As the Republican presidential candidates ramp-up their faux-patriotic militaristic jingoism, it’s time to remember just how dumb these people are. Here is “The Republican Party Animals Music Video”:
The American Conservative captured this thematic, quintessentially Republican cretinism, in all its contradictions—as if both “small government” and a massive military can coincide—in the cover art and cover story of the issue titled, “GOP and Man at Yale”:
Unbeknown to Republicans, “the military is government. The military works like government; is financed like government, and sports many of the same inherent malignancies of government. Like government, it must be kept small.”
The collective IQ that was lost when the Chinook carrying 22 Navy SEALs was downed by the Taliban yesterday was greater than the scrambled brains of 434 House Representatives (Ron Paul excluded; he’d raise that number).
Dedicate your life to the state, and chances are that life will be squandered.
Navy SEALs are incredible specimens, both intellectually and physically. Every interview with members of this elite unit, following the slaying of bin Laden, demonstrated the superman qualities SEALs possess. Some even look like cut-out images from an episode of “The Unit.” It’s a shame these magnificent action men give their talents over to an entity that is wanton about the wealth and the lives with which it is (foolishly) entrusted: government.
Alas, as I’ve pointed out elsewhere, action men like SEALS have few fulfilling options outside the army, given the monopoly over defense held by the military-industrial-complex. Compounding this state-of-affairs is the feminization of our society. In a healthy free society, men made of this stuff would be perfectly suited to raising militia and leading a revolution, alas… .
Belatedly, and after spilling much blood and treasure for nothing at all in Afghanistan, mainstream opinion makers have concluded what we non-interventionists concluded a decade ago. Making Afghans (and Iraqis) wards of the American state will increase their impotence (to say nothing of violating their negative, leave-me-alone rights and ours, as we’ve paid for the adventure in lost lives and livelihoods). “Ultimately, philanthropic wars are transfer programs—the quintessential big-government projects.”
A “two-year congressional investigation from Senate Democrats” gives details of the defeat. Via the National Journal:
“World Bank data estimates that 97 percent of Afghanistan’s gross domestic product comes from spending related to the military and donor community presence, according the report, which warns that a withdrawal could pull the rug out from under the Afghan economy.” …
I suspect that slashing and burning the Afghans’ poppy fields hasn’t helped them either. “In a country with a poor infrastructure, the ‘relatively stable value of opium and its nonperishability means that it can also serve as an important source of savings and investment among traders and cultivators.'” (From “Tokers Are Terrorists Now”)
It is the habit on the Memorial Day weekend to thank uniformed men for their sacrifice. Sorry! None of this meaningless jabbering. I thank all the Ramos’s and Compeans of this nation, who stand on this country’s soil and defend their countrymen from the detritus of mankind.
My sympathies go out to Americans who fight phantoms in far-flung destinations. I’m sorry they’ve been snookered into living, dying and killing for a lie. But I will not honor that lie, or those who give their lives for it, and take the lives of others in America’s many recreational wars. I mourn for them, as I have from day one, but I can’t honor them.
I am sorry for those who’ve enlisted thinking they’d fight for their countrymen and were subjected to one backdoor draft after another in the cause of illegal, unjust wars. My heart hurts for you, but I won’t worship at Moloch’s feet to make you feel better.
I honor those sad, sad draftees to Vietnam and to WW II. The first valiant batch had no option; the same goes for the last, which fought a just war. I grew up in Israel, so I honor those men who stopped Arab armies from overrunning our homes. In 1973, we came especially close to annihilation.
UPDATED I: THE SIX-DAY WAR: Another just war. I was one of the many small kids you see in a bunker in the footage here. From that shelter, to the sounds of artillery on the Jordanian border (back then every Israeli resided on some hostile border) we listened to the infamous (lying) Cairo Broadcast, a snippet from which you can read below.
“The existence of Israel has continued too long. We welcome the Israeli aggression. We welcome the battle we have long awaited. The peak hour has come. The battle has come in which we shall destroy Israel.”
UPDATE II: DYING FOR NOTHING. “Eight US soldiers killed in Afghan blasts,” via Jihad Watch. US General David Petraeus, more appropriately once dubbed General Betrayus,” has offered assurances that recent casualties are “because of the ‘progress’ made in ‘important areas’ since last year.”
Evidence to contradict his theory (mounting body count) is brought as evidence for his theory (we’re “winning”). How can the good general lose a debate?
Here’s what Betrayus will never say: Afghans (who’re mostly Muslim) have more of an affinity for the Taliban than for the Wilsonians who’re attempting to westernize them. This is why it is not uncommon to hear of an Afghan policeman opening fire on his American “colleagues” during a joint operation. Just the other day, on April 27 to be precise, as Times Of India tells it, “nine Americans—eight troops and a contractor—were killed by an Afghan officer who opened fire at a Kabul military training centre.”
