Endless War category archive
The Return of Swampwater 0
A rumor has been floated that Donald Trump is considering outsourcing Afghanistan to Erik Prince and Blackwater (which has since been renamed several times I forget its current alias because it did such a good job the first time).
A snippet:
War and Mongers of War 0
Lee Camp argues that Donald Trump is following precedent to lie us into lies. (The relevant portion is approximately the first half of the show.)
Warning: Language.
47 Years Ago . . . 0
. . . American soldiers turned their guns on American citizens exercising their First Amendment rights to protest one of America’s wars for a lie–not for the first nor for the last time.
I learned about it when one of my friends came into the Campus Center (aka Student Union) at my college and said, “They’re killing us.”
War and Mongers of War 0
Josh Marshall considers the news from Asia (emphasis added):
He goes on to consider the logic of a “preemptive” strike against North Korea and concludes that, in this case at least, there is no such thing.
It resolves to a simple point: the logic of a “preemptive strike” is that you can solve or mostly solve the problem at issue by striking hard and first. But that doesn’t seem to be the case here. So a “preemptive strike” really just means starting a war, which we couldn’t necessarily control in scope or duration once we started it.
Follow the link for the full article.
The Peace Train 0
Francis J. Gavin, writing in the Minneapolis Star-Tribune, considers Americans self-image as a peace-loving people and finds it somewhere between wishful-thinking and delusion.
I don’t agree with everything he says, but I think the article is worth the few minutes it will take you to read it. Here’s a bit:
It is easy to understand why Americans embrace these views. If the U.S. and its citizens and values are associated with peace and stability, then actions that might typically be understood through the narrow lens of self-interest can instead be translated into selfless policies that benefit mankind.
(snip)
Or so the story goes. But an honest portrayal of our own history, and that of world politics over the past few centuries, casts doubt on all three assumptions.
War and Mongers of War 0
Speaking of five-year old boys playing “Bang! Bang! You’re Dead!” . . . .
“But the Emails . . . “ 0
Will Bunch, who is a fairly reasonable sort, has had enough. Here’s a bit of today’s column:
This is what’s so alarming — that Trump might blow Kim Jung-un and a few million North Koreans to smithereens just to boost his hotel occupancy rates in Vegas. Apparently, the push to save the Trump Organization for democracy is behind the recent changes at the White House; Steve Bannon and his comic-book white supremacists and pretend Nazis are on the outs, and the retired generals and the boys (and girls) from Goldman Sachs are taking charge. In other words, the “serious people” who gave us the Iraq War and the 2008 fiscal collapse. That’s the upgrade. Heaven help us.
Image via Juanita Jean.
Afterthought:
I can’t shake the thought that Donald Trump reminds of nothing so much as a five-year old boy playing “Bang! Bang! You’re Dead!”
Innocents Abroad, Collateral Damage Dept., Reprise 1
Truth? You can’t handle the truth.
Just ask your iJunk.
(I had to remove the video. Something in the embed code was making my sidebar disappear. You can view it here. Here’s a summary from the webpage: Ignorance is pandemic to American society, but maybe technology can help? Everyone has intimate relationships with their smartphones and the information that it delivers to us, however what will Apple allow us to see? Metadata+, a drone tracking app that uses information culled from news reports, appeared in the App Store, only to disappear again for mysterious and ridiculous reasons. Correspondent Naomi Karavani weighs in on how Apple can help or hinder important progress.)
The Rockets’ Red Glare, Reprise 0
Update: The video has been taken down for some reason not stated. It showed John Oliver heaping scorn on American media figures masturbating to missiles over Syria and on Trump’s hypocrisy. Oliver asked, “What did they actually achieve” and concludes the answer is “Nothing.”
Warning: Language.
Via Raw Story.
