A Nation of Relentless Savagery

 

You've been avoiding this for a long time.

You prefer to remember the times he took you to the park, that amazing camping vacation a few summers back, the funny things he often says at the dinner table, that beautiful dog he gave you on your 12th birthday.

But you can't deny it any longer.  The truth is painful.  But . . .

Dad is an alcoholic and he beats mom.

Do you hate him?  Do you reject him as your father?

No . . . but things have to drastically change and very soon.

This is not actually the story I wish to tell.  I'm merely drawing a parallel.  I'm talking about dealing with denial, facing reality, accepting responsibility, taking action.

There are many situations in life for which the above scenario is a metaphor.

The parallel I'm making is the relationship between a citizen and a government gone mad.

We've avoided it for a long time.  We prefer to think of America as a beacon of hope in the world, the fountainhead of truth and justice, a purveyor of democratic values and human rights.

But we can't deny it any longer.  The truth is painful.  But . . .

As Martin Luther King, Jr. said in his monumental, myth-shattering speech -- the one that probably got him assassinated -- at Riverside Church in New York City on April 4, 1967:

“The greatest purveyor of violence in the world: My own government, I cannot be silent.”

I won't go into the long history of American aggression.  Whole books have been written which detail our gruesome heritage of merciless wars, the most notable being Howard Zinn's classics, A People's History of the United States and the more recent A People's History of American Empire.  Nor will I indict the U.S. foreign policy apparatus for its gross deceptions and hypocrisies, elucidated with unparalleled clarity and candor in William Blum's excellent work, America's Deadliest Export: Democracy.

I won't talk about the millions of human carcasses piled on top of more carcasses, the result of countless war crimes and merciless military strategies which place no value on human life, whether the victims are in uniform or innocent civilians.  I've realized that the scale of the horror is such that its incomprehensible to most good decent citizens.  I myself when confronted by figures like 3 million Vietnamese killed, 1.5 Iraqis killed, on and on, find my eyes glazing over in the deluge of zeroes.  I literally cannot grasp these numbers and apply them meaningfully to the grief and physical suffering which they are supposed to somehow encapsulate.

Let's instead look at a few simple very recent facts and try to put them in perspective.

Fact 1:  The U.S. is not officially at war with any other country at this time.

Fact 2:  The U.S. has not been attacked in any sense of the word in the last 16 years.

Fact 3:  Last year the U.S. military dropped 26,171 bombs on seven different countries.



Mind you, these are the official figures.  Who knows what the real totals are?

These were not water-filled balloons or July 4th fireworks.  At the end of every explosion, there were body parts strewn all over the surrounding area.  Survivors were being crushed in collapsed buildings, or crawling along the ground with limbs torn off, leaving a trail of blood squirting out of severed arteries.  Innocent people, men, women, and children just going about the everyday business of living, were mangled by a lethal mix of high-velocity shrapnel, and chunks of rubble created by ton after ton of high-yield explosives dropped anonymously from the sky.

Rigorous studies have made it very clear that well over half of the casualties of current warfare are civilians.  In what are called 'internal conflicts' -- like Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya, Syria, Yemen, Somalia -- which now are by far the most prevalent form of military conflict, the percentages can be as high as 90% civilians.  These violent clashes are typically fought by proxies. In all of the countries just listed, the aggressors are mercenaries paid by the U.S. and its allies to enter and destroy a country in what is then deceptively characterized as a civil war or "people's uprising".  There is very disturbing recent evidence, for example, that the U.S. through CIA back channels has been funding ISIS, Al Nusra, as well as other extremely barbarous terrorist groups in Iraq and Syria.

By the way, that money they withhold from your paycheck?  Or that quarterly tax payment you regularly make?  Think about it.  This is where a big chunk of your tax dollars is going.  You're paying for this.

Does any of this make my point a little more comprehensible?

26,171 bombs . . . funding terrorism . . . innocent civilians die . . . all in a days work.

America can say with great pride that what it does, it usually does very well.

When we put our minds to something, we pull out all the stops.

Now we can put killing right up there in the Top 10.

We kill efficiently.  We kill without remorse.  We kill without hesitation.

NOTICE TO THE WORLD . . .

Beware!  We are a nation of relentless savagery!

Then again, a lot of countries already know that.

---

I've said this many times before and I'll keep saying it until people get it . . .
Peace will not come from the top.  There are too many incentives and rewards in our corrupt corporate kleptocracy to keep the wars going and the wheels of the defense industry churning out more mechanisms of death and destruction.

It is only when we everyday citizens finally have had enough of the carnage, enough of the military waste, enough of the chest-beating imperialism which makes us less safe, enough of the empty rhetoric which claims to embrace the noble virtues but is just more deception in the name of war and imperial conquest, it is only then that America will turn around.

Maybe there are detailed plans out there somewhere to mobilize the good decent citizens of this country.  I haven't personally seen any.  So here is mine.  Yes, it is outside-the-box, some would say radical, extreme.  But if we are the nation we claim to be in the world and in the eyes of God, isn't cruelly and senselessly dropping 26,171 bombs on mostly innocent people extreme and radical?
My plan demands very little of us individually.  We don't have to march on the capital or mount a revolutionary insurrection.  Despite that, it could make all the difference in the future we leave to our children and our children's children.  All that is really required is that we listen to the voice of reason and stand strong.

At least take a look.  Open your mind up to the possibility of a future without the madness.  Of a future without endless war.  Of a future when our hard-earned tax dollars don't go to fund the relentless savagery of a military gone mad.

 

The Peace Dividend: The Most Controversial Proposal in the History of the World is now available both as an ebook and deluxe paperback at all of the usual outlets . . .

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[ This originally appeared at the author's personal website . . . http://jdrachel.com ]


A Nation of Relentless Savagery

War On Terror = More Terrorism and More War = More Terrorism and More War = . . .

We can talk and talk, cite all sorts of statistics, construct marvelous narratives, collect anecdotes, offer incisive and powerful analysis.  But sometimes a few charts says it far better than any amount of verbiage.

Look at these and you tell me how the War On Terror is going.  See if you see the same obvious connection between America's military intervention and geopolitical meddling and the growing threat of terrorism.


I remember a truly idiotic joke from my youth.  Pathetically it seems relevant here.

"Why do you keep hitting yourself on the head with that hammer?"

"Because it feels so good when I stop!"

When are we going to stop, ladies and gentlemen?

When?

I've offered an extreme remedy to this madness.

It's one that is so wild and completely outside-the-box, it actually makes sense.

The Peace Dividend!

Or maybe we should keep pounding ourselves on the head with a hammer.

Let's really go for it.  You can borrow mine . . .





[ This originated at the author's personal website . . . http://jdrachel.com ]



War On Terror = More Terrorism and More War = More Terrorism and More War = . . .

It’s not easy being infallible . . .

 

In case you didn't hear President Obama's historic speech at the Hiroshima Peace Park this past May 27th, let me sum it up for you.  Paraphrasing . . .

"It's very sad.  War is nasty.  Shit happens."

There is broad consensus among reputable historians -- who don't filter everything through the brainwashing lens of American exceptionalism -- that dropping the atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki was entirely unnecessary.

There is concrete evidence -- I've seen the U.S. government documents on display at the Hiroshima Peace Museum myself -- that dropping the bombs was an experiment.  These two Japanese cities, both of relatively marginal importance in terms of the war effort, were the petri dishes, the Japanese were the bacteria.  The nuclear scientists who had developed a deployable nuclear weapon wanted to see how people and dwellings would hold up in the 10,830º fireball.  You think I'm exaggerating about any of this?  The bombs didn't target factories or military installations.  The epicenter of the Hiroshima explosion was directly over a medical clinic, for chrissakes!

With those two heinous war crimes, of course, America was just getting warmed up.

Next came Korea, or more specifically North Korea.  In what was considered a savage and one-sided genocidal attack, over 20% of the population -- by some estimates close to 1.4 million people -- mostly civilians were killed by the U.S. campaign.  North Korea was reduced to rubble.  At the end of the carpet bombing, planes were returning with all of their bombs, with the pilots complaining there was nothing left to bomb.  Why did North Korea deserve such genocide?  They were demanding that as promised at the end of World War II, when they were finally liberated from the oppressive rule of the Japanese, that the country be unified and free democratic elections be held.  You think I'm making this up?  If you can go beyond the facile fairy tales of our high school history texts and do some reading, you'll find this right in the historical record.


 

After taking a little breather, the U.S. moved on to Vietnam.  What was the problem there?  These misguided gooks might go communist and we couldn't let that happen!  Of course, Vietnam is now a communist country.  I've been there.  It's a pretty decent place.  No one tried to shoot me.  I practically never saw any police.  The food is spicy.  Amazingly, I was treated with courtesy and kindness.  Why was I amazed?  Because we slaughtered between 1.3 and 3.9 million Vietnamese in that war, again mostly civilians.  We sprayed them and their farmland with lethal chemicals that are still causing horrible birth defects.  In fact, America dropped twice as many bombs on this tiny country as was dropped by all sides in every theater of World War II! 

Try to wrap your head around that.

Of course, just because we were at war with Vietnam didn't mean we would confine our destruction and carnage to that country, in losing the war.  We also mercilessly bombed Cambodia and Laos.  In Cambodia -- a country we weren't at war with -- America dropped a half million tons of bombs killing 100,000 innocent people. 

But that was child's play compared to Laos, again a country which was neutral not in any way participating in the Vietnam conflict.  Laos has the chilling distinction of being per capita the most bombed country in the history of the world!  Yes, we really cut loose on this tiny, impoverished nation by dropping 2,000,000 TONS OF EXPLOSIVES on them!

And how bad does America feel about the death and destruction it inflicted on tiny Laos?  Never one to let an opportunity for cynical irony go ignored, Obama in his public relations swing through Southeast Asia stopped by to do some glad-handing.  While when it comes to countries we've abused Obama prefers to leave the past behind, to look ahead toward a bright, harmonious future -- in particular one controlled by the corporate totalitarian regime of TPP -- he did give a nod to a little problem that 2,000,000 tons of explosives had left scattered across the landscape of Laos: that of unexploded ordnance.  He was in such a generous mood that he committed $90 million to help clean up the mess before more children lost their arms and legs.  $90 million for 2 million tons of explosives only four-and-a-half decades late.  What a guy!

I could go on but we'd be looking at a book.  A very depressing one at that.

The point is the bombing and the wars just keep on going and in parallel we are treated to a never-ending barrage of self-righteous deceptions and exceptionalist demagoguery.

The only difference now is that the rhetoric is more vitriolic and audaciously deceitful.

Since hopefully many of you like myself may not be amused by Obama's infinite capacity for expectorating America-first drivel, let me spare you from listening to this narcissistic ideologue and sum up his recent speech before the United Nations.  I read between the lines a bit, and here's the gist of this remarkable gust of self-congratulatory hot air:

"We know if you repeat a lie often enough, it will stick.  We are also firmly committed to never admitting a mistake, and no matter how implausible, always finding someone else to blame for what goes wrong.  Finally, the United States of America never apologizes."

For the final UN speech of his celebrated 8 years as president, I think Obama has done an excellent job of clarifying exactly where the U.S. stands, and sealing his place in the history books after the U.S. inevitably implodes, as one of the most myopic of our chief executives.

Having said that, I'm still for offering a balanced view.  Though we often get caught up in quibbling about the details, let's look at the big picture and give credit where credit is due.

Do you think keeping track of the torrent of destructive but spellbinding lies dumped on the American public and the rest of the world is easy?

Can you fathom how thoroughly exhausting it must be to relentlessly embrace and nurture such intemperate arrogance, such malignant hubris, such shameless moral insensitivity, how draining it is to keep feeding the rhetorical river of buttery self-congratulations and slimy bombast?

What about having to unrelentingly deny facts, obfuscate and hide the truth?  What about the colossal task of constructing an alternative and patently false reality to keep American citizens from waking up to the horror their leaders are visiting on the rest of the world?  You're going to tell me this is not incredibly grueling work?

In a nutshell . . .

Do you think it's easy being infallible?

Maybe we should ask President Obama at his next news conference.


[ This originated at the author's personal website . . . http://jdrachel.com ]



It’s not easy being infallible . . .

There were over 28,000 Prince deaths last year.

 

I never use the phrase 'conspiracy theory' anymore. It carries too much of a pejorative connotation and strongly implies that what is being discussed should obviously be dismissed.

I prefer a clumsy phrase which will never be used again:  'Observations and commentary on suspicions of coordinated action'.

To be candid, I will not be presenting anything like a conspiracy theory here, or making any attempt at a cohesive and conclusive argument.  What I will do is offer some facts and throw out some questions, then let you draw your own conclusions and make whatever connections might seem appropriate.

We were all saddened, perhaps shocked when Prince recently died from prescription opiate abuse.

At the same time, over 28,000 people died in the U.S. last year from prescribed opiates.  We might ask:  Is there is no human price too high to pay when it comes to maximizing corporate profits?

"Nationally 125 people die every day from drug overdoses," according to a recent article in the New York Times.  Death by drug overdose has recently been dramatically accelerating.


 
Death by heroin overdose quadrupled in eleven years and is now reaching alarming levels.

Here are some questions that immediately come to mind:

Why is it that so little funding is being made available for rehabilitation programs to treat drug addiction?

Why is it that the FDA is so lax when it comes to dealing with Big Pharma, apparently not willing or able to perform its mandated duty to protect the American public?

Why is it wherever the U.S. mounts special ops campaigns or as in the case of Afghanistan a full-on military assault, production of heroin and trafficking of drugs seems to explode?

Why is it that the CIA is often implicated in drugs-for-arms deals and drug trafficking?

Why is it America seems incapable of winning the War on Drugs?

Okay, here comes the curve ball . . .

Are you familiar with the Boxer Rebellion?

I was taught in high school world history class that this was an uprising against the West in China, specifically Beijing, which illegally seized power from the legitimate authorities, and was subsequently put down by Western powers with the help of Japan, to restore the proper order.  It was a turn-of-the-20th Century example of the enlightened West fighting the evil of terrorism in a nation we held dear to us because of our mutually-beneficial trade relations.

The truth is that China had been the victim of a vast opium trade, promoted by the West over several decades, which resulted in massive addiction and effectively a subjugation of China to economic manipulation and control by the West.  The Boxer Rebellion was an attempt to reclaim the country from foreign control and eliminate the scourge of opium addiction and the resulting disintegration of Chinese society. 

 

Xi Jinping, the current president of the People's Republic of China, as many other embittered Chinese scholars likewise do, refers to this era of addiction and enslavement as the Century of Humiliation.  He has vowed to never allow China to be subjected to such disrespect again.  It's what drives his foreign policy and what our historically-ignorant politicos view as his "confrontational" policies and recalcitrance with the U.S.  You see, Xi Jinping is acutely aware of America's use of drug trade and drug addiction to control and enslave whole nations.

Are you?


[ This originated at the author's personal website . . . http://jdrachel.com ]



There were over 28,000 Prince deaths last year.

Peace is as American as . . . ?

Has America ever really had a peace movement?

Yes, there was an anti-war movement in the late 60s, early 70s.

But it was an anti-war movement . . . specific to one particular war.

The Vietnam War.

Why?

Because young people -- I was the perfect age and in the thick of it -- didn't want to get blown away in some rice paddy in some country in Asia they could barely find on a map.

It's was survival.  Demonstrate.  Burn your draft cards.

Stay alive!

To be in principle for peace means you are values-driven.

But Americans for the most part are results-driven.

Get the job done.  Get the job done right.  Have a beer.

Which troublingly is a short leap to "the ends justify the means".

To see how that works out, just ask the civilian survivors of Dresden, Hiroshima, Nagasaki.

Ask the citizens of Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya, Haiti, Honduras, Nicaragua, Kosovo, Yemen.

Get the job done.  Get it done right.  Watch the Super Bowl.

Peace is a warm and fuzzy idea. It's something you can wriggle right up to, get all friendly, pinch its cute little cheeks, coddle it like a newborn, smile for the camera.

Yes, peace is really awesome!

As long as you don't have to be peaceful.

Therein lies the conundrum.

America likes to kick ass!  It's our way or the highway.

It's our way or you better head for a bomb shelter, mofo!

America is tough.  You know where America stands.

America wears its temperament on its sleeve.

It open-carries its guns . . . fair warning.

Don't even think about it!

Fuck with me and you're dead meat!

Doesn't exactly sound like fertile ground for a peace movement, eh?



However, peace signs are great!

Simple and attractive.

Make a great tattoo.  Charm bracelet.  Bumper sticker.

They're compact, symmetrical.

Fit nicely anywhere.

FUCK YEAH!  PEACE, BROTHER!


[ This originated at the author's personal website . . . http://jdrachel.com ]



Peace is as American as . . . ?

More Bases More Bombs More War

 

They say things have to get worse before they get better.

But how much worse can the U.S. and the world tolerate?

Driven purely by institutional self-preservation and relentless pursuit of profits by the military-industrial-complex, the cancer of American military presence continues to metastasize unchecked across the planet.  Not satisfied with creating tens of thousands of new terrorists since 9/11 with aggressive wars, invasions, special ops initiatives, drone bombing, assassinations -- all claiming the lives of over a million innocent civilians -- budgetary allocations are in place and plans being implemented for even more bases in Asia, Africa, Europe, even the Arctic.

Is it any surprise that when America sets up a new military hub in a foreign country, conflict and war soon follow?

It's a closed feedback loop where a cure sets up the conditions for the disease it's supposed to treat.  If an area is relatively at peace, the putative guarantees of continuing tranquility offered by a military presence will produce opposition and rivalry which inevitably will metastasize into conflict and war.

On that note, there certainly is no mystery why terrorism is on the rise, especially in Middle Eastern countries.

Osama bin Laden stated it clearly.  To paraphrase: "We don't want you here."

Not only is sovereignty at issue in these native lands, but often they host sites which are considered sacred in both social and political traditions which stretch back centuries. The very presence of U.S. soldiers, war planes, drones, or any of the other paraphernalia of empire is insult enough. But the slaughter of innocent individuals, too often women and children, can only evoke cries of outrage and demands for revenge.  Is it asking too much to imagine how U.S. citizens would react if a wedding party was blown to bits in Topeka, Kansas or Knoxville, Tennessee?

This must end. The unnecessary expansion of U.S. military presence throughout the world is bankrupting our economy, incriminating each and every American citizen in horrifying war crimes, risking World War III, and ultimately will collapse the nation and take down the great American experiment.

It's up to us to stop this before it's too late!



[ This originated at the author's personal website . . . http://jdrachel.com ]


More Bases More Bombs More War

Oratory as a Weapon of Mass Deception

 

I used to say President Obama is a great orator.

In retrospect, particularly in view of his speeches over the past two years, I would have to modify my appraisal: Mr. Obama is a mind-numbingly effective orator -- with major emphasis on 'mind-numbing' -- whose powers of persuasion are both awe-inspiring and reality-altering.

But great? I think not.

You see, great orators don't insult their audiences by lying and using their enormous gifts to wreak havoc on the world, demean other world leaders, and generally inflict listeners with self-serving propaganda.

Great orators ennoble, enlighten, inspire!

There is so much deception, obfuscation, manipulative innuendo, faulty logic, sheer raw hypocrisy in his recent U.N. speech, I could write volumes. But it's not worth your time or mine, since so many of the lies upon which he built this petty and self-aggrandizing show have been repeated with such relentless regularity, they are part of the accepted collective wisdom of both the American public and the government propaganda apparatus, aka the main stream media.

I'll just throw out a few comments.

"But we cannot stand by when the sovereignty and territorial integrity of a nation is flagrantly violated. If that happens without consequence in Ukraine, it could happen to any nation gathered here today."

Like Yemen being bombed by the U.S.-supported tyrannical government of Saudi Arabia? Like Iraq? Or Libya? Or Afghanistan? Or any of the 30+ countries the U.S. has attacked or effected regime change by proxy?

Here's a real gem.

"It is not a conspiracy of U.S.-backed NGOs that expose corruption and raise the expectations of people around the globe; it’s technology, social media, and the irreducible desire of people everywhere to make their own choices about how they are governed."

Oh really? One of America's favorite 'NGOs' is the National Endowment for Democracy. First of all even calling it an NGO is a laugh. Everyone knows -- at least in the crowd I run with -- that the NED was created by the CIA and is funded by Congress. For some reason, whenever it shows up on the scene, countries become immersed in chaos and insurrection, with regime change soon to follow. The most recent victim of its handiwork is Ukraine, where it fomented the overthrow of the legitimate democratically-elected government, then installed a chocolate puppet doll to do the bidding of the U.S.

Here the President deftly conflated bragging and threats, as in, "See how we've messed up things for you, Russia? If you don't tow the line, you ain't seen nothing yet, baby!"

"Sanctions have led to capital flight, a contracting economy, a fallen ruble, and the emigration of more educated Russians."

Then, just when I though it was safe to stop gagging and listen further, I picked up on this.

"When a dictator slaughters tens of thousands of his own people, that is not just a matter of one nation’s internal affairs — it breeds human suffering on an order of magnitude that affects us all."

Which is why we supplied chemical weapons to Iraq dictator Saddam Hussein in order to get the job done right back when he was one of our buddies? Which is why we overthrew the democratically-elected leader of Chile and replaced him with a brutal autocrat who then proceeded to kill tens of thousands of his people? Of course, I could go on with many more examples. But it's tedious and pointless, as hypocrisy is apparently now considered one of the great virtues in the Empire of Chaos.

"Assad reacted to peaceful protests by escalating repression and killing that, in turn, created the environment for the current strife."

Really? Is that the whole story? Or just the one the U.S. creates for its fairy tale version of every uprising it seeds and supports to overthrow governments it doesn't like?

Oh yes . . . about those crazy Muslims running around beheading people, driving tens of thousands to flee their native lands and seek refuge in Europe:

"We know that ISIL — which emerged out of the chaos of Iraq and Syria — depends on perpetual war to survive."

Like the U.S. military-industrial complex? Or the U.S. itself which can't stop bombing countries into complying with its dictates?



Credit where credit is due, however:  Our president did stumble into the truth a few times. Thus, here is absolutely my favorite quote from his speech . . .

"On this basis, we see some major powers assert themselves in ways that contravene international law. We see an erosion of the democratic principles and human rights that are fundamental to this institution’s mission; information is strictly controlled, the space for civil society restricted. We’re told that such retrenchment is required to beat back disorder; that it’s the only way to stamp out terrorism, or prevent foreign meddling."

. . . because it perfectly describes the United States of America, in particular the policies aggressively promoted by Mr. Obama himself.

---

Watch President Obama's entire speech and judge for yourself whether this man is ever capable of doing anything but creating a smokescreen for America's malfeasance in the world, its monomaniacal fixation with its power, its self-proclaimed right to lecture and dictate to others how the world should be run.

[ This originated at the author's personal web site . . . http://jdrachel.com ]

The Race To A Vanishing Point

 

The writing is on the wall. BIG writing! 

The U.S. has again unleashed forces it cannot control, to obtain some perceived geopolitical advantage, and give itself some edge in the grand game of chess, played on an immense, impersonal macro-cosmic scale __ which ignores individual tragedy, human suffering, destruction of peoples and cultures, wholesale slaughter of innocent civilians __ gradually edging the world toward the ultimate confrontation, the really big one, where we get to see what comes out of the other end of a nuclear confrontation.

We obviously learned nothing from our original meddling in Afghanistan, which produced Osama bin Laden and al Qaeda; our meddling in Iran, which produced the current regime we are still trying to dominate; our meddling and war with Iraq, which now has resulted in ISIS; our meddling and destruction of Libya, which now has the country in shambles and has helped spread chaos and carnage across the Middle East and northern Africa.

We just had to meddle even more, and create the current crisis in Ukraine by toppling the democratically-elected government there, then installing a fierce, racist, ultra-nationalistic "pro-Western" puppet regime which will ultimately put us eyeball-to-eyeball with Russia, a world power armed to the teeth with nuclear missiles.

David Swanson points out in an excellent article that prior to the both World War I and World War II, the public remained clueless as to the onset of war. This despite the fact that all the alarms, signals and flags were in plain sight, huge glaring signs that war was where things were inevitably heading. 

This despite concerned men and women, keen observers, highly visible pundits and scholars __ though admittedly they were in the minority and fatefully shouted down by the usual crowd of bombastic exceptionalists and grinning fools __ issuing grave and sober warnings, dire and thoughtful forecasts, based on sound and knowledgeable analysis, that the world was marching toward a disaster.

Similarly, the evidence is right before us, big pieces of a straightforward puzzle, which even the most simple-minded dolt could assemble into the frightening picture it is.

The insensitive, reckless, aggressive policies of the U.S. are precipitating World War III.

History has dramatically demonstrated that in the heat of major conflict, cooler heads never prevail. This coming war could and probably will go nuclear.

There is, of course, every reason to be concerned about putting food on the table, seeing our kids off to school, showing up for work, keeping the house and yard looking nice, making our homes comfortable for those we love.

But there's even more reason for preserving a world where there are things like food, tables, kids, schools, places to work, houses, yards, homes . . . those we love.

Am I just being a pessimist? An alarmist? A paranoid?

That's what they said about those folks who back before 1914 who were trying to get people to pay attention __ over 17,000,000 people then died in the conflagration of World War I.

That's what they said about many alarmed but certainly better informed folks in the 1920s and 1930s, who said that the Treaty of Versailles was a prescription for major disaster and could only end in a catastrophic conflict. 72,000,000 dead bodies from the greatest war in human history __ so far __ proved them right.

History repeats itself again and again . . . until it doesn't.

Until there is no more history.

Until it's all gone, and there is no longer anyone left to be annoyed by pleas for sanity and prayers for peace.

Then the planet will be governed by a vast, all-embracing quiet, when only the scurrying of cockroaches across a dusty, barren landscape offers evidence of life on Earth.



[ This originated at the author's personal web site . . . http://jdrachel.com ]

Bulging Waste Line

 

I am not anti-government.

What follows is not an argument for reducing government.

It is evidence that we need . . .

Good government.

Smart government.

Honest government.

Visionary government.

Representative government.

The following is hardly an exhaustive list. But let me just offer some examples and some numbers on vast, incomprehensible, mind-numbing, breathtaking, destructive, possibly suicidal waste by government misadventures and boondoggles over the past few decades.

I am focusing on defense squandering and pursuit of unnecessary war.

The F-35 Joint Strike Fighter, pictured at the top of this article, has been judged by many knowledgeable military analysts as the largest boondoggle in the history of the world. It is plagued with design flaws and technical problems. So far it has cost nearly $400 billion and total outlays to bring it into full production and implementation are projected to exceed $1.5 trillion.

The Department of Defense spent $40 billion between 2001 and 2014 on a missile defense program called Ground-Based Midcourse Defense System. It has been a complete flop. 

Another missile defense fiasco called X-Band Radar, a floating sea-based system, wasted $10 billion of taxpayer money. This was a project of the Missile Defense Agency, which still gets funded $8-10 billion annually, despite producing practically nothing of value.

At the end of 2014, Congress allocated funds for programs the Pentagon didn't even want:

• $1.46 billion for fifteen EA-18G Growler electronic warfare planes
• $1 billion to begin work on an additional San Antonio-class amphibious transport dock ship
• $479 million for four additional F-35 fighter jets (bringing the total number funded to 38)
• $341 million to modernize twelve Apache helicopters and nine Black Hawk helicopters
• $200 million for an additional Joint High Speed Vessel ship
• $155 million for twelve additional MQ-9 Reaper drones
• $154 million for an additional P-8A Poseidon Navy surveillance aircraft
• $120 million for M1 Abrams tank upgrades
• $150 million for medium and heavy tactical vehicles

Let's up the ante a bit. Look at this chart.


The U.S. has spent $1.5 trillion so far fighting in Afghanistan and Iraq. Mind you, both of these wars were completely unnecessary. There were no weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. And the Taliban offered to turn over to us Osama bin Laden, who was on a dialysis machine in Kandahar, if we didn't bomb them. So we bombed them!

Analysts are predicting that when all of the ancillary expenses are added in, including the interest on the money we borrowed to fight these two bogus wars, the combined total cost will be $4-6 trillion.

Now to add insult to injury, I'll take this a step further.

With the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1992, Americans were promised a peace dividend. With the Cold War competition over, we could now reduce the defense budget and devote more of our tax dollars to those domestic items which would make life for everyone in the country better __ schools and libraries, parks, community and infrastructure investment, better education, recreational facilities, maybe child care services, improved health care.

The peace dividend never happened. For 16 of the 24 subsequent years, military spending increased. In fact over two-and-a-half decades, the U.S. spent over $2.5 trillion beyond the level of military spending in 1992.

$2.5 trillion!

Instead of us getting a peace dividend, defense allocations went up __ way up __ adding enormously to the national debt and cutting short all of those wonderful things that were supposed to happen since we were entering a new, more peaceful phase of our history.

Interestingly, the more we spent on military, the more conflict and war there was.

You have to wonder if this was a mere coincidence.

Now with the military budget more than twice what it was in 2000 __ and this is just the official military budget which doesn't include a mind-boggling assortment of black budget allocations and defense spending tucked away in other departments __ we live in a more dangerous world than ever, with whole countries destroyed, jihadists, like ISIS, the Nusra Front, al Qaeda rampaging from one end of the world to the other, and a whole multitude of crises brewing in Yemen, Syria, Iraq, Ukraine, Africa, and the South China Sea.

Not surprisingly, the U.S. is being called the Empire of Chaos in some parts of the world. Recently, in an international survey by WIN and Gallup, America easily won the #1 spot as “the greatest threat to peace” on the planet.  China and Pakistan were a distant second and third.  Yaaay!  Go America!

We are without any doubt militarily the most powerful nation on Earth, arguably the most powerful nation in history.

We already spend almost as much on defense as the rest of the world combined!

With all of this military might, we have lost every single conflict __ except one which could have been won by a high school soccer team __ since World War II.

The obvious question is . . .

What drives this extraordinary squandering of taxpayer dollars?

Actually . . . that's easy.

The defense industry in its relentless pursuit of profits building a lot of junk that doesn't work; the misguided neocon agenda of Congress and the White House commending the purchase of a lot of weapons we don't need; the hunger to be the preeminent power in the world; the paranoid preoccupation of the security agencies with the potential for terrorist attacks from both within and from outside our borders; our bombing-is-the-only-solution foreign policy which creates far more enemies than it destroys; our sociopathic infatuation with American exceptionalism which creates resentment internationally and makes us the easy-choice target for aggression; the dubious distinction of being the biggest exporter on the planet of weapons and military hardware, which may bring in a lot of profits for the military-industrial complex, but perpetuates chaos and carnage, endless threats and conflict . . . all combine to destroy any sense of proportion, perspective, and fiscal responsibility.

The verdict . . .

America's obsession with the military is bankrupting us.

It will probably destroy us.


[ This originated at the author's personal web site . . . http://jdrachel.com ]


Bulging Waste Line

Obama’s Neocons and Other Hawkish Lunatics

 

People often don't see the obvious.

I constantly get criticized for maintaining that Obama is a warmonger. The
president's actions are proof positive:  His escalating of the war in
Afghanistan, his engineering the destruction of Libya, his manufacturing
the crisis in Ukraine, his demonizing Putin and resurrecting the Cold War 
with Russia, his infamous kill lists and callous use of drones in countries 
like Pakistan and Yemen.

Most recently, there was his request for unlimited war powers,
a new AUMF, a shrewdly and deceptively worded legislative authorization
which allows him to attack any country, anywhere on the earth,
targeting individuals, groups and nations which he alone decides are
deserving of some tough love __ aka annihilation by military force.

If this weren't incriminating enough, just look at the people he is surrounded by.

First, the hard-core psychopaths . . .



Ashton Carter is Obama's new Secretary of Defense. He wants confrontation with Russia; advocates a "preventive war" on North Korea, i.e. blow them to kingdom come now rather than later; and thinks we need to mount an aggressive campaign to fight ISIS. I guess he finds it easy to overlook the fact that our other aggressive campaigns created ISIS, that they are using the armaments we introduced into the region for their aggressive campaign, that every aggressive campaign we have mounted in the Middle East has recruited more fanatics and terrorists,
a fact which has been verified by our own security agencies. Carter is
an unapologetic proponent of projecting America's military across the
globe, without respect for the national interests of any other sovereign
powers and without patience for the niceties of diplomacy.

 

James Clapper is Director of National Intelligence, and is by any measure
Spy-Master-In-Chief.  He recently distinguished himself by 
lying under oath to the U.S. Congress,
evidence that he believes that as head of a major law enforcement
agency, he himself is above the law. Like other neocon exceptionalists,
he believes the U.S. itself is above the law, thus entitled to
ignore treaties, international legal precedents, and anything America
finds bothersome. He recently threw his flaming hat into the ring of
international politics by advocating sending lethal weapons to Ukraine,
violating the terms of the Minsk II agreement which is offering some
hope for the end of the bloody conflict, and more destructively,
antagonizing Russia, which has over the past year worked relentlessly to
broker peace there. But why would Clapper want peace? That might end up
reducing his bloated share of the federal budget.

 

Victoria Nuland is Assistant Secretary of State for European and Eurasian Affairs and married to Robert Kagan, one of the founders of the neocon Project for the New American Century.
She was instrumental in turning the Maidan demonstrations into a full-blown coup, an illegal, violent overthrow of the admittedly corrupt but still democratically elected government. She continues to sabotage any hope for a negotiated solution to the crisis she helped to orchestrate
and create. She is virulently anti-Russian and militantly in favor of
dismembering the country to expedite the control and plundering of
Russia's abundant natural resources, as well as those of the Ukraine,
for the benefit of American-backed banks and corporations.


 

General Philip M. Breedlove, is the current Supreme Allied Commander Europe
(SACEUR) of NATO Allied Command Operations. He has had a remarkable career indeed, but his recent detachment from reality and delusions of grandeur have made him the major proponent for war on Russia in the E.U. theater of command. His constant spewing of venomous anti-Russian rhetoric and wild claims have made him both a laughingstock and a thorn in the side of the saner members of the European community, who for some reason
don't want Europe to become an incinerated pile of rubble in service to
the American dream of world hegemony. If Russian troops and equipment
had invaded Ukraine as many times as General Breedlove has claimed __
against all evidence to the contrary __ half of the Russian military
would be set up in vast emplacements visible from the moon with a cheap
pair of binoculars. But you know those cagey Russians! They made
everything invisible! They're there! Really. Just ask Breedlove.

 

U.S. Ambassador to Ukraine, Geoffrey Pyatt is a California guy with a very shallow, checkered career in the diplomatic services, which makes him the perfect tool to go about the business of spreading propaganda, sidling up to chocolate king Petro Poroshenko __ current President of Ukraine __ for photo ops and general glad-handing, and promoting the depraved neocon agenda, unburdened by a comprehension of the complexities of international
relations, indifferent to the human suffering being inflicted on
citizens in the East of the country, and cavalier about the potential
for nuclear war the machinations of the U.S. is creating. Snatching war
and death from the jaws of peace and harmony? All in a days work!


Then, there are those without official neocon credentials but who embrace undisguised bullying and unrestrained militarism.

 

Samantha Power, U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations, seemed over the course of
much of her career to have her heart in the right place. She cared so
much about victims of genocide, she even wrote a Pulitzer Prize-winning
book about it, A Problem From Hell: America and the Age of Genocide.
She has stood strong for religious freedom, human rights, women's and
LGBT rights, and campaigned against human trafficking and for protection
of refugees and religious minorities.

Unfortunately, lately she's become very confused. She wants to accomplish these noble
things by bombing everyone into submission. She was instrumental in the destruction of Libya,
and now her weepy voice can be heard spreading propaganda and
subjecting the world to her acrimonious diatribes promoting chaos and
violence at the United Nations. Power issues shrill catcalls demonizing Putin, rails against Russia, then without blinking prevaricates about the actual role the U.S. has played in the Ukraine. What happens to these people? Is there some mutant strain of warmongering meningitis going around?

Vice-President Joe Biden and Secretary of State John Kerry put a unique spin on an old
tactic. Instead of doing the familiar GOOD COP/BAD COP routine, these
veteran clowns do BAD COP/WORSE COP __ each of them vying to be more
obnoxious, deceptive, and counter-productive than the other.

 

Joe Biden has always been a straight-talker, unafraid to lay it on the
line, paint stark images in bold strokes. He shoots from the hip and
often ends up with his foot in his mouth. The problem now is not his
candor. It's his rancor. That and his willingness to ignore facts and be a complete stooge for policies which at best are misguided, or at worst will plunge America and Europe into another major war. He and Kerry have already alienated Russia, undone years of diplomacy, unraveled the trust that had slowly built over decades, and launched Cold War 2.0, a frightening confrontation which has the potential to bankrupt the country, if not trigger the nuclear holocaust of World War III.
Joe just can't shut the fuck up. Maybe the gaffs were funny before, but
it's hard to get a giggle going when we're facing human extinction.


 

Unlike Biden who is a full-out puncher, the more guileful John Kerry is a master of the feint and duck. He'll often use the Rope-A-Dope to keep everyone off-balance, as if
this vindicates the havoc he will in the end remorselessly inflict. His pronouncements combined with Obama's has turned a peaceful and generally promising detente with Russia into a hostile and dangerous game of chicken. Along the way, Kerry has managed to alienate many of America's most trusted allies, and create panic and hysteria among many former nations of the Soviet
bloc. When not hiding behind his adorable impersonation of Pepe Le Pew,
he's threatening, intimidating, bullying, and overall a bombastic
buffoon.

If these lunatics are allowed to continue, they will not rest until they destroy the world.

These folks are so blind, so arrogant, so incapable of perspective and moral sensibility, so drunk on power and possessed by delusions of imperial grandeur and world conquest,
so out of touch and incapable of common sense and common decency, so
lacking empathy and basic kindness, they are happy risking nuclear
annihilation to see their misguided priorities and psychopathic visions
prevail.

Obama's foreign policy is a box of chocolates. Except you always
know what you're going to get __ more war, more bombing, more drone
assassinations, more innocent civilian deaths, more illegal regime
change, more chaos and destruction.

Then again, what else can we expect? It's the company he keeps. Obama is surrounded by bloodthirsty, arguably mad, imperialist warmongers, megalomaniacs who see themselves as saviors of the Universe, chosen by
destiny and blessed with infallibility. Were any of them to undergo
sound and objective psychological testing, they would immediately be
committed to maximum-security institutions for the criminally insane.

However, America treats them differently.

It elevates them to the highest positions of power.


[ This originated at the author's personal web site . . . http://jdrachel.com ]