Category Archives: War

Onward Christian Soldiers?

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On a recent holiday, my wife and I visited a historic church. Aside from the architecture, what struck me were two monuments on the church grounds: One was a war memorial placed directly in front of the main entrance honoring those church members who had served in war. The other was a gravestone dedicated to all the unborn who had lost their lives.

The contrast was striking. Obviously, the church supports killing on one hand and loathes it on the other. Is this what it means to be “pro-life?”

When did “Christian” churches begin to formally support our war machine? Based on what Biblical teaching? When did Christ ever sanction violence, let alone killing? How did “turn the other cheek” become “bomb the bastards?” Did God issue orders to invade Iraq as He did Jericho? How about Afghanistan? Vietnam? Korea?

I know this may seem particularly blasphemous to post on Memorial Day. (For the record, I honor all of those who have passed before us – soldiers and civilians alike.) But, if you believe in the 10 commandments, where is the asterisk noting that killing is okay as long as you’re wearing a military uniform?

A lot of Christian Americans have decried the violence of Muslim extremists. How is Christian support of war different? Aren’t churches supposed to be our moral compass? Shouldn’t they all hold steadfast to the teachings of their prophets and saviors? Shouldn’t they at least try to separate their teachings from the military, which is inherently about death and destruction?

But if churches can rationalize support for war, how is it not hypocritical for them to decry a woman’s choice to end a pregnancy? This is exactly the kind of hypocrisy that led the Church to torture and murder those it considered guilty of blasphemy or witchcraft.

Repealing Obamacare…Again.

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In case you haven’t heard by now, Teapublicans don’t like the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act. Since taking control of the House in 2011, Teapublicans have voted to repeal Obamacare 37 times.

The latest vote came yesterday.

Of course, there is absolutely no chance that the law will actually be repealed. Not only do Democrats control the Senate, President Obama would be certain to veto any bill calling for the law’s repeal. The Teapublicans know this. So why do they continue to vote for repeal?

According to Speaker Boehner, it’s because the freshmen congressmen have not yet had a chance to vote for repeal. Without such a vote, how would they ever be able to face their conservative supporters back home? Failing to vote for repeal might result in them being labeled RINOs (Republicans In Name Only) and being “primaried” by some nitwits who are even more hateful toward Obama and his landmark legislation.

Meanwhile, the other issues these Teapublicans claimed to support during their campaigns for election have languished. There have been no bills to create jobs, to reform taxes, to rebuild infrastructure, or to replace sequestration with a real budget designed to cut the federal debt without forcing departments to make mindless across-the-board cuts. And they most certainly have not reached across the aisle!

But they have held more kangaroo court-style hearings on Benghazi and they’ve threatened to start a couple more wars.

A Message To Tea Party “Patriots.”

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There’s simply no nice way of saying it. You are a bunch of self-serving, gun-toting, conspiracy promoting, anti-intellectual, anti-education, anti-evidence, anti-American nitwits.

You call yourselves Tea Party Patriots, but you’re neither patriotic nor even a party. You are the lunatic fringe. You wrap yourselves in the flag and spout quotes from a select few of our Founding Fathers all the while undermining the very principles they stood for. You say you’re strict Constitutionalists, but it’s apparent that the only part of the Constitution you’ve read is the Second Amendment (and you can only quote half of that). The other principles you attribute to the Founders are actually from the Articles of Confederation, the document our Constitution replaced.

You didn’t have the guts to stand on your own, so you decided to backdoor the Republican Party. Your angry rhetoric and Koch brothers’ millions managed to drive most moderate Republicans from office. As a result, you and your wealthy supporters have destroyed the party of Lincoln.

Now you’re trying to destroy our nation.

Your economic theories not only defy economics, they defy logic. They’re hurtful to children, the elderly, the poor, even veterans. You claim to be worried about the national debt, yet you sat idly by while the previous administration ran up enormous deficits through two ill-conceived wars and the collapse of our economy. Then you blamed President Obama for our economic ills. You watched as President Bush expanded the size of government by creating the government’s second-largest agency, the Department of Homeland Security, then screamed about the growth of government when the new administration took office.

You ignored the bailout of “too big to fail” banks, which saved the jobs of Wall Street millionaires and the assets of billionaires. But you howled in disgust when President Obama loaned money to US automakers, saving tens of thousands of jobs for middle class workers. You whined that you are “Taxed Enough Already” and blamed President Obama for raising taxes, even though tax rates were at a 60-year low.

You claim that you’re not racists, yet every single one of your rallies includes blatantly racist depictions of our democratically-elected president. You call him a Muslim, a socialist, a communist, a fascist and worse. You compare him to Hitler. You have even called him the leader of al Qaeda.

When you’ve failed to win elections, you’ve tried to change the rules. You have tried to suppress the votes of minorities and your political opponents. You have tried to deny women the right of equal pay for equal work. You have tried to deny women the right to control their own bodies. You have held our economy hostage in order to get your way. You have undermined democracy through use of the filibuster and gerrymandering. As a result, our nation now suffers from tyranny by the minority.

Thanks to your tactics, Congress has been turned into a venomous body devoid of compromise. Thanks to your representatives, the approval rating of our duly-elected Congress is lower than that of cockroaches. Thanks to your policies, the very wealthy have become wealthier while the rest of our citizens have suffered. Thanks to you, our nation is on the verge of becoming a plutocracy.

All of that is bad enough. But your real “triumph” is that you have made millions of Americans fearful of their government and of each other. Thanks to you, according to a new poll, 44 percent of Teapublicans now believe that an armed revolution against our government may be necessary…our own democratically-elected government!

Your entire movement is based on lies and meanness.

That said, it’s difficult to determine who is most at fault…you…or those who tolerate you, especially the media that give you undeserved credibility. One thing is certain…your movement would be more accurately called the Tea Not-Really-A-Party Traitors.

Caution With Syria Justified.

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Despite the right wing warmongers’ calls for war with Assad’s Syria, President Obama is correct to move cautiously. There are many questions to be answered. Who are the rebels? What are their aims? What will be the future of Syria if the rebellion is successful? What will be the cost to the US if we do intervene?

The truth about the Syrian situation is that it’s a civil war between Hezbollah and Al Qaeda. Neither of these groups will further the interests of the US. In fact, the best outcome may be for both sides to do serious damage to each other.

The bigger question is why the drumbeat for yet another war? Why do people such as Senators McCain and Graham seem so anxious to send our troops into battle? Aren’t these some of the same people who are horrified by the deficit and national debt? What effect would yet another war have on our economy? How many lives would be lost? How many lives changed?

Until the warmongers can provide answers to these questions, President Obama is right to ignore them. If McCain, Graham, McConnell, Boehner, Cantor, Ryan, Bush, Cheney and all of the Tea Party members are so impatient to join the fight in Syria, maybe they should just grab one of their numerous assault weapons and book a flight to Damascus.

We should never again choose to send our military into battle without serious debate and a full understanding of the goals and consequences.

Turning History Into Fiction.

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Last week’s opening of the George W. Bush presidential library was remarkable in one respect. With the opening, Teapublicans began their attempts to rewrite history in earnest.

Last week, you heard Bush state that he still considers our invasion of Iraq a great achievement for exporting democracy to the world. There was no mention, of course, about the tens of thousands of casualties, the war’s estimated $3 trillion price tag, and the fact that the invasion actually strengthened Iran’s influence in the area.

You heard some Teapublicans speak glowingly of Bush’s economic policies, which will, in their opinion, make history. They view Bush as the greatest president in recent decades. (In case you’ve forgotten, when Bush assumed office, there was an annual surplus. And when he left, our economy was in absolute free fall.) You even heard Karl “Turd Blossom” Rove state that Bush’s image should be carved into Mount Rushmore alongside Washington, Jefferson, Lincoln, and Roosevelt!

Does this mean that, in the feeble minds of Teapublicans, Bush has now displaced Reagan as the greatest president ever?

Given the amount of b.s. being generated in Texas last week, no wonder it’s known as the Longhorn state.

Flight Delays Versus Food, Children And Safety.

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Late Thursday and early Friday, legislation sailed through Congress faster than it has in years. The reason? Teapublicans were upset by furloughs to air traffic controllers, causing flight delays for business people, vacation travelers and, of course, Congress.

Oh my! How would these people ever survive an hour or two wait on their way to and from Washington?

On the other hand, Congress is not at all concerned about the other effects of sequestration cuts. Cuts to meals on wheels for the elderly? They’ll just have to learn to get by with less. Cuts to Medicare payments for cancer patients? Cancer drugs are a luxury. Cuts to food inspectors? We need to eliminate government over-regulation. Cuts to Head Start, displacing 70,000 children? It’s time those deadbeats stopped suckling from the government teat!

But an inconvenience to Congress and their wealthy contributors caused by travel delays? Now that’s serious!

And, even though the deficit is so massive that Teapublicans believe we must cut programs for the poor, the elderly, and the seriously ill, many seem to think we have plenty of money to go to war with Syria and North Korea. They even want to restore cuts to the military so the military can buy weapons the defense department doesn’t even want. The reason? These weapons are made by contractors in districts the allegedly budget-conscious Teapublicans represent.

When are voters going to finally wake up and realize that Teapublicans in Congress don’t care about your needs…unless, of course, you represent a defense contractor, a multinational corporation, or have thousands of dollars to contribute to their re-election campaigns?

A Warning To Democrats:

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From recent polls showing, among other things, that 13% of Americans believe the president is actually the Antichrist, you may correctly assume that the Republican Party is full of a bunch of crackpots (aka the Tea Party). You may rightly believe that the GOP platform is akin to something coming out of the north end of a southbound bull. You may also believe that Americans will figure this out and hand the next election to Democrats.

On the last point, you are most likely wrong!

You assume that most Americans actually follow the news and politics. (They don’t.) You assume the media will expose Teapublican ideas for what they really are. (They won’t.) You assume that voters will realize the superiority of Democratic ideas. (Unlikely.) And you assume that minorities, most especially Latinos, will recognize that Democrats best represent their interests. (Not necessarily.)

Too many Democrats are content to allow Teapublicans to define the Democratic Party and Democratic principles.

We cannot sit back and expect independents, union members and minorities to turn the country blue. All across the country, the GOP is hard at work trying to rewrite voting laws to ensure control of the House and the Senate in 2014, and the White House in 2016.

Even though the Great Recession was caused by Republican infatuation with deregulation, and even though our slow economic recovery is the result of Teapublican abuse of the filibuster and a refusal to compromise, it’s all too likely that voters will hold the White House accountable.

Democrats need to be working to register voters, working to fight voter suppression, working to fight gerrymandering, and working to fight attempts to change the Electoral College. We need to refine our message to make it clear that Democrats support fiscal responsibility, real job growth and the interests of all working people. Also, it wouldn’t hurt for Democrats to make it abundantly clear that we better adhere to the actual teachings of Christ; to show compassion for the poor and powerless; to resist the temptation of greed; to resist the calls for war.

That’s not a religious message. That’s a philosophy that has been largely abandoned by those who claim to be followers. And it’s a philosophy that is appealing to the largest portion of our population.

Democrats also need to make it clear what GOP stands for – Guardians Of Privilege. The GOP supports ever larger tax cuts for the rich and obscene profits for multinational corporations, along with diminished salaries for working people. These GOPstoppers have shown that they are against civil rights, women’s rights and religious freedom. While decrying big government, they want to enforce their own brand of “values” in the bedroom and every other aspect of our society.

Democrats, we’re at a critical juncture. Even if you reject this message, you must understand that we are now in a perpetual campaign cycle. We can’t afford to wait.

George W. Bush Presidential Library – What It Should Include.

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No, I’m not going to suggest that it consist simply of My Pet Goat, the only book other than the Bible that Bush is known to have read. But if a presidential library is intended to represent the achievements of a presidency, here’s what I believe it should include:

Bush 9/ll Room – The highlight of this display would be the July 6, 2001 Presidential Daily Briefing which was headlined “Bin Laden Determined To Strike In U.S.”

Bush Economic Policy Room – This room would consist of a glass bridge traversing a vast, deep hole representing the Bush administration’s effect on the US economy.

Bush Victory Room – It would contain Bush’s flight suit and the “Mission Accomplished” Banner which announced victory over Iraq more than 7 years before the war ended. The walls would be covered with quotes by administration officials used to sell the war, including the quote by Donald Rumsfeld which predicted that we would be welcomed as liberators and the quote by Paul Wolfowitz saying that the war would pay for itself.

There would also be a tiny empty shelf representing all the WMD found in Iraq.

Bush Patriotism Room – This would actually be a small closet consisting of a single empty file drawer intended for Bush’s missing military records covering the time he was AWOL. The only other item would be a photo of Valerie Plame, the CIA agent willfully exposed by the administration for her husband’s opposition to the Iraq War.

Puppet Master Room – This display would be devoted to Richard “The Dick” Cheney and Karl “Turd Blossom” Rove. In addition to The Dick’s Darth Vader costume, there would be the shotgun he used to shoot his hunting partner in the face and the Plan For A New American Century calling for the use of our military to exert our economic will around the world. There would also be a jar containing The Dick’s original shriveled heart.

Bush Justice Room – This would include a gallery of photos from Abu Ghraib, a map of sites for extraordinary rendition (aka torture), an explanation from “The Dick” explaining that nearly drowning someone repeatedly is not torture, and the 600-page report by the non-partisan Constitution Project which concludes that “it is indisputable that the United States engaged in the practice of torture” and that Bush and Cheney bore ultimate responsibility for it.

At the center of the room would be a replica of the statue of Justice with the cloak that former Attorney General John Ashcroft used to cover her bare breast.

Katrina Room – This room would be interactive. Once you enter, the water would begin to rise as a life-size image of Bush smiles and waves. No matter how much you beg, the library staff would refuse to help.

Tell me this wouldn’t be more accurate than the Bush library being portrayed in the media.

“We Can’t Afford That Anymore.”

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We hear it all the time. There’s no money to improve our schools. There’s no money to rebuild our infrastructure. There’s no money to ensure that our citizens have access to food and medicine. There’s no money to care for the mentally ill and the homeless. There’s no money to give our veterans the care they deserve. There’s no money for pensions and retirement benefits.

The US is broke…at least that’s what Teapublicans want us to believe.

So what happened? How did we go from the richest, most powerful nation on Earth to a nation that can no longer afford the things that our citizens value most? For starters, our economic ills are the result of two costly wars, the unparalleled expansion of government immediately following 9/11, an expansion of Medicare drug benefits and the Great Recession that began as the result of unfettered gambling by the so-called “too big to fail” banks.

But none of those causes have been as devastating as runaway greed, the off-shoring of jobs and money (it’s estimated that wealthy Americans, including Mitt Romney, and US-based multinational corporations have stashed trillions in off-shore tax havens), subsidies for large corporations, and tax cuts intended to benefit the very wealthiest portion of our populace.

Following World War II, when we could afford to build things, our top individual tax rate was 91 percent for those making more than $200,000 per year. The capital gains tax was 25 percent. And the effective corporate tax rate was 50 percent.

Compare those rates with today’s: The top individual tax rate is now 39.6 percent for those making more than $400,000. The capital gains tax is 15 percent. And the effective corporate tax rate is 17 percent (that is, if large corporations pay any taxes at all). In fact, some large multinationals now have a negative tax rate!

See the problem?

For most working Americans, wages have stagnated over the past 40 years, while worker productivity has skyrocketed, along with incomes for the wealthy. Most Americans are working harder and earning proportionately less…if they’re lucky enough to have a job! And the only answer Congress (at least the Teapublican portion of Congress) has for these problems is to cut spending, to protect tax cuts for the wealthy, and to cut taxes for corporations.

Speaker Boehner, Minority Leader McConnell and the rest of the Teapublicans in office want to “starve the beast.” They consider investment and compromise dirty words. And they steadfastly refuse to agree to one more dollar of revenue.

To relate that to family finances as Teapublicans are so fond of doing: It’s as if parents, faced with growing credit card bills, decided to give up food for their children in order to cut their work hours!

Yes, we have to cut government waste and be efficient with our spending. But there isn’t enough fat in discretionary spending to eliminate the deficit and still meet the needs of our growing population. We already have seen that with the sequester cuts, and they’ve only just begun. If we want to reduce our nation’s debt without destroying our fragile economy, we must find new sources of revenue.

At War With Ourselves.

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Not to diminish the loss and sacrifice of those fighting in Afghanistan, but America’s most lethal war is internal.

All of our wars since 1776 (and there have been far too many of them) have resulted in the deaths of 1,171,177 soldiers. But since 1968, 1,384,171 civilians have lost their lives to gun violence in America! Of course, that number is growing every day. For what purpose? So some wannabe “freedom fighters” can own a lethal collection of weaponry intended for military use?

If you’re one of the paranoid, anti-social nitwits who see tyranny around every corner, I have some news for you. The government isn’t coming to take your revolver, shotgun and hunting rifle. The black-shirted UN troops aren’t coming, either. And your neighbors aren’t coming for your stash of food, guns and gold.

Only a very small percentage of Americans are murderers, muggers, robbers and thieves. And the only reason they have guns is because you and the NRA are too damn paranoid to allow the government to institute sensible gun safety rules.

Because you feel it’s your constitutional right to arm yourself to the teeth, straw buyers are able to walk into any of the nation’s more than 58,000 gun stores and buy assault rifles for drug cartels. Because of your paranoia, gangstas are able to buy an array of semi-automatics from gun shows without even passing a background check. Because you want to think of yourself as a real-life Rambo, felons and children are able to buy guns on street corners throughout America so they can shoot innocents and each other.

Truth is, If you’re so paranoid that you fear universal background checks and restrictions on some types of weaponry, you are as responsible for gun deaths in America as those who actually pull the triggers.

That must make you feel very proud.