In Memoriam, 9/11

To the estimated 4,347 American soldiers who died in the war we were all lied into (see Casualties in Iraq),

Links:  The Bush White House Was Deaf to 9/11 Warnings

Bush Received More Warnings About 9/11 Than We Realized

Bush Warned of Hijackings Before 9-11

On the Charleston Shooting (guest post)

This was put out quickly today on and by Esquire magazine. I thought it too important to not post.

Charleston Shooting: Speaking the Unspeakable, Thinking the Unthinkable

In which we confront the dark heart of America. Again.

by Charles P. Pierce

What happened in a church in Charleston, South Carolina on Wednesday night is a lot of things, but one thing it's not is "unthinkable." Somebody thought long and hard about it. Somebody thought to load the weapon. Somebody thought to pick the church. Somebody thought to sit, quietly, through some of Wednesday night bible study. Somebody thought to stand up and open fire, killing nine people, including the pastor. Somebody reportedly thought to leave one woman alive so she could tell his story to the world. Somebody thought enough to flee. What happened in that church was a lot of things, but unthinkable is not one of them.

What happened in a Charleston church on Wednesday night is a lot of things, but one thing it's not is "unspeakable." We should speak of it often. We should speak of it loudly. We should speak of it as terrorism, which is what it was. We should speak of it as racial violence, which is what it was.

We should speak of it as an attack on history, which it was. This was the church founded by Denmark Vesey, who planned a slave revolt in 1822. Vesey was convicted in a secret trial in which many of the witnesses testified after being tortured. After they hung him, a mob burned down the church he built. His sons rebuilt it. On Wednesday night, someone turned it into a slaughter pen.

We should speak of it as an assault on the idea of a political commonwealth, which is what it was. And we should speak of it as one more example of all of these, another link in a bloody chain of events that reaches all the way back to African wharves and Southern docks. It is not an isolated incident, not if you consider history as something alive that can live and breathe and bleed. We should speak of all these things. What happened in that church was a lot of things, but unspeakable is not one of them.

Not to think about these things is to betray the dead. Not to speak of these things is to dishonor them. Let Nikki Haley, the governor of South Carolina, look out her window at the flag of treason that is flown proudly at her state capitol and think about these things, and speak of them, before she pronounces herself so puzzled at how something like this could happen in South Carolina, the home office of American sedition.

Let Hillary Rodham Clinton and Jeb Bush, both of whom want to lead this troubled country, consider what it meant to absent themselves from campaign events in Charleston and think of these things and speak of them before they turn to their consultants about whether or not staying in a grieving city was what a leader should have done.

Let the elite political media that follows the two of them, roughly thrown into a maelstrom of actual news, look out onto the streets of Charleston and realize that politics exist for the purpose of governing a country, and not simply to entertain it.

Let Squint and the Meat Puppet think about these things and speak of these things before inviting Donald Trump, who is a clown and a fool, to come on national television and talk about his hair. Not to think about these things is to betray the dead. Not to speak of these things is to dishonor them.

Think about what happened. Think about why it happened. Talk about what happened. Talk about why it happened. Do these things, over and over again. The country must resist the temptation present in anesthetic innocence. It must reject the false comfort of learned disbelief and the narcotic embrace of concocted surprise. There is a ferocious underground fire running through American history. It rages unseen until it flares again from the warm earth. It has raged from the death of Denmark Vesey in 1822 to the death of the Reverend and state senator Clementa Pinckney on Wednesday night.

This was not an unspeakable act. Sylvia Johnson, one of only three survivors of the massacre, is speaking about it.

"She said that he had reloaded five different times… and he just said 'I have to do it. You rape our women and you're taking over our country. And you have to go.'"

There is a timidity that the country can no longer afford. This was not an unthinkable act. A man may have had a rat's nest for a mind, but it was well thought out. It was a cool, considered crime, as well planned as any bank robbery or any computer fraud. If people do not want to speak of it, or think about it, it's because they do not want to follow the story where it inevitably leads. It's because they do not want to follow this crime all the way back to the mother of all American crimes, the one that Denmark Vesey gave his life to avenge. What happened on Wednesday night was a lot of things. A massacre was only one of them.

The Iraq War, By the Numbers

From the article of the same name from  the Business Insider:

BY THE NUMBERS: The Staggering Cost Of The Iraq War

The Iraq War was so messy and costly that the best attempt to assess the sheer damage is through numbers.

We drew from sources including various news reports, The Brookings Institute 's Iraq Index, and the Costs of War Project to document money and blood spent on the war. 

189,000: Direct war deaths, which doesn't include the hundreds of thousands more that died due to war-related hardships.

4,488: U.S. service personnel killed directly.

32,223: Troops injured (not including PTSD).

134,000: Civilians killed directly.

655,000: Persons who have died in Iraq since the invasion that would not have died if the invasion had not occurred.

150: Reporters killed.

2.8 million: Persons who remain either internally displaced or have fled the country.

$1.7 trillion: Amount in war expenses spent by the U.S. Treasury Department as through Fiscal Year 2013.

$5,000: Amount spent per second.

$350,000: Cost to deploy one American military member.

$490 billion: Amount in war benefits owed to war veterans.

$7 trillion: Projected interest payments due by 2053 (because the war was paid for with borrowed money).

$20 billion: Amount paid to KBR, contractor responsible for equipment and services.

$3 billion: Amount of KBR payments Pentagon auditors considered "questionable."

$60 billion: Amount paid for reconstruction, (which was ruled largely a waste due to corruption and shoddy work.)

$4 billion: Amount owed to the U.S. by Iraq before the invasion.

1.6 million: Gallons of oil used by U.S. forces each day in Iraq (at $127.68 a barrel).

$12 billion: Cost per month of the war by 2008.

$7 billion: Amount owed to Iraq by the U.S. after the war (mostly due to fraud).

$20 billion: Annual air conditioning cost.

Missing: $546 million in spare parts; 190,000 guns, including 110,000 AK-47s.

40 percent: Increase in Iraqi oil production.

$5 billion: Revenue from Iraqi oil in 2003.

$85 billion: Revenue from Iraqi oil in 2011.

$150 billion: Amount oil companies are expected to invest in oil development over the next decade.

$75 billion: Approximate amount expected to go to American subcontracting companies, largest of all Halliburton.

0: Nuclear Weapons of Mass Destruction found (though a bunch of chems were discovered).

Perhaps most importantly, this list doesn't account for the emotional damage caused to service members and their families as well as the destruction to the homes, social fabric, and psyche of the Iraqi people. 

For some visual accounts, check out Buzzfeed's Iraq war in front pages and Time's Iraq war in images.

Read more: http://www.businessinsider.com/iraq-war-facts-numbers-stats-total-2013-3#ixzz3bm3Zc9mJ

___________________________________________

So yes, next time someone says "You're still blaming George W. Bush", be sure to tell them they're right. We sure as hell are.

Best Way to Celebrate Memorial Day

On This Memorial Day

A story with links to photos from NPR:

It's Not Rude: These Portraits Of Wounded Vets Are Meant To Be Stared At

It's as George McGovern said so rightly and well, all that long ago:

“I'm fed up to the ears with old men dreaming up wars for young men to die in.” 

Important National Anniversary

I learned today, out here on the interwebs, that today is the nation's 13th anniversary of going into Afghanistan. I was reminded by some military veterans and their call:

Iraq Veterans Against the War

Today marks the 13th year since our country began the occupation of Afghanistan. It's long time for it to end yet we just signed a Bi-Lateral Security agreement that places us there for at least another decade. What do you think should be done?

To this I have three responses.

First, we absolutely should, at long last, get the hell out of Afghanistan.

Second, we need to end "perpetual war" in this country.

Finally, we have to recognize that we are, America is the world's warmonger, we have to stop it and we need to cut our absurd, huge, hugely wasteful, fiscally irresponsible, totally unsustainable, actually unaccounted for, nation-weakening defense budget.

“A nation that continues year after year to spend more money on military defense than on programs of social uplift is approaching spiritual doom.”

― Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.

To any politician or pundit on the Right calling for the US to go into Iraq again -- from an Iraq War Veteran

I’ll tell you what, let’s go back to Iraq.

Oh, yes, let us do that.

I’ll dig out my uniform and strap on my pistol and gird up my sword and ride into battle yet again.

Just so long as Donald Rumsfeld, Dick Cheney, George W. Bush, Rush Limbaugh, Anne Coulter, Glenn Beck, Michael Savage, Paul Ryan, Sarah Palin, Rick Perry, and every single one of those powdered, Botoxed talking heads at Fox News are in the vanguard. That’s right, you cowards, you put on a uniform and you lead the charge this time around. The Koch brothers and Mitt Romney can pay for it, every goddamned penny, we’ll bleed them until they’re dry and then we’ll pull the gold fillings from their teeth to pay for it right along with the rest of their Wall Street cronies. You fuckers got rich off the last one, you can damned well pay for this one. And when you run out of money, we’ll take your blood, fair’s fair.

Strap John McCain into the cockpit of an A-4 Skyhawk and let him fly air cover.

If he gets himself shot down and taken prisoner again, well, you know what? Fuck him, leave him to the enemy because frankly his hate and bile and raging insanity have done more damage to this country than Bowe Bergdahl ever did.

The terrorists can keep him.

Peace love and understanding tell me
Is there no place for them today
They say we must fight to keep our freedom
But Lord knows there’s got to be a better way

War what is it good for
Absolutely nothing…
- Edwin Starr, “War” 1969

Originally posted by Jim Wright on Stonekettle Station.

Memorial Day 2014

Happy Memorial Day, America.

You spend more on and for war than any other nation on the planet, far and away. Pretend, for a day or a long weekend you regret creating veterans. 

What kind of sick, sad, pathetic, greedy nation does that?

Answer: Us. The good, old US of A. More than any other nation, bar none. 

Happy Memorial Day you lazy pukes. 

Enjoy your picnic.

For anyone and everyone worried about America's spending

So many people espouse this idea that a) our government is far too big and that b) we spend too much and so c) need to cut spending needs to read all of the following by Senator Bernie Sanders, (Ind., VT):

For a Budget That Is Both Morally and Economically Sound

As a member of the U.S. Senate Budget Committee, I am more than aware that a $17 trillion dollar national debt and a $700 billion deficit are serious problems that must be addressed.

But I am also aware that real unemployment is close to 14 percent, that tens of millions of Americans are working for horrendously low wages, that more Americans are now living in poverty than ever before and that wealth and income inequality in the United States is now greater than in any other major country -- with the gap between the very rich and everyone else growing wider and wider.

Further, when we talk about the national budget, it is vitally important that we remember how we got into this fiscal crisis in the first place and who was responsible for it. Let us never forget that when Bill Clinton left office in January of 2001, the U.S. had a budget surplus of $236 billion with projected budget surpluses as far as the eye could see. During that time, the non-partisan Congressional Budget Office projected a 10-year budget surplus of $5.6 trillion, enough to erase the entire national debt by the end of 2011.

US Defense spending vs. the rest of the budget

What happened? How did we, in a few short years, go from a large budget surplus into horrendous debt? The answer is not that complicated. Under President Bush we went to wars in Afghanistan and Iraq -- and didn't pay for them. We just put them on the credit card. The cost of those wars is estimated to be between $4 trillion to $6 trillion. Further, Bush and Congress passed an expensive prescription drug program that was unpaid for. They also reduced revenue by giving huge tax breaks to the wealthy and large corporations. On top of all that, the Wall Street collapse and ensuing recession significantly reduced tax receipts and increased spending for unemployment compensation and food stamps, further exacerbating the deficit situation.

Interestingly, the so-called congressional "deficit hawks" -- Congressman Paul Ryan, Senator Jeff Sessions and other conservative Republicans -- all voted for those measures that increased the deficit. These are the same folks who now want to dismantle virtually every social program designed to protect working families, the elderly, the children, the sick and the poor. In other words, it's okay to spend trillions on a war we should never have waged and large defense budgets, and provide huge tax breaks for billionaires and multi-national corporations. It's just not okay when, in very difficult economic times, we try to protect the most vulnerable people in our country.

US Defense spending vs. the rest of the world:

Where do we go from here? How do we now draft a federal budget which creates jobs, makes our country more productive, protects working families and lowers the deficit?

For a start, we have to understand that, from both a moral and economic perspective, we cannot impose more austerity on the people of our country who are already suffering. The time is now for the wealthy and multi-national corporations who are doing phenomenally well to help us rebuild America and lower our deficit.

At a time when the richest 1 percent own 38 percent of the financial wealth of America, while the bottom 60 percent own a mere 2.3 percent -- we cannot balance the budget on the backs of people who have virtually nothing. When 95 percent of all new income during 2009 through 2012 went to the top 1 percent, while tens of millions of working Americans saw a decline in their income, we cannot cut programs that these workers depend upon.

Instead of talking about cuts in Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid, we must end the absurdity of one out of four corporations in America not paying a nickel in federal income taxes. At a time when multi-national corporations and the wealthy are avoiding more than $100 billion a year in taxes by stashing money in tax havens like the Cayman Islands and Bermuda, we need to make them pay taxes just like middle-class Americans. The truth of the matter is that according to the most recent information available profitable corporations are only paying 13 percent of their income in federal taxes which is near a 40-year low.

While in January 2013, we successfully ended Bush's tax breaks for the richest 1 percent, the truth is that they continue to exist for the top 2 percent, those households earning between $250,000 and $450,000 a year. That must end.

At a time when we now spend almost as much as the rest of the world combined on defense, we can afford to make judicious cuts in our military without compromising our military capabilities.

Frankly, it is time that Congress started listening to the ordinary people. Recently, the Republican Party learned a hard lesson when the American people stated loudly and clearly that it was wrong to shut down the government and not pay our bills because some extreme right-wing members of Congress do not like the Affordable Care Act. Well, there's another lesson that my Republican colleagues are going to have to absorb. Poll after poll make it very clear that the American people overwhelmingly do not want to cut Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid. In fact, according to a recent National Journal poll, 81 percent of the American people do not want to cut Medicare at all; 76 percent of the American people do not want to cut Social Security at all; and 60 percent of the American people do not want to cut Medicaid at all. Meanwhile, other polls have made it very clear that at a time of growing income and wealth inequality, Americans believe that the wealthiest among us and large corporations must pay their fair share in taxes.

It is time to develop a federal budget which is moral and which makes good economic sense. It is time to develop a budget which invests in our future by creating jobs rebuilding our crumbling infrastructure improvement and expanding educational opportunities. It is time for those who have so much to help us with deficit reduction. It is time that we listen to what the American people want, and not just respond to the billionaire class and major campaign contributors.

________________________________________

In short, ladies and gentlemen, if we're going to cut anything, anything from our national budget, it should be our defense spending and budget, first. Not only does it make eminent sense, it can easily, easily be argued it would actually make us stronger both internally and externally, not weaker.

Not by a long shot.

Links:  Senator Bernie Sanders of Vermont

Bernie Sanders | Facebook

Bernie Sanders - YouTube

Bernie Sanders - Wikipedia

American War, 10 Years On

Happy now?

America, the world's warmonger

Yessirree, Bob.

Good ol' America, the beautiful.

Right?

Isn't that who we are?

 Former leader of the Free World, for peace. Now the world's warmonger, as we have been and have become, in the last few decades. We outspend everyone, every other nation on the planet, many times over, on spending for war.

Think we're not?  Want proof?

Well, then, here you go, as posted by none other than the Iraq Veterans Against the War :

Iraq Gets $2 Billion Weapons Package from the Pentagon

Does that make sense to anyone out there?

And the only way it will change, folks, is if we, the people, stand up, organize, and demand an end to it.

All of it.



Great news on George W. Bush and members of his administration

I just found this today:

George W. Bush, Dick Cheney Convicted Of War Crimes

In the first verdict of its kind since former President George W. Bush left office, he and several members of his administration have been successfully convicted in absentia of war crimes in Malaysia.

Former President Bush, Former Vice-President Dick Cheney, Former Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld and the legal advisers Alberto Gonzales, David Addington, William Haynes, Jay Bybee and John Yoo that crafted the legal ‘justification’ for torture that basically said, ‘we can if we want to even if it’s illegal’ were the defendants. None were present, of course, but international war crime trials do not require the presence of the accused. The trial was run according to the standards set by the Nuremberg Trials to convict war criminals after World War II.

Professor Gurdial Singh Nijar, who headed the prosecution said, “The tribunal was very careful to adhere scrupulously to the regulations drawn up by the Nuremberg courts and the International Criminal Courts”.

Let's be clear here, too. This is not about blaming him for any of our other, current problems or situations, far from it.

This is purely because he lied to us, the American public, about the situation in Iraq and then went against our own, internal, national laws as well as external, international ones, too, and attacked that foreign, sovereign nation pre-emptively and offensively.

Let me say again, folks: that's against international law. Period.

Then, too, there's this: "Bush and Cheney have not only brazenly admitted they authorized torture in direct contravention of the Geneva Convention, but bragged about it."

Somebody needed to do this. Thank goodness Malaysia and the Malaysians did.

We need more people and nations to do the same.

They likely won't, especially the more prominent, wealthy, Western nations and that's a shame.

There's something else to note about this good news here, too, though.

It hasn't been in our national news.

At all.

Not the major networks. Not one, I don't believe, and it shouldn't be overlooked. It's significant. As the article says, "It's a BFD."

Hopefully more countries follow their lead. We'll see. I'm not holding my breath.

The reason this is important is because it was all a lie and because it was against law and finally, because we need to learn from those mistakes.

This second Iraq War and anything like it needs to never be repeated.

If we don't learn, as a nation and a world, it likely will and there would be more needless deaths and tragedy.

Link: http://www.addictinginfo.org/2012/05/13/george-w-bush-dick-cheney-convicted-of-war-crimes/

What the Iraq War was

In a soldier's own words:

From our own Iraqi soldiers

Honor the soldiers indeed. Bring them home.

Truth be told: Even American Soldiers are against our wars

Out of Afghanistan now. Ten years is far too long.

A decade of war (guest post)

From the Iraq Veterans Against the War and their site: DECADE OF WAR AWARENESS MONTH published by Jose Vasquez on 09/09/11 11:52am This weekend, our nation will somberly mark 10 years since the September 11th attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon. As we grieve for the victims and their families, another milestone looms: the October 7th anniversary of the invasion of Afghanistan and the beginning of the Global War on Terror. A decade in, the American public still knows very little about the Afghan people or the situation on the ground in Afghanistan. Meanwhile, Congress continues to increase military spending as we are faced with rising unemployment, a foreclosure crisis, and funding cuts for education, social security, and healthcare. In response, IVAW is working with a coalition of anti-war and social justice organizations to launch a Decade of War Awareness Month from September 7 to October 7. Throughout the month, we will be working with our partner organizations (including Military Families Speak Out, War Resisters League, Veterans for Peace, and Afghans for Peace) to promote relationship-building among people and communities affected by U.S. militarism and the war economy in both the U.S. and Afghanistan. At WarVoices.org, you'll find resources on the U.S. war economy and current on-the-ground realities in Afghanistan, including a full public education curriculum designed for your community. We encourage you to use this curriculum to orchestrate workshops and explore how U.S. militarism and military spending relate to your local campaigns for social and economic justice, both directly and indirectly, across a wide-range of issues. The month will culminate on October 7th in Washington D.C. with a unique forum, War Voices: Building Community After a Decade of Struggle at Home and Abroad. Through story-telling, workshops, discussions, and cultural performances, we will build our power as a movement by meeting one another, building relationships that will inspire us for the long haul, envisioning new directions for the future, and planting the seeds for structures of mutual support and solidarity that will allow us to create a demilitarized world. To register local events in your community to commemorate the 10th anniversary or for more information, please visit WarVoices.com. Link: http://ivaw.org/

This is from the troops themselves, not the media

It's nice to hear an eloquent former soldier from our own military tell it like it really is.