Changes To Rope 'N Choke!

NAVADMIN 247/09 came out last week with some changes to the Navy Physical Readiness Program (PRP). It has some substantive changes, such as "Sailors Who Get Three PFA Failures Within A Four Year Period Will Not Be Able To PCS, Re-Enlist, Or Extend" and "Progress Waivers Are Also No Longer Authorized", but here's the part that interested me the most:
"Individuals failing a scale weight test shall be taped three times, with an average computed to determine actual body composition. If there is more than an inch difference in the three measurements, a fourth measurement will be taken by a different measurer."
Yes, we've done it! Now we'll truly be able to win the war against Al Qaeda! In the past few years, the Navy has done a good job realizing that way to win the War On Terror isn't to be smarter than the terrorists, it's to look better than they do in uniform. Unfortunately, it turns out that, unbeknownst to our Leaders until now, some Sailors have been getting around being out of standards by making friends with the guy who does the rope 'n choke! (The "thumb under the tape during the neck measurement" trick is one that I know has never been done, nor is the "pull the tape really tight around the gut such that the flab completely covers the numbers and you have to lift it out of the way to see the result" maneuver.) By putting a stop to this insidious practice now, we're sure to find Osama Bin Laden before the next PFA cycle is over! (Luckily, there's absolutely no chance that Sailors still won't make friends with the guy who does the measurements, and if they do he certainly won't be smart enough to remember his results from one try to the next and write the numbers down such that all of them are within an inch.)

I'm just glad we have such smart Permanent Shore Duty non-command-served O-5s and non-CMC-served E-9s in D. C. and Millington who can come up with such amazing new initiatives! They truly are in touch with the needs of the fleet. My tax dollars are well spent.