Brought on by too much work, this rather interesting essay, and who knows what else, it occurred to me that D20 Modern is far too alone among games. We could have a D20 Postmodern, where the players as a group transform ("the death of the author") the sequence of ordinary events described by the GM into a narrative arc by imposing the world-view of "adventurers;" D20 Epic, where the ultimate ending is written in advance and known, like the laws of the gods, to all the characters, who must then live their lives knowing what the ultimate ending will be; and similarly D20 Tragedy, Comedy, Picaresque Romance, and so on.

We all play these games, of course, but it would still be amusing to form up a list of them all, and see if conversely there are some characteristic modes of RPG's which could be translated into unusual modes for other forms of storytelling.

(Hmm... is it just me, or does D20 Modern seem tailor-made for a game based on Gravity's Rainbow?)

And yes, I realize this is elaborate nonsense. What can I say, I'm sleep-deprived...

The Heimskringla is a remarkably good read. It's a history of the kings of various bits of Scandinavia, from Oðin's time up to the author's present day, in the late 11th century. But despite being a medieval text, it's just plain fun to read, and Snorri Sturluson (the author, one of the great scholars and politicians of his day, and possessor of a great-sounding name) does his best to give a real scholarly analysis, especially of the parts of the history that are furthest in the past and so hardest to verify. It's got a very modern feel to it.

Besides, any history book with chapter titles like "King Fjolnir Drowns in a Mead Vat" can't be that bad.

A scholar once made a deal with the Devil for, among other things, an "annus mirabilis." He hadn't read the contract very carefully and the Devil omitted an "n," leaving him with a talking donkey. "It could be worse," he noted, "I could have ended up shitting gold bricks for the rest of my life."

Thus satisfied of the Devil's good will, he set himself to payment, one soul to be damned. Knowing the Devil would claim an impure soul had gone to Hell on its own power, he set himself to corrupting the innocent in order to avoid damnation.

In the past two years, I've heard several soldiers say that they dislike civilians questioning the course of the war, since if the soldiers aren't allowed to do so, why should someone who isn't even involved?

This is part of a broader question: Can civilians legitimately question the war? Or is it just armchair generalling, and somewhat hypocritical?

This is a very important question, and it's worth answering. My short answer is, that's the civilians' job.

The long answer is:

In our military, we have a rather unusual division between the officers and the enlisted. (Most other militaries - those that didn't derive from England - do this differently) The officers' responsibility is to keep the "big picture" in mind, and among other things to question orders and refuse them if they're not legitimate or moral. The enlisted soldiers' responsibility is to follow these orders to the best of their ability. However, we are living in an age of small-group operations rather than giant infantry movements across the countryside. In most cases in the field, an E6 may be far and away the most senior person present - since we insist on commissioning people right out of college. An NCO in a position like this can't rely solely on the judgement of a junior officer; he or she needs training in how to interpret orders and decide when to refuse them at least as thorough as an O1 or an O2.

So my answer to the original question is, the soldiers do and should question the course of the war, especially on the scales for which they are responsible. An officer or an NCO is responsible for the moral conduct of himself (or herself - I'm just going to use one pronoun, bear with me. You know what I mean.) and everyone under his command. And what is a civilian's job? Well, a civilian needs to keep well-informed about the course of the war as a whole, and offer counsel to the President when something is wrong. And yes, sometimes this can mean saying that something is a bad idea and we should stop doing it - not as an allegation of incompetence (although those are fair game too! Someone has got to watch for it.) but as a simple question of policy.

That's a basic point in our system of government: A citizen's responsibility isn't just to vote for someone and then not pay attention to what they do, but rather to stay part of the process, to keep informed of the progress of everything - especially a war! - and apply pressure to make sure that the people they elected stay on track, and know what the public wants.

So if the public shows serious opposition to a war, it's the President's responsibility (and every other elected official's) to take a good, hard look at why the public is so opposed. If the President really believes that, despite opposition, the war is still a good idea, it's his responsibility to communicate to the public why he thinks so and convince them that he's right. If the President can't convince the public, then something is seriously wrong. At this point, it's the people's responsibility to make sure the President pays attention - and that's not necessarily something that can wait until the next election.

(And if all this isn't enough, consider that the average president has less experience doing his job than the average junior officer - at least the JO's went through officers' training. Would you like a random midshipman to run the country for a while without supervision? Or maybe a 2nd lieutenant, all bright-eyed and excited about Making a Difference?)