military@att.att.com (Bill Thacker, moderator) (01/21/89)
Forgive me, readers, for I have sinned. The current debate over the Libyan shootdown has taught me a valuable lesson: if I allow any political statements to be made, I have to allow them all. My policy to date has been to allow political statements so long as the article contained something relevant to military technology. This was the case for most of the postings about the Libyan affair. I felt it would be better to accept some politics than the reject the articles and force the authors to suffer a delay in their posting, which would upset the "rhythm" of the group. I now see the error in that logic; in the past few days, I've had to reject a half-dozen purely political responses, leaving me feeling that I'm suppressing one side of the argument by giving the other viewpoint "the last word." Henceforth, any submission containing *unnecessary or abrasive* political commentary will be summarily rejected, and returned to the author together with suggestions for making it more palatable. "Unnecessary" statements are amply illustrated by much of the Libyan shootdown traffic; as a rule, if the politics do not directly interact with weapons technology, they are unnecessary in this group. "Abrasive" statements are typified by the recent posting "Are Carriers Obsolete ?", which made reference to "the attempt to assassinate Khaddafy," meaning the US bombing of Libya. At this point, allow me to recommend to those wishing to discuss the political ramifications of this incident that this topic is currently active in talk.politics.misc. I intend to be quite summary and arbitrary in my treatment of these matters. To be sure your posting is acceptable, either leave politics out completely, or be very careful to state political issues in as neutral a manner as possible. This will prevent excessive delays in the posting of your submissions. - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - Bill Thacker moderator, sci.military military@att.att.com "War is a matter of vital importance to the State; the province of life or death; the road to survival or ruin. It is mandatory that it be thoroughly studied." - Sun Tzu