Ronald E. Yates's Blog, page 93

Are Terrorists Winning the War on Terror?

Within hours of the attack in New York in which an Islamic terrorist used a truck to mow down and kill eight people on a bicycle path, public officials were out in front of the cameras telling the public to go on with their lives because: “we can’t let the terrorists win.”

In fact, I would argue the terrorists have already won. During the past couple of decades, they have achieved what they set out to achieve. They have dramatically altered the way we live our lives, the way we travel, the way we perceive the world.

They have made terrorism a miserable fact of our lives.

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For those of us who grew up in the 1950s and 60s, these changes are especially striking and disheartening.

I remember when you could walk onto airplanes without even passing through a metal detector, let alone long lines for multiple security checks during which you must remove your shoes and submit to invasive electronic body searches.

I remember when you could go to a baseball or football game with a cooler and a backpack.

I remember when schools didn’t have metal detectors or armed guards standing guard or roaming the halls.

I remember when the only violence you occasionally encountered in a bar was between a couple of drunks throwing wild punches at one another. Not once did an Islamic terrorist walk into a crowded nightclub, shout “Allahu Akbar,” and start mowing down patrons with a semi-automatic weapon.

“We can’t let the terrorists win,” declare our public officials and media pundits.

But the awful reality is, terrorist cells are already plotting more attacks all across the globe. No country or city will ever be truly safe from terrorism again but that, sadly, is the era we live in now.

In George Orwell’s seminal book, “1984” a character says: “The object of terrorism is terrorism. The object of oppression is oppression. The object of torture is torture. The object of murder is murder. The object of power is power. Now, do you begin to understand me?”

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For all of our surveillance and intelligence gathering, terrorists are free, and we’re not. So who’s really winning the war on terror?

Unlike conventional wars between nation states in which there were clear-cut victors and vanquished, in this war, there is no end in sight, no light at the end of the tunnel.

Following the New York attack, I heard one public official state: “I believe we owe it to the victims of this act not to let the terrorist win by being terrorized. That’s exactly the response they are hoping for. Sure, it’s natural for our emotions to get the best of us. But, especially given the impact of sensational media coverage, we need to respond intelligently and rationally.”

“Sensational media coverage?” I wonder to what he was referring. The fact that the story of eight innocent people being crushed under the wheels of a truck driven by a deranged Muslim screaming “Allahu Akbar” was covered coast to coast? Why wouldn’t the media cover the first terrorist attack in New York since September 11, 2001, when the Twin Towers were brought down by Islamic terrorists?

The Daily Mail in London wrote: “The proper response to sickening crimes like these is not to apportion blame but to present a show of unity and defiance. We must let the terrorists know that we stand together against them and that an attack on one of us is an attack on all of us. If we allow the terrorists to divide us – setting one racial group against another – they have won.”

Such platitudes may sound reasonable, but they are misleading and dishonest.

On the one hand, they say “don’t let the terrorists win” while on the other they say that living in a world brimming with terrorism and ruled by multifaceted security checks is the “new normal.”

If this is the new normal, then I reiterate: The terrorists have already won because they have forced us to live in an abnormal world.

 

 

Dealing With the Dreaded Rejection Letter

If there is one thing most authors have in common, besides the shear agony that sometimes accompanies the writing process, it is the dreaded Rejection Letter from an agent or publisher.

I don’t know who got this one from Harlequin, but it had to be devastating to the person receiving it.

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I have received a few rejection letters–though none like the one from Harlequin.

Most authors–even wildly successful authors–have also received their share of rejection missives.

Don’t believe me?

Just take a look at this list of rejection letters that were sent by publishers and agents to world-renowned, Nobel and Pulitzer Prize winning authors. It is simply part of the creative process and you need to keep moving ahead–just as these authors did.

—“The American public is not interested in China,” a publisher wrote Pearl S. Buck. Her book The Good Earth becomes the best-selling US novel two years running in 1931/32, and wins The Pulitzer Prize in the process.

—Alex Haley writes for eight years and receives 200 consecutive rejections from publishers and agents. His novel Roots becomes a publishing sensation, selling 1.5 million copies in its first seven months of release, and going on to sell 8 million.

—“He hasn’t got a future as a writer,” a publisher opines. Yet, publication of The Spy Who Came in From the Cold leads to its author, John le Carré, having one of the most distinguished careers in literary history.

—“Hopelessly bogged down and unreadable,” a publisher tells Ursula K. Le Guin in a 1968 rejection letter. She was not deterred and her book The Left Hand of Darkness goes on to become just the first of her many best-sellers, and is now regularly voted as the second best fantasy novel of all time, next to The Lord of the Rings.

—The Christopher Little Literary Agency receives 12 publishing rejections in a row for their new client, until the eight-year-old daughter of a Bloomsbury editor demands to read the rest of the book. The editor agrees to publish but advises the writer to get a day job since she has little chance of making money in children’s books. Yet Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone by J.K. Rowling spawns a series where the last four novels consecutively set records as the fastest-selling books in history, on both sides of the Atlantic, with combined sales of 450 million.

—“It is so badly written,” a publisher tells this author. Dan Brown is not discouraged, however, and tries Doubleday where his book makes an impression. The Da Vinci Code eventually sells 80 million copies.

—“Too different from other juvenile (books) on the market to warrant its selling,” says a rejection letter sent to Dr Seuss. His books have racked up $300 million in sales and he is now the 9th best-selling fiction author of all time.

See what I mean?

Editors, agents, first readers who dig through the publisher’s slush pile–all are quite capable of making bone-headed decisions about other people’s work. And they do it all the time.

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So if you have a stack of rejection letters sitting on your desk or stuffed into a file cabinet, don’t despair. You are not alone.

What you should do, instead of becoming despondent and inconsolable, is read those rejection letters carefully and look for the constructive criticism in them.

In most cases you will find some–though as one publisher told an author many years ago: “This manuscript should be buried under a pile of rocks and forgotten for the next thousand years.”  (That book went to become a bestseller and was even made into a movie. It’s name: Lolita.)

 Phrases like that can be a bit disheartening–even to the most thick-skinned scribbler.  So far I have not received anything quite so venomous…though I have had my go-rounds with a few agents and editors who couldn’t see the value of what I was working on.

Now that I am writing fiction rather than nonfiction, I am finding that I no longer really care what an agent or publisher may think of my work. I find that especially satisfying when I am able to see that customers on Amazon, Barnes & Noble and Goodreads like my book and are giving it mostly 5-stars with a handful of 4-star ratings.

That tells me that I must be doing something right.

The key is believing in yourself and the story you are telling. You will NEVER please everybody. There will always be those who don’t understand or simply don’t like your book or books. That’s life.

But it is critical that you DO NOT stop believing in what you are writing. Does that mean you should ignore valid and constructive criticism?

No, it does not. If somebody has taken the time to tell you what is wrong with your book or why he or she didn’t like it, you should also take the time to consider that criticism and learn from it.

It doesn’t mean you should simply give up, stop writing and walk away from your computer. Writing is a skill that cannot be taught–at least not in the same way one learns calculus or biology.

It must be learned. And we learn to recognize good writing by reading.

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Then we learn how to write by by writing, writing, writing–even if the writing we do is terrible, with way too many adjectives in place of strong action verbs or way too many compound-complex sentences that give readers migraines as they slog through page-long paragraphs.

Reading should be fun–not a chore. And only you, the writer, can dictate that.

So if a rejection letter says your prose is ponderous and pretentious, or your story is tedious and byzantine you might want to take a hard, critical look at what you have written.

And after doing that if you still disagree with the author of that rejection letter, then by all means, plow ahead. You may be right and that agent or editor may be wide of the mark.

Time and book sales will tell.

 

The Awful English Language

(Periodically, I reblog a post that those who follow my blog found interesting or helpful. Here is a post I did a while back that looks at the Awful English Language. Enjoy.)

Let’s face it, Americans are notoriously inept when it comes to learning other languages. Unlike Europe, where many people speak several languages because dozens of nations with distinct tongues adjoin one another, the United States only has Canada to the North and Mexico to the South.

Spanish is the second most widely spoken language in the United States. So you would think it would make sense for us to learn Spanish. But how many of us have taken Spanish classes in high school (or even college) and can manage only such phrases as “Una Cerveza mas por favor” (one more beer, please) or “¿Como te llamas?” (What’s your name?)?

Then there is Canada—an English speaking country, except for those French-speaking diehard traditionalists in places like Montreal. Okay, some Americans may argue that Canadians speak English weirdly, as in aboot rather than about and uutside rather than outside.

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Nonetheless, Americans can travel to Canada and get along just fine without worrying about a significant language barrier. Cultural barriers are another matter, but I won’t go into those here.

Centuries ago, I took high school French, and I think the only phrase I still recall is: “Comment allez-vous aujourd’hui?” (How are you today?).

Later in life, I learned German, but only because I was based for almost three years in a small Bavarian town in a signals intelligence detachment, married a German woman, and minored in German at the University of Kansas. Later, I learned Japanese while living there almost ten years as a foreign correspondent for the Chicago Tribune. Then, I picked up some Spanish while working in Mexico, Central, and South America.

And that brings me to the purpose of this post. When I was teaching journalism as a professor at the University of Illinois, I used to spend part of a class talking about what I called “The Awful English Language.”

We Americans complain about learning other languages because we say they are hard to digest. But think about the non-English speaker who has to traverse the illogical and contradictory muddle that the English language is.

It is filled with homographs—words of like spelling that have more than one meaning. Then there are heterodoxies. That’s a homograph that is also pronounced differently.

Also, English tends to be a combination of prefixes, suffixes and borrowed words from several other languages. As a result, we end up with endless combinations of words with unpredictable, sometimes contradictory, meanings.

While some parts of the English language are relatively straightforward, such as the fact that nouns only have a single gender, it is the spelling and phonetics that often boggle the mind. There are so many silent letters – knock, knee, knight – and plurals that just don’t make sense.

The plural of ‘box’ is ‘boxes,’ yet the plural of ‘ox’ is ‘oxen,’ not ‘oxes.’ We see these arbitrary formations happen all the time in the English language, as well as words that sound similar yet are spelled differently, or sound the same but are used in different contexts.

Now for a brief homily about the English language and how it got so damned complicated. Ahem, bear with me, please.

The English language belongs to the West Germanic branch of the Indo-European family of languages but has been influenced over the centuries by many different languages. English is considered to be a “borrowing” language, and that is why it developed the complexity that non-English speakers and even we native speakers find frustrating today.

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English can be categorized into three groups: Old English (or Anglo-Saxon), Middle English and Modern English.

The invasion of the three Germanic tribes (Saxons, Angles, and Jutes) who came to the British Isles in the fifth century A.D from places now known as Northwest Germany and the Netherlands significantly impacted the English language. Their dialects mixed with English throughout the years.

Danes and Norsemen, also called Vikings, later invaded the country. Hence, Old Norse and Latin words are also found in the English language. The Anglo-Norman French of the dominant class also profoundly influenced vocabulary after the Norman Conquest in 1066.

Hence, we have a mongrel language blended from dozens of tongues, dialects, and idioms.

There. That wasn’t so bad, was it?

Now, take a look at these gems and maybe then you will begin to pity the non-English speaker who must learn English.

The bandage was wound around the wound.
The farm was used to produce produce.
The dump was so full that it had to refuse more refuse.
We must polish the Polish furniture.
He could lead if he would get the lead out.
The soldier decided to desert his dessert in the desert.
Since there is no time like the present, he thought it was time to present the present.
A bass was painted on the head of the bass drum.
When shot at, the dove dove into the bushes.
I did not object to the object.
The insurance was invalid for the invalid.
There was a row among the oarsmen about how to row.
They were too close to the door to close it.
The buck does funny things when the does are present.
A seamstress and a sewer fell into a sewer line.
To help with planting, the farmer taught his sow to sow.
The wind was too strong to wind the sail.
After a number of injections, my jaw got number.
Upon seeing the tear in the painting, I shed a tear.
I had to subject the subject to a series of tests.
How can I intimate this to my most intimate friend?
Why do our noses run but our feet smell?
I did not object to the object.
Freddie filled in his form by filling it out.
Why do performers recite a play, yet play at a recital?

Had enough? No? Then think about these conundrums of the English language.

If lawyers are disbarred, and clergymen defrocked, does it not follow that electricians can be delighted, musicians denoted, cowboys deranged, models deposed, or dry cleaners depressed?

Laundry workers could decrease, eventually becoming depressed and depleted.

Even more, bedmakers could be debunked, baseball players debased, landscapers deflowered, software engineers detested, underwear manufacturers debriefed, and even musical composers will eventually decompose.

On a different note, though, perhaps we can hope that some politicians will be devoted.

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Yes, English is a crazy language. In fact, that was the title of a song that Pete Seeger used to sing years ago. Here are a few excerpts:

“English is the most widely spoken language in the history of the planet.

One out of every seven human beings can speak or read it.

Half the world’s books, 3/4 of the international mail are in English.

It has the largest vocabulary, perhaps two million words,

And a noble body of literature. But face it:

English is cuh-ray-zee!

There’s no egg in eggplant, no pine or apple in pineapple.

Quicksand works slowly; boxing rings are square.

A writer writes, but do fingers fing?

Hammers don’t ham, grocers don’t groce. Haberdashers don’t haberdash.

English is cuh-ray-zee!

If the plural of tooth is teeth, shouldn’t the plural of booth be beeth?

It’s one goose, two geese. Why not one moose, two meese?

If it’s one index, two indices; why not one Kleenex, two Kleenices?

English is cuh-ray-zee!

You can comb through the annals of history, but not just one annal.

You can make amends, but not just one amend.

If you have a bunch of odds and ends and get rid of all but one, is it an odd or an end?

If the teacher taught, why isn’t it true that a preacher praught?

If you wrote a letter, did you also bote your tongue?

And if a vegetarian eats vegetables, what does a humanitarian eat?

English is cuh-ray-zee!

If teachers taught, why didn’t preachers praught?

Why is it that night falls but never breaks and day breaks but never falls?

In what other language do people drive on the parkway and park on the driveway?

Ship by truck but send cargo by ship? Recite at a play but play at a recital?

Have noses that run and feet that smell?

English is cuh-ray-zee!

How can a slim chance and a fat chance be the same

When a wise man and a wise guy are very different?

To overlook something and to oversee something are very different,

But quite a lot and quite a few are the same.

How can the weather be hot as hell one day and cold as hell the next?

English is cuh-ray-zee!” 

Of course English is a creation of humanity, not computers, and it reflects the creativity of the human race, which, of course, is not a race at all. That is why, when the stars are out, they are visible, but when the lights are out, they are invisible.[image error]

There are also dozens of illogical idioms we hear every day. Such as:

“Head over heels” (in love, for example). Surely the phrase should be “heels over head.”

 

 

“Meteoric rise” (to fame, for example). Meteors don’t rise. They fall.

“Quantum Leap” (meaning a significant change). A quantum leap is a very small change, but at least it is large on the scale of atoms.

“To leapfrog” over something. Surely it should be “frog leap” over.

He “turned up dead.” That’s used mainly in the US. Turning up, even when you are dead, takes real determination.

“Back-to-back” meaning consecutive, e.g., back-to-back wins. It should be “back-to-front,” I think. The end of one thing is followed by the start of the next thing and not the end of it. Unfortunately, “back-to-front” already has a different meaning.

Finally, there are these ten meaningless and irritating English clichés and expressions that should be banned forever. I cringe whenever I hear them, which is everyday—especially by news readers and political pundits on television.

At the end of the day
At this moment in time
The bottom line
I personally
With all due respect
It’s a nightmare
Fairly unique
Shouldn’t of (ouch!)
24/7
It’s not rocket science-

PS: Why doesn’t ‘Buick’ rhyme with ‘quick’?

 

The Diminished Meaning of the Word “Hero”

Our society seems obsessed with labels. Take the word “Hero,” for example. It is applied in the most absurd and inappropriate ways to people who don’t deserve that distinction.

When Whitney Houston died in 2012, for example, I couldn’t believe people were calling her a “hero.”

Why? Because she was a wonderfully talented singer who eventually threw her life and career away with a deadly addiction to different drugs such crystal meth, marijuana, cocaine, and pills such as Xanax, Flexeril, and Benadryl?

How exactly does that make her a “hero?” It doesn’t. It doesn’t even make her a good role model.

And what about others who have been accorded the “hero” appellation?

Remember US Airways Capt. Chesley Sullenberger, who in 2009 landed his plane full of passengers on New York’s Hudson River after his engines conked out? Sullenberger was quickly labeled “hero”–a term he says is not appropriate.

[image error] Capt. Chesley “Sully” Sullenberger

“That didn’t quite fit my situation, which was thrust upon me suddenly,” he said. “Certainly, my crew and I were up to the task. But I’m not sure it quite crosses the threshold of heroism. I think the idea of a hero is important. But sometimes in our culture, we overuse the word, and by overusing it, we diminish it.”

The Pittsburgh-based Carnegie Hero Fund Commission defines a hero as “someone who voluntarily leaves a point of safety to assume life risk to save or attempt to save the life of another.”

“When the engines stopped on US Airways Flight 1549 in January 2009,” Commission president, Mark Laskow wrote, “Capt. Sullenberger was not in a place of safety. On the contrary, he was in the same peril as the passengers whose lives he saved with his piloting skill. He did not have the opportunity to make a moral choice to take on the risk — it ‘was thrust upon’ him. I do not doubt that if he did have such a choice, he would not have hesitated to place himself in danger to save his passengers. That just wasn’t the actual situation in which he found himself.”

Once upon a time, I served in the U.S. Army. I did my job and did it pretty well as my various awards, and eventual promotion to Sergeant attests. But I was no “hero.” I volunteered, I did my job, and I left with an honorable discharge. When a soldier, marine, airman or sailor puts on his or her uniform, they are just doing their jobs.

Today, we apply the word “hero” to all servicemen and women who serve in the armed forces. How often do we hear people refer to “our heroes in Afghanistan?” They are not heroes. They are servicemen and women, and they are doing their duty serving their nation. When they are injured, wounded, or even killed they are casualties, but not necessarily heroes.

A hero is a person who goes above and beyond the call of duty and puts him or herself in harm’s way to perform an act of selfless gallantry. You might argue that servicemen and women put themselves in harm’s way on a daily basis, but that is their job–and they volunteered for that job. So how does that make “ALL” servicemen and women “heroes?”

It doesn’t.

I sometimes wear a baseball cap when I go shopping. On the front, it identifies me as a U.S. Army Veteran–a fact that I am very proud of. Sometimes people see that and thank me for my service. When that happens, I often feel a bit awkward. Yes, I did serve four years on active duty and another four in the reserves. But I don’t feel anybody owes me a “thank you.” I volunteered for the U. S. Army, and I did the job I was assigned to do. I am certainly no “hero” because of it.

Do you want to know what a hero is? Here is a hero. His name was Roy P. Benavidez. Not long ago someone sent me an e-mail that contained the fantastic story of his life.

In 1965 Benavidez was sent to South Vietnam as a Green Beret advisor to an ARVN infantry regiment. He stepped on a landmine during a patrol and was evacuated to the United States, where doctors at Brooke Army Medical Center (BAMC) concluded he would never walk again and began preparing his medical discharge papers.

[image error] Master Sgt. Roy P. Benavidez

But Benavidez, who was known by the radio call sign as “Tango Mike Mike” (“That Mean Mexican”) was not ready to accept that diagnosis.

Against doctors orders, he began an unsanctioned nightly training ritual in an attempt to redevelop his ability to walk. Climbing out of bed at night, Benavidez would crawl using his elbows and chin to a wall near his bedside and (with the encouragement of his fellow patients, many of whom were permanently paralyzed or missing limbs), he would prop himself against the wall and attempt to lift himself up unaided.

After several months of excruciating practice that by his own admission often left him in tears, he was able to push himself up the wall with his ankles and legs. After more than a year of hospitalization, Benavidez walked out of the hospital in July 1966, with his wife at his side, determined to return to combat in Vietnam.

Benavidez returned to Fort Bragg to begin training for the elite Studies and Observations Group (SOG). Despite continuing pain from his wounds, he became a member of the 5th Special Forces Group and returned to South Vietnam in January 1968.

That’s when this man’s incredible story heroism began. This is what his Medal of Honor Citation says:

“On the morning of 2 May 1968, a 12-man Special Forces Reconnaissance Team was inserted by helicopters in a dense jungle area west of Loc Ninh, Vietnam to gather intelligence information about confirmed large-scale enemy activity. This area was controlled and routinely patrolled by the North Vietnamese Army. After a short period of time on the ground, the team met heavy enemy resistance and requested emergency extraction.

  “Three helicopters attempted extraction but were unable to land due to intense enemy small arms and anti-aircraft fire. Sergeant Benavidez was at the Forward Operating Base in Loc Ninh monitoring the operation by radio when these helicopters returned to off-load wounded crewmembers and to assess aircraft damage.

  “Sergeant Benavidez voluntarily boarded a returning aircraft to assist in another extraction attempt. Realizing that all the team members were either dead or wounded and unable to move to the pickup zone, he directed the aircraft to a nearby clearing where he jumped from the hovering helicopter and ran approximately 75 meters under withering small arms fire to the crippled team.

  “When he reached the leader’s body, Sergeant Benavidez was severely wounded by small arms fire in the abdomen and grenade fragments in his back. At nearly the same moment, the aircraft pilot was mortally wounded, and his helicopter crashed. Although in extremely critical condition due to his multiple wounds, Sergeant Benavidez secured the classified documents and made his way back to the wreckage, where he aided the wounded out of the overturned aircraft and gathered the stunned survivors into a defensive perimeter.  

“Prior to reaching the team’s position he was wounded in his right leg, face, and head. Despite these painful injuries, he took charge, repositioning the team members and directing their fire to facilitate the landing of an extraction aircraft, and the loading of wounded and dead team members. He then threw smoke canisters to direct the aircraft to the team’s position. Despite his severe wounds and under intense enemy fire, he carried and dragged half of the wounded team members to the awaiting aircraft. He then provided protective fire by running alongside the aircraft as it moved to pick up the remaining team members. As the enemy’s fire intensified, he hurried to recover the body and classified documents on the dead team leader.

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  “Under increasing enemy automatic weapons and grenade fire, he moved around the perimeter distributing water and ammunition to his weary men, re-instilling in them a will to live and fight. Facing a buildup of enemy opposition with a beleaguered team, Sergeant Benavidez mustered his strength, began calling in tactical air strikes and directed the fire from supporting gunships to suppress the enemy’s fire and so permit another extraction attempt.

  “He was wounded again in his thigh by small arms fire while administering first aid to a wounded team member just before another extraction helicopter was able to land. His indomitable spirit kept him going as he began to ferry his comrades to the craft. On his second trip with the wounded, he was clubbed from behind by an enemy soldier. In the ensuing hand-to-hand combat, he sustained additional wounds to his head and arms before killing his adversary. “

  He then continued under devastating fire to carry the wounded to the helicopter. Upon reaching the aircraft, he spotted and killed two enemy soldiers who were rushing the craft from an angle that prevented the aircraft door gunner from firing upon them. With little strength remaining, he made one last trip to the perimeter to ensure that all classified material had been collected or destroyed, and to bring in the remaining wounded. Only then, in extremely serious condition from numerous wounds and loss of blood, did he allow himself to be pulled into the extraction aircraft.

  “Sergeant Benavidez’ gallant choice to join voluntarily his comrades who were in critical straits, to expose himself constantly to withering enemy fire, and his refusal to be stopped despite numerous severe wounds, saved the lives of at least eight men. His fearless personal leadership, tenacious devotion to duty, and extremely valorous actions in the face of overwhelming odds were in keeping with the highest traditions of the military service, and reflect the utmost credit on him and the United States Army.” 

The citation stops short of telling what happened when the helicopter reached its base. Benavidez was put into a body bag, and as it was being zipped up, using what little strength he had left, he spits on the face of the medic to show he wasn’t dead.

Roy Benavidez died on November 29, 1998, at the age of 63 at Brooke Army Medical Center, after suffering respiratory failure and complications of diabetes. He was buried with full military honors at Fort Sam Houston National Cemetery.

Now THAT is the definition of a HERO!

For those who want to see and hear more about Master Sergeant Roy P. Benavidez, you can do so by clicking on the following link:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RZ7968BbMnU&feature=player_embedded

 

 

 

 

Join Me Today on Blog Talk Radio’s Spotlight Honors Show

To my followers & all the ships at sea. Join me as I host a new show about books, writing, and authors today, Oct. 19, at 9 a.m. Pacific Time.

Tune in to BlogTalkRadio for the Rave Wave show “SPOTLIGHT” HONORS” produced by Rave Reviews Book Club.

Here’s the link:

http://www.blogtalkradio.com/ravereviewsbookclub/2017/10/19/rrbc-rave-waves-blogtalkradio-spotlight-honors-with-f-b-veneziano

Hope to meet you in the blogosphere!

Today’s Journalism: No Experience Required?

Good journalism, somebody once said, is a nation talking to itself.

That’s “talking to itself,” not yelling, screaming, shrieking, talking over one another and engaging in verbal bullying.

That is just about all we see on prime-time television–especially cable television–these days.

Primetime cable TV outlets such as Fox, CNN, MSNBC, CNBC, etc. continue to produce a proliferation of hosts and pundits with no foundation in journalistic ethics and tradition. Today’s so-called “news shows” more often than not devolve into shoutfests where guests and hosts engage, not in any intelligent discussion of issues, but in contests to see who can talk the loudest or bully those who disagree with them into submission.

 

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That kind of “squawk talk” comes with a steep price. What does the viewing public learn from such exhibitions of bad behavior?

The answer, I would argue, is not much. Because when people are yelling at one another, calling one another names or behaving like petulant children, reasoned discourse disappears and the viewer gets lost in the shrill entertainment of the moment. I believe we have lost the art of reasonable discourse in this country. If you don’t agree with someone, then just talk or shout over them, call them names, make faces and behave like a two-year-old. (Sorry if I have insulted any two-year-olds).

Opinion is NOT reporting. Yet those who monitor the recent explosion of misnamed “news shows” say viewers don’t discern between shows with distinct political agendas and those that attempt to present events with a minimum of subjectivity and a maximum of fairness and balance.

When I started out in the newspaper business, reporters were taught that while all of us have biases, as professionals we must work to subordinate those prejudices and keep our opinions out of the stories we report.

It was something that was drilled into our heads, and sound editors and producers made sure it never left.

That is just not the case today. Too many journalists (or those who like to call themselves journalists) feel compelled to insert their opinions in everything they write or produce. A “new” journalism of assertion and vilification has displaced the old journalism of verification. Gossip has become news, fiction is now fact, and biases are a part of straight news reporting.

In fact, many of these “journalists” are not journalists at all, but merely former political operatives and talking heads who wrap themselves in the mantle of journalism when real journalists are risking their lives in places like Afghanistan, Syria, and Iraq to bring people reliable news.

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The opinion-fueled shows that dominate cable news channels during prime time are far removed from the old-school straight news programs such as the traditional nightly network newscasts with which many of us grew up.

At an awards dinner a few years ago for the late Mike Wallace of CBS 60-Minutes fame, I had an opportunity to talk with Walter Cronkite about the state of television news in general and prime-time cable news in particular. During his reign on CBS Cronkite, who died in 2009, was often referred to as the most trusted journalist in America–an appellation he didn’t take lightly.

During our conversation, he decried the lack of ethics and professionalism that is so pervasive today.”Too many of these people simply don’t care about or have any desire to ferret out the truth,” Cronkite told me. “Too many have intense political or social agendas, and rather than present information as objectively as possible, they want to jam their opinions down our throats.”

“Too many of these people simply don’t care about or have any desire to ferret out the truth,” Cronkite told me. “Too many have intense political or social agendas, and rather than present information as objectively as possible, they want to jam their opinions down our throats.”

And, he added, most of the public cannot distinguish between these faux journalists and real reporters.

The Society of Professional Journalists–an organization I have belonged to since my days as a student at the University of Kansas–has a code of ethics of which most of cable TV’s shouting heads have no concept.

I, as well as a majority of the journalists I have worked within the U.S. and around the world, always worked assiduously to follow that code which consists of several sections.

The ones that stand out most in these days of ersatz journalism (and which are, unfortunately, too often ignored) are:

Give voice to the voiceless; official and unofficial sources of information can be equally valid.
Distinguish between advocacy and news reporting. Analysis and commentary should be labeled and not misrepresent fact or context.
Test the accuracy of information from all sources and exercise care to avoid inadvertent error. Deliberate distortion is never permissible.
Journalists should be free of obligation to any interest other than the public’s right to know.
Support the open exchange of views, even views they find repugnant.
Journalists are accountable to their readers, listeners, viewers and each other.

I have purposely NOT mentioned any names of the most egregious offenders here because that would require several more pages of copy. But I urge you to watch these so-called “news shows” with a critical eye and ear from now on.

Pay attention to who they have on as guests or as experts–and how often they appear. Watch how those with opposing views are interviewed–or not interviewed. Are they allowed to get their points or arguments across without being shouted down?

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What kinds of discussions are held on issues? Are they truth-seeking or attempts merely to reinforce the opinion of the host?

Does each member of a panel have an opportunity to talk without being insulted by the host or by some other panel member?

How you answer these questions will go a long way in helping you to determine if you are watching a frenzied opinion-fest or a real news show designed to get at the truth.

As Thomas Jefferson once said: “An informed citizenry is the only true repository of the public will.”

So, I will end where I began.

Good journalism is a nation talking to itself–and, I would add, it is a nation that learns from intelligent, rational discourse and has at its core the responsibility to help advance and encourage an informed citizenry.

 

 

 

 

Blacks, Crime, and the Bended Knee

I am reposting this article by journalist Shari Goodman. She makes many inconvenient, but valid points in this piece about the irrationality and absurdity of “white guilt”–of which I (and millions of other “European Americans”) have none. Zilch. Zero. Nada. The inane notion of “victimhood” in our country is growing tiresome, as is the concept of “white privilege” of which I (and millions of other “European Americans”) have had none. Zilch, Zero. Nada. Nobody in this life gave me anything I didn’t earn–except my mother, who gave me life. White privilege is a fabrication perpetrated by minorities convinced they are victims. About the only white people I know with white privilege are those individuals who are the offspring of billionaires. And then, not all of them are even white! Read on. I think you will be enlightened by some indisputable facts.

By Shari Goodman

Fresh off the heels of the march on Charlottesville and the destruction of historical monuments in the South by Black Lives Matter, new protests are occurring–this time against our National Anthem and our flag in stadiums across our country. “Taking the knee“ was first introduced by former 49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick about a year ago, but has since gained in momentum as many other black athletes with million-dollar salaries have joined in solidarity with demonstrations against white oppression and racism.

[image error] Colin Kaepernick and friends

Whites comprise about 75 percent of America’s population, and they have had just about enough of the offensive accusations, protests, and moral outrage directed at them. Yes, blacks were brought here centuries ago as slaves, but America did not originate slavery nor do we still practice slavery, as do parts of Africa and Muslim nations today.

In fact, America fought a civil war to end slavery. It’s been over 150 years since the Emancipation Proclamation, thus, the fate of today’s blacks rests not upon yesterday’s slaveholders, but upon today’s failed black leadership who have intentionally kept America’s blacks on an imaginary plantation through the indoctrination of victimhood. By

By instilling the notion that blacks today are the victims of white racism and “white privilege”, black leadership (Al Sharpton, Jesse Jackson, Louis Farrakhan, and Maxine Waters, to name a few) have created not only an entitlement mentality, but a dependency and helplessness prevalent among young blacks in inner cities throughout the country.

It is not “whitey” who is committing 62 percent of robberies, 57 percent of murders, 45 percent of assaults in the 75 biggest counties throughout the United States. Despite comprising only about 15 percent of the population in those counties. 91 percent of blacks are murdered by other blacks.

Blacks comprise 10 percent of the population but commit 42 percent of the robberies and 34 percent of felonies. In a report from the Department of Justice, over a 30-year period between 1980 and 2008, blacks committed half of all homicides in the United States despite comprising only 13 percent of the population. https://www.channel4.com/news/factche...

Furthermore, a 2007 FBI file reports there were 433,934 single-offender victimization crimes against whites by blacks compared to 55,685 crimes committed by whites against blacks — eight times as many more crimes committed against whites by blacks. Interracial rape is almost exclusively a black on white crime with 14,000 assaults on white women  but not one case of a white sexual assault on a black female.

In her book, The War on Cops: How the New Attack on Law and Order Makes Everyone Less Safe, Heather McDonald documents the inner city warfare committed by black males against other black males. In Chicago, 76 percent of all homicides are committed by blacks, and 78 percent of all juvenile arrests involve blacks.

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Black educational statistics are dismal when compared to whites. In a 2012-2013 report by the Schott Foundation titled “Black Lives Matter: The Schott 50 State Report on Public Education and Black Males,” it was reported that only 59 percent of black males graduate from high school compared to 65 percent for Latinos and 80 percent for whites. In Detroit, a city governed by black leadership for decades, only 20 percent of black males graduate from high school. What an indictment and disgrace!

Nor are whites responsible for the huge increase in out-of-wedlock births. In 2013, 71 percent of black births were born to black unwed mothers.

These children were born into a life of poverty without the benefit of a father in the home. The norm for these kids is to drop out, use drugs, become unemployed, commit crimes, and become imprisoned at many more times the rate of whites, Asian, and Hispanics.

Yes, the black community has a problem, but it is of its own making, and too often whites are the victims of a dysfunctional black community. America has lavishly poured billions of taxpayer’s dollars in recent decades to improve public education, outreach, and equal opportunity programs such as Affirmative Action for blacks in inner cities, but to what avail?

We have stepped aside and watched silently as city after city, once safe and prosperous, became Third World outposts after decades of corrupt black Democratic leadership. They enriched themselves with unkept promises while the rest of the population floundered.

For decades, beginning with the 60s, white guilt was kept alive by a civil rights revolution that swept the nation. Many blacks found success in the media, the press, education, sports, law enforcement, the halls of government, culminating in the election of the first black President, Barack Hussein Obama.

Many whites, eager to assuage their guilt after many years of playing defense, voted not for the best man to fill the office, but for a symbol, they hoped would end the racial conflict once and for all.

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Contrarily, the election of Obama only served to exacerbate tension between whites and blacks. Many blacks felt emboldened and protected in their demands, and racist protests against police are now commonplace.

Chants by Black Lives Matter “What do we want? Dead cops! When do we want it? Now!” were frequently heard at protests. The result is a war on cops with numerous officers killed in the line of duty in NYC, Dallas, Baton Rouge, San Antonio, and other cities throughout the land.

It is not you who needs protection from us. It is we who need protection from you. Black problems are self-created, and history has proven that no amount of money thrown at them will solve the problem. Scapegoating is getting tiresome and dangerous.

Do not lecture us about social injustice and the debt owed to you. The only thing we owe you and what is owed to any of us is equal opportunity. We have more than given that to you. It is high time for the black community to look inwards, and when it does, it will discover the problem is not a lack of opportunities, but a lack of values.

Education, self-reliance, delayed gratification, responsibility, hard work, ambition, and an intact family are values incorporated and ingrained within those who lead decent, productive lives. It is lacking within a large segment of the black community.

[image error] This made the rounds during the Obama reign

Shame on those who display ingratitude and dishonor America, a country that has given black athletes the opportunity to make millions playing a sport that young men in Africa can only dream about, a country that has given blacks liberty and opportunity.

Shame on you and those who kneel with you.

Shari Goodman is an educator, political activist, public speaker, and journalist. Her articles can be found in  American Thinker, World Net Daily, and Israel Today among others.

 

This Marine Takes a Knee against the NFL

I am reposting this commentary by former U.S. Marine, Ken Russell. I believe he speaks for millions of active duty and former members of the U.S. Military. He certainly does for me. HooRah!

By Ken Russell

I had the privilege to serve with the finest Americans, the U.S. Marine Corps, from 1979 until 1990.  These fine Americans included people you’ve never heard of like Pat Guigerre, Jeff Sharver, and Jeb Seagle, who gave their lives to provide NFL players the freedom to make an issue of themselves.

To demonstrate their feelings of concern about this horrible racist nation – at least according to their own delusions – they only need a modicum of audacity to denigrate the symbols of their freedom during a football game rather than on their own personal time.

Keep in mind that an NFL team demonstrating respect for white policemen murdered by a racist black man is…well, manifestly inappropriate and forbidden.

To amplify why NFL knee-taking is a personal insult to me, let me describe how Pat and Jeff gave their lives.  They were Cobra gunship pilots and were part of a flight of two Cobras during Operation Urgent Fury in Grenada.  The pilots in the other Cobra, Tim Howard, and Jeb Seagle, were providing close air support to some Army guys pinned down by enemy Cubans.

[image error] For some taking a knee is a matter of life and death

In the process of providing air support, Tim’s and Jeb’s Cobra was shot down.  Tim and Jeb survived the crash.  Tim lost the use of his right arm and both legs.  Jeb was eventually captured, tortured, and murdered by the Cubans.

At about that time, Pat and Jeff ran out of ammo.  To draw attention and enemy fire away from Tim and Jeb so that Mel DeMars, Larry King (CH-46 Sea Knight pilots), and Kelly Neideigh (CH-46 crew chief) could rescue the two Cobra pilots, Pat and Jeff flew their Cobra in a way to get the enemy to fire at them.

Their plan worked.  The Cubans shot down Pat and Jeff, killing them both, but Tim was rescued by Kelly and flown back to safety.  Mel, Larry, and Kelly weren’t able to get there soon enough to save Jeb before he was captured and murdered.

In the same way that it is a personal decision by many NFL players allowed to violate NFL rules and use their fame and professional excellence to demonstrate their dislike of this nation for whatever reason, it is also a personal decision for me never to watch another NFL game as long as these protests against this nation are allowed to persist during the National Anthem or anytime during a game.

It’s not as though my departure from being a football fan and viewer is going to matter to Mr. Goodell.  But I couldn’t care less.  I like watching football, but I don’t need it to survive or to make a living.  Mr. Goodell and the NFL team owners, players, coaches, TV sports personalities, vendors, and cities need the NFL to be successful to survive, or at least to make the next payment on the limo.

I will cry no tears for the NFL if they decide to throw everything they’ve worked so hard for away because they demand to rub their disrespect for their national anthem and their flag not just in my face, but in the faces of those who died providing their freedom.

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They could do something positive and stand up for Jeff, Pat, and Jeb and stand up for other Marines like Mel, Larry, and Kelly.  They could stand up for Greg Baur and Paul Gehring, who rescued wounded Marines in Beirut while their CH-46 was being shot at by small arms and rocket-propelled grenades.  They could stand up for Jeff Marshall and Kevin McNulty, who flew into Beirut International Airport one night in 1983 while it was under attack to rescue several wounded Marines.

I was a co-pilot in the backup Sea Knight in case Jeff and Kevin were shot down.  Because I had to stay in radio contact, I heard what they went through to get to the wounded Marines.  It still scares the hell out of me, and all I did was listen to the radio chatter describing how they risked their lives.

Maybe the reader knows a few service members who did similar or much braver things than those Marines with whom I was so very privileged to serve, by providing the NFL players the freedom to be world-class in their microscopic world of the greatest athletes on Earth.

Indeed the knee-taking players, the team owners, the commissioner, the sports media, and most politicians couldn’t care less where their freedoms originate and how their freedoms are maintained, nor do they care about the symbol and the anthem that represent their liberty.  Apparently, they care about only a silly notion of self-importance and arrogance they incorrectly call bravery and patriotism, with no fear of getting fired at or sustaining any personal danger for doing so.

[image error] Colin Kaepernick & Friends

If other service members and their friends, family, and co-workers, along with all the other football fans, appreciate symbols of freedom and care to join the likes of me to disinvest from the NFL completely (yes, even when no one is looking), well, maybe there’ll be enough of us to send a message to the knee-takers.

I have the personal luxury of knowing and seeing exactly where freedom originates and also where it is symbolized in both the flag and the National Anthem.  That’s why I’ve already disinvested.  I also know that Jeff, Pat, and Jeb would return the favor if it had been I and not they who died.  That’s why it matters.

Might I suggest that the NFL knee-takers and the NFL owners protest on their own time?  Otherwise, they have the freedom to protest on my time, and I have the freedom not to watch them do so.

You see, that’s how it works, and it’s so much bigger than a damned game.

 

Letter from Oxford: Revising History to Placate Contemporary Views and Prejudices

The following letter came to me via The Internet. It is a non-official satirical response written presumably by white students to black students attending Oxford’s Oriel College as Rhodes Scholars wanting to remove the statue of Oxford Benefactor, Cecil Rhodes.  Before I share the letter, here is a little critical background about the Rhodes controversy.

 The “Rhodes Must Fall” campaign was successful at the University of South Africa. That school removed Rhodes’ statue in April 2015, a month after the protest there began. Students and anti-colonialism activists then began similar protests to remove statues at other universities, including Oxford, where Rhodes (who was born in England) remains a significant figure. Oxford University still offers the elite Rhodes Scholarship, and a statue in his likeness presides over the university’s Oriel College campus.

[image error] Statue of Cecil Rhodes being removed at University in South Africa

In January 2016, Oxford students voted to remove the statue.  Later that month, the school opted to keep the statue after receiving threats from alumni to withdraw millions in donations if it was removed.  The college’s decision sparked more marches and ongoing protests, maintaining the issue in the news.

Oxford University’s chancellor, Chris Patten argued against the removal of the Rhodes statue during an appearance on the Today program on BBC Radio 4 in January 2016. However, his language was far tamer than the rhetoric employed in the following letter. Patten styled the objections to Rhodes as along the lines of the “safe spaces” policies adopted on many university campuses in Britain and the US, which critics have said are used to suppress debate on a range of issues.

“That focus on Rhodes is unfortunate, but it’s an example of what’s happening on American campuses and British colleges,” Patten said. “One of the points of a university – which is not to tolerate intolerance, to engage in free inquiry and debate – is being denied. People have to face up to facts in history which they don’t like and talk about them and debate them. Education is not indoctrination. Our history is not a blank page on which we can write our own version of what it should have been according to our contemporary views and prejudice.”

He added: “Can you imagine a university where there is no platform? I mean a bland diet of bran to feed people, it’s an absolutely terrible idea. If you want universities like that you go to China where they are not allowed to talk about western values, which I regard as global values. No, it’s not the way a university should operate.”

With that as background, here is the unabridged letter ostensibly sent to black students who are demanding that Oxford University pull down the Cecil Rhodes statue and other likenesses of him on campus. It also appeared as an op-ed on America’s Breitbart News.

Dear Scrotty Students,

Cecil Rhodes’s generous bequest has contributed significantly to the comfort and well-being of many generations of Oxford students – a good many of them, dare we say it, better, brighter and more deserving than you.

This does not necessarily mean we approve of everything Rhodes did in his lifetime – but then we don’t have to. Cecil Rhodes died over a century ago. “Autres temps, autres moeures.”*  If you don’t understand what this means – and it would not remotely surprise us if that were the case – then we really think you should ask yourself the question: “Why am I at Oxford?”

[image error] Cecil Rhodes statue at Oxford

Oxford, let us remind you, is the world’s second oldest extant university. Scholars have been studying here since at least the 11th century. We’ve played a major part in the invention of Western civilisation, from the 12th-century intellectual renaissance through the Enlightenment and beyond.

Our alumni include William of Ockham, Roger Bacon, William Tyndale, John Donne, Sir Walter Raleigh, Erasmus, Sir Christopher Wren, William Penn, Rep. Adam Smith (D-WA), Samuel Johnson, Robert Hooke, William Morris, Oscar Wilde, Emily Davison, Cardinal Newman, Julie Cocks.

We’re a big deal. And most of the people privileged to come and study here are conscious of what a big deal we are. Oxford is their alma mater – their dear mother – and they respect and revere her accordingly.

And what were your ancestors doing in that period? Living in mud huts, mainly. Sure we’ll concede you the short-lived Southern African civilisation of Great Zimbabwe. But let’s be brutally honest here. The contribution of the Bantu tribes to modern civilisation has been damn near zilch.

You’ll probably say that’s “racist.” But it’s what we here at Oxford prefer to call “true.”  Perhaps the rules are different at other universities. In fact, we know things are different at other universities.

We’ve watched with horror at what has been happening across the pond from the University of Missouri to the University of Virginia and even to revered institutions like Harvard and Yale: the “safe spaces”; the‪ #‎blacklivesmatter; the creeping cultural relativism; the stifling political correctness; what Allan Bloom rightly called “the closing of the American mind.”

At Oxford, however, we will always prefer facts and free, open debate to petty grievance-mongering, identity politics and empty sloganeering. The day we cease to do so is the day we lose the right to call ourselves the world’s greatest university.

Of course, you are perfectly within your rights to squander your time at Oxford on silly, vexatious, single-issue political campaigns. (Though it does make us wonder how stringent the vetting procedure is these days for Rhodes scholarships and even more so, for Mandela Rhodes scholarships)

[image error] Oxford students demanding Rhodes statue be dumped

We are well used to seeing undergraduates – or, in your case – postgraduates, making idiots of themselves. Just don’t expect us to indulge your idiocy, let alone genuflect before it. You may be black – “BME” as the grisly modern terminology has it – but we are colour blind.

We have been educating gifted undergraduates from our former colonies, our Empire, our Commonwealth and beyond for many generations. We do not discriminate by sex, race, colour or creed. We do, however, discriminate according to intellect.

That means, inter alia, that when our undergrads or postgrads come up with fatuous ideas, we don’t pat them on the back, give them a red rosette and say: “Ooh, you’re black and you come from South Africa. What a clever chap you are!”

No. We prefer to see the quality of those ideas tested in the crucible of public debate. That’s another key part of the Oxford intellectual tradition you see: you can argue any damn thing you like but you need to be able to justify it with facts and logic – otherwise, your idea is worthless.

This ludicrous notion you have that a bronze statue of Cecil Rhodes should be removed from Oriel College because it’s symbolic of “institutional racism” and “white slavery”. Well even if it is – which we dispute – so bloody what? Any undergraduate so feeble-minded that they can’t pass a bronze statue without having their “safe space” violated really does not deserve to be here. And besides, if we were to remove Rhodes’s statue on the premise that his life wasn’t blemish-free, where would we stop?

As one of our alumni Dan Hannan has pointed out, Oriel’s other benefactors include two kings so awful – Edward II and Charles I – that their subjects had them killed. The college opposite – Christ Church – was built by a murderous, thieving bully who bumped off two of his wives. Thomas Jefferson kept slaves: does that invalidate the US Constitution? Winston Churchill had unenlightened views about Muslims and India: was he then the wrong man to lead Britain in the war?”

We’ll go further than that. Your Rhodes Must Fall campaign is not merely fatuous but ugly, vandalistic and dangerous. We agree with Oxford historian RW Johnson that what you are trying to do here is no different from what ISIS and Al-Qaeda have been doing to artifacts in places like Mali and Syria.  You are murdering history.

[image error]

And who are you, anyway, to be lecturing Oxford University on how it should order its affairs? Your ‪#‎rhodesmustfall campaign, we understand, originates in South Africa and was initiated by a black activist who told one of his lecturers “whites have to be killed.”

One of you – Sizwe Mpofu-Walsh – is the privileged son of a wealthy politician and a member of a party whose slogan is “Kill the Boer; Kill the Farmer”; another of you, Ntokozo Qwabe, who is only in Oxford as a beneficiary of a Rhodes scholarship, has boasted about the need for “socially conscious black students” to “dominate white universities, and do so ruthlessly and decisively!

Great. That’s just what Oxford University needs. Some cultural enrichment from the land of Winnie Mandela, burning tyre necklaces, an AIDS epidemic almost entirely the result of government indifference and ignorance, one of the world’s highest per capita murder rates, institutionalised corruption, tribal politics, anti-white racism and a collapsing economy. Please name which of the above items you think will enhance the lives of the 22,000 students studying here at Oxford.

And then please explain what it is that makes your attention-grabbing campaign to remove a listed statue from an Oxford college more urgent, more deserving than the desire of probably at least 20,000 of those 22,000 students to enjoy their time here unencumbered by the irritation of spoilt, ungrateful little tossers on scholarships they clearly don’t merit using racial politics and cheap guilt-tripping to ruin the life and fabric of our beloved university.

Understand us and understand this clearly: you have everything to learn from us; we have nothing to learn from you.

Yours,

Free Thinking Students of Oriel College, Oxford

*Autres temps, autres moeurs – Other times, other customs: in other eras people behaved differently.

 

 

Is the American Empire Collapsing? (Part III)

When former President Obama scrapped the U.S. Manned Space program via Presidential fiat back in 2011, he signaled to the world that the U.S. was ceding its leadership and expertise in space exploration to nations like China and India.

In one of the most arrogantly oblivious declarations any president ever made he said he was ending the Constellation manned lunar landing program because “we’ve been there before.”

Instead of sending more Americans to the moon, he talked about possibly landing men on an asteroid in 2025 or perhaps Mars at some later date.

Our friends the Chinese were no doubt ecstatic at this announcement.

They have already embarked on a Lunar Exploration Program that will send both robots and men to the moon by 2025. In 2011, a Chinese rocket carried a boxcar-sized module into orbit, the first building block for a Chinese space station scheduled for completion sometime in 2020–the same year that the International Space Station, which is jointly operated by the U.S., Russia, Canada, Japan and 11 European countries, is scheduled to be de-orbited.  [image error]

In early October a Long March 3C rocket with the Chang’e-2 probe took off from Xichang launch center. The Xinhua News Agency said Chang’e-2 would circle just nine miles above the rocky terrain in order to take photographs of possible landing locations.

It is China’s second lunar probe – the first was launched in 2007. The craft stayed in space for 16 months before being intentionally crashed on to the Moon’s surface. This year the Chinese began mapping the entire surface of the moon with orbiting vehicles and in 2012 it will land lunar rovers that will begin prospecting for strategic materials.

Chinese scientists believe the moon is loaded with base metals and something called “lunar helium-3,” considered a perfect fuel for nuclear fusion power plants.

Robert Bigelow, founder of Bigelow Aerospace, the company he created over a decade ago to develop commercial space habitats using expandable (or inflatable) technology licensed from NASA, insists this is just the beginning of what he fears is an attempt by China to actually claim the moon as its own territory, locking out the United States and other nations.

One obvious obstacle is the Outer Space Treaty, of which China is a party. That treaty prohibits nations from making territorial claims to the Moon or other celestial bodies. Bigelow suggested, though, that China could work to amend the treaty through the support of countries in Africa and Latin America where China is making major investments and who routinely vote against the United States in international bodies such as the United Nations.

Alternatively, he said, China could simply decide to withdraw from the treaty. Public opinion, he said, won’t be factor. “There isn’t going to be World War Three over this,” he said. “There isn’t going to be a single shot fired.”

[image error]

Here is what the U.S. can expect, thanks to a myopic U.S. president: Soon, the only people walking around on the moon will be Chinese and don’t expect them to share any significant base metal or lunar helium-3 finds. That is simply not the DNA of a hard-core Communist regime that controls China.

As Bigelow said in a recent talk to the International Symposium for Personal and Commercial Spaceflight (ISPCS) in Las Cruces, New Mexico:

“China’s quest for prestige—to demonstrate that it is the most powerful country in the world—will inevitably drive the country to lay claim to the Moon. China already has a grand national vision. Their vision is that China wants to be indisputably number one in the world, measured any way you want to measure.”

One of the biggest advantages of the Chinese system is that they have five-year plans so they can develop well ahead, said Peter Bond, consultant editor for Jane’s Space Systems and Industry.

“They are taking a step-by-step approach, taking their time and gradually improving their capabilities,” Bond said. “They are putting all the pieces together for a very capable, advanced space industry.”

Meanwhile, NASA closed out its 30-year space shuttle era in 2012, leaving the U.S. dependent on hitching rides to the space station aboard Russian Soyuz capsules at a cost of $56 million per passenger, rising to $63 million or more today. The U.S. also hopes private companies will develop spacecraft to ferry cargo and crew to the space station.

[image error]

China is not the only country aiming high in space. Russia has talked about building a base on the moon and a possible mission to Mars but hasn’t set a time frame. India, which has already achieved an unmanned orbit of the moon, is planning its first manned space flight in 2016.

To be sure, space exploration is expensive. But to intentionally abandon leadership in an area where the U.S. has been a leader is simply misguided.

When President Kennedy announced in 1961 that the U.S. would land a man on the moon by the end of the decade because “we choose to,” it was a statement dripping with optimism that instilled pride and confidence in the American people.

His words seem as relevant today as when President Kennedy spoke them 56 years ago. Take a look at this excerpt:

[image error] President Kenndy “We choose to go to the moon…”

“We set sail on this new sea because there is new knowledge to be gained, and new rights to be won, and they must be won and used for the progress of all people. For space science, like nuclear science and all technology has no conscience of its own. Whether it will become a force for good or ill depends on man, and only if the United States occupies a position of pre-eminence can we help decide whether this new ocean will be a sea of peace or a new terrifying theater of war.

We choose to go to the Moon!  We choose to go to the Moon in this decade and do the other things, not because they are easy, but because they are hard; because that goal will serve to organize and measure the best of our energies and skills, because that challenge is one that we are willing to accept, one we are unwilling to postpone, and one we intend to win.

Fifty years later Obama chose to eliminate manned flights to the moon and concede lunar exploration to the Chinese. Not a move that instills pride and confidence, let alone optimism.

While the investment in space exploration alone does not signal the end of the American Empire, the fact that we are abandoning it says a lot about American leadership—or the lack thereof.

What made the American Empire remarkable was its refusal to accept defeat, to take a back seat amongst nations, to merely observe history instead of making it.

It is easy not to do something because it is difficult or expensive, but effective leadership requires that we not give up no matter how difficult or what the cost

If we do, then the American Empire is destined for the ash heap of history just as Rome and countless other empires were.

I hope I’m not around to see it.