TC the Terrible

I bitch and moan about the Metro as much as anyone you can name. But overall I think it’s a good thing for the District and surrounding area. Now that the line out to Dulles is finally about to break ground another round of fighting is about to break out.

It seems to me, and not like I know a lot about anything, that even if it costs more a underground line is the best option. Going underground causes fewer problems with current traffic patterns for the five to ten years it will take to finish the extension. Going underground will prevent setting back the economic progress of Tyson’s Corner. Underground will mean a cleaner look to the area. Underground lines still function during snow storms. Underground tracks and stations are not abused by the elements year round.

The only real advantage of taking the train on elevated tracks is a short term savings. I have yet to see a project that didn’t suffer in the long term because of the so-called saving created by short cuts. One of the District’s biggest landmarks is the Metro rail system. Not taking the time to do the newest line right would be doing everyone a dis-service. Spend the extra money now if we need to.

(c) Washington Post

I don’t get how last year the Washington Expos Nationals could come so close to greatness, and this year be so pitiful. I know playing without an owner can be nerve racking, but is that all that this slump really is? Frank Robinson has got to be wondering if coming back this year is worth all the grief.

The cure might be finding a power hitter. At least then the losses would be exciting. The Cards have always managed to keep one of those around and they seem to at least look like a contender most summers. I loved the summer that Pujols played for the Memphis Redbirds. Even then he walked to the plate like he owned the field.

I’ve read a good bit of Max Hastings work over the years and enjoyed the bulk of it. His stuff on Korea is classic and sets the bar for other writers to equal.

His comments in the Post today are pretty good. He gets down to the core that the military may have to answer to civilians, but the civilians should stay out of military operations. That’s pretty much been the way the American military has always worked. And it has always worked damn well.

The problem is that civilians tend to want things to always be clean and neat. It’s not something that will ever happen and military leaders tend to get that better. They are pretty much used to things going to hell in a hand basket at first contact. But civilians are more prone to micro-managing things.

Military leaders are trained to issues orders and then step back and let soldiers do their jobs. That’s not an easy thing to do and with the increase in technology over the last 10 years it is even harder for the civilian leadership to do.

Nobody wants a large body count, and both sets of leaders don’t want the American military to be seen as blood thirsty banditos. But the civilian leadership does not have the stomach to let the military do what they are trained to do, and suffer the losses that are going to come with it.

We need to let them do their jobs. That’s the bottom line.