Defense Articles

Self defense comes in many different forms. From the Karate Gi to military fatigues or biker boots, self defense styles and philosophies wear many labels and uniforms. And depending upon the form it takes, self defense can be considered an art, a science, a sport, or a combination of all three.

In reality, self defense is a broad brush used to paint the connecting dots between hundreds of different branches of fighting styles and techniques. And what distinguishes self defense from aggressive combat is sometimes difficult or impossible to pinpoint, because within each confrontation there are many miniature battles and contests. When you’re protecting yourself…THAT is self defense. And sometimes attacking an opponent with proactive aggressive tactics is realistic self defense, even if it takes the form of an offensive assault.

Ultimately, pure self defense is designed to protect us from an attack, so it is essentially a system of counter-attacks or reactions to force. But if someone throws a punch and we block it with enough force, we might break their arm, making self defense rather violent…even in the eyes of the court.

How many times do we hear about a court case involving a killing that was done in self defense? The legal system defines self defense with a narrow interpretation, and since those who practice self defense are often subjected to legal scrutiny, it is a good idea to study your local laws at the same time that you study martial arts or another form of self defense training.

What you learn from attorneys might save you in court. And staying out of jail is at least as important in terms of true self defense as a Bruce Lee jab.

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Jeff Anderson is President of the International Society of Close Quarter Combatants, a member-based organizaton offering REAL self defense training to its members via…

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Whether you live in a small rural area or a bustling city, the need for self defense can occur at any time. You never know when an unfortunate situation may present itself and may call for quick action, including that of self defense.

There are a number of instructors who teach self defense classes in order to help educate individuals with how to protect themselves in certain situations. Class demonstrations and active participation are both a part of self defense classes, which are often held in the evening to ensure a convenient time when most people are finished with work.

For individuals who do not have the time, money or the geographical location to participate in self defense classes, there are books and videos that may help to educate in the same manner. Although neither of these methods actually test your knowledge with practice and hands-on training, they can help to instill basic knowledge of how to react in a dangerous situation.

The techniques learned in self defense training are to be used for that purpose only and should not be bragged about to others. The decision to learn self defense is a private choice that should not necessarily be broadcast to anyone other than family and close friends. The best source of self defense is the knowledge that can be kept private. With that being said, it is ideal if family and/or friends can take self defense training together. This will provide for a more comfortable learning environment and may result in a better understanding or the concept.

Even with the knowledge of physical self defense, perhaps the best mode is that of common sense. By carefully selecting the times that you are out, not following an exact routine and choosing friends wisely, you will help to lessen the chances of ever needing to put your self defense training to use. However, if the unfortunate does occur, it is good to have the peace of mind in knowing that you can and will defend yourself at a moments notice and in any situation.

For information on self defense classes in your area, you may be able to contact city hall or stay tuned to the local newspaper for scheduling. If you prefer books and/or videos on the subject of self defense, these are readily available online from a variety of internet specialty stores. In addition, some areas may post upcoming self defense class schedules on the internet.

Based on recent threats to the U.S. homeland and global threats to U.S. interests, there seems to be a surge in missions involving homeland defense and expeditionary operations, all of which fall under the umbrella of “operations other than war.” It is often said that the military must prepare for future threats in terms of training, doctrine, and force structure, and our Army has always adapted, albeit mostly reactively, to changes in the threat environment.

In Military Organizations for Homeland Defense and Smaller-Scale Contingencies, Kevin D. Stringer provides a proactive solution to the new security requirements by suggesting that the U.S. Army should focus on developing specific kinds of brigade-size units, not general types, to conduct stability operations. Toward that end, Stringer combines Colonel (Retired) Douglas MacGregor’s concept of joint task forces/brigades and Lieutenant Colonel Richard D. Hooker’s proposal of educating leaders in accordance with career tracks and unit missions. Stringer’s “specialty brigades” would be assigned key stability missions such as domestic authority support, humanitarian assistance and disaster relief, counter-drug operations, arms control, noncombatant evacuation, peacekeeping, peace enforcement, show of force, counterinsurgency support, and even the more traditional attacks and raids.

To arrive at his optimum brigade model for stability operations, Stringer compares units from nine countries (Sweden, Norway, Israel, Britain, Denmark, Germany, Rhodesia, Soviet Union, and Colombia). This is where his analysis seems strongest.

Stringer also calls for a clear delineation of duties between active-duty and Guard/Reserve brigades, with the active concentrating on external threats and the Guard/Reserve focusing on domestic ones. Although somewhat controversial, this proposal falls at least partly in line with recommendations by the Hart-Rudman Commission and the Gilmore Panel, both of which urged that the National Guard be assigned homeland security as a primary mission.

On the debit side, Stringer does not fully address the issue of transforming while conducting combat operations, nor does he consider the political or financial impacts of restructuring and retraining. However, placed against the book’s fresh and innovative recommendations, these shortcomings seem more like quibbles than qualms. Ultimately, and most important, Stringer erects a strong foundation for future decisions about how we should transform our Army to face domestic emergencies and emerging threats. His book could become the benchmark for future publications addressing these issues.

Writing the history of a large government institution is always a challenging task, but the challenge is increased when the head of the institution is a controversial figure whose dramatic actions are difficult to assess outside the organizational context in which they occurred. Seen in this light, The McNamara Ascendency, the official history of the Office of the Secretary of Defense during the first four years of Robert S. McNamara’s tenure, is a remarkable achievement.

The authors begin with a mundane but necessary discussion of McNamara’s organizational changes, to include the creation of various joint organizations (Defense Intelligence Agency, Defense Logistics Agency, et al.) and the implementation of the Planning-Programming-Budgeting System, McNamara’s attempt to eliminate duplication between the military services by budgeting along functional lines–general war offensive forces, general purpose forces, sealift, and airlift forces, etc. Inevitably, these changes produced conflict between a defense secretary with strongly held ideas and the military and congressional leaders whose opinions he disregarded. This portion of the study almost demands that the reader draw comparisons to Donald Rumsfeld’s second stint as secretary of defense. The authors conclude that although these clashes cost McNamara politically, he (like Rumsfeld for more than five years) was able to prevail because of strong presidential support and his own enormous pragmatism and ability.

Thereafter, the bulk of the book focuses on McNamara’s role in the issues of the day, including the Berlin Wall and attendant partial mobilization, the two crises over Cuba, the continuing issue of Laotian neutrality, and the inexorable U.S. slide toward involvement in Vietnam. Again, the historical parallels to Rumsfeld are unavoidable, as McNamara remained confident that the Vietnamese Communists would be defeated even as he tried (although vainly) to minimize and reduce U.S. troop commitments in the war zone.

Ten years after Congress ordered federal agencies to have outside auditors review their books, neither the Defense Department nor the newer Department of Homeland Security has met even basic accounting requirements, leaving them vulnerable to waste, fraud and abuse.

An Associated Press review shows that the two departments’ financial records are so disorganized and inconsistent that they have repeatedly earned “disclaimer” opinions, meaning that they simply cannot be fully audited.
The Federal Financial Management Improvement Act of 1996 requires, among other things, that the financial systems of major federal agencies “comply substantially” with generally accepted accounting standards. Each year, those agencies are required to release results of outside audits.

The AP review of financial statements from the federal government’s 15 executive departments shows that most pass their audits, although many agencies — including NASA, the Coast Guard and FEMA — have been frequently cited for serious accounting errors.

The entire Homeland Security Department, with a $35 billion budget this fiscal year, passed its first audit in 2003 with strong stipulations but has failed every one since.

And the Defense Department, with a $460 billion budget this fiscal year, has never even come close to passing. Because that department makes up at least 20 percent of all federal spending, the entire federal government also has failed its audits since the congressional mandate took effect.

Failing an audit in any other venue could have dire consequences - - a public company’s stock could plummet, state and local governments could see bond and credit ratings sink. But for the federal government, effects are less direct because the U.S. Treasury is a guaranteed funding source.

Still, Tina Jonas, undersecretary and chief financial officer of the Department of Defense, and David Norquist, chief financial officer at the Homeland Security Department, agree that a disclaimer on an audit leaves their agencies vulnerable to waste and fraud. Both said they have other checks in place aimed at controlling how money is spent but also acknowledged that resolving the audit problems would save their agencies money.

“The consequence to the public is the federal budget is conceivably larger than it needs to be. And there’s no way of knowing if it can’t even be audited,” said Ronald W. Johnson, a senior vice president at RTI International, a nonprofit research institute in Research Triangle Park, N.C. “Even if there are no financial consequences, there are political consequences.”

For example, federal officials regularly face considerable fire from Congress at budget time for failing to balance their books.

“The inability of Defense and Homeland Security to pass financial audits is costing taxpayers dearly. There is no accountability for billions in wasteful spending,” said Rep. Henry Waxman, D-Calif., chairman of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee. “Private contractors are getting rich, military equipment can’t be tracked and fraud is growing. The departments seem incapable of providing even the most basic level of accountability by balancing their financial books.”

Robert Dacey, chief accountant for the Government Accountability Office, characterized the financial affairs of the two departments as “a pretty consistent mess.”

Jonas concedes the Department of Defense has a larger problem than most other federal agencies because of its mission, size and historical resistance to keeping its books.

“I think about this as if we have an old house, and we’ve got really bad plumbing and really bad wiring, and we have to pass an inspection on stuff, so we have to modernize,” she said.

At last count, accounting at the Defense Department is performed in 4,000 different business systems, Jonas said. And in its most recent audit, the department acknowledged that it had more than $270 million worth of unsupported accounting entries.

Jonas noted that there also have been what she called “significant successes.” In 2001, the Pentagon had hundreds of inoperable accounting systems and no data standards. This year, she said, it received a clean audit opinion on $215 billion, or 15 percent, of its assets and $967 billion, or 49 percent, of its liabilities.

Established in 2002, the Department of Homeland Security faces slightly different challenges. Norquist, the agency’s third chief financial officer, said that despite recent problems, officials have “a number of checks on our numbers and our budgets.”

What there isn’t, however, is a central financial management manual — something all other federal agencies have — that would enable auditors to check if Homeland Security is even meeting its own policies.

Nor is there a central accounting system: In 2005, after spending $52 million, DHS dropped a $229 million contract with BearingPoint to develop a single software accounting system after it became obvious it wasn’t going to work. The department now plans to base its systems on those already in place at the Transportation Security Administration or Customs and Border Protection.

Caption: Paul VanSant, 24, a junior, and Erin Byrum, 23, a graduate student, sign a book in front of a makeshift campus memorial April 16 at Virginia Tech in Blacksburg, Va. A gunman, later identified as a Virginia Tech student, shot dozens of people and killed 32 before killing himself at the university earlier that day. Writing about the tragedy, Jesuit Fr. William J. Byron, a former president of The Catholic University of America in Washington, said there “is no defense against malice in our world. But preparation is always possible. … The power of faith and religion to ready the human spirit to withstand any assault, physical or psychological, cannot be overestimated. … Liturgically–especially sacramentally–the believer must be helped to heal in the broken places.” Campus ministry centers and nearby parish, Byron wrote, “provide the space and facilitate the reflection that students need if they are to permit sacramental grace and the interpretative framework provided by the Christian Gospel to work the wonders they are capable of working.”

Global perspectives on social issues

K5077

Simon public affairs and law, American U.) and Ahn-Redding (criminal justice, High Point U.) examine and compare the criteria and procedures surrounding the defense of insanity across 22 countries. The consider such aspects as whether the burden of proof is on the defense or prosecution, whether beyond a reasonable doubt in needed or just a preponderance of the evidence, whether a judge or jury decides, the role of experts, and what happens to a defendant who is found not guilty by reason of insanity.

Falling upwards; essays in defense of the imagination.

Siegel, Lee.

Basic Books

2006

337 pages

$25.00

Hardcover

NX65

Cultural critic and essayist Siegel has published pieces in such prominent American periodicals as Harper’s, The New Republic (where he is a senior editor), Time, The Atlantic, The New Yorker, and The New York Times. Here he collects 21 of those essays commenting on such diverse cultural products as the Harry Potter books, the plays of Anton Chekhov, the television shows The Sopranos and Sex and the City, Stanley Kubrick’s film Eyes Wide Shut, and a biography of Saul Bellow. Throughout the essays he celebrates those works with imagination, those that display artistic authenticity and integrity, and denigrates those that are the products of an increasingly commercialized culture. His motto as a cultural critic is to “do unto art as what you would have art do unto you.”

The gun business isn’t a hide-bound industry governed by old New England stoicism any more. It’s taking to computers with fervor. Even small dealers are computerizing. And it’s easy now.

It surprised me how many software packages are tailored to the needs of gun dealers. I found four at the SHOT Show this year, and got information on another.

The adage about walking a mile in a man’s moccasins is especially true when you’re talking about computer programs. It takes a while to learn the basic functions. Then you find capabilities you didn’t know about whenever you try to do something a little different. What I learned about software for gun dealers is only a first impression. The programs discussed have features I didn’t find. But you’ll find them as you use the program.

So, consider this an introduction, an overview of software packages for gun dealers. It’s not a critical evaluation because that depends on what you want your software to do, and on how comfortable you feel with the way each one works. Nor is it a comprehensive review of all the point-of-sales systems offered. With hundreds of standard POS systems available, that task would be massive.

SHOTGUN

After installation, it literally took only a few minutes of reading the manual and looking into its many functions before I was actually using the program. It is menu driven so you don’t have to guess what to do. The screen tells you to move the cursor with up and down arrows to select items, but you can take a shortcut by simply pressing a number key corresponding to the menu item, and press ENTER.

Most of your day to day functions are listed on Main Menu #1. Counter sales, mail order sales, ship and invoice mail orders, accounts receivable, mailing list, customer file, vendor file, more function, and exit are the options. That’s a bunch to start with, but there are submenus defining functions within each of these choices.

The counter person will choose item 1, counter sales. If he makes a cash sale and you don’t care who the buyer is, he simply creates a temporary customer, enters the items sold, and the program picks up information on description. If it’s a firearm he’s selling, he must first go to the customer file and enter the customer’s information. But if it’s a repeat customer, the information is already there. You can update the file. Or just go back to counter sales and choose the option to sell an item.

The screen shows you a form. Enter an existing customer’s ID and his information is attached to the record automatically. Then you can itemize the items bought, make, model, serial number, and how it was paid. Then a lot of things happen. Since you’re selling the item listed, it’s deducted from your inventory and entered into your sales history files. If it’s a charge sale, it’s added to accounts receivables. In any case, your business records are updated. If it’s a firearm, your BATF record is updated, and you can associate the Form 4473 number with the transaction.

The other way to sell items is by mail order and it works a little differently. Rather than updating your files at the time of receipt printing, as counter sales does, entering the mail order only allocates inventory. The inventory is reduced and other files updated when the order is actually shipped in another section of the program.

But that’s not all you have to do in entering a mail order. You need to print out the red on white tags on UPS-COD orders, and/or a post card to confirm the order to the customer. Shotgun does this for you, using the work file in use.

The program is now fully bar code capable, the cash drawer reconciliation can account for all money in and out of the till, rather than just counter sales. You may create BATF acquisition entries without affecting inventory so you can handle customer repairs. And there are more enhancements planned for release later this year.

More than 50 programs make up the Shotgun package. Since they’re inter-related, you don’t have to enter information that’s already there. When you receive a shipment from your supplier, you add it to inventory and the program takes care of it from then on. In a word, Shotgun remembers all of your business activities and provides you with accurate reports for making good business decisions. All you need is any MS/PC-DOS type computer.

QUIKFIRE

QuikFire is a BATF compliant record keeping system, an inventory of current and disposed firearms, a costing manager, and a customer information file. It was written to be straight forward and easy to use. It was developed by gun dealers, for gun dealers.

Information is kept in two databases, like file cabinets. One holds information relating to gun transactions; the other, customer information. Each can be divided into different “drawers” organized in different ways. The first might be sorted by an individual’s Last Name, the second drawer by Company name, the third drawer by State.

U.S. Venture Capital Companies and Contacts includes information on 440 venture capital firms. The firms’ biotechnology company portfolios and funding stages, as well as helpful indexes, are also included.

The first-ever 2003 European Biotechnology VC Directory: European Venture Capital Companies and Contacts has similar data on 231 VC firms in Europe.

In addition, BioAbility recently produced a third book, BioDefense and Homeland Security, Funding and Resource Guide, in January 2003 to help biotechnology companies, research labs, corporations and academic researchers understand how they may contribute to the U.S. biodefense effort.

This resource guide includes details on biodefense programs and contacts at many government agencies. Billions of dollars of research funding will be available in 2003 for this monumental endeavor.