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| -Short Attention Span Theater- |
| Let’s abolish West Point |
| 2015-01-09 |
| A tenured English teacher at Annapolis tells ya'll what he really thinks of service academies. Many pundits have suggested that the Republicans’ midterm gains were fueled by discontent not merely with the president or with the (improving) state of the economy, but with government in general and the need to fund its programs with taxes. Indeed, the Republican Party of recent decades, inspired by Ronald Reagan’s exhortation to “starve the [government] beast,” has been anti-tax and anti-government. Government programs, as many of their thinkers note, primarily exist to perpetuate their own existence. At the very least, they have to justify that existence. In the spirit of hands across the aisle, I’d like to suggest that the first thing the new Republican majority devote itself to is not, say, the repeal of the Affordable Care Act (Obamacare), but to converting the four hugely expensive and underproductive U.S. service academies (Navy, Army, Air Force and Coast Guard) — taxpayer-funded undergraduate institutions whose products all become officers in the military — to more modest and functional schools for short-term military training programs, as the British have repurposed Sandhurst. |
| Posted by:badanov |
| #22 ...which brings up this point. |
| Posted by: Procopius2k 2015-01-09 15:38 |
| #21 College English departments should be abolished. If one doesn't know English by the time they enter college, they don't belong there. |
| Posted by: Daffy Angaigum8797 2015-01-09 14:14 |
| #20 Maybe some sort of compromise. Let the Citadel and VMI run 'em. |
| Posted by: Shipman 2015-01-09 14:01 |
| #19 Well, I click on the link and: 1. It's Salon 2. The guy's a dick Buh-bye... |
| Posted by: tu3031 2015-01-09 13:12 |
| #18 Can't have schools based upon merit and hard demanding work, no social promotion, no affirmative action, makes the civies look bad. The civies have got to protect their legacies (which is about the only thing they have to sell now). Posted by Procopius2k A lower [or elimination] of existing standards will accomplish the much needed 'leveling of the playing field.' BTW P2k, for a score of 300 on your next PT test, your time for the two mile run must be 13.5 minutes or less. Her's is 17 minutes. Please get on board. |
| Posted by: Besoeker 2015-01-09 11:30 |
| #17 It's salon. The article (and magazine) was already set on fire and pushed in a canoe into the lake bu military tweeters. Salon is another marxist rag. |
| Posted by: newc 2015-01-09 10:24 |
| #16 Should've stopped to think---instead of emoting, besoeker. |
| Posted by: g(r)omgoru 2015-01-09 10:15 |
| #15 A cost-benefit analysis is needed. Just how many 'food stamps' could be purchased from the annual budget of West Point. |
| Posted by: Besoeker 2015-01-09 09:52 |
| #14 The academies foster a military caste distinct from the civilians they serve. Frontier Regulars: The United States Army and the Indian 1866-1891 by Robert M. Utley. Chapter 4. The Army, Congress, and the People. Sherman’s frontier regulars endured not only the physical isolation of service at remote border posts; increasingly in the postwar years they found themselves isolated in attitudes, interests, and spirit from other institutions of government and society and, indeed from the American people themselves...Reconstruction plunged the army into tempestuous partisan politics. The frontier service removed it largely from physical proximity to population and, except for an occasional Indian conflict, from public awareness and interest. Besides public and congressional indifference and even hostility, the army found its Indian attitudes and policies condemned and opposed by the civilian officials concerned with Indian affairs and by the nation’s humanitarian community. There has always been a disconnect as they're two different cultures, that's why that same Constitution calls for a separate set of laws governing land and naval forces. It is a different society. Too many people think WWII and that was the 'norm' when it was very much the exception to the American experience. |
| Posted by: Procopius2k 2015-01-09 09:48 |
| #13 The academies were established, not really for warfare as the author asserts, but because there was no institution providing the engineering training necessary to conquer the continent as well as fight wars, a process the military led, barely, through the 19th century. 100 years later this process was complete and the academies unnecessary. The academies foster a military caste distinct from the civilians they serve. After all, flag officers get almost guaranteed admission for their children. Some perk. We should be seeking to diminish the military-civilian divide, not widen it. Nothing in the Constitution says the federal government should be in the education business. Time to get the government out of the unconstitutional degree granting business and into the constitutionally mandated military training business. |
| Posted by: Nimble Spemble 2015-01-09 09:16 |
| #12 Can't have schools based upon merit and hard demanding work, no social promotion, no affirmative action, makes the civies look bad. The civies have got to protect their legacies (which is about the only thing they have to sell now). |
| Posted by: Procopius2k 2015-01-09 08:20 |
| #11 How about this, Mr. fake conservative-Gramscian-Quaker school (Haverford grad) professor? If you agree to do the cuts to the social welfare state and government run healthcare FIRST, I'll agree to do some fat trimming to the military after. What's that? I have to accept that the things I like get trimmed first, and trust that your side, which has NEVER cut the size of government, ever, will honor your commitment to trim also, and will do the right thing and get rid of the 50-75% of the nonmilitary public sector work force that needs to go away just to get to 1960 levels of government? Sorry, Lucy. I think I've seen this football before. You'll get rid of the military AND use that money not for a tax rebate, or to pay down debt, but to hire even more useless government workers who will be lifelong Democrat campaign workers and voters. Yes you will. Liar. |
| Posted by: no mo uro 2015-01-09 08:09 |
| #10 |
| Posted by: Besoeker 2015-01-09 07:21 |
| #9 Sorry #5, (IMO) your table wins the FOAD award for imbecilic poor taste this morning. |
| Posted by: Besoeker 2015-01-09 07:05 |
| #8 ...I will give the guy this: get rid of the high-profile sports programs. You want to be a (FILL IN THE SPORT HERE) star and an officer, go to a Division I ROTC school. Mike |
| Posted by: Mike Kozlowski 2015-01-09 06:48 |
| #7 Well we could try the French system. To get into the French military academy you already have to have a four year Bachelors degree. The military academy adds the equivalent of a Masters to it. Of course the leftist infiltration has caused complaints from even the left oriented students. |
| Posted by: Vespasian Sholuting3430 2015-01-09 05:56 |
| #6 Raising and training of armies is mandated by the Constitution. Taking money from wealthier Americans to give health care to those who choose not to work is not. This guy's whole argument, is, therefore, irrelevant and wrong. |
| Posted by: no mo uro 2015-01-09 05:53 |
| #5 There are arguments both ways. p.s. High casualty figures are not, IMO, a pro argument---think about it LR. |
| Posted by: g(r)omgoru 2015-01-09 04:29 |
| #4 Yes let's make cheaper (in money) military caddemies and pay a higher price in blood. How about the authoir of the article serving under one of the ninety days wonders he is advocating? |
| Posted by: JFM 2015-01-09 04:06 |
| #3 Well, the web-link function did not work in my original post. Here it is: http://www.westpointaog.org/inmemoriam |
| Posted by: Lone Ranger 2015-01-09 03:59 |
#1  The many who lie here along the Hudson, killed in action in our nations conflicts might take exception to the claim of a "cheap education." |
| Posted by: Besoeker 2015-01-09 02:48 |