Neocon ruins his life with Bush devotion

[Coyote]

The guy is a fool and an asshole who has made a lot of stupid decisions. He's ruined his marriage through his obsession with jingoism...

The one thing in his favor can be said that at least unlike countless chickenhawks who we have seen, he put his money where his mouth is and enlisted and might actually end up in harm's way. Which makes him not a chickenhawk, but no less a fool for his support of their causes...

Pretty much my take on the guy, with one caveat: as his tour in Iraq looms before him, it seems that his tone is one of a man who realizes what he's done to himself, and that he can't back out now. To an extent, he has a strong grasp of principles, but... he really hitched his wagon to the wrong fucking horse, that's for sure.

The thing that keeps me from having too much sympathy for him is that he seems to be retreating into even more extremism: the GOP is "too liberal"? Seems like a "Palin2012" guy for me... but we'll see. His tour in Iraq may give him some perspective, especially if he sees the human toll of war-- the cost of what he wanted so much. I know I've changed a lot after my experience there, although I don't think I was ever as far into conservatism as this guy was/is.

[Medic]

If he were able to make it through basic training, what makes him different from any other bigoted asshole that's in the Army now?

That´s a pretty good point. The army is probably full of bigoted ultra right wing assholes just like him. Are there any statistics on this?

Probably not although as with the general population, retrenchment on social issues and right-wing affiliation tends to correlate strongly with older age, if I am any judge. (eating in the dining facility at Camp Funston is-as-good as a sample as one can realistically get -- the Transition Team / advisers training at Ft. Riley rank typically from E6 Staff Sergeants - E8 Sergeants Major and O1 1st Lieutenants to O5 Majors and run the gamut of ages above 30 generally speaking. Literally thousands have gone through there and my ears sampling size is easily in the hundreds) I would say that I'm pretty inured to glib comments directed at Democrats or "Liberals" from senior NCO's and officers; it no longer annoys or surprises me.

To be realistic though, if I had to be as exclusive as "bigoted ultra right wing asshole" just like the man being discussed, the sample size undoubtedly goes down. For one, turning bigotry into action (active or passive discrimination) means they run the risk of violation Equal Opportunity's firewall. No the Army cannot and will not ever PREVENT bigotry in all it's forms, but there's a system in place to deal with problem servicemembers even if dealing with it doesn't mean heads roll, as victims invariably desire.

Remember though that Military Times poll showing overwhelming support for McCain over Obama, pre-election? It was a voluntary sample from the rolls of Army-, Air Force- and Navy Times newspapers subscriber rolls; generally much more senior in rank, older, and yes, Conservative with-a-capitol-"C." However that describes only a segment of the military population as a whole, I couldn't be arsed to find the source, but I've heard the Army as it is now as one of the youngest ever.

[Darth Wong]

The level of rampant dishonesty here is breathtaking. Who hasn't seen some asshole cut him off on the highway and thought "I'd love to see that prick get flattened by a semi"? Oh of course, NOBODY here would ever think such thoughts, right? People enter this thread and suddenly rediscover a deep and abiding moral faith in the immense value of human life, no matter who it is!

The difference being, in your case the guy just did something that would bring it about - driving in an unsafe manner.

Except that he didn't cause an accident. He was just a rude asshole. The point, which nobody is willing to admit, is that we think poetic justice is funny when it's someone we have no respect for. That's why we laugh at Darwin Award winners who might be caring, loving human beings for all we know, but who did something really really stupid. And since the last bit is all that we know about the person, we don't respect him and we laugh at his idiotic death. Suppose you found out that a particular Darwin Award winner was a wonderful, giving person: would you find his death much less funny? Of course you would. And yet, nothing about the joke itself has changed.

You can try to pretend that there is some great moral distinction caused by being the actor directly responsible for your own death, but that plays into the moralistic arguments heard earlier, where people question why those actions actually deserve the death penalty. They don't, at least not morally. We simply laugh at the poetic justice because we don't know these people and don't respect them.

The problem in this case is that some part of you is inclined to respect this guy, because even though he's a blowhard idiot, he carried through with his beliefs and in so doing, he showed a certain amount of integrity. The moment you feel some respect for a person, then it cannot be funny for poetic justice to strike him down.

This guy? All he did was cheerlead from the sidelines. Frankly I see this as no different from the people screaming that all soldiers deserve to die because they volunteered. Yet we would dismiss them as loons here. So why is it funny in this case?

What the fuck is this "political activism means nothing" bullshit? You live in a democratic society, do you not? Every time an election rolls around, people talk about how important political activism is, do they not?

In a democratic society, political activists are not mere noisemakers; their leaders are influenced by the apparent popularity of their decisions. George W. Bush would not have invaded Iraq if 80% of Americans opposed it. So people like this should accept some responsibility for the actions they publically support. Political activists are not on the sidelines in a democratic process.

[Ender]

As for Ender- Alvarez may be happy with his decision. The divorce rate is indeed high in this country. The army does indeed pay him.

If he is happy, it is pretty hard to claim his life is ruined then, isn't it?

I still think he's a loser for letting his jingoism destroy his marriage(a point which is hammered home in that article despite the positive slant),

And again I point to the massively high divorce rate. Are all those people losers?

for giving up a (then) successful job (Mayabird does make a good point, but given the dates one can surmise in the article, I doubt all of this happened before the market was starting to melt down in a way that would become apparent to someone even as stupid as Alvarez-and I think he's stupid because my limited interactions with him on his board betrayed low comprehensive skills, not his political beliefs).

Even if you are right and Mayabird is wrong (a point I am not prepared to grant), your argument here comes down to "How dare he try to do something bigger than himself instead of doing what I think is right"

I respect that he did it;

And yet the fact that he did it led to repercussions that you hold up as evidence that his life has been "ruined"

I just can't believe the army wouldn't consider his rabid beliefs a liability in the field when it comes to working with others,

You are yet to demonstrate that these beliefs in any way violate the restrictions in place.

and I think the cost on his family was too high for him to stand up to his beliefs

I strongly get the impression that your objection comes down to "He is an idiot for serving". I asked you this earlier and you didn't clarify this. Is that an accurate summation?

They guy has done nothing that brought about the events that you are now claiming would be his comeuppance. He just cheer-leaded from the sidelines for those that did.

In a participatory democracy, cheerleading from the sidelines *is* 'doing something.'

So basically, you aren't going to debate the points I've raised against your position at all, instead playing semantics. You should have just stormed off in a huff like you said you were going to earlier, it would have made you look less foolish.

[Ender]

Except that he didn't cause an accident. He was just a rude asshole. The point, which nobody is willing to admit, is that we think poetic justice is funny when it's someone we have no respect for. That's why we laugh at Darwin Award winners who might be caring, loving human beings for all we know, but who did something really really stupid. And since the last bit is all that we know about the person, we don't respect him and we laugh at his idiotic death. Suppose you found out that a particular Darwin Award winner was a wonderful, giving person: would you find his death much less funny? Of course you would. And yet, nothing about the joke itself has changed.

You can try to pretend that there is some great moral distinction caused by being the actor directly responsible for your own death, but that plays into the moralistic arguments heard earlier, where people question why those actions actually deserve the death penalty. They don't, at least not morally. We simply laugh at the poetic justice because we don't know these people and don't respect them.

The problem in this case is that some part of you is inclined to respect this guy, because even though he's a blowhard idiot, he carried through with his beliefs and in so doing, he showed a certain amount of integrity. The moment you feel some respect for a person, then it cannot be funny for poetic justice to strike him down.

While this is probably right, there is one thing that keeps sticking out to me here Mike. The difference between this scenario and why laughing at drunk people when they do something stupid doesn't fall under the same heading.

What the fuck is this "political activism means nothing" bullshit? You live in a democratic society, do you not? Every time an election rolls around, people talk about how important political activism is, do they not?

In a democratic society, political activists are not mere noisemakers; their leaders are influenced by the apparent popularity of their decisions. George W. Bush would not have invaded Iraq if 80% of Americans opposed it. So people like this should accept some responsibility for the actions they publically support. Political activists are not on the sidelines in a democratic process.

In the general sense this may be right. But when it comes down to assigning real responsibility, you know full well that a single individual is absolutely nothing. The "Great Men" theory doesn't fly, particularly when it deals with a schmuck like this.

[Kanastrous]

They guy has done nothing that brought about the events that you are now claiming would be his comeuppance. He just cheer-leaded from the sidelines for those that did.

In a participatory democracy, cheerleading from the sidelines *is* 'doing something.'

So basically, you aren't going to debate the points I've raised against your position at all, instead playing semantics. You should have just stormed off in a huff like you said you were going to earlier, it would have made you look less foolish.

^ it's interesting that you can't grasp what I'm saying to you, when *I* say it...

In a democratic society, political activists are not mere noisemakers; their leaders are influenced by the apparent popularity of their decisions. George W. Bush would not have invaded Iraq if 80% of Americans opposed it. So people like this should accept some responsibility for the actions they publically support. Political activists are not on the sidelines in a democratic process.

In the general sense this may be right.

...but when Darth Wong tells you the same basic thing, suddenly it becomes comprehensible and he may be right.

Looks like your degree of comprehension - or maybe just your honesty with regard to what's said to you - varies depending upon who's saying it.

[Darth Wong]

While this is probably right, there is one thing that keeps sticking out to me here Mike. The difference between this scenario and why laughing at drunk people when they do something stupid doesn't fall under the same heading.

I presume you're referring to my comments elsewhere about how I don't find "hilarious" drunk stories to be funny? Leaving aside the irrelevant nature of the criticism, it's not funny because there's no irony or poetic justice in it. The drunk finds the story hilarious himself, because he does stupid things but pays no serious price for his behaviour. You don't hear too many drunks laughing when they tell the hilarious story of how they got paralyzed after driving drunk.

In the general sense this may be right. But when it comes down to assigning real responsibility, you know full well that a single individual is absolutely nothing. The "Great Men" theory doesn't fly, particularly when it deals with a schmuck like this.

You keep trying to mix up the concept of direct responsibility, as in "we should take this guy and kill him" and poetic justice, as in "if this happened, I would laugh my ass off".