Said, in different words, that the illegal conquest Iraqi Oilfields and National Prison-camp Ghetto Rebuilding has been secured and that the Iraqi Puppet Army and Police are sufficiently trained in Western Style Police Brutality. What a victory for Righteousness and Decency! Strange that they never found all those WMDs, though, ain't it? Meanwhile neighboring Syria and Iran are targeted and Guess Which Really Stupid Lie They're Telling Us to justify that? Go on, guess... Ok I'll tell you. WMDs. Apparently a nation like the U.S. which employs torture and assassinations that have historically killed about twenty times as many non-combatants as they do "terrorists" and many of whose political leaders believe they should establish a fundamentalist religious dictatorship worldwide, is the only nation morally fit to have WMDs. Add in that the U.S., which has more of every class of weapon than the entire rest of the world combined, is also the only nation to have used all three classes of WMD, Biological, Nuclear and Chemical. And routinely uses gas and is experimenting with mass Pain weapons against "their own" citizens. Sort of a high-tech version of what they accuse Gadafi and Hussein of doing. And make no mistake, the American Cop or Soldier
Tag: Vietnam
Spank a Vet with a warm fuzzy Attaboy
For those who think that the Peace people dishonor the veterans, think a bit on what the most prominent campaigns has to offer in the way of humiliation. One of the "new and improved" corporate motivational methods is called "peer recognition" because research showed that workers don't want to actually be, you know, adequately paid for our labor which enriches our bosses and impoverishes us. No, we want the empowerment of "recognition" for our good deeds. Say (and this happens far too often to be hypothetical) you have an innovation that saves your company many times your annual salary. What does the boss do to reward you? First he patents your innovation and declares it corporate intellectual property, then gives you an award ceremony where he more or less pats your head and tells you "Attaboy!" which those English speakers who own dogs might recognize. There's even an award letter, usually hand-written by your supervisor, saying "Attaboy!" and sometimes a Warm Fuzzy, which is a recognition pin that looks kind of like a piece of pocket lint or a dust-bunny from under a desk. How special, right? Your peers get to recognize that your contribution made the boss wealthier and as
My Lai every day
From Wikipedia: The My Lai Massacre (Vietnamese: th?m sát M? Lai [t????m ????t m?? l??j]; English pronunciation: /?mi??la?/ ( listen), also /?mi??le?, ?ma??la?/,[1] Vietnamese: [m??l??j]) was the mass murder of 347–504 unarmed citizens in South Vietnam on March 16, 1968, conducted by "Charlie" company, 1st battalion, 20th infantry, 11th infantry brigade, of the Americal Division, United States Army. All of the victims were civilians and most were women, children (including babies), and elderly people. Many of the victims were raped, beaten, tortured, and some of the bodies were found mutilated.[2] The massacre took place in the hamlets of M? Lai and My Khe of S?n M? village during the Vietnam War.[3][4] While 26 US soldiers were initially charged with criminal offenses for their actions at M? Lai, only 2nd Lt. William Calley, a platoon leader in charlie company, was convicted of killing 22 villagers. Originally given a life sentence, he served three and a half years under house arrest. When the incident became public knowledge in 1969, it prompted widespread outrage around the world. The massacre also increased domestic opposition to the US involvement in the Vietnam War. Three US servicemen who made an effort to halt the massacre and protect the
I’ve been criticized for this picture before…
That is ARVN General Nguyen Ngoc Loan executing Murdering Capt. Nguyen Van Lem of the VietMinh. The excuse often given for the General killing a prisoner is that members of Gen Nguyen's family had been killed recently. So had members of Capt Nguyens family, probably at the orders of Gen Nguyen. But, you see, grief and a desire to avenge ones family is a privilege only granted to The Wealthy Elite. How DARE a peasant presume that his moms or his wifes or his child's life was worth exactly the same as that of a Rich Person? And make no mistake, the General, in a country that could best be described as a satrapy, was rich. It's much like you don't have to come from a line of officers in the U.S. to get an appointment to the Service Academies, but if your family were enlisted men for generations it's almost guaranteed that you won't. And Robert E. Lee had an extreme advantage in that his grandfather was the first commandant of West Point and was a close personal friend of George Washington, and John McCain wasn't exactly hampered by his daddy being an Admiral either. Rank isn't supposed to be
Pentagon says bombing civilians necessary, will continue.
Of Course. Then we'll have Nut-Jobs like Charlie from the dead soldier picture comments saying that "No Marine he ever knew ever killed a baby", well, Charlie, Your Comrades Sure The Hell Do, Daily, and the Pentagon says it's "necessary" because mommy and daddy didn't surrender, didn't bow down and lick the jackboots of the NATO Imperial Stormtroopers like you. Some "freedom" y'all are fighting for, Free to submit to Corporate American rule or die, and your kids with you.
Colo. College guest Donald Gregg: the man who hired the man who killed Che
He administered OPERATION PHOENIX during the Vietnam War, the CIA counterinsurgency operation which sought to pacify Vietnam with the targeted assassination of thousands of potential insurgents. For Vice President George H. W. Bush's office, he coordinated the funding of the illegal US covert war against Central America, aka, the IRAN-CONTRA scandal. Yes, he supervised both Felix Rodriguez and Luis Posada, each of CIA-state-sponsored-terrorism fame. But Colorado College introduced Donald P. Gregg only as former national security adviser and ambassador to Korea. And CC gave Gregg an honorary degree -- with not a peep from the know-nothings they laud as their exemplary students. 23604
Recent rally against Monsanto and a little not-so-very-recent
At a recent rally in Downtown Colorado Springs... Mark made some good points about Monsanto. Here's some more. You remember, as do I, how exactly Monsanto got busted back in the late 70s with the Paraquat Pot? Paraquat is one of their signature lines of "weed" killers, herbicides, such as Agent Orange and Roundup. The company li(n)e is and was that there was no evidence that soldiers exposed directly to Agent Orange had (significantly) higher incidence of cancer than soldiers not exposed to it. Denial because they were being sued. Well, other herbicides they make, RoundUp and Paraquat, contain the same type of chemical, not the active ingredient, but a side-product of the chemical reactions to manufacture the "goodies". A class of chemicals called Dioxins. Their harmful nature ranges from damn that's freakin' scary to OhMyGod we've kicked open the doors of Hell and those are esoteric chemical-talk terms. If you don't recognise them then you're not a chemist. At the high end of the spectrum is where the product was burned. As in, soldiers usually on punishment detail raking up the dead plants and burning them. Monsanto didn't out themselves, nor did the Army. The DEA did instead, by publishing a warning
‘Call us when WE behead somebody’ …again.
So, what happens when we do WORSE than behead somebody? Say, for instance, gut-shoot a third-world person knowing full well that the only place in town which can treat an abdominal wound is a hospital associated with whatever torture regime we're propping up, or a US Military Hospital who will patch the dude up and then turn him over to somebody like the Saigon Torture Regime? Which is what these rifles were designed for doing. Not for a humane quick kill. 23388
Woody Guthrie at the Macy’s Thanksgiving Parade!
Actually, his son Arlo. Now, usually on Thanksgiving we hear Arlo's "Alices Restaurant". Which is a good song sung for a good cause, the Alices Restaurant Anti-Massacre Movement. Unlike a parade at which he sang the song in 1968, in Chicago, and a parade in Colorado Springs where the music was all militaristic, even the Al Khaly Shrine band playing God Save the Queen, the British National Anthem at a St Paddies' parade, with Royal Marines marching in the band, where neither Arlo, his most excellent music or really any radical ideals were expressed, (save for the Military theme of "We get to go to exotic lands, meet interesting people, and kill them in order to take those exotic lands") The Macy's Parade wasn't interrupted by Uniformed Thugs beating up Americans for daring to say that peace is better than murdering people. And his song at the Macy's parade? One of his fathers songs. "This land is made for you and me" which Right Wing Media Lunatic Beck makes a huge Hysterical Anti-Leftist Spasm about, because the song expresses a Communist principle that the land does NOT belong exclusively to the Wealthy. Especially since every square inch of what is now defined as
US/UK “Liberators” not allowing Afghan Liberty
What a surprise. The Puppet Karzhai government, as always echoing what Washington and London (but mainly Wall Street) tell them, is refusing to seat Members of Parliament elected "fraudulently". This from the most farcical "democracy" in history. Even the French and American puppets in Saigon weren't so obsequious. Or obviously propped up by Imperial Storm Troopers. That says a lot. The American and Koalition of the Killing soldiers standing guard outside polling places, to make sure nobody did a "terrorist" action like voting for somebody not on the Approved List, allowed those who WERE on the approved list to cast a few hundred thousand Phantom Ballots for themselves, Or So The Story-Line Goes So, what are the Conquero oops "Liberators" going to do next? It's THEIR Pentagon propaganda ploy. They deliberately dealt themselves this card, the question is what kind of bets are they making on this hand? Dissolve the Karzhai Puppet Show completely, declare an "international emergency" that allows the Corporate Thieves to keep the occupation going far beyond that 2014 magic number? Well, that part is a given. 20602
Pullout from Afghanistan? not for another 3 years..
BBC had a story "An hour away from Kabul, despair grows as NATO discusses exit..." Meaning, the BBC is required to report that the war is a positive thing for Afghan people so they focus on government officials who got their jobs handed to them by the American and British Conquerors and Occupiers errr "liberators and nation builders" and will, justifiably, have their heads handed to them by people who had friends and family (anybody in Afghanistan) Murdered, raped, imprisoned and tortured by the NATO Occupation forces. And the reader/listener is supposed to take pity on these poor, sad, wretched pathetic Traitors who sold their own people to the invaders as a means of gaining Puppet Local Dictator status. Awwwwww.... Shed a fake tear with me, Glenn Beck showed us how, put Vicks Vapo-Rub under your eyes... On the other hand, if 3 more years of the Mightiest Empire on earth wouldn't be enough time to build up a sense of safety in the Karzhai Puppet Regime, how long WOULD it take? Analysts who aren't in the pay of the Pentagon say there's no way, and that if the occupation succeeds it could only be by being Permanent. 20593
News sources, MSM and the mouths of horses…
See, we constantly get told, on this site and any other site that opposes the wars and the occupations and such, that we're listening to the "Liberal Mainstream Media". Huh? The most frequently criticized "Liberal" media are as rabid a War-mongering Mob as Fox, they're just more polite about it. Sometimes more polite about it. The bullshit with the "Ground Zero Mosque" is being whipped up by the MSM CORPORATE whores just as much as the FOX corporate whores. With an insidious difference, they'll use weasel words rather than coming right out and saying "Hate Muslims! Hate Islam! The REAL 'Obsession' is our Hatred for all things Middle East!" like FOX does. Same with the Wounded Warrior bullshit the Pentagon tries to fill a swimming pool with, and then dump us in. The fault of causing all those wounds and deaths isn't in the Anti-War movement, it's in those who twist their own words to make it appear just, and righteous, to CONTINUE the wars and start others. Why would they do that? Money. 19488
Failed Musicians, Earning Potential and Tort Reform
Charlie Manson, David Koresh... described as “failed musicians” because they played the guitar, and like the vast thundering herd of people who pick the git-fiddle they didn’t make a career of it. Adolf Hitler, a “failed artist” even though, in the economic blight of inter-bellum Vienna, he actually DID make a modest living selling painted postcards on the street. John Wilkes Boothe, said to be a “Failed actor” by some who had never trod the boards. Because their names are vilified and the demonization of their memory has to be complete. .Something you’d practically have to be a Documentary Junkie to notice, maybe after a marathon of History Channel BioPics.. Fairly subtle. Insidious even. What’s almost but not quite as subtle as a Taser to the testicles or a sledgehammer to the lower skull/first vertebra is the demonization of working class people throughout the world in Tort. The civil liability sections of law. In civil court, “earning potential” is taken seriously. So seriously, in fact, that it proves the LIE of the Capitalist Dream which is foisted onto the workers, that if we work hard and diligently, do a good job putting money into the pockets of our Wealthy Masters, we,
Clinton Seeks “Human Rights” improvements in VietNam
Actually the first real human rights improvements came after the French/American Puppet Saigon Government torture freaks were sent into exile. What does Ms Hillary think we're going to do, threaten to go in and get whupped by them yet a second time? Maybe if she could get U.S. troops, and Cops, over whom she has at least SOME nominal authority, to just freakin' QUIT KILLING PEOPLE for such crimes as Dissent, Dark Skin Color, and of course my personal favorite, Dissenting While Dark... at home and in the Conquered errr "Liberated" Territories. Hill, baby, Lead By Example. Because the Pentagon ain't gonna be able to take over any more countries. They won't even be able to hold the ones they've got so far. Meanwhile, a nation taking retribution against criminals who collaborated with the Occupiers isn't in any way abnormal. 18948
Ron Kovic, Private Nation and the mystique of the Token Cripple
Because I get the same kind of crap in lower doses than Kovic and Max Cleland did and still do. When you become disabled at work you're supposed to be grateful for any crust of bread thrown your way, and condemned as a whiner if you point out the guilt of the parties who brought you to that state. With war veterans it's worse. Ron Kovic and Max Cleland were "just fine" in the eyes of the Pentagon, until they started opposing the war, then they were and still are demonized. The Pentagoons, while Cleland was fighting to survive, leaving 3 of his limbs on the cutting room floor, (mixed metaphor there, cutting room is about films) his commanders were filling out paperwork exonerating themselves from any blame for what they had done to him. Like Kovic, and Private Nation, and John Kerry, and Flight Lt Joseph "Country" MacDonald, he was treated with the military equivalent of Honor as long as he consented to be the Token. The Warrior returning and still supporting a lost war. Touching, Heartwarming, (heartburn) but once they chose to speak out, save for Private Nation, they were the darlings of every parade, supporting sending even MORE
just when things couldn’t get worse…
McChrystal replaced by... Generally Betrays Us. Yep, "king" David Petraeus, the one whose staff leaked a protocol statement he had made sometime last year, announced on the Memorial Day weekend, of a military version of an Executive Order giving himself the power to decide which wars to start. Open ended statement that at one end of the interpretation spectrum, is authorization to commit air strike murder in any country of the world, including America, with no further authorization than his own. The departure point from Constitutional Law or, for that matter, ANY Law, is the authorization to initiate Military Intelligence operations. Much like the operations in Cambodia and Laos which John Kerry was condemned for even stating existed, and which NiXXon, (New name, but the same old gas) had sicced the "plumber" burglars on the Watergate office of Daniel Ellsbergs doctor in order to try to smash Ellsberg... the operation that so massively backfired.... the one in retaliation for Ellsberg "ratting out" the Secret War against Cambodia and Laos. Seems this keeps coming back around yes? Petraeus' mission paper, if accepted by Congress, would legalize that sort of shenanigans. Murder actually. In large numbers, in the Name of the American people,
Robert Fisk and the language of power, danger words: Competing Narratives
Celebrated reporter -and verb- Robert Fisk had harsh words, "danger words" he called them, for host Al-Jazeera where he gave an address about the language of power which has infected newsman and reader alike. Beware your unambiguous acceptance of empty terms into which state propagandists let you infer nuance: power players, activism, non-state actors, key players, geostrategic players, narratives, external players, meaningful solutions, --meaning what? I'll not divulge why these stung Al-J, but I'd like to detail the full list, and commit not to condone their false usage at NMT, without ridicule, "quotes" or disclaimer. 17409
Teabag solution to AfPak gun shortage
TeaBags, Militia, Minutemen... get off your "Patriot" arse and donate your rifles to the Army. Uncle Sam needs YOU(r rifles)! You silly bastards say you bought them, and keep buying more, for the "defense" of America, right? Against OTHER AMERICANS of course. But the Army says it needs more high powered rifles, you know, the ones that you buy to make yourselves feel less pathetic and weak and victimierrr ummm.. "More Macho".(strong hint: you can't buy manhood... if you could George Bush and Karl Rove and Glenn Beck would have already bought up all the available supply.) My cousin Hank was assigned to a detail burning a warehouse filled with New, still-in-the-packing-grease AK47s in Iraq after GulfWarz One. 17310
Propaganda Story “Military Medics Fight to Keep Afghan Boy Alive”
While in actuality, they were just prior to the kid getting blown apart, fighting to kill him. Military Medics are NOT non-combatants. They're COMBAT support. That was impressed on us in Basic Training and once again in Tech School, we were to be basically Monkey Mechanics, keeping the Human Fighting Machines in good working order. Every bit as dehumanized and coldly efficiently calculated as the base armorer keeping the Rifles in good working order. The base Veterinarians office keeping the Police Attack Dogs in good working order, and a subset of that, the Base Exterminator (yes, under the command of the Base Veterinarian) whose job is to control wild animals, like the flocks of birds near the runways, skunks, coyotes, rats, cats both native and feral, wild hogs, etc etc... And to use Herbicides like Agent Orange to kill the native vegetation, so that there's a clear field of fire. They SAY all this is necessary because if we don't do that, we wouldn't be able to provoke and fight Wars. Help me out here, I'm not seeing an actual Downside. 14681
The “difference” between an IED and a land-mine
Is the difference between a Militia Group (like those commanded by Washington) and the VietMinh or the Taliban "Insurgents" A matter of Semantic Perspective that's vital to propagandists, espicially if the Propagandists don't have anything better. It's the so-called "difference" between "conqueror" and "liberator" , USAF Bomber v Suicide Bomber Decapitation with a sword and decapitation with a .50 caliber round fired frim a Vulcan electric motorized Gatling gun. 14410
You have forgotten what to remember
Can someone please explain to me what it means to fly this flag? The POW-MIA flag is ubiquitous these days around veterans. Our town hall flies this black flag halfway below the Stars and Stripes. When the latter is at half mast, the former hangs indecorously low. Which reminds me of a pirate ship stalking a wavering Old Glory. I understand POW and MIA, and "you are not forgotten." But there is no flag for the veterans, the dead or wounded, to whom does this lone flag speak and why? 11342
These days we outsource our POW-MIA
According to Nation Magazine, there are 131,000 homeless vets, and about 18 suicides per day among America's 25 million vets.
Major Abu Nidal Hasan to meet Jack Ruby
So who was the Fort Hood shooter, do we know? The media's got the back story all lined up for it to be Nidal Malik Hasan, he has three names like all assassins (and sound bites), and now the Army is trotting out witnesses to point their fingers at the Muslim Major. Addressing reports of multiple gunmen, the Army says "there was only one shooter." Although five of the victims may have fallen to friendly fire. So there was a "friendly shooter?" Which one was Hasan? 11167
Shootout at the OK Fort
Hood. Texas. At a base theater and sports complex. Some of the News people are already speculating al Qa'eda. Sounds like horseshit to me. Three guys in uniform is all they've been told and it leaps to being a Terror Attack. 11084
I was watching Jacobs Ladder just now
I was watching Jacobs Ladder just now. Just a little bit intense. Definitely not your standard war flick. You know, the guy who recommended the film to me, he'd been there, in Nam. And in the VA outpatient clinics too. One of those from Louisiana-East Texas that I just slip right into jawin' with, easy... we call each other Cousin even if we've never met before. God Damn this is a bad movie. Not bad scripting or acting or plot. The bad part of it is that it's something real. 11009