OT Cockles & Sense

"Frank Reid" moc.deepselbac@diersicnarf wrote in message
...
Marvelously stated. Thanks, comrade.

Comrade? COMRADE? Uh, you must be mistaken, uh, uh, it was only a
business, uh tourist trip. Yeh, thats it, I liked the artwork.... Uh,
besides, the Wall was falling, and I, uh, just wanted to see what it
looked
like... I'm not a comrade. See, look, no membership card...

So, Amerikanski tovarisch, it seems that we no longer need your services.
And it falls to one of your own to provide a satisfactory end to our
relationship without the need for embarrassing recriminations or financial
indelicacies, yada yada.

Spasebo, komrad Leni.........um......Leno.

Fearless Leader

Spasebo, komrad Leni.........um......Leno.
Fearless Leader

Either spellink vill do,Volfgank! Like others from long time ago, you
should be avare, vas Ulanov for him, Sobelman for me. And is Bronstein for
Lev Davidovich.

Bolshoiyeh Spasebo, indeed!

Now, vere is Moose and Squirrel?
----
Stev Lenon 91B20 '68-'69
Drowning flies to Darkstar
Save a cow, eat a PETA

http://web.tampabay.rr.com/stevglo/i...age92kword.htm

Wolfgang:
And this brings us (by the short route, I admit) right back to where we
started. Just WHO or WHAT in hell are all these
brave and honorable Spartans protecting all these unidentified (snip) bones
FROM?

While Falstaff's soliliquy is of marvelous construction and somewhat to the
point when one is called upon to do battle and give no quarter, it is not
entirely meet to the question at hand.

And I wasn't aware that the beer of that ancient name and unpalatable
quality was still being brewed and sold. There's no accounting for taste or
lack of ability to discern quality.

But back to the subject. Deeds of honor, codes of honor, men of honor,
women of honor, all the things we do, as you so correctly state, because
they fit the elusive and hard to define category of "the right thing to do"
fall short of this topic. Crawling out under fire to secure and treat
wounded is the right thing to do but the act of doing so is not the honor
that we are debating.

There is another "honor", also because it is the right thing to do, that we
speak of here. The guards at the Tomb of the Unknowns are there to remind
anyone with eyes to see that the men and women of our military, and through
them, the nation, pay homage to the memory of those who fell in battle and
lay upon the field unknown at war's end. We honor their memory, their
sacrifice, their loss, their dedication, their fears, their pain, and their
families. Those who mount that particular guard are symbols that tell all
American troops that their comrades will not let them die unmourned or
forgotten. And that may not matter to those of you who have never served in
the armed forces. The honor guards aren't there for you. The effort of
walking that post in a hurricane, a blizzard, or in scorching sun is not
intended for the civilians who come to watch, or for the uninformed who make
light of their devotion to this post.

Yes, the tomb could be monitored by a camera and computer or rent-a-cops.
But earned military honors can not be rendered by cameras and security
guards. The troops who walkd those guard shifts are not there so much to
protect as to afford the honor and dignity that the situation calls for.
And the rifles are loaded because soldiers carry weapons with ammunition.

You point out that the bodies may even be those of soldiers from other
nations. That is true, they may, even though great care was taken to find
bodies from our forces. But in death, all soldiers are comrades. So I
honor the soldiers who died in my war regardless of their uniform. Their
death removed their enemy status.

What troubles me most in this thread is not that people fail to understand
this manner of conduct and behavior, but that they are unable to do so.

I went fishing and thought about this before I posted this response. I
rather suspect that trying to instill a sense of why this guard post is
maintained as it is falls into the category of giving voice lessons to
swine.
----
Stev Lenon 91B20 '68-'69

"slenon" wrote in message
...
And that may not matter to those of you who have never served in
the armed forces. The honor guards aren't there for you. The effort of
walking that post in a hurricane, a blizzard, or in scorching sun is not
intended for the civilians who come to watch, or for the uninformed who
make
light of their devotion to this post.

Well, I don't get your viewpoint on this. Risking injury and/or death by
standing out in a freaking hurricane is not 'honorable' to anything except
stupidity. There's got to be a line and to me this is about a hundred yards
past stupid.

1. Standing out in the sun? OK
2. Standing out in the rain? OK
3. Standing out in a blizzard? Maybe
4. Standing out in active electrical storm? Stupid
5. Standing out in a hurricane? Stupid

So where's your line? Hurricanes apparently are a reasonable risk. How
about radioactive fallout? Basketball sized hail?

--Stan (saw my neighbor get hit by a tree during Hurricane Bob)

Greg:
Vii znaiite sliishkom mnogo, tovarishch, iia dolzhin
bydy vas ybiit.

Sorry, Greg, but beyond tovarishch that exceeds what limited Russian I
still recall. I still recall a few phrases and common vulgarities but not
sufficient to do more than get lost after ordering a beer.

I do have a favorite answer to all sports trivia questions, however. The
athlete in question is either that Russian fellow or that Russian woman.
(****ivino or ****ivinova) No disrespect intended. My family left the
Russia around the time of the October Revolution.
----
Stev Lenon 91B20 '68-'69
Drowning flies to Darkstar
Save a cow, eat a PETA

http://web.tampabay.rr.com/stevglo/i...age92kword.htm

So where's your line? Hurricanes apparently are a reasonable risk. How
about radioactive fallout? Basketball sized hail?
Stan (saw my neighbor get hit by a tree during Hurricane Bob)

To my physical and mental limits, Stan. Everyone's breaking point is
different. But the troops here weren't forced to pull this duty. They were
offered relief due to weather and chose to not take that relief. It was to
them a matter of respect for fallen soldiers and a duty that they were proud
to pull.

Risking injury and/or death by standing out in a freaking hurricane is not
'honorable' to anything except stupidity.

Like others you are assuming that the troops on guard duty, called an honor
guard, somehow achieve honor by refusing to quit their posts.
But they are there to render honor, not garner honor.

This is a case where the gulf between civilians and people with military
service is inestimable. It either means nothing to you or it means more
than you can sucessfully relate. I don't mean to cop the "you had to be
there" line. But in this case it is appropriate.

----
Stev Lenon 91B20 '68-'69
Drowning flies to Darkstar
Save a cow, eat a PETA

http://web.tampabay.rr.com/stevglo/i...age92kword.htm

obROFF

"For approximately the first five years of its existence, the Patriotic
Studies discipline proceeded under the assumption that these
fluid-nations were benign entities, whose existence threatened neither
the stability nor the integrity of the traditional geo-nation. A classic
study of this period was conducted by Emmons, Denny, and Smith,
concerning the fluid-nation Men Who Fish. Using statistical methods of
retroattribution, the authors were able to show that, in time of
national crisis (Battle of the Bulge, Europe, 1944), American citizens
who were also citizens of Men Who Fish performed their duties every bit
as efficiently (+/- 5 Assessment Units) as did members of the control
group, even when that duty involved inflicting "harm" to "serious harm"
on Men Who Fish who were allied at the time with the opposing geo-nation
(i.e., Germany). During this battle, as many as seventy-five hundred
(and no fewer than five thousand) German soldiers who were also members
of Men Who Fish were killed or wounded by American soldiers who were
members of Men Who Fish, leading the authors to conclude that citizens
of Men Who Fish were not 'expected, in a time of national crisis, to
respond significantly less patriotically than a control group of men of
similar age, class, etc., who are not citizans of Men Who Fish.'"

[excerpted from A Survey of the Literature, Shouts and Murmurs, The New
Yorker, Sept. 22, 2003]

Stan Gula wrote:

... Risking injury and/or death by
standing out in a freaking hurricane is not 'honorable' to anything except
stupidity. There's got to be a line and to me this is about a hundred yards
past stupid. ...

Yeah, the Brits are the all time, world champeens of pompous and pretentious
military buffoonery and even THEY have enough sense to come in out of the rain.

If Louie or Frank wants to go to Arlington and do the twenty-one step fandango
in front of the tomb during a ****ing hurricane, more power to them, but when
active duty military do it, and they get hurt or killed, it costs taxpayers
lots of real money. At some point common sense has to prevail over so-called
military "honor".

--
Ken Fortenberry

On Sun, 21 Sep 2003 23:22:15 GMT, (Greg Pavlov)
wrote:

On Sun, 21 Sep 2003 22:06:21 GMT, "slenon"
wrote:

My family left the
Russia around the time of the October Revolution.


Mine tried to hang on for a while, both grandfathers were
in the white armies, but eventually were rescued by
English, who evacuated them across the Black Sea to
Turkey. I show my eternal gratitude by suffering to fish
with Peter on occasion (a meal or two from Suzy has its
attractions as well)


Hell, it could be worse, you might have had to fish with Suzy and eat
MY cooking!!

(sheesh, the English get blamed for everything . . . . )

Peter

"slenon" wrote in message
...
Like others you are assuming that the troops on guard duty, called an
honor
guard, somehow achieve honor by refusing to quit their posts.
But they are there to render honor, not garner honor.

You are quite wrong about my assumptions.

I'll repeat: Risking injury and/or death by standing out in a freaking
hurricane is not
'honorable' to anything except stupidity.

Note the phrase "'honorable' to anything".

EOT for me.