Saturday Emmylou Blogging

You know the songs...

Thanks to Larry Musicman.

Why We Did It - the unrated version

I'm sure a lot of us watched Rachel Maddow's report on why Cheney and Bush lied us into their criminal war in Iraq. We knew why 10 years ago. The report did flesh out some of the details and was well done but nothing earth-shatteringly new.

Daily Kos brought up some stuff I for one had not thought about. Worth a read.

MSNBC's short documentary titled “Why We Did It” that aired March 06th, 2014 was somewhat informative but mostly anticlimactic. The only people in this country who have never believed that these actions were about oil are either disingenuous for political reasons, or stupid.

A few simple facts:
a) Saddam Hussein was planning to switch to the Euro as his reserved currency, which would have had drastic effects on the value of the Dollar and the U.S. Economy. This is widely considered to be the prime motive for taking him out.

b) The spot price of oil bottomed out in 2002 at around $20.00 a barrel. By July 3rd, 2008, the spot price of oil had reached a peak of $145.31 a barrel. This upward trend tracks the progress of the war with an interesting parallel between a drop in Iraqi casualties in Jan 2008, the beginning of the Great Recession, and the sharp reduction in the price of oil after July 2008.

c)There is a bubble of record high profits by oil companies between late 2003 and 2008. Record oil profits track the war, not the peace.

They knew we had shale oil and that the infrastructure to extract shale oil was practically a pipe dream with oil prices at $20.00 a barrel. Meaning that the wars were not just a device for maximizing oil profits and the profits of oil tech companies like Halliburton but also a means to get the extraction infrastructure in place in the U.S. before demand from the new emerging BRIC countries would take hold.

The war wasn't to secure oil. it was about making the price of oil increase, both for sheer profit and to make fracking financially viable to make even more profit.

It's always about the Benjamins, dame Bush and Cheney's eyes.

CPAC Panderass Headline of the Day

Christie To Harry Reid: 'Stop Picking On Great Americans' Charles And David Koch

Tell the fuckin' loonies what they want to hear, I guess.

Headline of the Day

Vladimir Putin is Every Republican Bigot’s Wet Dream

Uh ... yup ...

First Pro-Marijuana Commercial Debuts on Major Network

I'm kind of kidding Fixer with this since he likes sushi aka "bait". :-)

Published on Feb 26, 2014
First Marijuana Commercial Debuts on Major Network produced by MarijuanaDoctors.com, the only service that connects patients with physicians for medical marijuana recommendations.

Visit www.MarijuanaDoctors.com to book your appointment or call 1-866-996-9333

Thanks to MarijuanaDoctors.com.

Oh, the irony...

Ironic Times

From the "Latest Headlines" crawl:

Russian Olympic biathlon team seizes control of Crimes
...

'12 Years A Slaveowner' wins Hoodie at KKK Awards
...

Senate cafeteria replaces Russian dressing with Thousand Island dressing

UKRAINE CRISIS THREATENS NEW COLD WAR
Hegel orders all nuclear forces to immediately stop taking drugs and try to pass their proficiency exams without cheating.

Arizona Governor Vetoes Bill Allowing Businesses to Refuse Service to Gays
Says God told her to do it, “or lose the Super Bowl.”

Swiss Bank Helped Rich Evade Taxes
Also, this winter in Switzerland, it snowed.

Ukraine: Abandoned Yanukovych Estate Opened to Public
Used same decorator as Saddam, Qaddafi.

Ukrainegate

El Rude-o. Links at site.

Look to Bush and Iraq, Not Obama and Syria, If You Think the U.S. Has Lost Influence in the World

One consistent theme throughout the coverage of Ukrainegate (why not?) is that President Barack Obama is a big, wet pussy getting roughly fucked by the manly man Vladimir Putin. Obama drew a red line over Syria that he had to back down from, they say, because Putin stepped in to help get rid of Syria's chemical weapons, so Russia felt free to ignore Obama's red line on the Ukraine last week. Obama is naive or inexperienced or dumb or incompetent or some combination of those, others bitch. "Weak" and "indecisive," as Senator Lindsey Graham said, essentially repeating what he tells the young South Carolina twinks he picks up who are unsure if they wanna fuck an old man's ass.

There's one thing the Rude Pundit knows for sure about President Obama. He never came out of a meeting with Vladimir Putin and said, "I looked the man in the eye. I found him to be very straight forward and trustworthy and we had a very good dialogue. I was able to get a sense of his soul." That is what the last president of the United States, one George W. Bush, said in June 2001 at a press conference with the ex-KGB spy standing next to him. Democrats criticized Bush at the time (as did some conservatives), but they didn't go bugnuts condemning him as a throbbing vagina. They just thought it was weird. And anyone could see that Putin was conning the rube. As Joe Biden said then, "I don't trust Putin; hopefully the president was being stylistic rather than substantive." But what does Biden know?

The other thing that the Rude Pundit knows is that President Bush started a war in Iraq by lying not just to the American people, but to the leaders of nations around the world about weapons of mass destruction. Remember the "Coalition of the Willing," the countries that were led by credulous fools or easily cowed wimps or the bribe-able who agreed to help in some way with the completely worthless attack on a sovereign nation? This ain't "Blame Bush" only. It's geopolitical history, motherfuckers. The shame of it all is that the people who helped engineer our slow demise in world influence, like Graham and John McCain, are still allowed to act as if they know what's best for the nation.
...

Whatever happens in the Ukraine will be dictated primarily by how much of a power play Putin is after (or, you know, so the Rude Pundit thinks after his one-hour of research). Obama's limited in how he can respond, not only because we're not fuckin' going to war with Russia, but because the rest of the goddamn planet thinks we're a bunch of assholes who need to pay a goddamn price for dicking everyone over.

Everyone loves to see the giant squirm when he's been a global dick.