Comments on: And I Can Feel It Building: Failure http://attackerman.firedoglake.com/2009/11/09/and-i-can-feel-it-building-failure/ Wed, 05 Jan 2011 21:59:36 -0600 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.1.2 By: WilliamOckham http://attackerman.firedoglake.com/2009/11/09/and-i-can-feel-it-building-failure/#comment-17545 WilliamOckham Mon, 09 Nov 2009 17:03:05 +0000 http://attackerman.firedoglake.com/?p=4674#comment-17545 Your lack of life experience is showing. Over 30 years ago, John Boyd was telling young officers that <blockquote>a day would come when "you're going to have to make a decision about which direction you want to go." Then he would point his hand to the left or right. "If you go that way, you can be somebody. You will have to make compromises and you will have to turn your back on your friends. But you will be a member of the club and you will get promoted and you will get good assignments." "Or", he said, pointing in the other direction, "you can go that way and you can do something -- something for your country and for your Air Force and for yourself. If you decide you want to do something, you may not get promoted and you may not get good assignments, and you certainly will not be a favorite of your superiors. But you won't have to compromise yourself." </blockquote> [From Robert Coram, <a href="http://www.arlingtoncemetery.net/jrboyd.htm" rel="nofollow">quoted here</a>] Of course, the situation wasn't new then. Boyd was just observing something that has true since, well, the before the invention of writing. Spend a little time studying the Pharoahs and you'll see what I mean. There is a big difference between the military and almost every other career. Josh Marshall and Ana Marie Cox (and even Lou Pai) could pursue their careers somewhere else. The innovative colonel, on the other hand, has few options in his line of business, nowadays at least. You can't really go to work for a competing military force and mercenary just isn't the same thing. Boyd identified the reason that careerists (in any field) succeed, especially in fields where excellence is divorced from commercial success. Some folks will spend their time sucking up and producing whatever pablum their bosses will accept. But that's different from Josh and TAP. I don't know any of the details about that situation, but I know it's a good thing that Josh Marshall got fired from the American Prospect. Look at what he's accomplished since then. He wouldn't have been able to do that at TAP (and that's not a slam against TAP). You're lucky to be working at time when career "insurgency" is valuable. TPM, FDL, and the Windy are winning; WaPo, the NYT and the rest of the print media are losing. OTOH, money and prestige haven't caught up with reality just yet. Your lack of life experience is showing. Over 30 years ago, John Boyd was telling young officers that

a day would come when “you’re going to have to make a decision about which direction you want to go.” Then he would point his hand to the left or right.

“If you go that way, you can be somebody. You will have to make compromises and you will have to turn your back on your friends. But you will be a member of the club and you will get promoted and you will get good assignments.”

“Or”, he said, pointing in the other direction, “you can go that way and you can do something — something for your country and for your Air Force and for yourself. If you decide you want to do something, you may not get promoted and you may not get good assignments, and you certainly will not be a favorite of your superiors. But you won’t have to compromise yourself.”

[From Robert Coram, quoted here]

Of course, the situation wasn’t new then. Boyd was just observing something that has true since, well, the before the invention of writing. Spend a little time studying the Pharoahs and you’ll see what I mean.

There is a big difference between the military and almost every other career. Josh Marshall and Ana Marie Cox (and even Lou Pai) could pursue their careers somewhere else. The innovative colonel, on the other hand, has few options in his line of business, nowadays at least. You can’t really go to work for a competing military force and mercenary just isn’t the same thing.

Boyd identified the reason that careerists (in any field) succeed, especially in fields where excellence is divorced from commercial success. Some folks will spend their time sucking up and producing whatever pablum their bosses will accept. But that’s different from Josh and TAP. I don’t know any of the details about that situation, but I know it’s a good thing that Josh Marshall got fired from the American Prospect. Look at what he’s accomplished since then. He wouldn’t have been able to do that at TAP (and that’s not a slam against TAP).

You’re lucky to be working at time when career “insurgency” is valuable. TPM, FDL, and the Windy are winning; WaPo, the NYT and the rest of the print media are losing. OTOH, money and prestige haven’t caught up with reality just yet.

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