This whole ’spend four months a year travelling overseas’ thing gets very old, very fast, let me tell you. First time on an A380, though.

Shorter MarkL: I’ll be out of Canberra for 4 weeks staying in a backpackers near Manly and the janitorial staff in the basement of the department of defence supply (where I work) bought me what they thought was the story of Walter Mitty, but it turned out to be a Tonka Toy A380.

If there was any CIA program implicated in JFK’s death, it may have been Operation Mongoose, or maybe some rogue elements irritated by JFK’s pusillanimous attitude to the Bay of Pigs misadventure.

Is that what happended to JFK, Martin Luther King and Bobby Kennedy then?

The irony is delectable, at least to me. Especially when using good (but dated) sources which are ‘revised’ by more up to date Communist Vietnamese sources. It’s an interesting reversal to see you ardently defending your cherry-picked interpretation of AMERICAN sources and down playing COMMUNIST VIETNAMESE sources.

That must really smart, when so earnestly hunting through the same source for things with which to feed an open anti-American bigotry.

Oh, as for the Emeritus matter? He was faculty head before retirement but he still spends several days a week there (health permitting) supervising advanced students and lecturing on his specialities. His (yes)former staff still playfully refer to him as ‘boss’ and in return are called ‘my loyal staff’.

I thought this would be clear from the nuances of the context. I DO apologise, I forgot how truly un-nuanced you are.

In terms of ‘revisionist history’, of course yours is one interpretation (and it is correct within its definition), as is mine; which is also correct within its limits as I defined it for you. Your missed this nuance, didn’t you? How amusing that I am the one playing ‘revisionist’you, the reactionary, in the context of this recent conflict.

Anyhoo, the taxi is due in 30 minutes as I am off overseas for two weeks or so. This whole ’spend four months a year travelling overseas’ thing gets very old, very fast, let me tell you. First time on an A380, though.

I truly treasure your sentence:

…what does your above comment mean?

That pretty much sums this discourse with you up, my friend! A plaintive plea of ignorance on your part.

TTFN!

MarkL
canberra

PS: You have not found it, have you, reactionary compadre?

Dolphin 45

So what? You may recall other events of that year.

Is it your argument that the CIA discontinued the Phoenix Program in 1972 because the CIA either needed or desired to redeploy its assets to another major project? If not, what does your above comment mean?

And thank you for the kind compliment. Erm… you DO understand that ALL historical scholarship revises what is known, and that, by definition, all history is ‘revisionist’? At least, according to my friendly Emeritus Professor of History and his staff.

You appear to be unaware of fact that an “emeritus professor” is a retired professor who continues to work on an honorary basis. An “emeritus professor” therefore has no “staff”. Your knowledge of academia is troublingly sketchy.

Your lack of acquaintance with the concept of “historical revisionism” is still more troubling. Here are more than 25,000 uses of the term “revisionist history of”. As you may be able to perceive, a “revisionist” history purports to do much more than make minor amendments to the historical record. On the contrary, a “revisionist history” purports to overthrow well-established orthodoxies, even to perform paradigmatic shifts in historical understanding.

Perhaps you could ask your “emeritus professor” and his “staff” to explain this to you in terms that you would understand.

Comment: Amusing. My 15 year old son took 2 minutes 55 seconds on Google to work out what this meant. You still have not been able to manage it. Guess that whole ‘history’ thing still has you beat all hollow, eh?

In MarkL’s labyrinthine tunnels of yearned-for counterfactuals, he fails to perceive the significance of the fact that the Phoenix Program, which remained a deep secret from the oversight of civil government and public scrutiny until 1975, was discontinued by the CIA in 1972!

So what? You may recall other events of that year. Oh, I forgot, your historical knowledge is too poor to do so.

The CIA, the chief projectors, architects and funders (by means of its secret budget, courtesy of US taxpayers) of the Phoenix Program, decided that the program was not worth continued support, even with someone else’s money and other nations’ lives. Clearly, the CIA came up with its own assessment of the value of the program.

Wrong. Again. If the CIA acted as described, where did all the existing programs (village defence, rural militia, provincial anti-VC networks etc etc) come from? Mars?

Gallingly for revisionists like MarkL, chewing bitterly on the gristle of vicarious defeat, the CIA was the first to arrive at the sound judgment of responsible historians.

Comment: Mere unsupported opinion of someone who has demonstrated a very poor knowledge of history.

And thank you for the kind compliment. Erm… you DO understand that ALL historical scholarship revises what is known, and that, by definition, all history is ‘revisionist’? At least, according to my friendly Emeritus Professor of History and his staff.

(Truly embarrassing silliness deleted)

1/10 is your mark today. Try harder next time, please.

Dolphin 45

MarkL
canberra

I think the following applies best, here:

Dolphin 45

Whereupon MarkL’s head explodes.

In MarkL’s labyrinthine tunnels of yearned-for counterfactuals, he fails to perceive the significance of the fact that the Phoenix Program, which remained a deep secret from the oversight of civil government and public scrutiny until 1975, was discontinued by the CIA in 1972!

The CIA, the chief projectors, architects and funders (by means of its secret budget, courtesy of US taxpayers) of the Phoenix Program, decided that the program was not worth continued support, even with someone else’s money and other nations’ lives. Clearly, the CIA came up with its own assessment of the value of the program.

Gallingly for revisionists like MarkL, chewing bitterly on the gristle of vicarious defeat, the CIA was the first to arrive at the sound judgment of responsible historians.

Keep hunting down those traitors, MarkL!

but wouldn’t the expectation be that the president would still be the one making the “go” decision?

Normally, with a normal president. Not with a reformed drunk high on teachings.

Dolphin 45

MarkL
Canberra

As for the history being ‘worthless’, you are busily utilising the 24 year old source I provided for you.

Is that so, MarkL?

Poetic MarkL:

“I am the Dean of KP College,
What I don’t know isn’t knowledge.”

MarkL has laboured mightily and produced an anaconda.

Comment: A genuine howl of pain from the punctured ego, that. Yes, Katz, I know you failed in any way to prove your contention that ‘Phoenix… was a fiasco’. So does everyone who has bothered to follow this. Some have even stated that, haven’t they?

Much of it is as worthless as history as it is inadequate as invective.

Comment: I am puzzled. Why should I bother with invective? I have not used any; leaving that in your capable hands. As for the history being ‘worthless’, you are busily utilising the 24 year old source I provided for you. So much for Karnow’s worth, then – at least in your view. No, wait! It is both worthless and excellent, according to your ruminations. Interesting.

The quality of your argument is …low – but you are no longer capable of even that, now. And this squeak of frustrated pain is the proof. SO you will do what the immature always do, completely reject everything, change the ground, and bruit it about that you ‘won’, like a kiddie in a kindergarten playground who lost the footrace and yells ‘you cheated!’. The real pity is, you do not even understand that there is no ‘winning’ involved. Only learning – at which you have failed.

There is nothing new here, merely more specious elaboration of his previous incorrect and irrelevant points.

Comment: And here it is, the Ad hoc fallacy I expected. Here, should I be interested in such things, I’d note this as the classic proof of ‘victory’ in debate.But Katz is – it is not about ego, it is about reality, and learning about it. I honestly do not think you understand this.

Embarrassingly for MarkL I have demonstrated:

1. Karnow ackowledges that the Phoenix Program was a failure.

Comment: Actually, he does not. Furthermore, you have not by the rules of logic or even common sense. However, this guff from here down is not about that, but about your bruised ego. This is little more than a childish cry of outrage that the ‘faster kid’ somehow ‘cheated’.

2. Karnow contradicts MarkL’s “Stab in the Back” conspiracy theory about the collapse of the American effort in Vietnam. This theory alone disqualifies MarkL as a credible commentator on the Vietnam War.

Comment: Interesting – but somehow I do not think I will withdrawn my published articles on Vietnam just because you know nothing about the conflict. Oh, and you really should display your ego and immaturity like this.
Your tactic here is juvenile. You invent something, ascribe your invention to me, then try to use that as something meaningful, to ‘prove’ that the ‘other kid cheated’ in the footrace because he was faster. I have to admit, you are amusing; but you don’t even understand this as the self-parody it is.

3. Karnow acknowledges that the SVN regime was and remained a puppet regime that excited little loyalty or commitment from the people of South Vietnam. MarkL’s reference to the small number of exceptions (yes there are usually exceptions) is testament to how threadbare is his argument.

Comment: An argument you cannot even begin to address, and have not the knowledge to.

But perhaps MarkL will magically produce another “authority” who will save him from the embarrassment of having been exposed as misquoting his previously proclaimed “authority”.

Comment: That you consider knowledge gained from a library to be ‘magic’ is an indicator of overweening ego and considerable immaturity.

Shorter Katz: I’ve got nothing, and the bad man’s facts and logics hurtses my delicate ego.

Oh, so you understand, that’s gentle, chiding mockery, not invective. The latter, I have left exclusively to you during this discussion.

But despite your self-demonstrated inability to sustain a logical argument, and abysmal ignorance of history, continue to read Karnow. You know very little about this conflict, and you will actually learn something (should you do more than cherry-pick Karnow to feed your open anti-American bigotry).

I have led this particular horse to water, anyway. I just doubt that it knows enough to drink.

MarkL
Canberra

So if you don’t mind stepping into this little booth, I think we’ll be requiring you to drop the lederhosen. You do of course realise that certain sausages of an Germanic type are strictly prohibited, I’m sure. Notice H.M. Customs 1957/4683 sections (g) and (h) I think you’ll find.

And these hypodermics, Herr Jayper. In the equestrian trade are we??

(Hurls chipped shot-glass at the dressing-room mirror.)

Pietro, my dahling, give me an injection of my “special medicine,” please, my dove. I know ze doctors varned you not to, but zis is, how you say, a difficult night. Is like one of your John Cassavettes movies, zat you see in film school, und zen nobody vants to know about, vunce you hit ze big time. So give me ze shot, darling. I promise, no vun else vill know.

Who said liquidity was missing?

For what it’s worth, I really liked your Eno joke. And if the AGW extract gives you indigestion, it’ll work twice!

Sorry, not quite a fart joke.

If anyone wants me, I’ll be sulking in my dressing room. In the dark. Sipping a dirty cup full of soapy water. Lukewarm, of course. And spiked with no-name vodka. Smirnoff’s, if you must know. Now get lost, I’ve got tears of jealousy to cry.

(folds, joins the Doug Yule Fan Club)

Well, can’t say I blame ye. It does be goin’ aroond.

– j_p_z, boiling his copy of “Another Green World” for the vitamins

As to this silly business of differing war motives (surely you can come up with something better, and I won’t mind if you call me Shirley), wouldn’t you say the Marshall Plan differs slightly from, oh, Carthago Delenda Est? The Japanese brass on board the Missouri certainly never saw that one coming: they were ashamed of the magnanimous terms they got, and said so for the frankest of reasons; had they been the victors, they knew very well what their hideous terms woulda been. You could ask a Korean if you don’t believe me.

There you go again, Japerz, talking about the era of American greatness.

Seems like nostalgia indeed is what it used to be, after all.

Is that what an irridentist does?