Not a Happy Camper

Rob Payne, that is. You'd think he'd be much more grateful to be living in the Greatest Most Wonderfullest Biggest Baddest Country There's Ever Been or Ever Could Be:

This is where the cultural aspects of American stupidity come into play. The military since WWII has become the sacred cow of American life. Even anti-war activists cannot help but tag “and our brave troops fighting in service to America” onto every anti-war piece that they write. Whatever the troops may be they are not in anyone’s service except perhaps that of Wall Street and the oil industries. The true nature of the troops is that they are parasites, very expensive parasites that produce nothing except misery at home and abroad costing the American tax payers dearly in billions every year that could have been put to much better use back in the States. Yet because of the intractable culture of all things military that lives on in the hearts and minds of most Americans very few can see much less admit to such a simple and obvious truth regarding “the troops.” The “liberal” news media of course do their best to keep such noxious beliefs alive and well with their embedded reporters and absurdly sentimental reporting on “the troops” ever portraying them as heroes and brave lads and lasses fighting for their country.

Hmmmmm, he's not a supporter of The Troops. Doubleplusungood. But maybe he'll say a good word for our historic first sort-of beige president?

American culture has become militarized to the point where people are mostly blind to the awful fact that congress has just passed legislation that gives our government the right to assassinate American citizens or imprison them for the rest of their lives on the say-so and whims of a bloody handed tyrant who goes by the name of Barack Obama. This legislation is so vague that it can be construed by the American government to the broadest interpretations possible and is in fact a loaded gun in the hands of the unscrupulous such as Barack Obama our Peace Laureate president. US citizens have just been stripped of their most basic and important rights, the right to trial by jury, and the very right to life itself, the ultimate and most important of all rights. Yet Americans continue on as if in a daze more enthralled with the latest telephone gadgets with large screens then they are with important legislation that shall soon impact them in a most destructive manner. If you ponder this as you might well it is no accident that this legislation that smacks of the Nazi movement comes on the heels of the recent OWS movement where some Americans are on the brink of realizing that the government is not what they thought it was. What better way to keep the great unwashed in line than this draconian legislation that Obama once said he would veto but now shall not – now that it is more in line with his own wishes for more power.

This illustrates how far from being "colorblind" we really are. The current insane, malicious, murderous policies, implemented by a decrepit mouth-foaming Caucasian such as McCain, might shock or alarm us. But recruit instead a younger, nominally-black smoothie like the dead-eyed psycho who now infests the office as the corporate cat's-paw for those same policies, and there's no problem. Day by day, "Idiocracy" becomes, more and more, prophecy.

Everyone's "the Enemy"

At Bradley Manning's court-martial hearing, his lawyer said something pretty naive:

Aiding the enemy is an offense that could bring the death penalty but the prosecution has said it intends to seek life in prison for Manning. Coombs said the prosecution needed a "reality check" and focused his closing remarks on urging them to seek no more than 30 years in prison.

Coombs asked the court to throw out charges of aiding the enemy and giving intelligence to the enemy, saying the audience for the information was the American people.

Why does Lawyer Coombs try to draw an artificial distinction between "the enemy" and "the American people," especially given the National Defense Authorization Act for 2012, which certainly makes it clear that there's no such distinction? Prexy can toss anybody he wants, explicitly including American citizens grabbed right here in America, into the clink forever -- no trial needed.

These goons aren't hanging out in Iraq, or Afghanistan, or Pakistan ... they're right in your back yard, and they're just itching to deal with you. So do what the nice officer tells you, and if he's not screaming at you yet, just dummy up until he orders you to speak -- if you know what's good for you, that is.

O Free-est Country Anywhere!

Still Waiting, Not Seeing

At the day job, I work with a man who, I think, would agree with me if I characterized him as a partisan of the Democratic Party. I'm not using his real name anyway, so maybe that doesn't matter. In any case, I was talking with "Bill" some months ago, and he was telling me how it was that President Obama (Bill always includes the title -- told you he's a partisan) would be withdrawing all The Troops from Iraq before year's end. I was skeptical. I asked if he was sure it wasn't just "combat" Troops that would be leaving, as there seem to be other sorts of Troop; how many American mercenaries (Blackwater Xe employees and the like) would be staying, and so on. Bill's an honest man; he admitted that there could be some definitional weaseling going on, and that some careful parsing might be in order. At conversation's end, we agreed to disagree, as we usually do; I said I'd have to wait and see what the situation would be at year's end.

Well, here we are. It's 20 December, and you've all seen the news, replete with reports of the very last Troop crossing over into Kuwait, keys to various reinforced-concrete fortresses being handed over to our gallant allies, the Cuddly Iraqis™ (those being our direct-report employees among the wog population). So, a few days ago, Bill naturally had to tease me a little, reminding me that I was supposed to be waiting and seeing, and asking me whether I was ready to credit the O-bomber -- excuse me, The President -- with ending Iraq War II. Now, Bill's a friend, and I certainly don't begrudge him his fun. But I had to say that no, my waiting-and-seeing was still incomplete. Plenty of waiting, but not so much seeing. I mean, presumably we're leaving an ambassador, right? In fact, we're leaving this "embassy" that's really a downsized city, sitting in a Green Zone that had better be hermetically sealed within some very thick walls; who's manning the walls? ("You want me on that wall; you need me on that wall ...") So, it's fair to assume that there'll be at least a smallish army providing embassy security ... but they're not combat Troops. Then, in the dutifully-transcribed Pentagon news releases that pass for reportage from our lapdog press, I've seen some vague references to military "trainers" who're supposed to be getting the Cuddly Iraqis up to speed as Modern Warriors, but those references have been notably shy about numbers. And, in any case, I'm sure that a trainer is also not a combat Troop.

How large a garrison will be left in the wholly-owned American subsidiary called Kuwait? Surely a withdrawal across that oh-so-formidable international border has to be regarded as purely administrative, doesn't it?

Now, I'm not saying I don't trust our government. I'm not saying our government would lie to us. I'm just saying ... well, all right, I'm busted -- I'm saying exactly those things. I'm saying I trust "our" government just as far as I could (over)throw it: a microscopic distance, indeed. I'm saying that "our" government can be relied on absolutely to lie to us, again and again, in multiple and conflicting versions. I'm further saying that to read or view the "news" supplied by the corporate press is exactly the same thing as consuming the info-waste products excreted by our secretive, lying, murderous government. I'm saying that to really know what the American military presence remaining in Iraq is, I'd have to go there and search the place, which I'm obviously not going to do. Thus, I go on about my mundane affairs, while waiting ... and not seeing.

Ugly Stupid Ugly and Stupid American

Please file this away somewhere in your memory, where it'll be easy to find when considering the profound question: Why do they hate us? It's how overcredentialed, underbrained, sawed-off twits get to talk when seeking the presidential nomination of Caucus A of the War Party:

Taking a hard line on a U.S. foe in the Middle East, Republican presidential front-runner Newt Gingrich indicated Wednesday that he would unilaterally "replace" Syrian President Bashar al-Assad because he is running a "bad dictatorship."

The former House speaker was asked on a morning radio show in Chicago to offer a "30-second" answer to what he would do about Syria, where anti-government protests have led to a violent crackdown. Gingrich said, "I can give you a three-second answer. Replace Assad. I mean Assad is our enemy. He is an ally of Iran. It is a bad dictatorship. It is to our interest to get rid of dictators of this kind."

Gingrich did not say how he would remove Assad, and acknowledged there would be "consequences" to such an overt U.S. action. He said that as president, it would be his job to manage them. "Now that means you have consequences and have to be much better at managing the consequences than this administration has been," he said on the Don Wade & Roma radio show. "But I think none the less getting rid of Assad will lead to a better future than keeping him there."

Faced with a tossoff performance like that one from the Newtster, I don't even know where to start. His is the hyper-banal voice of unreflective -- no, antireflective -- entitlement. The good news: he won't be elected president. The bad news: someone smoother and more plausible, but fundamentally no better, will be elected president ... I suppose either Killer Romney or Killer Obama, not that it matters which. The best news, however: given that famous Mayan-calendar thing, someone will be elected president, but no one will be inaugurated in January 2013, because the world will have ended and there won't be any January 2013. Obama's the last prexy, and he's a one-termer (slightly less than one full term, even). To those who are about to tell me that the whole Mayan-calendar business is a gross misunderstanding, I say: please be quiet -- I'm having such a nice dream. Thank you.

Okay, Just Call Me Pollyanna, Then

Doesn't it seem to you that the office, the institution, of the American presidency is shrinking like a wool sweater in a red-hot dryer? That's how it feels to me, contemplating the political "news" concerning the troop of clowns pursuing the GOP nomination to oppose the tiny little corporate puppet now inhabiting 1600 Pennsylvania Ave. I mean -- the latest up-and-coming Republican dwarf is Newtie? It's hard to describe the little toad as "evil," because to be evil should surely require some substance. Mr. Gingrich fails to rise to the threshold level of evil. If he grew up, maybe he'd be evil. Then there's the Obummer: Bush Part Three, without the pseudoTexan pseudotwang ... and certainly without anything that could possibly be mistaken for integrity, or even a coherent political philosophy.

And, on the whole, that's good news. As the United States weakens, the national figurehead's identity becomes less important; and, as the United States weakens, its ability to destroy other people's lives, families, and homes on a worldwide basis also diminishes, and that's a diminution that's plainly required, in the interest of elementary decency.


So count me among the smiling, as 2012 arrives in a few weeks. It's an election year, and the cracks, rust, dangling wires, and loose fittings on the machinery of tyranny show up best at such times. I may not (will not) be voting, but that doesn't prevent me from being a campaign worker. I believe I'll go and volunteer for Dwayne Elizondo Mountain Dew Herbert Camacho, the logical president for Amur'ka 2012!

Somebody Else Can't Stand the Smell

No, I'm not going to vote for Ron Paul in the Republican primary. There are several good reasons for that. One is that the Indiana primary happens in May, by which time Rep. Paul probably won't still be campaigning; another is that I don't vote any more, and all of my reasons for that still apply. Having said that, I'll go on to say that you've still got to love you some Ron Paul from time to time, especially when you juxtapose this:

Gingrich: “How Could You Turn Down the Donald?”

with this:

Paul Says No to Trump Debate

'Nuf said.