NJCubScouter

Just to make it clear, I posted my last message before seeing Rooster's. If I am going to respond point by point, it is going to have to be later. I do note that Rooster's is the first post in this thread to make a partisan point out of this situation, which is something that I specifically avoided doing. Rooster's post actually helps me win the second half of the bet I had with myself, because while I figured FOG would be the first to disagree with me, I also bet that someone would mention Robert Byrd and make a partisan point out of that. I listen to conservative talk shows on the radio when I can, particularly Rush Limbaugh and Sean Hannity, so I know all the "talking points." Hannity, in particular, mentions "Robert KKK Byrd" any time ANY racial issue comes up, particularly when any Republican is being questioned for some statement or opinion relating to race. I am not saying that you get your stuff from anyone, Rooster, or saying there is anything wrong with it (since I earlier quoted a different radio talk show host myself), I just can't help but notice the coincidence. I do have to point out this statement by Rooster: Not so surprisingly, Senator Thurmond didnt incur much criticism until he switched to the Republican Party in the 60s... That is just completely preposterous, Rooster. You say you haven't followed his career or studied his past, and this statement proves it. I also can't help but notice the partisan point associated with your statement, which is contrary to all relevant facts. The truth is that Thurmond led a march of Southerners out of the 1948 Democratic convention to form his own branch of the Democratic party and run for president on a blatantly racist and segregationist platform, and carried four Southern states, almost costing Harry Truman the election (the election being so close that it produced the famous "Dewey Beats Truman" headline); then was elected to the Senate in the 50's, nominally as a Democrat, and led the fights against every piece of civil rights legislation at that time, helping to delay the passage of major civil rights laws until the mid-60's... by which time he finally decided that his home was in a different political party. To think that he did not receive major criticism for any of this is just absurd. He was reviled as a practitioner of racial politics long before switching parties. And by the way, I found an article that contradicts your suggestion that his switch to the Republican Party is somehow associated with his "abandonment" of racist views. (I know you said it "happened to be about the same time" but it looks to me like you were trying to draw a connection. And this article shows that the two events occurred more than six years apart, which in the context of the subject is not "about the same time" anyway.) http://www.whiteprivilege.com/archives/2003/06/27/strom_thurmond_dead_at_100 This article says that he abandoned racial politics after a 1970 election in which his candidate for governor, who ran on a racist platform, was defeated. In other words, he decided that racism was no longer a route to political control in his state, so he decided not to use racism anymore. What his personal views were, or what they changed to be, if they ever did, is really besides the point.

Here we go with the dictionary again. First of all, the specific word isn't necessarily the point. In public, Thurmond was THE leading supporter of racial segregation and discrimination, but he engaged in relations with at least one black woman (really a girl in this case) and apparently took no precautions against bringing into the world a child who would have virtually no contact with her father for her entire life. Virtually no contact, that is, other than seeing and hearing him in the media, advocating that people like HER be kept in second-class citizenship. Hunt alluded to that aspect and as it happens, I was listening to a radio talk-show about this this morning, where one of the hosts said that the worst aspect of this is that after Thurmond fathered this child, he then spent the better part of his political career trying to deny HIS OWN CHILD the basic rights and freedoms of citizenship. Add to that (as this radio host also said) that this was a 22 year old man and a 16 year old girl, in what was really a master-servant relationship, really not that much different from slavery (keep in mind that this was in the South in the 1920's.) (The difference in ages and the position of subservience that this woman was in, in relation to Thurmond, was another issue pointed out by this radio host, who thought that under today's laws, what Thurmond did might be considered statutory rape. (Which under today's laws is more complex than just considering age; for example in New Jersey the "age of consent" today is 16, but if the "suspect" is for example a teacher and the alleged victim is his student, the age is 18.) This isn't really the point in my opinion, since later in life Thurmond really was no "moral exemplar" anyway and was well-known for socializing (and sometimes marrying) women much younger than himself.) What IS the issue is the inconsistency between what Thurmond advocated in public and what he did in private, regardless of whether "hypocrisy" is the right word. And here is the Merriam Webster Online definition of hypocrisy: a feigning to be what one is not or to believe what one does not; especially : the false assumption of an appearance of virtue or religion What Adrian is talking about is the second part of the definition and the "especially," which deal with the difference between what one pretends ("feigns") to believe and what one actually believes. But if the first part ("feigning to be what one is not") is read broadly, I think what Thurmond did fits into that. Adrian, I disagree with your statement that whether he was a hypocrite (or other negative word of your choice) "depends on whether he actually held racist views." I personally don't know and have no way of knowing what Thurmond was thinking when he made all his racist and segregationist statements over the years. I don't think it is relevant. I do know that he promoted racism and segregationism, and fought for the right of Southerners to practice those things, which in my book makes him a racist and segregationist. And not just a racist and segregationist, but the leading one in the entire country, the only person (to my knowledge) ever to make a serious run for the presidency based on a platform of racial segregation (though an argument could be made for George Wallace in 1968, but it wasn't quite the same thing.) But now we know that Thurmond was willing to make exceptions to those "avowed" principles in order to provide himself with pleasure. Is anyone defending that?

FOG, and your dating history and motivations (which I really didn't want to know about) are relevant to the actions of a famous segregationist who slept with (and fathered a child with) one of the people he said should not be allowed to associate with "his people," is relevant how, exactly? I do have to thank you, though. I had a bet with myself on who would be the first to disagree with me that Strom Thurmond was a hypocrite, and I had you to win. I lost the other part of the bet, though, because I thought that whoever was the first to disagree would actually say something relevant.

Since this is, after all, the "Issues and Politics" forum and we have not really had much "politics" recently, I decided I couldn't let this one go by. I always enjoy the exposure of hypocrisy, and in the past few days there has been a wonderful example of this, though done posthumously. In 1948, when he was running for president, Strom Thurmond said in a public speech: I want to tell you that theres not enough troops in the army to force the southern people to break down segregation and admit the negro race into our theaters, into our swimming pools, into our homes, and into our churches. Actually the site I got this from said that there are many who believe, based on accounts from people who were there when he said this, that he did not actually say "negro," but that he actually said a different word beginning with "n" but all the newspapers of the day decided to "clean it up." In any event, this is only one of many segregationist statements Strom Thurmond made. Now it turns out, while an army may have been insufficient to force the "negro race" into his homes, swimming pools, churches, etc., no army at all was necessary to get at least one member of the "negro race" into Strom Thurmond's bedroom. And a 16-year-old member at that, when Thurmond was 22. His family has acknowledged the claims of an elderly woman of "mixed parentage" that she is his daughter, that her mother was a black maid in the Thurmond household all those years ago, and that Thurmond sent her support payments for many, many years. I always thought that Thurmond's views on race and segregation were reprehensible. Now it turns out that his views in public weren't quite the same as his views in private. Just another hypocrite.

I just realized that this thread started out talking about a troop where you can't make Eagle until you are 17, and now is talking about the possibility of a boy making Eagle at 9! Someone before mentioned the Twilight Zone... I can hear the music...

Neil: If I understand your post correctly, these 9 and 10 year old Eagles are theoretical possibilities based on boys who actually finished grades at school at young ages; but they did not actually make Eagle at those ages, right? I have posted about this before, the idea of boys crossing over just past their tenth birthday, or age 9 or even earlier, because they were considered to be 1, 2 or even 3 grades higher in school than they would "normally" be. I think the BSA should consider closing this "loophole." I have written about a situation I know of in which a boy was "old enough" to join a troop several months after his tenth birthday because his parents were home schooling him and by their clock, he had finished the fifth grade, even though in any public school district in the state, he would have been finishing fourth grade. This is not nearly so egregious a case as the ones Neil cites, because this boy I know(who now seems to have settled down a bit though I still see him clinging to his ASM-father at meetings now and then) was not so egregious a case because he actually only "missed" by a month or two. But I do think that if a literal reading of the joining requirements would permit a boy to join a troop before some point, at the very earliest his tenth birthday, whether by "completing fifth grade" or earning Arrow of Light (which at that point would also have to be grade-level based), the BSA (whether it be the unit or the council, I'm not focusing on the details), really has to look at how it is that the boy has achieved that grade level at that age and whether the boy is really ready to be a Boy Scout. I just don't think a parent should have the ability, through a home-schooling or other special situation, to manipulate the joining requirements, and if that sounds harsh, as I said before I have seen it done to a minor degree, which means it could be done to a greater degree. And even if a boy has moved that fast through a regular school system, by being "gifted" and skipping grades, the unit or council or whoever needs to consider the "socialization" aspect. (My state doesn't really "skip" kids much anymore, different districts can provide accelerated classes or "un-graded" settings but the official grade stays the same.) This hypothetical 8-year-old Boy Scout may be in the sixth grade and know all the math, English, social studies of his older peers, but he most likely still acts like an 8 year old. Exceptions could be made, but I think consideration should be given to tightening up the general rule. Whoa, when I get on a roll... As I said, this has become an "issue" with me; as in what the kids say now, "that guy has issues..." And I don't want to start a debate about home schooling, that's not the issue.

I am not an expert in the Girl Scout program. I had two daughters in the Girl Scouts, both of whom quit what seems like a long time ago. (One of them was a first-year Cadette, I believe, and the other was a Brownie, when they both decided within a month of each other to give it up.) I therefore have no reason to doubt that the GSUSA girl-led emphasis is appropriate for their program. I also think that the Boy Scouts does not need to introduce boy-led that early. Through the Bear year, adult-led works fine. The BSA might consider incorporating some degree of boy-led into the Webelos program. Not to the degree it is used in a Boy Scout troop, but I think Acco is right, to go from zero to 100 percent (though in practical fact it is not 100 percent, but that is another thread) is pretty jarring. I'm not sure the boys quite know what to make of it at the beginning (after crossing over.) Maybe even more so, and I am half-smiling as I say this, the parents need better preparation for a program in which they are not in charge. I have seen numerous parents not quite "get" this, and have read about some pretty egregious cases of this in this very forum. A couple of years ago I met the CC (at least at that time) of the troop I was a member of as a youth, and some of the other leaders of that troop were around (including my father, which is how this "meeting" occurred), and she was talking about how the troop was going to do this and that activity... but she sounded for all the world like a cubmaster or den leader -- which I am sure she had been previously -- and not a CC of a troop. From listening to her, I got no sense that the boys had much to do with planning their own program, and from what my father has told me, this is largely true for that troop. (After 65 years in Scouting, 58 of them as an adult leader, my father has long since given up trying to tell the younger adult leaders what to do. I know that when he was SM, we had a boy-led troop, because I was there for part of that time.) So anyhoo, a little preparation for boy-led during the Webelos years (can 18-20 months be called "years"?) probably wouldn't hurt the boys or their parents.

First of all, I realized that I misspelled my own spelling. I usually write it as "Hanukkah" with 2 k's. Some people only write it with one. I have also seen it with 2 n's which may get us up to 16 possible spellings though I don't think many people use 2 n's. And from my long-ago and brief study of Hebrew, it is my recollection that that language seldom (if ever) uses double letters (that is, Hebrew letters) so I am not sure how the letters got doubled in English. Davej, just for the sake of historical accuracy, the events in the story of Hanukkah took place in the 160's B.C. (I had to look that up, I knew it had to be somewhere in the few hundred years before the time of Jesus Christ, by which time the Romans had obviously taken over Jerusalem from the Maccabees.) As for the "Syrians" being offended, I don't know. Syria itself was a conquered region at the time. Although "Syrians" are usually mentioned when the story of Hanukkah is told, the time in question is also often called the "Hellenistic" period of Middle Eastern rule. That is, the Greeks (led by Macedonians) were in charge. The ruling dynasty of Syria (and what is now Israel) at the time were the Seleucids, descendants of Seleucus (sp?), a Greek/Macedonian general in the army of Alexander the Great (which had conquered the area about two centuries earlier.) The story of Hanukkah culminates with the defeat of the Seleucids in Jerusalem by the Jews, led by the Maccabbees, who were themselves conqued by the Romans about a century later.

SPL T 15: First of all, on behalf of all those who celebrate Hanukah, thank you. Second of all, Jewish people spell it about 5 different ways ourselves. My preference is Hanukah, but Chanukah is also popular. Then, once the beginning is settled on, there are people who will double the "k" or leave off the "h." I guess if you multiply it out that is probably 8 choices though not all of them are actually seen. There may even be others I haven't seen. The same problem exists for many other words that were originally in the Hebrew alphabet (such as my last name, for another example.) The letters do not correspond easily to English. Merry Christmas and happy holidays to you and all.

Big Dog says: Did I hear that one of our soldiers was about to drop a grenade down that hole b4 he saw something? That could have saved a lot of trouble. It might have saved "trouble" in the sense of having to hold, try and punish the guy, and probably get criticism from other nations along the way (actually it has already started because the Brits don't want to participate in a process that involves the death penalty.) However, I think it is much better overall that we got him alive. Not to be too gruesome, but if that soldier had lobbed the grenade in there, convincing the nation and the world that the remains belonged to Saddam Hussein would have been much more complicated than what actually happened. DNA evidence from a corpse is one thing, but when they released that photo yesterday showing him with his beard shaved off, and with his hair cut and mustache trimmed back to where they were when he was in office, the picture tells a thousand words. That's the guy and everybody can see it. I hope he doesn't come to the states, he might get Johnny Cochrane as his defender or something. I think he is going to be tried in Iraq, though I am sure there will be American lawyers at least assisting the prosecution team, if not in a lead role. But why not give him the best defense lawyers money can buy? I don't mind my tax dollars going to the cause. Let the prosecutors prove their case against the best, and his conviction will have that much more impact. Our enemies in the Arab world will not be able to claim that he was railroaded and denied adequate counsel. Something else I wonder, why didn't he come out fighting? I'm not sure that he really gave it a lot of thought at that point. I think he just had enough. I have no sympathy for him, but I would guess that all of the hiding and running around and fleeing and finding out his sons were dead and statues toppled and top guys captured, had a serious emotional impact on him. I think even the meanest, cruelest person would begin to wear down under the strain. When he realized the game was up, he just gave up. I don't think he wanted to fight anymore. Is that suicide thing where you take as many with you as you can only good for peons? If he were a true believer in that stuff about virgins waiting for you in heaven (or wherever it is you go), wouldn't that have been better than that rat-hole he was hiding in? Despite his show of Islamic piety during the first Gulf War, I don't think he was devout at all, and did not really believe any of that stuff that they feed to 17-year-old prospective suicide bombers. He was in some ways a realist and pragmatist, though with an over-inflated sense of his own power. Also remember that the Baathist Party (still in power in Syria) was a quasi-Marxist, Soviet-backed, mostly-secular group. They use Islam as a tool to acquire and retain power, because that is a good way to recruit and keep their footsoldiers (including terrorists) motivated in those countries, but I really don't think there was a lot of sincere praying toward Mecca going on behind closed doors in the presidential palace. Anyway, here's to the hope Bin Ladin is quickly to follow... It would be nice but I would not hold my breath. It is really a different situation than Saddam, who had a lot of enemies, and most ordinary people were probably only to happy to help find him so they wouldn't have to worry about him anymore. As for binLaden, I would guess he is hiding in the Pashtun (ethnic Afghan and Taliban-sympathetic) areas in the mountains of western Pakistan and that the residents there have no interest in giving him up. I am also pretty sure we have agreed with the Pakistanis that we are not going to cross the border (at least not in force) to find him. I doubt the Pakistanis will either. ... and our troops can come home to the hero's welcome they so richly deserve!!!!! Dittos to that. I wouldn't mind if they came home now. We won the war. Trying to turn Iraq into a democracy, with our soldiers in the line of fire, is a fool's errand in my opinion.

I just want to pick out a fairly trivial aspect of this that caught my eye. Something was said about a unit being a "thorn in the side" of council, and apparent pride at being the thorn unit. It reminds me of when I got involved as an active Cub Scout parent and then den leader, and gradually figured out that the then-leaders of the pack loved to be a thorn in the side of the council and district, like routinely ignoring communications; no training or attendance at RT; skipping things like Scouting for Food; making a spectacle of the pack at Cub Camporees by (among other things) having campfires in our site that shot flames 20-30 feet in the air that were clearly visible (and audible, joined in by loud talking) at midnight from other units' campsites (not to mention being unsafe); and submitting charter paperwork late and usually at the last possible minute before an actual lapse occurred (and one time they missed that too though I think it was papered over later on). The Cubmaster once told me, "those guys really don't like us, but we don't care." (I cleaned up what he actually said.) Because this is the way life goes, the powers that be finally lost all patience with our pack at just about the same that almost the entire pack leadership "graduated," quit or faded away for various reasons, to be replaced by leaders (including me as ACM) who wanted to "get with the program," so to speak. It didn't stop us from having to deal with things like being assigned campsites at Cub Camporees that mortal men, boys and vehicles could barely get to in one piece, or being referred to as "oh, those guys" by the commissioner-types. We made a concerted effort to demonstrate to the powers that be that there was a new sheriff in town (like six of us showing up for the same session of leader training, and sending someone to every RT), and after a fairly short time, we were no longer the thorn in the side, and knocking on the door of Quality Unit, though we just missed in my last year. There is really nothing to proud about in being the thorn, there is only an eventual payback that doesn't do the boys any good.

I personally think that the sky would not fall, nor the mountains crumble to the sea (name that tune) -- nor, to the point, would the BSA program be adversely affected in any way -- if there were a place on the adult leader uniform designated for one to wear a small, unobtrusive pin (maybe the "mother's pin" with a colored backing or something) signifying the highest rank that one earned as a Boy Scout (or old-time Explorer, Venturer, Sea Scout, etc.) Maybe it could be a plain white knot (with no actual "knot" that the pin would be attached to (it would have to be smaller than the "mother's pin" to fit.) Or maybe on the lapel or sleeve or wherever. I emphasize small and unobtrusive, and a pin rather than a patch, because it should not "overshadow" an Eagle Knot worn by someone who has earned that award, nor should there be any possibility of confusing it with a youth rank patch. It would just be a way of signifying that the wearer was a Boy Scout as a youth and what rank the person achieved. It seems likely that someone who stopped as a Tenderfoot would not want to wear the pin; it would probably be mostly us Lifes for Life. Take it a step further and there could be a little 3-bar pin signifying that the wearer was SPL as a youth. And maybe other positions as well, though I suppose at some point it does start to get ridiculous. Disclaimers (based on posts I have read in the past in this forum): I am not making a "big deal" out of this. I suspect that this will never be done. Life (I mean in general, not the rank) and Scouting and my role in both will continue to go on as they are regardless of whether it were done. I know that pins cost money. I don't need to be given the address to make suggestions to national. I just felt like bringing up the idea here. I also am fully aware that there will probably be a resounding lack of applause for this idea from certain quarters, and I can pretty much guess what will be said. But you can say it anyway, if you feel like it.

Well, Hunt, I did not mean to start a semantic debate. The article that I quoted agrees with me, and in the portions that I did not quote (see link), it draws a distinction between "opinion" and "belief," the first one being based on facts and evidence, the second one not. That is a distinction that I have always gone by, even before I found that article earlier today. Maybe some people don't make that distinction. It doesn't matter. I do know that ScoutParent's dictionary definitions do not contradict what I said. I will acknowledge that I could have been more clear in my original statement, although I don't think that either ScoutParent or Rooster actually misunderstood me. What I really meant was that an opinion based on a false fact is not persuasive. But even then, Hunt, the example you give is one where your opinion (about nominations) can be supported by facts. You could find examples of members of both parties basing their decisions on ideology rather than objective facts. But when I see a suggestion or implication made that only one party does that -- and right now that charge is only being made by Republicans against Democrats -- I have to say something, because that "opinion" is demonstrably false. There are facts that disprove it. Something similar applies to statements I see all the time on here, or in talk radio -- like "liberals believe in such-and-such" or "gay people do xyz." Is that opinion, that might persuade someone? Or is it just pure belief, that is contrary to the facts when it implies that all of a particular group do something or believe something, when they don't. And to take it back to an issue we all know and love, I have seen statements on here or elsewhere on the Internet that James Dale wrote "I'm gay" on a leader application, or appeared in a gay pride rally in a Boy Scout uniform before he was terminated from the BSA, or that he appeared in a parade wearing a dress holding a sign about the Boy Scouts, or other things that he never did. While people who post such things on here may well believe they are true, someone started those stories, knowing they were not true. I can only conclude that they started those stories because they thought that if people believed any of those things, they would be more likely to agree that Dale should have been banned from Scouting, and maybe also that they would believe that all gay people act in an inappropriate manner. In other words, they were seeking to shape opinion based on false facts. And that is why I say, each of us is entitled to our opinion, but not our own facts.

ScoutParent (and Rooster too I guess, since you decided to jump in): If you are referring to my statement "opinions have to have some basis in fact," the dictionary definitions you cite do not contradict my statement at all. They support it. What I am saying is that an opinion based on false or nonexistent facts is worthless. To use an example from your post, ScoutParent, if I am asked to give an opinion on Haiti, and I say I like it because it is warm there, and you say you don't like it because it is too hot there, those are our opinions and there is no point in debating them. Neither of us can be right or wrong. However, if you have been told, and you believe, that the average summertime temperature in Haiti is 20 degrees (F), and you say your opinion is that Haiti is too cold, your opinion isn't worth much. Likewise, if you believe that Haiti is the name of a cow rather than a country, your opinion of the cow isn't worth much, because there is no cow. The dictionary also mentions judicial decisions, twice. I have read thousands of court decisions. Virtually every one has had some statement of what the facts are, upon which the opinion is based. If the facts are incorrect, the opinion is not worth much. In fact, if the facts in a lower court decision are clearly incorrect, the decision can be overturned on appeal. The "opinion" based on the incorrect facts becomes irrelevant. And I found an article that supports what I am saying: http://writing.colostate.edu/references/teaching/co300man/pop12d.cfm This article says, among other things, the following: An opinion is a judgment based on facts, an honest attempt to draw a reasonable conclusion from factual evidence. (For example, we know that millions of people go without proper medical care, and so you form the opinion that the country should institute national health insurance even though it would cost billions of dollars.) An opinion is potentially changeable--depending on how the evidence is interpreted. By themselves, opinions have little power to convince. You must always let your reader know what your evidence is and how it led you to arrive at your opinion. To bring this back to what I was talking about, Rooster re-posted an article that drew opinions from partial statements of fact, "spun" facts, "twisted" facts or no facts at all. It may have represented the writer's belief, but it had no weight in convincing anyone of anything because it was not based on actual facts. A number of the posts in this forum are like that too. Someone's pure belief, based on no facts at all, has no power to persuade me of anything. I may have my own beliefs, but I wouldn't try to convince anyone of them. So, I'm having a pretty good day, Rooster.

Rooster, yes, we both have strong opinions, and we are each entitled to them. But opinions have to have some basis in fact, and none of us are entitled to our own facts.

ScoutParent, if you want to tell yourself that the readers of this forum saw me "spit and sputter," I suppose that is your privilege. However, from my perspective, what the readers (and I'm mainly talking about the ones who don't post) have seen is you refusing to defend your statement or to answer any questions about it. And from that, they can draw their own conclusions about what was really behind your statement. Anyone could have asked you those questions; if it wasn't me, if it was someone who never posted here before, what excuse would you have used then?

Mark says: Agree or disagree, makes no matter - I love ya man! (And no, that doesn't indicate a softening on my position on the gay issue! LOL) LOL back atcha, and you didn't need the disclaimer, I took your comment in the spirit with which it was intended. Agree new adults' packs should also be inspected. We do that. I think I either read or wrote something in a confusing manner. I was not writing about new adults' packs, and if someone else was writing about adults' packs, I missed it. I have no problem with an older boy (an experienced cold-weather camper or backpacker as the case may be) checking a new adult's pack. Where I have a bit of a twinge of concern is with the new (or younger) BOY's pack. In other words an 11 year old boy, maybe never been on any camping trip, or one in non-dangerous weather. (Or for a backpacking trip, an 11 year old on his first backpacker.) For this young Scout, I'd like to at least have an adult looking over the shoulder of the older boy who is checking the pack. I agree that there will be many boys who could do a better job than some adults -- but hopefully there is at least one adult in the troop who is the most knowledgeable of all on what equipment to bring, and that is who I want at least supervising the check of the youngest boy's pack. That's all I meant. Also I did not mean to confuse things by adding backpacking trips in here. For a cold-weather trip the main point of the check is to make sure nothing crucial is left out. For a backpacker (assuming no sub-freezing temperatures) a large part of the issue is making sure not too much is being taken along. The real trick comes in with the cold-weather backpacker. But we're not taking the first-time camper along on that one anyway, right?

Push it. Absolutely. For the reasons eisely and Mark said. (Hey, I'm glad I can agree with you guys sometimes!) Just this past weekend (that is yesterday and the day before) I went on a "cold weather camping trip" and we did NOT have a pack check beforehand -- but on the other hand, we were IN a cabin, with protection against the wind, and a wood-burning stove. (It still got pretty cold.) And in a real pinch, our vehicles were within sight on the bottom of the hill. But if you are definitely not using the cabin, I think the pack checks are a must. I'd also add, for boys who have never done the cold-weather camping before, and especially for any boys who have never camped at all, I would have ADULTS check the packs, not the boys. Or maybe better yet, have an older boy check the inexperienced camper's pack WITH an adult as the failsafe. That's just my suggestion. That would also be my suggestion for any backpacking trip (which it sounds like this is not), regardless of weather. If I remember correctly, when my troop (as a boy) went on its first real backpacking trip in several years, EVERYBODY had to bring in their pack for inspection, and after that it may have just been those who were going on their first backpacker or were below a certain age. I forget the details, but you get the idea. Find yourself 7 miles from anywhere without something you really need... or have a 110-pound 11-year-old carrying 15 more pounds than he really needs to be because he doesn't know how to pack... it's not a good thing.

Earlier I wrote a sentence (actually a phrase at the end of a sentence) that said this about the persons nominated by the current president and confirmed by the Senate with no opposition from Democrats: I find it difficult to believe that with G.W. Bush doing the appointing, some (if not most) of those nominees have been "conservative Christians" and/or outspoken opponents of "abortion rights." when I actually meant this: I find it difficult to believe that with G.W. Bush doing the appointing, some (if not most) of those nominees have not been "conservative Christians" and/or outspoken opponents of "abortion rights." That word "not", it will get you every time. Or me, anyway. Of course, I should have avoided the double negative (or is it really a triple negative) in the first place and said this: I find it difficult to believe that with G.W. Bush doing the appointing, none of those nominees have been "conservative Christians" and/or outspoken opponents of "abortion rights." or even better, this: I am pretty sure that with G.W. Bush doing the appointing, some (if not most) of those nominees have been "conservative Christians" and/or outspoken opponents of "abortion rights." The wonder of grammar. I regret any confusion.

I'm just picking out one subject here, boy-run boards of review. Of course, for those of us who were involved in Scouting at the time of the "big change" in 1972-1973, we know that Scouting adopted boy-run boards of review through First Class. They still existed when I left my old troop in 1976, but no longer existed when I next picked up a handbook in 2002. My guess would be that this went "out" in the late 70s or early 80's when a number of the other early-70's innovations (like taking Camping MB off the Eagle-required list) were un-done. In case my reason for pointing this out is unclear to anyone, it is that the BSA experimented with boy-run BOR's in the lower ranks, evaluated the results, and (relatively quickly I am guessing) decided that it was not a good idea. A troop that adopts this approach now is using a method that was tried, given a chance, and failed. And of course, that is over and above the fact that you are not authorized to do it. And I don't just mean "wrong," which it is. I also mean that someone someday may get "caught" on this when going for Eagle. He will have BOR's for lower ranks signed by someone who is not authorized to sign, and someone at the district level might know someone and start asking questions. (It is unlikely but possible.) Or, Sturgen, does an adult sign off after the boys "vote"? In which case that adult is creating another problem because they are signing off that something happened (a BOR with adult committee members) when it never happened. As for the Eagle issue itself, Sturgen, it looks very much like your troop has added to the requirements. It may seem to make sense within your troop. However, a boy has a right to make Eagle in your troop using the same criteria and requirements as in any other troop -- and that means, if the boy completes the requirements for Eagle at 12, he gets it at 12. If you see boys making Eagle without actually earning it, that is a different issue. You capitalized EARN in the title of your post, and that is the right word to capitalize. Whether 12 or 17+364 days (as was the most recent Eagle in my son's troop, and I am not exaggerating), if you earn it, you should get it and you don't you shouldn't. Inventing a minimum age is not the answer.

OK, I didn't see Bob's latest post until after I posted mine. We have very similar committee-role lists. His basically provides the 2 I was missing. We do not have a Webelos resource position (right now this is being done by the troop secretary who as it happens as also a Webelos leader in one of the nearby packs, and has sons in both, but that will have to be looked at when her second son crosses over in the spring; and our camping/activities person also is the Cubmaster of another nearby pack) or a chaplain (at least not that I have seen; the IH is a minister and attends COH's but nothing else that I have seen) and we have only one fund-raiser a year which is coordinated by one person with assistance from the treasurer. I added public relations which as I said is probably combined with something else in most troops, and which my troop does not have. But we do have the Eagle coordinator. The point is that 13 committee members is not out of line. Also, comparing this to Troop A, if you have 7 boys (some of whom are not advancing and are below First Class) and 10 ASM's, what are all those ASM's doing? Are they just going on camping trips? If so, when they go, they don't seem to be working with the boys on advancement. Same thing for troop meetings, if they are there, what are they doing, sitting around drinking coffee? As I have suggested before, my son's troop has not achieved perfection in any of this. We have 5 ASM's and sometimes some of them ARE just sitting around. We have some boys who are lagging in their advancement. I know of one boy who must be 15 and is Tenderfoot, actually I know he had a Second Class BOR 3 or 4 months ago and "failed" it and does not seem to have had another one. I see him at troop meetings and on camping trips and do not know what the problem is, but it seems to me that the SM and/or one of the ASM's should be making more of an effort to figure out what it is and help the boy resolve it. He is probably not going to become a self-starter overnight. So in other words, I would list my troop as "improving" if there is an official category for that.

Just as an aside here about the 13-member troop committee, I wouldn't call it massive. If I were a CC in a troop with 34 active Scouts (as opposed to just 30+ on the charter some of whom show up once in awhile, as "my" troop has), I wouldn't mind having 12 other committee members and wouldn't have any trouble finding stuff for them to do. If you had 7 active boys, 13 would seem kind of massive, because for one thing, your most likely committee volunteers are parents of boys in the troop. But for 34 active boys, 13 committee members is not so massive. What do they do? There are a lot of roles, that in many troops are combined, but you can have separate people doing them. Off the top of my head: Chair Treasurer Secretary Advancement Training (me) Equipment (works with QM though this could also be an ASM role) Camping/Activities Public Relations (most troops probably don't have a separate person for this, but you can) Membership/Registrar Fundraising (if not part of the Treasurer's role) That's 10 right there. I have seen some lists that include Friends of Scouting coordinator, which in my experience has been part of someone else's role, but that would make it 11. And I could be missing a couple of things. (And I'm not counting the CR as being a committee member, so that would give you another one.) So 2 more gets you to 13. My son's troop at most times has 2 advancement committee members (besides the chair) who have no other roles -- they just rotate through BOR's with some of the other committee members, and one of them also coordinates merit badge counselors and classes, which I know is another issue for another thread, but it's the facts so I'm reporting it. We do have a fund-raising coordinator separate from the treasuer. We also have an Eagle coordinator/advisor on the committee. Between combined roles and people coming and going out, by my count my troop's committee (I mean my son's troop's committee) has about 10 or 11 members right now. If 2 or 3 more showed up and were willing to do BOR's or help the activities chair by doing the reservations/tour permits etc. for half the outings every year, I am sure they would not be turned away and could be given enough to do. I didn't necessarily want to get involved in the rest of the thread; I see where Bob is going with it and agree, the key is having a good, well-planned program, enough leaders and committee members to assist in the planning and carrying-out and all the support functions behind it. If I were troop B, I might tweak the numbers a bit and "re-allocate" one of those committee members to be an ASM (so its 5/12 instead of 4/13) so you have one more person to work with the boys on advancement (or as Bob might put it, to observe when the boys participating in the well-planned program do one of the things contained in the requirements; I haven't observed things flow quite so smoothly or transparently as that, but that's another topic.) But that's a minor detail, I agree with the overall premise of "program, program, program." My son's troop, by the way, is somewhere between Troop A and Troop B. I suspect a lot of troops are. Someday, in some other thread, maybe I will describe how, and how we are working on what needs to be improved.

Very funny, FOG. I said "been to", not "been in", though I guess technically I was "in" it, for a few hours. (Fort Dix federal prison in New Jersey, where the very large rolls of razor ribbon on all sides suggest an un-Club Fed-like apporach.) Counting all levels of government, I have probably been to (or in) about 20 different prisons, jails, "correctional facilities", "detention centers", "holding areas" and "hospitals" (the kind where the "patients" can't check out). I always had a "visitors" badge, though. But I think you already figured that out.

Rooster says: It shouldn't matter how a jurist feels about a controversial issue or even he or she takes a public stance. What matters is whether or not he or she will hold up the law as it is written and/or interpret it reasonably per the Constitution. Well then Rooster, I think you should get yourself elected to Congress so you can help change how both parties deal with nominees of a a president of the opposing party. Until then, both the Republicans and the Democrats will continue to question some nominees about their beliefs on certain issues and how those beliefs may affect their decisions -- and in some cases, play politics with nominations. People who are complaining about it now (like some Republicans, and the writer of that opinionjournal.com article, and Rooster) ought to think back a few years to how things were when there was a Democratic president and a Republican majority in Congress (and the latter still is the case) -- but of course, that is not how the political game is played. When the shoe is on the other foot, history goes out the window. Democrats are telling this country that those people who subscribe to that set of beliefs (i.e., conservative Christians, Orthodox Jews, etc.) are unfit to be federal judges. All Democrats are doing that? Or just some Democrats? If it's a few Democrats on the Senate judiciary committee, and some "liberal" groups here and there, that's not an entire poltical party. And I don't think any Democrat is telling anyone that anyway. As I said before, the Senate has confirmed about 160 out of about 165 judicial nominees, and I find it difficult to believe that with G.W. Bush doing the appointing, some (if not most) of those nominees have been "conservative Christians" and/or outspoken opponents of "abortion rights." And by the way Rooster, since you mention Orthodox Jews, I would be curious to see the list of Orthodox Jews (of which I am not one, by the way) who G.W. Bush has appointed to the federal bench and/or other high federal positions. Yet people of various religious faiths are being penalized for embracing the beliefs taught to them. Again, I think that's "spin." It is not what is really happening. And then of course we get the inevitable pre-emptive anti-counter-spin from Rooster: Liberals who proclaim otherwise are merely propagandizing in order to achieve their own political ends - even if it means circumventing the Constitution. Uh huh, Rooster. In other words, everything you say is the objective truth, but everything your ideological opponents say is "propagandizing in order to achieve their own political ends." Give me a break.

Hunt, I agree. There are a lot of opinions in that article and a lot of "characterization" (I won't call it "twisting") of the facts, but very few actual facts showing that Democratic senators were "persecuting" (or whatever word one wants to use) anyone on the basis of religion. As I said earlier, when religion has even been mentioned, the issue has been the extent to which someone may base their judicial decisions on their religious beliefs instead of on the law. I will say that personally, I don't necessarily approve of every question or every tactic that the Democrats have employed in this battle over judicial confirmations. If some of them have implied that someone who opposes abortion is not a suitable candidate, they are wrong, and in fact of the 160 or so Bush nominations that the Senate has approved without any controversy (as opposed to the 5 or 6 that have made the news), I am sure that many of them are opposed to abortion. So it's a big issue over not much. And anyway, what the Democrats are doing is no different than what the Republicans do. Under Clinton, the Republican-controlled Senate disapproved several nominations for administrative positions and ambassadorships. I remember they did not approve one guy to be ambassador to some little county (Luxembourg, maybe?) because he was gay. I also remember they did not approve someone for civil rights director because he favored affirmative action. So I don't think the Republican side has any basis to complain -- and I also don't think anyone is being disapproved because of their religious beliefs. On the larger issue of whether Christians are being "discriminated against": This a whole trendy thing now, I know there is at least one book out making this claim (by Rush Limbaugh's brother, David) and I hear about it on a conservative talk radio station (WABC New York) all the time. My question would be, since at least 90 percent of the country is Christian, and Christians make up large majorities in Congress and every other branch of government... who exactly is doing the discriminating? Are Christians discriminating against themselves?