[djmcmath]

350 -- finally had a chance to read your speech. Like most senior government types, it read like a lot of buzzwords with some deeper meaning. For the stupid people (like me), I'll try to summarize -- please correct me if I'm wrong. You're suggesting, with this posting, that the problem with the military is that the military-industrial complex has too much power over the rest of the country? That 3.5M people (what is that, a little more than half of our current population) is too much, and that if we continue down this path, we'l find ourselves in an interminable death spiral of building military simply for the sake of building military, and our civilization will fall to it's knees like so many before it because of some sick desire to build military beyond reason? Not that I'm disagreeing with you, or with your post, but I'm trying to clarify.

I've been doing submarines only briefly, in the grand scheme of things. I've run into a couple of people who served on the old boats, but can't think of anyone specifically from the "Valley Joe", sorry. The old boats were a totally different breed than today, of course. Franklin class boats, like your dad served on -- holy cow, that would have been crazy. The height of the cold war, the painfully recent lessons of submarine losses in the 50's, and you're on the front lines in a nuclear ballistic missile sub? I'm thankful to your father -- men like that paved the way for all of us.


Dan