Time to add a new caveat, because from email it's not clear to some folks (mind you, if you don't read this it won't matter...) Being an open post, people (collectively, the Denizens) other than I post in the H&I. They sign their work (most of the time) - keep that in mind when you want to flame someone in email please - if it doesn't say "The Armorer" or "John" then I didn't write it! And honestly - if you don't like something said or posted... leave a comment, and hash it out (within the context of The Rulez which are clearly posted on the comment form, I would add).

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HomeFront Six on the importance of paying attention in school, and life. It's wrapped up in that civics quiz Lex and I linked to.

J. of Armchair Generalist popped into Kat's post on Friday and crabbed a bit about the failures of the Administration (many of which I agree, *were* failures) as exemplified in Senator Obama's cherry-picked Army Captain (which I expostulated on in Friday's H&I Fires). J. seemed a bit miffed that I didn't write an extensive post on the subject and lectured me on Clausewitz, too. So, today, to balance Senator Obama's cherry-picked example, I will send you over to Blackfive, where Deebow posts his own, personal experience in the same era of the Afghan conflict as Senator Obama's Army Captain, as my counter-vailing cherry-pick. There. That means it all cancels out, right? Snerk. Of course not. It just shows you can cherry-pick, and policy should not be set by cherry-picked examples (see, Iraq, Invasion of, intelligence failures and the policy makers who made bad policy therefrom).

Fighting Soldiers, from the sky. Not any more. Robin Moore dies, Boston Maggie has the details.

Alan of GenX@40 opined that Canada could put more troops on the ground in Afghanistan and got "greased" for doing so. Interesting discussion. Over at The Torch, a Canadian milblog where Denizen Damian lives, you can just start at the top and read down about what the Canadians (and Brits, and Aussies) are doing in re: Afstan.

Denizen Bloodspite could use a prayer platoon. Gotta get some other posting done before I head off to Columbia to see my neice in Harvey... -the Armorer

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And now for something completely different...

Got young kids?

Got family with young kids?

Got friends with young kids?

Know any humans with young kids?

Check this out.

That is all. -Instapilot, aka Attila of Argghhh!

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Back in the day, when you could just kill people and break things without a note from a lawyer, they were pre-planned, but to the enemy, random, fires at known gathering points, road junctions, Main Supply Routes, assembly areas, etc - to keep the bad guy nervous that the world around him might start exploding at any minute.

*Not really relevant to today's operating environment, right? But, it *is*

The UAVs (oops, can't call 'em UAVs anymore - they're now Unmanned Aerial Systems... some Colonel got his Legion of Merit for that change...), er, um UAS's we fly over Afghanistan and Pakistan looking for targets of opportunity are a form of H&I fires, if you really want to parse it finely. We just have better sensors and fire control now.

I call the post that because it's random things posted by me and people I've given posting privileges to. It's also an open trackback, so if someone has a post they're proud of, but it really isn't either Castle kind of stuff, or topical to a particular post, I've basically given blanket permission to use that post for that purpose. Another term of art that might be appropriate is "Free Fire Zone."