Quo Vadis, Michael?

When last we left our intrepid correspondent, he'd tied himself in knots asking pointless questions, making wild assumptions found nowhere in evidence, and bastardizing the basic concepts of language.

Fresh for the day, let us take a machete to whack our way through the next patch of verbal thicket he's laid down.

"How long do you think that's gonna last? Even if you had a group of friends, say 100-200 hard corp, well trained, all in, tough as nails MFers that don't have bad backs, knees, necks, or shoulders from their time in the military. Let's even say that none of your merry band of men or their families have a need of any type of prescription meds for their high blood pressure, PTSD, hypo/hyper thyroid or any other number of ailments. Then what? Do you think you're going to take on the world, the neighborhood, own the block?"

How long do you think that's gonna last? 

How long do I think (all that Nothing that you assumed into existence in our last installment) is going to last? Well, that depends. Did you want the serious answer, or do we, like you, get to assume metric fucktons of things into being merely for the sport of gainsaying? Is this a game of Silly Buggers, or did you mean to apply children's make-believe game rules to a serious discussion? We await your reply most eagerly, as it will dictate the course of further exchange.

Even if you had a group of friends, say 100-200 hard corp[sic], well-trained, all in. tough as nails MFers that don't have bad back, knees, necks, or shoulders from their time in the military. 

Michael, me lad, when last we looked, we have a group of well over 75,000,000 hardcore MFers. Get back to me at your soonest convenience on how your myopia and innumeracy has left your assumptions in a state our German friends would refer to as "upgefucht".

Blah, blah, blah, laundry list of sick, lame, lazy, blind, crippled, crazy problems... [we summarize here for brevity's sake - A.]

You don't know what you don't know. We're going to attempt to illuminate things for you in words, and then with pictures. Maybe something will get through.

First of all, we recount to you, briefly, the story of Samuel Whittemore, who mustered on Lexington Common one cold April morning in 1775, at the age of 80 years old. (This was back when 80 years of age was considered "old", and was something of a rarity.) He killed three British soldiers that morning, was shot for his trouble, then bayoneted, and left for dead. He recovered, and survived to the ripe old age of 98, living to see not only American independence from Britain, and the establishment of the US Constitution and Bill of Rights as the supreme law of the land, but seeing President George Washington re-elected for his second term after the Revolutionary War.

In case you're more of a visual learner than a textual one:

Then what? Do you think you're going to take on the world, the neighborhood, own the block?

The world will do what the world will do. But we're going to take on all the neighborhoods, and all the blocks. Since you asked. And we're going to do it the same exact way ants eat an elephant: one bite at a time.

Let's continue, shall we?

"Oh... you were smart and got out of the cities while the getting was good. Okay. So, is your merry band of men going to all come out to the farm with their families and are all of you are going to live happily ever after on the farm? Are you gonna grow a few potatoes, milk a few cows, hunt for dove, pheasant, deer or whatever wild game there is in the sticks? How long do you think that's gonna last?"

Oh...you were smart and got out of the cities while the getting was good.

1) What makes you think getting out of cities is "smart"?

2) When we've gone to war in past conflicts, did we bomb the countryside, or the cities? Did we march into wheat fields and declare victory, or the cities? Why d'ya suppose that is?

3) What makes you think leaving the Other Side any - or many - safe hives is a good idea? Why wouldn't you want to take the opportunity to kick the enemies of your blood in the crotch, even before they roll out of bed every morning, and five times a night while they attempt to sleep?

You really haven't thought anything through, have you? You're just spinning your next clever point, without realizing you're merely parading your own ignorance, of strategy, tactics, logistics, insurgency, and pretty much anything and everything covered in any treatise on warfare by von Clausewitz, Machiavelli, Musashi, or Sun Tzu, since ever.

The countryside is where you build insurgencies, shelter them, rest them, train them.

The cities are where your underground steals the enemy's food and arms, sabotages their industry, intercepts their communications, and generally f--ks up their plans, recruiting, training, communications, logistics, and generally makes their every waking moment a thousand living hells.

EVERY. SINGLE. MINUTE. EVERY. SINGLE. DAY. AND. NIGHT.

Okay. So is your merry band of men going to all come out to the farm with their families and are all of you going to live happily ever after on the farm?

Crack a friggin' book, and tell the class how many people HAD TO move to the countryside during the Revolutionary War; then how many moved there for the Civil War? How about during the Spanish-American War? WW I? WW II? Korea? Vietnam? Desert Storm? OIF/OEF?

Wait-what?!? That NEVER happened?!? Unpossible!!

So why would everyone need to do something this time we've never needed to do once in nearly 250 years of existence? Show all work.

What makes you think the Other Side can infallibly sort the sheep from the goats? What do you think Mao meant when he wrote "The guerrilla moves in the sea of the people?" Or is this the first time you've ever heard that in your entire life?

And why wouldn't you want to take war to the enemy on THEIR home turf rather than fighting them in the sticks on YOUR own front porch? Doesn't that strike you like setting yourself on fire to wrestle hand-to-hand with your enemy? Don't you think that's a pretty stupid way to go about winning? In fact, forget winning, don't you think that's just plain stupid at all?

Are you gonna grow a few potatoes, milk a few cows, hunt for dove, pheasant, deer, or whatever wild game is in the sticks?

Are you a total moron? Or just totally and completely historically ignorant of the fact that the continent ceased to support the population like that in about 1800? About the time the entire U.S. population passed the 5,000,000 mark. How about if we let the farmers farm, and the ranchers ranch, like we've done for, oh, about 300-400 years in North America?

How long do you think that's gonna last?

I think it's never going to start, but you continuing to try to paint false dilemmas as the only possible choices just shows how wrapped up you are in delusional thinking, and trying to paint someone into a corner of a castle you built in the air, or just in your head.

Evidently it's news to you, but painting a dozen different scenarios, all of your own imagining, and then knocking them down is the essence of the Straw Man Fallacy.

You have yet to address one single thing I said in the post you claim to disagree with; so far, all you're doing is disagreeing with the dog whistles only you hear, and arguing with the voices in your own head. It's entertaining for me, but hardly productive for any point you were hoping to make. You've laid out all your imagined problems with things I neither expressed nor espoused. And - Lord love a duck! - we still aren't even at the end of your first paragraph.

ROWYBS: Rock On With your bad Self!