Savages

"The target is destroyed." Pilot of a Soviet SU-15 interceptor to his flight controller, September 1, 1983. The "target" was Korean Airlines Flight 007 with 269 people aboard. Everyone was killed in the ensuing crash.

The early indications are that a Malaysian Airlines 777 was shot down as it flew over Ukraine in an area near the Russian border. This was a scheduled flight from Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur. Two hundred ninety-five were aboard. According to FlightTracker it had reached FL 330 (33,000 feet) and was travelling in excess of 500 miles per hour. Amateurs didn't bring this airplane down.


Believe nothing coming out of the press, or any agency of any government (including ours) concerning this horror. The facts - an airplane crashed and nearly three hundred people spent the last moments of their lives knowing what was about to happen to them. Everything but the grim pictures of scorched earth, scattered aircraft parts and the twisted bodies of the dead is supposition. Some of it will be intentional disinformation planted to create a context for world reactions that are in someone else's interest. Whoever did this - and they alone (at this moment) know who they are - killed because the abject horror of it all would advance their cause.

Years ago, on the way to a wedding, my wife and I flew over Cuba. One would have to have been alive and aware during the early 60s to remember that lovely island as the source of a nuclear standoff. We have maintained strained relations with the Castro government over the decades. There was no way we would fly right over Cuba.

Of course we did. It is the twenty-first century. Civilized nations, even those at odds with each other, understand the benign and advantageous nature of free commerce. It is even possible to fly to Cuba, if one decides to play a fiction that "ignores" American law. We later learned (same trip) that we were free to travel to Nicaragua. Imagine that.

Civilization still grapples with the Dark Age temperaments of savages. Here, in Ukrainian skies, seems another example. We must raise our voices, our fists and maybe more, at all of them no matter what "side" they are on.

I'm in. What can I do to help?

Long Time Gone

"A headwind, really fighting it. Tough, hot going into Jeffrey City. Cook dinner, get said hi to by about 47 girls in an old Dodge Dart." Bikecentennial diary, Split Rock Monument, WY, June 19, 1976.

Over the course of the Bicentennial summer I rode a Viscount aluminum-framed ten speed from Reedsport, OR to Yorktown, VA. Although I had made virtually every mistake I could selecting the equipment for the journey, I had one thing going for me. I was twenty-one.

Turkey Knots

"When you need to use your tourniquet you have the rest of your life to figure out if you set it up properly or not."

Two officers down, both seriously wounded (not "injured." To quote Band of Brothers injured is when you fall out of a truck). The investigation continues, but this much is clear.

There was bravery, there was selflessness. There was quick thinking. And there was (at least one) timely application of a tourniquet.

The SEALs say "Ready to lead, ready to follow. Never quit." Last night, no one quit.

For Jon and Kim - prayers for speedy recoveries.

Signatures on a Parchment

"That to secure these rights governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed." Declaration of Independence, adopted 1776 in Philadelphia, PA.

Much is often made of how the self-interested find their way into government, or its periphery. Truth to tell, there is money and power to be had there. With three-plus trillion dollars flowing through Washington every year there are uncountable ways to prosper.

It is fashionable in some cliques to attribute this to our Founders, the men who this day 238 years ago in muggy Philadelphia affixed their signatures onto a parchment declaring a treasonous act. They were a wealthy elite, one percenters, who organized a country to further their own interests. So goes the tale.

Name That Tune

Overheard in King Soopers -

Seafood Counter Employee #1: "I've heard this song before (referring to store background music).
Employee #2: "Yeah, me too. I just can't place it.

Nearby, a shopper turns.... "They've gotten patriotic today for some reason."

The "song" was:



I believe we are doomed.

A Different War

Lt. Elroy Carpenter: Oh, you are brilliant, Sir. In fact, I would say you are one of the most brilliant, most intelligent, most outstanding officers that I have ever... 
Captain Wallace B. Binghamton: Stop buttering me up - I'm on a low-fat diet.

Bob Hastings (L), with Joe Flynn and Ernest Borgnine

Noting the passing of Bob Hastings at age 89. He was a WWII veteran (a B-29 navigator) who portrayed Lt. Elroy Carpenter, the obsequious aide to officious, blundering Captain Binghamton in the '60s comedy McHale's Navy. Like the show Barney Miller was to policing, McHale's Navy probably portrayed the South Pacific PT boat war closer to truth than fiction. The stories my Marine father told - of alcohol-powered escapades indulged in by men sure that their next battle would be their last - certainly support that notion. He thought the show funny, anyway, allowing us to stay up and watch with him. The tiny black and white RCA set was a perfect medium for a war that had ended less than twenty years prior. Hastings's performance was always frantic and evasive as he struggled to stroke the ego of a Navy Captain better suited for a Stateside assignment in...administration.

Mr. Hastings was a character actor, to be sure. But, for a few years, he helped America remember that the fighting men who defeated an empire were flawed human beings in often generous, humorous ways. Many made the ultimate sacrifice having lived their last days making the best of a trying situation. For all of its lightness, McHale's Navy helped us honor the men and women who ventured so far from home to keep us free. Bob Hastings joined that cast in a worthy cause. 

(Pew, Pew)

You cannot invade the mainland United States. There would be a rifle behind every blade of grass. Quote sometimes attributed to Japanese Admiral Yamamoto (often disputed).


The sun peeked over the horizon, a thin-air chill clinging to the foothill shooting range. Shades of gray and purple greeted a city below just stirring from slumber, cars humming along the interstate rimming Green Mountain. Awakening unusually early I was meeting friends.

Officers in almost every jurisdiction are required to demonstrate proficiency with firearms on a regular basis. Most will enjoy long, fulfilling careers never firing a shot in anger. Too many will rely on their sidearm or long gun to defend themselves, or someone around them. The majority of encounters are sharp, intense battles measured in seconds. Situational awareness, instantaneous decisions, and first-round accuracy can spell the difference between survival and an elaborate funeral.

So my friends - range instructors all - met me in the early morning hours for pointers, a qualification course and some cop camaraderie. I got to shoot a lot, learned a ton about trigger control (stop it...you know who you are) and was invited to expend a magazine of .223 through an amazing AR platform. Of course I accepted.

And I passed the qual course.

Mornings like this keep me coming back for more. Thanks, guys.