While reading something on Matt’s blog recently, he commented about taking the time to send a letter to the troops. While I’m sure it was being done before my experience in 1986, I found myself at the other end of a big letter writing campaign. Here’s my after action report:

I’m not sure if this story is about the real beginnings of Operation Dear Abby, but I believe it is. The purpose of this post is to use some history to give you some first hand accounts of the impact of letters from all over America have on our troops, and, quite honestly, to help you make a decision (for you fence sitters) to take the time to get out pen and paper and to communicate with those at the “pointy end of the spear.”

Sometime in mid to early 1985, an enterprising and forward looking sailor stationed aboard USS BIDDLE (CG-34), wrote a letter to Abigail Van Buren (Dear Abby) and asked if she would ask her readers to write to “any sailor” while our Battle Group was on deployment to the North Arabian Sea from Oct, 1985 through Apri1, 1986. This certainly was before the days of extensive access to the internet in the US, so “the word” would have to he passed by more conventional means. From my understanding, Abby checked with the Pentagon to make sure this would be acceptable to publish and (the obivious) answer was “yes.”

Fast forward about 9 months. We had left our east coast ports, sailed to Singapore, and then made an early return to the “Med,” in January, 1984, due to the belligerent stance taken by Col. Khaddafi. By April, we had conducted several “freedom of navigation” operations and had engaged Libyan surface slips in combat. Then the letters started to come.

Sometime about early April, mountains, as compared to the normal flow of mail, I’m not exaggerating, began to be delivered to the USS CORAL SEA Battle Group, addressed to “Any Sailor.” My staff was embarked aboard BIDDLE at the time, and when the logistic runs by helicopter from the Carrier came each day, we would get 3-4 large orange mailbags of just this mail. The bags would be taken to an area near the front of the mess deck, and left for all to dig through as time permitted. Believe me, we made time for this.

I’ll say this: It was better than Christmas, and all we were getting was letters from ”home.” It was special and mail, the hard copy kind, hand written stuff is/was always wonderful to receive from your real relatives, but this stuff was outstanding because all types of people from all over took a few moments of their lives to write to us; faceless, nameless service members floating about on haze grey vessels half a world away. I can’t put into words the elation these pieces of paper provided to so many of us.

We read them, passed around the ones we liked, and many sailors wrote back, I know at least a few sailors even met some of the writers. I recall letters from veterans, housewives, an airline pilot, school kids and even a few from some women inmates in the Florida Correctional system. The “thank yours” were numerous, but many included just plain old “slices of life” from the hearts and souls of American citizens, giving as a glimpse of their days.

These letters were a special gift and lifted the spirits of many. If your ever wonder if just taking a moment to share a little of your life with someone in the service is worth the effort, the answer from someone on the other end, is a resounding “it sure is!”

I know after we were released from the theatre, after a 3 week extension to bomb Libya in May, 1986, the continuous, massive amounts of mail were delivered to the Battle Groups left in the Med, and I suspect it got distributed widely about the Fleets in all oceans.

For my part, thank you to those who may have written back then, but today, especially to anyone who has been doing the same sort of thing for our service members. You are making a difference, and, as then, I know your seemingly small efforts are tremendously appreciated by the men and women far from home.

It’s called a “data port” and I believe it began to he standard equipment in cars about 1995. Don’t quote me on that but, suffice it to say, it’s a development we know took place.

Ok, here we go. This data port enables mechanics to connect computerized diagnostic computers to your car quickly. Not only can they “see” into your engine quickly they can, theoretically, identify and quickly correct problems in the automobile. That has the benefit of saving on labor hours for the consumer, as well as giving the mechanics the ability to handle a greater volume of customers.

Invented by the automobile industry by the hybridization of electronics and mechanical devices, some other people come along and come up with a way to further their work, at no significant cost. Enter the law enforcement profession. The data port is not merely an interface into your vehicles “propulsion” system it has been fortified by being given a short, but telling memory. Like the sibling we had that reveled in reporting our egregious acts of immaturity and boundary testing to our parents the data pat retains a constantly refreshing memory of what you had the vehicle doing for the last 30 seconds.

30 seconds? That’s not long you think. Just for fun, stop doing anything else and watch your watch via clock for 30 seconds. This will recalibrate you as to how long 30 seconds is. With things like speed, acceleration and breaking being recorded, quite an accurate picture can he quickly reconstructed, completely unbiased by people with agendas. When an accident occurs, an information recovery specialist will use specialized equipment to record the vehicles last 30 seconds of data. Certainly this type of information retroviral will or must have been judged as legal, as is permissible to search based on “probable cause,” when a crime has occurred. If there was an accident, it certainly follows that a warrant-less search is in order. “They” now have what you did (and did not do) for permanent record. I would hope this would cause one to consider this, and to meditate on whether personal driving habits should be changed.

It gets better. Look how far we’ve come in less than 10 years: From the automobile engineer to the mechanics to law enforcement. Just where can we go next? Enter an industry that grew from the premise of sharing risks to the one that has become risk adverse and “currency–philic:“ Insurance. About a month ago, I caught the last portions of a news report on how an insurance company in the northern mid-west is experimenting with having customers place a device on their car’s data port to record not just the last 30 seconds of data as they roll into their driveways at the end of the day, but all day long. When you get home, you remove the data collection module, hook it up to your computer and upload your day’s driving to the insurance company’s computer. Once your data (provided voluntarily) is there, the insurance company software will take over and analyze your driving.

How could a same person volunteer to do this? It’s simple, the insurance company offers an attractive incentive: a 15% discount. I’d be willing to bet this “project” is presented as a way to collect live data for the actuaries to review and analyze, So the company will be able to mitigate the isles farther. That certainly Sounds fair, but the real question is in which direction is the risk being attenuated? It’s not in your favor.

As time passes, some incredibly compulsive math managers (actuaries) will sit down with computer programmers and discuss which combination, data points from the daily data capture files will indicate an unsafe (read: someone who we think will cost us money) driver is. The programmers will return to their cubicles and begin coding the proper “algorithms” to apply to received data. This process, in and of itself, is working material for an entire other post but that will have to he done later.

Just close you eyes for a brief moment, get in touch with your inner child and imagine your flood of emotions when, as you have your first cup of coffee, you find an email from your wonderfully protective, good neighbors type insurance carrier subject line: “You insurance is canceled.” Oops, that’s traumatic. Try this line: “Your insurance rates have been raised.” Sin confident your blood pressure is higher as a result and you may even have wondered (in the first scenario), “how will I get to work today?”

Ina perfect world, a perfect set of computer code will be able to weed out aggressive drivers from the pack. On the other hand, were far from a coherent problem solving program. In the January, 2005 issue of “Scientific American,” pages 36 through 37A have an article discussing robotics and Hans Moravec of Carnegie Mellon University and Seegrid Corporation fame, figures a Mac G5 (dual processor) 2Ghz computer is sort of at the top of current mainstream computing ability and he rates it’s intelligence above a guppy and below a mouse. The news is computing power is improving, but it won’t be until about 2040 until computing power reaches that of humans. In the meantime, that means the fate of your driving record will be determined by either a smart fish, or a less than smart rodent. That, I submit, will jump start your heart better than a portable defibrillator.

All of this reminds me of the BBC produced series ”Connections” of about 20 years ago. This started as a way to service a car more efficiently and it ends up being the sibling that always ratted you out, and all at no cost to anyone except the original designers of the data port.

As a porting thought, consider the current Rush Limbaugh prescription drug “shopping” charges and how the Police collected Rush’s medical records from his doctors, without a warrant. That issue is presently headed for the Florida Supreme Court to determine the legality of this type of evidence seizure. Put that in the context of personal daily driving statistics being stored in the information systems of insurance companies. Will insurance companies willingly turn over information demanded by someone with a badge? It’s probably much clearer to assume that a “doctor-patient privileged relationship” would be upheld, but I doubt that few people would think to apply that quality of protection to information held by the insurance firms.

As the computing power of the insurance companies computers grow, so will the capabilities of vehicle computers. With “On-star,” callers are electronically located by GPS. Cell phones have a GPS locating feature in ones produced in the last few years. You can bet that all vehicles will soon be fitted automatically with such equipment, and interfacing it to the data port will he a simple thing. When this occurs, Sin sure downloaded data from this pat will include position reports. As with the mechanics into it will quickly become a mandatory thing, and it could even be used to write speeding and other traffic violations automatically.

We will accept this story creeping, penetration into our lives without a thought, other than how it enhances am lives on a minute-to. Minute basis, being concerned little about the threat to personal privacy this will beget.

10/25/2004 marks 60 years from the day of the Battle off Samar,

which is near Leyte Gulf in the Philippine Islands. I ask you to take a few minutes to meditate on the events of this day so long ago. As a side note, this day has a tremendous amount of meaning for me, as my personal history has become linked with not only that day, but the people who ”stood to” as the British would say, when the odds were so far against them surviving that most would have written it off as “impossible.” The story is compelling because the decks of the ships were awash in as much raw courage, as they were in blood and seawater. It speaks to the ability of the human race to rise to an inpossible challenge.

The best book I have found on the events of this day is “The Last Stand of the Tin Can Sailors” by James D. Hornfischer. Not only is the story a compelling and captivating one, in and of itself, James’ research was thorough and he really brings the people to you, not merely a litany of what ship moved where, fired what and the result is history. This book was awarded the Samuel Eliot Morrison Award for books on Naval History.

I will preface the rest of the post with this quote from Samuel Eliot Morrison: “In no engagement in its entire history has the United States Navy shown more gallantry, guts and gumption than in those two morning hours between 0730 and 0930 off Samar.” Samuel Morrison is one of the pre-eminent Naval Historians, particularly of the WW II era. The men in this battle are the forefathers of the men and women who risk themselves completely in Iraq and Afghanistan today land I consider them to be cut from the same cloth.

The Battle off Samar had been forming for several days before the 25th of October, 1944. Two groups of attacking Japanese surface ships, without aircraft carrier support had been working their way through the Philippine Islands, enroute the vicinity as Leyte Gulf in order to destroy the amphibious landing forces. This landing was General MacArthur’s return to the Islands and the one where the historic pictures of him wading ashore were taken as he exclaimed “I have returned.”

One force of battleships, cruisers and destroyers had been effectively decimated by the night of the 24th by the battle force of Admiral Olendorf. In the approaches to the Surigao Straights, in the darkness of the night, the U.S. PT boats, destroyers, cruisers and bloodied veteran battleships from Pearl Harbor would extract a high price from Admiral Nishimura’s approaching surface group. The battle was a textbook case of “Crossing the ‘T’ .” Another battle force, under Admiral Kurita, consisting of four battleships (one was the IJNS YAMATO, equipped with 18” naval guns, the largest ever put to sea), six heavy cruisers, two light cruisers and eleven destroyers, had escaped detection as it slipped through the San Bernadino Straight that same night.

As the sun rose on the morning of the 25th, Admiral Kurita’s Central Force bore down on an un-alerted task element that was called “Taffy 3” from 25 miles north of the U.S. group. Taffey 3 consisted of six “escort” carriers (CVEs), which were merchant ship hulls fitted with flight decks, three FLETCHER Class destroyers (DDs) and four destroyer escorts (DEs) sunder the command of Rear Admiral Clifton “Ziggy” Sprauge.

Naval officers, from the earliest times fighting ships put to sea, have dreamed of being the winner in the great sea battles of history, hoping to equal Lord Nelson at Abikour Bay. In more modern times, U.S. admirals dreamt of “the great Mahanian sea battle,” described by Admiral Alfred Thayer Mahan, where the huge dreadnoughts duked it out in strategic battles at sea. The aircraft carrier dominance brought to the world on December 7th, 1941 pretty much ended that dream.

On this fateful day, the battle came to Admiral Sprauge, Commander Evans, Commander Hathaway, Lieutenant Commander Copeland and Gunners Mate Paul Carr, and a host of other unlikely heros I haven’t listed, and they hadn’t planned for and it was nothing like Admiral Mahan ever thought of. he details above are to set the stage for what occurred next. Picture two sea-borne opponents, one Goliath, one David, yet unlike David, Admiral Sprauge had not been observing the warriors run from Goliath day after day, before he chose to step onto the battlefield. This situation was more like the war between the Philistines and Hebrews was raging and Goliath sought out David’s flock as he tended his sheep and surprised him at dawn.

Admiral Sprauge, upon being told of the Japanese presence, knew the only choice was to stand and fight, regardless of the cost. Had Kurita’s Central Force gotten by Taffy 3, the heavy Japanese combatants would destroy the landing force. One lesson that both Carrier Group and combatant type officers constantly needed reminding of is you are only there to ensure the landing force gets ashore. All the other glorious “stuff” is superfluous. You are actually an “ablative shield” for the Marines, or Army, as was the case here, leather jackets and fancy high, speed ship handling be damned!

The battle was quickly shaping up as one of complete sacrifice. The math says the U.S. Navy brought 23 5” guns and 42 torpedoes to the fight. All seven of the escorts were armed with nothing bigger than 5”/38 caliber guns, which can fire a 54 lb projectile. The destroyers had 5 guns, the DEs had only two. The Japanese had about 66 equivalent barrels on the 11 destroyers alone. I’m not sure what the projectile weight on an 18” Japanese round was, but U.S. Battleship 16” guns fired a 2200 lb round, so it has to be roughly equivalent to say the Japanese could attack with rounds at least that size.

Commander Evans on the JOHNSTON, a DD, steamed at full speed into the approaching threat armed with torpedoes and 5-5” guns, he and his crew knew it was the moment to put all their skills and focus to work. His ship was sunk in the battle, hut not before he seriously damaged several of the attaching cruisers. As the survivors of the JOHNSTON clung to their rafts in the water later, one of the Japanese ships mustered their deck crew while the battle continued, to render a salute to their audacity and seamanship as the continued to chase the CVEs.

Commander Amos T. Hathaway commanded another of the FLETCHER Class destroyers on the 25th, the HEERMANN. Captain Hathaway and his crew sent their ten torpedoes and numerous 5’; 40 mm, and 20mm rounds towards the Japanese, sustaining severe damage from battleship rounds hitting them, but the ship survived to be repaired. The SAMUEL B ROBERTS (DE-413), commanded by Lieutenant Commander Robert Copeland, raced into the salvos of the Japanese as well, with Gunners Mate 2nd Paul Carr as the Mount Captain of Mount 52 (the after 5” gun mount). Following the JOHNSTON into battle with the HEERMANN close by, the “Sammie ‘B’,” is a legend in U.S. Naval history, for the courage her crew displayed that day. This vessel has rested on the bottom off Samar Island since that day.

Paul Henry Carr was a young man from Checotah, Oklahoma. The single son in the family, with 6 or 7 sisters, he enlisted in the Navy as did millions after Pearl Harbor. He was married, so he left a young wife behind when he sailed to the Pacific. In the book, Captain Copeland reported that Gunners Mate Carr’s gun mount was not only the best on the ship, but the best he had ever seen in his service time. Not only was it so clean your could eat off the deck (a real feat in a gun mount full of hydraulics and constant foot traffic, let alone heavy metal things like shell casings and tools being dropped on the deck) the gunnery performance was also excellent. Paul Carr took his duty as Supervisor of a gun and gun crew seriously.

On the 25th, Mount 52 hammered out round after round, striking their targets. The rate of fire for a good 5”38 gun crew was about 10 rounds/minute. The Sammie B sustained numerous hits from large caliber weapons of the enemy, and at some point, the high pressure air compressors went off line. “HP air” is used to clear the 5” gun barrel of combustion fumes, which are toxic, after a shell is fired, and before the gun breech is opened to ram in the next round. Despite the loss of the gas clearing air, Carr’s crew kept firing their gun mount. The smoke and odors must have been overwhelming, but they kept up their rate of fire. Eventually, power to operate the hydraulic loading ram was lost, so they shifted to manual loading the gun, as the Japanese ships surrounded the fearless destroyers and destroyer escorts who had the impertinence to take on the largest battleship in the world.

Continuous firing of a gun heats the metal of the breech of the gun. At some point, a condition called a “hot gun” exists. This is when the temperature of the metal is so high, that it will cause the powder in the propellant casing to ignite without operating the firing mechanism. A standard gun magazine load on destroyers has been 600 rounds for all the years during and since WWII. By this time, Mount 52 had fired almost all of their rounds, and the gun was glowing red at the breech. While loading a powder casing behind the projectile, and before the breech block could be closed, the powder exploded, killing most of the crew in the mount. Paul Carr initially survived the blast.

Shortly after Mount 52 was silenced, the ROBERTS took a few more hits and was dead in the water, listing. As the medical crews went about treating the less wounded, they set Paul Carr aside to treat others. Paul had been ripped open from his chest to his crotch, and obviously wouldn’t live long. When they came back to check on him, he wasn’t where they had laid him, he had crawled back into the damaged gun mount, had picked up the last projectile and was asking for help to load and fire it.

A dying man on a dying ship, stood up, as the life quite apparently drained from him, and he was trying to carry on the fight, for the enemy was still a threat. He succumbed to his wounds shortly afterwards. The airmen who got aloft from the CVEs, many without bombs or even gun ammunition make any real or mock attacks on the Japanese ships to take the pressure off their own “home plates,” as well as the surface ships engaged at close range. I’d almost venture to say you could have shoveled up the raw courage that day and stored it in 55 gallon drums, and had plenty to last centuries. I can’t begin to do honor to the men who served there that day.

Read the book.

I am passionate about this story for the following reasons: I served 20 years in the Navy. The last shipboard tour I had was as the Executive Officer aboard the USS CARR (FFG-52). I had some of the war diary logs in my files turned over to me by my predecessor. It captivated me then.

I was required to take a computer course for my NROTC scholarship. A tall, thin man, the only Navy Officer at an Army oriented school (The Citadel) was my professor. His name was Captain Amos T. Hathaway, the Captain of the USS HEERMANN off Samar.

Reporting to Fleet Combat Training Center, Atlantic at Dam Neck, Virginia, I was assigned as the Combat Systems Operational Team Training Officer for the Pre-Commissioning crews of the OLIVER HAZARD PERRY Class FFG-7 Guided Missile Frigates. The first crew I trained was going to the USS CLIFTON SPRAUGE (FFG-16). As I was leaving two years later, one of the last crews I trained was USS COPELAND (FFG-25).

It was October, 1988 when I took over as XO on CARR from then CDR Tom Brown. I didn’t know much about the battle, just that one gunner’s mate had received the Silver Star for his heroism in WWII. During my time as XO, the Chief Staff Officer at our supporting destroyer squadron was Captain Paul X. Rinn, who had been the Commanding Officer on the USS SAMUEL B ROBERTS (FFG-58) when it hit a mine in the Persian Gulf. That ship would not have been saved, with out his innovative thinking and a crew that rose to an immediate danger, just as those of the DE-413 had done many years before.

I know deep within me, that my association with this date is no coincidence. As I was re-reading some of the book tonight, and after scanning about for some information on the USS CARR, I found out CARR is now assigned to Destroyer Squadron Two out of Norfolk. One of the two squadrons of Japanese destroyers of Kurita’s Central Force where in their Destroyer Squadron TWO.

If you’re still with me here, here are some important notes about this battle:

In William Shakespeare’s Henry V (Act 4, Scene 3), there is a speech referring to “We band of brothers,” about those who are on the field of battle on Saint Crispen’s Day. The actual battle was the Battle of Agincourt October 25th, 1415. This was another battle in history where the underdogs won the day, despite the problems they faced.

The Charge of the Light Brigade in the Crimean War at Balaclava, memorialized by Alfred Lord Tennyson, happened on October 25th.

The Battle off Samar is the last naval ship to ship battle (other than between or with patrol boats) in the world’s history.

The battle happened with out air cover from large deck carriers, because they had been pulled away by Admiral “Bull” Halsey to try to sink Japanese aircraft carriers. There were in fact, some Japanese carriers in the area, to the north east, which were sent as a decoy to draw the large ships away from the landing area. It worked, and the other point of that most Japanese naval pilots with any significant experience had been killed, so Japanese carriers were almost no threat. On the book’s web site tonight, there was a comment that the reason the Battle off Samar wasn’t ever publicized, it would have to have called to question why Bull Halsey was off on a goose chase, and not making sure the amphibious force was protected.

This past weekend, the survivors of several ships and aircraft squadrons had a 60th year reunion in San Diego. There are still many of them alive.

My final point: As I read stories on weblogs such as Black Five and Mudville Gazette, I see the same courage is being exercised, but these days, it’s more than likely happening in a USMC or Army unit. We still have these sorts of young men and women answering the call to fight for freedom, even if it costs them their lives and I thank God for that.

If you’re one of those men or women reading this that is serving now, you have my gratitude and my envy. May God keep you safe.

I used to not understand how a book written many years ago would have much bearing on my life. Since October 1998, I have been growing in understanding in how the wisdom of the Bible is applicable today. A vision of a life’s experience recently came to me to help me counter the objection of: “How can a document written 2000 and more years ago have any applicability in today’s society?”

I spent a career in the Navy, to include a duty that required me to be a Ship’s Navigator for 18 months. For 15 years before the moment the story following describes, I had been associated with the principles of celestial navigation, but it had not been my professional assignment to actually conduct the task. I first saw it practiced on the USS ANCHORAGE (LSD-36) by the bearded Lieutenant who was the Navigator. It was many years later when I took the sextant in my hand to look skyward and tell my Captain where I figured we where. My first effort, as a 1st Class Midshipman, was very inaccurate. I recall at least I was plotting us in the western Pacific, which is good, since we were there. By March of 1990, aboard USS CARR (FFG-52), my navigation skills had developed considerably.

I have experienced the same thing in my newfound Christian life. I am confident that with each passing day and devotion to learning, I will find the messages more precise and concise. I recall the cool, humid air rushing by my face as the ship cruised at about 15 knots across the calm waters of the Persian Gulf. The night is just about to leave twilight and the sky is cloudless. All of the stars of the heavens are not yet visible, just the brightest ones, to the eye, but they are there. The western sky is still dimly lit, providing a clear view of the horizon. I review my planning sheet, completed this afternoon, and make sure my recorder has his stopwatch ready. Standing with my legs apart to stabilize myself on the starboard bridge wing, I lift my sextant and preposition the adjustable arm to the estimated angle for the first star I will “shoot.” Gazing to the southeast, my practiced eye quickly focuses on Sirius as I bring the small telescope to my eye. My left hand pinches the release mechanism to make an adjustment of the mirror. I see a split picture of the sky around Sirius in the mirror and the horizon. I pause and watch the subtle upward movement of the star in my field of view brought on by the rotation of the Earth. I turn the fine adjustment wheel to shift the view where Sirius is slight below the level of the real view of the horizon. I begin to swing the sextant left and right about 20o, “swinging the arc” to ensure I have brought the star to the horizon correctly. My legs flex to compensate for the slow rolling of the ship to provide an accurate reading. A thought crosses my mind as I wait for Sirius to match the horizon. My body is in automatic after so many times I have shot celestial bodies in the course of my assignment. I think just how marvelous the human mind is and how it can accomplish so much with so little thought – a true gift. With each slow swing of the sextant, pivoting about my eye, Sirius rises slowly ever so slightly. My urge to manipulate the fine adjustment more is overridden by my desire to savoir the moment in this peaceful state. I perceive so much, yet I am so single-minded. In the background, the crackling static of the bridge-to-bridge radio and the footfalls of the Officer of the Deck coming onto the bridge wing are heard, but do not distract me. My recorder, a signalman without professional tasks at the moment, stares at the stopwatch he holds to the clipboard with his left hand, his other holding a pen over the star sighting log sheet, dimly illuminated by a small flashlight clipped to the board. As Sirius is about to cross the horizon, I say “Standby” to alert him, then a few short seconds later “MARK!” when the view in the mirror of the brightest star in the sky crosses the horizon, by my best reckoning. He notes the time and I take the sextant from my eye and shine a red flashlight on the angular reading. As I read the numbers to him, I think about how the reading I have just taken represents the light that was made from that star many millions of years ago by the fusion process. I am using it to figure out where my ship is today, but the light has had to travel across space in time to reach me so I could use it as a reference now.

God placed the stars in the heavens many years ago, so I might be able to “fix” my position, then from there I might be able to plot a course to my destination. I can come back later and take reading from the same stars to measure how far I have gone and in which direction and they are still gracing me with this information based on their presence in antiquity. The stars are large and bright and their light has spanned the millennia, being used by the ancient Phoenicians, Chinese and European sailors. The methods used by these ancient sailors have been refined, but the techniques are essentially unchanged today. The Bible is a book the does for you, what the stars did for me on that and many other nights. It may have been written many years ago, but it’s wisdom and guidance fixes us and our life’s direction today. Also, like the stars, they will report where you are, if you read them correctly. If you have traveled off course, they will reveal that to you, just as they can tell you are where you expect you would and should be to avoid navigation hazards. God made this book so we would have it today to avoid life’s hazards and it can tell you when you are right as well as wrong, once you study it.

After shooting Sirius, I repeated the process for Betelgeuse, Castor, Pollux, and Aldebaran. My recorder dutifully recorder the time and the “height observed.” I review the data sheet and head back to my state room. I close my door, reach for my nautical almanac, and HO 229 on my book shelf to begin the process of reducing what I have observed. I do the lengthy calculations manually for the intellectual exercise. After stepping through a long series of formula and look up tables, I arrive at values to mark on a nautical chart. The results of this next step will tell me how accurately I can determine the results. When I first began, it was not unusual to be within five nautical miles of where I should have fixed the ship, but as the days went by, my precision became more refined and therefore more correct “interpretations.” This is a similar process with the Bible and understanding. At first, you pick up this ancient text and know there is some wisdom, but you don’t understand how well it actually speaks to you. With time and regular exposure to the Scriptures, your understanding becomes more clear and concise.

The infinitesimally small arcs on the chart are drawn as straight lines, as the radius of the circle plotted in millions of light years in measurement. After a few minutes, a crossing of the lines indicates where the ship was about an hour ago, as I stood 41 feet above the water’s surface, calling marks to my recorder. I could not make an instantaneous judgement on my position, as the stars are so far and small, I could not interpret it until I studied it for some time. The Universe, created to show us God’s glory, is vast and too large to grasp, but when studied, some of the meaning will be revealed, if you make the time to observe it and devote time to interpret what you have observed in your “readings.”

As the navigator looks to the ancient sky to find his place on the face of the globe today, so can we look at this example to help understand the purpose of the Bible and how it relates to our lives now. Navigation is the combination of pure mathematics and personal proficiency in interpreting what you study. With dedicated effort, your ability to find the lessons of life become clearer. With understanding, you gain the ability to pass the information on to others, but they too must devote their energy to gain the ability to know for sure when the stars cross the horizon in the split mirror view. Knowing the “math” alone will not lead you to the answers, nor can you expect that using someone else’s observations to provide as much as you need to know, if you just “plug in the values.”

I sent an email to Matt at Black Five to make some personal observations about a story about John Kerry riding in a military aircraft. By telling a story of my Navy experience, I wanted to bring out differences in leadership. I could do this because of a man who was the first person I actually had working for me, once I was assigned my first leadership tasks at my first command, the USS MILWAUKEE (AOR-2).

I have decided to repost it here, as it is a tribute to Operations Specialist Chief Petty Officer Michael P. MacCaffery, USN, a man whom I owe much to for taking me aside and teaching me things that are the foundation of leadership. If he ever manages to read this, he’ll be upset that I didn’t refer to him as “RDC,” the Radarman rating that had been replaced with “Operations Specialist” just before I came into the service. He was proud of the old moniker, and had a certain passion about him as he chomped on his half smoked stub of a cigar and snarled “RDC MacCaffery!” to make sure everyone one knew who he really was, after being addressed or introduced as “OSC Mac.”

Here’s my posting:

Once more, it’s the “when you think no one is looking” stories that tell your heart…

Before I begin, let me say something I learned about leadership. My twenty years in the Navy began aboard a replenishment oiler out of Norfolk. As an Ensign, I was a Division Officer, fresh out of several professional schools and college, but with no hands on experience in leadership of any significance beyond Boy Scouts and “playing Army” at The Citadel. OSC Michael P. MacCaffrey, USN, began the age old duty of making something out of the know nothing that just became his “boss.” For at least the next six months (and I didn’t realize what this was until about 4 years later), the Chief would ask me if I’d like a cup of coffee. I’d say “yes,” and we’d head off to the “Goat Locker” (what a Chief’s Mess is called). Chief Mac would regal me with all sorts of stories, interspersed with questions, as we drank coffee, surrounded by the Backbone of the Fleet, the senior enlisted men. These stories were in the best fashion of parables. He slowly injected principles of leadership learned over centuries of human interaction, yet rasied to a fine art in modern western society, into my consciousneess, and sub-consciousness. That’s the ground work, for the
point of one of these coffee induced meetings (read “disguised lectures”).

The discussion went something like this:

Chief Mac: “Sir, if were at GQ (General Quarters) and we have to do Battle Messing (boxed meals delivered to yout combat stations, since you can’t leave during heavy fighting), if we come up one ration short, who doesn’t eat?”

Me: (Sort of knowing there was a key lesson here, and pondering the answer) “Me.” (I really had to think to come up with this answer, so I noticably hesitated before answering)

CM: “Right! What if we’re short two rations?

Me: (I answered quicker now, as I was finally catching up mentally) “You and I!”

CM: “You got it! What if we’re short three?”

Me: “You, I and the Leading Petty Officer!”

CM: “Right again. Sir, the other thing is before you open yours, you make the rounds of every man in the watch station area and make sure he has a proper meal and don’t you dare open yours up and start to eat, until they are ALL taken care of. Do this and these men will follow you anywhere.”

Over the next 19 years from that tour of duty, that simple leadership principle served me well, and the great leaders I worked for and with all had that as a part of their core beliefs. I was blessed by compentent people believing in me and together my units routinely stood out at the top of the heap, whether a Division, Department, Section, or a Ship, or Inspection or Training Team. It was more than about Battle Messing, it’s all about the highest duty of a leader is to make sure his people are cared for before him or herself. Think about that for a moment, and consider those you have worked with whom you hold in highest esteem, and know they demonstrated that over and over to you.

John Kerry grabbing the pizza in the story below is a statement not on his hunger, but his character. Thank God I had many Michael P. MacCafferys in my life as a leader. I’m saddened that John Kerry did not.

I’m hopeful, but there’s this feeling I have that we are on the verge of seeing a change in how we have elected officials seated. There was a foreshadowing of it in Oct/Nov 2000, but this time, we’ll have it in spades.

The reason I believe there is a realistic opportunity for this to happen is because we have become a pretty sue crazy society. If it’s not how we like it, forget about sitting down and discussing it and don’t even consider looking at the bigger picture outside ourselves, to possibly find out it is beeter for all for us to take a second place, or even back seat, in order that a greater good be fulfilled.

With the introduction of electronic voting systems, there is a possibility they can be tampered with, and there are already indications some analysts/consultants have shown it can happen. Picture this: In a tight race, there are no hanging chads to joke about, and that, my readers makes it no joking matter. There will be no reliable way to reconstruct the actual “will of the people.” What then? If we settle for the “recorded” and for the sake of this discussion, and contested contest? That would certainly suit the winner of the moment, but, I submit, here’s where we get into trouble. The “loser” has a legal right to challenge it, due to the known vulnerabilites of electronic voting. Now, how will anyone possibly be able to pull togehter the program code and be able to replicate the voting to a degree that is reasonable, without redoing the actual election over again? Trust me, it will be so close to impossible that our puny little heads would explode from either 1) the massive technical issues involved in re-creating the votes, or 2) the millions of dollars someone would have to spend to do this properly.

Ok, so the bad news is electronic voting might provide such results that we need a judge to be the arbitrator.

Actually, if that wasn’t bad enough, pitting humans (who aren’t taught real math any more, let alone digital logic and related topics, required to not be completely cluless – another topic to be discussed later on how we have failed to teach real life things in our schools) against computers, how about the extreme hatred that will pit humans against humans? I can see it now, accusation and counter accusation about this and that group being “disenfranchised” in the process, so off to court we go. That’s going to be the downfall, when “we the people” have our votes questioned in court.

“Activist” judges. Yep, they exists. Not all judges are appointed for life. Some are elected. Since they are elected, they will try to model the behavior of the people that elected them, and that can go either way in party affiliation, to be fair about it. How will we feel when a judge rules a few thousand votes should have been this instead of that? If that tips the scale, and now its advantage to the moments before loser of the election, how will we react/

That’s a rhetorical question, of course, but think about that. I’ll pray we won’t have to deal with this, but with all the slimy maneuvering in the election, I think we will.

Thanks to the overly active imagination of Frank J. at IMAO:

“This is Dan Rather with continuing coverage of Hurricane Jeanne which has surprisingly skipped right over Florida and landed in Minnesota. Yes, I know some ankle-biting pajama wearing fanatics known as ‘bloggers’ are disputing this, some claiming to be from Minnesota and showing pictures that everything is fine, but we still have this evidence.”

Rather held up a photo of hurricane damage with the word “Minnesota” on it.

“See, this photo, sent to us by an anonymous, unimpeachable source, shows hurricane damage and is clearly labeled ‘Minnesota.’ And listen to this expert.”

An expert walked up to Rather. “That is clearly a label.” He then walked away.

“So, you snot-nosed punks, stop doubting me!” Rather then jumped up on his desk. “I am newscaster Rather! Fear my power, or I shall report your obituary!”

This link leads you to an interesting posting regarding the before and after action of CBS in the recent “RatherGate” issue that discusses what constitutes criminal behavior. It’s pretty well laid out. Settle in for a 10 minute concentrated read.

All in all, it’s one thing to mis-report, it’s entirely another to “modify” the truth with conscious effort.

On the ride home the night of 9/20/2004, the local talk fill in host talked about how he was for George Bush, but he didn’t think he was being aggressive enough prosecuting the war in Iraq. Most of his callers agreed.

Here’s the skinny: Step back and look at the proper long term strategy. If President Bush had gone full tilt boogie on the bad guys, it’s still like trying to get rid of the cockroaches in your southeast low country home. You can go after them and beat them back, while you consider your options, or just burn the house down. Option two helps you make it through the day, with only sometimes seeing the bugs at night when you turn on the light. You keep them from overrunning the place, and it’s pretty livable, given other more aggressive options. If you burn the house down, you’ll probably have the cockroaches around, and you’ll get really, really wet when it rains. So here George is, standing at the threshold of getting rid of many of the cockroaches, while his “family” pleads with him to quit gassing the house and spreading chemicals all over, because it hurts the environment. He’s within striking distance, but the gate he must pass through to do more is the one labeled “Re-Election.”

If George leaves office now, we will slip in our resolve, and many of the hard fought gains will be lost. Because the “family” of the American public is teetering on the fence right now, it’s good that he takes a generally moderate, strategic holding battle into the war. It will cost some lives, but here’s the advantage: It will keep the squeamish conservatives on his side that may sway the vote. Since the President has a term limit, once he’s back in, then he can roll up his figurative sleeves, take off his gloves and stand and fight hard for us. It will repel some, yet in the long run, think what four more years of fighting terrorists would do for World peace? If we have come this far since 9/11/2001, and we have had a military that has been transmogrified into a flexible, well trained organization, capable of fighting in asymmetric environments, and conducting joint operations, augmented by OGAs as well as drawing on the significant expertise of the citizen-soldiers of this modern time. In Vietnam, the book On Strategy argued we took a European heavy armor mentality to the triple canopy jungle. The author was right, it didn’t fit the battle field strategically.

Since Vietnam, we have evolved somewhat in our war fighting orientations, but it was still focused on building a better self-contained military. We have been pretty successful at that. What we didn’t seem to learn very well, until we somewhat got it in GWI, is that war is a multi-faceted thing, to include the press, economics, and many other things, and not all of those arenas have people in camouflage in them. We did better this time. Anyhow, back to may main thesis: George Bush needs to grit his teeth until he is re-elected, before he goes to the “and I’m not joking” bare knuckles approach needed to get rid of the terrorists. Once in office for the four more years, then he can get busy prosecuting war as he should, for the betterment of the entire human race. Short of impeachment, and it has been demonstrated how hard that is, he will be able to run it well, provided he has a Republican Congress in his bag of tricks. So, for those who are frustrated with George Bush, help put him back in and see where this goes. Don’t put him in and see what happens in our back yard.

This is maybe somewhat brutal, but then again, maybe not. I think we call the end of the http address the domain, .com, .gov, .net, .us, .biz, edu, .info. I propose a new domain (if that’s the right name for them): .joke. I mean, it would warn people before they went there about the mirth ready to befall them. I we could start with http://www.johnkerry.joke. How does that sound? From there, consider the possibilities. We could have MCM (mainstream comedy media) such as www.billcosby.joke, www.adamsnadler.joke, www.stevemartin.joke, and www.rosannebarr.joke (oops…these are supposed to be funny!). Then again, maybe it’s a bad thing to decide we need more domains. What will come next? Maybe .satire, followed by .news (which may be good, but how will you know if CBS belongs in the .joke or .news domain?). Pretty soon, there might be .bucanneers for the somehow still loyal in Tampa, which would be like .saints for the New Orleans crowd. Anyhow, this is a planted thread, to see where it goes from here. The options are pretty endless, unless we ru n out of English words, at which point, we could do a survey for the next most popular language (Spanish?) and begin lifting those words to populate the net with new domains. The down side is our little heads will explode, trying to keep track of the explosion of addresses we have to keep track of. We’d have to demand wall sized screens, just so we had a hope of scrolling through our lists of favorite addresses. Now, that would drive the display market to feed our need. Oh, but what about if someone opposite your view registers the domain name first> For instance, as a staunch Democrat, you could go to www.johnkerry.com and think he’s some commercially related site, you know, someplace that wants your money! Hey! Wait…that’s it, HE DOES! Not only will he take your donations, he’ll tax you and get what you used to have left over for yourself, and spend it how he sees fit. I digress. But, as a good Democrat, your fingers may slip and you’d end up on www.johnkerry.joke. You may be terribly confused if the jokes there are not household humor of the incredibly wealthy, but those from his opponents. If you went to www.johnkerry.biz, you’d find nothing, as he’s never run a business. At www.johnkerry.mil, there may be a single entry, in large purple heart ribbon color letters that says (no emphasis added): “I SERVED IN VIETNAM!” at www.johnkerry.info, I’m not sure what you’d find, certainly no federal bills bearing his name. How about taking a peek at www.johnkerry.us. Hmmm….just what could be said there? Maybe a list of Heinz plants that have moved out of the country and “outsourced” the work to foreign nationals. So it would carry the connotation of really more like www.johnkerryswifesaysscrewyou.us. That’s our “Momma T!”