Category Archives: Military

The Big Dog Wags The Dog

In the course of the catalogue of Obaminations the president has inflicted on the country, the Big Dog has chosen to wag the dog at convenient times.

To ‘wag the dog’ means to purposely divert attention from what would otherwise be of greater importance, to something else of lesser significance. By doing so, the lesser-significant event is catapulted into the limelight, drowning proper attention to what was originally the more important issue.

(UsingEnglish.com)

The government has spent time and money barring Americans from accessing public places. At the same time, and during a government shutdown, Obama has given the go-ahead for a military operation in Libya and Somalia about which the targeted countries are unhappy.

The seizure in Tripoli of the alleged al-Qaida operative Abu Anas al-Liby prompted the Libyan government to issue an angry statement, questioning the US account that Liby had been detained with its full knowledge. The statement said: “As soon as it heard the reports, the Libyan government contacted the United States authorities to demand an explanation [for] the kidnapping of a Libyan citizen.”
US officials had briefed the media on Saturday that the mission had been conducted with the knowledge of the Libyan government, but on Sunday an official told the Guardian: “We consult regularly with the Libyan government on a range of issues. We do not get into the specifics of our communication.”

(The Guardian)

It’s hard to know what Americans think, if they do indeed think. Will Obama succeed in wooing a war-loving people, or have Americans wizened up to his ways?

The Co-Conspirators In Military Mass Shootings

Affirmative Action, Crime, Military, Political Correctness, Race, The State

“The Co-Conspirators In Military Mass Shootings” is the current column, now on WND. An excerpt:

At Dummies.com you can learn how to “refresh a computer system.” It is hardly a super-specialized IT job.

“Refreshing computer systems” for the Navy Marine Corps’ Intranet network was the job description of the Washington Navy Yard killer, Aaron Alexis. Alexis, who gunned down 12 military contractors in the capital, on Sept. 16, was not an irreplaceable cog in the US military-industrial complex. Given his checkered record, Alexis ought to have been a liability to any organization.

Nevertheless, the former Navy reservist would have been coveted by military contractors for his prized possession: the secret military security clearance and common-access card (CAC), courtesy of the U.S. government.

Access is invaluable. If you’re cleared to work on military installations, you’re gold to contractors—who are themselves cogs in the corrupt military juggernaut.

A government grant of privilege, not his skills, turned a mass-murderer in the making into an asset to The Experts Inc., for which Alexis worked.

Unburdened by brains, liberals are demanding to know “why was Alexis able to buy guns?” Again, ask the government. Gun sellers must use the FBI-run National Instant Criminal Background Check System for background checks on customers. Sharpshooters Small Arms Range, from which Alexis bought the Remington 870 shotgun used in the crime, was in compliance. The shop checked Alexis out with the feds. The government gave them the go-ahead.

Equally compromised, Republican Senator Susan Collins was prompted to “question the kind of vetting contractors do.” Ask the government you serve, Susan, for it, not the contractors, conducts background checks.

“The government maintains the final approval authority,” said Rear Admiral John Kirby to CNN’s Wolf Blitzer.

And for government officials, no infraction committed by Alexis was too egregious to ignore. …

… Not only is it preposterous to float the idea that the point people at OPM, DOD, DONCAF or NCIS “dropped the ball” (as media are framing it)—the truth is almost entirely the opposite. …

Read the entire column. “The Co-Conspirators In Military Mass Shootings” is the current column, now on WND.

If you’d like to feature this column, WND’s longest-standing, exclusive paleolibertarian column, in or on your publication (paper or pixels), contact ilana@ilanamercer.com.

JOIN THE CONVERSATION:

• At the WND Comments Section. Scroll down and “Say it.”

• On my Facebook page.

• By clicking to “Like,” “Tweet” and “Share” this week’s “Return To Reason” column.

Another Case Of Workplace Violence In Military (Yeah, Right!)

Barack Obama, GUNS, Homeland Security, Military, Propaganda

Barack Obama calls the Navy Yard shooting in the capital, today, “another mass shooting … on a military installation in our nation’s capital. It’s a shooting that targeted our military and civilian personnel.” It goes without saying that all those who’re part of the massive welfare system that is the US military—entire families are “enlisted” on the country’s payroll—are, in the president’s words, “patriots,” “protecting all of us”:

They know the the dangers of serving abroad, but today they faced the unimaginable violence that they wouldn’t have expected here at home.

In reply to a gun-control question, this dreadful cur of a man found the presence of mind to quip: “[We will] be investigating thoroughly what happened—as we do so many of these shootings sadly that have happened and do everything we can to try to prevent them.”

Note that the “Silent Conspirators in the Case Of Major Nidal Malik Hasan” are still at large. (Hint: Look at the role played by policy makers as well as that of the top brass of the US military.)

Nothing is likely to change on that front.

UPDATE II: The Proof Is In the Putin

Media, Middle East, Military, Propaganda, Republicans, Russia, The State, War

The punditocracy is shouting almost in unison that Russia and Syria have pulled one over us. The US, they say, has been weakened because someone halted the momentum of the American war juggernaut.

You see, the pundits and the pols cannot perceive of greatness outside the state because they are part of the state apparatus; and depend on it for status and income.

Individual Americas who have nothing to gain and only losses to sustain from a war are somehow mistakenly identifying with the state and its emissaries—politicians and pundits—who have everything to gain from the great theatre that is war. “In Syria (and all else), it’s ‘Us’ against ‘Them.'”

Think about it. Who benefits when America goes to war? Not you. Not ordinary Americans. Those who benefit “function within the nimbus of great power” in D.C. and around it—the media-military-congressional-industrial complex.

What happens to the bluster of Bill O’Reilly, his sidekick Dennis the Menace or Charles Krauthammer if the US is no longer dictating the terms of war (lots of it) and peace (too little of it) in the world? Their immense egos suffer. Maybe even their incomes, eventually. But not you, the ordinary American. Krauthammer, ridiculously, equates the failure to go to war against Syria with “Russia supplanting America as regional hegemon.”

But the proof is in the Putin, who stopped a war. Why is stopping a war tantamount to supplanting US power?

Rather, the Russians are replacing bully power with a balance of power. And this is good for Americans (if not for their overlords who art in D.C.)

He who saves you from war is better than he who sends you to war.

UPDATE I: Gerson, another neocon:

“This allows Moscow to supply proxies such as Syria and Iran with weapons while positioning itself as the defender of international law and peace.”

UPDATE II (9/15): Yet another Republican pundit (albeit one of the few talented ones) who depends on The Party for status and income. Here Ann Coulter praises Republican wars.

She promotes and profits from ’em; YOU fight ’em.