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TechnoratiWhat is all this nonsense about us electing a "commander in chief"?
Okay, I mean we all know it's President Bush's favorite title. He thrills to being a "war president," and loves strutting around in front of guys in uniform and getting saluted. But really, what is this all about?
The Constitution says that the President is the commander in chief of the army and the navy, and of the militia if it is called to national service. But that is really just for the sake of having a civilian at the top of the food chain.
President cum commander in chiefs do not actually run the military. They aren't trained to do that any more than they run education, or run the weather service or NASA. Running the military, like running any federal agency, is what the head of that agency does, and in the case of the military, that's what the Joint Chiefs of Staff do. A president certainly makes critical decisions in choosing who heads each agency, and in broad policy matters by discussing options with department leaders. The same is true in the case of the military with regard to the Joint Chiefs. But presidents decidedly do not act as top generals.
The idea that Americans, when they go to the polls, whether in a primary or in a general election, are choosing a commander in chief, as our feckless media pundits are wont to tell us, or as candidates running for president are fond of saying in these trying times, is not only overwrought rhetoric-it is downright dangerous, and idiotic too.
What voters are electing is the leader of the country-the person who is responsible for administering the federal bureaucracy that protects our environment, regulates our commerce, funds our education system, builds our roads, and, oh yes, chooses the top brass that runs our military.
Great presidents in wartime-Abraham Lincoln, Woodrow Wilson and Franklin Roosevelt--were great not because they were generals. Certainly Lincoln and Wilson had no significant military experience, and Roosevelt's military experience was limited. And generals who have been presidents have been a mixed bag. General Grant was by all accounts a poor president; Eisenhower a good one.
Our current commander in chief, because he is obsessed with this one little aspect of his job description, has plunged the country in to the most disastrous war of its history-a war fought entirely on borrowed funds. Faced with a handful of rag-tag terrorists, he has bloated the military with 30 percent more money over the course of his tenure, so that today, the American military budget, in inflation-adjusted dollars, is about to equal the amount the government spent on the military in World War II, when the entire nation was mobilized to confront two powerful adversaries in a global conflict involving millions of American troops.
What a pathetic picture!
America doesn't need a commander in chief. It needs a wise, level-headed leader who has the courage to acknowledge that you can't solve problems by throwing ordnance at them, the courage to tell the citizens of the country that we don't need to spend $1 trillion a year on war and preparations for war, and that in fact, if we cut that spending by two-thirds or three-fourths, we'd still have the mightiest military in the world-and more importantly, a much stronger society and economy.
What America needs is a president who sees the military as an option of last resort, not an option of first resort.
Let's banish this commander in chief nonsense from the campaign. Bush has already made the title laughable. That is the response we should have when we hear someone say that title in public.
A guffaw.
Dave Lindorff is a Philadelphia-based investigative reporter and columnist. His latest book is "The Case for Impeachment" (St. Martin's Press, 2006) and now available in paperback. His work is available at www.thiscantbehappening.net
36 Comments so far
Show AllSaw a trailer for a new independent movie that's coming out called Blue State. It's about a guy that moves to Canada to make a statement after GW won again in '04... Seemed kind of contrived at first, but then you hear about blatantly lying to the public... It starts to sound enticing! The blatant disregard for the law that the executive branch has demonstrated over and over again (most recently the Scooter Libby pardon) is revolting!
If the GOP retakes capital hill, I'm outta here! All I wanna know, is who's coming with me! Hahaha!
Anyways, the movie looked pretty good. You can check out the trailer @ www.bluestatemovie.com
GI Dubya
I don't got to fear no evil doer
(I don't gotta fear no evil axis)
Now that I got my top gun plastic action hero
Mounted on my hummin SUV
I don't got to fear no evil doer
Now that I got my top gun plastic action hero
Mounted on my hummin SUV
I don't got to fear no oil wars
I don't got to fear no more star wars
I don't got to fear no over come the evil one wars
Cause I got my cocky little plastic action hero and
He's mounted on my hummin SUV
That's right I don't got to fear no evil doer
I don't got to fear no evil doer
Now that I got my top gun plastic action hero and
And I got him mounted on my humming SUV
I don't got to fear no furriners
I don't got to fear no long necked box cutters
Cause I got my 'bring im on' hero and he's
Mounted on my hummin SUV
He's the Enron stiff little plastic guy
You pull his cord and he'll say
God bless America
Well god bless my little plastic action hero
Thank god he's plastic for ain't he the red rapture button one
Hey well this top gun guy gotta protect one fancy nest
Pams nest maybe?
Pam…Yah
Pam is the material gal
My nest is best …
uses the most oil
OIL you know is an acronym for Operation Iraqi Liberation.
PAM is an acronym for Policy analysis Market.
Poindexter's wet dream.
Who gonna get it next? Don't the market know what's best?
Yah…
Who gonna get it next? Don't the market know what's best?
Who's gonnna get it next?
Is it gonna be us all top gun?
Who gonna get it next? Don't the market know what's best?
You got your OIL; you got your PAH; You got your PAM
You got your plastic action hero, You got your material gal,
Are they sittin on your SUV?
Who gonna get it next? Don't the market know what's best?
So get your plastic action hero…
Got your GI George yet?
He's the Enron stiff little plastic guy
You pull his cord and he'll say: " God bless America"
Then he'll bow down and pray and say
God bless us onward Christian soldiers
God bless our shock and awe
You got your plastic action hero yet?
You got your GI george?
Yes, I do read all the posts. I'm a compulsive reader. It's gotten me in trouble a lot.
DD - as usual, you're delusional. Obama is the one who believes the Republican bullshit about Social Security being near bankruptcy. Clearly, he can't tell truth from bullshit.
Plus, didn't he threaten to bomb Pakistan because BinLaden might be there? Please.
To Bill from Saginaw,
Thanks for your good post above. You explored several scenarios that indeed I wasn't "clear" on, but merely have vague hunches about. The bottom line is that a veteran of combat MAY have learned that war is a pretty important thing to avoid if you can, and then again, as you saw in uniform, the chain of command is sometimes populated with deluded people. We might wish to vote for Col. Potter, perhaps, but not Maj. Frank Burns. We also could perhaps be comfortable with low-raking Radar O'Reilly after he grew older, but certainly not the Col. Flag character who used to occasionally visit the M*A*S*H unit from "intelligence."
Other bottom line: I think Obama has it to identify B.S. from truth, to stare down the former, and act with wisdom on the latter---including being a real CnC when needed.
the infragard article is on alternet. instead of feebs it appears they are feeb-lets, where as they are considered immune from any and all, we in turn have those same rights if confronted by them. everyone from everywhere on every site is extremely paranoid and over the top today. this is as if, okay i am paranoid as well, they have some type of , no actually it is the vision of cheney from 10 years ago coming to fruition. freedomswatch, damn bunch of Corportacracys with freelance mercenaries, contractors, non-union of course, oil interests and the need to spill and smell blood. bunch of a$$wipes, oh my when r those radical islamofacistsjihadiststaliban scary moslems cummin to git us, oh my, oh me...
tried the find a new country thing in december and january, no, keeping my tush here, going down with the ship, my ship, not letting it go down just yet.....
I can just see it now - McCain in his first day in office, singing "bomb bomb bomb, bomb bomb Iran", whereupon the door flies open, and in rushes Debra Cagan (his new head of Homeland Security), "Gosh Mr President, when do we start? You know I hate all Iranians".
This, I know is black humour at it's worst, but you see, I am scared that it will actually happen.
God help us all, because we are not capable of helping ourselves.
David Grayling: I wish I could live in Oz or NZ, but my age would probably preclude me for doing so. There are a lot of people here in the UK, who are concerned about the US leadership race, but you never hear about us. It is as though the British media and politicians cannot wait for a winner to be declared, and then they will start the sickening adulation and congratulations.
I am ashamed to be English, when I look at the way our politicians caved in on the Iraq issue.
Do you remember the 1959 film "on the beach", it was very chilling watching that as a youngster, and I think that it is quite relevant, in these times, when the rhetoric from the US, regarding Iran (and other states) is worrying to say the least.
It's fair to say that the majority of US citizens can rightly be described as "crazy" (you said it Sandyk, and I agree), whilst the people who post on here, should be spreading the word as quickly as possible.
Woodrow Wilson was a great President?
The man who is said to have believed that he was directed by God, and frequently said so, and was said to have thought that God had made him president of the United States
The man who was duped into giving us the Federal Reserve Act and Income Tax in 1913 setting the stage for a century of war and depressions.
The man who defined nation building, starting with regime change and occupation in Mexico in 1914. A man who sent the U.S. Marines into Haiti and the Dominican Republic to support repressive governments for the business elite and intervened in various other Latin American countries so he could teach them how to elect good men.
A man whose closest adviser was a Communist (Col. House)
The man who despite being warned by Henry Morgenthau of the massacres of Armenian Christians "a campaign of race extermination." killing as many as 1.5 million Armenians, did not intervene militarily or even threaten to do so, probably because they were not the right kind of Christian (he was Presbyterian).
The man who lied to the American people that we would go to war in order to get elected in 1916 and then got us into the war in 1917 . For what, the Germans announced they would sink any ship supplying their enemies in a time of declared war. If we refused to supply Britain, they would have negotiated peace. No one even knows what the stupid war was about anyways, an assasination having nothing to do with Germany, France, Russia or Germany? Yet we go into a war of choice and lose over 100,000 men, for nothing except to enrich our bankers.
The man who allowed the Communist Trotsky to go back to Russia in 1917 and to overthrow the peoples revolution by non-communists who overthrew the Czar. He was detained by Canada on a stopover from NY, and they were at war at the time and knew that if the Bolsheviks started another revoultion this would weaken Russia who was fighting the Germans on their side. Wilson requested them to release him.
The man who gave us the War Powers Act of 1917 and the Espionage and Sedition Acts of 1917 and 1918 that put people in JAIL for speaking out against the government war of choice.
The man who agreed to the Versailles Treaty, a treaty intended to be so unfair as to virtually ensure there would be a 2nd World War (never ratified by the Senate).
The man who supported the League of Nations that gave the British and French the Mandate to occupy the Middle East and is responsible for many of the problems today.
The man who reversed the Federal policy of integration in the Capital
The man who is probably more like George Bush than any other President?
David Grayling. February 7th, 2008 10:46 pm
Seen from as far away as Australia, what's happening over in your neck of the woods is kind of like a horror movie, like seeing a real life beginning of 1984.
The New World was a nice dream. It seems to be turning into a nightmare. I'm glad I'm on the other side of the world although it may not be far enough.
www.dangerouscreation.com
You're right! I would already be in Canada if not for the cold. I would love to be on the other side of the world. I used to be proud to be a yank but no more, unless we defy the ignorant masses here and elect BARACK OBAMA for pres. Otherwise, get my passport ready.
BTW, the Bush crime regime has purchased a compound in Paraguay, SA. Anyone know the extridition laws in that country? Bet Ken Lay has decorated the place for them and Dumya's DICK! Pray and meditate for us over here since we are surrounded by STUPID PEOPLE and crazy christians!
greenerthanthou February 7th, 2008 1:52 pm
Madhoosier, I agree with everything you write up until your last sentence.
Jesus, you read all that? Not me! If people can't condense their thoughts to two paragraphs I think they need to get their own blog or STFU!!!
Seen from as far away as Australia, what's happening over in your neck of the woods is kind of like a horror movie, like seeing a real life beginning of 1984.
The New World was a nice dream. It seems to be turning into a nightmare. I'm glad I'm on the other side of the world although it may not be far enough.
www.dangerouscreation.com
Martial Law will not be televised.
Hey, locust, you got any dates from 2001 still available in your pool?
In the Roman Republic experience in several military campaigns (and in increasing positions of responsibility) was necessary in order to have a political career.
Being C-in-C allows Bush to order people about.
He is too weak of a person to lead people so instead he commands (or tries to).
Martial law is for when Obama is elected. If McCain is elected then things will settle down.
It's not too late to join my Martial Law pool. It only costs $5, name the date and if you're right all monies go to you to afford the lawyer you'll need to get out of whichever KBR gulag you're sent to.
For further proof of corporate ownership and marriage in a totalitarian fascist state, just go to http://www.infragard.net/
and browse!!!
You can also google 'infragard' to see all the chapter web sites.
Takeover is already done. only thing left to do is declare martial law for the fascist state to appear.
As a former draftee and US Army veteran, let me assure Daniel David and others that a stint of military service in a politician's personal resume can cut both ways.
With John McCain the destined Republican candidate, you can bet your last dinar the GOP attack machine is already revving up to go after Barack Obama or Billary big, big time for the liberal Democrat's "lack" of "real" previous military experience particularly at this historic moment, a time of war..... Dave Lindorff's excellent article and this comment thread are likely to be most timely come next fall.
It's not at all clear to me what DD is referring to when he talks about former soldiers "grinding old axes" or "avenging what they were commanded to do while in uniform", but here's my take on the issue.
Prior military service has been seized upon as a significant credential for holding high federal electoral office ever since the days of George Washington. Many who parlayed their wartime exploits into attaining the Presidency or leadership positions in the Congress proved to be corrupt and racist rogues. A few - Dwight Eisenhower certainly, Teddy Roosevelt to some degree - became good Presidents, largely by then avoiding war when the external temptations arose.
In my opinion, the single greatest asset (for the wannabe political leader) of being an honorably discharged veteran is the capacity to stare down and shut up the warmonger when the situation calls for it, especially if it's a chicken hawk extolling the virtues of military adventurism to be paid for with other people's blood and lives. Not only having been there, but having also actually seen combat while serving and surviving the experience, helps enable one to become a vociferous, effective advocate for peace.
On the other hand, veterans also recognize the sweet smell of bullshit when the virtues of the cult of the warrior are being peddled like so much snake oil. Damn right military intelligence is usually an oxymoron. When those public opinion polls (of civilians) consistently show the uniformed military held in much higher esteem for moral virtue, honesty, integrity, and the like compared to teachers, lawyers, doctors, clergy, Congress, and other occupational groups, I marvel at how well it proves again that familiarity quite properly breeds contempt. Some of the most vile, conniving, sadistic, bigoted, and crooked men I have ever encountered in my lifetime were on active duty sporting rank and good conduct medals. And I'm a criminal defense attorney.
The Big Con - the biggest con consistently played upon those who have never worn the nation's uniform by those of us who have - is that a military background experience makes us presumptively better qualified to hold and voice learned opinion about matters touching upon national defense. This is not just an abstract violation of some principle of maintaining civilian control over the military decisionmaking, although the substantive political views of Generals Douglas MacArthur, George Patton, and Curtis "Dr. Strangelove" Lemay are certainly food for thought. What I mean is that from the lowest end of the khaki food chain up through the noncommissioned and commissioned officer ranks it is astounding how many utter jackasses and borderline lunatics there are populating the chain of command.
The systematic exclusion of African Americans, and of women, from from equal access to military careers (until the latter part of the 20th Century) stood as an enormous barrier - a red, white and blue ceiling, so to speak - to success in career electoral politics. The Big Con bestows unearned gravitas far too often in my opinion, and has been virtually a litmus test credential to be taken seriously on military matters at least ever since the end of World War II (which is far, far to long).
Which brings me finally to John McCain.
For the last eight years, Little George and Dead Eye Dick and the civilians running the Pentagon on Rummy's watch have given civilian control of the military a bad name. At least on the issue of torture, Senator McCain did step up and challenge Karl Rove's orthodoxy while the Democrats meekly held his coat.
McCain's a survivor. He's tough. A hero, who before he was shot down and captured, took part in the saturation bombing of North Vietnam, and is damn proud of it.
As the GOP's presidential candidate, can we really trust the keys to the Oval Office to a guy who hums "Bomb-bomb-bomb-Iran" for the delight of his party's faithful?
There must be a delicate way for the Democratic Party's nominee to communicate the simple truth that for some folks, sometimes, a certain type of military background experience might be cause to disqualify, rather than qualify, for holding higher office.
Bill from Saginaw
Greenerthanthou: Mayer's book is definitely an eye-opener, though I find it too reminiscent of modern America for comfort…
This article makes a few good points, particularly with regards to Americans' curious martial obsession, but I have to take exception to this one: "Great presidents in wartime-Abraham Lincoln, Woodrow Wilson and Franklin Roosevelt–were great not because they were generals."
Lincoln and Roosevelt were above average, perhaps, but Woodrow Wilson was a megalomaniac and war-monger of the first degree. His administration was even guiltier of violating the civil liberties of American citizens than Bush has been (especially German-Americans) and propagandized the country into a war in which it had no business engaging. This tipped the balance of that war in favor of an unjust peace and the inevitable slaughters that followed. The homework assignment for anyone who believes the man was a great president is to read Thomas Fleming's "The Illusion of Victory: America in World War I" and any books you can find on the Espionage and Sedition Acts, Robert LaFollette, Jeanette Rankin, and Eugene Debs.
I also tend to disagree with the notion that generals are inherently more war-like than civilians if given power. It's chickenhawks like Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld, etc. who are the dangerous ones.
"I hate war as only a soldier who has lived it can, only as one who has seen its brutality, its futility, its stupidity."- Dwight D. Eisenhower
"Dulce bellum inexpertis (War is delightful to the inexperienced)." - Erasmus, the 16th-century scholar
Gee - this an excerpt from another CD article just posted:
*note - notice the "when, not if, martial law is declared" comment
They're not bothering to hide the takeover any more. They are preparing for a full blown FASCIST state!!!!
"..... One business owner in the United States tells me that InfraGard members are being advised on how to prepare for a martial law situation - and what their role might be. He showed me his InfraGard card, with his name and e-mail address on the front, along with the InfraGard logo and its slogan, "Partnership for Protection." On the back of the card were the emergency numbers that Schneck mentioned.
This business owner says he attended a small InfraGard meeting where agents of the FBI and Homeland Security discussed in astonishing detail what InfraGard members may be called upon to do.
"The meeting started off innocuously enough, with the speakers talking about corporate espionage," he says. "From there, it just progressed. All of a sudden we were knee deep in what was expected of us when martial law is declared. We were expected to share all our resources, but in return we'd be given specific benefits." These included, he says, the ability to travel in restricted areas and to get people out.
But that's not all.
"Then they said when - not if - martial law is declared, it was our responsibility to protect our portion of the infrastructure, and if we had to use deadly force to protect it, we couldn't be prosecuted," he says.
I was able to confirm that the meeting took place where he said it had, and that the FBI and Homeland Security did make presentations there. One InfraGard member who attended that meeting denies that the subject of lethal force came up. But the whistleblower is 100 percent certain of it. "I have nothing to gain by telling you this, and everything to lose," he adds. "I'm so nervous about this, and I'm not someone who gets nervous."
yeah bush is so obsessed with his stupid "commander in chief" title, ignoring the rest of his responsibilities. like a silly boy fixated on a toy. iraq iraq iraq iraq, terror, that's what we hear all day from this pathetic excuse for a president. this war is a complete farce! nothing new to add here, just ranting
"What voters are electing is the leader of the country-the person who is responsible for administering the federal bureaucracy that protects our environment, regulates our commerce, funds our education system, builds our roads, and, oh yes, chooses the top brass that runs our military."
word?? and all this time i thought they were only there to bail out banks when they've overstretched themselves by suckering people. And all this time i thought i was because they had nothing better to do. i've been turned upside down!!!!
Just hit that Freedomswatch site (stupid name!), and it seems there are only a couple of people on the so-called blog. So, I checked out the issues page, and you all have to see this bunch of garbage!!~~
ISSUES
Conservative Solutions Agenda
Freedom's Watch believes in limited government, low taxes, less regulation, free enterprise, and more personal responsibility. We believe that a secure border is vital to the national security and economic security of America. We promote and advance solutions to public policy problems that empower individuals and are based on free market principles, not government command and control. Whether opposing liberal tax hikes, granting taxpayer-funded health care to illegal aliens, working to confirm judges who will follow the law and not legislate from the bench, or battling liberal special interest groups, Freedom's Watch is on the frontlines fighting for conservative principles. Freedom's Watch provides a credible conservative voice and strong leadership on pressing domestic issues to keep America strong, safe, and prosperous.
Radical Islam and National Security
Radical Islam is a political and ideological movement that poses an immediate threat to the national security of the United States. The threat of a nuclear Iran is equally real and just as serious. At Freedom's Watch, our mission is to educate and inform the American people about these threats and the consequences of inaction; provide a powerful voice for those who support victory in Iraq and the Global War on Terror; and promote a strong national defense capable of defeating radical Islam anywhere around the globe. Freedom's Watch never forgets the sacrifices of our brave men and women in uniform and always supports them. In keeping with this mission, Freedom's Watch provides the necessary resources to expose, confront, and ultimately defeat the global menace of radical Islam and the emerging Iranian threat.
Illegal Drugs and Crime
Illegal drugs ruin lives, destroy communities, and impose enormous costs on taxpayers. Freedom's Watch opposes the legalization of illicit drugs. We believe a sound drug policy must be both tough and humane, and based on three proven strategies – enforcement, prevention, and treatment. Freedom's Watch not only challenges state and national legislative initiatives to legalize drugs, but also addresses the crime, gang violence, and border chaos caused by illegal drug trafficking.
Opposing Big Labor's Radical Agenda
Freedom's Watch supports the rights of every worker and opposes attempts by Big Labor to enact its left-wing, big government political agenda. Despite dwindling membership, the Big Labor bosses are using their political muscle to expand membership through coercion, intimidation, and abuse by ending secret-ballot union elections, block free trade agreements, raise corporate taxes, prevent school choice, and expand government control of the economy. Freedom's Watch supports state and national efforts that protect individual workers' rights and assists those who want to stop Big Labor's radical agenda.
Great War Commanders - like George Custerbush?
The networks chose not to broadcast Ron Paul's speech to CPAC this afternoon. They probably figured John McCain had given it for him.
spencefi said: "We need a leader for the free world"
I agree, we do need a leader for the free world. Preferably not an American. I'm not quite sure why Americans seem to think that the president is the 'leader of the free world" when that's such a bunch of bullshit. The President of the United States is the world's number one terrorist! Nothing "free" about that. In fact, "free" is such a commie idea... let's let the 'free market' dictate our democracy. That's the American Way!
Thank you David! Excellent article. I will use that argument the next time someone starts using that Commander-in-Chief line. We need a leader for the free world, not a CiC. After all, if he or she is the leader he needs to be, we never need to use that title in the first place!
I agree with madhoosier, but his response seems a bit "off topic" to me. Bush clings to the "commander in chief" title because nowhere in the Constitution (you know, that "g--damned piece of paper"?), are there duties ascribed to the title as there are for the office of president. Therefore, hiding behind the "commander in chief" banner (not to mention his trumped up war -- after all, what's the use of a commander in chief if the nation's not at war?), Bush has the perfect cover for his facist makeover of the U.S. Government, all in the name of "national security."
I agree with greenerthanthou that they will likely wait until Hillary is good and in office before they stop pumping wild money into the system to prop it up - then they can blame the HippieLiberalDemocrats AND a female for any and all consequences - and then spend the next century telling folks what a mistake it was to let someone like that into power.
I agree with greenerthanthou!!!!!
& Lindorff.
Madhoosier had a point about the PNAC need for a 'new Pearl Harbor' but omitted one detail.
In the original PNAC document, Condoleeza Rice was the quoter of the phrase. She was also quoted elsewhere at least once.
After the Iraq war began and while she was being primed for Secy. of State, all references to her were removed.
Again, I think you're right, but I reserve my judgement. If, in spite of corporate fascist greed and chicanery, any other candidate has a chance or Clinton won't win, look for suspension of the elections and martial law sooner rather than later.
I guess Bush is the end result of everybody's clamoring for a government run like a business.
Now that's the kind of comment an author likes to hear! Thank you. (If you want you can go to my site and order the book (see the right hand column), and get it autographed, and for less than it would cost at Amazon.)
Dave Lindorff
http://www.thiscantbehappening.net
Madhoosier, I agree with everything you write up until your last sentence. More likely, they will pump up the economy until they install Clinton, then let it collapse, THEN declare martial law, round up dissidents, etc.
Why cancel the elections when they control the voting machines and Clinton is just as willing as Bush to go along with the corporate fascist agenda?
The facade of democracy is important to them. Even in Nazi Germany "They Thought They Were Free". (A book by Milton Mayer that I strongly recommend).
Oh my gosh!! Dave Lindorf...your writing is excellent and will get a copy of your latest book today. THANK YOU!!
These are excellent comments, especially from Madhoosier! It's true that Midwesterners have a great deal of just plain common sense and Madhoosier is very eloquent as well. Obama fills the bill for me and, as a great-grandmother offers hope and confidence that the next generations will restore the American Dream. Thanks all!
Some think that a president with some military service will be a better commander in chief. I tend to think the opposite. Most people who were ever in the service had some tough experiences there (even in peacetime) and may be subconsciusly wishing to "grind some old axes" with potentially disastrous results. It would not surprise me at all that Barack Obama might actually have more respect for people in uniform than John McCain. Remember, the CnC position is about decisions they might make in the future to "initiate" something, not about avenging what they were commanded to do when in uniform earlier in their lives.
Post to http://www.freedomswatch.org blogs and confront the Bush supporters
Lindorff writes; "What America needs is a president who sees the military as an option of last resort, not an option of first resort."
The entire PNAC political theory is that violence is the option of first resort. They stated they needed "A new Pearl Harbor" to be able to implement their agenda. They stated that they needed new, usable nuclear weapons; they stated that they wanted to develop racially specific biological weapons. They stated that violent "regime change" was an acceptable policy. When the U.N. inspectors were on the ground in Iraq with total access to Saddam's infrastructure they ordered the U.N. out so they could launch a war of aggression because they knew that if the U.N. inspectors were allowed another month of inspections without finding the nonexistent WMD's their trumped up excuse for war would be shot to hell.
What this nation hasn't figured out is that their international policies and their domestic policies are the same. As the first responders were breathing the toxic fumes of ground zero instead of announcing that there was nobody to rescue and calling it off this administration lied about the air quality and sent thousands of men and women into the toxic cloud.
In New Orleans you could have driven into the Convention Center with semis full of supplies at any time after Hurricane Katrina except that FEMA and other authorities had barricaded the roads. Caravans of fishermen towing bass boats were turned away from rescuing the stranded citizens of New Orleans, had they been allowed to launch their boats the evacuation of New Orleans would have been completed in less than a quarter of the time it took the lumbering helicopters to winch people off rooftops.
As people were dying of thirst and breaking into stores to get a bottle of pop the Bush administration ordered that looters were to be shot on sight. They'd rather send in Blackwater than bottled water.
Bush has only ever admitted that he has made mistakes in choosing people in his administration, because of this they are not going to grant themselves pardons and retire from office at the end of their term. They contend that they are above the law, torture is legal, they can wiretap anybody for any reason, and hundreds of other blatantly illegal acts aren't violations of the law. As a direct result of neoconservative economic policies the U.S. is poised on the brink of a depression that was completely predictable. I have no doubt whatsoever that in response to the economic collapse the Bush administration intendeds to implement fascist policies including rounding up political dissenters, canceling the elections, voiding the Constitution, attempting to install a dictatorship and implementing martial law.
EMBRACE YOUR INNER PRESIDENT. Everybody is a potential leader. You just bring forth your dreams in a way that at least some other people will understand and accept. OH and be humble, listen to others, and try not to be a despot! Thus goeth The Human Angel's Brief Manual on Leadership. On sale now at The Imaginary Store for the price of a Sigh.