Tort Reform

An unbelievable thing happened to me on Friday. I've been suspended from my job for giving an employee a promotion! You read that correct. I give an employee a promotion and I get suspended. Not only that, but the company gets sued! I guess this is the "New World Order" Bill Clinton was talking about.

"How can this be?" you ask. Well, did I mention that the employee was female?

Indeed, if you don't move these people up the corporate ladder, it's sex discrimination. If you push them up the ladder, it's sexual assault. There is no winning with the feminist movement.

The young lady in question had been doing a fine job and I thought she was ready to take on more responsibility. I filled out all the necessary paper work, got all the approvals, and called her to my office. She seemed very happy when she got the news that she was moving up. We shook hands and as she left I gave her a congratulatory rump pat.

How exactly a suspension comes in, I don't know. I just know that it was this employee that filed the complaint. I don't yet have the details other than I'm not to report to work and that I will at some point have to talk with a company lawyer in order to prepare for the lawsuit.

I don't know how this nation is supposed to compete with other countries when people are constantly hauled into court over the most benign things. If there has ever been more proof that we need to redesign our current justice system, I don't know what that proof is.

Disgrace

I just can't believe the cowardice of the British sailors and marines kidnapped by Iran. When it happened, I prayed the ones who'd shamed their country would be court-martialed on return to Blighty, and given dishonorable discharges after a couple years breaking rocks in the Outer Hebrides. Now, I confess, I wouldn't shed a tear if some worse fate befell them.

The only coherent response I get to these sentiments is: "How do you know what they've been through? How would YOU stand up?" To which the obvious reply is the one Dr. Johnson gave in some similar case: "I may criticize a carpenter who makes me a bad table, though I cannot make a table myself. It is not my job to make tables." It is the job of a Royal Marine to fight, and if necessary suffer and die, for his country. They know that when they go in. It's what they are told! I know that if put to the test, I would stand up as well as any Marine. Whether or not I would, however, is irrelevant. Whether or not I could stand up well to torture, I expect Marines to.

And in any case, there was no evidence of torture or mistreatment in any of the filmed cases I have seen. They look just fine. You can't fake that. The girl sailor had that headscarf on within hours. From what I've heard of torture, even weaker cases can hold out for a few days.

As for the argument that these people might have buckled under threats to hurt their comrades, I should think a soldier's answer would be: "They are soldiers, same as me. They know the risks of service, and they'll answer for themselves."

In any case, a trained soldier will have been instructed that these Iranian fanatics are without any scruples. They practice what Lenin called "revolutionary morality"—i.e. whatever advances the revolution is good, whatever does not, is bad. It should be assumed that everything the Iranians say is a lie. If they say: "Do this, and we won't harm your mates," and you do it, they will harm your mates anyway. Of course, this kind of truth is much harder to get across to young people who have been brainwashed from elementary school to believe that their own culture is corrupt, evil, and false, while the cultures of Third World barbarians are morally superior...

Update 4/14/2007:

One of my readers has notified me that my post has been plagiarized by someone at the National Review Online. Thank you for letting me know. I have contacted that publication and demanded that I be credited for the piece.