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 |  "Putting on the Game Face" |
  This blog is a doorway into the mind of Percy Goodfellow. Don't be shocked at the lost boys of Namby-Pamby Land and the women they cavort with. Watch as his caricatures blunder about the space between audacious hope and the wake-up calls of tomorrow. Behold their scrawl on the CRT, like graffitti on a subway wall. Examine it through your own lens...Step up my friends, and separate the pepper from the rat poop. Welcome to my abode...the armpit of yesterday, the blinking of an eye and a plank to the edge of Eternity. Note: This blog is my journal. I've no interest in persuading anyone to adopt my views. What I write is whatever happens to interest me when I start pounding the keys. |
| Linda is caught up in a struggle between her parents who are in their 90’s. Her father is in rehab and her mother, home alone is like a loose cannon. My wife and her sister live some distance and check in on her daily by phone and have to endure a raft of hateful venting and hostility that has become characteristic of my mother in law's state of mind. My wife, Linda is a nice blend of the best in both her parents and has been the joy of my life for almost fifty years. Still, her mother’s tirades take an emotional toll. Her father doesn’t want to go home and keeps finding ways to extend his stay in the hospital. Does that sound like a Stephen King Novel? Anyway when she gets to her wits end Linda will crawl up under my arm and we’ll joke and make light of a situation that isn’t all that amusing. On occasion it leads to an intimacy she refers to as “Snuggle Cheese and Squirt Wurst.” I’m not sure I understand the full meaning of those metaphors however, the tenderness is a brief respite in a struggle Shakespeare described as “the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune.” I remember in college a friend of mine saying, “If you want to know how your wife will look some day check out her mother.” He was referring to physical appearance and if that’s the measure I’m blessed with a pretty good-looking wife. If however the message goes deeper I could be in deep kimshee.  |
| In real life "Me" is the central character of my life. I know what I think and can hear what I say. I don't always say what I think because there are times when I feel a need to be sensitive to feelings of others. Often in conversations with my wife and friends I wonder how much they are saying is pure truth and how much is a defense mechanism designed to put their behavior or what is happening around them in the best possible light. As a writer we have a unique opportunity. We can record a conversation between two characters and get into the mind of the central character and show their thoughts parallel to what they are saying. This is a powerful tool that often goes unused, is used sparingly or is added as an afterthought. If you think about a telephone conversation there is probably three times as much thought as there are words of expression passing between the two parties. If you add to that tone of voice and body language, the words themselves are but a part, albeit an important part, of the exchange of communications. Anyway, I'm trying to develop this aspect of what we think and what we say in the class I'm taking. The next time you are writing a short story try going heavy on the interior or submerged dialog and see if you like the results of what you come up with. |
| Well, (As an old Grammar School teacher used to say... "The WELL is getting deeper.") the time has come in the day when I need to feed the cats and fill up the wood stove. My shed is half full as of this date and I think I am just going to let it run dry. I had some oak delivered last week but it is still green and needs to be seasoned for next year. So, (The thread is getting shorter) unless I cut some trees down what I have gathered is what I have to last the rest of the winter season. I am taking this HSP class called Romantica. The reason I am taking it is because I need to practice writing my own brand of restrained "Sensual Prose" for my novels. On the one hand I don't want to offend those readers who tend to be a bit more traditional and straight laced. On the other Ignoring that aspect of the human experience is in my view something of a cop out. I've been working at acquiring this deft touch ever since coming to WDC and find the genre an extremely difficult one to write in. The question is of course, how much is enough? Finding the fulcrum is a real challenge because for different folks it rests on different points along the continuum. What might be shocking to some readers will leave others non-pulsed. The search has brought me now almost full circle. I went from ignoring the issue, to exploring the graphic dimension and have slowly been dialing it back to see how much the unsaid can be allowed to say. I know that doesn't make sense to many but if you have been married awhile you realize that the "unsaid" always has plenty to say. What isn't said can be as powerful a form of expression as speaking in plain English. Thus, I know its late and I hear you yawning, is that Percy has once more stumbled into a realization of the obvious. How you say something is as important as what you blab. Duh! |
| Today it finally started to warm up a little. At twenty below I burn a pickup load of wood every three days. Today it was almost 20 degrees F. What a welcome relief. For the past week I had been looking for the tail and elevator to my Cub Cadet. Yesterday I found them underneath the passenger seat of my Prius. I wanted to dance a jig of sheer delight. Ron, who is covering the model told me I needed to find it ASAP. I was so happy I called him right up with the news. I'm taking a course offered here at WDC. I'm enjoying it and getting to read the material of my fellow students. They are quite talented. We went shopping today and it was good to get out of the house. This time of Winter is when the "Cabin Fever" sets in and even something as mundane as Walmart is a welcome relief. Looking at the diversity of people is a great reminder that there is a world outside the confines of the farm. |
| This morning I went to breakfast with my flying club friends. We sat around and chewed the fat and enjoyed listening to what each other had to say. It you don't have this sort of outlet once a week you might consider joining a group that shares some of your special interests. One of my friends, Ron, slept in and missed breakfast. I had an airplane he was supposed to pick up so I dropped by his house. I got to see his shop which I had wanted to check out for a long time. It was a rather small workspace but ample and well organized. My shop is larger but pretty disorganized. Anyway we talked for about an hour and I had to head home. On the way I stopped at the grocery store and bought some items that Linda had told me to pick up. Then it was back to chopping wood. This afternoon the temperature climbed into the high twenties. That is a veritable heatwave for this winter. It was nice to feel the sun warming the back of my red plaid work coat. It felt a little like a heated seat in one of the newer cars being marketed. I know, I know, many of my readers might think such a seat is an unneeded extravagance, but here in Wisconsin they sure feel good on a cold winter day. Linda is telling me that supper will be ready in 5 minutes. I don't want to miss that because she is a good cook. Tonight we are having tilapia. It is Gorton's, Simply Bake. For a quick meal it is delicious. When I finish I have to go to Weyauwega. We are having a meeting of another one of the flying clubs I belong. It's going to be a long drive. So that has been my day. |
| I picked up my new saw today. It's a Steil 362. Right now all my saws are running pretty good and this morning I cut a trailer load of wood. One of my trailers had two flat tires and when I tried to reinflate them discovered that the sides were ripped open. I must have snagged that side on something sharp. That'll be another expense. Last night I got lazy and didn't go out and fill up the wood stove at midnight. This morning it was 50 degrees in the house. I really had to hustle and only now at about 3pm is the house up to normal temperature. I continue to have vivid dreams but they aren't quite as bad as they used to be. I got a med from the VA that helps. In my dreams there's always a thread of reality but I'm portrayed as a bad person. When I wake up I get indignant and say to myself Hey! that isn't the way it was at all. Sometimes I think my demons are trying to mess with my mind. . I asked the Dr. if I had Post Traumatic Stress Disorder? He said "No." Considering what I'd been through, he opined, I was still remarkably sane and and in possession of a well integrated personality. Linda and I took a walk this afternoon up "Five Car A Day Road." That isn't the actual name but I think you get the idea of how isolated my farm is. Sometime I call it "Donner Pass Road." It's been packed ice and snow since November. Honey, my Golden Doodle really enjoyed herself, prancing and frolicking about. |
| It continues to be bitterly cold in Central Wisconsin. I am burning firewood as fast as I can gather it. It is so cold my trailers have flat tires and I will need to get them pumped back up tomorrow to stay in operation. Plus, I have to get a new chainsaw. My others have worn out or are nearing the end of their service life. My shed is still half full but without replenishment (at the current usage rate) I probably have a three week supply on hand. Today we went to see our new tax man in Waupaca. The old guy we had just couldn't seem to get it right. So this year we found someone new based upon a friend's recommendation. He seems pretty sharp and hopefully he will perform up to expectations. My 1940 Ford Sedan is coming along. It has been a frame up rebuild. The next step will be rewiring it and then it will be a runner. I'm thinking about writing a novel that spans several generations, beginning with my grandfather who bought it, to my father who stored it in the barn, to myself who raced it and finally my son who comes back from Afghanistan and finds it sitting once more on blocks in the garage. I have a plot of sorts kicking around in my mind and it should be interesting. I keep you posted on how the effort comes. |
| Here I go slacking off on my blog again. I really should carry a notebook around with me because I get these good ideas during the day and forget what they are when its time to do my blog. I am currently writing a story about a woman who wants a relationship but keeps sabotaging her opportunities. It is like a "Death Wish" but in this case it isn't about physical death but "Relationship Death." She wants to be see as trying in the eyes of her friends and family but has an attitude that poisons any hope she might have for success. She meets this guy who is looking for a long relationship but is ordinary looking. He's a good athlete and has a good job but he has been told by his coaches and bosses that he doesn't have a "Killer Instinct." He is intrigued when he meets Edith because she has an instinct for the jugular that he admires and she sees in Charles a nice man, with a good education and job. To Edith Charles is good husband material but keeps looking for ways to get him to end the relationship as Charles finds himself drawn more and more to her abrasive and outspoken personality. Anyway I have been working on this story the last couple of days and trying to make it work. |
| It was another cold February days. It started out below zero F and warmed up into the single digits above. Fortunately there was no wind and in the afternoon, when I cut wood, it was not all that bad. Things are going to warm up marginally and that is a good sign. I got my 272 Husky out of the shop and when I tried to run it it had no top end. When it reached cutting RPM it would bog. I need to get a book on chainsaws and find out where the lean screw is. This morning I cooked bacon and made toast. My mother taught me how to cook bacon as a kid. The trick is to use a low temperature and keep turning it. That way you get a nice flexible strip. Then I made some toast. I looked for grapefruit juice in the refrigerator and there wasn't any. Had to settle for orange juice. How deprived does a guy get? I'm not a big breakfast eater but do like bacon and toast. Then I had to go outside and get the stove going. Since Linda has been gone I have not tended the stove at midnight. As a result it goes out in the night and the temperature falls to 50 degrees F in the house. That isn't so bad. As a matter of fact that is the way it was in the house I grew up in in France. In the morning my dad would get the potbelly stove going, mom would fire up the wood cooking stove and make breakfast. I know that sounds pretty primitive but my dad was raised on a farm and my mom grew up dirt poor in Norther Wisconsin during the depression. My grandfather was on the road as a glazier working on green houses and his pay check was hit and miss. She did learn to cook and do laundry with tubs and a washboard dragged into the kitchen. When my Dad was assigned to LaRochelle France after WW2 the house we lived in was similar to what my mom grew up in. She took to it like a duck to water and all the other army wives used to flock to our house to see how she operated and get a weekly bath. Thats right, when my brother and I were in school all the ladies came over and took baths. My mom was a virtuoso on operating all that low speed French period technology. Her father taught mom and her brother how to wire and that was another useful skill to have. I can still see her on a stepladder running wires into that ancient fuze panel. The panel had round fuzes if you remember those. That was the happiest period in my mother's life and she hated to come back to the United States. |
| Just got through watching the Super Bowl. That had to be one of the worst games I ever saw. The Broncos were pathetic. I was hoping for a contest like that two weeks ago between the Seahawks and the Forty-Niners. No such luck. Linda is in Atlanta with her parents and Honey, my Golden Doodle is lying in my wife's spot. I got the wing I made yesterday mounted on the model Airplane. It looks OK. I think it will fly. Might not win a beauty contest but it'll fly. I'm so disgusted by that lousy game that I'll call it a day. |
| Wow! I sure am glad January is gone, for two reasons. Reason #1 is that I froze my fanny off. Reason #2 is that January’s blog calendar was an embarrassment. There was a two-week stretch where I didn’t write much of anything. If you don’t know it already, if you quit writing in your blog your regular readers quit dropping by. In that regard I don’t care all that much except for Karen. She is a great reader of my blog and I know if nobody else reads it Karen will. Writing a blog requires discipline. The reason for my two week lapse was I had to crash on firewood cutting. When you are outside in subzero weather, it really drains you of vitality and when I would get in all I wanted to do was warm up and crash. I bought this electric fly 3-D RC airplane from a friend of mine. It had a busted wing and like most of my models the price was right. One of the wings though was still intact and today I traced its outline and made a wing to replace the one that was destroyed. It turned out pretty good considering I didn’t have a plan. What I did was take the good wing and trace the tip rib and then the root rib. This gave me two templates. It was a complex wing where the size of the ribs tapered from large to small and the length did the same thing. It is a whole lot easier when all the ribs are the same size. I found that by taking the tip or outermost rib and starting with that I could trace each of the interior ribs using the outside of a thick sharpie. Each time I cut one out it was a little bigger and a little longer. By the time I got to the fuselage my ribs had grown in size and length to where the last one was within a whisper of the root rib. I could have cut the good wing up and used all the ribs for templates and that would have been the most exact but I was loath to cut up the half that was still good. My friend said I would never get the base out of the fuselage without destroying it but actually it came out rather easily. That was because it had been covered before it was inserted into the slot and that was what the glue adhered to. I also found that one of the rear servos was stripped out. He told me his dog stepped on it but I don’t believe that entirely. The dog might well have stepped on it but I suspect it was crashed before that. The dogs paw would not have stripped the servo gears while a hard impact will. Once I get the wing back in and covered with Monocoat you won’t be able to see the difference. |
| Krauthammer’s book, Things That Matter, is filled with a bewildering array of profound editorial material. In the course of the day something from his book will bubble up in my mind and I’ll try and recall in what essay he wrote it. I can spend an hour leafing back through and still not find the reference I’m looking for. At some point I stop and ask myself, “Why is the exact quote so important? Don’t you remember the essential drift of his thinking?” “Yeah,” I tell myself. “I still remember the drift, albeit imperfectly.” This is where I find myself tonight as I look at the clock ticking away. My blog has a calendar and if I don’t post before 11:00 pm I will have a “no blog day.” In deciding what to write about I remembered that Krauthammer preferred Winston Churchill to Albert Einstein as the man of the Century. Let me begin by saying that Krauthammer believes that politics is one of the most serious responsibilities a citizen has. Most voters become so frustrated and disenchanted by their politicians that they want to put aside the whole process. Charles says we do so, only at our peril. Thus it is that he sees in Churchill rather than Einstein the most important man of the century. He explains this saying that if Einstein had never been born then some other physicist would have come along to make the discoveries. It might have taken longer but they were inevitable. There were other smart scientists around who would have risen to the challenge and figured things out. Churchill on the other hand, by a sheer exercise of will, turned the course of history. Had he not been on the scene and in a position of power the post WW2 world would have been a much different place. I have to agree with his assessment. |
| I’m reading Krauthammer’s book and it contains a delightful series of editorials he has written over the past years. Anyone who listens to him on Fox news knows he’s a force and is able to articulate his views in a clear and convincing manner. He started out a liberal Democrat and became a Conservative Republican. He claims that the Democratic Party abandoned him and not the other way around. One of the pieces that really struck me was entitled The Central Axiom of Partisan Politics. “To understand the workings of American Politics you have to understand this fundamental law. Conservatives think Liberals are stupid. Liberals think Conservatives are evil.” He then goes on to explain why this is true. What I find troubling is that stupidity can be illuminated, debated and subjected to the light of reason. Evil on the other hand is a belief driven concept codified in religious dogma. A belief system cannot be proved or disproved by empirical evidence and must be accepted by faith. So how is it that Liberals would even consider using such a term. They are supposedly the champions of atheism so how could they ever subscribe to a concept such as evil. Yet they do. While the conservatives frame arguments in lucid and logical terms, the liberals are profane, intolerant, and use inflammatory language to demonize their conservative opponents. They behave like religious zealots who have forgotten the tolerance of a loving God. If anyone deserves the label EVIL it’s those who work tirelessly to turn our Democracy into a socialist state. |
| The temperature has plunged this week and the wind has made -15 degree F weather even more bitterly cold. Ten years ago I invested in an outdoor wood stove. For most of those years it cost me more in time and effort and I’d have been ahead just buying propane or natural gas. This year however, was a game changer. I had a pretty good supply gathered but it was gone in December. I went into a crash program of cutting and splitting and have managed to tread water through January. I am hearing the horror stories now about supply shortages and how prices have risen from around $1 a gallon to from $5-$7 a gallon. These might be exaggerated. My storage tank is still over 60% full but that is because I only expect the gas to bridge the gap between what the wood stove can provide and the 60 degrees we maintain in the house. At night we turn the thermostat down to 50 degrees and climb under the electric blankets. Actually I rather enjoy sleeping at a lower temperature with my wife on one side and my golden doodle on the other. What I hate is having to get up early, go outside and restart the wood stove after it has all but gone out in the night. Anyway I have definitely made money this year chopping, blocking and splitting my own firewood. I have saved, even considering the hassle of gathering the wood, chainsaw upkeep, wear and tear on the equipment, and splitting and stacking. In a pinch I could have done more by turning off the water circulating through the cement floor of the garage/workshop. As it is the garage is just below 40 degrees F and the shop is at 50. I need the building sort of warm to make the starting of my old diesel equipment easier. If I need to work in the shop I can turn on the “Modine” which is a heat exchanger that blows hot air and hangs from the ceiling, providing an additional circuit of hot water from the wood stove. The mind numbing cold is manageable if you stay healthy and prepare for it. |
| Many of my readers watched the playoff game between the Forty-Niners and the Seattle Seahawks. Football is a simplistic model from which we can infer truths in the murky complexity that surrounds the fog of war and politics. In that playoff game we saw two teams of equal talent hungry for victory. The game went back and forth until the final seconds. With time running out the Forty-Niner's quarterback, Colin Kaepernick, threw the perfect pass to the end zone. Both Michael Crabtree and Richard Sherman were racing down the field as the pass followed its slow and inexorable trajectory. It looked like Crabtree would make the catch when at the last second Sherman deflected it away. For an instant victory and defeat hung suspended by the slimmest of margins and then the game was “decided.” Hold that thought! Was the game really decided on that final play? Each team had about fifty (50) offensive and defensive plays that preceded the finale. Is it reasonable to praise or blame the field goal kicker, or in this case, Kaepernick or Sherman, for the final play in a long series of defensive and offensive exchanges? The answer is emphatically NO! As any football coach will tell you there are many opportunities that decide a contest and not just the last one with time running out. It’s human nature to remember that last one… it has a way of sticking in your mind, but it’s the collective weight of all the plays that really decides the outcome. To his credit Robert Gates moved with relentless energy to get the Army to develop vehicles that could survive an Improvised Explosive Device (IED). However an IED, like the last play in a football game, is but the final link in a chain of causation. As he looked at those wounded warriors and wrote letters to the families of soldiers killed in action the vision of an exploding vehicle is what seems to have been foremost in his mind. If I push myself I can come up with at least a dozen links in the chain that preceded an exploding vehicle, any one of which might have prevented this regrettable outcome. We did the same thing in the aftermath of 911. We focused on airplane hijackings and airport security rather than on all the other links that led up to the attack on the Twin Towers. I’m not picking on the SECDEF, a public servant I hold in the highest esteem. Nor am I overly critical of the other players who had opportunities to mitigate these tragedies. I blame the process that doesn’t look back at the “films” and focuses instead on the last play in the game. Only by looking at each link will we ultimately figure out the best way to wage an effective counterinsurgency in the war on terrorism. |
| One of the most profound statements made by Gates in his book was to say words to the effect, “Never pass up an opportunity to keep your mouth shut.” Throughout his tenure as Secretary he was a master of keeping silent in testimony before congressional committees, allowing them to vent before the cameras for the benefit of their constituencies, and timing his remarks for those moments when they would have the greatest effect. As time went on he found this increasingly difficult to do. The hypocrisy of Congress, the pettiness of the Cabinets and the weight of the defense bureaucracy really started to wear him down. He bit his tongue so often it’s a wonder he didn’t bite it off. As carryovers from the Bush administration he and Admiral Mullins often had to sit and listen to the Obama team rant about how screwed up the Bush policies had been. This required taking a deep breath especially when the new administration was not long on better ideas and in fact continued many of the “Failed Policies” they were so quick to disparage. The fact that he was asked to continue as Secretary of Defense reflects the strength of his reputation on both sides of the isle. Regardless of the infighting he was held in high esteem throughout his watch as SECDEF. One interesting aspect of the book was the way he showed his slow evolving relationship with Vice President Joe Biden. He began by saying that Biden was wrong on virtually every policy position the VP took. Then he said that Biden had an irreverence and blunt way of expressing himself that he couldn’t help but like. As the book continued he showed how one commander allowed his staff to get out of control saying things to the press that were disparaging of the VP. Towards the end, when Gates does some soul searching, one of the things he admits is that if he had it to do over he would have looked for some more common ground with Joe. Finally there comes an exchange on the drawdown from Afghanistan where Biden leans over and whispers, “Isn’t this what I’ve been advocating all along?” As the collective impact of all these comments sunk in I was reminded of my earlier blog that emphasized “Not dismissing the ideas of those you find abrasive just because they’re annoying.” I got the distinct impression that Gates started out marginalizing the VP when with a little effort he might have turned him into a valuable ally. As it was the two worked at cross-purposes for the early years of the Obama administration. There’s a lesson here and I won’t offend my readers by saying more. |
| Gates says in his book that the military services continued after Vietnam to plan for wars that would never be fought. It might be argued that when you do so and are ready to fight a worst case scenario then you have a capability that can be tailored to less demanding situations. In facing the challenges that existed in Central Europe after Vietnam we were able to show the Soviets that even in conventional war there was a growing probability that we could win. Their involvement in the quagmire of Afghanistan and the growing strength of the NATO Alliance contributed to their defeat in the cold war and breakup of the Warsaw Pact. The ease with which we defeated a top third world power in Iraq showed further our awesome capability in fighting a conventional war. So the military argument that if we could successfully defeat a conventional threat we could deal with a subset has some validity. However what we were to learn in Iraq and Afghanistan, Gates pointed out, was that the military had forgotten how to fight an insurgency. He’s wrong. He assumes incorrectly that we ever learned in Vietnam how to wage an effective counter insurgency. What was institutionalized after the Vietnam conflict were tactics that were never viable to begin with and led only to needless causalities. In essence the military drove on roads and walked around the country in gaggles inviting death and injury. These are the tactics that were institutionalized, and repeated to our everlasting shame. Roads in an undeveloped country are less than one percent of the total geography and yet we insisted on driving over them. This made our Army easy targets for Improvised Explosive Devices (IEDs) that took such a horrific toll on our forces. If you were to look at statistics from the end of the Vietnam Conflict you would see that it was these same IEDs that were killing and wounding our troops. So to say we had forgotten how to wage a counterinsurgency is a stretch. We never "broke the code" to begin with. The approach that Gates and DOD took in dealing with IEDs was upgrading the capability of vehicles to protect their occupants in the event of a detonation. Some additional progress was made in technologies to target those who emplaced them but this was more cosmetic than real. The ultimate solution for vehicles was to find ways to quit using the roads and highways. Never in a million years you say…? Never say never. In watching the news the ground operations look almost identical to what we did in Vietnam. The pacification effort was to show a US presence in the rural areas. Units walked around looking for trouble. It was trouble our enemies would provide in sniper fire, ambushes, and most deadly of all, IEDs. “BRING IT ON” our tactics proclaimed and in Vietnam, and the Middle East that is exactly what our enemy’s did. As we wind down our wars in Iraq and Afghanistan we need to take a close look at lessons learned, see what worked and think deeply about the differences between conventional and unconventional war. If the goal is to pacify an urban or rural area the first step must be to make the enemy move to some other geographical location, preferably far removed from the one they occupy. Once they are out of the picture and the population is relieved of the terror influence, then nation building can begin. Having an armed force walking mindlessly about is idiotic unless there is an underlying reason for doing so. "Showing the Flag," does not in itself qualify as a "Compelling Reason." I hesitate to say more for fear that in this day and age there are those out there who might be getting ideas I wouldn’t want shared. Be advised however, there is plenty we could have done that was not. It goes back to properly Defining the Problem and constraint equations that nudge "Best" out of the solution box. |
| In reading Gate's book I'm struck by much of the analytical thought. In the course of my service life I had an opportunity to write documents that were essentially “Staff Studies.” At different stages in the book Gates presents to President Bush and Obama “Talking Points” that support the recommendations he makes. In some cases these are facts bearing on the problem, in others assumptions and in still others conclusions and recommendations. These Talking Points, arranged (as he recalls), are powerful and convincing. It appears that each in themselves is not classified but they were lifted from documents that certainly were. This raises the question how much influence Secretary Gates had in writing the documents. Were they penned by his hand or did a staffer write them based upon the boss’s intent? Actually it doesn't really matter. In the end all that matters is that they were used effectively. As Hesiod once pointed out, (Allow me to paraphrase) a tier-one intellect discovers "Best" and a tier-two knows it when they see it. In the American Military there is a process whereby there is first an analytical phase followed by an action phase. In the Army the analytical phase is referred to as the Commander’s Estimate of the Situation and the action phase as the Operation’s Order. In the Commander’s estimate an adapted form of the problem solving process is used. It consists of defining the problem, identifying relevant facts and assumptions, formulating courses of action, analyzing and comparing these, reaching a conclusion and making a recommendation. Critics often attack an analysis beginning with the assumptions when they would be better severed by taking a good look at the problem statement. In preparing for the action phase the Operations Order is written based upon what the Commander decided from the Estimate. What we see in Gate’s book, as he pleads his cases with the two Presidents, are excerpts from these two processes. Please bear with me as I explain for those who are not familiar. To set the ball rolling the Commander (Director) issues his planning guidance before those around him go to work on the documents. This guidance should define the problem and usually begins with the boilerplate “We need to determine the best way to….” He might provide some facts and assumptions to begin with. Ideally he leaves the identification of options open so as not to steer or constrain the outcome. Historically these processes have proceeded along three paths. First the commander is mentally game playing in his own mind. Secondly he might choose one or two subordinate commanders to pursue an independent assessment. Finally it goes to the commander’s staff for a third input in the decision process. A critical aspect is the first step, defining the problem. If the commander fails to define the problem then there are certain to be serious issues down the road. I used to provide a vignette to student staff officers of a situation and then ask them to define the problem. It never failed that I got different answers from most everybody who often defined the problem in terms of facts, assumptions, courses of action and various other off the wall considerations. For example Secretary Gates might have told his staff “We need to determine the best way to bring the war in Afghanistan to a viable conclusion.” President Bush might have defined it, as “We need to determine the best way to win the war and leave behind a democratic government.” President Obama might have defined it, as “We need to determine the best way to get our troops out before the midterm elections.” Vice President Biden might have defined it, as “We need to determine the best way to get our troops out as soon as possible.” I hope my readers are beginning to see how important defining the problem is. In Gate's Book I don’t see much of a common definition among the players and must infer from actions the way they saw the problem. |
| When I read a book the first look is from cover to cover to get a sense for what it’s about. Then I set it aside and see what begins to percolate up into my daily awareness. Today I was cruising along through life when I got to thinking about something I read in “Duty,” by Robert Gates. His time in office spanned the last two years of the Bush administration and the first two years of Obama’s. Despite the fact that he was a Republican, Obama decided to continue him on as Secretary of Defense. The book suggests the reason was to insure the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan didn’t overly distract from the new president’s domestic agenda. For whatever reason, Secretary Gates soon earned a special trust and confidence in the new president. Contrary to the advice Obama got from his staff, he most always took the recommendations that Gates offered and was well served in doing so. It was only when Gates left office that things started going south for the current administration. I contend that the life-changing event for the President came the night of Benghazi and everything that has followed has been one continuous series of scandals and unraveling of domestic policy. He was very critical of “Bush’s Failed Policies,” however they pale by comparison to his own. I can only wonder that if Bob Gates had remained as Defense Secretary how much of the bungling could have been avoided. On one hand it can be said that the seeds of destruction were planted early in the Administration’s first term and germinated in the second. This is to say that the presence of Secretary Gates would have made essentially no difference. On the other hand, Gates was a mini-computer in a sea of hand held calculators and if Obama had continued to have access to his advice he might have gotten over some of the hurdles without knocking each one down. The complexity of managing two wars, changing somewhat the culture of DOD and killing unnecessary Pork procurement programs was a daunting task that Gates successfully accomplished. Both Obama and Gates were tier two intellects but Gates knew how to get things done in Washington and Obama was seriously deficient. He is only now beginning to “get it” as he nears the end of his second term. Electing an “Amateur” was a bad idea and The United States of America has paid a bitter price for his inexperience. |
| I have very few readers of my blog here at WDC. There are a greater number of nonmembers who read it for reasons I can only wonder about. Most of the members who drop by and visit probably know that I teach a WDC New Horizons class called the Exploratory Writing Workshop. When the workshop is in session I get students to write vignettes of around 3K words to explore aspects of a novel they are thinking about writing. Each of the first six sessions has a vignette requirement that must include requirements contained in the weekly lesson. These requirements are akin to contest prompts, but instead of a single prompt there are several. My students come to the course with many different backgrounds and skill levels and I do a review on each weekly vignette submission. My review technique must take into account the diversity of student skills and so I take the following approach. First I look for the three things I feel were best done in the submission and then look for the three things that could be most improved. With this model I can write reviews tailored to the development of each student. Aiding me are the objectives in each lesson that provide a checklist to see if the student bothered reading the requirements and addressed them in the vignette. How (you might ask) can a student provide a vignette without reading the lesson? The answer is that many students take my workshop in order to get feedback on material they have written earlier. Rather than following the process the class is designed to offer, I often get something quite foreign to what the lesson asked for. As a consequence the checklist of requirements is ignored and the vignette submission is about an aspect of their earlier manuscript that has nothing to do with the lesson. Why (you might ask) do I put up with this nonsense, not issue a warning that such behavior will not be tolerated, and threaten to drop them from the workshop. The reason is because that while most students lack the discipline to follow the program of instruction all of them want to improve as writers and as long as that is their agenda, I’m prepared to help them as best I can. So while I point out each week the degree to which they complied with the class requirements I don’t get too hung up when they fail to address them and still offer a review that comments on the three strengths and weaknesses of their submissions. It seems that there is a great temptation to use the workshop as a vehicle for getting review and feedback for a manuscript written prior to the class beginning rather than writing a vignette in compliance with the lesson objectives that is new and demonstrates the value of exploratory sketches prior to the outline phase of a novel. Several students have commented that writing 3K words each week with a common story and characters is too demanding and having something already “in the can” is a necessary fact of life. I don’t buy this, but I accept it and the fact that the demands of a job and family can put a premium on quality writing time. As a consequence I remain flexible allowing students to tailor the workshop to their needs and expectations even though I think they are missing much of the benefit by using a preexisting work. |
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