some of the Rebellion’s finest pilots into a desperate rescue effort that highlights the B-wing’s durability and the A-wing’s agility.
Heroic New Paint Schemes
Fly with the best! The alternate paint schemes on the starfighter miniatures from the Rebel Aces Expansion Pack allow you to battle for the Rebellion’s cause while representing the heroic efforts of the pilots who first flew its A-wings and B-wings as experimental prototypes.
Only ace pilots were granted the right to fly prototypes for the Rebel fleet. Piloting the agile A-wing required tremendous focus and lightning fast reflexes. Still, by helping the Rebel Alliance develop and improve upon its original designs, their efforts benefitted everyone dedicated to the cause of galactic freedom, and the A-wing ultimately proved its worth during the Battle of Endor by helping to cripple Star Destroyers.
To honor those prototype pilots who first flew the ship, the A-wing in Rebel Aces features the paint scheme depicted on the Prototype Pilot ship card, with a bold blue central stripe and red and yellow highlights.
http://www.fantasyflightgames.com/edge_news.asp?eidn=4705
Close Air Support
Manufactured by Incom Corporation, the Z-95 Headhunter was the primary inspiration for the later design of the T-65 X-wing. Even though the X-wing eventually outclassed it in nearly every respect, the Z-95 was cheap, durable, and reliable enough that it continued to see use throughout the Galactic Civil War, most commonly in close air support roles.
Entering X-Wing as the Rebel starship with the lowest squad point value, the Z-95 Headhunter is perfectly suited to play the role within the game that it played within the Star Wars galaxy. It’s a durable and reliable starfighter that comes with the ability to carry and fire missiles, making it capable of playing a strong support role.
http://www.fantasyflightgames.com/edge_news.asp?eidn=4663
The CR90 Corvette
While the Tantive IV is easily the most iconic CR90 corvette in the Star Wars galaxy, it is by no means the only one of import. Manufactured by the Corellian Engineering Corporation, the CR90 was a swift, multipurpose ship that saw widespread use among governments and private parties.
The CR90 corvette’s modular design made it easy for users to reconfigure it to best suit the purpose they wanted it to serve, and the CR90 was often employed as a cargo transport, troop carrier, passenger vessel, or light escort. Additionally, the CR90 could be outfitted with enough weaponry to make it a formidable gunship; it could equip as many as eight turbolasers, six laser cannons, and four ion cannons.
The Tantive IV Expansion Pack presents a similarly adaptable starship for use in your games of X-Wing. Between its two ship cards, for fore and aft sections, the CR90 can equip up to ten upgrades of four different types.
http://www.fantasyflightgames.com/edge_news.asp?eidn=4663
Every time X-Wing Miniature players think they have this game figured out, Fantasy Flight comes up with new ships with entirely new variables making the game ever evolving unlike most table top games. As players provide Fantasy Flight Games with feedback on their website chat forum, the game designers have proven adapt to filling voids discovered in strategy. For instance, Imperial players were dominating tournament play with Tie swarm tactics which allowed cheap Tie Fighters to overwhelm the more expensive point values of the Rebel players by sheer numbers. Fantasy Flight saw this trend and is now releasing the Headhunter which will be nearly the same point value giving Rebel players the option of putting swarms of Headhunters against Imperial players. The CR90 and CR-75 will be the first of a series of big ships to hit the game which will bring entirely new strategies to the game not even yet explored. In this way the strategies that players used last year in 2013 will be useless in 2014 with all these new variables being introduced. In this way, X-Wing Miniatures is very dynamic and is likely the reason the game is exploding in popularity. I know I spend considerable amounts of time reading cards and planning strategy even when I’m not playing the game. It fills my mind with enjoyment for the sheer mechanism of focused thought.
It is always a pleasure to experience a company that is doing everything right. With Fantasy Flight the only real issue they have is in delivery of new product line. They are currently late on the CR90 and CR-75, but for what they provide as far as product, they are worth the wait. There are few things that bring me so much pure joy as Fantasy Flight Games X-Wing Miniatures. For those new to the game I have provided samples of tournament play from Team Covenant who is a committed group of table top gamers who wish to advance the hobby to for the uninitiated. The game is different from gambling games like Poker and Black Jack because it is essentially a war simulation. The added ability to actually pilot vessels makes X-Wing Miniatures even fun to watch because the entire game play area is up for grabs. Every conceivable mathematical surface of a play area is an option. The game is not limited to spaces, or a game board—but to the unlimited options of a game player and how they chose to utilize that battlefield. That freedom is both within the game and from external electronic control, surveillance, and other limitations that make X-Wing one of my favorite current past times—a trend that is not likely to subside any time soon.
Rich Hoffman
March 27, 2014
Why a Good Man Goes to Court: Boot-lickers shape a story
The Cincinnati Enquirer has taken an interest in the Lang case involving the law suit pressed by three West Chester police officers against the current president of the township trustees. The Enquirer has cut together a video clip seen at the link below illuminating some key statements by Lang which the officers are building their case on. If the entire video is watched, which I have put in its entirety on another article, it is clear that Lang wasn’t picking a fight with the West Chester police, but was trying to explain why he—as a trustee had agreed to an out-of-court settlement to keep the victim of police brutality from going to court against the police department. I know the context of the video because it’s my video. I shot it, I uploaded it, and I own it. Lang didn’t ask me to, he didn’t “publish” any such statements intended for public consumption beyond the explanation to a group of fiscally concerned Tea Party members who wanted to understand why he spent tax money for an obvious out-of-court settlement.
http://www.cincinnati.com/videos/news/politics/2014/03/22/6737579/
The Enquirer has a history of doing hit pieces. It was Lang’s predecessor Cathy Stoker who worked up a hit piece against me along with some other Lakota levy supporters because they were upset that I was involved in a charity event that undermined their community altruism—power. So they used segments of my statements made on these pages to try to paint me as a sexist—because they essentially didn’t have a way to answer my arguments against them. They played politics—which is the same as saying that they “cheated.” This is often the strategy used when an establishment is challenged by new ideals—they dig in and use “politics” to protect themselves from change.
George Lang represents real change in the role of community politics. This makes many people very upset—particularly government type workers. In that same video highlighted by the Enquirer Lang also told the audience not to vote for any future tax increases for the police department because as he said, they are already well paid and make too much money. And he’s right. They are.
Government workers from police to school teachers and the reporters who are aligned with them for feel good “community” stories don’t want people like Lang in charge. They want chaos, and open purse strings that will demand tax increases every time those government workers want a pay raise. If there was anything that Lang said negative in that video it wasn’t the very fair statements made about the case involving the beating—because he didn’t say anything that could even remotely be considered as “slander.” He didn’t even mention the officers’ names. They did that to themselves when they filed a law suit against Lang. Surely their lawyers told them that Lang would bring forward the officers who told him about the bragging that was going on at police headquarters and that they’d be put under oath at the trial–surely they aren’t that stupid—then again, perhaps they are. Or that the doctors who worked on the victim wouldn’t provide testimony as to the contents of the beating to validate the truth of Lang’s statements about why the township had to settle out of court. The police obviously didn’t think this case through. Instead, they have already slandered George Lang by attacking him. They have already provided false statements to the public. Lang had nothing to do with “publishing” the video. I did. And he never said a word about the case to me at any point in time under any circumstance which of course I will provide testimony to—under oath.
The real problem the police have with that video based on my personal experience with all the parties involved is that Lang came out against a future police levy. They won’t admit to that under any circumstance, but deep within their secrets of their minds, they know it’s the truth. That is their real issue. Lang told the audience not to give the township any more money because the trustees would just find a way to spend it. Does that sound like a bad, malicious, slanderer? Lang also said that the police were heroes and that he was glad that he didn’t have to do their job? That comment didn’t show up in any of these Enquirer clips and articles. None of those statements made it into the story at any point—because they are all on the same side. When the video is played in court, the judge, the jury and the audience will also see that Lang said all those things—that were far from disgraceful, slanderous, or mean-spirited.
Oddly enough this story broke only one week after Lang’s trustees stood with the residents of West Chester in preventing a Kroger Marketplace from going in to a controversial plot of land where the developer was seeking a zoning change. It might be a coincidence, but the timing is awfully similar to my own situation where I had quite a sensation with my charity announcement to help Lakota students, then the very next week my name was plastered on every radio station in the Cincinnati area in a negative way—the context removed. Developers give quite a lot of money to sheriff campaigns, so favors against political rivals are not out of the question. In this case the issue is irrelevant, because I know the meaning of the video— I shot it, I published it, and I was there to confirm the context. It only took two years for the police to become upset about it, and it just so happened that this story hit the Enquirer a week after the Kroger Marketplace deal fell through………….I’m sure it’s all just a coincidence…………….by the way………I have some swamp land to sell in Alaska.
The case against Lang is not one in pursuit of justice or fairness. It is to pound him into political submission by the political currents of West Chester in my opinion. Behind the three police officers involved in this law suit is a labor union aligned with all government labor unions driven by radicalism to their own selfish desires. What they are really mad at is that Lang is against tax increases for West Chester—and this law suit is designed to rough him up—based on my history with such things and the characters involved. Lang said nothing slanderous about the three officers—he stuck strictly to the facts which are how it should be done. He has a responsibility to the community which he took seriously. The police may not have liked it, but they shouldn’t have screwed up on that late night beating of a helpless drunk—just because they had the “law” at their back.
At the beginning of that same video Lang also mentions the things I have said on this site—and that oddly enough didn’t make it into the Enquirer either. A lot of people read my blog, probably a lot more than who read the Enquirer every day, or the Today’s Pulse, by Cox Publishing. I can understand that they’d be jealous, or upset. But they’d find they’d have more readers if they’d stop pandering to the villains and stand behind the righteous—like Lang. People like good people, and Lang is a good person. They don’t like suck asses and boot lickers—and too often the Cincinnati Enquirer asks their reporters to be both and the casualty is not George Lang, or myself—it’s the readership of the newspaper. Lang isn’t the only politician who reads my work, and they are reading me because they can’t get the facts anywhere else. And it is also why my video is at the center of this case because the Enquirer was too busy kissing ass to film it on their own. And they don’t even have the guts or courtesy to acknowledge that their source material came from Overmanwarrior’s Wisdom.
But they had no problem taking credit.
Rich Hoffman www.OVERMANWARRIOR.com
