Col Wilkerson

When I piss and moan about 'honor', this is part of what I have in mind.

Larry Wilkerson is no hero owing to the simple fact that he didn't say any of this when he was in a position to make it stick, and to make a difference by coming out with it. It's possible that he was just too close to the problem at the time; or that he was living the nightmare scenario for any military pro, where you start to get the feeling that the people in charge are leading you off the cliff, but your training and experience are telling you just to keep your head down and do the work. "Theirs not to reason why" and all that shit.

In the end, though, every soldier has to make a judgement call as to whether or not his orders are inside the legal and ethical boundaries. You don't ever stop being responsible for your own actions.



Watch the whole series here.

The Maverick Abides

This does not absolve John McCain for having become such a complete dick over the last dozen years or so, but I still hafta throw him a bone for trying to get back to his old self.

“The trail to bin Laden did not begin with a disclosure from Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, who was waterboarded 183 times. The first mention of Abu Ahmed al-Kuwaiti—the nickname of the al-Qaida courier who ultimately led us to bin Laden—as well as a description of him as an important member of al-Qaida, came from a detainee held in another country, who we believe was not tortured. None of the three detainees who were waterboarded provided Abu Ahmed’s real name, his whereabouts or an accurate description of his role in al-Qaida. In fact, the use of ‘enhanced interrogation techniques’ on Khalid Sheikh Mohammed produced false and misleading information.”

Here's a decent piece by Joe Conason at Truthdig

Yeah, Um, About That Torture Thing

Osha Gray Davidson at Forbes:

“Listen,” he said, “waterboarding and/or other coercive techniques did nothing to contribute to our attempts to track down UBL (Usama bin Laden). What did succeed was weeks, months and years of diligent, laborious, and dedicated work – all within the bounds of legal and ethical boundaries….No torture, no waterboarding, no coercion – nothing inhumane – is considered a useful tool in our work.”

Straight up - Dick Cheney is a criminal.  I can be pretty forgiving of people in positions of power who fuck up if I think they made wrong decisions in good faith.  I can even be persuaded to ease up on a guy if he comes back to say he fucked up and if he had a chance to do it over, he'd do it differently.  None of that applies to Dick Cheney.  The guy is bloated with rot. 

A Few Fun Pics

 

Just A Single Nod

One small detail of OBL's demise that's drifted thru the noise over the last coupla days is that  JSOC (Joint Special Ops Command - the outfit that pulled off the raid in Abbottabad) was Stanley McCrystal's baby.  Also, McCrystal was a major player in making the deal with Pakistan that included the "Hot Pursuit Clause" that made it all legal to invade Pakistan in our attempt to hammer OBL.

People under McCrystal's command were openly hostile to their CinC and others in Obama's admin (as reported via Rolling Stone Magazine earlier this year).  That's called insubordination, and it just can't be tolerated.  Our system requires keeping the military subordinate to civilian authority because we know it can be extremely dangerous to allow even the best general officers to build any public constituency that runs counter to that civilian authority while still in uniform.   So I won't cry for poor ol' Stanley because I think firing him was exactly the right thing to do, but I think we can acknowledge the guy for having made an important contribution.  Way to go, Stan.  Thanks - and enjoy your retirement.

One Good Line

It turns out that sending all that Foreign Aid to Pakistan over the years was just feeding the hand that bites you.

Ding Dong The Bastard's Dead

Osama bin Laden is dead.  There's a certain feeling of satisfaction for me, but I'm finding it hard to get into any kind of party mood.  First because I think it's more than just a little ghoulish and primitive to celebrate anybody's death, even when it's somebody who is so obviously and irredeemably a nihilistic asshole like OBL was.  But mainly it's because of the price the whole world has had to pay just to kill this one guy.  And it's because this isn't the end of anything; it's not the beginning of the end; it's not the end of the beginning; it's not any other clever little bumper sticker sentiment the pundits and PR spinners will come up with over the next several news cycles.  (Tho' I admit it'll be fun to see what we decide will be the winning slogan)

Here's one:
"My government spent a trillion dollars, 20 billion rounds of ammo and 6,000 American lives to kill Osama bin Laden, and all I got was this lousy t-shirt."

Follow The Money

It never fails.  I don't know why we have to re-learn this particular lesson every fuckin' time.

Here's the short version:  There are hucksters here.

Whenever you start throwing large piles of dollars around, you can expect large numbers of people to show up who have recently (and suddenly) discovered they have a great passion for doing whatever it is you're spending all that cash trying to do.

Sometimes, those hucksters are perfectly well-meaning solid citizens who just kinda get caught up in the frenzy, but in the end, it's always mostly the same old story of greed, ambition and groupthink.

Conor Friedersdorf at The Atlantic:

Earlier this year, a reporter at a small community newspaper got the answer to a question she'd been asking for months: "Are there really 33 terrorist organizations in St. Paul, Minnesota?" That's what her county sheriff claimed in the budget reports he submitted to his superiors. According to her investigation, however, his anti-terrorism unit had been squandering taxpayer money for months on end, and getting away with it by pretending to be guardians of homeland security.

Is this man villainized in the press for his behavior? The subject of a federal inquiry by hard charging investigators? Nope. In the War on Terrorism, wasting funds in the name of security is so commonplace that the allegation isn't even surprising.

The World Is A Battlefield

Wondering why Obama isn't following thru on what we all took as a pledge to change how we approach the "War On Terrorism"?  Simple answer = he can't.

It's possible that a lot of the turmoil and upheaval in Western Asia grew out of The Bush Doctrine (tho' it's more probable it was happening by itself anyway), but the main thing is that something very big and very dangerous is in motion, and is gathering a heavy inertia.

All Obama can do now is try to guide the thing on its path; to minimize the damage, and to position us to take advantage of whatever tiny crumbs of benefit might fall out of it along the way.

So here's the thing:  The massive cluster fuck we call The Arab World gets bigger and more complicated every day.

Jeremy Cahill on Democracy Now.
BTW: you know Cahill is probably onto something because our Corporate Government insists on ignoring what he reports.

Security Theater

 WIth all the negative sentiment toward The Gummint that's been building up over the last 30 years, it's a little surprising we haven't seen more home-grown attacks like the bombing in Oklahoma City, especially considering the relentless rhetorical assault on W, and now Obama.

So I wonder about the intended affects of all this Security Theater.  The apparent aim is to prevent attacks from the outside, but since government almost never tells us the real reasons for what they do, is it not possible that a big part of what DHS is doing is aimed at keeping US citizens quiet as well?

When will we see the first strike against Wall St?  or Bank of America?  or whatever?

Will most of us condemn the attackers as domestic terrorists?  Or will we see the rise of the new American anti-hero? - the kind of people who were robbing banks in the 1930s' who were hunted down (and mostly shot down like dogs) by the Feds; but were lionized by a big bunch of people who saw the actions of the outlaws more in terms of simple payback against a system that had become corrupt and oppressive.

How bad do things hafta get before Blowin' Shit Up becomes a reasonable response?

Take a look at this by Bruce Schneier.

Security Theater

This week's episode: "The Portland Bomber"

From OregonLive.com:

The FBI thwarted an attempted terrorist bombing in Portland's Pioneer Courthouse Square before the city's annual tree-lighting Friday night, according to the U.S. Attorney's Office in Oregon. 

A Corvallis man, thinking he was going to ignite a bomb, drove a van to the corner of the square at Southwest Yamhill Street and Sixth Avenue and attempted to detonate it. 

However, the supposed explosive was a dummy that FBI operatives supplied to him, according to an affidavit in support of a criminal complaintsigned Friday night by U.S. Magistrate Judge John V. Acosta.

The FBI got a tip from the accused bomber's parents.  They set up a sting, telling the kid to buy all the materials, mail everything to them, and they'd build the thing for him.

Here's the take over at The Agonist.

Keep an eye on this one.

Security Theater

Here's the solution to the security hassle at airports.

We just need a booth that you can step into that will not x-ray you, but will apply a new kind of energy emission that does two things: 1) it detects the tiniest amounts of residue from explosives, and 2) detonates any explosive material you have on your person at the time.

This is a win-win, and there'd be none of this crap about racial profiling; plus it eliminates the need for long expensive legal proceedings.  Justice would be quick and sure.

Just imagine - you're in line waiting for the scan; you hear the muffled sound of an explosion, followed by two messages on the PA system.
"Wet clean up on concourse B"
-and-
"Attention standby passengers:  We now have a seat available on flight 63 to Boston..."

(hat tip to Doug Z)

Security Theater

I really hope this continues to get even more interesting. I want very much for this to be "the tipping point", but I'm afraid we'll bitch about it (while it's hip and popular to bitch about it) for the standard four or five days, and then just learn to live with it. And it'll pass into being just one more thing the historians will include in the many reasons the USA finally broke down and took its place among all the other failed empires.

Just Wondering

So Obama cans McChrystal, and of course, we need a quick refresher on what our Afghanistan strategy actually is.  And that goes kinda like this: we have to fight off the Taliban while training up the Afghan Security Forces, and we have to try to root out the corruption in Karzai's government; because the Afghan people can only be expected to fight for themselves if they have faith in their government.

Really?

Why does it seem that all the "conservatives" here in the US are going along with this?  What am I missing here?  Why do we have to have Free Market Solutions for everything here, but we have to have Government Solutions in other places?

Could it be that we just call it 'the government' in other places because it provides some convenient cover for the fact that several Mega-Corp companies are actually calling the shots?

And why aren't the know-nothing rubes outraged by all this very expensive nation building stuff?  Couldn't we solve the whole problem over there just by building a couple of Wal-Marts or somethin'?

The Mosque At Ground Zero

There's a meltdown occurring because the community board in lower Manhattan has approved plans to build a good-sized Mosque/Muslim Community Ctr a couple of blocks away from the WTC site.

The Brain Free Zone (aka Fox News and other Wingnut Media) is going ape shit, yelling about "those insensitive bastards...; it's a slap in the face...; blah blah blah.

I only know two things about any of this:
Fear is the opposite of love, and forgiveness is the opposite of hate.

BTW: the proposed mosque is to replace one that's already within spittin' distance anyway.  If you're opposed to any mosque "on hallowed ground", then you need to have been a little more aware of what's been goin' on all along.

This non-troversy is typical reactionary bullshit and I'm callin' it for what it is.

Fallout

We haven't heard much about it lately, but apparently there's still some effort to get back at the US for our high-handed approach to "fighting terrorism" during the Bush administration.

From Harper's Mag online.

I use the term "get back at" because I think these attempts are more about grandstanding for public consumption than they're about justice and substance.  That said tho', the Spanish seem to have a real bug up their butts about it.  And it wouldn't exactly hurt my feelings if somebody from Bush's team took a fall.

I think it's more than a little interesting that not one of the former Bush officials has ever gone out of the country to do any kind of victory lap anywhere but Saudi Arabia.

Make Up Your Mind

Break Free

The more we spend on oil, the more money the bad guys get to spend on attacking us.

If you oppose efforts to move away from fossil fuels (ie: clean energy legislation, carbon tax/cap-and-trade, etc), then you're supporting a status quo that makes it more probable that we will be attacked.

If we take more steps that dry up some more of their sources of funding (like NOT sending so much money to the Saudis), then assholes like al-Qaeda get fewer dollars they can use to buy things to blow shit up. Get it?

When In Doubt...

...just make some shit up.
Military Tribunals (and access to them in some circumstances) have existed in the US for a couple of centuries. And what makes Crowley think BushCo would've hesitated to send Reid to Gitmo if they tho't it would help them get a conviction?

Or you can smear by innuendo "is Abdulmuhtallab cooperating because he got a plea bargain?"

These people have no soul and no honor.

Holy Warriors, Batman!

Washington's Blog


TUESDAY, JANUARY 19, 2010
U.S. Military Officially Endorses Crusade

I've written numerous posts showing that the war on terror is really a religious crusade, at least for troops on the ground (I've pointed out that the officials ordering the troops into battle may not be religious at all, but may be faking religious sentiment to rally the troops).

Now, an official Pentagon spokesman is making it clear that the U.S. military endorses the crusade. As Raw Story notes:

A Pentagon spokesman says there is nothing wrong or illegal with the armed forces using rifle sights inscribed with references to biblical passages.

Air Force Maj. John Redfield, a spokesman for US Central Command, said the sights from Michigan-based Trijicon -- which are now the target of controversy following news reports earlier this week -- "don't violate the [military] ban on proselytizing because there's no effort to distribute the equipment beyond the US troops who use them," the Associated Press reports.

"This situation is not unlike the situation with US currency," Maj. Redfield said. "Are we going to stop using money because the bills have 'In God We Trust' on them? As long as the sights meet the combat needs of troops, they'll continue to be used."

Meanwhile, a lawyer and former training officer for the US Army Reserves says that any attempt by the US government to cancel its contracts with an arms supplier that enscribes biblical references on its rifle sights would be "discrimination."

Play any word games you like ... the truth is that the military has just officiallyacknowledged that it endorses a crusade.

Nice work creating new terrorists, you morons.