Libertarianism in the U.K.

This guy was WAY more into "the scene" than I was, but I can find a lot of common ground with him on the punk-conservative idea. "Libertarian" is about as close as I can get to a political label for myself, although my attachment to Good Government goes back as far as I've had an opinion, so the Anarchy thing was never happening.

I think the biggest thing that would have you transition between Punk and conservatism is the fact that you can think for yourself. There were a fair number of slumming dilettantes hanging around the gigs 25 years ago, but the people like me who were living on their own and too poor to buy new jeans when their old ones ripped survived on our own ingenuity. Except those who were on Welfare who were never likely to amount to anything. Some others of this group have gone on to be hateful leftist PC types, but not that many.

The biggest thing I got out of being a "punk" (as labelled by others, not initially self-identified) was the idea that it was a group where I could be myself. There were of course always the "harder-core than thou" types who were their own sort of conformists, but I was quite capable of ignoring them.

A group identifies by certain conventions they follow, and my favourite one of the list McInnes gave was #6 about slam dancing. Slam dancing was fun, because you could actually move, with a (usually) gratifying amount of physicality to make it more interesting. Moshing is an abomination and I personally blame Nirvana for ruining everything. Picking people back up was a key part of slamming, and this made it a social activity instead of a blood sport.

I said I blame Nirvana, so I shall substantiate. It was the fall of 1991 and I was a young guy living in a dank basement apartment downtown with a couple of friends. There were a small number of clubs which were "alternative" at least in the middle of the week when the hard-drinking party crowd was in abeyance. These we patronized on the Tues/Wed/Thurs as appropriate and at the time I knew pretty much everyone who showed up at least by sight if not better.

Then "Smells Like Teen Spirit" started getting heavy rotation on Much/MTV and things changed almost overnight. Fratboy jocks started showing up and trying to flatten people on the dance floors. The rest of us had learned the social mores of punk at gigs and followed them in the clubs; these new arrivals had no idea and seemed disinterested in learning better. It was a flavour of the month thing, but it "broke" the alternative scene in my city.

Entropy is the way of the universe so my time for that passed, but it was mildly disturbing to be off the cutting edge at 21. However, it was never about that; I as an accidentally opportunistic Individual liked the music (still listen to it and seek out new stuff) and was not about to conform to something I didn't like just to stay "in".

Doing your own thing and minding your own business are the traits of both Punks and Libertarians. My current career is a blatant sell-out to financial security as I really don't like being told what to do, and LOATHE being told how to do it. This is how I'm fighting Entropy these days, but I hope to make a change to being my own boss. Having children does tend to keep one's inner Anarchist under control, so I'm plotting and planning, but not holding my breath or betting the house on it. There's the "conservative" part.

What else particularly resonates with me? # 8 (The PC Police Have No Power Over You) and #10 (Violence has its Place). The former is part of the hating-to-be-told-how-to-do-things issues I have, and the latter is merely the way of the world. Indeed, both of these precepts are the underpinning of this Blog's existence.

Categorizing people inherently limits them, and nobody that I want to know would fit neatly into any one category. I'm all over the place in how I feel about things, and what I write here is a fair representation of that, but the map is not the territory. Speaking of a map, this post has lost it's way so it's time to tie it off.

God will know His own

Just when you thought things were screwed up enough in South Asia:

(Reuters) - An Islamist leader who had a $10 million American bounty placed on his head this week has been helping Pakistan de-radicalize militants under efforts to stabilize the strategic U.S. ally, a top Pakistani counter-terrorism official said on Friday.

Of course I have no idea how sincere this guy's effort to get heads out of religiously-brainwashed asses is, but taking the statements of the Pakistani government at face value, this situation seems sufficiently absurd to be plausible.

I know that doesn't seem like the best way to make a case for it, but that how things roll in the Global Something On Guys We Don't Like For Some Reason Or Another (GSOGWDLFSROA). I will forgive you if you don't see that acronym sticking, but I think it sums up the current state of play pretty well.

A key thing to remember is that even in the best-case that this is legit, "de-radicalizing" to the Pakis is not the same as it would be to the Yanks. To the former it means that some of the would-be jihadis will get jobs or at least stop attacking their own people. To the latter it would mean that they stop targeting Western troops and interests in that part of the world and beyond. It doesn't take a genius to see that "a" does NOT equal "b".

So? Past and current American practice is to shoot first and ask questions later (though ironically not when their own troops need that fire support in combat) so even money has a Hellfire with Hafiz Saeed's name on it despite whatever anyone else says about him. He may have it coming, but it is at least possible that killing him will be counter-productive on the strategic level. Oh well, I can always hope to be pleasantly surprised and that some investigation will be done before they lock on. On va voir.

Declaration of War, the Short Form

For years now (predating this blog even) I have railed against the Americans' lack of sense vis a vis National or Strategic interest. This is manifest from everything they have done in the last 20 years. I say that time period, as during the preceding 40 years you could argue that the questionable regimes they propped up or overthrew were within the overall strategic design of containing Communism. When that collapsed under the weight of it's own inefficiency the Yanks started looking around for causes to replace it.

In fact the rot started before that, at the time slightly disguised as a way to stick it to the Soviets. The lack of consideration for unintended future consequences in shipping hundreds of millions of $ worth of cash and weapons to a barely (if at all) civilized group of raiders in Central Asia was truly breathtaking, but at least it was in the context of containing the Red Menace. Replacing them with the Green one wasn't the plan of course, but...

The article in The Atlantic which I linked to addresses the lack of long-term thinking that goes into the way America (and NATO by extension) fights these days. This is certainly fair, but I think it misses the bigger picture. Instead of planning as if you'll still be there in five years, ask yourself why wherever/whatever it is would be worth, in blood and treasure, getting locked up in it for years on end.

Let's imagine that the Americans broke Afghanistan's government ten years ago, laid a beating on Bin Laden's goons and then let the locals sort each other out. The whole thing as far as we're concerned would be over by spring 2002, mission (actually!) accomplished. Instead, we're here over ten years later staring down the barrel of the whole place doing exactly what I've said we should have let it do in the first place when NATO finally pulls the plug after 12-13 years in 2014 or so.

It's not a tactical problem, it's a strategic one. The trick lies in finding places that we might be able to help, not failed basket case states that will act as nationbuilding tar pits. Afghanistan? Fucked. Kosovo? Shouldn't have gotten involved, it was another "stick-it-to-the-Slavs" exercise which should have died out when Yeltsin came in. Iraq? I think we all know how big a mistake that was by now. Libya? Sure Qaddafi was a dick, but a bit of pragmatism in our foreign policy would have been in order there in view of what has happened. That one at least I am willing to wait out a bit before passing judgement, but my crystal ball has Tripolitania and Cyrenaica (at least) making a comeback...

What you want is a basically sound country with a bad government; that's a simple fix. Note however that "simple" and "easy" are not the same word; if it was easy the people would do it them selves. My example for this is Zimbabwe, albeit fixing it would require some old-school colonial-style administration while you build them a functioning government. South Sudan is another possibility, but the grand prize is Iran.

You may have noted that whenever I mention attacking Iran, it's always the Revolutionary Guard and other bulwarks of the Islamic regime, not the country itself. We can get on just fine if we clear the decks for them to have a more reasonable crew in charge of the place. There would be nary a boot on the ground, save some operators making contact with the opposition, certainly no "ground troops".

This is how I would do things, but I don't set policy for anyone. What I can say is that whatever I did I would assume that my kids would be dealing with it after I'm gone, and pick my battles accordingly.