A Better Idea for National Defense
If there’s one thing that bothers me this time of the year, it’s seeing ex-servicemen in wheelchairs or sporting titanium arms and legs on television. If peaceful, rational humanoids from another galaxy landed in the U.S., I have to believe they would be appalled. I can just hear them asking, “Who sent all these healthy young men and women off to be maimed and killed?” And, “Did the people who sent them lead the charge into battle?”
Many argue that having the lives of thousands of young adults destroyed — or lost — is the price of preserving our freedom. And during World War II, when America was a very different nation, most people had no trouble buying into that proposition. But in today’s corrupt, semi-socialist America, the biggest threat to our freedom comes not from abroad, but from the criminal class in Washington — and, unfortunately, no one is talking about invading the nation’s capital.
It’s time to skip the political-correctness silliness and face up to reality: Most wars are transfer-of-wealth scams — transferring money from you and me to the companies that build the planes, tanks, bombs, uniforms, drones, etc. that politicians say they need to protect us. The military-industrial complex has been dominant in all advanced civilizations throughout history, and it’s never been in better health than it is today.
We’re talking very big business here. So big that those who benefit the most from it are willing to have people killed in order to keep the war assembly lines moving ahead at full speed.
As a third-generation tyrant (Kim Jong Un, a.k.a. “Chublet II”) steps to the fore in North Korea, one can’t helping thinking about the infamous Korean War that ended without victory in 1953 — even though victory was in the palm of General Douglas MacArthur’s hand.
Or the infamous Vietnam War that ended in defeat in 1975 — even though the U.S. could have won that war years earlier had it been willing to use overwhelming force.
Or the infamous Gulf War that ended, curiously, with Saddam Hussein still in power in 1992.
If you want to be ahead of the curve, you can add the Iraq War and the Afghanistan War to the above list as well. Bet the farm on this one: The Iraq story is going to have a very unhappy ending. The only question is whether the country will be overwhelmed by civil war or by an Iran takeover.
As to Afghanistan, it will end the same way that all Afghan wars end — meaning never. Its latest attackers — the Americans — will go back home with their tails between their legs, just as the Russians did before them. And the Afghans will continue to do what they’ve always done — fight.
It’s not possible to win a war against Afghanistan, because it’s not a real country. It’s a down-and-dirty suburb of the moon, filled with tribesmen who get up every morning, put on their skirts, and do what they‘ve been doing for thousands of years — fight anyone who is willing to enter the ring with them. And if there are no takers, they’re happy to fight each other.
I don’t doubt the courage or patriotism of the young Americans for whom wheelchairs or prosthetics are now a way of life. They acted in good faith and did what they thought was right. They believed they were being patriotic and defending our freedom.
But it makes me angry that their lives have been shattered because corrupt men and women in Washington got them to believe they were fighting for a noble cause. They were not. That will become obvious to all in the coming years as we watch events unfold in Iraq and Afghanistan. But, along the way, a trillion dollars got transferred from the pockets of taxpayers into the coffers of the military-industrial complex.
With drones, bunker busters, and, in a pinch, nuclear weapons, war should by now be passé. It’s not necessary to risk the lives of young men and women in far-off lands. If I were a hawk (which I most definitely am not), I’d free the North Korean people in about seventeen minutes — without harming any young Americans. Iran might take a week — just long enough to turn things over to the pro-Western youth in that country whom Barack Obama was so pleased to see crushed.
But, as I said, I’m not a hawk, so I wouldn’t take either of the above actions. I’m just your average libertarian-centered conservative who is tired of war … tired of seeing young people’s lives shattered … tired of seeing American taxpayers forced to hand over their money to politicians so they can pursue never-ending overseas military adventures.
That said, let me make it clear that I’m a big advocate of having a strong national defense. My message to rogue nations would be simple: Mess with us and yesterday will always be remembered as the best day of your life. And, yes, we will use nukes if that’s what it takes to make you behave.
Imagine all the lives and money that could have been saved had we hit the Tora Bora mountain range with a string of nuclear bombs in 2001. No U.S. casualties, no trillion dollars wasted, no ten years of political posturing. And, best of all, from Russia to China, from North Korea to Iran, the rest of the world would live in fear of what might happen to them if they messed with the Great Satan. How much more comforting it is to be feared rather than liked.
The holiday season is a good time to reflect on how nice it would be if young Americans didn’t lose any more arms or legs and taxpayers would not have to fund a military-industrial complex with such a voracious appetite.
Strong national defense: Yes! Unwarranted wars and wars that we’re not serious about winning: No!
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Copyright © 2012 Robert Ringer
ROBERT RINGER is a New York Times #1 bestselling author and host of the highly acclaimed Liberty Education Interview Series, which features interviews with top political, economic, and social leaders. He has appeared on Fox News, Fox Business, The Tonight Show, Today, The Dennis Miller Show, Good Morning America, The Lars Larson Show, ABC Nightline, and The Charlie Rose Show, and has been the subject of feature articles in such major publications as Time, People, The Wall Street Journal, Fortune, Barron's, and The New York Times.
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My dad and his brother, who are still alive at 86 and 90 yrs old respectively, were both in “the Service” as far back as WW2. Between the two of them, they have a total of 18 combat medals—some of those, you know, are the kind of medals which you receive for killing men so close that the enemy’s blood gets spattered on you.
When I accompany my dad to Audie Murphy Veterans Hospital in San Antonio we both get a firsthand look at all the latest “cannon fodder” which has come after us. The experience never fails to turn my dad’s stomach, and it makes my blood boil.
You see, it’s not just the physical wounds, but, also consider, if you will, the countless veterans with mental and emotional problems which will haunt both them and their families for the rest of their lives. Many of these vets will end up on the street squatting with other vets from past wars. Yet, what was really accomplished? Did anybody of significance cheer the Americans as they left Iraqi? Where were the parades for our troops who liberated Iraqi? The only thing I saw that resembled a parade was large groups of people burning amerikan flags as the troops departed the country.
Does any critical thinker really believe that amerika won the hearts and minds of the Iraqis or solved any of the long term problems of a country which is already on the verge of a civil war only weeks after amerika left?
Currently, the war-mongering, Neocons want to wage war on Iran, a country three times the size of Iraq.
“Imagine all the lives and money that could have been saved had we hit the Tora Bora mountain range with a string of nuclear bombs in 2001.”
RJR has articulated a very rational position in the above article. It is a position which I share except for the above quote. I wholly and vehemently protest the first use of nuclear weapons under any conditions unless there is a clear and present danger of America being attacked with weapons of mass destruction.
Even the first use of limited, tactical nukes in what otherwise could be a conventional war is not acceptable to me. The first use of nukes is simply madness! It’s a war crime! I find it reprehensible. Once that line is crossed, the world could end in less than an hour.
< It’s a war crime!
no…it is tacking an exponent onto a war crime.
and ww2, "the good war", is denial, which is therapy-speak for, "you're a liar". also, the first, arbitrary & gratuitous, use of exponents.
so much for "libertarian-centered".
My sentiments exactly. Mr. Ringer, you really have crossed an unacceptable line in advocating the use of nuclear weapons merely for the sake of expediency.
WHAT DEVICE?!?!? … WITHIN THIS NATION’S 235-YEAR HISTORY … HAS, OR MORE POSSIBLY COULD HAVE BEEN MORE “MASSIVELY DESTRUCTIVE” THAN THAT PEN, IN THE INK-WELL OF THE OVAL OFFICE, BEING UTILIZED IN WHATEVER HAND HAS DONE SO, UNDER THE ABSOLUTELY UNCONSTITUTIONAL GUISE OF AN “EXECUTIVE ORDER,” ISSUED AT 1600 PENNSYLVANIA AVE. , WASHINGTON D.C.?!?!?! …
IF that draconian act has not been the DIRECT CAUSE, THEN ITS INTIMIDATING POTENTIAL HAS CERTAINLY EXACERBATED THE DECAY OF ANY MORAL FIBER THAT MAY HAVE ARRIVED IN THAT CESSPOOL COMMUNITY, SUFFICIENT TO MAKE THE DESIRED CONSTITUTION VITIATING ACT TO OCCUR ANYWAY!!!
WHAT CONQUEST SEEKING POWER WOULD DARE “NUCLEAR” OBLITERATE SUCH FLUIDITY IN EFFECTUAL SUCCESS OF ITS AMBITIONS, WITH ITS TOTALLY CAPTIVE OPERATIVE SITTING AT THAT DESK WITH THAT PEN IN HAND, TO DO ITS BIDING?!?!?
Spot on Robert. George Washington warned us against standing armies and Eisenhower warned us against the “Military-Industrial Complex”. This is why.
yes, ike, co-creating participant & product of m.i.c. “warned”, as he was walking out the door. a mcnamara-esque mea culpa. a pontius pilate lavatory scene. these guys get old, sometimes they discover conscience. sometimes they just hope they can hedge into heaven. deathbed conversions should disgust, not impress.
In other words, do what Napoleon has always done: concentrate all your forces on the main obstacle and do not segment them. Once the main obstacle collapses everything else falls into place by itself. China is just perfect. Not strong enough to win a defensive war, but strong enough to cause serious damage to the whole planet.
really? when next you commune with your patron, ask his retrospective on russia…..(maybe you could touch base with hitler on that subject, too)…..
Great comments. However, I do disagree with the idea of WWII veterans preserving our freedom. That war was for the military industrial complex’s benefit too.
My father, who is 96, was in the army when Pearl Harbor was attacked. He found out the next day that FDR had to be involved in planning the attack.
I also disagree that we should have hit Iraq with nuclear weapons. Not because I think nuclear weapons should be off limits but because the war was foolish and unnecessary. Like Ron Paul I was opposed to Bush’s war.
The “criminal class in Washington” is not the root cause of our problems. The politicians, lobbyists, foundation leaders, et al. are merely puppets.
The rich have been disadvantaging the masses for thousands of years. The only change is that, while our titular leaders have power, the real power flows from the major owners of corporate America – the super-rich. Many of the super-rich families received their original backing from the controllers of the world: the Rothschilds, Warburgs, etc.
Not only did Bush not lead the charge into battle his daughters did not feel it a worthy cause to join.
That says a lot.
Robert, normally I agree with you but on using nuclear weapons on OBL and his thugs, I do not. What about the radiation that would spread by the winds west and south of there? Do the innocents in Pakistan and Northern India have to suffer in order to take out a handful of evil men? We did the right thing to send in troops and back it up with conventional bombing.
Herman Goring said it best: Naturally, the common people don’t want war; neither in Russia nor in England nor in America, not for that matter in Germany. That is understood. But, after all, it is the leaders of the country who determine the policy, and it is always a simple matter to drag the people along, whether it is a democracy or a fascist dictatorship or a parliament or a Communist dictatorship… The people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders. That is easy. All you have to do is tell them they are being attacked and denounce the pacifists for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger. It works the same way in any country.
yes…the bees bear more responsibility than the queen.
That’s why I will never be a libertarian. On foreign policy, they use far-left arguments in support of pacifism and appeasement. None of these wars that Robert mentions were created to enrich munitions manufacturers. That makes no economic sense whatsoever — Robert, you should be ashamed of yourself for advancing such lame, communist arguments.
You can, and should, argue against the necessity for waging such wars, or argue for better alternatives, but to use the Marxist argument that we dirty capitalists start wars to make money on arms manufacture — that is beyond the pale.
first, it’s not capitalism; second, “we” is, nominative plurals are, always evasive, distributive of responsibility – lynch mobs love them; third, cartels are opposed to “economic sense”, they are for rents/socialized costs & losses/privatized “profits”; fourth, “foreign policy” is euphemism for “empire”, which is to say the projected corruption of venal people.
you’re way behind, in a number of categories….
Stogie, Stogie – It’s time to take off the rose-colored glasses. You don’t have to be a libertarian to realize that power and money corrupts and that those for whom they become gods have no qualms about sacrificing the nation’s children or the whole damn economy and banking system for the sake of self-enrichment.
Right on, Robert! I survived the Vietnam war by the good fortune of being in the Army Signal Corps instead of the Infantry, and getting my enlistment over with in ’66, before it really got going good. Several of my buddies didn’t. Thus, by the time we gave up and came home with our tail between our legs, I was so disgusted with our politicians’ insane oxymoron of ‘limited warfare,’ that I have despised the breed ever since. By the time I first read, “Looking Out For # 1,” I was already espousing a simple National Defense strategy.
I said if I were dictator of America, I would abolish warfare. I would disband the Army and Marines, cut the Navy down to the Polaris Fleet, and the Air Force down to SAC. Then, I would offer the world all the military toys they wanted – tanks, artillery, small arms, etc. Come and get them, we wouldn’t need them any more; because we were never again going to play the game of war.
In my New World Order, henceforth any country messing with America, or one of our allies, would immediately collect two nukes. One targeted on the government center of their capital, and the other on the estate of their ruler. Then I would apologize ahead of time to the world, for the two atomic bombs that would be soon detonated somewhere, because some fool tyrant would not believe me.
The good news would be that they would be the last two, which ever would need to be used. Imagine how different the world would be today, if Truman had had the good sense to announce this in 1945, and add any country even trying to develop the bomb to the list of proscribed affronts to our hegemony. What a missed opportunity for world peace. ◄Dave►
you did not survive intact, however……as RR writes about.
You are probably right. The Military Industrial Complex would never permit such common sense to interfere with their industry. Besides, the blood and treasure we have squandered in the 45 years since, makes so much more sense, doesn’t it? ◄Dave►
neither position makes sense…..both are psychological/emotional projections. more, or less, intellect brings up the rear, to justify/rationalize. basic sales.
reunion,
see what i mean, viz. “countless veterans with mental and emotional problems
it’s why i’ve made past exclamations to the effect, “one day, it’s going to be, BOOM, a worldwide garden of mushroom clouds blooming in all their radioactive glory..
i say, all of you big-bad asses out there should remember that the first use of nukes can mean only one thing; and one thing only: amerika is committed to go all in with the human race as the bet, i.e. defcon 1.
then, in reaction to defcon 1, what happens when one of the other hegemons with nukes call the hand or raise the stakes?
oh? really? you don’t think that will happen? you think that amerika is the only country with such balls?
conclusion: BOOM!
yes. bunch of napoleons with world killer push-buttons. and their legions of fawning admirers, all ready, vetted, for their mutually exclusive heavens – via man-made nuclear suns.
“the christian religion is a parody on the worship of the sun, in which they put a man called christ in the place of the sun, and pay him the adoration originally paid to the sun.” ~ thomas paine
Yes, reunion, I get the point:
Scene one: take i) The Tora Bora mountain range, a sunny azure blue sky, pastoral village, a group of rag-clad Muslims engaged in the third of their five daily prayers and herds of sheep and goats bleating and billy(ing) in the background.
Scene two: Segue the Staples “easy button” repainted with a black and yellow mushroom emblem.
Scene three: Panning shot of the smoldering Tora-Bora rubble and the ensuing fallout windstorm, then a presidential voice: “That was easy……”
……time for church.”
lol…funnier than mine….am more like (and like) the chick from “terminator” (linda hamilton), less like errol flynn. daddy dev does not approve, probably.
also find it lovely that paine, much of whose work, conceptualizing, found its way into the revered docs that the churchers hold in whichever hand does not contain ‘the book’, lays down the spades – and is conveniently minimized, or ignored. he was more “linda”, too, less twain…..
AMEN !!!
A righteous warrior abhors war, for there are no absolute winners or losers. Huge sacrifices are made on all sides during conventional warfare.
My personal National Security Policy would be – Oderint dum metuant – Let them hate, so long as they fear. If the US were attacked, or even threatened with attack, the response would be so overwhelming it would startle the world. One or two examples should be all it would take to regain our lost respect.
With our current ability to commute to war, flying bombers from Idaho and Missouri to the Middle East and back, there is absolutely no reason for any ground troops to be deployed or harmed. The continued use of ground troops is stupid and archaic.
Unfortunately, carpet bombing and inadvertently killing innocents is no longer politically correct. However, in the big scheme of things, it is an attention getter and somewhat of a deterrent. If some rag-headed zealot realizes a bomb will not only get all his countrymen but one will surely have his name on it too, he may be a bit more thoughtful about saber rattling in the direction of the US. I would much rather annihilate a large portion of the population of a threatening country than to harm even a single United States war fighter.
I agree with those who chastise you for advocating the use of nuclear weapons. Once that Genie is out of the bottle, you can’t put it back. Thousands of tons of conventional explosives are just as effective, though.
empire has no righteous warriors.
your policy sounds a lot like the one falsely, probably, attributed to marie antionnette. the most rudimentary understanding of psychology, history, knows where your policy leads.
you have the false impression that cowering terrorized fear is a synonym for respect.
carpet bombing civilians may no longer be pc, but it is still sociopathic. i see you.
reunion, do NOT attribute to my comments anything not specifically there. I never mentioned “empires” at all. The current regime and many preceding have all been empire builders but you do not find mention of that in my comment.
I said if the US were attacked or even threatened with attack. Not if the US felt the need to build itself a new empire by taking over some other country it politically disagreed with. Nor do I advocate my policy should pertain to any US’ perceived need to defend its allies.
In addition, labeling me as sociopathic because I mentioned carpet bombing places me into the same category as anyone who would attack or threaten to attack the US. If that’s the case, so be it. Payback is a muthafugger.
I’d still prefer to wipe out large portions of another countries population than to waste the lives of our own soldiers. Perhaps you prefer otherwise?
since amerika IS an empire, and has been for a long time, none of it’s warriors in service to empire have been, are, or will be righteous. does that satisfy your attempted quibble? “new empire”, lol….
empires do get attacked. they bring it upon themselves. have you never blackened a bully’s eye? the bully should then bring out the carpet bombs?
and in your opinion, civilian populations – you even to them correctly as innocents – are merely collateral damage. that is sociopathic.
are you a lawyer, or a constitutional “scholar”?
A short study of the Byzantine history is in order. The Byzantine era was a short era, but made its major item of national interest foreign trade. However they kept a strong national defense for its countrys border. We should keep a strong national defense, but reduce the size. No longer is this nation able to support a military larger than the entire combined armies of the world. Security, trade, defense, are necessary, matter of fact they are mentioned in the founding documents of this country. The militia can be used for various duties in this country, trained, vetted, and disciplined citizen soldiers, unpaid, and volunteers. Let us ponder the actions of nuclear weapons over a glass of good brandy and sitting by a still lake. Surely those so anxious to see if nuclear weapons still function should be summarily discharged from duty/office. I should hope dear readers over the course of your life should you give thought to the idea of a nuclear war, you will look upon the photographs from Jackass Flats, New Mexico, or any of the defense films documenting the experimentation and implementation of nuclear, atomic, and thermonuclear weapons. You are in fantasy land if you think you will be in the ten percent, that survives. Strange topic for the day after Christmas, the spirit did not last long before we are again faced with a destructive geni let out of the bottle and now resides in the whole worlds hands. Happy New Year.
yes. except wholly appropriate topic for christian holy days (as well as the others, including the godless, secular, ones). a mindset, undergirded by certain assurances, or guarantees, especially on the supernatural side, and that undergirded by something else, is the fulcrum of the bombers.
We should adopt a foreign policy based on the conept that the US will not become militarily involved in any foreign nation in which it does not have a commanding national interest. Had we pursued this policy over the decades since the Korean War, we would not have been involved in Vietnam, Iraq II, Afghanistan, or Libya to mention few. A corollary is that our President and other politicians should butt out of other countries internal affairs and stop the lecturing.
< the US will not become militarily involved in any foreign nation in which it does not have a commanding national interest.
your own version of the commerce clause……
I read you regularly, and have admired your work ever since Looking Out for #1. But — are you seriously suggesting that we nuke Afghanistan? If so, I’m shocked.
This is one of the best written opinions regarding the military industrial complex as it stands today that I have read in a long while. I have long been very pro-military, and do not find Robert’s position inconsistent with such a stance. Only over time has this become more clear to me, as I see the “leaders” for whom our kids fight and die. Now I urge family and friends whose kids are thinking of joining the military to reconsider, in that at some point these soldiers are going to be used for obviously immoral purposes if we continue on our path towards fascism. In other words, now it is still arguable that there are reasons we are in Iraq and Afghanistan (though I agree with Robert finally here). However, as we continue down the road towards national poverty via socialism, we will become more expansionist and it will be harder and harder to rationalize the reasons for which we will be killing others and having our own troops sacrificed. And all the while, few of our “brave” politicians who send the troops have even seen battle, much less lead the charge now.
Especially interesting in this article is the contrast with the situation in World War II. Just a great piece. Thanks again, Merry Christmas Robert!
< at some point these soldiers are going to be used for obviously immoral purposes if we continue on our path towards fascism.
you owe it to your sense of perspective to read smedley butler's book. i think you'll immediately recognize his authority to speak to this subject. and you will also see that you were not even born yet, when "at some point" had long since come & gone.
as for "as we continue…towards fascism". this is not a zenos arrow paradox. the arrow is not in continuous, never arriving, flight. it has arrived. more than that, blizzards of arrows have arrived. at what point will that become obvious to you? it's an important question.
“War as politics by other means,” is one of the most astute observations made by Karl Von Clauswitz, an expert on the subject.
We would not need to use extreme mesures such as nuclear weapons if we adhered to a simple foreign policy mission that goes something like this:
We will trade with whomever, whenever we wish. Any attempt to interdict or otherwise interefere with that endeavor will be dealt with appropriately; diplomatically, economically and if necessary with a triad military power. Sea lanes will be kept free of intereference. Airports and harbors will enjoy free, secure and open access at all times.
These intangling alliances and interference in other peoples affairs by the U.S. must cease.
except, the impulse to clamp competition via cartel is never satisfied. one world, carved, polished, ossified, to hang around the cannibal chieftaincy’s collective gullet, is the dream.
“What’s the point of having this superb military that you’re always talking about if we can’t use it?” ~ madeleine albright
Right-O Reunion; Cartel is always the great temptation for trade chiefs. That’s why Chieftans need to be checked as well.
I like the idea of keeping sea lanes open…not invading countries. I also like the idea of changing Chiefs often lest they become too powerful and comfortable.
Speaking of which, how about we lift the Congressional exemption of the Sherman Antitrust Act for the National Football League to start? All in favor of free trade….
I would love to see a laundry list of a few hundred – no, make that a few thousand – oh, this is so frustrating, I just can’t make up my mind! OK, let’s compromise and just make it a few hundred-thousand things that would trigger an automatic tactical nuclear response. Things like building the things to build the things to build the things that go into building nuclear bomb technology. What the hell, I figure I’ve got only a very few years left anyhow, why not go for broke?
But before we do all that, I’d like to see us stop providing all those who hate us, swear they’ll kill/destroy us with the financial and technological capability to do so! We continually rationalize our charitable behavior by invoking that heartstring plucking starving children or brutalized women/poor/(insert classist/racial/sexual/religeous cause of the day here) to give hard-earned stuff to people who wind up hating us anyhow! What’s more humane than saving them years of suffering by letting them starve early, or die at the hands of their own countrymen ASAP? Our moral imperitive at the moment should be looking out for our own first! If you object to this, I implore you to go out and borrow a few hundred thousand dollars to GIVE to me! That’s what we’re doing as a country, when people like ME need FREE STUFF, and are far more deserving than all that OWS rabble freeloading off hardworking taxpayers! Screw ‘em all! Charity begins at home! 54 characters left.!!! Well, not now, only 15, well,
< We continually rationalize our charitable behavior
more accurately, charitable behavior is held up to rationalize, offset, the blood & treasure lust (which is ignored…convenient little scam, eh?).
who hates switzerland? the hate is manufactured. here. not "over there".
I am always glad to read the opinions of others but when you wrote “…those who are ignorant of history and unwilling to think” and then proceeded to scoff at climate change, dismiss distribution of wealth as class warfare, and blame the “ne’er do well” in the White House along with congressional Democrats, I recognized someone who could be lumped with “those”. I suppose you have equally good explanations for, say, the partial disappearance of the middle class, the 40% of Americans who are reported living in poverty, and the growing discrepancy between the rich and the poor? Study..think..happy new year….
“I suppose you have equally good explanations for, say, the partial disappearance of the middle class, the 40% of Americans who are reported living in poverty, and the growing discrepancy between the rich and the poor?”
It’s called government intervention and social engineering; not to mention laziness.
And, by the way, the biggest problem reported among those 40% is obesity. Figure that one out. Our “poverty stricken” now have Walmart gift cards and 1000 minute cell phones… where else except in Obamao’s Socialist America?
if it were just a matter of “opinions”, would there be any point, at all? my fave ice cream, tonight, is “cherry garcia”. what’s yours? who cares, right? those are opinions.
climate change has a history. climate variability has been completely independent of any anthropogenic prefixes for a very long time – and the evidence indicates that it still is. alternatively, the neo-malthusians have not only not proved their contentions, they’ve been caught fabricating data. perhaps you are a hockey player, and don’t particularly mind being ‘sticked’?
“distribution” of wealth is the kind of telegraph that invites half a dozen jabs and combinations..but if you don’t mind being sticked, what’s a few punches?
on all questions of economics , as opposed to treasured opinions (cherry garcia is the best!), i have the explanations, because the answers to such questions are not matters of opinion…but they are matters of contention amongst those who would have them be matters of opinion. or, as i like to think of you, because it makes me smile, the ‘i scream, you scream, we all scream for ice creamers”…..
Robert, if you think that using nukes were a solution, and that it is comforting to be feared, then you are still under the propagandistic influence of the military-industrial complex.
They want you to think like this.
Please become more conscious about this.
The problem with using nukes is they’re not a one way street. Not to mention the fact that not all cultures revere human life as the West does. Ho Chi Minh spoke to this cultural difference when he told the French in 1946: “Kill ten of our men and we will kill one of yours; in the end it is you who will tire.” And the French certainly tired. (I read this Ho Chi Minh quote in John Gregory Dunne’s collection CROONING.)
reverence for life is part of western mythology, not western reality. history, from 10 minutes ago, to as far back as you’d care to go, makes that quite clear.
I’ve lived long enough in foreign countries around the globe, as will as the USA, to know without a doubt that American culture has a sanctity-of-life attitude that is not present in the mores of certain other cultures. It may be a matter of degree, but the differences are definitely there.
the west’s arrival further west transplanted it’s murderous proclivities. know anything about the native americans? all the wars of expansion that occurred here? the war of consolidation? then the projections of empire?
the western projections of whatever name is given to power, in the various commercial campaigns, have killed many millions, and still are killing.
legalized abortion, has killed millions since ’73, continues.
sitting within a hypocritical culture (cage) and then comparing the mythos to that of other, perhaps less hypocritical cultures, does not get you anywhere.
Aside from the moral problems of using our taxpayer dollars and troop lives to fight foreign wars is the issue that we ignore all the traditional war wisdom throughout the ages. Our requirement for congressional authority to go to war is rooted in wisdom as Sun Tzu had said that one must win a war first before going into battle. By giving strong thought to war with the counsel of many leaders and the requirement of a substantial number of them to approve, we “win” the moral part of the war and we open up a dialog to discuss exactly what it is we want and to some extent how we intend to get it. Yet when leaders are allowed to just declare wars with executive power, we forgo this.
I would like to point out a lesson we should never forget about two of our candidates who ran last election as well. Prior to the South Carolina debate for the 2008 election an ordeal happened in the Persian Gulf where an Iranian ship broadcasted a message intercepted by one of our ships that caused a stir. Nobody was really sure what the message was but Mitt Romney stated at the debates he would have considered the message a reason for war. I watched as Ron Paul argued about how horrible it would be to go to war over such shaky evidence. Romney then criticized Paul for being “too timid”. Later it was found that the message was probably interpreted in error and was not hostile at all.
When asked if he would seek congressional authority, Romney states he would merely talk to attorneys!
may seem reasonable, brent. but there are underlying assumptions that do not stand up to scrutiny.
first, the moral problem of taxes (what they are used for is subsequent).
next, the idea of “counting heads, instead of weighing them”, connected to another one, characterization of congress as “leadership” connected to another one, “moral majority” (a variation on the first one).
taxation is theft, and there is no way to launder that fact, make it clean (moral).
moe, provides leadership to larry & curly/shep. drovers provide leadership to herds (“drovership”?).
the amerikan state has not waged a moral war since the inceptive revolution. and there is much evidence that morality was but a gloss in service of sheening & selling that one to the herd, whom the drovers needed to move in a particular direction.
I could respond with a treatise—trust me—on this, but it’s not worth my time. I’ll just leave off with this telling quote of Leon Trotsky’s: “We must put an end once and for all to the papist-Quaker babble about the sanctity of human life.”
and because the short list of inconveniences to your thesis i’ve mentioned were not preceded, at least publicly (have you seen some of the things wt sherman, said/wrote privately, by any chance?), by quotes such as trotsky’s, his words are aligned with actions and that is more meaningful than the same actions minus the words?
if it’s not worth your time to finish, whose time is it worth for you to begin? not seeing it thru in these venues relegates efforts to graffiti…
I’m diggin the convergence of honest antiwar Left and honest antiwar Right, anti-imperialism.
A few reading suggestions:
William Engdahl – Century of War — (anglo-American oil axis vs. German technology)
William Engdahl – on Ayatollah Khomeini installed by West per plan of Bernard Lewis and George Ball
the Grand Chessboard, entire book or key quotes, like 1 about “vassals” and “barbarians” and another about “imperial mobilization”, the concepts of selective destabilization, stabilization, causing chaos, bringing order, etc.
Cheney on YouTube as past Director of the CFR (Rockefeller, Brzezinski, Liberal Elites)
Perle and Cheney as members of the Trilateral Commission (emailed me their list as Word Doc), in other words, high level ties between “Neocons” and “Democrats”, for our slow-thinking brethren
Wikipedia on Maliki, Talibani, the Dawa Party in Iraq, ties to Hezbollah and Iran under Ayatollah Khomeini. Recent stories of extravagant state dinner for Ahmadinejad in Iraq, kissing his hand and cheeks.
Violent ethnic cleansing & relocation of Sunnis, including modernists, and Shia “collaborators” i.e. “family friends”.
The imposition of Sharia Law on modern secular Iraqis, by Bush and Bremer, and by Petraeus’ “Wolf Brigade” of Shia-oriented fanatics or gangsters,
Allawi and others tried to kill Saddam, his Catholic VP, and did terror bombing of civilians prior to Iraq-Iran War
Bush gave CIA $300k to start, hired Rendon Group PR firm which created Iraqi Nat Congres
vassal is a great word, for its definition, and for how phonetically similar it is to “vacillate”……
I have told my liberal friends for years: “If you are truly anti-war, vote REPUBLICAN! WW I: Woodrow Wilson (appropriately initialed), liberal Democrat. WW II: FDR, VERY liberal Democrat. Korea: Harry S Truman, liberal Democrat party hack, a/k/a “High-tax Harry.” Vietnam: LBJ, very VERY liberal Democrat, a/k/a “The last of the New Dealers,” architect of the disastrous so-called Great Society. International conflicts under Republican presidents have been relatively brief, with comparatively few casualties, even under ill-advised George W. Bush. And we must never forget that it was disgraced Republican president Richard M. Nixon who ABOLISHED THE MILITARY DRAFT ONCE AND FOR ALL, making him–as far as this dyed-in-the-wool pacifist is concerned–one of the greatest presidents in this nation’s history.