Post #124
Subject: Endorsement?
Democratic – um, Independent –Senator Joe Lieberman is endorsing Republican Senator John McCain for President. Lieberman and McCain co-authored the 2002 resolution in which the Senate abdicated its Constitutional responsibility and authorized President George W. Bush to declare war – a cowardly act with an unfortunately long history in this country.
Lieberman, without a word about one coward covering another coward’s back, said, "Being a Republican is important. Being a Democrat is important. But you know what's more important than that? The interest and well-being of the United States of America. Let's put the United States first again, and John McCain is the man as President who will help us do that."
McCain said “Thank you for covering my cowardly ass” – no, wait, he didn’t. He really said, "It is one of the great honors of my political career to have known him, to have worked with him and to have received his endorsement."
A Lieberman aide said that the Connecticut senator decided to endorse McCain because he considers him "the most capable to be commander in chief on day one of his administration, and the most capable of uniting the country so that we can prevail against
Islamic extremism."
Aaahhh – there it is.
Who are these preachers of Islamic extremism, and how will kicking in a few more Baghdad help?
I quote from the column “Islamo-fascism?” by Pat Buchanan, http://www.theamericancause.org/, from September 1, 2006.
“America faces a variety of adversaries, enemies and evils. But the Bombs-Away Caucus, as Iraq and Lebanon reveal, does not always have the right formula. Al-Qaida, Hamas, Hezbollah, Syria and Iran all present separate challenges calling forth different responses.”
“Al-Qaida appears to exist for one purpose: Plot and perpetrate mass murder to terrorize Americans and Europeans into getting out of the Islamic world. Contrary to what Bush believes, the 9/11 killers and London and Madrid bombers were not out to repeal the Bill of Rights, if any ever read it. They are out to kill us, and we have to get them first.”
Bombing Iran, democracy blooming in Iraq or invading Syria will NOT stop planes from flying into buildings. Our enemy is in Afghanistan – the enemy who should be the focus of our military. Simply, we need to be smarter in order to protect the interest and well-being of the United States of America.
Wednesday, December 26, 2007
Wednesday, December 19, 2007
Post #123
Subject: Exactly right-wing! :p
If a right-wing Nut has a good opinion, I’ll admit it. It’s part of that “keep your friends close, keep your enemies closer” philosophy. I refer of course to “Knee-Deep in Religion.” by Charles Krauthammer, Thursday, December 13, 2007.
http://www.townhall.com/columnists/CharlesKrauthammer/2007/12/13/knee-deep_in_religion
My responses and additions – in [brackets]….
WASHINGTON -- Mitt Romney declares, "Freedom and religion endure together, or perish alone." Barack Obama opens his speech at his South Carolina Oprah rally with "Giving all praise and honor to God. Look at the day that the Lord has made." Mike Huckabee explains his surge in the polls thus: "There's only one explanation for it, and it's not a human one. It's the same power that helped a little boy with two fish and five loaves feed a crowd of 5,000 people."
This campaign is knee-deep in religion, and it's only going to get worse. I'd thought that the limits of professed public piety had already been achieved during the Republican CNN/YouTube debate when some squirrelly looking guy held up a Bible and asked, "Do you believe every word of this book?" -- and not one candidate dared reply: None of your damn business.
[And that – “None of your damn business.” – is the only proper response. When I started this blog, God told me to never mention our relationship, and I find it hard to believe that God has approved of so much shameless pandering.]
Instead, Giuliani, Romney and Huckabee bent a knee and tried appeasement with various interpretations of scriptural literalism. The right answer, the only answer, is that the very question is offensive. The Constitution prohibits any religious test for office. And while that proscribes only government action, the law is also meant to be a teacher.
In the same way that civil rights laws established not just the legal but also the moral norm that one simply does not discriminate on the basis of race -- changing the practice of one generation and the consciousness of the next -- so the constitutional injunction against religious tests is meant to make citizens understand that such tests are profoundly un-American.
Now, there's nothing wrong with having a spirited debate on the place of religion in politics. But the candidates are confusing two arguments.
The first, which conservatives are winning, is defending the legitimacy of religion in the public square. The second, which conservatives are bound to lose, is proclaiming the privileged status of religion in political life.
A certain kind of liberal argues that having a religious underpinning for any public policy is disqualifying because it is an imposition of religion on others. Thus, if your opposition to embryonic stem cell research comes from a religious belief in the ensoulment of life at conception, you're somehow violating the separation of church and state by making other people bend to your religion.
This is absurd. Abolitionism, civil rights, temperance, opposition to the death penalty -- a host of policies, even political movements, have been rooted for many people in religious teaching or interpretation. It's ridiculous to say that therefore abolitionism, civil rights, etc., constitute an imposition of religion on others.
Imposing religion means the mandating of religious practice. It does not mean the mandating of social policy that some people may have come to support for religious reasons.
But a certain kind of conservative is not content to argue that a religious underpinning for a policy is not disqualifying. He insists that it is uniquely qualifying, indeed that it confers some special status.
Romney has been faulted for not throwing at least one bone of acknowledgment to nonbelievers in his big religion speech last week. But he couldn't, because the theme of the speech was that there was something special about having your values drawn from religious faith. Indeed, faith is politically indispensable. "Freedom requires religion," Romney declared, "just as religion requires freedom."
But this is nonsense -- as Romney then proceeded to demonstrate in that very same speech. He spoke of the empty cathedrals in Europe. He's right about that: Postwar Europe has experienced the most precipitous decline in religious belief in the history of the West. Yet Europe is one of the freest precincts on the planet. It is an open, vibrant, tolerant community of more than two dozen disparate nations living in a pan-continental harmony and freedom unseen in all previous European history.
In some times and places, religion promotes freedom. In other times and places, it does precisely the opposite, as is demonstrated in huge swaths of the Muslim world, where religion has been used to impose the worst kind of unfreedom.
In this country, there is no special political standing that one derives from being a Christian leader like Mike Huckabee or a fervent believer like Mitt Romney. Just as there should be no disability or disqualification for political views that derive from religious sensibilities, whether the subject is civil rights or stem cells.
This is pretty elementary stuff. I haven't exactly invented hot water here. The very rehearsing of these arguments seems tiresome and redundant.
But apparently not in the campaign of 2008. It's two centuries since the passage of the First Amendment and our presidential candidates still cannot distinguish establishment from free exercise.
Subject: Exactly right-wing! :p
If a right-wing Nut has a good opinion, I’ll admit it. It’s part of that “keep your friends close, keep your enemies closer” philosophy. I refer of course to “Knee-Deep in Religion.” by Charles Krauthammer, Thursday, December 13, 2007.
http://www.townhall.com/columnists/CharlesKrauthammer/2007/12/13/knee-deep_in_religion
My responses and additions – in [brackets]….
WASHINGTON -- Mitt Romney declares, "Freedom and religion endure together, or perish alone." Barack Obama opens his speech at his South Carolina Oprah rally with "Giving all praise and honor to God. Look at the day that the Lord has made." Mike Huckabee explains his surge in the polls thus: "There's only one explanation for it, and it's not a human one. It's the same power that helped a little boy with two fish and five loaves feed a crowd of 5,000 people."
This campaign is knee-deep in religion, and it's only going to get worse. I'd thought that the limits of professed public piety had already been achieved during the Republican CNN/YouTube debate when some squirrelly looking guy held up a Bible and asked, "Do you believe every word of this book?" -- and not one candidate dared reply: None of your damn business.
[And that – “None of your damn business.” – is the only proper response. When I started this blog, God told me to never mention our relationship, and I find it hard to believe that God has approved of so much shameless pandering.]
Instead, Giuliani, Romney and Huckabee bent a knee and tried appeasement with various interpretations of scriptural literalism. The right answer, the only answer, is that the very question is offensive. The Constitution prohibits any religious test for office. And while that proscribes only government action, the law is also meant to be a teacher.
In the same way that civil rights laws established not just the legal but also the moral norm that one simply does not discriminate on the basis of race -- changing the practice of one generation and the consciousness of the next -- so the constitutional injunction against religious tests is meant to make citizens understand that such tests are profoundly un-American.
Now, there's nothing wrong with having a spirited debate on the place of religion in politics. But the candidates are confusing two arguments.
The first, which conservatives are winning, is defending the legitimacy of religion in the public square. The second, which conservatives are bound to lose, is proclaiming the privileged status of religion in political life.
A certain kind of liberal argues that having a religious underpinning for any public policy is disqualifying because it is an imposition of religion on others. Thus, if your opposition to embryonic stem cell research comes from a religious belief in the ensoulment of life at conception, you're somehow violating the separation of church and state by making other people bend to your religion.
This is absurd. Abolitionism, civil rights, temperance, opposition to the death penalty -- a host of policies, even political movements, have been rooted for many people in religious teaching or interpretation. It's ridiculous to say that therefore abolitionism, civil rights, etc., constitute an imposition of religion on others.
Imposing religion means the mandating of religious practice. It does not mean the mandating of social policy that some people may have come to support for religious reasons.
But a certain kind of conservative is not content to argue that a religious underpinning for a policy is not disqualifying. He insists that it is uniquely qualifying, indeed that it confers some special status.
Romney has been faulted for not throwing at least one bone of acknowledgment to nonbelievers in his big religion speech last week. But he couldn't, because the theme of the speech was that there was something special about having your values drawn from religious faith. Indeed, faith is politically indispensable. "Freedom requires religion," Romney declared, "just as religion requires freedom."
But this is nonsense -- as Romney then proceeded to demonstrate in that very same speech. He spoke of the empty cathedrals in Europe. He's right about that: Postwar Europe has experienced the most precipitous decline in religious belief in the history of the West. Yet Europe is one of the freest precincts on the planet. It is an open, vibrant, tolerant community of more than two dozen disparate nations living in a pan-continental harmony and freedom unseen in all previous European history.
In some times and places, religion promotes freedom. In other times and places, it does precisely the opposite, as is demonstrated in huge swaths of the Muslim world, where religion has been used to impose the worst kind of unfreedom.
In this country, there is no special political standing that one derives from being a Christian leader like Mike Huckabee or a fervent believer like Mitt Romney. Just as there should be no disability or disqualification for political views that derive from religious sensibilities, whether the subject is civil rights or stem cells.
This is pretty elementary stuff. I haven't exactly invented hot water here. The very rehearsing of these arguments seems tiresome and redundant.
But apparently not in the campaign of 2008. It's two centuries since the passage of the First Amendment and our presidential candidates still cannot distinguish establishment from free exercise.
Wednesday, December 12, 2007
Post #122
Subject: Those who forget history are doomed to repeat it, as somebody once said. Pt. II
Lieutenant General Robert Gard signed a letter to President George W. Bush critical of foreign policy last year – see my Post #14. On “Hardball,” then, Chris Matthews asked, “Is there anything that‘s happened in Iraq since 2003, when we invaded, that we couldn‘t have foreseen?”
And Gard answered, “I don‘t think so. The problem is that there was an assumption that there would not be an insurgency. We would be greeted with sweets and flowers. There was no preparation for what to do after Baghdad fell.”
In my Post #112, retired Lieutenant General Ricardo Sanchez, coalition commander in 2003 and 2004, said the Iraq war plan from the start was "catastrophically flawed, unrealistically optimistic," and the administration has not provided the resources necessary for victory, which he said the military could never achieve on its own.
Simply, History would have told us what to expect – even the History of predictions! ;p
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP, from 1994)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: So you think the U.S. or U.N. forces should have moved into Baghdad?
DICK CHENEY, FUTURE VICE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: No.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Why not?
CHENEY: Because if we had gone to Baghdad we would have been all alone. There wouldn’t have been anybody else with us. It would have been a U.S. occupation of Iraq. And under the Arab forces that were willing to fight with us in Kuwait were willing to invade Iraq. Once you got to Iraq and took it over, and took down Saddam Hussein’s government, then what are you going to put in its place?
That’s a very volatile part of the world. And if you take down the central government in Iraq, you can easily end up seeing pieces of Iraq fly off. Part of it the Syrians would like to have for the west. Part of eastern Iraq the Iranians would like to claim, fought over for eight years. In the north, you have got the Kurds. If the Kurds spin loose and join with the Kurds in Turkey, then you threaten the territorial integrity of Turkey. It’s a quagmire if you go that far and try to take over Iraq.
The other thing was casualties. Everyone was impressed with the fact that we were able to do our job with as few casualties as we had. But for the 146 Americans killed in action and for their families, it wasn’t a cheap war.
And the question for the president in terms of whether or not we went on to Baghdad and took additional casualties in an effort to get Saddam Hussein, was how many additional dead Americans is Saddam worth? And our judgment was, not very many,
(END VIDEO CLIP)
Life in Bush’s Washington goes on -- unencumbered by that burden of History! :p
White House press secretary Dana Perino at a White House briefing held on October 26 was asked, "Do you want to address the remarks by President Putin, who said the United States setting up a missile defense shield in Eastern Europe was like the Soviet Union putting missiles in Cuba, setting up a Cuban missile crisis?" "Well, I think that the historical comparison is not -- does not exactly work," Perino responded.
The Cuban Missile Crisis? She didn't know what it was. "I was panicked a bit because I really don't know about… the Cuban Missile Crisis," said Perino. "It had to do with Cuba and missiles, I'm pretty sure." "I came home and I asked my husband," she said. "I said, 'Wasn't that like the Bay of Pigs thing?' And he said, 'Oh, Dana.' "
Ya would think that the press secretary for the President of the United States would have at least a passing knowledge of the most important event of the second-half of the 20th century. But consider who she works for? :p
Subject: Those who forget history are doomed to repeat it, as somebody once said. Pt. II
Lieutenant General Robert Gard signed a letter to President George W. Bush critical of foreign policy last year – see my Post #14. On “Hardball,” then, Chris Matthews asked, “Is there anything that‘s happened in Iraq since 2003, when we invaded, that we couldn‘t have foreseen?”
And Gard answered, “I don‘t think so. The problem is that there was an assumption that there would not be an insurgency. We would be greeted with sweets and flowers. There was no preparation for what to do after Baghdad fell.”
In my Post #112, retired Lieutenant General Ricardo Sanchez, coalition commander in 2003 and 2004, said the Iraq war plan from the start was "catastrophically flawed, unrealistically optimistic," and the administration has not provided the resources necessary for victory, which he said the military could never achieve on its own.
Simply, History would have told us what to expect – even the History of predictions! ;p
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP, from 1994)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: So you think the U.S. or U.N. forces should have moved into Baghdad?
DICK CHENEY, FUTURE VICE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: No.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Why not?
CHENEY: Because if we had gone to Baghdad we would have been all alone. There wouldn’t have been anybody else with us. It would have been a U.S. occupation of Iraq. And under the Arab forces that were willing to fight with us in Kuwait were willing to invade Iraq. Once you got to Iraq and took it over, and took down Saddam Hussein’s government, then what are you going to put in its place?
That’s a very volatile part of the world. And if you take down the central government in Iraq, you can easily end up seeing pieces of Iraq fly off. Part of it the Syrians would like to have for the west. Part of eastern Iraq the Iranians would like to claim, fought over for eight years. In the north, you have got the Kurds. If the Kurds spin loose and join with the Kurds in Turkey, then you threaten the territorial integrity of Turkey. It’s a quagmire if you go that far and try to take over Iraq.
The other thing was casualties. Everyone was impressed with the fact that we were able to do our job with as few casualties as we had. But for the 146 Americans killed in action and for their families, it wasn’t a cheap war.
And the question for the president in terms of whether or not we went on to Baghdad and took additional casualties in an effort to get Saddam Hussein, was how many additional dead Americans is Saddam worth? And our judgment was, not very many,
(END VIDEO CLIP)
Life in Bush’s Washington goes on -- unencumbered by that burden of History! :p
White House press secretary Dana Perino at a White House briefing held on October 26 was asked, "Do you want to address the remarks by President Putin, who said the United States setting up a missile defense shield in Eastern Europe was like the Soviet Union putting missiles in Cuba, setting up a Cuban missile crisis?" "Well, I think that the historical comparison is not -- does not exactly work," Perino responded.
The Cuban Missile Crisis? She didn't know what it was. "I was panicked a bit because I really don't know about… the Cuban Missile Crisis," said Perino. "It had to do with Cuba and missiles, I'm pretty sure." "I came home and I asked my husband," she said. "I said, 'Wasn't that like the Bay of Pigs thing?' And he said, 'Oh, Dana.' "
Ya would think that the press secretary for the President of the United States would have at least a passing knowledge of the most important event of the second-half of the 20th century. But consider who she works for? :p
Wednesday, December 05, 2007
Post #121
Subject: Again, George W. Bush defies the Constitution… Pt. II
In my Post #112 – Subject: "a nightmare with no end in sight” – I quoted retired Lt. Gen. Ricardo Sanchez, coalition commander in 2003 and 2004, who called the Iraq war "a nightmare with no end in sight," for which he said the Bush administration, the State Department and Congress all share blame. “After more than four years of fighting, America continues its desperate struggle in Iraq without any concerted effort to devise a strategy that will achieve victory in that war torn country or in the greater conflict against extremism," Sanchez said.
Careful readers of this blog will know that is exactly where I stand: We are stuck in Irag, and that has nothing to do with the War on Terror.
Sanchez also said the Iraq war plan from the start was "catastrophically flawed, unrealistically optimistic," and the administration has not provided the resources necessary for victory, which he said the military could never achieve on its own.
Yep, George W. Bush has never understood the appropriate role of the military: What they do, what resources are required to do what they do, and what resources are required for when what they do is over. The military is, after all, composed of people.
And, now, Bush and Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki signed a "declaration of principles" to keep us mired in Iraq permanently – tho by not calling a treaty, a “treaty,” the Bushies manage to bypass Senate ratification. Simply, Bush wants to leave 50.000 of our troops as a “trip-wire” – like our troops in South Korea – to deter aggression from obviously Iran. How many peeps had our soldiers being held hostage as an original reason for supporting Bush’s folly? And how is that fighting Terror?
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP, September 11, 2007)
SENATOR RUSS FEINGOLD (D), WISCONSIN: So the question we must answer is not whether we are winning or losing in Iraq but whether Iraq is helping or hurting our efforts to defeat al Qaeda. That is the lesson of 9/11.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
Our focus obviously should be on Pakistan – where jihadists are close to getting their hands on a nuclear arsenal.
Instead, we are being led “to support the Iraqi government in training, equipping, and arming the Iraqi Security Forces so they can provide security and stability to all Iraqis; support the Iraqi government in contributing to the international fight against terrorism by confronting terrorists such as Al-Qaeda, its affiliates, other terrorist groups, as well as all other outlaw groups, such as criminal remnants of the former regime; and to provide security assurances to the Iraqi Government to deter any external aggression and to ensure the integrity of Iraq's territory.” Bush said that Iraq's leaders "understand that their success will require U.S. political, economic, and security engagement that extends beyond my presidency.” – Fact Sheet at whitehouse.gov : U.S.-Iraq Declaration Of Principles For Friendship And Cooperation.
There it is, peeps: Bush’s plan for domination of the Middle East. My, that’s a long way from the threat of WMD. It confirms my suspicion that Bush is making this up as he goes along. He has no idea when it’s over in Iraq, when it’s time to let the Iraqis sink or swim on their own, when it’s time to focus elsewhere.
At least, we won’t have to hear “the surge is working, the surge is working” any more – tho watch out for those “Bush as Truman” spins! :p
Subject: Again, George W. Bush defies the Constitution… Pt. II
In my Post #112 – Subject: "a nightmare with no end in sight” – I quoted retired Lt. Gen. Ricardo Sanchez, coalition commander in 2003 and 2004, who called the Iraq war "a nightmare with no end in sight," for which he said the Bush administration, the State Department and Congress all share blame. “After more than four years of fighting, America continues its desperate struggle in Iraq without any concerted effort to devise a strategy that will achieve victory in that war torn country or in the greater conflict against extremism," Sanchez said.
Careful readers of this blog will know that is exactly where I stand: We are stuck in Irag, and that has nothing to do with the War on Terror.
Sanchez also said the Iraq war plan from the start was "catastrophically flawed, unrealistically optimistic," and the administration has not provided the resources necessary for victory, which he said the military could never achieve on its own.
Yep, George W. Bush has never understood the appropriate role of the military: What they do, what resources are required to do what they do, and what resources are required for when what they do is over. The military is, after all, composed of people.
And, now, Bush and Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki signed a "declaration of principles" to keep us mired in Iraq permanently – tho by not calling a treaty, a “treaty,” the Bushies manage to bypass Senate ratification. Simply, Bush wants to leave 50.000 of our troops as a “trip-wire” – like our troops in South Korea – to deter aggression from obviously Iran. How many peeps had our soldiers being held hostage as an original reason for supporting Bush’s folly? And how is that fighting Terror?
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP, September 11, 2007)
SENATOR RUSS FEINGOLD (D), WISCONSIN: So the question we must answer is not whether we are winning or losing in Iraq but whether Iraq is helping or hurting our efforts to defeat al Qaeda. That is the lesson of 9/11.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
Our focus obviously should be on Pakistan – where jihadists are close to getting their hands on a nuclear arsenal.
Instead, we are being led “to support the Iraqi government in training, equipping, and arming the Iraqi Security Forces so they can provide security and stability to all Iraqis; support the Iraqi government in contributing to the international fight against terrorism by confronting terrorists such as Al-Qaeda, its affiliates, other terrorist groups, as well as all other outlaw groups, such as criminal remnants of the former regime; and to provide security assurances to the Iraqi Government to deter any external aggression and to ensure the integrity of Iraq's territory.” Bush said that Iraq's leaders "understand that their success will require U.S. political, economic, and security engagement that extends beyond my presidency.” – Fact Sheet at whitehouse.gov : U.S.-Iraq Declaration Of Principles For Friendship And Cooperation.
There it is, peeps: Bush’s plan for domination of the Middle East. My, that’s a long way from the threat of WMD. It confirms my suspicion that Bush is making this up as he goes along. He has no idea when it’s over in Iraq, when it’s time to let the Iraqis sink or swim on their own, when it’s time to focus elsewhere.
At least, we won’t have to hear “the surge is working, the surge is working” any more – tho watch out for those “Bush as Truman” spins! :p
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