Monthly Archives: March 2012

Can We Leave Now?

12 Monday Mar 2012

Posted by in Afghanistan

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

, , , , , ,

The Afghanistan quagmire just gets uglier and uglier:

“Stalking from home to home, a United States Army sergeant methodically killed at least 16 civilians, 9 of them children, in a rural stretch of southern Afghanistan early on Sunday, igniting fears of a new wave of anti-American hostility, Afghan and American officials said.

Residents of three villages in the Panjwai district of Kandahar Province described a terrifying string of attacks in which the soldier, who had walked more than a mile from his base, tried door after door, eventually breaking in to kill within three separate houses. The man gathered 11 bodies, including those of 4 girls younger than 6, and set fire to them, villagers said.

[…]

The officials said the suspect was an Army staff sergeant who acted alone and then surrendered…A senior American military official said Sunday evening that the sergeant was attached to a unit based at Joint Base Lewis-McChord, a major Army and Air Force installation near Tacoma, Wash., and that he had been part of what is called a village stabilization operation in Afghanistan…Another senior military official said the sergeant was 38 and married with two children. He had served three tours of duty in Iraq, this official said, and had been deployed to Afghanistan for the first time in December.”

Republican hawk and supporter of starting yet another war in Iran, Lindsey Graham, shrugged it off as ‘oh well, shit happens’:

“While this is tragic and will be investigated that soldier will be held accountable for his actions under the military justice system, unfortunately these things happen in war,” Graham said on ABC’s “This Week.” “You just have to push through these things.”

“The surge of forces have really put the Taliban on the defensive. The Afghan Army is better equipped and better trained than ever….I hope that the strategy partnership agreement between the United States and Afghanistan will stop the narrative we’re leaving,” Graham said on ABC. “We can win this thing. We can get it right.”

Yes, the Afghan armed forces are well equipped and trained, and are turning that equipment and that training on NATO forces at an increasing rate:

“Afghan security personnel have killed “around 70 members of the NATO force … in 42 insider attacks from May 2007 through January 2012,” Reuters reported, based on statistics provided by the US Department of Defense. Fifteen of the ISAF soldiers, or more than 20 percent, have been killed in the last seven weeks, according to press releases issued by ISAF.”

John McCain, advocate for military intervention in Syria, called the shootings just “one of those things”:

“It’s one of those things that you cannot explain except to extend your deepest sympathy to those victims and see that justice is done,” he said on “Fox News Sunday.”

Cannot explain? Not to in any way excuse the actions of this sergeant, but this is the result of decade long wars requiring repeated deployments by an all-volunteer military. We seem to lose sight of the fact that our men and women in uniform are human beings, not robots. They are subject to human failings, like the psychological toll war takes on those who face death day after day after day, tour after tour after tour, and the actions that can result from that kind of constant stress.

Very few of us know because the burden of war is borne by a very small percentage of our population. Which explains things like this recent Pew poll showing 58% of Americans favor military action in Iran. Of course they do. It doesn’t cost the vast majority of them one dollar or one sleepless night worrying about the well-being of a loved one.
.
Two points. First, we need to get out of Afghanistan ASAP. Two more years or ten more years there won’t matter. Al-Qaeda is gone, bin Laden is dead. Mission accomplished, time to bring our soldiers home.

Second, a proposal for Sens. Graham, McCain and the 58% polled by Pew. Any US military intervention in any country from this point forward will be accompanied by a draft and a 10% income tax surcharge to pay for it. Let’s see how hot they are to go to war then.

What the President Can Do About Gas Prices: Then and Now

07 Wednesday Mar 2012

Posted by in Energy, Politics

≈ 2 Comments

Tags

, ,

What a difference 4 years, and the party of the sitting president, makes. In 2008 President Bush had no power to raise or lower gasoline prices and “when you hear a politician say he or she will bring down oil prices it’s complete BS.” Then:

Now:

Fair and balanced?

Feckless? I Don’t Think So, Mitt

07 Wednesday Mar 2012

Posted by in Iran, Obama, Politics, Romney

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

, , , , , ,

As I was reading Mitt Romney’s saber-rattling, tough talking, op-ed on Iran in the Washington Post yesterday, what jumped out at me was where Romney called President Obama “America’s most feckless president since Carter,” Feckless. Unsure of the meaning I did what any self-respecting 21st century American would do–I Googled it. Here’s what I found:

feck·less
adj.
1. Lacking purpose or vitality; feeble or ineffective.
2. Careless and irresponsible.

Careless and irresponsible. Maybe it’s just me, but I would consider the epitome of carelessness and irresponsibility in an American president to be rushing headlong into another war. Another war based on dubious claims from the usual suspects that if we don’t act immediately we face the imminent threat of seeing mushroom clouds over American cities. Haven’t we been here before?

President Obama properly addressed Romney, and the other Republican presidential candidates who have pretty much echoed Romney’s hawkishness, at his press conference yesterday:

“What’s said on the campaign trail, you know, those folks don’t have a lot of responsibilities,” Obama said. “They’re not commander in chief. And when I see the casualness with which some of these folks talk about war, I’m reminded of the costs involved in war. I’m reminded of the decision that I have to make, in terms of sending our young men and women into battle, and the impacts that has on their lives, the impact it has on our national security, the impact it has on our economy…“This is not a game,” Obama continued. “And there’s nothing casual about it.”

Careless and irresponsible. I don’t think so, Mitt.

One more thing about Romney’s op-ed. He closes with this:

“We can’t afford to wait much longer, and we certainly can’t afford to wait through four more years of an Obama administration. By then it will be far too late.”

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said much the same thing in his speech at AIPAC:

“Israel has patiently waited for the international community to resolve this issue. We’ve waited for diplomacy to work, we’ve waited for sanctions to work. None of us can afford to wait much longer,” he said.”

One thing to keep in mind when listening to the ‘we can’t wait’ crowd in Israel and in America. This ain’t the first time these boys have cried wolf:

1984: West German intelligence sources [say] that Iran’s production of a bomb “is entering its final stages.” US Senator Alan Cranston claims Iran is seven years away from making a weapon.

1992: Israeli parliamentarian Benjamin Netanyahu tells his colleagues that Iran is 3 to 5 years from being able to produce a nuclear weapon – and that the threat had to be “uprooted by an international front headed by the US.”

1992: Israeli Foreign Minister Shimon Peres tells French TV that Iran was set to have nuclear warheads by 1999.

[I]n early 1992 a task force of the House Republican Research Committee claimed that there was a “98 percent certainty that Iran already had all (or virtually all) of the components required for two or three operational nuclear weapons.”

1995: The New York Times conveys the fears of senior US and Israeli officials that “Iran is much closer to producing nuclear weapons than previously thought” – about five years away – and that Iran’s nuclear bomb is “at the top of the list” of dangers in the coming decade.

1998:..Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld reports to Congress that Iran could build an intercontinental ballistic missile – one that could hit the US – within five years.

‘Nuff said.

When Is an Apology Not an Apology?

06 Tuesday Mar 2012

Posted by in Politics, Rush Limbaugh

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

, ,

When it comes from a radio talk-show host who’s hemorrhaging sponsors and trying to cover his ample backside. After his feeble attempt at an apology on Saturday went over like a lead balloon, Rush Limbaugh began his show on Monday with another try. I suppose to his loyal followers and those who may have been listening for the first time after Slutgate blew up, it might have been acceptable and believable, but for those who have heard him before, not so much.

Rush began this version of his non-apology by saying that his major error was in descending to the level of those who are willing “to say anything or do anything to advance their agenda”–something that he would never ordinarily do (chortle, chortle). Then he repeated the phrase “those two words” five times:

“Against my own instincts, against my own knowledge, against everything I know to be right and wrong I descended to their level when I used those two words to describe Sandra Fluke.  That was my error.  I became like them, and I feel very badly about that.  I’ve always tried to maintain a very high degree of integrity and independence on this program.  Nevertheless, those two words were inappropriate.  They were uncalled for. They distracted from the point that I was actually trying to make, and I again sincerely apologize to Ms. Fluke for using those two words to describe her.  I do not think she is either of those two words.  I did not think last week that she is either of those two words.”

So I guess the part about Ms. Fluke posting sex videos on the internet wasn’t out of bounds? OK then.

That was as close to an apology as he got. From there it became a diatribe against the “socialist agenda” of President Obama and his Democratic allies in Congress who wanted to steer the direction of Darrell Issa’s Oversight Committee hearing away from its original intent of Obama’s unconstitutional attack on the Catholic Church, and make the hearing all about contraception. This was the goal because, according to Rush, “Obama is sorely hurting with women in preelect polls.” Not any more, Rush. Thanks to you and your Republican buddies:

“It’s looking like President Barack Obama may be back in the good graces of women. His support dropped among this critical constituency just before the new year began and the presidential campaign got under way in earnest. But his standing with female voters is strengthening, polls show, as the economy improves and social issues, including birth control, become a bigger part of the nation’s political discourse.

…An AP-GfK poll conducted Feb. 16-20 showed that on overall approval Obama has gained 10 percentage points among women since December, from 43 percent to 53 percent…In one-on-one matchups, Obama beats Romney 54 percent to 41 percent and tops Santorum 56 percent to 40 percent among women…”

Then Rush launched into yet another personal attack on Sandra Fluke. She may not be a slut and a prostitute, but she’s a liar:

“Sandra Fluke gave vague examples based on unnamed friends who she says couldn’t afford birth control to treat medical conditions they had, since Georgetown University wouldn’t pay for them. Georgetown paid for all of their other medical treatment, but it wouldn’t pay for the birth control pills that these doctors prescribed should they be necessary — or so she says. We still don’t know who any of these friends of hers are, these other women, and we don’t know what happened to them. Her testimony was hearsay, and it was unprovable.

[…]

So Sandra Fluke, a 30-year-old birth control activist gives unverified and inexpert testimony about how Georgetown’s long-standing and public policy has hurt her unnamed friends. And let’s be clear on something else. I haven’t called Georgetown to see if they pay for birth control pills when being used to treat her medical conditions. I have no idea if they do or don’t.”

A liar who should have gone to school somewhere else:

“Georgetown is a Jesuit University. It’s Jesuits, run by the Jesuits, which are a Catholic order of priests. Their policy on birth control is not exactly a secret. It’s not given to you in a sealed envelope after you sign up. It’s out there for everybody to see. It’s a Catholic university! Everybody that goes to there knows. Miss Fluke stated on occasion she went there specifically to change the policy. If birth control insurance is important to you as an enrolling student, and you find out that Georgetown doesn’t offer it, you might want to attend (or work at) a school that isn’t run by Catholics. I mean, just a thought.”

So by that logic, James Meredith shouldn’t have applied for admittance to the University of Mississippi. He knew their policy was ‘whites only.’ He should have just gone to a school that wasn’t run by racists. Just a thought.

Rush’s one-time lapse in judgment was also the fault of the Cybercast News Service:

“The story at the Cybercast News Service characterized a portion of her testimony as sounding like (based on her own financial figures) she was engaging in sexual activity so often she couldn’t afford it. I focused on that because it was simple trying to persuade people, change people’s minds.”

Then after 10 minutes of shirking responsibility and accountability, Rush closed with this:

“I am huge on personal responsibility and accountability…”

Nice try, big guy. I’m looking forward to Apology Part III. Coming soon to a radio station near you.

Charity Begins at (Somebody Else’s) Home

01 Thursday Mar 2012

Posted by in Politics, Republicans

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

, , , ,

Len Burman at Forbes:

“As many have pointed out, Mitt and Ann Romney have been very generous, donating 19.2% of their income [to charity] in 2011 and 13.8% in 2010.  Barack and Michelle Obama were in a similar league, donating 14.2% in 2010… At the other end of the generosity spectrum were Newt and Callista Gingrich, who made gifts of only 2.6% of their $3.1 million income in 2010, and Rick and Karen Santorum, who donated 1.8% of their $0.9 million income in 2010.  (The Santorums gave 2.7% in 2009. The Gingriches have not released earlier tax returns.)”

I’m a little surprised that two avowedly religious candidates are so stingy with charity.  The bible says tithe, which is 10 percent, and that would seem to be a small sacrifice for someone earning close to a million dollars (Santorum) and chump change for Gingrich ($3 million).”

Practice what you preach much?

Today’s Worst Person in the World

01 Thursday Mar 2012

Posted by in Racism

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

, , , , ,

And the winner is…the chief judge of the District of Montana, a George W. Bush nominee to the federal bench.

“Chief U.S. District Judge Richard Cebull on Wednesday admitted to sending a racially charged email about President Barack Obama from his courthouse chambers.

[…]

The subject line of the email, which Cebull sent from his official courthouse email address on Feb. 20 at 3:42 p.m., reads: “A MOM’S MEMORY.”

The forwarded text reads as follow:

“Normally I don’t send or forward a lot of these, but even by my standards, it was a bit touching. I want all of my friends to feel what I felt when I read this. Hope it touches your heart like it did mine.

“A little boy said to his mother; ‘Mommy, how come I’m black and you’re white?'” the email joke reads. “His mother replied, ‘Don’t even go there Barack! From what I can remember about that party, you’re lucky you don’t bark!'”

[…]

The judge acknowledged that the content of the email was racist, but said he does not consider himself racist. He said the email was intended to be a private communication.

Of course not. I’m sure the Klan doesn’t consider themselves racist either, They’re just fighting for…um…states’ rights…yeah, that’s it. And if the judge intended for his racism to remain private it might have been a good idea not to forward it from his official courthouse e-mail address. Not only a bigot, but a bigot with very poor judgment. Definitely two qualities we need in chief district judge.

Once this trash became public it was followed by the obligatory non-apology apology:

“It was not intended by me in any way to become public,” Cebull said. “I apologize to anybody who is offended by it, and I can obviously understand why people would be offended.”

Really judge? You can understand how people might be offended by an e-mail accusing the deceased mother of the President of the United States of having sex with a dog? That’s mighty…umm…big of you.

“Cebull said he does not consider himself prejudice against people of other races or ethnic backgrounds, and that his actions in his courtroom have demonstrated that.

“I have never considered myself that way,” Cebull said. “All I can emphasize is I’ve treated people in my courtroom all these years fairly. I don’t think I’ve ever demonstrated racism. Nobody has ever even implied it.”

Right, I’m sure this is a completely isolated incident, a one-time lapse in judgment. And if you’ll buy that…..

I don’t know how it works in the world of district judges, but if a low-level, blue-collar schlub like me forwarded that garbage through my company e-mail address I’d be in the unemployment line before the sun went down. This judge should resign immediately.