I read this in the morning before going to the gym and somewhere on the exercise bike, when I had enough oxygen to the brain, I had a few thoughts about the situation.
Part 1 - When I was a kid in Saudi Arabia, we occasionally would get into street fights with Saudi kids. I'd sort of forgotten about this - I know, ironic for a B-Company StreetFighter but... I digress. So, what would happen is we'd be playing a pick-up game of soccer on the hard marl football pitch and somebody would check somebody and somebody else would check them back and the next thing you know, a fight breaks out.
So, what the Saudi kids would do, is they'd run away. Us international kids would get all cocky thinking we had scared them off because we were such badasses (If only Donald Rumsfeld would have consulted me). But... what the Saudi kids were doing was - going for backup. So, the next thing you know, there's 10-15 of us Westerners being surrounded by 20-30 Saudi kids.
What they would do is, they would array themselves in a semi-circle - using the walls on two sides of the football pitch for the rest of the circle. They would be about 50 meters away, standing about 5 meters apart and there was no way out. Us Western kids had our 20" BMX bikes (I rode a Diamondback, friends rode bikes from Kuwahara, Redline, GT, Hutch, Mongoose, etc.) and a few had 10-speeds but, the bottom line is that there was no way we were going to break through this human wall - on foot.
So, we had to do a Call of Duty style Zombie Train on them to get them to commit in one direction and then we'd accelerate on our bikes and ride in the opposite direction as fast as possible to try to keep from getting our asses beat by 25+ Saudis. That usually worked but it was still scary.
So, what I was thinking for the Rudder's Rangers quad assault, is why not take all the D&C Cadets and space them 5 meters apart "Saudi style" in a human chain around the quad. Or, you could do it with all the fish (or CT Zips and tell them it's a privilege like guarding the yardline markers when the FTAB marches). In any case, UPD is probably not going to provide much more than a couple of roadblocks but, the Corps could provide its own security for such an event.
Part 2 - The Corps of Cadets has a reasonable presence on social media. Instagram, FB, Twitter, YouTube.
Why not do a livestream on whichever of these platforms is appropriate. I know for a fact that one of the members of the Commandants Staff knows how to do this because I watched his FB feed when Bush 41's funeral train came to College Station.
So, as I thought about this a little more, what might make even more sense is for the Corps to do the next evolution of social media and create a "Corps TV" channel on YouTube, or whatever.
My "Million Dollar" big idea for the day is to have a Corps TV YouTube channel where they livestream Corps activities. That way, folks like me who are far remote from College Station could tune in and watch a March-In, or a Band halftime, or a Rudder's Rangers Quad Assault.
I've got a buddy who sits on the 3rd deck in "The Zone" who livestreams all the FTAB halftime performances at Kyle Field. It's pretty cool and he's just using his phone. I would imagine that for a couple of $$$$, the "Corps TV" channel could have some professional equipment and stream a nice 1080p feed.
I know I'd tune into that for every game and I guarantee you people like my 83 year old Class of '59 A-Infantry father wouldn't miss an episode of "Corps TV". Heck, we were touring a winery in Napa Valley two years ago and he's on his damn iPhone watching Aggie Basketball. I know he'd watch "Corps TV".
Alright, enough TexAgs for one day. It's Friday night in Sydney's Northern Beaches and I've got a couple of cold tinnies with my name on them
