We've had what was called 'The Cold War', based on fear of total destruction, that in reality only benefitted the few. Those that seek ever growing power and wealth that accomplishes it's growth on the fear factor.
Without attempting to stop, once we used and everyone witnessed the total destructive power we unleased, we started a race to arm those able with more and more of that destructive power, making them even more so as the technology advanced.
Those weapons of total mass destruction are still around, with more becoming able to develope them, and we've got the technology to make and use them, which we are, on a lower but still destructive level, without thinking of the long lasting destructive results.
We have even raised our technology on the fear factor, battling a word 'Terrorism' which is criminal in nature and actions. Instead of approaching that word for what it is we use it as a label to attach to anyone deemed the need to continue and build on the fear and a perpetual conflict. Anyone can be made an 'enemy' if it serves the purpose of the power brokers, the few, as they also wage terror on others, but hey we're the 'good guys'.
Back than, for us, the fear was also based on a word, one that describes an ideology, 'Communism', for the rest of the world it was based on their fear we would be wacky enough, or rather dangerous enough, to once again unleash it's total destructive force, anytime on anyone!
So instead of really acting as our arrogant words describe ourselves, we speak the words over and over while acting the complete opposite, but once again we're the 'good guys'.
U.S. making sure the Carnage Expands! Continuing, and expanding, our long running failed foreign policies that come back to haunt us, creating ever expanding hatreds and enemies!
We do the opposite of what we supposedly stand for, while condemning others doing exactly the same!
Within the past month, the U.S. military command in charge of day-to-day operations in Iraq ordered subordinate units to step up creation of the local forces, authorizing commanders to pay the fighters with U.S. emergency funds, reward payments and other monies.
We are a major force, now, behind the growing ethnic cleansing in Iraq, that as long as we occupy and continue the policies we set forth, will only grow!
Enemy of our Enemy {Warning-Graphic Violence}
Newly formed 'Killing Squads', we've been here before, many times, in other places and times! In this case everyone is a 'suspected' member of al Qaeda to justify the cleansing, or if that fails than label them 'Terrorists', it's a useful blanket phrase, as we and other's 'Terrorize'!
Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice will announce proposed extensions and enlargements of foreign aid to Israel and Egypt and a proposed arms sales package to Persian Gulf nations including Saudi Arabia before she leaves on a trip to the region on Monday, the officials said.
And we think gonzo is worthless, which he is, as is all the incompitant administrative fools. On the world stage there's our own condi, who nobody listens to, and probably could care less if ever meeting with.
Inside The Surge
You can also view the above at The Guardian Site where other links can be found. The Guardian's award-winning photographer and filmmaker Sean Smith spent two months embedded with US troops in Baghdad and Anbar province. His harrowing documentary exposes the exhaustion and disillusionment of the soldiers. Slideshow: Sean Smith on life in Iraq before and after the invasion Guardian photographer Sean Smith was in Iraq before the invasion, and stayed in Baghdad throughout the allied campaign until the city fell to US forces. Here three galleries of photographs show his view of the conflict.
We 'responsible adults', as those before us, create the world those following us will one day call their own as they in turn do the creating for those behind them. Our childrens children children have now been blessed{?} with the world we have now created, only I doubt they'll look on it as blessed!
"Child of War"
This is just one of the results many of us, opposed to the failed policies, right from the beginning, were saying would happen if those policies were carried out, it has only gotten worse since they were!
And 'finally' there is a recognition of what already has been developing and not only as to the above! There is much more at the sites than the initial reports! And what will happen has Nothing to do with 'Hating' our Freedoms and Democracy nor Religious Ideologies!
And what are we doing to our own.
War's Developing Casualty: Military Kids
Not only to the children of our present military force but those not feeling the direct results, yet, but know what's going on, and those to come!
And in any conflict brought about by the invasion of others and their want to rid themselves of the occupiers of their lands and cultures, the results are well known.
All troops, when they occupy and battle insurgent forces, as in Iraq, or Gaza or Vietnam, are placed in "atrocity producing situations." In this environment, surrounded by a hostile population, simple acts such as going to a store to buy a can of Coke means you can be killed. This constant fear and stress pushes troops to view everyone around them as the enemy. This hostility is compounded when the enemy, as in Iraq, is elusive, shadowy and hard to find.
While the above points to the results to U.S. forces, it also is what occurs to everyone involved and grows the longer the conflict!
One can go back and find numorous examples of our's, and others, failed foreign policies that have created much hate towards us and those others. But here is one glaring one that was extensively used as the excuse, and still is, for us invading a country of people that did nothing to us.
International Crisis Group Joost Hiltermann manages a team of analysts based in Amman and Beirut conducting research in the countries of the Middle East and writing policy-focused reports on the factors that increase the risk of and drive armed conflict. The crisis in Iraq and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict are Crisis Group’s two priorities in the region, but research is conducted as well in Iran, Syria, Lebanon, Saudi Arabia and the Gulf.
Eyes wide shut The US hunts in vain for a military solution By Peter Harling and Joost Hiltermann Faced with more US troops, many armed Iraqi groups have gone to ground – for the moment. Others manipulate US troops to do their dirty work for them. The US has failed to create a political settlement and appears to be blind to its own lack of progress.
Ever wonder why Saddam wasn't brought up on charges for Halabja, and other crimes, on the world court before or after the 1st Gulf War?
Ever wonder why, after his supposed capture, the Halabja killings were not the first charges he faced?
Ever wonder why he, or his look alike, was tried in Iraq and not the World Court?
Hint, think when and whom, as well as what support he was given by whom!
Now if one wants to find out about what has been going on 'in their names' the book below looks promising as are many others that are out there and not only on or about the CIA.
The True -- and Shocking -- History of the CIA This essay is a review of Legacy of Ashes: The History of the CIA by Tim Weiner The American people may not know it but they have some severe problems with one of their official governmental entities, the Central Intelligence Agency. Because of the almost total secrecy surrounding its activities and the lack of cost accounting on how it spends the money covertly appropriated for it within the defense budget, it is impossible for citizens to know what the CIA's approximately 17,000 employees do with, or for, their share of the yearly $44 billion-$48 billion or more spent on "intelligence." This inability to account for anything at the CIA is, however, only one problem with the Agency and hardly the most serious one either.
Can what's to follow these present failed policies be stopped? I'm afraid not, we've already long ago passed the threshold of possibility to do so.
But can they be minimized, maybe!
And the only way that may happen is by getting everyone in the region of the present debacles involved, statespersons and religious leaders, as in that part of the world religion is part of their ideology and policy.
Lets look at a recent discussion pointing to exactly this.
Obama: "I think what is irresponsible and naive is to have authorized a war without asking how we were going to get out -- and you know I think Senator Clinton hasn’t fully answered that issue.The general principle that I was laying out is that we should not be afraid as America to meet with anybody.”
Clinton spokesperson Richard Holbrooke: "As she has said many times, Senator Clinton believes we need to engage in vigorous diplomacy after the cowboy approach of the Bush years. She has said she would initiate serious, responsible dialogue with nations with whom we don’t agree in order to further the national security interest of the United States. But she is right not to risk the prestige of the presidency by unconditionally committing to meet with leaders of adversarial nations."
Both are right, but screw this arrogant thought about 'prestige of the presidency', that's already gone, as is the 'prestige' of this country!
There is constant death and destruction going on and we all know those who started it haven't a clue, and are to engrossed in their own arrogance and incompitance, to even start any needed regional discussion, now we find out they just want to pour more arms into the area.
And we can't just sit back, watching more and more death and destruction, and more hatreds being created, untill the next election, which by the way isn't going to change a damn thing.
This has to be started much sooner rather than later, and started by others in leadership, representing this country, and more than willing to not only start rebuilding what this country likes to think of itself as but setting it in the direction of acting that way!
For the way one's country leads is the way others perceive it to be, and right now we're coming from the gutter!
Voices: Pushes to Ensure Those Who Served Aren't Denied Disability Benefits Grammy-award winning rock star Dave Matthews is pushing Congress to protect Iraq veterans traumatized by combat and who have been misdiagnosed with personality disorders, trying to make sure that those who served are not denied the disability benefits they need. This week, six senators introduced legislation that would temporarily suspend personality disorder discharges for combat veterans until there is a comprehensive review of current procedures.
The Dave Matthews Band is urging fans to push Congress to do more to ensure that U.S. troops coming home traumatized by combat get the help they need. A petition on the band's Web site has 23,000 signatures so far, singer Dave Matthews said in an interview aired Sunday, July 15th, on ABC's "This Week." Sign the Petition
Get the feeling I want YOU to sign onto Dave Matthews Petition, if you haven't, you're damn right! This above report was around the 15th of this month and it only had some 23,000 signatures than, if you haven't signed on get your Apathedic Fingers over to the site and do so, this should already have well over a couple of hundred thousand signatures on it!
Myself, and others, posted and sent out e's about the petition as soon as we found out about it, so What Are You Waiting For!
Now we know about that which Dave is lobbying for above, along with so much more related to returning Maimed Military Personal while we have not One but Two Theaters of Opperation's going on.
And we know which Political Party held Total Control over the Administration that sent them into these Theater's, as well as the Congress who held the Purse Strings and the Ability to find out about the Care being received!
Below is the totally dishonest speach by the pResident, and a followup report by Bob Woodruff, who sent them to War but wasn't concerned enough to followup on the care the returning military personal were receiving, that his Appointee's were watching over! {I'm still Royally pissed at the blowoff of the Woodruff question, Especially after giving that so called Concerned Speach!!}
Wounds of War
I believe what Ex-Senator Dole says in the interview, that he'll keep fighting. But I must say, Bob, you are an injured WWII Veteran with a long service to Country in Congress, and even wanted to be President. Extreme problems with Treatment of the Veteran's of this Country is nothing New, and you know Exactly what will happen with the report you and the others just turned over! And need I remind you, your wife has been a sitting Senator, mine by the way, the whole time that these Conflicts have been raging and the maimed have been returning! And untill recently her's and your's political party Held Total Control, Where Was The Information and Rage These Last few Years!!
Now the below was a recent report that fit's well with the Dave Matthews Band, Musical Artists, giving 'Freedom' to their art forms, if only for a short time period and in a relatively safe area of the country . Something they had, 'Freedom' to do anywhere, even under our friend their Dictator, Saddam.
But under our Occupation only Death and becoming Refugee's seems to bring their 'Freedom' from the destruction We Have waged on their Country!
We look hard for signs of hope in Iraq. And so we were pleasantly surprised when we went to a music festival in Erbil -- about 300 Iraqi musicians and dancers had been flown in to the northern city, and were given the run of an enormous performing arts center, courtesy of a grant from the US government. On hand were nine American music and dance teachers, who were giving classes on such subjects as Baroque keyboard technique, hip hop dancing and contemporary jazz. It was fun to see the Iraqi musicians soaking it all in. For 10 days, in the relative safety of Kurdistan, they got to act like most musicians in the rest of the world who don’t have car bombs and gunshots constantly disturbing their sense of harmony.
After Bob Woodruff was blown off, at the end, from his question to the pResident, with that Damn Sick smirk and laugh, Woodruff had a followup report about the Military/VA Care given.
The following is a combination of the two News Clips, from ABC News. One is of the press conferance held on the 25th of July, the other is the followup report.
Wounds of War
In the middle I have a Question I would like any Candidate running against a standing Republican Congressional office holder to ask, House and Senate, use your own words, but I want Answers!
At the end I have what I want on peoples minds as we approach the coming elections, Especially as to the Party that held total control in the buildup of War and Throughout, untill the recent elections, and were Rubber Stamping the wishes of these Neo-Cons, but Not Doing Their Jobs!!
If they were sent to fight, they are too few. If they were sent to die, they are too many!
Is 'Funding' Really For Troops?
What Happened To Funding and Oversite For Military/Veteran Care In Previous Congresses?
We hear the numbers of suicides because of Iraq but we hardly ever know their names or their stories. Here are over one hundred of them. How many more will it take before we take care of the troops we sent into combat?
Talk of the Nation, July 24, 2007 · As more military women return from fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan, they are finding that veterans services aren't meeting their needs. An estimated 8,000 female veterans are homeless and others suffer from mental illness. Female veterans discuss their unique experiences and the rising concern about the services available to them.
Marsha Four, director, Homeless Veterans Services; former chair, the Veterans Affairs Advisory Committee on Women Veterans; served in the Army Nurse Corps during Vietnam
Cheryl Beversdorf, president and CEO, National Coalition for Homeless Veterans
Long deployments, repeat duty puts strain on children in military families.
For the 230,000 children whose parents have been deployed to the Middle East, the war is never far away. At some military bases including Fort Hood in Texas, children attend special programs and videoconferences to speak to their parents who are on the battlefield. Would you like to send a message of support to military families? Log on and post comments. "World News" will then send the messages to military families. Send Message Via ABC Forums
And while viewing Remember the lives of the Iraqi Children, that We Have Given Them, and they've been growing up in!
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If they were sent to fight, they are too few. If they were sent to die, they are too many!
Is 'Funding' Really For Troops?
What Happened To Funding and Oversite For Military/Veteran Care In Previous Congresses?
I truely hope those who are so against Accountibility, i.e. Impeachment, hone up on their reasons for such conduct. For, depending on your age, your grankids, great grankids, great great grankids are going to want to know the reasons why.
The following came in an E from MoJo and was a short post on their blog.
It's from an article on the 21st, a quiet saturday news day.
Buried at the bottom of page A-6 in today's Times is news that Halliburton spin-off KBR and its subcontractor Eagle Global Logistics built bribery charges into the cost of delivering basic supplies to U.S. troops in Baghdad.
The guilty plea by Mr. Smoot is the second by an Eagle executive in the case. But the papers describing his plea indicate that investigators believe at least one more Eagle employee and five KBR employees, all so far unnamed, were also involved. Mr. Smoot alone admitted to delivering bribes, called gratuities in the legalistic language of the court papers, to the employees of KBR on some 90 occasions between 2002 and 2005.
Now, when will this Country finally Wake Up and realize the Criminal Element that are running things and mindlessly Killing our Military Personal and Innocents of other Countries are doing so for just pure, or unpure, Wealth and Power!
A spokeswoman for KBR, Heather L. Browne, said in a statement yesterday that the company “in no way condones this behavior.”
Ya 'right' Heather, just like everything else that's been going on, we're going to believe you and the others using the same lame statements!
The thing is folks, these clowns, running this show, are so freakin Incompitant, that it speaks volumes of the rest of us as to allowing what's been going on to continue unabated, oh we're just such an intelligent bunch!!
Newly formed 'Killing Squads', we've been here before, in other places and times!
What will happen when these Sunni groups join together, which they probably already have, creating an established leadership, and turn on the Shiites, which they probably already are doing!
What will happen when they turn back on our forces, which they probably already have or are close to doing!
We are creating another, once again, regime like the last we supported. Only this time we're In-Country doing the Creating!
Nice Job Dictator cheney, The Future Of Our 'National Security'!
It's Friday morning, and I'm on my way to finally meet an ex-cop and soldier who lets me have it now and then with stinging e-mails.
"I'm Disappointed!" said the subject line of Terry Schauer's latest missive, in which he scolded me for last week's column about my nephew enlisting in the Marines. "I think you took this opportunity to turn your column into an antiwar rant, at your nephew's expense. It is belittling not only to your nephew, but to all who serve."
One month into it, I'm still having trouble getting used to the sound of those words.
Today’s column continues:
I'm not the only one he writes to. I once came across a powerful letter to the editor he'd written to the New Yorker. In it, he said he was proud to have served in Vietnam, but he eloquently expressed the complexity of his continued distress over the killing of a young North Vietnamese soldier.
"Killing an adversary removes part of your soul," Schauer wrote. "Your 'kill' turns out to be a young kid much like you — armed, in uniform, sent forth by his country into battle.
"As time passes, feelings of guilt, sorrow, and remorse accompany the odd, displaced feeling that you have become the person you killed," he continued. "You see him in your sons, and wonder if fate will someday take them from you to settle the score."
Ever wonder why most never really talk about their experiances after serving in a Combat Theater, Terry gives you a glimpse into one of the reason’s, and wether you have or have not killed, everyone knows what is going on In Theater, especially those living in the Invaded Countries.
His mother tells Schauer that he never came back from Vietnam.
No one, who goes through these actions of what we do as human beings, is ever what they were before that experince, No One!
Most everyone born, no matter where, are raised to believe in values that shape their being, Wars are the Total Opposite of those learned values, and especially Wars of Choice with No Justifiable Reasons for the Carnage!
"If I woke up tomorrow and was 21, I wouldn't want to join the Army again," he says, telling me that time has only made him more certain the soldier he killed did not deserve to die any more than he did.
Used as pawns of the desires others have, certainly not the wants of the individuals who are used to obtain those others desires, for many who would send others into Invasions never haave experianced the destructive nature they have unleased!
Terry goes on to describe the why of Steve’s nephews want to join and serve and closes with this:
"Write him often, Steve. Tell him you love him. Keep him current on what he likes…. Don't go overboard on telling him you're worried about him. That doesn't help."
