“We will bankrupt ourselves in the vain search for absolute security.” -Dwight D. Eisenhower
“How far can you go without destroying from within what you are trying to defend from without?” –Dwight D. Eisenhower
Generals gathered in their masses
Just like witches at black masses
Evil minds that plot destruction
Sorcerers of deaths construction
In the fields the bodies burning
As the war machine keeps turning
Death and hatred to mankind
Poisoning their brainwashed minds, oh lord yeah!
Black Sabbath – War Pigs
As Americans mindlessly celebrate another Memorial Day with cookouts, beer and burgers, the U.S. war machine keeps churning. As we brutally enforce our will on foreign countries, we create more people that hate us. They don’t hate us for our freedom. They hate us because we have invaded and occupied their countries. They hate us because we kill innocent people with predator drones. They hate us for our hypocrisy regarding democracy and freedom. Just when we had the opportunity to make a sensible decision by leaving Iraq and exiting the Middle East quagmire, Obama made the abysmal choice to casually sacrifice more troops in the Afghan shithole. We have thrown over $1.3 trillion down Middle East rat holes over the last 11 years with no discernible benefit to the citizens of the United States. George Bush and Barack Obama did this to prove they were true statesmen. The Soviet Union killed over 1 million Afghans, while driving another 5 million out of the country and retreated as a bankrupted and defeated shell after ten years. Young Americans continue to die, for whom and for what? Our foreign policy during the last eleven years can be summed up in one military term, SNAFU – Situation Normal All Fucked Up. These endless foreign interventions under the guise of a War on Terror are a smoke screen for what is really going on in this country. When a government has unsolvable domestic problems, they try to distract the willfully ignorant masses by proactively creating foreign conflicts based upon false pretenses. General Douglas MacArthur understood this danger to our liberty.
“I am concerned for the security of our great Nation; not so much because of any threat from without, but because of the insidious forces working from within.”
Economic Opportunity Cost
“You can’t say civilization don’t advance… in every war they kill you in a new way.” – Will Rogers
Any doubt that the Military Industrial Complex is as strong as ever should be removed after examining Obama’s 2012 Budget which has $900 billion dedicated to our military machine. We spent $370 billion in 2001, $620 billion in 2006, and now this liberal anti-war Democrat from Illinois is spending 45% more than that war monger Bush who was burned in effigy by the anti-war Democrats during Iraq War protests. It seems both parties are war pigs.
The Soviet Union collapsed in 1989, leaving the United States as the only remaining superpower on earth. Since 1990, the United States has depleted the U.S. Treasury of $11.5 trillion for spending on War. With no military on earth capable of challenging us why would there be a need to spend this much on the military? Over this same time frame the U.S. spent $500 billion on science, space & technology and $70 billion on energy, a mere 6% of the spending on invading sovereign countries. Military expenditures benefit humanity in no way. If these trillions had been invested by the private sector or devoted to energy and scientific research, our economy might not be a hollowed out shell, dependent on China for financing and oil exporting countries for energy. Neo-Cons argue the Arms Industry employs millions and benefits the country. These companies employ brilliant engineers and scientists who spend their days developing weapons that kill people more efficiently. If they had been employed manufacturing high tech goods to export around the world, inventing new technologies that didn’t obliterate human beings, newer safer nuclear power plants, a more efficient electric grid, upgrading our deteriorating infrastructure, or finding a cure for Alzheimer’s, would the United States be better off today?
The National Debt in 1990 was $3.2 trillion. Today, it is $15.7 trillion. This is a 500% increase in twenty-two years. What benefit has $11.5 trillion of spending on War produced for the United States or the world? In 2001, spending on Defense was 17% of total governmental spending. In 2012, Defense, Homeland Security, and war spending account for 25% of government spending. In the meantime, major cities experience blackouts due to an overloaded electrical grid, our 156,000 structurally deficient bridges crumble, one hundred year old water pipes burst under our streets every day, and we transfer over $300 billion per year to foreign countries for our precious oil. The 19 terrorist hijackers who implemented their plan with box cutters, spent less than $500,000 to pull off their 9/11 acts of terror – not war. The United States will directly spend at least $3 trillion on our wars of choice in response, while turning our country into a prison camp and stripping our citizens of their freedoms and liberties for perceived security and safety.
You would think we must be trying to keep up with our enemies by spending $900 billion per year on past and present military adventures. But one look at the following chart reveals the United States is spending almost as much as the rest of the world combined. The two countries considered potential rivals, China and Russia, spent $200 billion combined in 2010. This is 22% of U.S. spending. From a foreign viewpoint, one must wonder why the U.S. is spending such vast sums on our military. They can only conclude that it is for offensive intentions rather than defensive. The United States soil has not been attacked by a foreign power since December 7, 1941. Prior to that surprise attack, a foreign power hadn’t attacked the U.S. since the War of 1812. With this stupendous level of wasteful spending, our leaders feel compelled to interfere in the business of sovereign states and dictate how they should govern their nations . When you have an enormous hammer, every country looks like a nail.
Laughably, the neo-con hawks and Fox News pundits declare that our military is a hollow shell and needs much greater funding to insure our safety from attack by our many enemies. Other countries, such as China and Russia, feel they have no choice but to increase their expenditures on the military. On a percentage basis, they have more than doubled their expenditures in the last ten years, and still are a drop in the ocean compared to American Empire spending. The fact is that the U.S., China and Russia all have enough nuclear weapons to obliterate the world – mutually assured destruction. The United States could realistically protect itself from attack with only the 18 ballistic missile nuclear submarines we have in commission.
When did Americans lose their ability to distinguish between intellectual and moral pygmies like George Bush, Barack Obama and Mitt Romney versus statesmen like Dwight D. Eisenhower? The Bush Doctrine of pre-emptive war when our country was not threatened has proven to be financially and diplomatically disastrous and his blueprint is being followed by our Nobel Peace Prize President in his saber rattling with Iran. Following this policy puts them in fine company.
“Preventive war was an invention of Hitler. Frankly, I would not even listen to anyone seriously that came and talked about such a thing.” –Dwight D. Eisenhower
The U.S. borrowed $807 billion from China, Japan and oil exporting countries to wage a war in Iraq that was based on false pretenses. None of the terrorist hijackers on 9/11 were Iraqis, they had no links to Al Qaeda, and Iraq had no weapons of mass destruction. Historian Barbara Tuchman description of “war as the unfolding of miscalculations” was never so fitting. In 2002, Secretary of Defense Rumsfeld estimated the costs of the war in the range of $50 to $60 billion, a portion of which he believed would be financed by other countries. The United States invaded Iraq to secure the 115 billion barrels of oil reserves, pure and simple. We traded the blood of young Americans for oil because we chose to not develop a cohesive logical energy policy in the last 30 years. Americans, not in the military, sacrificed nothing in the last 11 years of war. We bought BMW SUVs, 6,000 square foot McMansions, flat screen HDTVs, iPads, iPhones and Rolexes while less than 1% of Americans fought and died, with the cost passed to future unborn generations. We are a country of chickenhawks, willing to sacrifice the few so the ruling class can comfortably relax on their decks sipping wine, believing Fox News propaganda about terrorists lurking behind every bush, and filling up their Mercedes convertibles for their excursions to the summer cottage in the Hamptons.
“Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every rocket fired, signifies in the final sense a theft from those who hunger and are not fed, those who are cold and are not clothed.” – Dwight D. Eisenhower
As we spend $900 billion per year on instruments of destruction, 49 million Americans live in poverty, with 46 million on food stamps. There are 3 to 4 million people homeless in any given year. Military Veterans, who make up 13% of the population, account for 23% of the homeless. This is another example of Federal government politicians using young Americans to fulfill their agenda and then tossing them away like pieces of garbage. With the country supposedly three years into an economic recovery, tent cities of homeless dot the landscape across the nation. We pour billions into killing technology while millions of American families are forced to live in tents or sleep in their cars.
As the world spends $1.7 trillion per year on new methods of killing, millions die the old fashioned way.
- 13 million people per year die from starvation in the world.
- The FAO says that 925 million people worldwide are undernourished.
- For the price of one missile, a school full of hungry children could eat lunch every day for 5 years.
- One child dies every 5 seconds as a result of hunger – 700 every hour – 16 000 each day – 6 million each year – 60% of all child deaths (2002-2008 estimates)
What kind of a civilized society allocates 44% of the taxes taken from its people to war? Only 2.5% of your taxes go to science, energy, and environment. Only 2.2% of your taxes go to education and jobs. You produce the results that you would expect from your investments. A full 13% of our population doesn’t have a high school diploma (20% of African Americans & 43% of Latinos) and only 30% have a college degree. How do we expect to lead the world in technology and research with these figures? We do lead the world in government issued student loan debt with $1 trillion and rising.
Human Cost
Politicians hide themselves away
They only started the war
Why should they go out to fight?
They leave that role to the poor
Time will tell on their power minds
Making war just for fun
Treating people just like pawns in chess
Wait till their judgment day comes, yeah!
Black Sabbath – War Pigs
George Bush, Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld, and Barack Obama are cowardly politicians who never had the “pleasure” of coming under fire in battle. The brilliant anti-war novel Catch-22 describes these men perfectly.
“Some men are born mediocre, some men achieve mediocrity, and some men have mediocrity thrust upon them. With Major Major it had been all three.”
The world has been a huge game of Risk for these warmongers, with young Americans as the game pieces. Instead of conquering Kamchatka in a board game, these non-veterans sent 6,470 Americans to their deaths in Iraq and Afghanistan for a false cause. Their ideology of empire convinced them they could change the world into their image of how it should be, and their re-election campaigns were funded with millions from the purveyors of death – the arms industry.
“In modern war… you will die like a dog for no good reason.” – Ernest Hemingway
Another 47,545 Americans have been badly wounded in Iraq and Afghanistan. Three of these despicable politicians have written their memoirs, raking in millions for telling lies and half-truths. The 6,470 dead Americans won’t have a chance to write their memoirs or get rich. They will never get a chance to see their kids’ graduate college or walk their daughter down the aisle at her wedding. Their children will grow up with a giant hole in their hearts. Their widows will never recover from their endless heartache.
Politician chickenhawks who send our young people to their deaths for oil and ideology will receive their reward on judgment day if there is a just God.
As National Guard troops have been deployed over and over again to Iraq and Afghanistan, they must realize that Catch-22 is alive and well in today’s military.
“There was only one catch and that was Catch-22, which specified that a concern for one’s own safety in the face of dangers that were real and immediate was the process of a rational mind. Orr was crazy and could be grounded. All he had to do was ask; and as soon as he did, he would no longer be crazy and would have to fly more missions. Orr would be crazy to fly more missions and sane if he didn’t, but if he was sane he had to fly them. If he flew them he was crazy and didn’t have to; but if he didn’t want to he was sane and had to. Yossarian was moved very deeply by the absolute simplicity of this clause of Catch-22 and let out a respectful whistle.”
“That’s some catch, that catch-22,” he observed.
“It’s the best there is,” Doc Daneeka agreed
American soldiers, who have completed their duty to country, have been lied to and had the rules of the game changed again and again. Their politician leaders have reneged on their promises by sending men and women back to the war zone or not letting them come home on the timeline that was agreed to. Meanwhile, their families have gone bankrupt, lost their houses, and saw their marriages dissolve. Politicians started these wars and are too cowardly and prideful to accept failure.
“The military don’t start wars. Politicians start wars.” – General William Westmoreland
Over 1,300 more Americans died needlessly when Barack Obama, winner of the Nobel Peace Prize, chose to double down in Afghanistan to prove he was as tough as Bush and McCain. Another man who has never been under fire needed to prove his manliness to his opponents and his constituency. He should have studied the words of former Presidents who were under fire.
“I hate war as only a soldier who has lived it can, only as one who has seen its brutality, its futility, its stupidity.” – Dwight D. Eisenhower
“My first wish is to see this plague of mankind, war, banished from the earth.” – George Washington
President Obama follows the standard Presidential game plan and dutifully gives patriotic speeches at military bases proclaiming the bravery and sacrifice of our troops. These are the words of politicians. The brutal reality for troops is much different. Representative Ron Paul in November 2003 described the early mistreatment of our soldiers:
- Fort Stewart, Georgia housed hundreds of injured reserve and National Guard soldiers in deplorable conditions who were forced to wait months just to see a doctor. These soldiers made huge sacrifices, leaving their families and jobs to fight in Iraq. They found themselves living in hot, crowded, unsanitary barracks and waiting far too long to see overworked doctors. This was hardly the heroes’ welcome they might have expected. Only an exposé in a major newspaper brought attention to their plight, prompting an embarrassed Defense department to rush additional doctors to the base.
- Some wounded soldiers convalescing at Walter Reed hospital in Washington were forced to pay for hospital meals from their own pockets. Other soldiers returning stateside for a two-week liberty had to buy their own airfare home from the east coast. Still others paid for desert boots, night vision goggles, and other military necessities with personal funds.
- Existing federal rules forced disabled veterans to give up their military retirement pay in order to receive VA disability benefits. This meant that every VA disability dollar paid to a veteran was deducted from his retirement pay, effectively creating a “disabled veterans tax.” No other group of federal employees is subject to this unfair standard; in every other case disability pay is viewed as distinct from standard retirement pay.
The Humvees that soldiers were forced to drive did not have enough protective armor. In December 2004, Secretary of Defense Rumsfeld was giving one of his usual inspirational speeches when Army Spc. Thomas Wilson of the 278th Regimental Combat Team, a unit that consisted mainly of reservists from the Tennessee Army National Guard asked him a question:
“Why do we soldiers have to dig through local landfills for pieces of scrap metal and compromised ballistic glass to up-armor our vehicles?”
This set off what the AP described as “a big cheer” from his comrades in arms. Rumsfeld paused, asked Wilson to repeat the question, then finally replied, “You go to war with the army you have.” Besides, he added, “You can have all the armor in the world on a tank and it can be blown up.” I’m glad Donald Rumsfeld has a clear conscience. History will not be kind to this despicable excuse for a human being.
Rumsfeld also sent Americans into battle without protective body armor. Only after bad publicity did the proper protection reach the troops. The blood of dead soldiers is on Rumsfeld’s hands. While President Bush sacrificed by not golfing, terribly wounded soldiers were sent to Walter Reed Hospital to recover. Instead they entered hell on earth. Outpatient mistreatment was reported in 2004, but nothing was done. In 2004 and 2005, articles appeared in the Washington Post and in Salon interviewing First Lt. Julian Goodrum about his court martial for seeking medical care elsewhere due to poor conditions at WRAMC. A Washington Post expose in 2007 finally revealed the horrible mistreatment of our brave wounded soldiers. These reporters uncovered the following conditions:
- WRAMC’s Building 18 was described in the article as rat- and cockroach-infested, with stained carpets, cheap mattresses, and black mold, with no heat and water reported by some soldiers at the facility. The unmonitored entrance created security problems, including reports of drug dealers in front of the facility. Injured soldiers stated they are forced to “pull guard duty” to obtain a level of security.
- The typical soldier was required to file 22 documents with eight different commands – most of them off-post – to enter and exit the medical processing world, according to government investigators. Sixteen different information systems were used to process the forms, but few of them could communicate with one another. This complicated system has required some soldiers to prove they were in the Iraq War or the War in Afghanistan in order to obtain medical treatment and benefits because Walter Reed employees were unable to locate their records.
There was a tremendous surge in suicides by soldiers who have been pushed beyond their limits as they increased by 80% between 2004 and 2008. There are almost as many deaths by suicide as deaths in combat:
- Overall, the services reported 434 suicides by personnel on active duty, significantly more than the 381 suicides by active-duty personnel reported in 2009. The 2010 total is below the 462 deaths in combat, excluding accidents and illness. In 2009, active-duty suicides exceeded deaths in battle.
- Soldiers returning from long tours in Iraq or Afghanistan suffering from combat stress were sometimes met with scorn from their superiors and something bordering on neglect from some medical officials. As their largely untreated problems deteriorated, their marriages unraveled under the strain. They turned to alcohol and drugs and in some cases saw no other way out than suicide.
- Healthcare officials at various installations who are struggling to help say they’re overwhelmed by huge numbers of troops returning from two, three or even four deployments with acute mental problems from combat.
- Statistics on Iraq and Afghanistan veterans, obtained in 2011 through a Freedom of Information Act request by a San Francisco newspaper, found that more than 2,200 soldiers died within two years of leaving the service, and about half had been undergoing treatment for post-traumatic stress or other combat-induced mental disorders at the time.
- For five years, beginning in 2005, a service member died by suicide every 36 hours, according to the report by the Center for New American Security.
Nearly 20% of military service members who have returned from Iraq and Afghanistan — 300,000 in all — report symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder or major depression, yet only slightly more than half have sought treatment, according to a RAND Corporation report. Many service members said they do not seek treatment for psychological illnesses because they fear it will harm their careers. But even among those who do seek help for PTSD or major depression, only about half receive treatment that researchers consider “minimally adequate” for their illnesses. Recent studies expect PTSD to affect 30% of all returning veterans.
For all the glory and accolades of dying for chickenhawks like Dick Cheney, enlisted soldiers make between $17,000 and $32,000 per year. The military evidently does not prepare them well for the outside world as their unemployment rate is 12.1% versus the national rate of 8.2%. The pandering Obama gives speeches and the criminal bankers at JP Morgan have their PR maggots create TV commercials about hiring veterans, but the numbers don’t lie. A country can be measured by how well it treats its veterans. Our leaders talk a good game, but their actions prove they don’t care about the human costs of war. They are busy planning their next move in their game of Risk.
Moral Cost
Now in darkness, world stops turning
As the war machine keeps burning
No more war pigs of the power
Hand of God has struck the hour
Day of Judgment, God is calling
On their knees, the war pigs crawling
Begging mercy for their sins
Satan, laughing, spreads his wings
All right now!
Black Sabbath – War Pigs
Omar Bradley, the last five star General in the U.S. military, was known as the “soldier’s general” during World War II. He was portrayed by Karl Malden in the movie Patton as a thoughtful man who cared about his troops. He was one of the key architects of the Normandy invasion and led the 12th Army Group consisting of 900,000 men until the end of the war. After the war, Bradley headed the Veterans Administration for two years. He is credited with doing much to improve its health care system and with helping veterans receive their educational benefits under the G.I. Bill of Rights. He ultimately rose to Chairman of the Joint Chiefs. Contrast the words of the fictional Colonel Kilgore from the movie Apocalypse Now, with the words of General Bradley:
Kilgore: I love the smell of napalm in the morning. You know, one time we had a hill bombed, for 12 hours. When it was all over, I walked up. We didn’t find one of ’em, not one stinkin’ dink body. The smell, you know that gasoline smell, the whole hill. Smelled like
[ sniffing, pondering ]
victory. Someday this war’s gonna end…
[ suddenly walks off ]
“The world has achieved brilliance without wisdom, power without conscience. Ours is a world of nuclear giants and ethical infants. We know more about war than we know about peace, more about killing than we know about living.” – Omar Bradley
We need giants like Omar Bradley and Dwight D. Eisenhower to lead our country through the difficult times ahead. These men knew the horrors of war and didn’t act like it was a game of chess. Instead we will be led by intellectual and ethical infants, Obama or Romney. There are no wise men with a conscience and high moral standards in power today. Only those with no conscience and a willingness to lie are able to gain power in today’s world. General Bradley understood that morality was ultimately more important than power and strength in determining the progress of a country. His words are those of someone who knew we had failed in our moral duty:
“We have grasped the mystery of the atom and rejected the Sermon on the Mount.”
Peacemakers are ridiculed and shunned in America today. Those who preach diplomacy and non-interventionism, like Ron Paul, are scorned and ignored. Old men who care more about their own power than the human race are willing to sacrifice the blood of young people for precious oil, phony nationalism, their own strategic interests or corporate interests disguised as philosophical agendas. The world is a game for these old men. They care about their personal legacy and rigid ideologies. War and militarism are a failure of passion over reason. Albert Einstein, whose discovery brought about this age of potential world destruction, had no love for these blind warriors.
“He who joyfully marches to music in rank and file has already earned my contempt. He has been given a large brain by mistake, since for him the spinal cord would suffice.”
The overwhelming cost of maintaining a global empire eventually bankrupted Rome and Great Britain. Treasures were wasted, young men were needlessly sacrificed in the name of the flag, and the morality of leaders sank to unprecedented levels. The U.S. had advanced financially and technologically for more than a century, but since the takeover of our economic system by private banking and corporate interests in 1913 we have seen continuous war, continuous currency debasement, and continuous moral decay. How far will we decline before a sufficient number of Americans are outraged enough to lead a new American Revolution?
Our current situation reminds me of the movie Planet of the Apes. The apes are divided into a strict class system: the gorillas as police, military, and hunters; the orangutans as administrators, politicians and lawyers; and the chimpanzees as intellectuals and scientists. Humans, who cannot talk, are considered feral vermin and are hunted and used for scientific experimentation. The United States is now in the control of gorillas and orangutans. If we continue down the current path of financial and moral decay, allowing the Military Industrial Complex, criminal bankers and corrupt politicians to push us into further world conflicts, we will experience the shock and horror that George Taylor, played by Charlton Heston, displayed in the final scene of Planet of the Apes .
George Taylor: Oh my God. I’m back. I’m home. All the time, it was… We finally really did it.
[ screaming ]
You Maniacs! You blew it up! Ah, damn you! God damn you all to hell!
The War Pigs must be stopped before it’s too late. The Military Industrial Complex, with the unwavering support of central bankers printing unlimited amounts of fiat currency, while controlling the scoundrel puppets in Washington DC, will destroy this country in their never ending quest for power and profits. One man fights a lonely battle against these forces of oppression. We must join his legion and take this country back from the war pigs.
“As many frustrated Americans who have joined the Tea Party realize, we cannot stand against big government at home while supporting it abroad. We cannot talk about fiscal responsibility while spending trillions on occupying and bullying the rest of the world. We cannot talk about the budget deficit and spiraling domestic spending without looking at the costs of maintaining an American empire of more than 700 military bases in more than 120 foreign countries. We cannot pat ourselves on the back for cutting a few thousand dollars from a nature preserve or an inner-city swimming pool at home while turning a blind eye to a Pentagon budget that nearly equals those of the rest of the world combined.” – Ron Paul
I read this article and I could not stop crying. Soppy thing, me.
Not much to add except this article should be nailed to the forehead of our current Sec of Defense and State. Obama, naw, he just does what his handlers tell him and he is too brain damaged from his time spent in the Choom Gang, heh.
@RE: Where you been? I’ve had to should the full Doom load here. Get your butt back in here.
Great piece! Everything stated was supported by facts. I agree with you 100%. However, just a thought/suggestion … although the Eisenhower quotes that you used were very appropriate & certainly supportive of your arguments (with which, again, I agree), we must not forget that after Truman said now, & the CIA said yes to UK’s proposal to overthrow a democratic and pro American Iranian government. US/CIA, under the approval from Eisenhower, took the initiative, ok’d the idea, and basically executed a successful Operation Ajax in Iran. Unfortunately, we are now seeing the costly (bloody & dollars) impact of such an act of aggression.
the fall of the Roman Empire was followed by the so-called Dark Ages. These Dark Ages, with small interruptions, seem to be getting darker.
“It is a universal truth that the loss of liberty at home is to be charged to the provisions against danger, real or pretended, from abroad.” -James Madison
Admin:
Great piece, as usual you hit right in the front teeth of another topic that no one wants to talk about. Our military budget, and funding, escapes any fundamental logic. We could be doing so much more with our treasure and youth than pissing it away to “securing our freedom from terrorism”. I am so sick of it all, I support our troops so much that I wish they would just come home and raise their children and be with their own families. On this Memorial Day, I wonder how many veterans are rolling aound in their graves thinking that they did not give their lives for this type of “freedom”. We are lost!
Administrator:
This one’s another great. You’re good peeps.
Took the family to the local cemetery today, to place flowers and pay our respects to my ww2 veteran Grandfather, and my wife’s Korean war veteran Father. As we were sitting there, listening to the service in the distance, I saw a very old man getting out of his car. He was obviously one of the few remaining ww2 vets. It was all he could do to walk out to the headstone. I thought of getting up to help him , but you could tell this was something he wanted to do on his own, for what is very likely the last time, as even his wife was waiting for him leaning on their car. He reached the headstone, with a single flower in his hand, no stem, just a wild iris flower. He started crouching down, with his legs shaking and balance off, but he placed the flower on the flat headstone. Then fought with his legs to stand back upright, when he made it, he stood at full attention, and saluted the grave. He then turned around, smiled at my son, and made his slow trip back to his car.
As I sat there wondering if that was his brother, or a friend, it really put some of the debate here into perspective.
@HZK
@RE: Where you been? I’ve had to should the full Doom load here. Get your butt back in here.
I’m pretty busy these days on the Diner and also trolling the Board on The Automatic Earth. Just dropped back in because this was a real good article by Jimbo. Caught it over on ZH so I stopped by to see how the old place was doing.
RE
http://www.doomsteaddiner.org
Hi!, Patrons Of The Burnig Platform Et Al:
st. Matthew 26:51 & 52…..51: And, behold, one of them that were with Jesus stretched out his hand, and drew his sword, and struck a sevant of the high priest’s, and cut off his ear. 52: Then said Jesus unto him, Put up again your sword into his place: for all they that take up the sword shall perish by the sword.
In today’s world the US has restricted trade with Iran utilizing sanctions, in order to attempt to impede Terharns nuclear ambitions. Thus it needs be too, in order for Jesus to be correct above right? For two parties to live in eligibility for mutual self destruction both sides needs their own military force to complement the threat from the other visa versa. In this way each has its’ own powers to threaten the other with destructive forces whether nuclear or otherwise without cowering to the others’ demands outside of mutually destructive confrontations. Literally thereby the word of Jesus are forever enforced within human nature by natural laws inherent in human nature like the moths burnng in the flame. The only escape Jesus give us in St. Matthew 14:6…Jesus saith unto him, I am the way, the truth and the life: no man cometh to the Father but by me. The life of God operating in the lives of men as it did in Jesus surely isn’t the same as a moth flying over and over again into the fireball flame to its’ certainty of death is it?
Instead of perishing by he sword (whichever type is available) Jesus tell us in St. John 10:10: The thief comes not, but only to steal, and to kill, and to destroy: I am come that they might have life, and that they might have life more abundantly. Jesus always identified Himself with life including His often referring us listeners to His/OUR Fathers’ desire to impart to each of us eternal life as opposed to death but in these verses Jesus obviously opposed obtaining eternal life utilizing military force and so he told the servant of the high priest to put up his sword didn’t He? Jesus asked His disciples to go into all the world preaching His gospel to every creature making disciples of all Nations by babtizing them into the Name of The Father, The Son & The Holy Spirit which brings us the fruits of The Spirit which are love, peace & joy etc. These fruits are to bring new life into OUR world; not death!
RUSS SMITH, CALIFORNIA
[email protected]
I like Einstein’s quote about those marching to the music needing only a spinal cord. The same could probably be said for voters who habitually sanction the same old war mongering crap with each new election. At most they rely on the r-complex ( reptilian complex neuron mass) located just above the brain stem and not the cortex where man’s unique higher reasoning ability is thought to take place.
We don’t do anything but talk in this country. We simply don’t know what to do except talk about our decline. Our children don’t know what to do so they decided to raise hell by protesting (Occupy).
Wake up America – THE REVOLUTION HAS STARTED!
Read “Common Sense 3.1” at ( http://www.revolution2.osixs.org )
We don’t have to live like this anymore. “Spread the News”
Admin
There is another side to this as well. I live adjacent to a military base named in your article. I know a man who was in the army for 4 years, currently is civil service, is very fat and as a consequence of his obesity has a hurt knee. He somehow convinced the VA it was “combat related” He is an IT guy. He is now 60% disabled and will collect tax-free benefits the rest of his life. He is 35. He laughs about it. It is a joke to him. The active duty army, to feed this war machine, has begun to recruit folks of lower and lower moral character. It’s the only place some of these guys can find employment. The brave enlisted fighting man of old is a long-gone myth if you live next to a military base. Many of the enlisted guys deal drugs and weaponry stolen from the military. Sad.
GW
I see no mention of the TRUE reason we are fighting wars in the middle-east. No mention of filthy little Israel and it’s stranglehold on our media and govt. No mention of the 9/11 FALSE-FLAG attack by ISRAEL to trick the US into fighting Israels’ eneimies.
Goliath
Tell us about Building 7.
CCR – Someday never comes…
“Well, I’m here to tell you now, each and every mother’s son,That you better learn it fast, you better learn it young,’Cause someday never comes.”
The nation is unworthy of the blood of its soldiers.
The Building 7 takedown is so nonchalant, as presented by the government so as to be absurd in the context of such a “horific attack”….like ordinging a cup of coffee while the restaurant collapses around you.
Just keep punding the bastards.
The article brought a tear to my eye. I live in the mid-west in a very rural area. As most of you are probably aware, the rural midwest supplies a draw dropping number of enlisted men relative to the population size. I graduated in 2004 in a class of 30 students, 10 of which are enlisted in the military as of right now.
I’ve watched their families get ripped apart (marrying their highschool sweet heart did not work out), their lives are essentially ruined by combat fatigue. They try to exit the military but are unable to get jobs, so they have to redeploy back over seas.
My own family has seen its fair share of loss, having planted people in the ground for WW2, Korea, and Viet Nam.
Divorce. Death. Suicide. All in the name of the United States of America.
I still believe our country and its people are great. Its the ones who are running it that need to be removed.
Down with the American Aristocracy!
Admin:
I have been viewing for weeks now documentaries on “You Tube” with great interest. Mainly interested in WWII battle films, I clicked on “Days That Shook the World: The Battle of Midway”. After watching the sea battle program, I continued viewing the link about the events in Rumania in December 1989. This is very intriguing story of revolution by the people after the fall of the Berlin Wall. AS history is not academic, this was the beginning of the revolution but certainly not the end after the Ceaucescu’s were assassinated by the Rumanian military. I remember these events vaguely now, but forgot their significance during the series of events that engulfed all of the former Warsaw Pact block. Please view this link when you have time. The documentary of these two days in Rumania starts about 58:00 minutes after the Midway story.
Are we so different than the Rumanians? When will our citizens (along with our military) decide that enough is enough and take to the streets? I don’t know. Food for thought as I see SO MANY parallels in this documentary to America right now. For what it’s worth.
An excellent article. Someone said it should be required reading for those thinking of enlisting, No it should be required reading for everyone before they step in the voteing booth, but as yyou pointed out the choices have little difference on this subject.
Please give credit where credit is due sir. Doug Casey was the first I know to make the analogy of the US Military functioning as a “giant gold plated hammer.” He describes this as being a problem because “everything starts looking like a nail.”
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hSyJjC_jBWQ
I really enjoy your style of writing though. Keep up the good work.
Glad to find this site, I will be back. The powers to be believe that only war can bring the world out of depression as it did in the 30’s however this time nuclear weapons will be involved.
JZ
take note and then STFU.
Dear Helen [ Keller],
I must steal half a moment from my work to say how glad I am to have your book, and how highly I value it, both for its own sake and as a remembrance of an affectionate friendship which has subsisted between us for nine years without a break, and without a single act of violence that I can call to mind. I suppose there is nothing like it in heaven; and not likely to be, until we get there and show off. I often think of it with longing, and how they’ll say, “There they come—sit down in front!” I am practicing with a tin halo. You do the same. I was at Henry Roger’s last night, and of course we talked of you. He is not at all well;—you will not like to hear that; but like you and me, he is just as lovely as ever.
I am charmed with your book—enchanted. You are a wonderful creature, the most wonderful in the world—you and your other half together—Miss Sullivan, I mean, for it took the pair of you to make a complete and perfect whole. How she stands out in her letters! her brilliancy, penetration, originality, wisdom, character, and the fine literary competencies of her pen—they are all there.
Oh, dear me, how unspeakably funny and owlishly idiotic and grotesque was that “plagiarism” farce! As if there was much of anything in any human utterance, oral or written, except plagiarism! The kernel, the soul—let us go further and say the substance, the bulk, the actual and valuable material of all human utterances—is plagiarism. For substantially all ideas are second-hand, consciously and unconsciously drawn from a million outside sources, and daily use by the garnerer with a pride and satisfaction born of the superstition that he originated them; whereas there is not a rag of originality about them anywhere except the little discoloration they get from his mental and moral calibre and his temperament, and which is revealed in characteristics of phrasing. When a great orator makes a great speech you are listening to ten centuries and ten thousand men—but we call it his speech, and really some exceedingly small portion of it is his. But not enough to signify. It is merely a Waterloo. It is Wellington’s battle, in some degree, and we call it his; but there are others that contributed. It takes a thousand men to invent a telegraph, or a steam engine, or a phonograph, or a telephone or any other important thing—and the last man gets the credit and we forget the others. He added his little mite—that is all he did. These object lessons should teach us that ninety-nine parts of all things that proceed from the intellect are plagiarisms, pure and simple; and the lesson ought to make us modest. But nothing can do that.
Then why don’t we unwittingly reproduce the phrasing of a story, as well as the story itself? It can hardly happen—to the extent of fifty words except in the case of a child; its memory-tablet is not lumbered with impressions, and the actual language can have graving-room there, and preserve the language a year or two, but a grown person’s memory-tablet is a palimpsest, with hardly a bare space upon which to engrave a phrase. It must be a very rare thing that a whole page gets so sharply printed on a man’s mind, by a single reading, that it will stay long enough to turn up some time or other to be mistaken by him for his own. No doubt we are constantly littering our literature with disconnected sentences borrowed from books at some unremembered time and now imagined to be our own, but that is about the most we can do. In 1866 I read Dr. Holmes’s poems, in the Sandwich Islands. A year and a half later I stole his dedication, without knowing it, and used it to dedicate my “Innocents Abroad” with. Then years afterward I was talking with Dr. Holmes about it. He was not an ignorant ass—no, not he; he was not a collection of decayed human turnips, like your “Plagiarism Court;” and so when I said, “I know now where I stole it, but whom did you steal it from,” he said, “I don’t remember; I only know I stole it from somebody, because I have never originated anything altogether myself, nor met anyone who had.”
To think of those solemn donkeys breaking a little child’s heart with their ignorant rubbish about plagiarism! I couldn’t sleep for blaspheming about it last night. Why, their whole lives, their whole histories, all their learning, all their thoughts, all their opinions were one solid rock of plagiarism, and they didn’t know it and never suspected it. A gang of dull and hoary pirates piously setting themselves the task of disciplining and purifying a kitten that they think they’ve caught filching a chop! Oh, dam—
But you finish it, dear, I am running short of vocabulary today.
Every lovingly your friend
Mark [Twain]
http://www.lettersofnote.com/2012/05/bulk-of-all-human-utterances-is.html
Well done, Sir.
The PEOPLE of the United States and the PEOPLE of Iran are at peace with one another.
It is the LEADERS of the U.S. and Iran who are in opposition.
So why don’t the LEADERS get together and fight it out and let the PEOPLE alone!
**Thank you for the time and effort you put into writing this piece. Powerful stuff!**
The ENTIRE Machine must be ground to a halt at the time that we CHOOSE, not the aware cocksuckers amongst the elite who are actively engineering crisises for personal gain and the end game of GLOBAL GOVERNMENT! Terrible atrocities are to come and be acted out in the name of nationalism so that once the dust settles and the blood in the streets stop flowing, that anyone left willingly and happily will embrace the notion of an out in the open global government, no longer required to hide in the shadows.
30 second snip it from a speech from Mario Savio:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u5o_0ZYA5HM&feature=related
BTW, Excellent article Admin!
I hope more soldiers take the time to read it and give honest feedback…personal stories ALWAYS add further context to understanding the complexities of their situations. Unfortunately I don’t believe many active duty military will publically express how they truly feel; for fear of reprisal in some form or another. I suppose it makes more sense to “not be the nail sticking up the highest” in fear of being “hammered” first. I would add though, that eventually all the nails get hammered.
Platoplubius said, “I hope more soldiers take the time to read it and give honest feedback……” Can I comment? I was a “soldier” for 24 years, but some of us are known as sailors, airmen, and marines. In the end, servicemen and women are all soldiers.
I second the attaboys to Admin. However, and I may have missed it, but I didn’t see a single possible suggestion to cutting the defense budget.
I have commented several times on that mightiest of power projections in the U.S. military arsenal, the aircraft carrier strike force and its attendant support fleet. It is big, it is expensive, and it is indeed capable of doing exactly what it is intended to do. Ripping your face off. But do we need more and better carriers? I have repeatedly said no. In fact, we could get by with less. That saves money, tens of billions or more, on FUTURE expenditures as well as CURRENT ones.
I will now turn my attention to the U.S. Air Force, the largest and most sophisticated in the world. No one comes close to being second. Not Russia. Not China. No one. It is such a massive runaway that second place is a joke!!!!
So, do we need over 5,500 aircraft in the active Air Force, the Air National Guard, and the Air Force Reserve? And don’t forget to throw in over 2,000 cruise missiles and 450 MIRVed ICBMs (multiple independently-targetable reentry vehicle, intercontinental ballistic missiles). Again, my answer is no.
Holy shit. Each ICBM carries EIGHT warheads of 350 kilotons explosive power, over 10 times the size of the Hiroshima atomic bomb. At 450 ICBMs, that means we can hit 3,600 targets with just those missiles alone. And we’re not even getting to the nuclear SLBMs and bombs carried by the Navy’s Ohio-class nuke subs (again, the SLBMs are MIRVed) and the Air Force’s B-52s, B-1s, and B-2s.
Does it sound like we have violated Ike’s defense strategy of “sufficiency” in national defense? Sure does to me.
We can save an estimated $100-150 billion annually on our current defense budget just by taking a cold, hard look on the bloated military posture we are maintaining. Maybe more. And we could save even more in future defense expenditures by asking a simple question, especially for the so-called 4th generation aircraft carriers, “Do we really need this?”
However, and I may have missed it, but I didn’t see a single possible suggestion to cutting the defense budget.
I have commented several times on that mightiest of power projections in the U.S. military arsenal, the aircraft carrier strike force and its attendant support fleet. It is big, it is expensive, and it is indeed capable of doing exactly what it is intended to do. Ripping your face off. But do we need more and better carriers? I have repeatedly said no. -SSS
Then we need to stop the increasing of that budget?
Kill Bill
Yes, absolutely. And not only stop increasing the budget, but cut it.
Massive cuts to the defense budget is not only possible, but it will leave our country with every bit of the capability to adequately defend our nation against any current or foreseeable threat.
How can the US save money on defense? Let’s see – pull out of Irag/Afghanistan. Close 90% of foreign bases. Stop interferring in other nation’s sovereign rights. Concentrate on defensive weapons and not on weapons used for attacking foreign soil. And here is one that would save heaps if the US could be trusted to not be an aggressor – implement a draft/national service and pay the kids peanuts. Nothing wrong with national service if it is based on defense and not aggression. Works fine for the Swiss, for instance. Further savings could be made by actually using defense forces for, say, positive things like patrolling borders. The derfense budget could be slashed. As could customs/etc etc etc.
llpoh
Thoughtful comments. The foreign base withdrawals in places like Japan, Great Britain, South Korea, Germany, and Turkey are a given. More billions!!!!
What an excellent essay, Jim!
EZRA POUND already warned his fellow Americans and the world about the harm and danger of these Overlords many decades ago!!!
He paid a very dear price for all of his warnings, got jailed then put into psychiatric hospital! He’s freed only with the help from Eustace Mullins.
Here are what Ezra direly warned long in the past and are still quite relevant until today:
“The Nomadic Parasites will shift out of London and into Manhattan. And this will be presented under a camouflage of national slogans. It will be represented as an American victory. It will not be an American victory.
Until you know who has lent what to whom, you know nothing whatever of politics, you know nothing whatever of history, you know nothing of international wrangles.” — Ezra Pound (1885–1972)
“The monopoly of money, or the restriction of its circulation, is merely a variation of this simple form of monopoly. That is all. The stupid fall into the trap. Wars are provoked in succession, deliberately, by the great usurers, in order to create debts, to create scarcity, so that they can extort the interest on these debts, so that they can raise the price of money (i.e., the price of the various monetary units controlled by, or in the possession of, the same autocrats), altering the prices of the various monetary units when it suits them, raising and lowering the prices of the various foodstuffs when it suits them, completely indifferent to the human victim, to the accumulated treasures of civilization, to the cultural heritage.” — Ezra Pound (1885–1972)
llpoh
I esseintally agree with your leading comments (but why stop at 90%?)
As for “if the US could be trusted … ” the historical record doesn’t support it. Let’ see, Lincoln needed a draft, and Wilson, and FDR was preparing for war as early as 1935 but didn’t get around to a peacetime draft until 1940. (There’s a fine acronym from 1941 …
http://www.ohiohistorycentral.org/entry.php?rec=534
but wasn’t only that state. Ties into the law of contracts … and trust … )
Anyway, the women of Okinawa would be all for base closing and ‘the people formerly known as Diego Garcians’ might get the island back stolen from them for a U.S. base. Etc.
Just wondering, what was your national service?
And “defense forces for, say, positive things like patrolling borders” … except for _posse comitatus depending on Constitutional interpretation or unitary presidents.
Where is Smokey these days?
I miss those nonsensical rants.
Come out & play
Did anyone catch the Defense official sounding the alarm over projected cuts? It said something like…..FEED ME FEED ME FEED ME
http://nbcpolitics.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2012/05/30/11960423-obama-defense-official-re-sounds-the-alarm-about-spending-cuts?lite
Man I’m getting cynical.
N – air force.
llpoh
Ta. I was army, 1959-62.
A grunt – shoulda known. 🙂
Smedley Butler, “An Amendment for Peace”
“An Amendment for Peace”
by Major General Smedley D. Butler, USMC
(Originally printed in the September, 1936 Woman’s Home Companion)
I PROPOSE an Amendment for Peace, to the Constitution of the United States:
1. The removal of the members of the land armed forces from within the continental limits of the United States and the Panama Canal Zone for any cause whatsoever is prohibited.
2. The vessels of the United States Navy, or of the other branches of the armed service, are hereby prohibited from steaming, for any reason whatsoever except on an errand of mercy, more than five hundred miles from our coast.
3. Aircraft of the Army, Navy and Marine Corps is [sic] hereby prohibited from flying, for any reason whatsoever, more than seven hundred and fifty miles beyond the coast of the United States.
Such an amendment would be an absolute guarantee to the women of America that their loved ones never would be sent overseas to be needlessly shot down in European or Asiatic or African wars that are of no concern to our people.
http://justwarriors.blogspot.com/2009/11/smedley-butler-amendment-for-peace.html
SUCH an amendment, linked with adequate naval and military defenses at home, would guarantee everlasting peace to our nation.
How would such an amendment insure peace?
In the first place, the United States is in no danger whatever of military invasion. Even the Navy and Army Departments, which are always preparing for war, and the State Department, which is always talking about peace but thinking about war, agree on that. By reason of our geographical position, it is all but impossible for any foreign power to muster, transport and land sufficient troops on our shores for a successful invasion.
There is another bar to any invasion of the United States by the political dimensions abroad, which prohibit any one nation from leaving its own borders unguarded in order to make war on a foe three thousand or six thousand miles distant. Yet if, by some incomprehensible diplomatic hocus pocus, an agreement could be reached among certain foreign powers whereby they would forget their own differences for the time being and pool their resources in a joint effort against the United States, there still would be very little fear of successful invasion.
Our fleet, bound by this Peace Amendment to stay close to home shores, would be on hand to repel such invasion at sea: if, through some series of unforeseen circumstances or disasters, an enemy army did succeed in landing on our shores — the Atlantic, the Gulf of Mexico or the Pacific — the entire manpower of this nation would spring to arms. Every American, every man and boy, would be ready, without conscription, without pleading — every American would be ready to grasp a rifle and rush forth to defend his home and his country.
Yes, everybody would be in that rush. Even the “peace at any price” people. They would forget their scruples. The pacifists would be among the first in line. The Quakers, the Mennonites and the members of other religious faiths which are opposed to the bearing of arms would be in that rush to protect our children and our womenfolk.
History shows it. I know it from the experience of my own forefathers, who were FRIENDS.
Militarists and pacifists, Republicans and Democrats — all Americans, regardless of race, creed or color — regardless of political or economic beliefs — regardless of everything — all Americans would rush forth to defend their homeland.
Therefore, with the invasion of our shores an impossible military undertaking, the only war in which we can possibly become involved is one in which our people would have no interest and no concern — and no right to join.
It would be one into which we should be thrown by some economic, political or diplomatic intrigue, and not a war which we should wage in defense of our homes.
And it is from just such a war, a war such as the late World War, that we must protect ourselves. And from all the evidence, such a war is now imminent elsewhere.
Money — that’s where we fit into the picture. Make no mistake about it. You can’t fight wars without money. Everybody knows that. You can have all the airplanes and all the guns and all the warships and as many soldiers as you want, or as many as you can get, but you can’t go to war without money. And remember. Uncle Sam has the money.
When the European powers get through their present task of “choosing up sides,” and get down to the actual fighting, both sides will endeavor to maneuver the United States into the war — on their side.
ANOTHER question naturally presents itself: What of our territories and dependencies? The answer is subject to great study and debate, but let us note here a few points.
The Philippine Islands are now on their way to independence. They are not a defense necessity; commercially, they are a liability; it is virtually impossible to defend them adequately. We should let them go. A bill to give Puerto Rico its independence has been introduced in Congress; we should let it go. The Virgin Islands, Guam, American Samoa, Wake and the Midway Islands are not indispensable in our national life. While American capital is invested in each instance, it would have to take its chances, just as in all external investments. The balance of trade is against the United States in all these dependencies — we buy more from each of them than we sell to them. They are not assets.
Hawaii and Alaska are our own territories: we cannot set them loose. It is virtually impossible, from a military or naval standpoint, to defend them properly except at prohibitive cost, so I believe our defense of these territories would have to be by economic pressure. We would move the naval station and the huge military detachment from the Hawaiian Islands and such forces as we have in Alaska but we would announce to the world that these are ours and they are not to be touched: that while we will not go abroad to fight for them, we will exact every possible economic pressure against any power which might be tempted to take these possessions. And the United States is so situated that it can successfully exert economic sanctions.
That leaves the Panama Canal Zone. The Canal is essential to our defense. We must defend it. Any nation which would attempt to block, damage or destroy the canal would do so only as a prelude to war upon our people. We would defend it is we would any part of our coast.
We must always bear in mind that there is no royal road to peace. In recent years and as the result of disclosures of World War intrigues, men and women have been endeavoring to chart new paths and byways toward the goal of peace. But no one of these paths, alone, leads permanently away from the danger of war.
These paths are neutrality, take-the-profit-out-of-war, referendum on war, total disarmament, mass protests, education of the masses, students’ strikes and Oxford oaths. Let us suppose that all the antiwar measures that have been proposed were passed by Congress and placed on our statute books. Let us suppose that all America’s youth of fighting age were to subscribe to the Oxford oath against participation in war.
THIS would not insure the peace of our nation. Laws passed by Congress in one week can be wiped off the statute books the next week. And laws can be evaded.
Take our neutrality measures, prohibiting the export of rifles, ammunition and other products to nations at war. There are ways and means of avoiding such embargoes. Machine guns can be — as they have been in the past — shipped as sewing machines. Cannons can be camouflaged as locomotive parts and. with the necessary bribes, placed aboard ship.
The proposed take-the-profit-out-of-war bill also could be evaded by intricate financial jugglery such as was common during the World War.
And last, even the war referendum — the plebiscite to decide wither our people are to go to war or not — is not foolproof. Don’t you suppose that the American people could be roused, by skillful propaganda, to vote for a war in which we have no legitimate interest, even if a hysterical Congress did not previously wipe the law from the books?
Once the cannons begin booming and the drums begin rolling, red-blooded youth, despite its Oxford oaths, despite its massed protests, despite its satiric “veterans of future wars,” will succumb to the war clamor. Radio orators screaming their pet and smug phrases of “war to end war” and “war to make democracy safe” and the newspapers shrieking in black headlines of war atrocities — these and similar propaganda arts of warmakers would be invoked to break down the earlier opposition of America’s youth to war. You think it impossible?
Just look back to 1916 and 1917. In November 1916, Woodrow Wilson was re-elected president of the United States on a platform of “he kept us out of war.” Five months later, on April 6, America declared war on Germany. Antiwar sentiment can be changed to a war clamor in a very brief time. But it takes at least nine months — that is a record for the prohibition amendment — for an amendment to be taken from the Constitution, and one such as the proposed Amendment for Peace would take considerably longer. And in that period, surely we should return to our better sense.
At any rate, in the bitter fight that would develop in an effort to remove such an amendment from the Constitution we would forget about the war overseas and keep the fight, with voice and ballot, right at home.
THERE is nothing un-American in the Peace Amendment. When our forefathers planned this government, they foresaw no necessity for preparing for wars in Europe: for wars that didn’t concern us. As a matter of fact, after the Revolutionary War had been won and after the new United States Government was established, our army and navy were eliminated. There was no provision for an army or a navy. True, we had a militia. That is, each state had its own militia. We still have them. We call them National Guards now. But the militia, the only armed force in the United States at that time, was not to be used beyond the territorial limits of the United States.
If you look back into history, you will find that during the War of 1812 a certain regiment of militia marched northward toward Canada. When they reached the Canadian border, they refused to cross, and went home. The militia then was for home defense — and home defense only.
That’s what our army and navy should be. Home defenders, ready and able to defend our homes, to defend us against attack — that’s all.
The efficiency of our navy can be maintained by maneuvers a few hundred miles off our own coast just as well as it can be maintained by maneuvers thousands of miles away, and almost in Japan’s back yard, where our navy conducted its main maneuvers last year.
Let’s pass all our suggested antiwar legislation; let’s attend all the peace and disarmament conferences; let’s have all the war protest meetings we can arrange; let our young men form their “veterans of future wars” groups — let’s do all this and more; but if we really want to make it impossible to have our young men sent abroad to fight the wars of others, then let us by all means insist upon adding the Peace Amendment to the Constitution of the United States.
And the mothers, the wives and the sisters of the future cannon fodder must lead the way! •
Prediction: The Great American Global Empire isn’t going to fall. There may be cutbacks but bases, fortified embasies, fleets, troops, civilian contractors, drones, subversives, and all the other ascpects of America’s worldwide reach and influence will remain. In fact, I predict they will increase. The military, AIPAC, and the big banks control our politicians, our media, and this country. That’s what they want.
The Administrator, like the rest of us can rail against the trend, but he’s feckless, just like we all are.
Get used to it. This is an o.k. country to live in and great if you have more money than most. Keep your head down and your nose clean. Don’t buck the trend like J_ _, R_ _, P_, or some of our other late citizens who B_ gave a Thursday thumbs down to.
How does one differentiate between a symbol of freedom and one of murder and oppression ?
I guess it depends on which side of the firing line one stands?
U.S. Labels ALL Young Men In Battle Zones As “Militants” … And American Soil Is Now Considered a Battle Zone
http://www.zerohedge.com/contributed/2012-05-31/us-labels-all-young-men-battle-zones-%E2%80%9Cmilitants%E2%80%9D-%E2%80%A6-and-american-soil-now-cons
The Latest Update on the Costs of (Lincoln’s) War
Posted by Thomas DiLorenzo on May 29, 2012 02:26 PM
http://www.lewrockwell.com/blog/lewrw/archives/112957.html
What To Remember on Memorial Day
by William Norman Grigg
http://lewrockwell.com/grigg/grigg-w260.html
This is a terrific article and I agree with everything you say except one thing, i.e. that somehow Ron Paul can lead us out of this quagmire. He can’t because no single person can.
The politicians we elect are a reflection of who we are, intellectually and spiritually. A clever politician doesn’t promote his own ideas but is able to divine what the majority of the public wants to hear and says it. Hitler was good at this. Through innovative use of radio, he roused the German public’s hatred against Jews and nearly burned the planet to ashes. In contrast a good politician will nurture the positive aspects of a society to make the country and the world a better place to live.
That said, who we are, our hopes, desires and fear are largely shaped by each other, our educational institutions and unfortunately “the mainstream media”. In the 70’s the MSM was a good source of information. The coverage of the Vietnam war accurately and appropriately transmitted the horrors of war to the general public. It was, in part, due to those images that the war was brought to a close after eight bitter years. Compare the reporting of respected giants like Walter Cronkite and Peter Jennings to the likes the CNN or Fox News “personalities” and the reason for our current predicament becomes clear. Consider this quote:
“Preserve your independence of all demagogues and place-hunters and never submit to their dictation; write boldly and tell the truth fearlessly; criticize whatever is wrong, and denounced whatever is rotten in the administration of your local and state affairs, no matter how much it may offend the guilty or wound the would-be leaders of your party…Make an earnest and conscientious journal; establish its reputation for truth and reliability, frankness and independence. Never willfully deceive the people, or trifle with their confidence. Show that your journal is devoted to the advocacy and promotion of their temporal interests and moral welfare.”
–Joseph Medill
May 1869, Chicago Tribune
Compare that quote to today’s profit driven MSM that will literally tell LIES, if it enhances the bottom line and the reason for our current state of collective insanity becomes clear. It explains why politicians like Bachmann, Perry, Cain, Romney, Palin, Gingrich etc are allowed to set foot in the political arena when not so long ago they would have been laughed of the stage by BOTH parties. If further explains why the last moderate Republican, Richard Luggar, was voted out of office after 20+ years of faithful service to his constituents. I’m focusing on the conservative side of the isle because it is they who have been victimized by cynical opportunists like Ruppert Murdoch and Richard Ailes. The situation could have easily been reversed if Murdoch believed liberals could have generated more revenue.
As I stated above, the politicians we get are the ones most of us want. But in a perverse kind of feedback loop, we want them because corporate American tells us we want them. Money has changed the political discourse in the way our founding fathers feared. If there is ANY doubting this you have to ask, how well do conservatives feel Dwight Eisenhower or even Ronald Reagan would have fared in today’s political climate?
In summary our national discourse has been overtaken by individuals and corporations who actively work to legitimize our negative beliefs, biases, hatreds, divisiveness and xenophobia, all for the sake of ad revenue. As a result politicians that we get are the ones smart enough pander to the lowest common denominator.
Im 26 years old and I have thought about joining the military about 1000 times. I have 3 kids I am unemployed and this song seems to tell how I feel on an everyday basis. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jTW0y6kazWM. Im am so glad I didn’t join up and be a pawn in the politicians game of war and money. As the rich get richer and the poor get poorer the middle class disappears. They say get a college education but what they don’t say is if everyone got one they would just raise the requirement to get a good job. There is always gonna be the working man and the poor. The poor will eventually become slaves and the rich will be the slave owners but what can I do about it. I am going to teach my kids to be slave owners instead of becoming victims to bad politics and bad government. I think the system corrupt and bitter and I will be waiting for the day their is a revolution!! Not to bring the system down but to have some reform. What the rich fail to realized in their greed is they are hurting themselves in the long run. How can they run a government in turmoil?
Azygos
I hear you. I am at the other end of the generational scale but I even followed your link. Yeah, I agree with the feeling there but you know, new goon same as the old goon, and before them and those, little different in my life. But that’s in retrospect. It takes a long time for some of us older folx to figure out that the American Dream was an American nightmare. Some never do.
If I had any answers, I’d offer them. Unfortunately, as one gets older, there are more questions than answers; I do know when I was drafted in 1959 that I received $30/mth initially.
Times have changed but people haven’t. You do what you have to do for your your family. And yourself. I remember the oath I took, which is why I am a member of Oath Keepers — too bad those fools in Congress have no clue.
What I do know is, it takes time to re=educate yourself from government schooling (and that is worse now!) Sites like this flense out the facts from the government lies. At least you have a window onto the truth whether it helps in pragmatic terms or not — at least you know what you are up against. And sometimes you have to ‘work the system’ even if it is rigged against you.
I wish you luck, for you and family; hope you stick around.
Its all that money involved. Yes a couple of nuclear subs and the willingness to use them if needed.
That wouldnt make people money though.
It’s time we let our leaders fight for us – after all, they represent the very best of our very best. I suggest that we arm them with swords or spears and let them go at their foreign counterparts (simularly armed) to resolve international disputes. When the dust settles, world peace shall reign!
Barbarossa, when the dust settles we will be in the stone age or the planet will be destroyed.
On a completely different topic, why hasn’t anyone put up a thread about Rand Paul endorsing Mittens????…and on Hannity of all places, which is a double insult. Meanwhile his dad’s followers are busting their asses, getting hassled by cops and assaulted in a heroic effort to get more delegates for his dad. I know that Rand is a shrewd politician but I will never vote for Romney, even if Rand winds up on the ticket. Fuck Romney and while it pains me to say it, Fuck Rand. I suppose it started with Ron having breakfast with Bernanke…
Romney is a complete tool of the corporations and banksters. Only a complete idiot would think he would do anything to advance the liberty movement.
“The 154 suicides for active-duty troops in the first 155 days of the year far outdistance the U.S. forces killed in action in Afghanistan — about 50 percent more — according to Pentagon statistics obtained by The Associated Press.”
“The statistics include only active-duty troops, not veterans who returned to civilian life after fighting in Iraq or Afghanistan. Nor does the Pentagon’s tally include non-mobilized National Guard or Reserve members.”
http://news.yahoo.com/ap-impact-suicides-surging-among-us-troops-204148055.html
Well, the MSM reported on a real story for once.
I wonder what the real rate is. After all, if things seem pretty bleak in the military I can only imagine what its like to leave and realize that you can’t get a job doing anything else. Despite the crappy economy I know a lot of retired servicemen/women who hold themselves personally to blame for not being able to find a job.
“Blood and gold. Our blood and their gold.” – David Eddings