War, Politics, and Life by Bruce Maulden
“The issue is not whether the Iraqi people will greet U.S. soldiers as their liberators, but what will they do six months after that. I find it naive and disingenuous to claim that you can create democracy in Iraq any time soon. The administration has already assured us that the U.S. will not stay there…
“To say that we are closer to victory today is to believe, in the face of the evidence, the optimists who have been wrong in the past. “To suggest we are on the edge of defeat is to yield to unreasonable pessimism. “To say that we are mired in stalemate seems the only realistic, yet…
Another anniversary this morning, and a sad day indeed for US peoples. Ten years ago today, George Jr. signed into law the infamous USA/Patriot Act, a move which revealed the end game for the great American experiment in democracy — nowadays the US is closer to George Orwell than George Washington. And although George Jr.…
Such a great graph — and a great h/t The Big Picture. (Illustration found here). I hope the graph is readable — if not, it originates from Spiegel Online at the link just above. One can readily see George Jr. did more than his fair share, but to all those big-yapped GOPers, the real shit…
Another version of an international tall tale popped up this week with the initially alarming news of an official Iranian plot to kill the Saudi ambassador at a DC restaurant via Mexican drug cartel gunmen. A tale so convoluted it turns out that David Mamet would have a hard time trying to decipher the plot. Yesterday,…
On Wall Street this morning protests continue as a now-major force in the news cycle, making folks pay attention to one of the great scams of world history. And today is for the future — Kids Speak Out Day — as the swelling demonstrations starts its 24th outing to put the spotlight on the horrors…
One thing that aggravates me to no end is George Jr. — the man can’t really disappear because of all the horror he left behind haunts the entire planet. Now he’s afraid US troops don’t love him anymore: “They hadn’t seen me and they hadn’t seen me with the troops,” he said. “So therefore I…
Mr. Bush had belittled “nation building†while campaigning for president 18 months earlier. But aware that Afghans had felt abandoned before, including by his father’s administration after the Soviets left in 1989, he vowed to avoid the syndrome of “initial success, followed by long years of floundering and ultimate failure. “We’re not going to repeat…
“How can we let this happen? How is that acceptable in the United States of America? The answer is, it’s not. It’s an outrage. And it’s a betrayal — a betrayal — of the ideals that we ask our troops to risk their lives for.” — Presidential candidate, Barack Obama, April 2008, reacting to the suicide…
In the last few years there’s been a momentous outburst of gall — the audacity of some people to bullshit despite incredible evidence to the contrary — which has touched just about every aspect of US life, especially in politics. Two such unrelated examples occurred this past weekend, one involved GOP presidential candidate Rick Perry…