Year: 2017

Life & Island Times: Bats Over Barstow

Editor’s Note: God help me, Doctor Hunter S. Thompson, whose earthly remains were recently shot from a cannon at his beloved Owl Creek Farm near Aspen, CO, was one of the formative influences on my professional and artistic life. This is Marlow’s take this morning. God help us all. Bats Over Barstow America is speeding […]

Arrias on Politics: Equal Justice

If there’s one idea that encapsulates the Founding Fathers goals, it’s this: Equal Justice. A responsive government that worked – literally and figuratively – for the citizens, was a means to that real end: a political system wherein everyone – everyone – was treated the same. Last week a Congresswoman opined that Vice President Pence […]

Totality

Everyone was kind of nuts yesterday about the heavens, and the accidental passage of the moon between us here in North Americ and the solar orb. We were not quite in the sweet spot, and I was not going to join the other lemmings seeking darkness at noon, though naturally I am not opposed to […]

Dewey’s War Orders

There is a lot of talk about monuments these days. The direction it is going- more demonstrations in Boston this morning, results unknown at press time- amounts to an assault on the country where I thought I grew up. I am OK with the debate, though not the direct action taken against monuments to causes […]

Cruise books

(You could look these guys up in the Cruisebook, if you had the right one. Here is a chance!) Shipmates and fellow travelers, I could rail on about what is going on this week- and which has been going on for some years in the context of the Conference theme of “Cognitive 5th Generation Warfare” […]

Durham Bull

This is going to have to be short- I am in between panel discussions at the big Defense IT conference and have many networking obligations this morning. Still, I have to say that the news from Durham got me going this morning. The bullshit confrontation between Nazis and Commies in wonderful little Charlottesville- both groups […]

Arrias on Politics: Herman Kahn, Captain Kirk, and Kim Jong Un

Editor’s Note: We are publishing this morning from St. Louis, where the annual Department of Defense Intelligence Information Systems (DoDIIS) conference is being held at the convention center. Travel and flight arrangements were great, (“Saint Louis in August!”) though our arrival seemed to catch the hosting hotel- I won’t defame it by name- completely by […]

Where Are the Carriers?

Editor’s Note: we have a peripatetic correspondent named Jim whose jottings reflect a life of service. This is a gem, and he has allowed me to forward to both the professional website and the Socotra distribution. For those who have not done a tour at sea, it may be a revelation. For those that have, […]

Night Shift

(President Chon Tu Hwan of the Republic of Korea) As you well know, there is more talk about nuclear weapons than in a long time. DC is not in range, according to what they are reporting, but apparently the little fat guy thinks he can hit Guam, which makes this all personal. So, I was […]

Newman’s Own

As you are doubtless aware by now, I am privileged to be a mostly passive participant in a bunch of email strings with other retired Navy spooks (I generate too much of my own blather), and generally respect (and protect) their privacy and stories. I have saved several of the strings about places like Cambodia […]