The Hinterland Rants from the hinterland. A Denver writer and pretend anthropologist rips into artistic treason and random acts of ethical violence.
May also contain gushes of enthusiasm.


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Wednesday, September 17, 2003


The myth of General Clark's domestic inexperience

If you think General Clark has no experience on domestic issues, then you've never served in the military. That's not an attack on your patriotism, just an explanation of how you got duped.

The biggest surprise most people discover when they first sign up with the army, is that hardly anyone inside it fights. Roughly ten percent of the army is a fighting force. The other 90 percent exists to create an entire subculture/subeconomy, to provide for nearly every facet of human life: food, housing, education, health care, even religious services.

Interested in healthcare reform? Guess who runs one of the largest single-payor systems in the world? The army builds its own network of hospitals, hires its own doctors, nurses and administrators, provides much of their training and runs the entire operation.

Public housing? They've got hundreds of thousands of men women and children under their roof, a system rivaling all of HUD.

Concerned about crime? They've got an entire court system of their own: judges, juries, prosecutors, defenders and an entire military police force. I'm pretty sure General Clark will be the only candidate in the field to have served as a judge.

General Clark is best known for foreign policy, but his biggest single concern actually appears to be education. He has very strong positions and very deep experience on education because that's one of the biggest businesses the army is in. He's had far more experience with it than shrub ever did as Governor of Texas. The army runs an undergraduate university at West Point, a graduate "War College," an airborne school, ranger school, infantry school, dozens of other major schools developing tens of thousands of cadre of instructors for basic training, dozens of advanced training schools in nearly every major area of human endevour, and constant continuing education programs for close to a million soldiers. They also build, maintain and run elementary and secondary schools on most of the large posts for children of servicemen. It is quite likely the most expansive and diverse educational system in the world. Of course Clark did not preside over the whole thing, but it is a top priority for the institution, and a central concern of every commander, which Clark began facing as platoon leader and company commander decades ago. As a four-star general, he has been emeshed in the system and responsible for portions of it for decades.

(More soon. He's speaking now.)
Comment                        11:20:52 AM                        


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Rants from the hinterland. A Denver writer and pretend anthropologist rips into artistic treason and random acts of ethical violence. May also contain gushes of enthusiasm.

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