While I agree with the assessment on the cards I would say two things. To some degree officers doing courtesy warnings for each other’s families is probably inevitable and the key part is to control it. Second, my ex-wife had a silver courtesy badge from her NYC cop brother-in-law. I believe while we were still married she used it all of once.
The story is called Erring Like a Sailor and the phrase the story characterizes the habit in question is one I know. It is one I use today over two decades after I left the service.
My father had stories about the same problem and not just with enlisted men. He had one story where the Captain of his ship suffered from it. After passing through another crowded shipping channel, the Straits of Gibraltar, the Old Man was so sleep deprived he became a danger to his own ship. How my father handled that situation is quite probably how he made Lieutenant a year ahead of his Naval Academy class.
The story also explains why I was so angry at the President’s defense of fleet size in the debate in 2012. His statement was considered a sick burn.
We have these things called aircraft carriers, where planes land on them. We have these ships that go underwater, nuclear submarines. And so the question is not a game of ‘Battleship’ where we’re counting ships. It’s what are our capabilities?
It isn’t the capabilities of the ships alone that matter. We have no ship capable of being in two places at one time. If we have the same commitments to be on station in certain places we did twenty-five years ago, which we more or less do, fewer ships covering the same spots lead to over-extension. Not only over-extension of ships but people.
Laughing at that may be sick but it isn’t a burn.
Video of the Week:
Dr. Peterson has been in the news a lot this week after an interview on the BBC. It appears he has come to prominence from two directions. The positive is his lectures have gathering a following for his philosophy of making a place and purpose in life. The negative was his opposition to the pronoun bill in Cananda.
I am a fan of Dr. Peterson and had pre-ordered his current book. However, I found him for a reason separate from the two above. I was linked to a video from his Maps of Meaning course about the movie Pinochio. The reason for the link was his knowledge of the nature and purpose of story which was offered as help for writers.
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