Gold Showers on the EGA

"A fate worse than a fate worse than death... Sounds pretty bad." ~ Blackadder IV

The images and video of US Marines urinating on the corpses of (Al Qaeda? Taliban? Unidentified Pashtun Tribesmen?) has elicited the standard reaction of outrage and condemnation from the SecDef, Commandant of Marine Corps, Secretary of State and put into motion a full NCIS investigation of the video and every possible Marine involved from Camp Lejeune. This incident is rapidly degenerating into the Torture "Debate", wherein the Right-Wingers defend something completely wrong because our "enemies" do bad things thereby making it okay. Mainly because conservatives have no compunction about being evil.

Personally, I never understood how it was fine to kill someone but, the follow on act of "desecrating" their bodies was then deemed the actual violation of the Rules of War. This is no doubt because I am not a gentleman.

Marines should know War is a gentleman's pursuit because every new recruit is taught Marine Corps Officers back in the 19th century wore a Barracks Cover with the Quatrefoil embossed on top. Officers were deemed not-legitimate targets for sniper fire and had to have a distinguishing mark on top of their cover to inform snipers of their non-targetable status.

Other ridiculous Rules of War have been tried over the centuries, the infamous Vatican decision in 1139 the crossbow was too deadly a weapon and could not be used, except on Muslims. All the way down to the the Geneva Conventions of the 20th Century.

The currently accepted Geneva Conventions (Right-Wingers orgasmic love of torture notwithstanding) are really a way Large Armies can fixate and maximize their advantage over small armies. Only a foolish military commander would follow rules of war which ensure his destruction. The moment Al Qaeda begins to mass large troop concentrations for a pitched battle is the moment they are obliterated. Such a concentration, training grounds, depot, armory, motor pool would be spotted and targeted with a massive amount of airpower.

Our enemies would be exceedingly stupid to follow the Rules of War.

This latest incident won't change much. Besides not getting the slap-in-the-face Good Conduct Medal, these Marines will be punished for their crimes, but what can never be brought up is that War itself is a Crime. Jingoistic War Profiteers and Chicken Hawks make too much money off of war. It doesn't matter that War breaks minds and bodies, plenty more were they came from, but don't make the War look bad.

Thus the Afghan War will continue for a few more years (or 4 more years if Mitt Romney steals into the White House) and new Wars will be hatched by the Establishment and the 99% will suffer all the costs, fiscal, physical and mental for the profit of the 1%.

Related:
Golden Shower aficionado Dana Loesch, the St Louis Tea Party spawn of Andrew Breitbart, spoke on her radio show and declared "I want a million cool points for these guys" and "I'd drop trou and do it too..."

Loesch is given air time on CNN regularly and was deeply involved in the baseless smear campaign of the two University of Missouri-Kansas City teachers Judy Ancel and Don Giljum. And as for her "I'd drop trou and do it too..." line I don't remember ever seeing her skinny chicken hawk ass on the yellow footprints let alone in Afghanistan.

Related 2:
It is easy to tell when an action is absolutely wrong because all the right-wing, never served a day jingoistic chicken hawks come out in support of the action. Cowardly warmonger Mark Levin declared "count me in as staunch supporter" of the pissing Marines.

Related 3:
Now you can be absolutely sure the action is wrong, criminal and evil because Representative Allen West (known for torturing innocent Iraqis and trying to intimidate Congresswomen) has declared, “As for everyone else, unless you have been shot at by the Taliban, shut your mouth, war is hell.” Yes, Congressman West how about reading the Bill of Rights.

Obama is Winning Afghanistan

So says General Stanley McChrystal.

"Have you done it? Have you turned the tide?" Diane Sawyer asked the General.

"I believe we're doing that now. I believe that we have changed the way we operate in Afghanistan. We changed some of our structures and I believe that we are on the way to convincing the Afghan people that we are here to protect them. We've been at this for about seven months now and I believe we've made progress," he told Sawyer.

But, the Punks and Hypocrites on the Right are in a trick bag if Obama's Strategy works in Afghanistan after 7 months when Super America Defenders Bush and Cheney allowed the situation to languish for 8 years. They'll have to figure out a way to undercut the President and downplay the news while not attacking McChrystal.

So, the bigoted vegetative Obama Haters will get their dander up and bellow, Obama doesn't say War on Terror enough! and Why did Obama wait so long? or We're succeeding despite the Chicago Machine and ACORN! and Sarah Palin would have gone over and subdued the Al Qaeda guys because jesus choose her!

Because the Punk Ass Bitches, Bullies and Chicken Hawks on the Right have to lie, lie, lie to convince the American People Obama loves Terrorists in order to realize their goal which is Republican Control of Government. That's all they care about, they don't care about protecting America, or the rights of americans or religious freedoms or pollution, all the REMFpublican Party wants is to regain control because then they can undercut programs to aid the poor, remove taxes from the Corporate Masters and murder Americans.

That's the 3 Things Republicans love to do: Funnel Taxes to the Rich, Screw the Poor, Murder Americans.

However, I don't necessarily agree with General McChrystal. 4GW warfare is an ebb and flow and has the nasty habit of flaring up time and again after an area is "pacified". And I would rather leave Afghanistan to the locals than sacrifice one more American for the Dollars flowing to the Makers of Death and Destruction.

You know who are happy about Obama's Afghanistan War

"I want justice. And there's an old poster out West that says, 'Wanted: Dead or Alive.'" ~ President Bush 09/18/2001

Lost amongst the Obama Afghanistan War Surge was the tacit and quickly ignored conclusive proof that President Bush purposely allowed OBL to escape from Tora Bora.

The Senate Committee on Foreign Relations finally got around to telling America that President Bush ordered the US Military to allow his buddy Osama Bin Laden to get away. I don't know if John Kerry got a copy of Kill Bin Laden by Dalton Fury but the Senate Report references Fury's book extensively.

[O]ur nation has never been closer to killing or capturing bin Laden as we were at Tora Bora. As uncomfortable as it may be to accept, we have now known for years that bin Laden was not killed or captured at Tora Bora ~ Kill Bin Laden, pg. 291

But, this is okay to the Terrorist Teabaggers and to their REMFpublican Fondlers, who don't care about and hate Americans, for wars make them big profits and win them elections. Therefore, the conclusion is easy; President Bush is a traitor who forced his way into operational decision making and stopped America's Special Forces from killing Bin Laden because Bush needed the specter of UBL to scare Americans win elections and use the power of the Federal Government to channel Trillions of Dollars to his handlers and controllers.

As to Obama's acceptance of more war... There is a difference between starting 4GW Wars of Choice like Bush/Cheney did and inheriting the cluster fuck of guerilla wars from Republican Chicken Hawk Cowards but I had hoped for more from President Obama than to be subsumed into the Pentagon's Warmongering Military Industrial Complex.

Hillary Clinton has always been a warmonger, ready to use the military for National Interests but I thought National Security Advisor and Former USMC Commandant James Jones skepticism may have carried the day and convinced Obama to not escalate but begin the draw down and exit.

Jones explained: "You can keep on putting troops in, and you could have 200,000 troops there and Afghanistan will swallow them up as it has done in the past. We need a better plan with the allies to gradually turn over responsibility for the country to Afghan institutions and organizations in as short a time as possible."

But, besides the REMFpublicans and the Neo-Con Warmongers the other group which is extremely happy about expanded War in and around Afghanistan are: The Fucking Mercenaries... Afghanistan is big business for DynCorp.

"We expect to see relatively steady growth in our business in Afghanistan largely because we have a pretty broad portfolio of services at work in the country today," DynCorp Chief Executive Bill Ballhaus said

So those who profit off of Death and Destruction continue to use America and when it comes to Using the Troops and kowtowing to the MIC it doesn't matter who's President.

Related:
Disaffected and it Feels So Good: Bush Stopped US SOCOM from Killing Bin Laden (10/05/2008)

Obama: End the Wars and Earn Your Prize

While Obama hasn't done anything as cool as invent Dynamite, Obama was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize.

I hope the Award is earned by Obama and he pulls us out of Afghanistan and Iraq. If Obama is able to extricate us from both of Bush's Wars of Money Transfer he'd have go down as the greatest president. Because despite the rhetoric of the Right the goal of Bush's Wars has always been transferring Trillions of Dollars into the coffers of those who profit on Death and Destruction and who Control the Federal Government.

I always felt The Strategy of Getting (Getting In, Getting Bin Laden, Getting Out) would have been a better choice.

I'm optimistic but only cautiously so... I hope Obama is strong enough to get us out of the Wars, in which, Bush and his Controllers treated Soldiers as RISK gameboard pieces. Little wooden tokens easily placed on the map and easily removed when killed.

But, besides the cost in dollars and more heart-wrenchingly in lives, it's the millions of little pains and evils which accompany the survivors home and are suffered by their families. Because that's the true cost of wars; the suicides, the divorces, the arguing, the fights, the drinking, the drugs, the small crimes the shattered dreams, the pain...

Update:
Remember how the hatred for Obama isn't based on Race? Well, yes it is: Flabby Chicken Hawk Coward Jonah Goldberg asks if Kayne West could attend the ceremony.

Erick Erickson of Red State, who would rather disband Police Forces* than allow them to Unionize, declares the Noble Prize has an affirmative action quota.

*- This needs expanding. About 130 Macon Georgia Police Officers want to unionize. For such temerity, Erickson stated: I’m thinking I’ll have the City Attorney draft me legislation to dissolve the police department and contract with the Sheriff to provide public safety services. Erick Erickson hates people and wants them to die. In that regard he is a typical Right Winger Punk Ass Bitch.

Afghanistan = A Bag of Smushed Assholes

“If I knew exactly what the mission was, probably so, but I don’t.” ~ Sergeant Christopher Hughes when asked if the mission was worthwhile.

Bush handed Obama a shit-filled leaky plastic bag of a mismangled war in Afghanistan. Deaths have been on the rise the past two years, including the cold blooded murder of two American Soldiers by an Afghan National Police Officer.

With COIN and most guerrilla wars the campaign remains at a low simmer for years with the occasional flare up. The Insurgents only real goal is to remain alive. They do not have to conduct any operations and the occasional successful attack on the occupying force is enough to bolster their recruitment or morale while trying to provoke the occupiers into a poor heavy handed response. Insurgencies end when the occupier leaves or begins colonization of the region.

If an occupier does colonize an area the attempt can become a mass migration and displacement (The Magyars into European Hungarian plain, the Normans into Sicily, The Europeans into the Americas, The English into Australia),
Or succeed for a few years or centuries (The Berbers into Spain, the French into Indochina, the Chinese into Tibet, The English in India) and then become reversed and the conquerors leave behind a sizable minority.

Most of the recent extended 4GW conflicts of the post-world war 2 world stem from repeated colonization attempts, e.g. Ireland, Israel/Palestine, and The Balkans.

Afghanistan has always been a crossroads of empire and warfare, especially the last 30 years; following the failed Soviet attempts at subjugation of the region, the Warlord battles of Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, Burhanuddin Rabbani, Abdul Dostum, the Taliban gained control and waged campaigns against the ethnic minorites of Tajik, Uzbek and Hazara in the country, until the US and Coalition forces invaded in response to the Terror Attacks of 9/11.

Any way, 8 years later, I don't know what the mission in Afghanistan is today and the Troops in Country don't know either. I don't think Obama knows either. It's not as if we're trying to diminsh the ridiculous growth of poppies flooding the world with Heroin, but, we have set up a Government, which conducts Bush-esque fair democratic elections, killed thousands of Al Qaeda terrorists, Taliban supporters and innocents, and brought back corporations to the region and revitalized infrastructure during the 7+ years we and ISAF occupied the area. Sooooo, now why are we staying? And what would be the point in adding 50,000 more troops as General McChrystal requests?

"You can always hear the people who are willing to sacrifice somebody else's life. They're plenty loud and they talk all the time"... Uber-Patriots Sean Hannity and R. Limbaugh are attacking Obama on his strategy in Afghanistan. They demand to know his plans, they demand he listen to General McChrystal! The pure unmitigated gall, the lack of compunction of these Chicken Hawks is what I've come to expect from the cowardly Punk Ass Bitches of the Right.

There was never a word against Bush's utter colossal failures, gross negligence and incompetence in fucking over America, Afghanistan and Iraq. His failures were points of pride for these Toxic Pukes. They spent the entire time attacking Democrats and adhering to the IOKIYAR mantra. Obama has no idea what to do with the Afghan War but to his credit is taking time to meet with Advisors and analyze the Bag of Smushed Assholes he inherited from Bush. But to the Punk Ass Bitch Conservatives and REMFpublicans Obama's to blame for not immediately doubling down and supporting the mantra of War Today, War Tomorrow, War Forever!

Victory in Iraq (again)

The Declarations of Victory in Iraq have emerged from bloggers, Organizations such as the College Republicans and from noted Accurate-tician Bill Kristol, "we've won the war".

Zombie Times declared 11/22/08, in solidarity with others, as Victory in Iraq Day (VI Day). The College Republicans want the following answered: Now, the only question is will President Obama purposefully force defeat on our troops in Iraq, or will he let our military finish the job?

The obtuse attempts at connecting the Iraq War with World War II continue. The Iraq Invasion and Occupation are not WWII or Vietnam but mainly analogous, as I've often posted, to the small wars of the 19th century and America's involvement in the Philippines.

And all the protestations of victory in Iraq on 11/22/08 have not stopped guys from dying. Nor does the fallacious analogy that more Americans died in Chicago than Iraq, hold up to scrutiny. Cook County has over 5 million residents, roughly 180,000 Americans are in Iraq so the sample sizes are quite different.

The reasons those in their comfortable homes in the States are declaring victory in Iraq is two-fold. The smaller part is an attempt to salvage for Bush something other than absolute ridicule for all time, the larger part is to use Iraq against Obama. By declaring Victory (again) the set-up has been made to blame him if Iraq were to fall into fractional fighting, which is almost assured as the Kurds attempt to gain a Nation-State or if the extremists on the islamic religious divide decide to bomb one of the otherside's mosques again.

But, when you find yourself absorbed in an ideological struggle to control the awesome Apparatus of the US Government everything is acceptable. And the problem is all the Declarations won't comfort those who lose their loved ones after the War has been "Won".

The Surge! The Surge! The Surge!

Violence increases in 2007! The Surge is working!

Violence decreases in 2007! The Surge is working!

Violence increases in 2008! The Surge is working!

The Surge is working so well the increased US forces have to remain throughout 2008 and 2009. Bush lives in a fantasy world.

When the deaths of Iraqis and US service members increased in the summer of 2007. Bush trotted out of his intoxicated slumber and touted the increase as signs of success.

Violence decreased at the end of 2007, because the insurgents realized attempting to fight a modern military head-to-head is a surefire way to be annihilated. Bush managed to rouse himself out of his drunken stupor and declared Major Strategic Victory and proof the Surge had worked. Bush declared in the State of the Union with glassy eyed certainty, "Some may deny the surge is working, but among the terrorists there is no doubt."

Now violence is increasing again. Bush managed to grab hold to a podium to keep from swaying or failing over to declare the resurge in violence is a sure sign of the Surge's success! Crooks and Liars has the video of a clearly inebriated Bush Declaring Victory in Iraq.

Of course, Bush isn't left alone to declare Victory, several Warmongering Chicken Hawk professional talkers all wait anxiously by the phone for CNN, CSPAN, or the Wall Street Journal to call them up so they can spout off on how awesome and safe Iraq is, from the rugged confines of an American studio.

On 03/24/08, during Iraq: The Way Ahead at the American Enterprise Institute, Fred Kagan, Michael O'Hanlon and Ken Pollack trumpeted the Victory in Iraq.
"The first thing" Fred Kagan wanted to say is, "The Civil War in Iraq is over". Michael O'Hanlon stated Chicken Hawks who supported the Surge "did two things that I think would have made Vince Lombardi proud."

How is it this progress in Iraq is so neubulos that while it's "substantive, it is reversible". What happened to the analogies to struggles of World War II? Could the victories at Tarawa, Iwo Jima and Okinawa been couched in these terms? We're winning but we can't leave. The continued violence means success. It's insanity and the right-wingers are so blinded by their political aspirations and hatred for liberals they will allow more and more Americans to die and be maimed than look at the realities of what the Iraq has cost us and is costing us...

Purposefully Misunderstanding the Iraq War

The misshapen lump of jaundiced flesh, Richard Perle, is now claiming We have already won in Iraq. As an aside the use of we always makes me laugh especially when uttered by a chickenhawk warmonger who ensured he wouldn't soil his lily white breeches by experincing direct fire.

However, in his article Perle hedges his bets and also writes in the same article, the war is far from over. You see Perle is a political scientist, which is one of those soft and lumpy sciences. So, it's a perfect fit for Perle. It allows him to make contradictory statements even in the same article.

Perle was a Champion of Iraq War as a member of the Project for the New American Century. But, of course Perle is a rear echelon commander, he envisions all these great benefits from sending the American military into action without understanding anything about war. And I don't mean what the day-to-day grind being in theatre does to a man's pysche and the other individual horrors men face for the rest of their lives after being used as pawns. I'm writing about the a complete ignorance of what an "enemy" is bound to do on the field.

This underlines a basic misunderstanding of the war The Bush Regime lied to start and continues to lie about today. The battlefield in Iraq is a 4th generational war. In 4GW, physical conflict is the least important component by the non-state entity (the insurgents), other than ensuring they do not allow themselves to be fixed on the battlefield and obliterated. Therefore, when it comes actual confrontation, the insurgents fail when they allow themselves to be concentrated in a one place (like Fallujah 2004) and they succeed when they employ force multipliers such as IEDs, suicide bombers and snipers.

When the US Surges extra forces into the battlefield, the insurgents understand they need merely to lay low, knowing the Surge can not be maintained indefinetely. This lowers the number of deaths (which are still appallingly high) and is why Bush wants to keep the extra forces in Iraq for the reminder of his Dictatorship. The illusion of reduced violence in Iraq, with special thanks to the US news media which refrains from mentioning the daily deaths of Iraqis and Americans, provides a winning formula for Bush to claim the Surge worked, he "won" and Iraq is a Grand Old Success before he stumbles his way out of the White House.