Walker

He was a good dog.

I am writing through tears tonight because my dog Walker passed away today. My parents told me when I got home from work. He had been sick, and today he was in pain. They decided it was time. They were right.

But oh God, I miss him.

I don't think I will ever meet a dog with a sweeter disposition than he had. He was a big yellow mutt of uncertain lineage who was born on a cold afternoon in January twelve years ago. He was one of a litter of eight to which my brother's dog, Chocolate, gave birth. We didn't even know she was pregnant. I still remember when my mother brought them inside - all tiny bundles of wet fur, seven boys and one girl. He was the only yellow one, and the only one without a tail- just a little flap of skin and fur - and the only one we kept, because he was the kindest and gentlest of them all. When they were puppies gathered around the food bowls, that poor little girl had no chance against seven brothers. But Walker would push his way into the squirming mass, get a mouthful of food, and take it to little Dolly. Then he'd go get his own, back and forth, making sure she got fed. He was a good dog.

When he was first born he had a tiny little wrinkled up face (it was as though he had more face than body) that made him look like a bulldog, so that's what I named him: Walker, after a general I had read about who was nicknamed "Bulldog" Walker. He was such a tiny thing - he could fit in the palm of my hand back then, and I remember him crawling around on a mouse pad that must have seemed vast to him. Tiny paws, nose, ears, claws, and of course no tail at all - he was just unbelievably small.

But he grew. Oh, how he grew! He was a bit fat and liked to lay around the house sleeping (what dog doesn't?) - especially under my dad's desk or at the top of the stairs with his paws hanging over the edge of the top stair - but if your feet were cold you could edge your toes under him for warmth and he'd barely even stir. And he was always up for attention. He'd come up to you and rest his chin on your knee and look at you with those soulful brown eyes, and I'd scratch his head and play with those big floppy velvety ears that were so big I'd sometimes play peekaboo with him using his ears to cover his eyes. He never seemed to mind.

He was a big dog but never rough. Even people who don't like big dogs liked him. Heck, even people who don't like dogs period liked him. He was the prototypical big lovable lazy mutt. I taught him to sit and to shake, and he'd do it eagerly, especially if there was a bone in it for him. Shout "treat!" and watch him take off, gallumphing along on those huge soft paws. And he'd sit, and he'd shake, and he'd take the bone out of your hand just as gently as you please and wait for you to rub his head before he ran off to eat it. He was a good dog.

He was always a good dog, and now he's gone, and I miss him. I was sixteen when he came along, and I am twenty-nine now, and he was there as I grew from a boy to a man. And I am not ashamed to cry, because he was a good dog, and I loved him dearly, and I am so lucky to have had so good a dog, and I am going to miss him so much more than I can ever say.

Pontiac

This week, General Motors announced that its Pontiac division will close by the end of 2010. Although I have long believed that this is a necessary step if GM is to survive, I take no pleasure in it: it is a desperate move by a dying automaker, and Pontiac was once an American icon.

Pontiac was founded in 1926 as part of GM's effort to have a brand at every price point, occupying the space above Chevrolet but below Oldsmobile. For its first three decades it fit neatly into GM's family, selling mostly unremarkable cars that the Chevy owner aspired to buy. In 1957 the first Bonneville arrived; costing the same as a Cadillac, it began the process of blurring the lines between the GM divisions that ultimately led to Pontiac's demise.

The division's greatest impact on American popular culture came in 1964. For years horsepower had been escalating, but Pontiac general manager John DeLorean kicked the horsepower wars into high gear with what some consider the first true muscle car: the Pontiac GTO. No more than a standard Tempest with a bigger engine, different transmission, and some suspension parts, the first GTO launched the muscle car era in a cloud of tire smoke and exhaust fumes. Successive GTOs raised the bar higher and higher until the government regulation and the oil crises of the 1970s ended the party.

There was a revival in 1979 when the car-chase film "Smokey and the Bandit" propelled the Pontiac Firebird - complete with screaming chicken hood decal - into the forefront of the national car consciousness. There would be other occasional flashes of brilliance over its last three decades: the mid-engined Fiero, more Firebirds, the Solstice roadster, a new GTO - but by the 1980s Pontiac was in terminal decline. Its products were unremarkable at best, embarassing at worst: rental-grade sedans, Chevys tarted up with plastic body cladding and labeled Pontiacs, rebadged Daewoo subcompacts, the Aztek. Pontiac was broken, and there was no saving it. Its death is a mercy killing.

Today I drove the last new Pontiac there will ever be, the Pontiac G8 GXP. It is classic American iron: a large sedan powered by a big honking V-8 driving the rear wheels through a six-speed manual transmission. It is big, fast, and luxurious. It possesses neck-snapping torque and superb handling. It is the best Pontiac ever made.

It was designed and built in Australia.

Ave atque vale, Pontiac. I will remember you for tire-smoking Goats and Burt Reynolds in a Firebird; I will remember you for the Solstice that was the first manual transmission car I ever drove. I will remember you for the 1970 Catalina that my father drove on his first date with my mother, and I will remember you for the 1979 Bonneville (red on red with an appetite for transmissions and police attention, a CB radio, fender skirts, and the fuel filler behind the license plate) that was the first car they ever bought new. I will remember you for the 1979 Catalina station wagon, baby blue, that was the last car my grandfather for whom I am named ever owned, and which he drove on every visit to see us. I will remember you for your exploits in motorsports - for the iconic image of Air Force One landing behind Richard Petty's blue No.43 Pontiac as he raced down the backstretch at Daytona on his way to his 200th and last NASCAR win, for Ricky Craven's fender-banging victory over Kurt Busch at Darlington in 2003 that was your last NASCAR win, and for the road-racing GTOs and GXPs and Pontiac-Riley Daytona Prototypes that in your last years showed that there was yet some driving excitement at Pontiac.

For all of these things, and more, you will be remembered: an icon fallen, but not forgotten.

Talladega

The big story in motorsports this week is the ending of Sunday's NASCAR race at Talladega, Alabama. Carl Edwards was leading on the final lap when he moved to block Brad Keselowski as the two cars came through the trioval toward the checkered flag. The two cars touched and Edwards spun; the rear of the car lifted off the ground but appeared to be coming back down when it was struck by Ryan Newman's car and catapulted into the catch-fence high above the racing surface. Edwards' car came back down on the track, completely destroyed; Edwards was not hurt, but seven fans were injured by flying debris.

The most important principle is business is this: don't kill your customers. NASCAR came perilously close to doing this on Sunday. Had the catch-fence failed, dozens, maybe hundreds, would have been killed; it would have been the worst racing disaster since the 1955 Le Mans 24 hour race, when a collision sent Pierre Levegh's car flying into the crowd, killing Levegh and 80 spectators. That accident resulted in a ban on motor racing in several European countries that was only lifted after safety improvements were made. Mercedes, which built Levegh's machine, did not return to racing for three decades.

NASCAR and its fans were fortunate on Sunday: the catch-fence worked and no one was seriously injured. But it never should have come into play.

Talladega has always been a dangerous track. When it opened in 1969, speeds were so high that many drivers boycotted the race, citing the inability of tire manufacturers to produce a tire able to stand up to the 200 mph laps being turned. NASCAR ran the race anyway, and the next year, the drivers returned. By 1987, speeds were much higher: Bill Elliott set a record when he won the pole with a lap of 212.809 mph for the 1987 Winston 500 that May. During the race, Bobby Allison cut a tire, spun, and flew into the catch-fence at just about the same spot where Edwards crashed on Sunday.

Although no one was seriously injured, Allison's flight forced NASCAR's hand: the cars had to be slowed down. The solution was the restrictor plate, which reduces the flow of air into the engine, dramatically reducing horsepower and thus speed. NASCAR has used restrictor plates at its two fastest tracks, Talladega and Daytona, since 1987. Unfortunately, the restrictor plates resulted in all of the cars making approximately the same power, leading to the cars bunching up in huge packs that make for huge wrecks.

The restrictor plate was part of the problem on Sunday, but there is a more basic problem: the cars are getting faster again. Telemetry from the TV footage indicates that Edwards and Keselowski were doing 199 mph when they collided on Sunday. Racing is about speed, but that much speed is too dangerous for the spectators. The cars are too fast. They need to be slowed down again.

Many solutions have been offered. NASCAR will almost certainly introduce smaller restrictor plates that will sap even more horsepower from the cars, keeping them bunched up and resulting in more huge wrecks. They will probably tinker with the aerodynamic package used at the restrictor plate tracks. What they will not do is something drastic. NASCAR rarely ever does.

But something drastic needs to be done. Some have suggested reconfiguring Talladega. I would suggest that a better solution is to change the cars themselves in a way that solves two problems: the excessive speed and the huge packs. To eliminate the huge packs requires that the restrictor plate be eliminated; to reduce speed requires something more.

NASCAR's engine formula is simple and outdated: a 358 cubic-inch carbureted pushrod V-8. NASCAR has never been about technology, and that isn't likely to change, but technology isn't the solution. Rather, it's in turning an old saying on its head: "there's no replacement for displacement." The bigger the engine, the bigger the horsepower. Conversely, the smaller the engine, the smaller the horsepower.

The engines should be smaller. As part of the rules package mandated for Talladega and Daytona, NASCAR should specify a much smaller engine that does not use a restrictor plate. Less size equals less power equals less speed; no restrictor plates equals no huge packs equals no huge wrecks.

And all of that equals no cars flying into the stands, which is the point of this entire exercise. Remember the first rule of business: don't kill your customers. NASCAR almost broke that rule on Sunday. If they ever do break it, it will be the end - of the unfortunate victims, of NASCAR, and maybe even of the sport itself. And not killing your customers is more than a rule of business. It's a moral imperative to which NASCAR must pay greater attention - before it's too late.

Miscellaneous Friday

An assortment of things not necessarily warranting independent posts...

Car Lust touched on the MG Midget today. The article is not up to the usual demented standards of Car Lust - frankly, it seems like little more than a warmed-over version of a Wikipedia (spit) article - but it nevertheless reminded me of a Midget that was, as far as I can remember, the first convertible I ever rode in, about fifteen years ago. The Midget was up the usual British automotive standards of the day, but it still sold more than 200,000 examples over twenty years. That record speaks to three things: the indomitable spirit of the British, the undying appeal of the roadster, and the sagacity of P.T. Barnum.

Thankfully, I contracted a less-severe form of British roadster-itis and bought a Miata.

(For those of you who think my NA Miata is tiny, consider that at 156 inches long and 2300 pounds, it dwarfs the 137-inch, 1600-pound Midget! That car got its name for a reason.)

While we're on the subject of British cars, let me point you to Chuck Goolsbee, biodiesel brewer, Jaguar E-type owner, and classic sports car photographer extraordinaire. If you want to see magnificent photos of vintage European iron - runners, no less - look no further. The man takes beautiful pictures of beautiful cars.

***

Pirates are all over the news lately, what with Maersk Alabama and other seizures. Much has been made of the American response - I thought it was appropriate, if delayed - and what we should do about it in the future. I've seen suggestions ranging from cooperation with the Somalian government (such as it is) to working with Somalian clan leaders to putting boots on the ground.

I can't see anything good coming out of any of those options. Cooperating with a Somalian government that barely controls the capital strikes me as a way to get dragged into the unending Somalian civil war. (If you liked Baghdad, you'll love Mogadishu!) Working with Somalian clan leaders sounds like a thinly-described euphemism for bribing them not to attack merchant ships. Putting boots on the ground would only work if foreign powers took over and governed the place themselves - the same thing that ended piracy along the North African coast in the 19th century - and if you believe that's going to happen, I have a reliable MG to sell you.

I think the best solution here is maritime insurance. I don't mean the kind you get from Lloyd's of London, but the kind you get from Blackwater of Virginia. Private security. Armed guards. Piracy continues because the risk-reward equation is on their side, but in the immortal words of the outlaw Josey Wales, "Dyin's a hell of a way to make a livin'." Up the risk, reduce the piracy.

Worth a shot, anyway.

***

Much made of high-speed rail lately too, what with the president taking an interest. Now I'm all for better transportation, but there's an auto racing maxim that's just as applicable here: "Speed costs money. How fast do you want to go?" High-speed rail is expensive, and in most places there just isn't the population density to justify the expenditure. If you're going more than about 500 miles, it's faster to fly. High-speed rail works in the Northeast Corridor between Boston and Washington, and it could probably work in certain areas with high population densities - existing services in both Northern and Southern California could be upgraded - but a nationwide high-speed rail network is just not in the cards. The country is far too big and our population density is far too low to make it work.

No single mode is the solution to our transportation problems. Rail works for commuter service and over some shorter distances. Air works for places where there isn't the population density to support rail service for long hauls. And roads will get you to places that neither rail nor air service go. An integrated, multi-modal solution is the way to go. There are no panaceas, and there ain't no such thing as a free lunch, either.

***

On the subject of spending, some of you may have noticed the Tea Party protests that have popped up lately. Conservatives are not, as I have noted in the past, especially good at protesting. But, as Glenn Reynolds points out, we're getting better at it and that may be to the detriment of the political establishment.

Not that that's a bad thing.

***

Song recommendation for you: Jamey Johnson's "In Color." Great song. Cool video. Reminds me of a conversation I once had with my Uncle Ed and Aunt Ellen when we were looking at some old pictures - we see the past in black and white, but they lived it in color. Maybe that's why I'm so fascinated by color photography from the Thirties and Forties - it's a glimpse of a world we so rarely see.

***

One of the things that bummed me out about moving to Omaha was being so far from the ocean. That still bums me out, but it's not so bad now that I've discovered Freedom Park, home of the World War II minesweeper USS Hazard, Cold War submarine USS Marlin, and other relics. I went there the other day, and while the ships aren't open yet, it was still nice to wander around and take some pictures. They say a bad day on the water is better than a good day on land, and I don't know how that applies to ships berthed on land, but it's nice to have them here anyway.

***

I've been reading a book lately called The Wreck of the Memphis, which is about the tsunami that struck Santo Domingo in the Dominican Republic on August 29, 1916, battering the city and wrecking the armored cruiser Memphis, which was there helping maintain order during one of the periodic disorders that mark the Caribbean history. The book was written by Edward L. Beach, Jr., son of the commanding officer of Memphis during the disaster. The elder Beach went on to command the battleship New York with the British Grand Fleet in 1918, while the younger Beach also became a naval officer who distinguished himself in submarines during World War II and eventually commanded the submarine Triton when in 1960 she became the first vessel to complete a submerged circumnavigation of the Earth. Both also distinguished themselves in literary pursuits. The elder Beach published the first edition of The Bluejacket's Manual, the Navy enlisted man's bible since 1902; the younger Beach wrote many books but is best known for Run Silent, Run Deep, the 1955 novel of World War II submarine life that became a 1958 movie starring Clark Gable and Burt Lancaster.

The Navy has traditionally named its destroyers and frigates after notable naval figures. I think it would be fitting for the Navy to so honor these two men with a USS Edward L. Beach.

***

And while we're speaking of literary figures, I have lately been working on cover art for a re-release of Wake Relieved, with an eye toward an Amazon.com release and publication of the other books in the series. π is doing most of the heavy lifting on this one, because she's just that talented and I am not, but it's not the easiest process in the world. I don't have an artistic bone in my body. I could paint you great paintings, if only I could paint. I can see exactly how they should look on canvas, but they get lost somewhere between my brain and the brush. I don't know why.

Sometimes I'd like to be able to download my brain.

***

Joe Yogerst has an article called "America's Scariest Drives." I view this as a travel guide. As the Extra Milers say, "The shortest distance between two points is no fun."

***

Relations with Cuba seem to be warming. I'll believe it when I see it - things warmed up a little under Carter, too - but although I dislike a Communist dictatorship as much as the next guy, we've isolated Cuba for fifty years and they're still a Communist dictatorship. Points for consistency - in fact, I think that may be the longest America has ever stuck with one foreign policy item - but how's that working out for us? Flooding the place with tourists might be a lot easier. Plus then all the hipsters in their Ché shirts would have someplace to go where they could feel really ironic.

***

Graduating Duke point guard Greg Paulus, a standout quarterback in high school, may be headed to Michigan to play quarterback.

Are we sure this is a good idea? I mean, ask any Duke fan who suffered through his three years as the Blue Devils' starting point guard - he's got a career assist-to-turnover ratio of 1.54. Am I the only one who sees an interception machine of Favrean proportions here?

***

Meanwhile, John Madden, one of the all-time great football broadcasters and a Super Bowl winner as head coach of the Oakland Raiders, has retired.

***

There are wild turkeys living in Omaha, I've discovered. A few weeks ago I saw one on the grounds of my apartment complex, and last Sunday I was visiting friends when four turkeys landed in their back yard. Apparently they're fairly common, and in season. Who knew?

***

Paid off my appendix last week. That was my last medical bill - finished paying for the gall bladder a month or so ago - and it felt good to get it off the books. Bad genes are expensive.

***

And...I'm out!

Norfolk

City by the sea, river bay and shore
Tree-lined streets and salt air smell
Ships in the harbor and boats on the beach
Coastal.

Oily Elizabeth drifts through and around
Ships in the docks and the tour boats cruise
Tables half-full, the smoke wafts away
Harbor.

Come all to Willoughby, where it's sandy and damp
Trees bent away, Atlantic winds blow
Cottages in shadow, the amusement park's gone
Ocean.

Old trees and houses shelter beneath
Moss hangs low, leaves fall on the grass
Sidewalks uprooted but no one much minds
Home.

Iowa

John Kinsella: Is this heaven?
Ray Kinsella: No. It's Iowa.
-Field of Dreams

This isn't exactly what I had in mind.

When I went railroading, I went to Texas. And I loved it. The work was enjoyable and it allowed me to spend a lot of time outdoors and away from the computer. Even when I was at the computer, the sun streamed in through the bay window on the side of the depot where the office sits and trains passed maybe ten feet away. I worked with a great bunch of people. Many of them were old heads, veterans of the Missouri Pacific or Southern Pacific, with a sprinkling of Katy people and one refugee from the Rock Island. These men (and a couple of women) taught me a lot about life, about work, and about railroading. If I'm ever any kind of a railroader, it's because of them.

I would have been content to spend my whole career in Texas. I knew I'd be transferred, but I fully expected I'd be going to Houston, where we have a vast complex of yards and industrial trackage. What I didn't expect was to be offered a chance to transfer to the dispatching ranks. Nor did I expect to take it - but it's a good career move and in the current economy, it seemed like the way to go.

So now I sit in an open cubicle filled with computer screens in a windowless bunker in downtown Omaha, Nebraska.

As I said, this isn't exactly what I had in mind.

Don't get me wrong - the work is still interesting, the people are still good, and (a major plus) the hours are a lot shorter. And I like Omaha. I have a place just across the river in Council Bluffs, Iowa. It sits next to a golf course and gives me a great view of downtown. It reminds me in some respects of Fort Worth - it's relaxed, it has all the big city stuff but isn't so big that you feel lost, it's got a nice downtown area, there's a river, I have friends here. But in other ways it's very different from anywhere I've ever lived before.

I've traveled a lot, but I've always lived in the South, and I've never lived more than a couple of hours from the ocean. Until now, that is. See, I grew up with Southern drawls and tobacco fields in rural North Carolina; I've lived on the southern edge of the northeastern megalopolis, in a sleepy coastal city in Virginia, and in a small town in South Texas. Now I live in a Midwestern city smack-dab in the middle of the country, halfway between Chicago and Denver, a thousand miles from the nearest ocean, where the cornfields stretch off as far as the eye can see and the accents hint of Scandinavia rather than England. It's different.

I have lately had an acute urge to read Thomas Wolfe.

It's not a bad place to live, but I do feel a bit alien here at times. Maybe it's just because I'm still getting used to it. But it is so different from what I've been accustomed to that it's taking some adjustment. There is for me, who has always been close to the water, a sense of geographic isolation that comes from living so far from the sea. I am coastal, the Midwest is solidly terrestrial. It's different.

But it's not different in a bad way, and in some ways it's not very different very different at all. The people here have a lot of the same values as anywhere else in America - faith, family, hard work - that come from a rural heritage, albeit one of a different nature than the ones I knew. The commonalities are greater than the differences. Even so, I notice them.

Is this heaven? No. It's Iowa. But it'll do.

2009 Ford Mustang V6 coupe

Note: this was written in July 2008, but somehow never got posted. It refers to the 2009 model, not the mildly revised 2010 model, which is said to have improved some of the things I didn't like about the 2009 car. And no, I didn't buy one - I ended up with a first-generation Miata instead.

The search for a new car continues...

Certain among those close to me are uncomfortable with the idea of me buying a Mazda MX-5 Miata, a car which I have driven twice and now lust after mightily. Their objection is simple: they think it too small and worry that I'll get squished. If I must have a convertible, they say (and I must), then what about something bigger? What about, say, a Mustang? It's still a convertible, still rear-wheel drive, still available with a manual transmission, if I must have one (and I must), and it's, well, bigger. Less squishable.

So today I went in search of that rarest of beasts: a Mustang convertible with a V6 engine, a manual transmission, and a leather interior. I did not find one. But I did find a coupe with a cloth interior and the appropriate drivetrain, so I decided to make a Bold Move, Drive One, and discover whether Quality is Job One and if there is in fact a Ford in Your (My) Future.

Have you driven a Ford lately? I have.

Let there be no doubt: retro style has reached its peak with the current Ford Mustang. The almost-fastback body, the big chrome emblem on the rear, the three-bar taillights, the three-spoke wheel, the throwback typeface on the gauges - the past melds seamlessly into the present in today's Mustang. But there are awkward elements: the dials rest deep inside their bezels, and while the tachometer is well-positioned, the speedometer lies too far to the right, forcing the driver to turn his head to look at it. The switchgear is simple and intuitive, but oh, that speedometer. And that fastback style does come with a penalty: two enormous blind spots aft of the driver. Lane changes are a test of situational awareness - and faith.

As for the seating arrangements, the rear seats of the current Mustang are as useful as in any other Mustang: they're not. But that's okay; the Mustang isn't about the passenger, it's about the driver. Unfortunately, the cloth seats are rough, unpleasant affairs, not like those found in other Fords. Spend a little extra and get the leather.

The Mustang drives pleasantly enough. There were no twisties to be found, but the steering never attracted any undue attention, either. In fact, it didn't attract any attention. It's properly weighted and linear; the car goes where it's supposed to without undue effort on the driver's part. The 4.0-liter V6 engine is, depending on your perspective, either hopelessly outdated or tried and true; either way, I found its 210 horsepower and 240 pound-feet of torque enough to motivate the 3350-pound car to extralegal speeds in a reasonably short time. Many buyers will opt for the 4.6-liter V8, with its 300 horsepower, 320 pound-feet of torque, classic muscle-car sound, and bragging rights. The fuel economy penalty is minimal - one mile per gallon separates the automatics, two the manuals - but the V8 commands a $6700 premium up front. Put another way, you can buy a V6 convertible for V8 coupe money. Or you can buy 1675 gallons of $4 gasoline to drive (at the manual V6's 20mpg combined rating) 33,500 miles. We won't even speak of the price of a V8 convertible (hint: it's a lot.)

Where the Mustang's mechanicals disappointed me, however, was in the transmission. Maybe it's the European and Japanese cars I've been testing, but the Mustang's clutch was heavy and the shifter felt notchy and clunky, with long throws and a strong hand required. At one point, rolling in traffic with the clutch fully depressed, the shifter simply refused to go into second gear. Maybe I didn't pull it far enough over, but it took three tries before it would go in gear. I may be an inexperienced manual driver, but that shouldn't happen.

I haven't driven a current convertible, so I don't know if the wind still hammers occupants above 60mph as it does in the previous-generation Mustang I've spent a lot of time in. I am told that it doesn't. Watch this space.

When it appeared in 2005, the current Mustang received many accolades for its styling, improved chassis dynamics, and greater refinement over previous models, all achieved without sacrificing any of the car's essential Mustangness. Those accolades were well-deserved: the current Mustang is a great improvement over the previous car. But to me, it's not good enough. At this price point, I expect more.

Maybe it's a good thing Ford went retro on the current Mustang. Buyers who came of age in during the first muscle-car era will love today's Mustang; it reminds them of all that they loved about the classic Mustangs, with enough creature comforts to keep them happy in their middle age. But as the second muscle- car era draws to a close, ended (once again) by rising gas prices and environmental concerns, the Mustang stands alone. For better or worse, it is - or soon will be - the last great American muscle car. Whether it survives the coming automotive apocalypse remains to be seen.

Heard at the NCAA tournament

"When I think of Wisconsin, I think of physicality."

Really? Because I think of cheese. And beer. And brats. And the frozen tundra of Lambeau Field, the Green Bay Packers, and Brett Favre.

I mean, the only physicality I associate with Wisconsin is a fat guy wearing a cheesehead and a Favre jersey (if we're lucky, a painted "4" on his bare chest if we're not), drinking a beer, and grilling a brat outside Lambeau Field before a Packers game on a day cold enough you can see his breath.

I'm just saying, is all.

The high-low mix

One of the few things Admiral Zumwalt got right was the concept of the high-low mix. In fact he didn't invent it; as Friedman (and others ) have pointed out, he was merely pointing out the state of affairs then existing in the USN surface force. From the 1920s until the 1990s, the USN sustained its overall numbers on the back of construction from the previous war. One of the problems facing the USN today is that it has very nearly finished burning through those ships and has not come up with a satisfactory replacement.

The problem is that the US has never been very good at building second-rate warships. This has its roots in several places. I think one of them is the lack of a serious imperial experience; the 19th century Royal Navy was forced to develop a high-low mix in order to maintain its Empire - sailing battleships to keep the peace in Europe, small men-o'-war to police the Empire. Another place is Mahan; he divided navies into those that controlled the sea and those that denied the sea, and the general interpretation of his theory was that sea control required a fleet of battleships. The USN, without the Imperial responsibilities of the Royal Navy, never quite got the idea that sea control requires both a fleet of battleships (aircraft carriers) that can defeat a rival fleet (or deter it from fighting or even being built) and a fleet of smaller ships to conduct the day-to-day business of sea control - fighting pirates, knocking the odd local chief on his head, etc. The closest we got to acceptance of a high-low mix was building ships intended to defeat sea-denial navies (ie, anti-submarine vessels.) Another is the American cultural tendency to go with the biggest, best (and most expensive) thing out there.

So - a country culturally disinclined to build cheap ships, which early in its history did not need to build cheap ships and developed a naval theory that called for expensive ships, has a navy which tends not to build cheap ships. This should come as no great surprise.

The problem is that we now have a very different naval problem than ever before.

During the 20th century the US filled the "low" end of the high-low mix with leftovers from the last war. During WWII, the low end was made up of destroyers left over from WWI (augmented by new ships that were mostly too late to be much help.) During the Cold War, the low end was made up of destroyers left over from WWII, augmented by new ships that were intended as their replacements, but were never built in sufficient numbers to fully replace them. Since the end of the Cold War, the low end has been made up of ships left over from the Cold War, which have been augmented by...nothing. These Cold War leftovers have mostly been used up by now, and there is still nothing to replace them - at a time when the US has, perhaps for the first time in its history, a need for cheap ships not necessarily intended to counter sea-denial fleets (ie, we need the low end to do something other than ASW.)

We are not good at building these.

We need to get good at it.

The current Naval culture does not fit the current Naval mission. We have a Naval culture that thinks in terms of building the latest and greatest without reference to whether the latest and greatest is actually very useful. Sometimes it is. Our aircraft carriers are the latest and greatest - and they should remain so. The USN has had no peer competitor since 1945, and the power of our carrier force is part of the reason why. Its very existence guarantees our freedom of the seas. The USN has also gotten very good - thanks in part to the inherent advantages of air power - at using its carrier force for the day-to-day work of sea control. But aircraft carriers and their escorts cannot be bought in the numbers necessary to do everything, which is why we need a low end.

However, the modern USN has proven unable to build a proper low-end ship. LCS should have been that ship, but it isn't. It is too weak to be a high-end ship and too expensive to be a low-end ship. It is a dead end.

The USN needs to rein in its tendency to gold-plate everything. It cannot fulfill its mission if it does not. This process will be difficult. The military-industrial complex has evolved a major political component that adds major complications to any effort to build a cheap ship. But all the players are facing hard choices. The Navy should decide whether culture is more important than mission. Industry should decide whether it can make more money selling a few expensive ships or many cheap ships. Politics should decide the Navy's mission - whether it is a battlefleet, a sea control fleet, or a jobs program.

I say "should decide" rather than "must decide" because nothing I have seen gives me any indication that any of these actors "must decide" anything, or at least believe that they must. They seem content to muddle on, fiddling while the Navy burns. But indecision is a choice, too, and like any choice, it has consequences. At least choosing a course of action would convey some choice of consequences. Instead the Navy sails on, rudderless, into an uncertain future.

A year from then

It's amazing how much can change in a year. One year ago, my life revolved around college. I had just finished my third semester at Old Dominion and was getting ready for my last one. Academia occupied a dominant position in my life - it consumed a great deal of my time and energy. I was finally going to get that degree; I just had to get through one more semester, a few more classes, a few more papers...

Most of the space not occupied by college was occupied by college basketball. I lived and breathed Old Dominion basketball and WODU. I was constantly going from one game to another, working to make sure our games would get on the air, doing play-by-play, hosting my weekly radio show. There would always be another game...

I was starting to think hard about what I wanted to do career-wise after I finished school. I was putting in applications, mostly to railroads and other logistics companies, and trying to come to terms with the idea of a career that didn't involve sports. I had no idea what I was going to do, knowing only that I had to do something...

Now it's a year later. I have the degree. I've thought about going for a master's degree, but college now seems somehow strange, remote. Alien. I don't know that I want to go back. I don't know that I could go back.

Another game hasn't come. I closed that door regretfully, although I keep telling myself that one day there will be another. Perhaps there will. I hope so.

I have a career, and although it doesn't involve sports, it does involve another passion, railroading. I don't regret the choice, although I do regret some of the sacrifices it has required. I know there are more of those to come, probably very soon. I am coming to a crossroads in my career - perhaps interlocking would be a more appropriate word - and there will be choices to be made, although I don't yet know what all of the options will be. I hope I choose the right ones.

I wonder where I'll be a year from now. I wonder what I'll be a year from now. I wonder who I'll be a year from now.

I guess I'll find out.