I think you are over weighting the importance of social identity here. Use of social identity is trying to apply to groups of individuals a coherency that only barely applies to individuals. The issues of no two individuals having aligned preferences or interests is what causes the principal/agent problem in the first place, and the larger the group gets the bigger those differences will be. That is the fundamental problem addressed in Public Choice theory, and social identity doesn't solve it. The importance of social identity is thus vastly overrated, an analytical red herring.
The term "identity" has be over-used and abused a lot recently and there are many petty and trivial "identities" out there today but the concept and its utility is still rock solid.
Your language, education, religion and ideology are all social identities. We will work better with people who have the same basic world-view as our own.
One example I could use here is the concept of nepotism in public service in the middle-east. "Why shouldn't I get my brother-nephew-cousin a job in my department? That's what a good man SHOULD do". Is a very cogent argument for a certain sort of person with a certain world-view which could reasonably be called a Social Identity.
Hey you were replying while I was replying, cool! I appreciate you see what I was trying to do, but I also understand Eric's point, especially in the context of his affinity for precision of terms.
I replied to Grant in a way that covers much of this, but in short: what you are calling "social identities" I would call personal attributes, but I agree that we work better with people with the same general culture, expectations, experiences, etc. As you say, it makes things predictable, and to the extent we all like generally the same sort of stuff and accept generally the same sorts of tradeoffs between that stuff, we will get along better than otherwise.
However...
Similar is not exactly the same. People have differing preferences despite having similar personal attributes. I am at least one standard deviation from your average American economics PhD, for instance. Even if you were to find someone extremely similar observable characteristics to me, we would differ quite a bit. We might be more similar than people with very different characteristics, sure, but alignment that solves principal/agent problems requires essentially exact alignment.
It is also worth noting that certain cultures perform very differently, even with shared identities. Grant alludes to that below, related to how certain identities can help mitigate issues around these problems. I agree, though I would call that shared virtues in a culture, not generalized identity. (I feel like we are using the terms in odd ways.)
Identity determines interests. I use the term social identity to highlight the importance of the social aspect, not to imply there isn't an individual component. You can use whatever specific definition of identity you think is appropriate from various fields of psychology (evo/social) and philosophy to make that first statement resonate.
When I'm talking about aligning interests, I'm not talking about aligning them perfectly, only aligning them more effectively. My overall position is that we have institutions employing agents with diametrically opposing interests, and current social dysfunction can be modeled this way. To your point about no two individuals having aligned interests, I disagree. In many contexts interests can be completely aligned, such as in smaller male only groups. I think ideally interests are fully aligned in marriage.
Identity does solve the problem addressed in Public Choice theory, but not in a way I explained, or rather I might have only explained half of it. The already explained bit is alignment of identity to whatever extent that is possible (yes, it is more difficult as groups get larger, and exponentially more difficult as they get larger and more heterogenous simultaneously, hence my partiality for the federal system as designed distributing political power as locally as possible while providing mechanisms to consolidate power to address external threats, although this hasn't really worked so who knows). The other half is for agents who occupy these positions to recognize where their interests may diverge and actively incorporate as a part of their identity a commitment to what we call in the Army "selfless service". This aligns identity in a way that leads to more virtuous/spiritually aligned behavior. After all, the public servant is ostensibly supposed to be serving the publics interests over their own. This is a practice that is central to much virtuous behavior and psychologically and spiritually powerful, but is ignored by most academics who are vicious by nature.
I don't see how that is possibly true, outside of identity meaning "this person, here, whose identity is Grant Smith," an identity that can't be shared (You may be using a hyper specific definition of "identity" that I am not aware of. If so, please identify.)
Even between very similar people with roughly the same interests, their specific interests will misalign. You and I have a great deal in common visa vie "dads with multiple kids and similar political outlooks", but our personal interests differ. Not just in the obvious "if we all liked the same thing we would be fighting over the same woman" way, but even if we were say working for the same company there would be competition over zero sum interactions like who gets a promotion or who gets laid off. We have broad agreement over the rules of the game, but specific interactions within the rules of the game are still going to raise these problems.
You see this with identity politics where Al Sharpton or Jesse Jackson claim to speak for blacks. Their interests wildly diverge from that of the majority of blacks even in the broad sense, and within each sub group there are ever more divisions.
Identity in the sense of "I am the kind of person who does what I am supposed to do instead of what is convenient for me" (as alluded to in your last paragraph) still does not solve the problem of the principal/agent problem. It helps, certainly, but there is still the ever present issue that the principal can not know to what extent the agent is sincere and thus actually aligned with their interests, or even how well the agent understands the interests, and even if there is optimal alignment it cannot be 100%. Arguably even individuals don't get to 100% alignment within themselves across time, but certainly two individuals cannot share the same interests perfectly.
That is just from the agent's side, by the way. The principal can have wildly bad misalignment as well, see Communist Russia.
So no, identity (or virtue or common culture, your use seems to be blending many different ideas) does not solve the Public Choice problem, even if it does mitigate it. Shared goals are never 100% shared, and things break down especially over time as interests and situations change.
Your marriage example should throw up a red flag for you there. Not because many marriages end in divorce. Rather, it is because of how much work marriage between just two people is. Now expand that outwards: how many people would you invite to be part of your marriage? How well would that scale? I am guessing the answer is probably less than "I could make marriage work with a whole town at once". So if marriage is an example of really well aligned "identity" and it can't scale, how does identity solve the problems of collective choice at scale?
Sorry I skipped over your first comment, identity determines interest at whatever echelon, individual to collective. Insofar as there are collective interests, they are determined by collective identity. If you say there is no such thing, consider how we formulate national strategy. We consider the national interest, and this national interest is based on national identity. No national identity, no national interest, no national strategy. So if you say you don't believe in collective interest, then you don't believe in collectives, and of course you will ultimately be dominated and/or exterminated by people who do (even if they only do subconsciously, as that is still enough to coordinate collective action).
Yea, and that is where I contend that you are exactly incorrect. As I pointed out, you can have broad but specific shared interests such as "We would like to not have our trade ships sunk," or "We would like to keep our own stuff and not have people from over there come violently take it." National interest that goes much past that immediately gets bogged down in conflicting definitions and beliefs about what is best.
You can have groups that act together, and that group might focus its group actions on _specific_ goals and interests that act as reasons for people to group together. There is not one overarching set of interests they all share, however, and so there will be tradeoffs made between conflicting sets of interests. Even where their interests do align perfectly, there will be disagreement on how best to achieve those interests.
Hence you can have things like national defense because people all agree on some level about that, even if what optimal national defense looks like is a topic of disagreement. But to say "All Americans want X as a national interest" is at best a sign of never paying attention to debates about national interests or strategy.
You are either stuck using a vague, vibey nonsense definition of identity or saying that collective interests are extremely limited based on the scale of the group.
So I guess I have to ask: how are you defining "identity" in this context, precisely?
Yeah the larger and more heterogenous the group the more difficult aligning interests becomes. I wouldn't think of the alignment of interests in terms of identity being the same, but merely compatible. The principal agent problem becomes a kind of gordian knot with no possible mitigations if there are incompatible/mutually exclusive interests held by principal and agent. I'm really just trying to advance this model as a way of keeping this in mind with minimal cognitive load, not trying to say its a panacea. I don't believe in utopia.
To define American identity is obviously highly contentious because it essentially verbalizes where you think the line between friend and enemy is, and you'll almost certainly exclude people who are really friends and include people who are really enemies in the sense of interest compatibility I described earlier. I don't have the authority to draw such a line, and I can only speculate as to where it falls. That said, as I stated in the article it falls somewhere short of "everyone who is a U.S. citizen" and anyone who thinks just having that piece of paper is evidence enough that someone is "American" in a way that their interests can be expected to be compatible/aligned with everyone else in the political body is mistaken.
I find people reflexively consider this controversial, but if you think of American identity as a continuum rather than dichotomous it makes more sense. I think people can be more or less aligned with any given collective identity, including that of American. Consider, who is more American, a foreign born LGBTQ+ activist who just got their citizenship, or someone with ancestors going back to the revolutionary war? Some would say they are equivalently American, but my point is that this is absurd, and the principal agent problem and efficient self-deception help explain the practical consequences of not making such a distinction.
I don't disagree with any particular points there, but I think before one can argue over whether someone is more or less American one has to define what American even means. What does it mean to be more on one end of the continuum vs the other? Is it just genetics or ancestry, culture, specific values or beliefs? Being in favor of mom and apple pie?
It seems in some ways that the way you are using identity in reverse, with shared interests determining identity. That almost makes more sense, but starts to drift towards "No True Scotsman" territory, as the definition of identity (what it means) and specific identity (what it means to be an X) start to be defined down to what groups shares some sort of interest. I am not sure.
I do note you didn't define "identity" as you use it yet :D so I am patient in case you have something ready to go!
First to resolve a verbal dispute, when I say "solution" I mean it the same way you use "mitigation" here. I'm not trying to say any of this completely solves the problem, only that it can help. I consider them solutions to a problem that obviously can never be completely resolved given the points you've raised.
There is a substantial but subtle difference in my understanding of how this all works that is highlighted by your competition example and discussion of zero sum interactions. That is the really the idea that I am attacking here, but it is so foundational to your background and education I have little hope of shifting your perspective, so I won't try to, I'll just try to explain how I understand it, which you will almost certainly discard immediately.
There is something fundamentally different about cooperation and competition. I don't think people "on the same team" should be competing. I think competing with your teammates is a sort of betrayal of the common purpose you ostensibly share by virtue of the fact that you're on the same team. So to use your company example, I would want YOU to get the promotion and for ME to get laid off if this is what was best for the company, not in terms of profits, but in terms of the purpose of the company. I reject the notion that the purpose of all business is to make a profit, I think it is to serve customers. Even businesses that target the same customers can be thought of not as competing for customers, but cooperating to best serve customers. The thing is, for this to work everyone has to generally share this disposition, have some innate distaste for competing against people they consider friends and allies, and for anyone who engages in behavior that is competitive where it should be cooperative is effectively held accountable. Given the current state of things anyone who takes this approach without those mechanisms in place will be regarded as a sucker who deserves what they get by people who have internalized the sanctity of deracinated individualism on one hand, and those comfortable with rampant nepotism based on social identity regardless of the context/broader purpose in question.
The marriage example is just to demonstrate that interests can overlap entirely at one extreme. The extent of interest overlap is a continuum. I'm just saying that considering how they overlap is one mitigation measure, and keeping in mind that people will deceive themselves into exaggerating the extent of overlap and finding ways to account for that can move the needle along the continuum in a more favorable direction than other kinds of policies/approaches.
This conversation is making me think of Adam Curtis' docuseries "The Trap" that explores the history of game theory, public choice theory, and some of the psychological theories that go along with them positing that the best means of coordinating society in the new globalized world is deracinated individuals competing within a framework of fixed rules. My take is that this kind of works if everyone sees themselves as deracinated individuals, but it exposes everyone who does to predation by people with more coherent and cohesive social identity. I think that is what we are living through, and I'm just trying to come up with ways to address it, which is difficult because rhetorical defenses of deracinated individualism are thoroughly and intentionally embedded to, I argue, protect a small insular elite who see themselves as being in competition with the rest of humanity who can really only be challenged via effective collective action.
Ok, if you want to say shared identities (cultures, beliefs, whatever) mitigate principle/agent problems, contingent on that shared identity being one of "I strive to minimize conflicts of interests" then yea, there is no real disagreement here. It doesn't fix the problem, but it makes it less of a problem than it would be otherwise. Totally with you there.
Your point about competition/cooperation is more worrying. I say worrying because it seems to ignore the possibility that people might disagree on who the best person to be promoted/fired might be, as well as putting an odd moral onus on competition, as though it is always bad. I can see how someone in a military context might see things your way, in so far as e.g. the Army isn't competing with the Navy, but cooperating towards the same end. That does not generalize to human interactions overall, however. Decisions have to be made about who does what, and the questions of who is best to do that given disagreement on the facts have to be answered. That's what competition does.
Writing this response, it occurs to me that you seem to have a very different sense of how different people are than I do. It appears that you are assuming that very similar preferences and understandings (agreement) on facts and relationships is normal or at least easily achievable. Otherwise, it isn't clear to my why you would think that two people might agree on what "best serving the customer" might even mean such that they would cooperate in the manner of your example.
I see people disagreement on facts being a major source of, and requirement for, competition, e.g. one guy thinks the city is best served by putting an ice cream parlor in a corner store location, another thinks a book shop is best. Both can share the goal of best serving the public, but disagree on what that means. Yet there is only one such spot... who gets it?
In a kind of amusing way, you seem to be intuiting what economists call a "social utility function", basically a knowable function whereby if everyone just aligned their behaviors we could maximize the utility (happiness or whatever it means) of everyone. I rather suspect that idea would make you throw up a little in your mouth, but you seem to be arriving at the notion from the other side, as it were.
I understand the worry, but there are ways those issues are addressed culturally that I simply didn't mention. The concept of leadership comes to mind as a way purpose, direction, and motivation is coordinated within groups. Legitimate leaders have authority such that there is actually a recursive relationship between their decisions and the identity of the group they lead. The disagreement over who is best for the promotion is resolved by the decision of a respected leader. The leader picked X, so X was the right pick.
To address your point about competition emerging from disagreements where there is no respected leader to arbitrate, a common condition in the West no doubt, I think this can best be understood in the context of finite and infinite games. As countrymen, we're all ideally cooperating in the infinite game making competition in the various finite games contained within pro-social/beneficial. As long is there is trust we're cooperating in the infinite game then we can all be content to allow competition in finite games to help clarify the facts that you mention. By allowing people into the system that consider themselves opponents in the infinite game, this trust gets shattered and competition becomes a zero sum game of survival at every level where the rules of finite games are bent and broken towards those ultimate ends.
If I may paraphrase your last paragraph to check my understanding, it seems to me you are saying that there are many unwritten cultural rules about what the right or acceptable way to compete is, and what one does or does not do, from small things like don't take all the pennies out of the Take A Penny Leave a Penny tray to big things like it isn't ok to scam stupid people out of their money, and if too many people who defect from those rules (either knowingly or out of ignorance) are inside the society and do not get corrected, things break down.
If that is the case, I say I agree!
The "As countrymen" part is unneeded I think, as we don't need to live close to each other or live under the same government for all that to hold.
Also, "allowing competition" makes me wonder if you didn't take the long round about way to Marxism at some point, in fact a lot of this identity collectivism thing does. Who is allowing competition in some cases and not others? In what sense can there not be competition for scarce things many people want? Whose preferences must be subordinated on whose say so?
Which leads me to the first paragraph. You are describing a leader who is as much a cult leader as anything. Doesn't one's estimation of the quality of a leader depend a great deal on the quality of their decisions? That clearly leaves room for disagreements persisting past the arbitration of the leader, which gets us right back to where we started, no resolution in sight.
Interesting. In general the danger is Trump could NEVER meet rising expectations, especially after decades of abuse- that he’s ending- but it’s not enough. Of course not. We’re only human and We.Want.Blood. 🩸.
However in particular;
- You’re slamming Stu Scheller in the footnote for not pursuing revenge?
Or do I misunderstand?
As for Dan Boingo - I think we aren’t looking at his choices. Or his orders. From Trump.
In the case of the matter of retribution IF and WHEN lies with the President and he is or isn’t at his schedule.
One could reasonably argue the matter of the Coup and the Intelligence and Law Enforcement agencies being involved in domestic coups (going back to Nixon and JFK) is more important.
What Scheller is doing is making Restitution, as opposed to Retribution called accountability.
Actual Accountability would be Joe Biden, Fauci, possibly Lloyd Austin. Biden is beyond any accountability as he’s been senile since he started campaigning in 2019. Austin is probably at deaths door.
Before we demand the lynching of subordinates we can have true accountability at actual mens rea (guilty mind) people , not confused or misled subordinates.
I have personally been put through worse wringers than this… and I am not after revenge.
On the matter of Scheller the policy is restitution not retribution, on the matter of Boingo he’s on Trump’s schedule not the Internet.
My reading of Stu's comment is that accountability of any kind for the unlawful implementation of the military covid vaccine mandate is off the table. That he dismisses the need for accountability with the straw man calling for prison time for all generals is just an effective use of rhetoric. At a minimum there needs to be an investigation, and based on that investigation we might find that the appropriately calibrated accountability is simply a letter of reprimand. As it stands I know for a fact people broke the law, were informed of exactly how they were breaking the law, kept breaking the law and ended up permanently injuring many, and killing some, service members. That is to say nothing about the moral injuries. I care less about Bongino, I understand your point, but my overall assessment is that Trump is subject to the same principal agent problem and susceptibility to efficient self-deception. For what its worth I believe he's earnestly doing what he perceives as what is in the interests of the American people, but as I tried to explain that doesn't necessarily mean much.
I don't want blood, I just don't want the social order to collapse under the weight of misaligned interests. For interests to be aligned there needs to be some form of accountability.
A thorough investigation would be required to establish full context. My sense is that LORs outlining the impact of the mandate on the command and how the commander failed to fulfill their duty to ensure FDA approved vaccine was available (language that was in all of the orders on the Army side) would be sufficient given the impact this would have on status, reputation, and identity. In cases of willful deception demonstrated with hard evidence (emails etc) that resulted in death or severe injury, perhaps appropriate UCMJ charges, but this would probably be rare.
You obey orders, or get out, or we have no military… and perhaps we don’t deserve one.
Faithless people can face danger on their own merits.
Certainly we as a nation are also responsible for our voting? So where do you start or stop.?
Sir you labor under a lie.
It’s called “laws” in the sense of … someone else gets it. Well, then that Agent will then decide what’s got and what’s not. If the principal has a problem with it… they can do it themselves.
And bear the costs.
Become agents.
As far as this nonsense about letters of reprimand… or UCMJ.. this is fantasy. Investigations.
It’s war , not a courtroom drama.
Now if someone burns for the principal or “principle” of justice and cannot accept the Agent’s results they can do it themselves… and face the costs.
Clive did, Smith didn’t.
The East India company conquered and ravaged, looted a civilization- and if Smith didn’t like it , he can do something about it himself. It’s a fact they certainly liked the loot Clive bought them.
…. They just decided to be sensitive from a safe distance about how distasteful it was…
The only problem is the principal’s want to have others do the dirty work, then betray them …
Then let us have no more principals, only agents.
The agents decide.
Stu Scheller lost all but his life, he is the principal, he is the correct agent, he TOOK Agency.
The rest of us mere audience. We can be silent or hecklers, we get to decide nothing…
… unless we reach out and take agency.
And indeed I think we will.
Why shouldn’t it be our turn? We may have to.. in any case. Too many weaklings with mortgages and wives became our “leadership”
… this being what you’re chasing, BTW. You’re in pursuit of weaklings.
Of course they said yes.
No meant ruin, jail, divorce , wife takes the kids. They’d have died in those cages if Trump hadn’t been elected, as would likely he.
They disobeyed orders. The order initiating the covax mandate specified commanders at echelon were responsible for ensuring FDA approved vaccines were available. They weren't. Little known fact is that commanders at echelon who recognized this were able to entirely shield their commands from the mandate. Happened up to the O6 level in some instances. The LORs would be for failing to follow orders and any UCMJ action would only be applied where clearly appropriate under Article 134 based on findings of investigations. So to restate for clarity, commanders executing the mandate disobeyed orders and need to be held accountable for this, as do attorneys who advised them that this was legal. This is all out there in writing, it just gets missed because, you guessed it, efficient self-deception makes the most obvious shit impossible to understand when the truth adversely impacts your perceived interests.
As for your comments on principals and agents I can't tell if I just did a really bad job of making my point or if you just missed it. This isn't some reference to the man in the arena. We're all principals in certain contexts and agents in others unless you're living off the grid in social isolation. If your point is that you shouldn't ever delegate anything and that when people delegate things to you trusting you're advancing your interests you should just do as you please because by God you're an Agent, thats a take I guess, but its one that irreparably destroys the social fabric we depend upon to survive.
On the matter legality … I answered elsewhere… but if you think a witch hunt on matters of law or interpretation are worth it, my good side disagrees.
My nihilist vengeful side applauds your COA because I want the Law exposed as fraud - and cowards, traitors to boot.
BURN IT ALL DOWN.
Difference is I know that means actual fire. Great.
Rock on. 🤘🏻 💀
And burn the precious social fabric too, because it’s all lies and using people. Our social fabric has become denunciations and betrayals, to a degree that would have made Beria blush. By all means expose the fraud. It’s quite time to chase the cops away and settle things honestly.
Let the heavens fall, and Hell reign.
Principal-Agent. If the Principal betrays the faithful Agent , the agent owes the Principal nothing but the full and natural answer to betrayal.
Also he owes the commons the duty of ridding the world of a faithless and unfit principal.
… you may realize you’re talking to a betrayed agent, and there’s a lot of us…
A courtroom drama I can cheer. For me- Mad Max cleansing leading into a restoration of the Pre-Enlightenment Thunderdome justice.
2 men enter, one man leaves. Dueling if you like. Back to basics;
Violence instead of words.
You’re perhaps thinking Nuremberg, I am thinking the necessary antecedent of The Eastern Front.
On the other hand, to give honest counsel, perhaps we let it go, let Trump decide, and rebuild.
Revenge is sacrificed for Restoration.
Now in truth- there’s another analysis I’ll share. We need logistics and we need American industry and infrastructure built in every respect and as it happens DOD is taking lead and Venture Capital is standing side by side, if not leading. The young men rise and finance is greeting with open purse.
Ostensibly China.
Yes, the world is coming for us, we gave it no choice.
However… we’re also coming for each other and the young men rise, because they know they must fight. Each other.
So my ulterior motive here for saying drop this past minor evil… is war comes from every side.
Because we gave them nor each other no choice.
So yes, our interests are mis aligned. Yes.
An alignment comes.
And we need every man, and all the materials we can make.
The social “fabric” is already gone.
This is about survival for America now. Not a moment, match or man to spare.
Trump certainly doesn’t have the Principal Agent problem, he is both.
He is in fact elected specifically as our agent and his principal is his very life. Moreover he is very much not just a President but by name put there to do the best for the nation. He said he’d make America Great Again, not “punish our enemies and reward our friends.” That was another.
Now Trump has a choice of rebuilding- his entire core in public and private life being building- OR XOR (Exclusive Or) pursuing Retribution.
The man who seeks revenge should dig two graves, the other grave in this case would be the nation and we’ll rebuild after our enemies are dead. If however one outsources “Justice” or “alignment of interests ” with another person or institution- then accept the results.
The principal agent problem - well be your own man or live with the agent’s work.
He is absolutely both in different contexts, and the problem exists in every context. To keep it simple, you don't consider the 2M executive branch employees his agents? You don't think some of those employees have interests that aren't aligned? There is obviously massive misalignment and this creates huge problems. This is what I'm talking about, not some abstract decision to have an internal locus of control or something.
Of course we know they do. I will say I’m not going to second guess:
Trump
Veep
His cabinet
DOGE
Big Balls - cuz 🩸
Stu Scheller
Boingono
Or Patel
Most especially Tulsi
I think what we disagree on is method.
I say let Trump decide
He IS the Principal Agent
As well as his appointees etc. we are NOT there or on the spot nor fully informed.
He decides.
Moreover we cannot ignore the picture in Toto.
My estimate is he is fixing the big problem, not going after flunkies.
He is restoring Constitutional government.
Your method seems to be you want Law and punishment.
Problems
1) law? Especially military law ? You’re serious?
They aren’t. About scapegoating and/or ass covering yes. See GITMO. How long?
Worse than worthless.
2) A drama and inquisition to go after tertiary matters and barely tertiary actors, weaklings really would squander resources and introduce distrust and fantasic turbulence as we are trying to reform and rebuild the military when it’s not ready for war.
Perhaps you haven’t been through a witchhunt, I have.
Any unit going through a witchhunt is combat ineffective.
The result would be whitewash or Salem Witchunts and all are drained and unit strained.
The great purge did not improve Soviet Readiness.
3) The nation would be consumed with drama and its already tattered defenses further weakened, and you can forget about rebuilding anything. Its restoration or revenge, choose.
Only one.
Then there’s me; I don’t believe in using the Law as “swatting” and this certainly is…
BTW in war no one’s hands are clean. None.
If nothing else the stay behinds are either shirking or festering they’re denied their honor , or both.
Speaking of Honor our laws preclude Honor, in favor of “process.” That’s real American Law.
The only honor is denying Law a place it doesn’t belong… in our ranks.
And then going to jail like Stu , where he would have perished had the election gone the other way. Along with the J6 prisoners, who were there a 1000 days (without trial by the way) and would be there still.
You apparently have never suffered under the Rules of Engagement. Even when they aren’t nonsensical they are not constant, indeed they change with any major event, the mood of whoever is on duty in the TOC, or especially MEDIA.
Or depending on the last lawyer…
ROE also change retroactively. That means charges because the rules were changed AFTER. Directly unconstitutional.
But legal.
And the system thinks nothing of passing on charges known to be false based on THE MEDIA. See Abu Gharib, Haditha, Derek Chauvin, many others.
The law is not a friend but fickle foe.
I say again if soldiers are punished for obeying orders, especially based on changing political fashions - which they are, just fashion- then we shan’t have and don’t deserve any defense or military at all.
I say this as a complete opponent of the COVID Regime and the poison Vaccine.
An answer on your misaligned interests;
Yes. We all see that.
They will either align with our national choices, leave, or perhaps fight.
It might be wise not to force them to fight if they’d rather quit or fall in line. An Inquisition- don’t delude yourself it’s anything but - forces their hand.
I think you are over weighting the importance of social identity here. Use of social identity is trying to apply to groups of individuals a coherency that only barely applies to individuals. The issues of no two individuals having aligned preferences or interests is what causes the principal/agent problem in the first place, and the larger the group gets the bigger those differences will be. That is the fundamental problem addressed in Public Choice theory, and social identity doesn't solve it. The importance of social identity is thus vastly overrated, an analytical red herring.
I disagree.
The term "identity" has be over-used and abused a lot recently and there are many petty and trivial "identities" out there today but the concept and its utility is still rock solid.
Your language, education, religion and ideology are all social identities. We will work better with people who have the same basic world-view as our own.
One example I could use here is the concept of nepotism in public service in the middle-east. "Why shouldn't I get my brother-nephew-cousin a job in my department? That's what a good man SHOULD do". Is a very cogent argument for a certain sort of person with a certain world-view which could reasonably be called a Social Identity.
Hey you were replying while I was replying, cool! I appreciate you see what I was trying to do, but I also understand Eric's point, especially in the context of his affinity for precision of terms.
I replied to Grant in a way that covers much of this, but in short: what you are calling "social identities" I would call personal attributes, but I agree that we work better with people with the same general culture, expectations, experiences, etc. As you say, it makes things predictable, and to the extent we all like generally the same sort of stuff and accept generally the same sorts of tradeoffs between that stuff, we will get along better than otherwise.
However...
Similar is not exactly the same. People have differing preferences despite having similar personal attributes. I am at least one standard deviation from your average American economics PhD, for instance. Even if you were to find someone extremely similar observable characteristics to me, we would differ quite a bit. We might be more similar than people with very different characteristics, sure, but alignment that solves principal/agent problems requires essentially exact alignment.
It is also worth noting that certain cultures perform very differently, even with shared identities. Grant alludes to that below, related to how certain identities can help mitigate issues around these problems. I agree, though I would call that shared virtues in a culture, not generalized identity. (I feel like we are using the terms in odd ways.)
Identity determines interests. I use the term social identity to highlight the importance of the social aspect, not to imply there isn't an individual component. You can use whatever specific definition of identity you think is appropriate from various fields of psychology (evo/social) and philosophy to make that first statement resonate.
When I'm talking about aligning interests, I'm not talking about aligning them perfectly, only aligning them more effectively. My overall position is that we have institutions employing agents with diametrically opposing interests, and current social dysfunction can be modeled this way. To your point about no two individuals having aligned interests, I disagree. In many contexts interests can be completely aligned, such as in smaller male only groups. I think ideally interests are fully aligned in marriage.
Identity does solve the problem addressed in Public Choice theory, but not in a way I explained, or rather I might have only explained half of it. The already explained bit is alignment of identity to whatever extent that is possible (yes, it is more difficult as groups get larger, and exponentially more difficult as they get larger and more heterogenous simultaneously, hence my partiality for the federal system as designed distributing political power as locally as possible while providing mechanisms to consolidate power to address external threats, although this hasn't really worked so who knows). The other half is for agents who occupy these positions to recognize where their interests may diverge and actively incorporate as a part of their identity a commitment to what we call in the Army "selfless service". This aligns identity in a way that leads to more virtuous/spiritually aligned behavior. After all, the public servant is ostensibly supposed to be serving the publics interests over their own. This is a practice that is central to much virtuous behavior and psychologically and spiritually powerful, but is ignored by most academics who are vicious by nature.
"Identity determines interests."
I don't see how that is possibly true, outside of identity meaning "this person, here, whose identity is Grant Smith," an identity that can't be shared (You may be using a hyper specific definition of "identity" that I am not aware of. If so, please identify.)
Even between very similar people with roughly the same interests, their specific interests will misalign. You and I have a great deal in common visa vie "dads with multiple kids and similar political outlooks", but our personal interests differ. Not just in the obvious "if we all liked the same thing we would be fighting over the same woman" way, but even if we were say working for the same company there would be competition over zero sum interactions like who gets a promotion or who gets laid off. We have broad agreement over the rules of the game, but specific interactions within the rules of the game are still going to raise these problems.
You see this with identity politics where Al Sharpton or Jesse Jackson claim to speak for blacks. Their interests wildly diverge from that of the majority of blacks even in the broad sense, and within each sub group there are ever more divisions.
Identity in the sense of "I am the kind of person who does what I am supposed to do instead of what is convenient for me" (as alluded to in your last paragraph) still does not solve the problem of the principal/agent problem. It helps, certainly, but there is still the ever present issue that the principal can not know to what extent the agent is sincere and thus actually aligned with their interests, or even how well the agent understands the interests, and even if there is optimal alignment it cannot be 100%. Arguably even individuals don't get to 100% alignment within themselves across time, but certainly two individuals cannot share the same interests perfectly.
That is just from the agent's side, by the way. The principal can have wildly bad misalignment as well, see Communist Russia.
So no, identity (or virtue or common culture, your use seems to be blending many different ideas) does not solve the Public Choice problem, even if it does mitigate it. Shared goals are never 100% shared, and things break down especially over time as interests and situations change.
Your marriage example should throw up a red flag for you there. Not because many marriages end in divorce. Rather, it is because of how much work marriage between just two people is. Now expand that outwards: how many people would you invite to be part of your marriage? How well would that scale? I am guessing the answer is probably less than "I could make marriage work with a whole town at once". So if marriage is an example of really well aligned "identity" and it can't scale, how does identity solve the problems of collective choice at scale?
Sorry I skipped over your first comment, identity determines interest at whatever echelon, individual to collective. Insofar as there are collective interests, they are determined by collective identity. If you say there is no such thing, consider how we formulate national strategy. We consider the national interest, and this national interest is based on national identity. No national identity, no national interest, no national strategy. So if you say you don't believe in collective interest, then you don't believe in collectives, and of course you will ultimately be dominated and/or exterminated by people who do (even if they only do subconsciously, as that is still enough to coordinate collective action).
Yea, and that is where I contend that you are exactly incorrect. As I pointed out, you can have broad but specific shared interests such as "We would like to not have our trade ships sunk," or "We would like to keep our own stuff and not have people from over there come violently take it." National interest that goes much past that immediately gets bogged down in conflicting definitions and beliefs about what is best.
You can have groups that act together, and that group might focus its group actions on _specific_ goals and interests that act as reasons for people to group together. There is not one overarching set of interests they all share, however, and so there will be tradeoffs made between conflicting sets of interests. Even where their interests do align perfectly, there will be disagreement on how best to achieve those interests.
Hence you can have things like national defense because people all agree on some level about that, even if what optimal national defense looks like is a topic of disagreement. But to say "All Americans want X as a national interest" is at best a sign of never paying attention to debates about national interests or strategy.
You are either stuck using a vague, vibey nonsense definition of identity or saying that collective interests are extremely limited based on the scale of the group.
So I guess I have to ask: how are you defining "identity" in this context, precisely?
Yeah the larger and more heterogenous the group the more difficult aligning interests becomes. I wouldn't think of the alignment of interests in terms of identity being the same, but merely compatible. The principal agent problem becomes a kind of gordian knot with no possible mitigations if there are incompatible/mutually exclusive interests held by principal and agent. I'm really just trying to advance this model as a way of keeping this in mind with minimal cognitive load, not trying to say its a panacea. I don't believe in utopia.
To define American identity is obviously highly contentious because it essentially verbalizes where you think the line between friend and enemy is, and you'll almost certainly exclude people who are really friends and include people who are really enemies in the sense of interest compatibility I described earlier. I don't have the authority to draw such a line, and I can only speculate as to where it falls. That said, as I stated in the article it falls somewhere short of "everyone who is a U.S. citizen" and anyone who thinks just having that piece of paper is evidence enough that someone is "American" in a way that their interests can be expected to be compatible/aligned with everyone else in the political body is mistaken.
I find people reflexively consider this controversial, but if you think of American identity as a continuum rather than dichotomous it makes more sense. I think people can be more or less aligned with any given collective identity, including that of American. Consider, who is more American, a foreign born LGBTQ+ activist who just got their citizenship, or someone with ancestors going back to the revolutionary war? Some would say they are equivalently American, but my point is that this is absurd, and the principal agent problem and efficient self-deception help explain the practical consequences of not making such a distinction.
I don't disagree with any particular points there, but I think before one can argue over whether someone is more or less American one has to define what American even means. What does it mean to be more on one end of the continuum vs the other? Is it just genetics or ancestry, culture, specific values or beliefs? Being in favor of mom and apple pie?
It seems in some ways that the way you are using identity in reverse, with shared interests determining identity. That almost makes more sense, but starts to drift towards "No True Scotsman" territory, as the definition of identity (what it means) and specific identity (what it means to be an X) start to be defined down to what groups shares some sort of interest. I am not sure.
I do note you didn't define "identity" as you use it yet :D so I am patient in case you have something ready to go!
First to resolve a verbal dispute, when I say "solution" I mean it the same way you use "mitigation" here. I'm not trying to say any of this completely solves the problem, only that it can help. I consider them solutions to a problem that obviously can never be completely resolved given the points you've raised.
There is a substantial but subtle difference in my understanding of how this all works that is highlighted by your competition example and discussion of zero sum interactions. That is the really the idea that I am attacking here, but it is so foundational to your background and education I have little hope of shifting your perspective, so I won't try to, I'll just try to explain how I understand it, which you will almost certainly discard immediately.
There is something fundamentally different about cooperation and competition. I don't think people "on the same team" should be competing. I think competing with your teammates is a sort of betrayal of the common purpose you ostensibly share by virtue of the fact that you're on the same team. So to use your company example, I would want YOU to get the promotion and for ME to get laid off if this is what was best for the company, not in terms of profits, but in terms of the purpose of the company. I reject the notion that the purpose of all business is to make a profit, I think it is to serve customers. Even businesses that target the same customers can be thought of not as competing for customers, but cooperating to best serve customers. The thing is, for this to work everyone has to generally share this disposition, have some innate distaste for competing against people they consider friends and allies, and for anyone who engages in behavior that is competitive where it should be cooperative is effectively held accountable. Given the current state of things anyone who takes this approach without those mechanisms in place will be regarded as a sucker who deserves what they get by people who have internalized the sanctity of deracinated individualism on one hand, and those comfortable with rampant nepotism based on social identity regardless of the context/broader purpose in question.
The marriage example is just to demonstrate that interests can overlap entirely at one extreme. The extent of interest overlap is a continuum. I'm just saying that considering how they overlap is one mitigation measure, and keeping in mind that people will deceive themselves into exaggerating the extent of overlap and finding ways to account for that can move the needle along the continuum in a more favorable direction than other kinds of policies/approaches.
This conversation is making me think of Adam Curtis' docuseries "The Trap" that explores the history of game theory, public choice theory, and some of the psychological theories that go along with them positing that the best means of coordinating society in the new globalized world is deracinated individuals competing within a framework of fixed rules. My take is that this kind of works if everyone sees themselves as deracinated individuals, but it exposes everyone who does to predation by people with more coherent and cohesive social identity. I think that is what we are living through, and I'm just trying to come up with ways to address it, which is difficult because rhetorical defenses of deracinated individualism are thoroughly and intentionally embedded to, I argue, protect a small insular elite who see themselves as being in competition with the rest of humanity who can really only be challenged via effective collective action.
Ok, if you want to say shared identities (cultures, beliefs, whatever) mitigate principle/agent problems, contingent on that shared identity being one of "I strive to minimize conflicts of interests" then yea, there is no real disagreement here. It doesn't fix the problem, but it makes it less of a problem than it would be otherwise. Totally with you there.
Your point about competition/cooperation is more worrying. I say worrying because it seems to ignore the possibility that people might disagree on who the best person to be promoted/fired might be, as well as putting an odd moral onus on competition, as though it is always bad. I can see how someone in a military context might see things your way, in so far as e.g. the Army isn't competing with the Navy, but cooperating towards the same end. That does not generalize to human interactions overall, however. Decisions have to be made about who does what, and the questions of who is best to do that given disagreement on the facts have to be answered. That's what competition does.
Writing this response, it occurs to me that you seem to have a very different sense of how different people are than I do. It appears that you are assuming that very similar preferences and understandings (agreement) on facts and relationships is normal or at least easily achievable. Otherwise, it isn't clear to my why you would think that two people might agree on what "best serving the customer" might even mean such that they would cooperate in the manner of your example.
I see people disagreement on facts being a major source of, and requirement for, competition, e.g. one guy thinks the city is best served by putting an ice cream parlor in a corner store location, another thinks a book shop is best. Both can share the goal of best serving the public, but disagree on what that means. Yet there is only one such spot... who gets it?
In a kind of amusing way, you seem to be intuiting what economists call a "social utility function", basically a knowable function whereby if everyone just aligned their behaviors we could maximize the utility (happiness or whatever it means) of everyone. I rather suspect that idea would make you throw up a little in your mouth, but you seem to be arriving at the notion from the other side, as it were.
I understand the worry, but there are ways those issues are addressed culturally that I simply didn't mention. The concept of leadership comes to mind as a way purpose, direction, and motivation is coordinated within groups. Legitimate leaders have authority such that there is actually a recursive relationship between their decisions and the identity of the group they lead. The disagreement over who is best for the promotion is resolved by the decision of a respected leader. The leader picked X, so X was the right pick.
To address your point about competition emerging from disagreements where there is no respected leader to arbitrate, a common condition in the West no doubt, I think this can best be understood in the context of finite and infinite games. As countrymen, we're all ideally cooperating in the infinite game making competition in the various finite games contained within pro-social/beneficial. As long is there is trust we're cooperating in the infinite game then we can all be content to allow competition in finite games to help clarify the facts that you mention. By allowing people into the system that consider themselves opponents in the infinite game, this trust gets shattered and competition becomes a zero sum game of survival at every level where the rules of finite games are bent and broken towards those ultimate ends.
If I may paraphrase your last paragraph to check my understanding, it seems to me you are saying that there are many unwritten cultural rules about what the right or acceptable way to compete is, and what one does or does not do, from small things like don't take all the pennies out of the Take A Penny Leave a Penny tray to big things like it isn't ok to scam stupid people out of their money, and if too many people who defect from those rules (either knowingly or out of ignorance) are inside the society and do not get corrected, things break down.
If that is the case, I say I agree!
The "As countrymen" part is unneeded I think, as we don't need to live close to each other or live under the same government for all that to hold.
Also, "allowing competition" makes me wonder if you didn't take the long round about way to Marxism at some point, in fact a lot of this identity collectivism thing does. Who is allowing competition in some cases and not others? In what sense can there not be competition for scarce things many people want? Whose preferences must be subordinated on whose say so?
Which leads me to the first paragraph. You are describing a leader who is as much a cult leader as anything. Doesn't one's estimation of the quality of a leader depend a great deal on the quality of their decisions? That clearly leaves room for disagreements persisting past the arbitration of the leader, which gets us right back to where we started, no resolution in sight.
Interesting. In general the danger is Trump could NEVER meet rising expectations, especially after decades of abuse- that he’s ending- but it’s not enough. Of course not. We’re only human and We.Want.Blood. 🩸.
However in particular;
- You’re slamming Stu Scheller in the footnote for not pursuing revenge?
Or do I misunderstand?
As for Dan Boingo - I think we aren’t looking at his choices. Or his orders. From Trump.
In the case of the matter of retribution IF and WHEN lies with the President and he is or isn’t at his schedule.
One could reasonably argue the matter of the Coup and the Intelligence and Law Enforcement agencies being involved in domestic coups (going back to Nixon and JFK) is more important.
What Scheller is doing is making Restitution, as opposed to Retribution called accountability.
Actual Accountability would be Joe Biden, Fauci, possibly Lloyd Austin. Biden is beyond any accountability as he’s been senile since he started campaigning in 2019. Austin is probably at deaths door.
Before we demand the lynching of subordinates we can have true accountability at actual mens rea (guilty mind) people , not confused or misled subordinates.
I have personally been put through worse wringers than this… and I am not after revenge.
On the matter of Scheller the policy is restitution not retribution, on the matter of Boingo he’s on Trump’s schedule not the Internet.
My reading of Stu's comment is that accountability of any kind for the unlawful implementation of the military covid vaccine mandate is off the table. That he dismisses the need for accountability with the straw man calling for prison time for all generals is just an effective use of rhetoric. At a minimum there needs to be an investigation, and based on that investigation we might find that the appropriately calibrated accountability is simply a letter of reprimand. As it stands I know for a fact people broke the law, were informed of exactly how they were breaking the law, kept breaking the law and ended up permanently injuring many, and killing some, service members. That is to say nothing about the moral injuries. I care less about Bongino, I understand your point, but my overall assessment is that Trump is subject to the same principal agent problem and susceptibility to efficient self-deception. For what its worth I believe he's earnestly doing what he perceives as what is in the interests of the American people, but as I tried to explain that doesn't necessarily mean much.
I don't want blood, I just don't want the social order to collapse under the weight of misaligned interests. For interests to be aligned there needs to be some form of accountability.
What are the costs and consequences of what you want done?
In context?
And to who?
What echelon?
A thorough investigation would be required to establish full context. My sense is that LORs outlining the impact of the mandate on the command and how the commander failed to fulfill their duty to ensure FDA approved vaccine was available (language that was in all of the orders on the Army side) would be sufficient given the impact this would have on status, reputation, and identity. In cases of willful deception demonstrated with hard evidence (emails etc) that resulted in death or severe injury, perhaps appropriate UCMJ charges, but this would probably be rare.
Who gets punished for following orders?
And this business of questioning orders?
Language? FDA?
Are you serious?
Rapidly you’ll have no military, or a revolution.
Or mutiny, rightly so.
You obey orders, or get out, or we have no military… and perhaps we don’t deserve one.
Faithless people can face danger on their own merits.
Certainly we as a nation are also responsible for our voting? So where do you start or stop.?
Sir you labor under a lie.
It’s called “laws” in the sense of … someone else gets it. Well, then that Agent will then decide what’s got and what’s not. If the principal has a problem with it… they can do it themselves.
And bear the costs.
Become agents.
As far as this nonsense about letters of reprimand… or UCMJ.. this is fantasy. Investigations.
It’s war , not a courtroom drama.
Now if someone burns for the principal or “principle” of justice and cannot accept the Agent’s results they can do it themselves… and face the costs.
Clive did, Smith didn’t.
The East India company conquered and ravaged, looted a civilization- and if Smith didn’t like it , he can do something about it himself. It’s a fact they certainly liked the loot Clive bought them.
…. They just decided to be sensitive from a safe distance about how distasteful it was…
The only problem is the principal’s want to have others do the dirty work, then betray them …
Then let us have no more principals, only agents.
The agents decide.
Stu Scheller lost all but his life, he is the principal, he is the correct agent, he TOOK Agency.
The rest of us mere audience. We can be silent or hecklers, we get to decide nothing…
… unless we reach out and take agency.
And indeed I think we will.
Why shouldn’t it be our turn? We may have to.. in any case. Too many weaklings with mortgages and wives became our “leadership”
… this being what you’re chasing, BTW. You’re in pursuit of weaklings.
Of course they said yes.
No meant ruin, jail, divorce , wife takes the kids. They’d have died in those cages if Trump hadn’t been elected, as would likely he.
No more Principals.
Only agents.
And Spectators.
Sincerely,
An Agent.
They disobeyed orders. The order initiating the covax mandate specified commanders at echelon were responsible for ensuring FDA approved vaccines were available. They weren't. Little known fact is that commanders at echelon who recognized this were able to entirely shield their commands from the mandate. Happened up to the O6 level in some instances. The LORs would be for failing to follow orders and any UCMJ action would only be applied where clearly appropriate under Article 134 based on findings of investigations. So to restate for clarity, commanders executing the mandate disobeyed orders and need to be held accountable for this, as do attorneys who advised them that this was legal. This is all out there in writing, it just gets missed because, you guessed it, efficient self-deception makes the most obvious shit impossible to understand when the truth adversely impacts your perceived interests.
As for your comments on principals and agents I can't tell if I just did a really bad job of making my point or if you just missed it. This isn't some reference to the man in the arena. We're all principals in certain contexts and agents in others unless you're living off the grid in social isolation. If your point is that you shouldn't ever delegate anything and that when people delegate things to you trusting you're advancing your interests you should just do as you please because by God you're an Agent, thats a take I guess, but its one that irreparably destroys the social fabric we depend upon to survive.
On the matter legality … I answered elsewhere… but if you think a witch hunt on matters of law or interpretation are worth it, my good side disagrees.
My nihilist vengeful side applauds your COA because I want the Law exposed as fraud - and cowards, traitors to boot.
BURN IT ALL DOWN.
Difference is I know that means actual fire. Great.
Rock on. 🤘🏻 💀
And burn the precious social fabric too, because it’s all lies and using people. Our social fabric has become denunciations and betrayals, to a degree that would have made Beria blush. By all means expose the fraud. It’s quite time to chase the cops away and settle things honestly.
Let the heavens fall, and Hell reign.
Principal-Agent. If the Principal betrays the faithful Agent , the agent owes the Principal nothing but the full and natural answer to betrayal.
Also he owes the commons the duty of ridding the world of a faithless and unfit principal.
… you may realize you’re talking to a betrayed agent, and there’s a lot of us…
A courtroom drama I can cheer. For me- Mad Max cleansing leading into a restoration of the Pre-Enlightenment Thunderdome justice.
2 men enter, one man leaves. Dueling if you like. Back to basics;
Violence instead of words.
You’re perhaps thinking Nuremberg, I am thinking the necessary antecedent of The Eastern Front.
On the other hand, to give honest counsel, perhaps we let it go, let Trump decide, and rebuild.
Revenge is sacrificed for Restoration.
Now in truth- there’s another analysis I’ll share. We need logistics and we need American industry and infrastructure built in every respect and as it happens DOD is taking lead and Venture Capital is standing side by side, if not leading. The young men rise and finance is greeting with open purse.
Ostensibly China.
Yes, the world is coming for us, we gave it no choice.
However… we’re also coming for each other and the young men rise, because they know they must fight. Each other.
So my ulterior motive here for saying drop this past minor evil… is war comes from every side.
Because we gave them nor each other no choice.
So yes, our interests are mis aligned. Yes.
An alignment comes.
And we need every man, and all the materials we can make.
The social “fabric” is already gone.
This is about survival for America now. Not a moment, match or man to spare.
Trump certainly doesn’t have the Principal Agent problem, he is both.
He is in fact elected specifically as our agent and his principal is his very life. Moreover he is very much not just a President but by name put there to do the best for the nation. He said he’d make America Great Again, not “punish our enemies and reward our friends.” That was another.
Now Trump has a choice of rebuilding- his entire core in public and private life being building- OR XOR (Exclusive Or) pursuing Retribution.
The man who seeks revenge should dig two graves, the other grave in this case would be the nation and we’ll rebuild after our enemies are dead. If however one outsources “Justice” or “alignment of interests ” with another person or institution- then accept the results.
The principal agent problem - well be your own man or live with the agent’s work.
In short nonsense.
Adam Smith you know was very much a child.
Clive and The East India company were men.
He is absolutely both in different contexts, and the problem exists in every context. To keep it simple, you don't consider the 2M executive branch employees his agents? You don't think some of those employees have interests that aren't aligned? There is obviously massive misalignment and this creates huge problems. This is what I'm talking about, not some abstract decision to have an internal locus of control or something.
Of course we know they do. I will say I’m not going to second guess:
Trump
Veep
His cabinet
DOGE
Big Balls - cuz 🩸
Stu Scheller
Boingono
Or Patel
Most especially Tulsi
I think what we disagree on is method.
I say let Trump decide
He IS the Principal Agent
As well as his appointees etc. we are NOT there or on the spot nor fully informed.
He decides.
Moreover we cannot ignore the picture in Toto.
My estimate is he is fixing the big problem, not going after flunkies.
He is restoring Constitutional government.
Your method seems to be you want Law and punishment.
Problems
1) law? Especially military law ? You’re serious?
They aren’t. About scapegoating and/or ass covering yes. See GITMO. How long?
Worse than worthless.
2) A drama and inquisition to go after tertiary matters and barely tertiary actors, weaklings really would squander resources and introduce distrust and fantasic turbulence as we are trying to reform and rebuild the military when it’s not ready for war.
Perhaps you haven’t been through a witchhunt, I have.
Any unit going through a witchhunt is combat ineffective.
The result would be whitewash or Salem Witchunts and all are drained and unit strained.
The great purge did not improve Soviet Readiness.
3) The nation would be consumed with drama and its already tattered defenses further weakened, and you can forget about rebuilding anything. Its restoration or revenge, choose.
Only one.
Then there’s me; I don’t believe in using the Law as “swatting” and this certainly is…
BTW in war no one’s hands are clean. None.
If nothing else the stay behinds are either shirking or festering they’re denied their honor , or both.
Speaking of Honor our laws preclude Honor, in favor of “process.” That’s real American Law.
The only honor is denying Law a place it doesn’t belong… in our ranks.
And then going to jail like Stu , where he would have perished had the election gone the other way. Along with the J6 prisoners, who were there a 1000 days (without trial by the way) and would be there still.
You apparently have never suffered under the Rules of Engagement. Even when they aren’t nonsensical they are not constant, indeed they change with any major event, the mood of whoever is on duty in the TOC, or especially MEDIA.
Or depending on the last lawyer…
ROE also change retroactively. That means charges because the rules were changed AFTER. Directly unconstitutional.
But legal.
And the system thinks nothing of passing on charges known to be false based on THE MEDIA. See Abu Gharib, Haditha, Derek Chauvin, many others.
The law is not a friend but fickle foe.
I say again if soldiers are punished for obeying orders, especially based on changing political fashions - which they are, just fashion- then we shan’t have and don’t deserve any defense or military at all.
I say this as a complete opponent of the COVID Regime and the poison Vaccine.
An answer on your misaligned interests;
Yes. We all see that.
They will either align with our national choices, leave, or perhaps fight.
It might be wise not to force them to fight if they’d rather quit or fall in line. An Inquisition- don’t delude yourself it’s anything but - forces their hand.
Respect 🫡
Think it over.
“Who are we, what do we want, and how do we work together to achieve it without being destroyed by betrayal? “
Well. This could have just been put at top.
The answer to betrayal isn’t a matter of legality.
So how badly do We Want it? And what is it that we want?
We. Well.
(Yes you hear the Barbarian Pirate 🏴☠️ 💀chuckling. Yes.)
How bad you want it?