Now this is cool. Thanks Paul Zimmerman! The money quote:
You have chosen to risk your lives for the defense of this country. I will not insult you by saying that you are dedicated to selfless service — it is not a virtue in my morality. In my morality, the defense of one’s country means that a man is personally unwilling to live as the conquered slave of any enemy, foreign or domestic. This is an enormous virtue.
Bar Tally: 77 Hours
The army is no longer allowing troops to use PMags, a bigger advance in reliability for the M4/16 than gas piston operation.
Memorial Day always sits poorly with me. Allow me to explain:
I’ve never been a fan of Black/Women’s/ect. History Month. Seems it cheapened a group to give them a month as if they don’t deserve their fair due on each day. So it is with Memorial Day. Am I supposed to pull out my list of dead friends on one day each year to thank them? Those men that made their mark walk with me with every step of every day. They keep me humble. They shame me into action when I am weak. Those sons of bitches force me off the couch to not waste the gift they’ve given me, be it internal empowerment, security, freedom to worship (or in my case to never take to my knees), knowledge, or the fact that no man dares call me a subject. My days are often spent like a terrible Family Circus comic, but instead of Billy’s grandpa looking down from a cloud smiling, there are hundreds of ghosts over my shoulder watching my every move and demanding bold action.
Don’t stop with those fallen within our borders with a uniform on. Many of those vets among us are walking dead. No one comes back the same. It isn’t only those with an American uniform we should be grateful for. I’m thankful to those Greek veterans, spear in hand, that faced down the Persians. I’m thankful for those Franks that stood against tyranny at Tours. I’m thankful for those brave men who stood against despotism in Rhodesia. Imperialist as it may sound to most, I’m thankful for the brave 130 Brits who stood down the Zulu Kingdom at Rorke’s Drift who advanced Western Civilization against barbarism and unchecked power.
I am just as grateful for those brave men who didn’t carry a weapon. In his writings about the Spanish American War, Teddy Roosevelt once said that the greatest honor is in the performance of duty, and not the accident of valor. Picking up a weapon can be satisfying, but may not be the best one can do for the effort. I think of John Basilone whose greatest courage may well have been to come home to sell war bonds when he wanted to be off at the front. He died when he returned walking tanks through a minefield on Iwo Jima. To Nathan Hale. I thank those brave men and women who stood to advance knowledge when to do so may well be their death. They didn’t wear a uniform, but they were fighting in a war all the same. I have found moral courage twice as rare as physical courage in this world and I thank those brave souls who had the testicular fortitude to take a stand. To Ayaan Hirsi Ali. To Chris Hitchens.
And to a good man we lost today. As a nation we are poorer, for we lost a throwback today: the rare breed that built this country and kept the Soviets away. We’re losing them and if we do not emulate and take with us their strength then Chesty will have had it right when he said, “Our Country won’t go on forever, if we stay soft as we are now. There won’t be any America because some foreign soldiery will invade us and take our women and breed a hardier race!” Jack, you taught me about endurance. You taught me about the power of two hands and what they can create, when my own hands mostly destroy. Thank you. Try not to push too hard as one of those new ghosts over my shoulder.
So no, today isn’t Memorial Day. It’s Monday. I’ll be doing more Bar Review thank you. Not feeling like some Slipknot? Deal.
Bar Tally: 69 hours
Let’s see if I can fit a combat nap in here:
Dragon will be making its approach to the International Space Station at 0430. SpaceX will be running a live webcast.
On a side note, I really hate the Rule Against Perpetuities. It’s double frustrating to study since Idaho doesn’t even concern itself with such silliness.
Bar Tally: 58 Hours.
Bar Tally: 50 Hours
In other news, my Bar books arrived today:
5 mile pack and boots run. I feel like I’m starting to kick butt, then remember that Spartan Beast is going to be 13. Grrrrrr. I’ve got some work yet.
Bar Tally: 46 Hours.
According to the guy giving my bar lecture:
“As you know there are two religion clauses, the establishment clause and the free exercise clause. And frankly, under neither heading are the cases entirely logical. Do yourself a favor here and don’t expect the constitutional doctrine on religion to make perfect sense: it…it doesn’t. So just remember the results and the doctrinal buzzwords that the Court uses to explain them, and don’t worry yourselves much over whether they all fit together.”
Outstanding! I approve of this guy.
Bar Tally: 41 hours.
Well, the Falcon 9 launch ended up being aborted. No matter. Lessons learned. There’s a relaunch scheduled for Tuesday.
On the upside of this, on Saturday, the little one and I were able to finally launch without losing/destroying our rocket.
I don’t think I’m more passionate about anything in this world than space flight. When you watch a Nascar race, you often, whether you admit it or not, partially watch it for the accidents. These launches are nothing like that. In the hours leading up to the launch I start getting butterflies in my stomach, almost like I’m about to go see a girl I’m dating. In the seconds, it’s almost like an impending orgasm. You don’t know exactly what is going to happen, but the anticipation is absolutely incredible. There’s even a sense of communion that comes with it. I watched with some friends on facebook, and even hearing the excitement of the guy counting down (who was so excited that he had to slow his count as he got ahead of the clock) made me feel like I was there, not just with my friends, but with a specter that is the glory of our species, looking at history being made.
I had this whole idea to wax poetic about it, then it occurred to me that this has all been said before. My friend John introduced me to a movie a long time ago called Vision Quest that’s already got this covered:
Side Note: Yesterday I sold video games and bought books with the money. Something about that seemed cool. I also cleared 8 hours of Bar Study and a 6 mile run. Not shabby.
Bar Tally: 34.5 hours.
We so, we so excited!
I’ve been wanting to get to these for a while. Let’s see if I can avoid spoilers.
Red State:
Kevin Smith directs an awesome movie bashing both the Westboro Baptist Church and the ATF. How can you not love that? You can catch it on NetFlix.
Yesterday I watched something else on Netflix if I remember correctly was called, Kevin Smith Burns in Hell. He spends most of the time talking about Red State and getting protested by the WBC. He goes into their counterprotests and his interactions with the WBC. I was laughing my ass off.
The Cabin in the Woods:
Joss Whedon directs a horror flick. It has all the things you should love from Joss to include good old fashioned anti-gov. love. You’d think that Joss could finally kill a few main characters and not have it be a big deal since you’re dealing with a slasher, but he still pulls it off.
The Avengers:
Speaking of Joss killing people, one of the cool parts of dealing with him is that you really don’t know if someone is going to die. It’s an unusual feeling to have in a movie. It has the usual great dialogue from a Whedon flick and might be the best superhero movie I’ve seen, and I’m really only an Iron Man guy. That might belong to Batman though.
Oh yeah: Iron Man / Tony Stark. You better have stayed up for the SpaceX Dragon launch tonight.
No spoilers make for a crappy review, but seriously, I’m just telling you to watch them.
