Wednesday, January 17, 2007
Tuesday, January 16, 2007
Memories ...
761927:
...
But in January 1971 that didn't really matter. Mine was only one of about eight or ten M16's in my squad - we also had a M60 machine gun. Four squads made a platoon, three platoons made up Alpha Company, 2nd Battalion 8th Cavalry, 1st Cavalry Division. We packed immense firepower; my limited marksmanship skills made little difference. That became clear to me in my first "firefight". I use the term loosely since we took almost no return fire. But we sure poured it out even as our targets melted into the jungle. Our first salvo swept away the small brush in front of us. Our continued fire pruned away larger vegetation while the M60 rounds chewed through small trees. The entire engagement lasted no more than one very long minute and left the air filled with smoke and the smell of cordite. Our follow-up patrol found drops of blood but no other sign of the two individuals who had the misfortune to intersect our path.
...
They write themselves*
Incredible. And he actually believes this shit:
*An increasingly regular series as reality and the Bush administration get farther and farther apart.
... I am proud of the efforts we did. We liberated that country from a tyrant. I think the Iraqi people owe the American people a huge debt of gratitude, and I believe most Iraqis express that... ~ the Chimp on 60 Minutes.
*An increasingly regular series as reality and the Bush administration get farther and farther apart.
Great thanks to Xsociate for the link.
Stating the obvious
Stars and Stripes
Obvious, but thank you anyway, Senator. If, as President, you'll get us out of Iraq and back into Afghanistan, I'll vote for you.
If you can make it happen sooner, I'll still vote for the Democratic candidate.
LANDSTUHL, Germany - U.S. Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton said on Monday that Afghanistan has made some progress, but the country is "tottering" and needs more troops to finish off Taliban and al-Qaida forces.
"I'm encouraged by the progress in Afghanistan, but Afghanistan is tottering," Clinton said. "We've got to get more support there to make sure we try to finish off the Taliban and al-Qaida that are regrouping, coming across the border. We expect a big spring offensive."
Obvious, but thank you anyway, Senator. If, as President, you'll get us out of Iraq and back into Afghanistan, I'll vote for you.
If you can make it happen sooner, I'll still vote for the Democratic candidate.
More popcorn, Moqtada? We're gettin' to the good part...
Fareed Zakaria
All Bush ever wanted was what the neocons told him to want - oil, hegemony, and the dominance of Israel in the area. Oh, and a legacy unlike the one he has already gotten out of the deal.
Lt. Col. Steven Duke says the Mahdi Army is 'sitting on the 50-yard line, eating popcorn, watching us do their work for them.'
Over the past three and a half years, the dominant flaw in the Bush administration's handling of Iraq is that it has, both intentionally and inadvertently, driven the country's several communities apart. Every seemingly neutral action - holding elections, firing Baathists from the bureaucracy, building up an Iraqi military and police force - has had seismic sectarian consequences. The greatest danger of Bush's new strategy, then, isn't that it won't work but that it will - and thereby push the country one step further along the road to all-out civil war. Only a sustained strategy of pressure on the Maliki government - unlike anything Bush has been willing to do yet - has any chance of averting this outcome.
Otherwise, American interests and ideals will both be in jeopardy. Al Qaeda in Iraq - the one true national-security threat we face from that country - will gain Sunni support. In addition, as American officers like Duke and Brady have noted, our ideals will be tarnished. The U.S. Army will be actively aiding and assisting in the largest program of ethnic cleansing since Bosnia. Is that the model Bush wanted for the Middle East?
All Bush ever wanted was what the neocons told him to want - oil, hegemony, and the dominance of Israel in the area. Oh, and a legacy unlike the one he has already gotten out of the deal.
No one 'chooses to lose', but Bush did when he started his 'war'...
Good article in The American Spectator:
A referundum of the Iraqis as to whether they want us to stay or go? Good idea, but if you think Bush would permit that, just on the off chance (cough!) it might not go his way, then I've got this nice bridge for you...
As to 'honor', in the main, our troops have acquitted themselves with honor. For far long enough. Bring them home.
This nation's leaders have no concept of the meaning of the word. They confuse it with 'vanity' and being the biggest dog on the block or else. Which they're not.
There is no 'honor' in lying to get your way at the expense of everybody else.
Oh I know, I know, we lost the war in Vietnam, were humiliated, and we're never going to let it happen again. But that's the whole point. We're always going to end up losing when we intervene in these civil wars and try to prop up a puppet regime in a country that basically doesn't exist.
How many times do we have to learn this lesson? There is no Iraqi democracy. All there is are Sunni and Shi'ites who have been fighting each other since 700 A.D. It's humiliating to watch President Bush playing Br'er Rabbit with this Tar Baby, crying, "Where are you Iraqis? Why don't they stand up?" They only exist in his imagination. Prime Minister Maliki isn't George Washington, he's a frightened bureaucrat trying to avoid being assassinated. He can't "disarm the Shi'ite militia," they're the ones who keep him in power. They're already killing television comedians, university professors, anyone who represents normal life. They'd kill him in an instant if he turned against them.
Bush had his Clark Clifford moment when Baker and company handed him The Iraq Report. Amazingly, he didn't take it. Instead, he was reportedly won over by Fred Kagan's "Choosing Victory," cooked up at the American Enterprise Institute.
I would challenge anyone to read this report. Here's the way Kagan begins:
* American resources are great: 300 million people, $12 trillion in GDP compared to 25 million Iraqis, $100 billion in Iraq GDP in a country the side of California.
* Success requires effort and will, but we need not choose to lose.
It's interesting that he implies we're at war with the whole country. I thought we were supposed to be defending somebody? Someone should also inform Kagan of Archimedes' principle. The force of an object at the end of a lever is its weight times the distance. We may have six zillion times the wealth of the Shi'ite militia, but the war is being fought on their home territory. By the time a U.S. soldier starts poking through the warrens of Sadr City, all that wealth back home has been reduced to his rifle and body armor against a bunch of IEDs and AK-47's.
Kagan's analysis simply reprises the joke that circulated around the army in 1970. The Pentagon hires a huge computer, plugs in all the data about comparative forces, and asks, "How long is it going to take us to win in Vietnam?" The answer comes back, "You won back in 1965."
The best suggestion I've heard is this. Let's schedule a referendum for March asking the Iraqis if they want us to go or stay. They're a democracy, right? Let them decide. If they want us to stay, then we've answered the world. If they want us to go, then we can withdraw with honor.
A referundum of the Iraqis as to whether they want us to stay or go? Good idea, but if you think Bush would permit that, just on the off chance (cough!) it might not go his way, then I've got this nice bridge for you...
As to 'honor', in the main, our troops have acquitted themselves with honor. For far long enough. Bring them home.
This nation's leaders have no concept of the meaning of the word. They confuse it with 'vanity' and being the biggest dog on the block or else. Which they're not.
There is no 'honor' in lying to get your way at the expense of everybody else.
Lightweight stuff
Me'n Mrs. G had a real "Global Warming Weekend", with just a smidgen of irony since it's been -2° to about 20°F around here for days. Spent eight bucks on Pay-Per-View. We watched An Inconvenient Truth, which I highly recommend to everyone. To warm up (heh!) for that we watched Ice Age 2: The Meltdown, with Queen Latifah, beautiful as ever, as a Wooly Mammoth who thinks she's a possum. Heady stuff.
We haven't watched an awards show for years, but this time we were kinda interested, and besides, there ain't enough good TV shows these days that there was anything else to watch, so we watched the first coupla hours of the Golden Globes. 'Watched' might be a little strong, but we looked up whenever something would come on we were interested in.
The actress and the show that we wanted to win, won. Congratulations to America Ferrera and Ugly Betty. To see what she really looks like, go here. There's about four shows a week we like, and that's one of them. If you haven't watched it, watch it.
I return you now to our regular earth-shattering cosmic programming.
We haven't watched an awards show for years, but this time we were kinda interested, and besides, there ain't enough good TV shows these days that there was anything else to watch, so we watched the first coupla hours of the Golden Globes. 'Watched' might be a little strong, but we looked up whenever something would come on we were interested in.
The actress and the show that we wanted to win, won. Congratulations to America Ferrera and Ugly Betty. To see what she really looks like, go here. There's about four shows a week we like, and that's one of them. If you haven't watched it, watch it.
I return you now to our regular earth-shattering cosmic programming.
How's that working out for ya?
Dr. Attaturk:
Late for work, bye!
It looks likely Castro is going to die a natural death some 47 years after taking power, and 43 and a half years after we staked out our policy of boycotting him.
WOW, how fucking effective has that been?
...
Late for work, bye!
Letters
In the vein of my post the other night, via Flame, a letter to the people of Iran and Iraq, and others:
Much more and very well thought out. A good morning read.
First let me speak to the people in Iran.
There is a large majority of Americans who are terrified by our governments inability to hear our voices. We do not want war. Not with you, not with anyone. We admire your ancient culture and respect your religious beliefs...
Now, the people of Iraq hear me out.
Please understand our sorrow in what our leaders have done to your nation. While most of us believe that Saddam Hussein was a terrible dictator, we also understand that for many years, our country supported him and only deposed him as the president of Iraq when it was beneficial to our government. Our leaders lied to us about the threat of weapons of mass destruction in Iraq.
Most of our citizens at the time were quite fearful over what was happening in the world due to the attacks on September 11, 2001, and our president used that fear to further his personal agenda. It was WRONG. It was not our place to overthrow a dictator; it was yours if you so choose.
...
To the people of Israel...
I'd like to say we understand.
We recognize your struggles in the world. We understand that for many years you were persecuted. However, that does not give you the right to do to others what has been done to you. I'm not suggesting that you bare all of the responsibility for the struggles in the West Asia, but you're not helping to solve it either.
...
Much more and very well thought out. A good morning read.
Monday, January 15, 2007
Bush the Empire Slayer
I never heard of this guy until just now, but I'm going to call this piece by Bernard Chazelle today's "damn sure oughta read".
That's pretty much what we're seeing. It's going to get even uglier.
Somewhere, deep in the cold, worm-infested soil that a mother will keep watered by tears, lies one of 3,000 young Americans. Dispersed across the land, thousands more will forever carry the scars of war in their battered bodies and hollowed souls, mutants battling hellish shadows and silent phantoms. And the Iraqis, yes those, Mr President, see them spiral into Dante's lower rings of hell, as they join the fastest-growing sect in the land: the dead - hundreds of thousands strong. Watch the White Man's Burden devolve into an orgy of torture and mayhem. (Has it ever devolved into anything else?)
Could the invasion have succeeded? Not a chance. All the grousing about incompetent planning is the age-old excuse-making prattle of losers. Leave aside the not-so-trifling fact that the United States never had the proper DNA for empire (lite or otherwise). It is the incontrovertible reality of the 21st century that the time for the White Man's Burden has passed. Not only is the era of empire gone, but the days of the so-called liberal hegemonic order are numbered. Even before 9/11, the cumulative impact of European integration, the rise of Asian powers, and the resurgence of Muslim identity sounded the death knell for American hegemony. To hasten the burial will be one of Bush's legacies. Alas, incalculable misery in the Middle East, enduring anti-American hatred, and future terrorist attacks in London, Paris, and Seattle will be another one.
To connect it to the war for terror would indeed be easier. A self-declared uniter, Bush is beginning to unite the country around the belief that he is the worst president in US history. Whether his reelection, ipso facto, makes the electorate the dumbest ever is a logical inference that a political culture drunk with self-admiration will have trouble getting its woozy head around.
To call Team Bush a thundering herd of galloping loons is to be unnecessarily kind. For rarely has daftness been elevated to such a lofty plane of power and influence. [...]
The unfolding catastrophe in Iraq had a single cause: the reassertion of US hegemony after 9/11. Its trigger was a rare astral alignment. Big Oil, the neocons, the Christian fundamentalists, the liberal hawks, AIPAC, the MSM, and 9/11 all formed cosmic dots in the sky that only one power could - and did - successfully align: the president of the United States. No American leader has so much owned a war.
And none has so little owned up to it. Victors are never war criminals. That's because they get to write the history books. Bush won't have that chance. The die has been cast and the hour is too late for him or anyone to alter the unforgiving judgment of posterity. Therein, paradoxically, lies our quandary. For, if freedom is just another word for nothing left to lose, then Bush is a free man - free to pursue the most malignant policies, heedless of the consequences to his unworsenable presidential standing. Beware the desperation of a cornered man.
That's pretty much what we're seeing. It's going to get even uglier.
Iraq: Beyond the Gallows
Conflicts Forum
The technical term for what Bush is attempting to do by way of self-salvation in Iraq is "shoveling shit against the tide", the "shit" being our troops in his estimation.
The Bush administration's provocative posture towards Iran in recent days could thus say more about what has already happened than about what is yet to come. From the vantage point of the Oval Office, raising the specter of a military confrontation with Iran may in fact seem preferable to facing the greatest humiliation of all: the acknowledgement of an Iranian victory in Iraq. Yet it now appears that Saddam's ignominious end was exactly that: victor's justice - Iranian victor's justice. It is a message from Iran to Iraq's Sunnis that it is Iran, and not the U.S, that is now the dominant force in Iraq. Iran may have been diplomatic enough to call Saddam's execution a "victory for the Iraqi people," but the blunt message heard across the region is that Iran will not relent in asserting its title as the region's leading power.
The message for the Bush Administration should be clear: shifts in military strategy cannot undo the fact that the political struggle for Iraq has already been lost.
The technical term for what Bush is attempting to do by way of self-salvation in Iraq is "shoveling shit against the tide", the "shit" being our troops in his estimation.
Bush: I'm Sending More Troops To Iraq No Matter What Congress Does
Think Progress
It's there to watch if you've got a stronger stomach than I do.
Congress, you've just been bitch-slapped. You gonna take it from that punk?
Probably.
This week, Sen. Ted Kennedy (D-MA) introduced a resolution requiring President Bush to gain new congressional authorization before escalating the War in Iraq.
President Bush, however, says that he is going to send more troops to Iraq no matter what Congress does. Watch an excerpt from his 60 Minutes interview tonight:
It's there to watch if you've got a stronger stomach than I do.
Legal scholars on the right and left agree that Congress has the legal power to prevent an escalation or end the war completely.
Transcript:
Q: If you have the authority to put the troops in there no matter what the Congress wants to do.
BUSH: I think I've got, in this situation I do, yeah. I fully understand they could try to stop me from doing it. But I've made my decision. And we're going forward.
Congress, you've just been bitch-slapped. You gonna take it from that punk?
Probably.
Oh, the irony...
Ironic Times
CONGRESS IN MAJOR FIGHT WITH WHITE HOUSE OVER IRAQ
Shown (left to right): Senators Feingold, Durbin, Boxer, Obama leave contentious hearing on Capitol Hill.
Robot Aircraft to Monitor Canadian Border
Will watch for seniors returning to U.S. with arthritis medicine.
Administration Will Seek Continuing Bipartisan Advice on Iraq
By talking to Joe Lieberman.
Gas Prices Plummeted During Two Months Before Election, Started Rising Day After
Consumer advocates call for more frequent elections.
Describing Lieberman
I think Michael Stickings says it best:
Joe is only out for Joe and he's cast his lot with the Neocons. It was nice to see Chuck Hagel hand him his ass yesterday, but it's sorta sad a Dem couldn't have done it before Election Day. A shame Dems were conflicted over supporting their own party's candidate or spoiled, whiny Lieberman. Well, you got what you wished for. Now Joe can openly support the Chimp, undercut the Dems on national TV, and there's nothing you can do because you're afraid he'll jump ship to the Rethugs (as if he hasn't already).
Dear Dem leadership,
Ned Lamont wouldn't be parroting WH talking points on Timmeh's show. Good thing all you senators are "good friends" (right, Mr. Dodd?) and have that "collegial relationship". It's time you stopped kissing Joe's ass and call a spade a spade. Like Michael says, he's a "dangerous idiot".
... Joe Lieberman has proven himself to be a dangerous idiot who thinks Bush is a great leader, cozies up to McCain and the neocons, plays the 9/11 card in defence of the Iraq War, and uses his children and grandchildren as gratuitous props in his outrageous fearmongering ...
Joe is only out for Joe and he's cast his lot with the Neocons. It was nice to see Chuck Hagel hand him his ass yesterday, but it's sorta sad a Dem couldn't have done it before Election Day. A shame Dems were conflicted over supporting their own party's candidate or spoiled, whiny Lieberman. Well, you got what you wished for. Now Joe can openly support the Chimp, undercut the Dems on national TV, and there's nothing you can do because you're afraid he'll jump ship to the Rethugs (as if he hasn't already).
Dear Dem leadership,
Ned Lamont wouldn't be parroting WH talking points on Timmeh's show. Good thing all you senators are "good friends" (right, Mr. Dodd?) and have that "collegial relationship". It's time you stopped kissing Joe's ass and call a spade a spade. Like Michael says, he's a "dangerous idiot".
Sunday, January 14, 2007
Innocents
This is my overwhelming deal. It's what motivates me to blog, it's the basic story behind my books, it's my message.
I have a big problem with innocents being trampled. I have a problem when every time the big guys make a move, a buncha innocent folks have to pay the price. Reminds me of the joke: What's the black shit between the elephant's toes? Slow moving pygmies.
In my life I've seen too many innocent people, men, women, and children, run over because somebody a million miles away makes a decision. I can't take for granted that some people, somewhere, have to pay the price for polices a buncha folks who somehow are smarter than the rest of us pull out their collective ass, and that it's okay.
Like the unfortunate goatherders in Somalia, whose fires were mistaken for an al-Qaeda encampment. 90% just shrug and say 'oh well, they were in the wrong place at the wrong time'. Nice. So were those 3000 people at the World Trade Center on September 11th.
That's why people's cavalier attitude toward war, this surge in particular, chaps my ass. And it's not just folks' disregard for the lives of the troops who will be sent there, or have their tours extended, or be retained under stop-loss; though the troops are probably better prepared for it. When I was in, I was used to getting pissed on and told it was raining.
It's the poor bastids in Iraq, not the 'dead-enders' not the jihadists, but the regular folks who only want to keep their families safe, put food on the table, and give their kids a better life than they had. These poor people were getting by under Saddam, they were at peace, and though living was hard, their sons and daughters had a chance to get an education and make something of themselves. If they stayed out of the way, didn't make waves, and minded their own business they could live half-decently.
Because some moron, and a buncha other morons with him, decided that removing a despot who was contained, who kept the peace between people who have hated each other for 1400 years (something we have yet to do), was the right thing to do for whatever reason, that has all changed for the average guy. Now he's afraid to send his wife to the market, send his kids to school, or let his daughter out on the street unescorted if at all.
Because of that same buncha morons, a group of Somali goatherders won't be coming home to the families who depended on them, and the animals who were also slaughtered. Do you think these poor guys didn't have families? Did you think the goats were there for decoration? I wonder how many months' supply of meat and milk those goats represented. Did you not learn, the last time our troops were in Somalia, how these poor people have to eak out a living in a land of anarchy and chaos? Or did you even pay attention? Yeah, the black shit between the elephant's toes.
Do any of you realize how lucky we are? How lucky we are not to be subject to the tsunami that occurs when great nations shrug. We just shrug and go about our lives. Twenty thousand more troops? Yeah, no problem, ain't my kid. A surge? Yeah, no problem, it's just a buncha brown folks who like to kill each other anyway so it doesn't matter what we do there. Airstrike on al-Qaeda? Oops, just a buncha Somali goat ropers, no big deal; we'll get 'em next time.
It's nice to be at arm's length, not to be the one pulling the trigger. Take it from someone who has. It's nice to know that no matter what the clown parade in Washington decides, you'll probably wake up tomorrow and do what you do every Monday morning. You take it for granted, whether the President orders an airstrike on a buncha Somali farmers or sends three carrier groups into the Persian Gulf, you'll still pull out of your driveway and go to work. Whether the President sends twenty thousand troops into Baghdad or not, you'll still come home to your wife and kids tomorrow night.
As you lay comfortably in your beds tonight, think about the poor folks who are praying they live through tomorrow. They're the ones who are paying for our leaders' decisions. The black shit between the elephant's toes.
I have a big problem with innocents being trampled. I have a problem when every time the big guys make a move, a buncha innocent folks have to pay the price. Reminds me of the joke: What's the black shit between the elephant's toes? Slow moving pygmies.
In my life I've seen too many innocent people, men, women, and children, run over because somebody a million miles away makes a decision. I can't take for granted that some people, somewhere, have to pay the price for polices a buncha folks who somehow are smarter than the rest of us pull out their collective ass, and that it's okay.
Like the unfortunate goatherders in Somalia, whose fires were mistaken for an al-Qaeda encampment. 90% just shrug and say 'oh well, they were in the wrong place at the wrong time'. Nice. So were those 3000 people at the World Trade Center on September 11th.
That's why people's cavalier attitude toward war, this surge in particular, chaps my ass. And it's not just folks' disregard for the lives of the troops who will be sent there, or have their tours extended, or be retained under stop-loss; though the troops are probably better prepared for it. When I was in, I was used to getting pissed on and told it was raining.
It's the poor bastids in Iraq, not the 'dead-enders' not the jihadists, but the regular folks who only want to keep their families safe, put food on the table, and give their kids a better life than they had. These poor people were getting by under Saddam, they were at peace, and though living was hard, their sons and daughters had a chance to get an education and make something of themselves. If they stayed out of the way, didn't make waves, and minded their own business they could live half-decently.
Because some moron, and a buncha other morons with him, decided that removing a despot who was contained, who kept the peace between people who have hated each other for 1400 years (something we have yet to do), was the right thing to do for whatever reason, that has all changed for the average guy. Now he's afraid to send his wife to the market, send his kids to school, or let his daughter out on the street unescorted if at all.
Because of that same buncha morons, a group of Somali goatherders won't be coming home to the families who depended on them, and the animals who were also slaughtered. Do you think these poor guys didn't have families? Did you think the goats were there for decoration? I wonder how many months' supply of meat and milk those goats represented. Did you not learn, the last time our troops were in Somalia, how these poor people have to eak out a living in a land of anarchy and chaos? Or did you even pay attention? Yeah, the black shit between the elephant's toes.
Do any of you realize how lucky we are? How lucky we are not to be subject to the tsunami that occurs when great nations shrug. We just shrug and go about our lives. Twenty thousand more troops? Yeah, no problem, ain't my kid. A surge? Yeah, no problem, it's just a buncha brown folks who like to kill each other anyway so it doesn't matter what we do there. Airstrike on al-Qaeda? Oops, just a buncha Somali goat ropers, no big deal; we'll get 'em next time.
It's nice to be at arm's length, not to be the one pulling the trigger. Take it from someone who has. It's nice to know that no matter what the clown parade in Washington decides, you'll probably wake up tomorrow and do what you do every Monday morning. You take it for granted, whether the President orders an airstrike on a buncha Somali farmers or sends three carrier groups into the Persian Gulf, you'll still pull out of your driveway and go to work. Whether the President sends twenty thousand troops into Baghdad or not, you'll still come home to your wife and kids tomorrow night.
As you lay comfortably in your beds tonight, think about the poor folks who are praying they live through tomorrow. They're the ones who are paying for our leaders' decisions. The black shit between the elephant's toes.
Quote of the Day
Two today.
Frank Rich:
Steve Gilliard:
Frank Rich:
What the world saw on Wednesday night was a defeated Willy Loman who looked as broken as his war.
Steve Gilliard:
Why the fuck is the president listening to this fat motherfucker who wouldn't know how to load an M-4, much less take one apart in the dark.
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