I Don't Plan to Die

Be polite. Be professional. But, have a plan to kill everyone you meet.

More accumulated wisdom for you. Much has been made about "plans" being made for attacks on Iran over the nuclear issue. Brother, let me tell you, the Pentagon is full of folks who do nothing but plan. I've never done duty in the Pentagon, but I've visited on an orientation tour. These guys have their eyes on almost everywhere and scads of field grade officers, when not making coffee and going on snack runs for all the colonels there, must be put to useful work. You can safely say, "America planning to recapture Panama Canal Zone." "America planning campaign to liberate Darfur." "America planning strikes on North Korea." "America planning rescue of diplomats in _________." Many of these plans have been sitting on the shelves for years. They get wargamed occasionally, tweaked and revised. I'll bet the invasion of Iraq didn't get whipped up from scratch, but got pulled off the bookshelf and extensively updated to meet up-to-date realities.

I wonder if Dave has anything to say about this, security permitting.

On a localized level, if I'm involved in a self-defense shooting situation, the goblin's lawyer might make the point that I *planned* to shoot his (perhaps deceased or hospitalized) client. I must counter that I *prepared* to be able to defend myself before ever meeting his *client* and the conditions shaped by his client forced me to enact my preparations (or *PLANS*) with deadly force when I couldn't avoid it.

Moving back out to the macro level, the US of A doesn't seem so sinister, unless you're already predisposed towards that view.