By popular demand.
And Now For Something Completely Different
When I read the Washington Post story on the FBI’s struggle to find Arabic proficient agents this morning, it occurred to me again that what the country needs with this long war ahead is an academy dedicated to producing law enforcement/homeland security professionals who arrive at their first job with a skills package that includes the languages and technology training that the modern FBI/CIA/NSA/Homeland Security Agency need in alrge numbers. Recruiting from college campuses will always be necessary, just as it is for the military services who then send the able would-be officers off to OCS of one sort or another.
But if you want and need a particular type of young professional, the quickest and most secure way to get them is to buy them as the military does via the service academies. The midshipmen and cadets get a free education. The country gets their service for at least five years, and often for their entire careers.
The president should ask Congress to work with him to establish such an academy and to staff it and enroll a class asap. (No tenure for the faculty, please!) There are a legion of superb uniformed faculty at the academies who can get such a school opened, and scores of retired or nearing retirement professionals from the agencies that would be looking to the new academy for recruits who can assist in designing the specialized curriculum.
And Arabic, Chinese, Farsi or some other critical language skill would not be an elective, but a required course depending on the needs of the country’s law enforcement/counterterrorism agencies.
An interesting idea…
And Now For Something Completely DifferentPost + Comments (40)
Open Thread
If a tree falls in a forest and I’m too busy to blog it, it still crushed a squirrel. Discuss.
RIP R.W. Apple
An institution has passed:
R. W. Apple Jr., who in more than 40 years as a correspondent and editor at The New York Times wrote about war and revolution, politics and government, food and drink, and the revenge of living well from more than 100 countries, died early this morning in Washington. He was 71.
The cause was complications of thoracic cancer.
With his Dickensian byline, Churchillian brio and Falstaffian appetites, Mr. Apple, who was known as Johnny, was a singular presence at The Times almost from the moment he joined the metropolitan staff in 1963. He remained a colorful figure as new generations of journalists around him grew more pallid, and his encyclopedic knowledge, grace of expression — and above all his expense account — were the envy of his competitors, imitators and peers.
He led an interesting life.
Open Thread
Joementum Comes to PJ
This actually is kind of interesting- PJ Media interviewed Joe Lieberman.
And before the catcalls start about me bowing to my corporate masters, I like the way things have evolved at PJ as far as the design.