Kahuna

Why heck, I'll bet there are still some who do it today. Ya' reckon?

The 75% is 6 months, 1 year, and 18 months respectively and it is cumulative, so theoretically a member could attend 100% of activities for one year and then go on to QM with a minimal attendance. I don't see this as precluding periods of absence. I know of some Ships that don't even have summer activities because the kids are too dispersed at camps and whatever. You can't alter the requirements, but everything is subject to some interpretation. Of course I'm a lawyer, so everything everywhere is subject to interpretation.

It is fun to discuss nonserious Scouting topics. Bill Hillcourt would go around at events where there were young Scouts and ask if they knew how to tell the time by the sun. Usually they didn't. He would take a small stick, put it in the center of his palm, look at the shadow carefully and tell the boys the exact time to the minute. Boys would go off in wonderment. They didn't notice Bill had turned his wristwatch around so it faced up and he was looking at the watch.

GernBlansten: It's even trickier than you thought. The tents must be green.

This is truly hilarious! There must be something of greater importance that we could discuss, such as whether all buildings in Scout camps should be painted brown or dark green.

Speaking of Paris . . . In the late 1950's, I was in Normandy at a time when Charles deGaulle was touring the invasion sites. In Cherbourg, there was a huge rally for him. He made a rousing speech (I think, I don't speak 5 words of French, everybody went wild anyhow), at the end of which he led the crowd in the French anthem (can't spell it). I knew the words in English, so I joined in the singing. The notoriously language conscious French folk around me undoubtedly heard me, but no one even gave me a dirty look. If they could stand that, I guess I can stand hearing ours in Spanish. Having said that, I don't think it should become a standard practice for ceremonies and public events.

Congratulations, both. It ain't easy to strike the proper balance between encouragement and nagging. Obviously, you found the right one.

That was a great move, FB! Nothing else you could have said would make those kids realize what they could be doing in Scouts.

Good luck, whatever you decide. A yacht club can be an ideal sponsor, but when they are looking to boost membership and obtain boats, they might not be the best choice. The Legion would probably make a good sponsor, but then you have the problem of where to keep your boats and do your boating. Before you sign up the yacht club, you might put them through one of the video presentations or a short version of the specialized training so you can make sure they understand what they are getting.

Hoo boy, guys! I want to thank you for this discussion. I will have no further trouble avoiding the issues and politics section in the future. Sheesh!

And yet, Rumsfeld remains arrogant...and the administration still emphatically supports him. So, packsaddle, you would support a wartime SecDef who is less arrogant? That would make it okay? Patton wasn't arrogant?

SR540B: I don't know what the radio talk show pundits have to do with any of this. And General Myers isn't the "real deal"? The problem with this analysis is that this is not a generals revolt. I would prefer to compare this with Viet Nam than Korea in terms of complexity. No question that Johnson and McNamara screwed up that war by micromanagement. During Viet Nam, the generals were not only silent, they were complicit. Had they stood up and resigned and told the public what was going on, they would have done far more as patriots than they did by assisting prosecution of a war that was taking many lives and that they weren't going to be allowed to win. That would have been a generals revolt. Maybe those generals who are speaking out now are correct and maybe they aren't. I don't think they reflect the thinking of 70% of the officer corps in theater, but I could be wrong. The plain fact is, if they felt the way they say they did, they could have resigned and then spoken out. The impact would have been much more forceful and I would tend to give them more credibility.

I'll get into the Rumsfeld thing, don't have time to think through everything else. Those generals, in my opinion, are running for SecDef under Hilary or Kerry. They could not have spoken out before retirement, but they certainly could speak their minds to the establishment. If they felt as they say they did, they should have resigned. I saw General Myers, the recently retired Chairman of the Joint Chiefs, yesterday on Fox. He said that Rumsfeld always listened to the generals and frequently took their advice. He also said the same thing Rumsfeld did: You got hundreds of generals out there and lots of egos. Last, but not least, it is significant that they are all Army generals. No admirals, no Air Force generals. The Army is the service that Rumsfeld has really taken on for reorganization and a lot of generals don't like it.

I'll offer a comment on OA, since that is one reason a lot of older Scouts end up in Sea Scouts and other Venture programs. Their real interest is in maintaining the OA connection. I agree with all of Campcrafter's points and would add one more. One of the things I discovered when I started working with Sea Scouts was the love that they have of regattas and other inter-unit stuff that they can do. I think there is a great interest among kids this age in meeting kids their own age from other units and other communities, even other states. I think the OA meets the same needs for teens.

Oh, yeah, and Been a while since I looked at the fac.

I think there are only three. If you do a : followed immediately by a ), you get . If you do a : followed by a ( you get . I you do ; followed by ) you get .

Rooster, Sorry to lose you. Don't be ashamed if you change your mind. Kahuna

Rooster, We are probably too far apart for it to make much sense to argue about this, but I can agree with you about the existence of what you call God. However, you must have engaged in more than an observation in order to conclude that (God) exists. In other words, you were searching for Truth, unless your whole search simply began with the assumption that (God) exists. I approached the search from the perspective that God didn't exist and, if he did, there would be some evidence of it. Over the years, I came to the same conclusion that you did. We don't necessarily agree on the nature of the evidence, but we agree that there is too much evidence of an intelligence greater than ours at work. From that point, the search becomes to determine what that intelligence is. In other words, you begin the search for God. As a Buddhist, I don't find any evidence of a personal god, sitting in judgment or involving itself with human affairs. Nor do I believe that good, evil, love or hate are anything more than chemistry in the brain. But, I think we are really talking about the same thing when we discuss the search for Truth versus the search for God.

LongHaul, I think that is as good a definition as any I can think of. GernBlansten has a point in saying that we are more likely to regard a decision unfavorable to our point of view as legislating from the bench than one favorable to us. But your analysis is right on, it seems to me. When the Constitution is interpreted in a way that goes against its plain meaning and the presumed intent of the framers, and also in a way that is a radical departure from precedent and common understanding, that is legislating from the bench. The examples you give are both excellent ones. The framers, in their wisdom, provided a means to make the Constitution "a living document." That is the amendment process.

I suppose on the surface they are inconsistent...unless one has searched for the truth and found God, in which case they would be one in the same. But that was my point. If you search only for God and don't find God, you don't necessarily find the Truth.

Our troop had a bus. We took some fairly long road trips. Bus had a tape player but not a CD player. Boys were allowed to play tapes from time to time, but most had their own sound systems. We kept a tape of German accordian music handy. Penalty for playing an obnoxious tape, being too noisy or uncooperative was a half hour of German accordian music. Usually kept things pretty quiet. We didn't worry about what they listened to as long as we didn't have to hear it.

However, terminology like spiritual enlightenment and belief system or protests that religion was unsatisfyingas I see it, these terms and that kind of complaint reflects a person who is not looking for God, but for something else. . . Truth is truthit is what it is These strike me as inconsistent with each other. Either we are searching for Truth or we are searching for God. If we search for God and don't find God, the search is over. If we seek Truth and we find God . . .

Rooster says: My conclusion is this: Their superstitious nature makes them fearful of an honest search one that will show them the one and only true God. They are afraid of the truth and how it will affect the rest of their lives. By which you mean your God. I have two observations. First, everyone is afraid of the Truth and all the neuroses and psychoses that we live with is the best evidence of that. Searching for the Truth is the most difficult thing in life. Unfortunately, Truth and religion are not necessarily the same thing. Which leads to the second. Speaking for myself and many others who were raised in Christian churches (and not to single out Christianity) and then moved on to other beliefs, the search for Truth is complicated greatly by religious beliefs. It is extremely difficult to genuinely seek Truth when you have been raised to believe that Hell awaits those who leave that religion. By the same token, it must be difficult for those who are raised without any religious training to sort out how to approach finding the Truth. Which, I assume, is why so many people end up in cults. It is also why many accept the teachings about Christianity on first hearing. The teachings of any religion have been refined and many have been refined in order to attract believers. I am not arguing any point of view here, just making the observation.

Indeed, if I understand correctly, any LDS follower who dies within the faith becomes a God (or perhaps God-like being?) himself. Saints, I believe. Hence, Latter Day Saints. Like the others, I am not LDS and am subject to correction.

Limiting it to three is tough. I guess I would say: 1-Is actually two experiences working and living with Bill Hillcourt at two camporees of which he was camporee chief. 2-The 1969 Jamboree in Idaho as a leader. Armstrong and Aldrin landed on the moon while we were there around noon Pacific time. If you've never heard dead silence from 35,000 people holding their breath and then yelling when the announcement came, you can't quite grasp it. 3-Scoutmaster at Junior Leader Instructor Training at Philmont, 1966. We had the best and brightest Boy Scouts in the country to work with for two weeks at a time all summer. Totally uplifting.