One segment of the May 4th edition of CBS television's 60 Minutes provided an update on the struggle of Mary Tillman, mother of NFL star-turned Army Ranger Pat Tillman, to get the full story of the circumstances of her son's death while in action April 22, 2004 in Afghanistan. (May 3rd was the anniversary of Tillman's funeral that the Pentagon so shamelessly exploited through the media, including the posthumous award of the Silver Star, the second highest military decoration for bravery in the face of enemy fire.)

But Tillman had not died from enemy fire while taking on a large enemy force and giving his comrades time to regroup and eventually survive the encounter. Yes there was a very hot firefight between Taliban/al Qaeda adherents and the mixed Afghan/U.S. Army Ranger unit hunting them in the rugged mountains of the Pakistan/Afghanistan border. Given that first reports are invariably wrong, when Tillman's spouse and parents were informed of his death, a simple "we are still investigating" should have been the "explanation" proffered - especially to the media. But even today, Mary Tillman believes the Pentagon still has not told the whole truth about her son's death.

"What goes on four legs in the morning, two legs at noon, and three legs in the evening?"
--The Riddle of the Sphinx

A necessary aspect of armies--or even of a military style police force--is that they carry weapons. Even in Great Britain, except for the local "Bobbie" on the beat, it seems as if more and more special police armed units are being created to fight criminal enterprises. Meeting the need for compact, powerful pistols and other small arms is a vast industry, one that, in the United States, started in the three decades prior to the U.S. Civil War.

So it was no great surprise, seven years after the U.S. defeated the Taliban in Afghanistan and five years after Saddam Hussein's army dissolved in Iraq, to find in the Fiscal Year 2008 National Defense Authorization Act (Public Law 110-181) some congressional action to procure small arms to help rebuild the armies of these countries. The relevant Section is 892 of P.L. 110-181 titled "Competition for Procurement of Small Arms Supplied to Iraq and Afghanistan." This section specifies that the procurement of small arms of less than .50 caliber cannot be sole source. Specifically, it enjoins the Secretary of Defense to ensure that the competition is "full and open," that no U.S. manufacturer is excluded, and that no "product" manufactured in the United States is excluded even if the parent company is incorporated or has its base of operations in another country.

The March 5 edition of the Wall Street Journal carried a story, demurely buried on page 13, citing the latest public opinion poll from the non-partisan Pew Research Center for the People and the Press on the public's view about the war on terror in general, the Iraq war in particular, and more specifically the public's attitude on the success of the 2007 "troop surge."

The opening sentence of the article ought to give pause not just to those who want the U.S. to withdraw military forces from Iraq but also to the Pentagon brass for what is implied for the future security of the country: "The [public's] perception [is] that the U.S. troop surge in Iraq has succeeded...." The February poll found that 48 per cent of respondents thought the war in Iraq was "going well" or "fairly well" and 47 percent said that U.S. troops ought to stay in Iraq for now - nearly as many (49 percent) as calling for immediate or rapid withdrawal.

"There will one day spring from the brain of science a machine or force so fearful in its potentialities, so absolutely terrifying, that even man, the fighter, who will dare torture and death in order to inflict torture and death, will be appalled, and so abandon war forever."
--Thomas A. Edison

War is a progressive concept.

Not sociologically, but in the sense that what began as an "art" has evolved through direct and indirect absorption of advances in peripheral disciplines (e.g., chemical and nuclear energy and health and medicine) into a separate "discipline" that is studied in its own right. Nonetheless, the elements of science--ballistics, ordnance engineering, propellant source , mechanical engineering, electronics and nanotechnology--focus more on the generally incremental development of weapons and support systems than on analyzing the implications for fighting formations and tactics of more effective weaponry.

On January 23, the Congressional Budget Office released an update on spending for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, for reconstruction, and for "war on terror" associated projects.

CBO put the combined costs at $691 billion, of which nearly two-thirds--$440 billion ­has been poured into Iraq. CBO estimates the current monthly expenditure for war-fighting in Afghanistan and Iraq comes to $11 billion, but the administration's 2008 requests are said to be at least $193 billion. This translates into a significantly higher monthly "burn rate"--more like $16 billion.

These numbers may be old hat to many of you, but unless you can roll the big ones off your tongue without thinking twice--or that the national debt now stands at $9.6 trillion, up from $5.3 trillion when Bush started his first term in office, or that the minimum raid on the Treasury to pay for the "economic stimulus package" will be another $150 billion--you must not feel in your bones just how much damage this president has done to the country.

"At the edge of the Rubicon, men don't go fishing."
--"Richard Nixon" in the 1987 Opera, "Nixon in China"

"I can predict that the historians will say that George W. Bush recognized the threats of the 21st century, clearly defined them, and had great faith in the capacity of liberty to transform hopelessness to hope, and laid the foundation for peace by making some awfully difficult decisions."
-- George W. Bush, January 4th, 2008 Interview for Israel's Channel 2

Those familiar with the Tarot know that the figure depicted on the first card in the deck is the Magician. The Magician is a very powerful figure, for seemingly he creates realities where before there was nothing. A clear indication of this creative power is the presence on the card of the mathematical sign for infinity -- ∞ -- representing the possessor of all knowledge (magi), all space, all time going forward.

But those who would ask the Magician to "perform" need be wary of what the response is. In some cultures, the magician is a trickster whose real objective is to deceive--sometime with devastating consequences for the interlocutor. And when that interlocutor is the President of the United States, the consequences of deception can be earth-shattering.

Yesterday was the anniversary of the December 7, 1941 attack on Pearl Harbor by the Imperial Japanese Navy. For the individuals who died, for their families, it was a day in which the personal worlds of thousands were suddenly turned upside down. When President Franklin Delano Roosevelt asked Congress for a declaration of war, the entire country's political, economic, and social worlds turned upside down as 12 million men and women donned uniforms and women entered new jobs on the home front.

As I write this Thursday morning, December 6, it has been about 100 hours since excerpts from the latest U.S. National Intelligence Estimate (NIE) on Iran's nuclear capabilities became public knowledge around the world.

"An occupying army cannot expect to find friendsbut [it must] give the uninvolved population every opportunity to have some kind of a quality of life."
-- MGEN Yair Naveh (Ret.), Israeli Defense Force, Defense News

Last week, as participants in the latest international peace conference on Israel- Palestine prepared to wend their way to Maryland's Chesapeake Bay, in Tel Aviv senior Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) officials were wrapping up a three-day headquarters exercise focusing on urban terror. Media reports said the drill was the largest in eight years to test reactions to and prevention of terror incidents.

Jordon Fox--does the name mean anything to anyone other than his family and personal associates? Probably not, unless you happened to be listening to yesterday's news summaries when his name was mentioned.

What about Tyson Johnson III or Robert Loria? No? Not surprising.

They are but three of the more than 29,000 U.S. service members wounded in Operations Enduring Freedom and Iraqi Freedom. They are also among the thousands of separated war veterans who have had to wrestle with a dysfunctional military medical bureaucracy to receive the medical and rehabilitative care to which they are entitled and for assistance navigating the military's convoluted process that determines whether an injured soldier should be medically discharged and referred to the Veterans Administration for continuing medical treatment.

Congresswoman Jane Harman has introduced legislation--H.R. 1955: "Violent Radicalization and Homegrown Terrorism"--that is expected to be referred to the House Rules Committee for assignment of floor time for debate by the House. This is a bill that is unneeded, unwise, and unfortunately will pass and be signed into law as it purports to be part of the response to 9/11 and the global war on terror.

At base, Harman's proposal seems to be a direct attack on First Amendment rights. No where is this more clear than in the third introductory paragraph (the "where as" section) that provides the context for the action desired. Specifically, this legislation aims at the unregulated nature of the Internet:

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad flew into New York City Saturday. He had come to the United States to speak before the UN General Assembly's opening session this week. Under agreement with the UN, the United States as the host country for the UN headquarters cannot refuse to issue a visa to heads of state or other officials who come to the UN to speak. However, the State Department can and does impose a maximum travel radius on representatives of countries deemed unfriendly. Moreover, within the allowed radius, police departments may refuse requests, on the basis of security concerns, to go to specific destinations.

Most readers of the September 7, 2007 Washington Post who stayed with the news (i.e., non-sports, non-fashion, non-entertainment) sections of the paper probably went to the story headlined: “Petraeus Open to Pullout of 1 Brigade.” Nothing remarkable about that; given that General David Patraeus, commander of U.S. forces in Iraq, and Ryan Crocker, U.S. ambassador to Baghdad, were due to testify before Congress starting Monday September 10.

The Petraeus story was important because of the timing. But there was that day another story whose headline, even though appearing above the fold on page one, may have been read by far fewer readers despite the gravity of the issue: “Judge Invalidates Patriot Act Provisions.” In a civil suit initiated by the American Civil Liberties Union (ALCU), U.S. District Judge Victor Marrero of New York ruled unconstitutional the post-9/11 expanded use by the FBI of warrantless “national security letters” (NSL) to force electronic communications companies to provide customer data in secret.

If it's August, there must be something the White House is trying to slip by the Congress and the public.

The patterns were there long before the Bush administration was a jot - let alone a tittle - on the pages of U.S. history.

• Congress invariably is in recess and many members are traveling abroad;
• Parents, distracted by the need to prepare for the approaching school year, find themselves beset by children's pleas for another day or two at the amusement park;
• Hurricanes often (but not always) are prolific, but the month is always hot and humid;
• The president is spending "down time" either at Camp David or at the "family" home, but that does not stop him making recess appointments that would not get through Senate confirmation.;

"The only way you deal with the threat we face from al-Qaeda or from Iran and these other places is to have a policy in place that has bipartisan support and that can be sustained through multiple administrations. So when I talk about gardening, it may be the next administration or the administration after that that harvests all this."

Time. According to the cliché, it heals all wounds. But judging from the last few days, one suspects that the cliché might not hold true in non-western societies.

Time: that would seem to be the operative concept for the way ahead, at least from the perspective of Secretary of Defense Robert Gates after nearly a week in the Middle East visiting, with Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, the leaders of Egypt and Saudi Arabia and then, on his own, stopping in Kuwait and the United Arab Emirates.

"There are people out there calling for democracy. Now isn't that the silliest thing you ever heard."
-- Saudi Arabia's King Faisal, 1922

"Ignorance is preferable to error, and he is less remote from the truth who believes nothing than he who believes what is wrong."
-- Thomas Jefferson

It is March 2008; U.S. forces in Iraq have been maintained at "surge" levels. The government of Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki has been replaced twice in the in last nine months. The current cabinet, a coalition dominated by technocrats and secularists, includes military officers who hold the Defense and Internal Security portfolios as well as former Baathists. Even so, its hold on power is shaky as the sectarian militias of the religious parties still pose a possible security threat--a threat that that continues to roil the politics of the Gulf and the larger Middle East.

"Humility must always be the portion of any man who receives acclaim earned in the blood of his followers and sacrifices of his friends."
-- Dwight David Eisenhower, Guildhall Address, London, June 12, 1945

Every national holiday develops traditions that pass from generation to generation. Except for Armistice Day--now called Veterans Day--no holiday is observed with more melancholy than is Memorial Day. But this day, unlike, say, July Fourth, seems to have developed two traditions depending on whether or not the United States is at peace or the armed forces are in a hot war when the last weekend of May arrives.

April 27 on Public Broadcasting System (PBS) television saw an all-too-brief and much-too-rare analysis of the ever-shifting influences that drive policy formulation and program implementation of an administration under siege.

Should you have missed the program--the inaugural of a new series, "Bill Moyer's Journal" for Friday, April 27--it undoubtedly can be purchased from PBS. The segment of interest comes near the beginning, and it is so trenchant that a number of Internet sites carry it on-line. Moyers, a veteran journalist who also was a White House insider in the Johnson administration, discusses political developments of the week just ended with Jon Stewart, host of the fake news program "The Daily Show" carried on Comedy Central. When Moyers refers to Stewart as a journalist, Stewart demurs and reiterates his comedic profession and calling.

"A person without any sense of shame is no longer a human being."
-- Mencius, Chinese Philosopher (c. 372-289 BCE)

The question that is this essay's title was famously put to Senator Joe McCarthy by Joseph Welch, special counsel for the Army during the red-baiting "Army-McCarthy" hearings of the early 1950s.

In 2007, the American public could do far worse than to demand that the question be asked again--this time put by Congress to those who, in 2004, were in charge of the Department of the Army and the Department of Defense--to include the occupant of 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue who is both the "commander-in-chief" and the chief executive of the federal government. Specifically:

There's a new sheriff in town--and it's neither the U.S. nor a U.S.-sponsored surrogate "invited" by the U.S. It's another of those pesky international conventions the administration loves to hate and refuses to join--but still cannot stop from taking effect. Fifteen years in the making, the pact outlaws state terrorism of a type frequently practiced by the United States: "extraordinary rendition."

On this topic, February was a month of unwelcome revelations (from the administration's perspective) and long overdue (from the people's perspective) media attention on the policies and programs the White House created and justified for incarcerating "known" or suspected terrorists in the extensive acknowledged and unacknowledged Defense Department and CIA prison systems created nearly 5 years ago.

The U.S. military lives by the rule: "Leave no soldier behind." The Walter Reed Army Medical Center (WRAMC) seems to have operated according to a different principle: "Out of sight, out of mind."

It is unconscionable for a government to send soldiers to fight, die, and suffer life-changing wounds without assuring them first-class medical care and rehabilitation should they require it because of their service. Government should also provide injured soldiers with the financial resources for a decent standard of living, consistent with the severity of wounds suffered. The recent media revelations of the medical care at Walter Reed, particularly for returning soldiers billeted in outlying buildings, demonstrate that the U.S. government has broken this social compact.

Most people know and, in any given week, probably utter one of the many thousands of "Murphy's Laws" that exist.

But Murphy is not the only perceptive spirit: We have Howe's Law, Sod's Law (British), O'Toole's Commentary (Irish?), Skinner's Constant, Jennings's Corollary, Barth's Distinction, and Farber's Rule. And then there is something called Zymurgy's First Law of Evolving System Dynamics: "Once you open a can of worms, the only way to re-can them is to use a larger can."

Pondering the significance of the First Law quickly led to the realization that, as it stood, it was incomplete. Without modification, it is boundless; that is, it is conceivable that more than one can of worms could be open at the same time either accidentally or purposefully because the can-opener overestimated his re-canning ability. Either way, the danger is that some worms from the first cans opened will escape and, un-canned, multiply beyond control.

Writing in the New York Times on January 31, columnist Thomas Friedman reminded readers that both putative U.S. enemy Iran and putative U.S. ally Saudi Arabia have mixed records in their post-September 11, 2001 relations with the United States.

The caution was timely, given the increasingly reckless rhetorical assaults on Iran that were emanating from various administration sources. Most often (or most prominently discussed), what the U.S. public heard from the White House, the State Department, and the Pentagon was an echo of Bush's 2002 "axis of evil" speech in which both Iraq and Iran were portrayed as evil and unredeemable. And while Iran has continued to be castigated for its activities, almost nothing is said--or reported--or remembered about Saudi activities that have been "unhelpful," as a former Defense Secretary once said, to U.S. objectives.

"You go to war with the army you have," Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld famously noted." "They might not be the army you want or have at a later time." Echoing Rumsfeld, President Bush said in his 2007 State of the Union Address, "This is not the fight we entered in Iraq, but it is the fight we are in."

Yet the Pentagon continues to spend money on weapons that are ill suited for the fights "we are in." As a top U.S. Air Force commander told Aviation Week and Space Technology, the most expensive fighter aircraft ever built may be ready for war but it's not ready for the war we have today in Iraq. The F-22 isn't "ready for Iraq" because it probably can't fulfill its core mission, especially in the Baghdad area. In straightforward language, the F-22 would be electronically "blind" despite having the most advanced suite of intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance devices in the U.S. Air Force.

The death of former President Gerald Ford on December 26, 2006 produced a collective outpouring of sympathy and remembrances across the United States that culminated in a formal state funeral January 2, 2007. And while many dignitaries attended, the service at the National Cathedral was, in effect, an "American" one led by President Bush.

The ritual associated with the death and burial of a former leader normally is a communal or relational undertaking--unless the former leader fell from power. This latter circumstance also played out, ironically, on December 30 in the unseemly hasty execution of Saddam Hussein, a sentence not so much of justice but of revenge, which is an individual as opposed to a collective act.

It didn't require oracles or entrails after the U.S. public signaled its rejection of the Bush administration's Iraq policy on November 7, 2006. Something had to change.

A week later, when General John Abizaid, Combatant Commander of the U.S. Central Command, testified before the Senate Armed Services Committee, he signaled that the White House was on the verge of abandoning the status quo. The president finally had decided that the only course forward in Iraq was to accelerate the fitful training program, started two years earlier. The training program was supposed to create a professional Iraqi military establishment that would be loyal to the national Iraqi government, be effective enough to defeat the insurgency and the foreign extremists, and allow the withdrawal of U.S. ground combat forces from Iraq.