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44 Years Later, LBJ's Ghost Hovers Over the 44th President
A few days after the inauguration, in a piece celebrating the arrival of the Obama administration, New York Times columnist Bob Herbert wrote that the new president has clearly signaled: "No more crazy wars."
I wish.
Last week -- and 44 years ago -- there were many reasons to celebrate the inauguration of a president after the defeat of a right-wing Republican opponent. But in the midst of numerous delightful fragrances in the air, a bad political odor is apt to be almost ineffable.
Right now, on the subject of the Afghan war, what dominates the discourse in Washington is narrowness of political vision -- while news outlets are reporting that the number of U.S. forces in Afghanistan is expected to "as much as double this year to 60,000 troops."
It's heartbreaking now to read the admixture of profound humanity and nascent war madness in the inaugural address of Lyndon Johnson. "In a land of great wealth, families must not live in hopeless poverty," he proclaimed. "In a land rich in harvest, children just must not go hungry. In a land of healing miracles, neighbors must not suffer and die unattended." And that wasn't just rhetoric. LBJ went on to launch Great Society programs with great effects and far greater promise.
But the same inaugural speech foreshadowed the massive slaughtering of people in Vietnam, and the undermining of the United States -- with what Martin Luther King Jr. two years later likened to "some demonic destructive suction tube" -- bringing home terrible depths of human pain and bitterness. "If American lives must end, and American treasure be spilled, in countries we barely know," Johnson said at his inauguration, "that is the price that change has demanded of conviction and of our enduring covenant."
Pundits and congressional leadership nodded sagely as the president cited the threat of communism and proceeded to boost U.S. troop levels in Vietnam. Similar nodding -- and nodding off -- is now underway as the president cites the threat of terrorism and prepares to boost U.S. troop levels in Afghanistan.
Down the line, some key words from Obama's inaugural address -- telling dubious foreign leaders that "your people will judge you on what you can build, not what you destroy" -- will need to face a reflection in the mirror.
Lyndon Johnson's capacity to deliver on hopes for a Great Society shattered on the jagged steel of a war that, year after year, few pundits were willing to acknowledge was crazy. The war effort in Vietnam was the essence of supposed rationality.
Now, hopes for the Obama administration are vulnerable to destruction from an escalating war. "Afghanistan could quickly come to define the Obama presidency," the New York Times reported on Sunday.
Many independent journalists and authors, such as Chris Hedges and Sonali Kolhatkar, have written from depths of knowledge about the derangement of the U.S. war effort in Afghanistan. That effort won't bring "victory," but it can multiply the suffering endlessly.
Several weeks ago, a Bob Herbert column made a practical moral argument: "Sending thousands of additional men and women (some to die, some to be horribly wounded) on a fool's errand in the rural, mountainous guerrilla paradise of Afghanistan would be madness."
Days after the inauguration, the news has included a fresh spate of stories about Afghan civilians killed by U.S. missiles. Hamid Karzai, in effect the president of Kabul, declared that the Pentagon's frequent killing of civilians in Afghanistan "is strengthening the terrorists." And so it goes.
Escalation of a crazy war will make it crazier. Pretending otherwise will not make it any less insane -- or any less destructive.
And, as we heard in Obama's inaugural address, "people will judge you on what you can build, not what you destroy."
- Posted in
68 Comments so far
Show AllPIPEDREAMS Says: "If it seems to good to be true, odds are it's not true!"
Do we abandon Afghanistan again to the narco war lords and the Taliban? This is an extremely toxic place. The last time we walked away the Jihadists filled the vacuum and before long 3K dead Americans paid the bill. So, granted none of us want an endless war here what do we do? Do we allow this place to become a design lab for further terror strikes against everyone et al.? I don't have an answer but it's a problem.
You will never reach an answer by adhering to the mythology of Jihadists being responsible for 911.
PIPEDREAMS Says: "If it seems to good to be true, odds are it's not true!"
Oh, IC then your saying the 19 people that have been identified as the terrorists on 9/11 weren't really terrorists at all but actually who? CIA, NSA, MOSSAD ( of course because we all know the Jews are behind it all). Or how about space aliens? Grow up. The facts are 19 ARABS mostly Saudi members of Al Qeda did this under explicit instructions from Bin Laden et al. You want to believe some other fantasy go right ahead but understand it's because you and people like you have already decided to pin this on your own ideological or political enemies no matter what the FACTS.
Incredible. Doesn't it occur to you how much those arguments sound like the ones that got us into Iraq? The evil of Saddam Hussein (now the Taliban), aiding and abetting terror, the horrors he visited on his own people. Eight years and over 3,000 of our own dead later -- and thousands upon thousands of Iraqis dead or mutiliated, half of them children -- and we're desperately trying to get out and not an inch closer to bin Laden. There is no reason to think the same won't happen in Afghanistan. Those people know their landscape, far more rugged and dangerous and full of hiding places than Iraq (not a nice big fat city like Baghdad to bomb to rubble). And of course there's the border with Pakistan to help us spread the war into that country.
To save our own soldiers, the military will rely more than ever on bombs dropped on houses in the night, killing more civilians, more children. We have absolutely no business sending thousands of troops into that country or bombing it. We need tons of special ops, deep intelligence, genuine smarts in our intelligence services, hard work behind the scenes with other nations. Afghanistan is the next disaster waiting to happen, and I think the American people are sick of reading that we've killed more civilians. We didn't hire Obama for that.
If you would ever have bothered to do any honest research on 911, you would know that what you present as "FACTS" are not facts at all. For almost two years I also believed the bogus story about the 19 hijackers, and the motivations seemed plausible to me at the time. I'm not interested in debating your so-called facts here. You need to do your own work in researching. Just start googling 911. What ideological bent keeps you tied to the Official Story. There is so much material contradicting this whitewash if you are sincerely interested.
Yawn...
As with so many of the dumbed-down electorate, I'm so pleased that you, too, are an ardent follower of fashion.
It is wonderful how the defenders of militarism prefer insults and generalities to factual arguments.
Pipedream. - "we all know the Jews are behind it all. Or how about space aliens? Grow up."
nwfisher. - "Reynolds foil is on sale at most local grocers this month. I'd be interested to see your new hat design."
There are volumes and volumes of factual arguments questioning the official 9-11 story. Can steel girders melt from a gasoline fire? Can skyscrapers fall straight down at almost freefall speed if the lower stories are not exploded? Can a newly minted amateur pilot make a 270 degree turn directly into a low target like the Pentagon? Is it possible that no interceptor jets would be scrambled even after two hours of warning? Just some questions. Take a look at "Architects and Engineers for 9/11 Truth," http://www.ae911truth.org or google: 9/11,"David Ray Griffin"
Of course there are also plenty of competent technical people who favor the official story.
Main point? Before you engage in any more glib ridicule, especially on such an important issue, do some research. And as they say in high school math classes, "Show you work."
The FBI Most Wanted list does not list the WTC attacks as crimes for which Mr. Bin Laden is wanted.
Do you have information which the FBI does not? If so, The FBI would like to see your evidence, I am sure.
So where is the Terror now?
Any place on earth can be a terror lab.
Our invasion made all things worse and the longer we stay we make terror spread.
if bin laden is alive, he has won already because his strategy was to bust the USA economically.
the longer we play his WAR ON TERROR game the poorer we get and it becomes inevitable that the terror will come home and start here by desperate folks here.
Also if you look at all wars today, most are funded from all sides on the money from the "War On Drugs".
We are using a personal medical problem to help pay for terror labs and terror labs in the pentagon.
and on "LBJ's Ghost", Johnson used his "War on Poverty" as a distraction from his Viet Nam War and escalation of the Cold War that JFK was winding Down.
War is big business and War = Terror.
War is the problem.
Soloman's comparisons between the tragic Vietnam decisions that destroyed LBJ's Great Society presidency and what may well happen to Obama if he escalates more troops into Afghanistan is well taken. The GOP has openly embraced military adventurism abroad and engaged in sabre rattling ever since the days of Teddy Roosevelt. The Dems usually talk much more about peace and the virtues of international law, but seem to wind up getting the country enmeshed in bigger, uglier wars when they hold the Oval Office. Once again, George W. Bush and his global war on terror may have broken the mold. Now Republicans give us both more wars and bigger ones.
The parallel that needs to be drawn here, it seems to me, really goes back to the domino theory.
Only a tiny, tiny sliver of the farthest right wind of the neo-con right wing still clings to the belief that US involvement in the Vietnam War did, in fact, prevent Communism from dominating all of southeast Asia, the Malay penninsula, Indonesia, and beyond. There is a wide consensus among historians, political scientists, politicians, and the American public which now recognizes that the domino theory was bullshit being misapplied by the Johnson White House. Once US troops were on the ground and the bombing started, Vietnam was much more a war about Vietnamese nationalism, than it was about international Marxism or Cold War geopolitics.
What is spooky about the dynamics of Afghanistan right at this moment is that a return to power by the Taliban in Afghanistan (where, as they say, empires always go to die) indeed might lead to a domino effect bringing radical Islamic theocrats into power in the tribal regions, the Swat Valley, and even Pakistan itself. To me, this current domino theory scenario (with the last domino to fall being a giant nation state already possessing nukes) is a lot more realistic, and a lot more dangerous situation, than ever actually faced LBJ in 1964.
Of course all US and NATO troops should be pulled out of the region as soon as feasible. The continued American presence there serves to rally support behind the jihadis (much like US military excesses strengthened the Viet Cong), while undermining the political fortunes of local figures who look favorably towards secularism, modernity, womens' rights, and other western civil libertarian values. That's the long term picture.
However, I believe Obama's "surge" out of Iraq into Afghanistan is really very much a short term reaction to a perceived, and perhaps very real, emergency brewing up on the ground in that region. An escalating military committment that is open ended will merely add the United States to a list of outsiders like the Soviet Union, the British colonials, and Alexander the Great, who went into Afghanistan to impose outside values by force of arms, and came away empty handed and often humiliated.
Barack should have his envoy Richard Holbrooke announce that all US and NATO forces are prepared to leave within 90 days of Osama bin Laden and Zwahiri being turned over to a neutral Muslim state for trial under international law. If that means cutting a deal with Mullah Omar to seal the deal, then so be it.
Bill from Saginaw
Maybe your right Dave, Well see.
I have read arguments from people all over the political spectrum regarding how the Vietnam War prevented some nationalist (combined with communist or not) movements in Southeast Asia from expanding and achieving success, though in Cambodia the nationalist movement grew but became twisted and self-destructive. Part of the rationale for the war was to inflict so much damage on Vietnam that others in the region would think twice before fighting against Western capitalist domination. And the war apparently was successful to a significant degree in achieving that aim. But since that goal is not recognized by the great majority of Americans or people in the world (certainly not by me or I suspect any progressives) as a legitimate objective in war, those who agree with it are reluctant to argue that the war was a success because of achieving it.
This certainly brings up some excellent questions about the nature of human conflict and we are wise to consider that past wars were fought for political and social advancement. Today we might also consider the influence that religion exerts on current conflicts. If one believes that "God" has chosen them to be the representative of his will, it seems that an idea of world religious domination might follow.
I hear many people bringing up the idea of the Zionist connection behind much of the current activity we see, be it in Gaza or if generalized, elsewhere. Believing one's group to be unique in this way and responsible for not only some revelatory catalytic action, be it to fulfill some ancient prophesy, or make their "God" the supreme ruler of all, might be a central cause behind the escalating war crisis.
Perhaps the wars in Korea and Vietnam were slanted towards Capitalist dominion, it seems to me that these current "wars" in the Mideast might have more to do with some form of Religious dominion.
What happens when snowflakes stick together?...............friends come together and have snow ball fights. :)
Leea
I agree Bill that we should ask for bin laden to be turned over... but if he is dead and that is a secret and nobody can prove he is dead or alive, that condition will just keep the occupation going.
If he is alive, He could be anywhere and most likely in Pakistan as anywhere else.
Peace is the way to get good Intel. We can always go back to war if we have to.
People forget that the Taliban leadership actually offered to try Osama bin Laden - under Sharia law. In response, Bush bombed the country, killing around 3,500 people who had nothing to do with the Twin Towers attack.
Afghanistan is a busted up country, and the United States is just the latest imperial power there. All of the bombings and troop surges have no purpose - except maybe to protect a future oil pipeline, but no legitimate purpose.
-TIA
This article misses the mark, as -sigh- so many do. I shall, once again, elucidate the reality that we all must see if we are to make progress.
Why does Mr. Obama want to double the number of troops in Afghanistan?
He said it was because Afghanistan is the 'central front' in the 'war on terror'.
There is no 'Afghan war' and using that term (as well as 'Iraq war') just adds to the fog of war, hiding the real conflict from the American public.
The US military does NOT award an 'Afghan war' medal. It awards an 'Afghan campaign' medal, as a campaign, a battlefield, in a larger war (same with Iraq).
The US military awards a Global war on terrorism service medal, and that's all you need to know about which conflict the military and the government are waging, even if the public think something else.
Progressives can continue to talk about all the wars that they think are being fought, but the government and military are fighting an insane and unwinnable war on terror, waged to 'prevent future terrorism' by our announced enemies al-Qaeda and the Taliban.
That's why the missile strikes into Pakistan, aimed at al-Qaeda. That's why the cross-border attack last year from Iraq into Syria, aimed at 'foreign fighters linked to al-Qaeda'. That's why the air strikes into Somalia, aimed at various nebulous groups such as 'Islamic extremists linked to al-Qaeda'.
Get it, yet? It's one big global f@@@-uped 'whack the terrorists' conflict that will never end because future terror can never be fully eradicated (unless we're all in cages, of course). It's been seven years so far and nobody has even yet elucidated what victory could possibly look like.
'Preventing future terrorism' (Congress's words) is a goal that's unachievable, so like LBJ, Mr. Obama is stuck with the following choices:
1. Withdraw from the war without victory and suffer the political consequences.
2. Continue with more of the same (more troops, more money, more death) and hope that things somehow get better.
Which do you think Mr. Obama has chosen?
"'whack the terrorists' conflict that will never end"
Nothing ever lasts forever, and it could end in a way that is beyond imagining.
The longer we exacerbate the situation instead of calming the situation, especially with "the hope for change" at the helm, the more we risk a world war three.
Other nations watch us and follow our lead. I pray my President can truly lead as we hope he intends. To build, not destroy.
What happens when snowflakes stick together?...............friends come together and have snow ball fights. :)
Leea
The US has always used wars as the default stimulus package to revive its economy.
With the US economy in the tank it will be easy to recruit lots of cannon fodder to send to Afghanistan or elsewhere.
Correction: War of Error
The hope is that if the economy gets bad enough, we wont be able to keep all those military bases operating overseas and the military will have to shut down as there isn't enough money to buy all the oil that it uses.
I'm not sure what Norman is arguing for here. Does he want us to leave Afghanistan and let the Taliban take over again?
There is no easy answer to this problem. If the nato escalation results in the end of hostilities---say it happens in Obama's first term---then I'm all for it.
"What gives the US any right to determine who should govern Afghanistan? Why do you apparently assume that the government the US would install would be any better than the Taliban?"
Of course you are right. We have no business telling the Afghanis who should lead them. Installed President Karzai seems like a corporate stooge. But the problem is that we ARE there; and the choices we have seem to be to either keep things as they are (not working), leave (give-up and give it back to the Taliban), or try to bring it to a close through a plan like Obama's.
But the US does have it's self proclaimed right to interfere with, oppose or topple the governments of countries that hold lands that contain or allow access to strategic resources.
The reason the US is in Afghanistan has nothing to do with the Taliban, or hunting Ossama Bin Ladin.
It never did.
It does, however, have everythng to do with a pipeline right of way granted by the former head of the UNOCAL oil company, one Hamid Kharzai, now 'president' of Afghanistan. Who in reality is just another US puppet and little more than the Mayor of Kabul (which he is widely know as by the population of Afghanistan).
Walk in peace.
The reason we went in there has everything to do with the fact that the Taliban would not play ball. The pipeline you referenced was proposed to the Taliban and they nixed it. So we went in under the terrorist ruse.
It has a lot to do with the Taliban.
The Taliban was built and supported by the US for quite a while. Is that why you want it to crush innocent Afghans? I do not wish to see my tax dollars go towards such brutality but if you do, please give Uncle Sam more money or better yet please leave the country and move to Afghanistan and keep helping the Taliban. Obama is not a fool to drag the country into Afghanistan as there are bigger problems here at the homefront to face. Are you some rich corporate welfare queen or something?
Terrance Mitchell
Redfield, South Dakota
Strange response. You assume I want to crush innocent Afghanis. You think I'm helping the Taliban?
And then you imply I'm a corporate welfare queen? I don't get it.
It must be the sensory and cultural deprivation syndrome caused from living where he does. It must especially be bad in winter.
---USAn---
The Taliban were never built or supported by the United States or by the US Central Intelligence Agency. After the Soviet Union withdrew its troops from Afghanistan and a chaotic civil war ensued there between various competing warlord groups, the United States walked away from its decade long clandestine working relationship with Pakistani intelligence that had armed and supported the "brave Afghan freedom fighters" (including a few foreign jihadists like Osama bin Laden) in the long campaign that eventually ousted the Red army.
The Taliban were built and supported by the Pakistani ISI with no involvement whatsoever by the United States government, the CIA, or the DIA.
It was the Pakistani intelligence service ISI that recruited and trained refugees from the camps which sprang up in the tribal areas and on the Pakistan side of the Afghan border during the post-Soviet civil war. The ISI helped the Taliban rise in Afghanistan as a religious-based, Pashtun alternative to the tribal warlord factions incessantly battling there. The Taliban's message of replacing the bloody chaos of warlordism had obvious appeal to ordinary Afghans who found themselves forever caught up in the crossfire.
The Pakistani ISI facilitated creation of the Taliban to secure a relatively friendly Pashtun dominated Afghanistan on its neighboring border, and secondarily to enlist Taliban fighters for operations in Kahsmir, giving Pakistan some degree of deniability in their unending conflicts with India. What has been taking place during the last three or four years, while George W. Bush was focused upon the insurgency in Iraq and extending his global war on terror into Iran, was a major re-emergence of the Taliban - now as a virulently anti-American, anti-NATO force to be reckoned with militarily and politically throughout entire region.
The tail is ominously wagging the dog. That's what I think Obama is talking about when he says Afghanistan rather than Iraq has become the central front in what is labeled the global war on terror.
And Obama is right. This is blowback big time in reaction to George Bush's military interventionism.
What is critical to keep in mind is that the United States never had a thing to do with the rise of the Taliban. It is the Pakistani ISI (one of the key "friendly foreign intelligence services" that helped provide humint info and electronic intercept translation services to the US intelligence community in the months immediately preceding the 911 attacks) that first clandestinely created, and has always since worked hand-in-glove with the Taliban.
What America must do is disengage militarily from Afghanistan in a manner that does not result in a Taliban-linked crazed jihadi theocratic movement taking over Afghanistan, the frontier tribal areas, and even Pakistan itself, when we depart.
Those nuclear weapons of mass destruction in Pakistan's arsenal, potentially available for proliferation through something akin to Dr. Khan's old international network, are very, very real.
Bill from Saginaw
I think it should be remembered that Lyndon Bains Johnson was a bully and mysogynist who benefitted directly from the assasination of JFK.
It was LBJ who expanded the war in Viet Nam.
It was LBJ who knew of the false flag operation we now call Tonkin Gulf.
It was LBJ who ordered the cover-up of the Israeli strike on the USS LIberty.
If I was Obama, I would be very nervous about public engaements. And I would keep a close eye on my Veep who is very cozy with the corporations.
Walk in peace.
Obama's inexperience was the highlight of concerns that many Americans voiced and Hillary Clinton warned against. It was a great concern of mine to be sure.
We will now possibly need to pay the real price for that concern.
"Down the line, some key words from Obama's inaugural address -- telling dubious foreign leaders that "your people will judge you on what you can build, not what you destroy" -- will need to face a reflection in the mirror.'
....and then he will see through the looking glass darkly.
This our final lesson, if one is still needed for us to learn?
What happens when snowflakes stick together?...............friends come together and have snow ball fights. :)
Leea
If we pull out of Afghanistan now, the new elected government will fall and the Taliban will take over the country. One can only assume that the Taliban would then set up shop as a safe haven for terrorists, complete with training camps.
This is a situation where there is an easy answer. What really needs to be done is the world to deal with Pakistan as a safe haven for terrorists. That now includes Muslim terrorists in India. It is more than likely that the Al Qaeda leadership, including Osama Bin Laden, are in the remote Waziristan Province of Pakistan. However, our current status quo is the Pakistan government does enough to pretend they are cracking down on terrorists to keep getting billions of US dollars. The problem in assuming that the military is actually following through is that the military is thoroughly infiltrated by fundamentalist terrorist supporters.
I hate to see our military quagmired like we were in Vietnam. The military leadership gets alienated everytime we have "mission drift." In Vietnam, we were supposed to simply follow through in seeing that national elections were held. When we saw that Ho Chi Minh would have a landslide victory and establish a communist government, the government wanted a repeat of Korea and divide the country. Why? The Dominoe theory was the dominant scare tactic back then, that one Asian country after another would fall to insurgents and communism and become allies of communist China.
Of course, we can look back and easily see this was not true, but the trick is soul searching and asking ourselves whether or not we are falling for the same type of scare tactic. Just substitute the word "terrorism" or the term "Muslim fundamentalist jihad" for "communism" and the Dominoe Theory, and you have a direct match.
Then you have our troops. They are in a situation where there are no front lines, and you have a split second in many situations to decide to pull the trigger on an enemy or risk getting killed. You can't tell who is an enemy and who is a civilian non combatant. Asymetrical Quagmire combat without front lines is extremely demoralizing. In Vietnam, we invented the term "gook" to dehumanize the population, and in Iraq I am sure the terms "camel jockey" or "towel heads" have been used for the same purpose. That makes it easier to pull the trigger.
And then we keep pumping out veterans with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder and other substantial physical injuries that end up comprising one third of our homeless population. It would be quick and easy to say Afghanistan isn't worth that price, as our troops obviously are on a neverending mission with no opportunity to "win." It is not against the rules for the Taliban to launch strikes into Afghanistan from Pakistan, but it is against the rules for us to cross the border and launch strikes on the Taliban in their safe haven. We are playing by their rules, and our only role in this is that we are the targets.
Very good food for thought and action even. I think that having the world in on this mission is the only sure way to not end up in a quagmire.
What happens when snowflakes stick together?...............friends come together and have snow ball fights. :)
Leea
"We are playing by their rules" --
The rules that are supposed to prevent armed forces from attacking non-belligerent countries are NOT the Taliban's rules. They're the rules that are supposed to prevent powerful countries from attacking weaker ones; the whole object of braeking those rules is to persuade the stronger country that it can only achieve its goals by permitting its soldiers & pilots carte blanche to engage in actions that allow them to inflict "collateral damage".
To end the so-called "War on Terror," the US need only to cease its support for separate but equal Palestines, and support instead a single, unified, democratic, secular Palestine with equal rights and protections for Jews, Christians, and Muslims. Failure to do this will guarantee a global nuclear war by 2100.
The reality is that without US support, Israel could no more exist that unicorns or jelly bean rain or – more to the point – Dixie, the separate but equal never-never land of white segregation.
"Just look at her lickin' inside that hen-e-ral's ear!"
Also Nixon's ghost. After 5.25 years of LBJ, we needed a change. Sadly, Nixon didn't represent the type of change that was needed. After 8 years of Dubya, we need a change. Will Obama be the kind of chamge that's needed? End Iraq now, don't wait 4 years like Nixon did on Vietnam.
If the current administration really wants peace in Afghanistan they wouldn't advocate the 'surge'. Peace in Afghanistan-Pakistan will never be achieved as long as 'satans' soldiers are on the ground. We need to get out. Period.
The only way to achieve peace in the region is to involve Russia, Iran, India and China. We can provide them with assistance if need be. A combined effort by these neighbours is far more effective in solving this problem. Pakistan can be coerced into shutting down its terrorist infrastructure by the U.S. clamping down on its funding the Pakistani Army. The Indians need to have this infrastructure shut down as it has become politically suicidal to them to remain as bystanders. The Kashmir issue was already being slowly resolved between them till the Mumbai attacks shut it down.
The 'surge' is absolutely the wrong strategy and will not help in the least bit. We will probably end up installing a politically rekindled Taliban govt anyways, pretend to save face, spin it and get out of there after years of violence and wanton killing.
Why do we have this urge to control everything ? If only we had a genuine interest in resolving issues and helping the Afghans everybody will be happy !
Norm's right to make the comparison - just check the news form Pakistan and Afghanistan - and wait until 'we can't reach agreement with Iran'.
But I could be wrong !
Please be advised that President Karzai is not only an ivy legue graduate,
but was a guest of the Bush Inc cottage in Kennebunk, Maine
Karzai is a member of the Bush Family Corporation called, "The Carlyle Group"
What I am trying to say, is that we don't know who are what we are fighting.
The insider interests are out of control. Where is Obama?
As usual, Norman shows his smarts and progressive worldview.
In the short run we can't know Obama's plan.
He may be acting militaristic in order to establish his tough-guy credentials. Mr. Spock said in a Star Trek film that "only Nixon could go to China".
He may be planning real diplomatic solutions, in spite of the war criminal militarists he has on his team.
Or he may plan to maintain the 190 year-old tradition of US militarism and lawless violence.
We won't know for a while.
Meanwhile good articles like this constitute a good, progressive voice for the rule of law over GWOT.
Well that was refreshing. For once in very long time an article that didn't imly that JFK was escalating in vietnam, like Chomsky and Cockburn alsways do. This is important, AS IT IS NOW CLEARER THAN DAYLIGHT THAT HE WAS GOING TO END US MILITARY INVOLVEMENT, AND NO ITS NOT EVEN FUZZY IT IS CLEAR CUT ITS JUST THAT SUCH A THING WILL NEVER BE NEWSWEEKED LIKE ALL THE KENNEDY BASHING STORIES WILL BE.
When it came out Oliver Stone was ridiculed for this idea. NOW IT IS THE CONCLUSION OF EVERY MAJOR HISTORICAL STUDY OF THE QUESTION SINCE THE NEWSWEEK TIME WALL TO WALL RIDICULE. Somehow our journalist friends have forgotten to retract their ridicule. All an attmept to disuade the left from looking into the now clearer than ever Kennedy Assassination. As even Daniel Ellsberg now agrees > conspiracy CIA! See JFK and the Unspeakable: Why He DIed and Why it Matters. Why do you think the Mafia done it books are now getting the kind of press coverage onece given to the likes of Posners trash Case Closed-- a book that today nobody will touch with a ten foot pole.
_____
Please read JFK and the Unspeakable: Why He Died and Why It Matters, or people will remain thinking that the Presidents Chosen by Wolf Blitzer will change everything, and we-- as a species will devlove into quivering lime Jello, and not even cold quiverin
oujiQualm34-In spite of your post's all caps shouting style, I heartily concur with your book recommendation on JFK by Jim Douglass. For any of you who wonder what in the world this has to do with Norman Soloman's column, let me explain.
Just like Kennedy was offered at least two opportunities to start WWIII over Cuba (Bay of Pigs and the Missile crisis--some thought that Berlin was also a potential powder keg waiting to explode in JFK's face also) President Obam is predicted to be tested by some dramatic provocation within the first 6 months to a year of his presidency. The source of this prophecy is none other than his own VP Joe (the Senator from Mastercard) Biden in a campaign appearence in Seattle around October 20th or so.
Prophet Biden has declared that some great crisis would happen to test the newly elected president, initial public reaction would be great skepticism, that President Obama would have to take drastic steps to restore order, and that they (fatcats like Soros, Bill Gates, and others of such ilk who were in attendence) would need to use whatever influence they had to quell the great public unrest.
Given the history of this country since 1963, Prophet Biden appears to be signaling a potential false flag incident and the imposition of draconian measures to deal with it upon the US populace. The substance of motormouth Biden's utterings was reported in both the Seatle Post Intelligencer and the Chicago Sun Times among other publications and then promptly forgotten.
We know that Obama is hot to militarily get it on in both Afghanistan and Pakistan and we know that he is trying as hard as he can to pass this nearly 1 trillion dollar economic stimulus package. War has always been a wonderful opportunity for totalitarians to force the common folk to relinquish their freedoms, their treasure, and to get them organized working on building greater and more efficient means to produce death and destruction.
The security state establishment otherwise known as the military-industrial complex has not gone away and has not stopped working on their master plans for total global hegemony. They are animated by a spirit of greed and murder that is beyond human, and the power to resist their seductions must be the superior forces of selfless love and sacrificial offering of our lives to a cause greater than our individual selves. (See MKL Jr's Beyond Vietnam speech excerpt below)
*************************
delivered 04/04/67--Has anything really changed in the past 42 years?
A genuine revolution of values means in the final analysis that our loyalties must become ecumenical rather than sectional. Every nation must now develop an overriding loyalty to mankind as a whole in order to preserve the best in their individual societies.
This call for a worldwide fellowship that lifts neighborly concern beyond one's tribe, race, class, and nation is in reality a call for an all-embracing and unconditional love for all mankind. This oft misunderstood, this oft misinterpreted concept, so readily dismissed by the Nietzsches of the world as a weak and cowardly force, has now become an absolute necessity for the survival of man.
When I speak of love I am not speaking of some sentimental and weak response. I am not speaking of that force which is just emotional bosh. I am speaking of that force which all of the great religions have seen as the supreme unifying principle of life. Love is somehow the key that unlocks the door which leads to ultimate reality.
This Hindu-Muslim-Christian-Jewish-Buddhist belief about ultimate reality is beautifully summed up in the first epistle of Saint John: "Let us love one another, for love is God. And every one that loveth is born of God and knoweth God. He that loveth not knoweth not God, for God is love." "If we love one another, God dwelleth in us and his love is perfected in us." Let us hope that this spirit will become the order of the day.
We can no longer afford to worship the god of hate or bow before the altar of retaliation. The oceans of history are made turbulent by the ever-rising tides of hate. And history is cluttered with the wreckage of nations and individuals that pursued this self-defeating path of hate. As Arnold Toynbee says: "Love is the ultimate force that makes for the saving choice of life and good against the damning choice of death and evil. Therefore the first hope in our inventory must be the hope that love is going to have the last word" (unquote).
We are now faced with the fact, my friends, that tomorrow is today. We are confronted with the fierce urgency of now. In this unfolding conundrum of life and history, there is such a thing as being too late. Procrastination is still the thief of time. Life often leaves us standing bare, naked, and dejected with a lost opportunity.
The tide in the affairs of men does not remain at flood -- it ebbs. We may cry out desperately for time to pause in her passage, but time is adamant to every plea and rushes on. Over the bleached bones and jumbled residues of numerous civilizations are written the pathetic words, "Too late." There is an invisible book of life that faithfully records our vigilance or our neglect. Omar Khayyam is right: "The moving finger writes, and having writ moves on."
Poet
I really appreciate this post Poet. I suggest that one word that describes the kind of love and care we need today is 'benevolence' or a will to do good. Even better would be dear benevolence which would be our will to great love of doing good.
What happens when snowflakes stick together?...............friends come together and have snow ball fights. :)
Leea
There is a documentary record on JFK's conditions for withdrawal from Vietnam:
http://www.jfklancer.com/NSAM263.html
The context of the conflict was that (as Eisenhower stated when president) that if they had an election in 1956 Ho Chi Minh would have won 80 percent in both the North and the South, unifying their country after French occupation and division. Eisenhower, of course, therefore, blocked the election.
As Eisenhower said, years after blocking the election with the puppet leader Diem, who opposed the election:
"I have never talked or corresponded with a person knowledgeable in Indochinese affairs who did not agree that had elections been held at the time of the fighting, possibly 80 per cent of the population would have voted for the communist Ho Chi Minh."
http://www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk/VNhochiminh.htm
Kennedy's criteria for withdrawal were contingent on preventing democracy and demonizing (as "communists") those defending Vietnam from the French and then US invasions and occupations.
Yes, Kennedy wanted to withdraw, but only on terms that prevented democracy, and on terms favorable to US domination. Read the National Security Action Memorandum of October 11, 1963, NSAM263.
Are you having second thoughts on supporting Mr. Obama, Norm?
Some day you will apologize, maybe?
Why haggle over who voted for whom? If apologies are required, this article certainly serves.
While I didn't vote for Obama, there are things about his ascendancy that are truly ground breaking... like Aretha singing My Country Tis of Thee, a song from the classrooms of the segregated schools across the nation (and don't forget the ascendancy of a genuine Sunday go-to-meeting hat at the inaugural, certainly a first in itself). No need to be ashamed or regretful of a vote for him. That progressives like Solomon can go on to push as hard into Obama's blind spots as they did against Bush's visual black hole, even after supporting him, is a welcome change in itself... let's not discourage it or put divisions where they do not belong and are not useful.
Paul Siemering
Obama needs to announce that the "war on terror" is over because there never was such a thing. Then he can find somebody smart to figure out what to do about getting out of Afghanistan. I mean something that doesn't have bombs attached. Afghanistan is now suffering its 28th consecutive year of non stop war. Give them a rest. yes and build up all those bombed houses and buildings.
Come crawling back, Norm, but what did you expect?
You talk of the joy in defeating a right-wing Republican opponent, but is Obama even in the political center? He made no secret about planning to escalate the wars in Pakistan and Afghanistan during the campaign. And now he has a real mandate to do just that.
We found out today on the Democracy Now program that Obama approved those Predator drone airstrikes that killed 20 people in Pakistan. Democracy Now cites The Guardian newspaper as the source.
Isn't this the same policy? Isn't this Bush's policy?
McCain was defeated to get this policy?
I don't hear you talking "push," Norm. You said Obama could be pushed to do the right thing. He just bombed some people in Pakistan and is sending 20,000 more troops to Afghanistan. Tell us how we get him to change his mind. But why should he? He told us he was going to pursue this policy in no uncertain terms.
Finally, it's worth recalling the context of Obama's quote, "people will judge you on what you can build, not what you destroy." He was referring to the evil-doers, the terrorists, when he said that. It's almost as if Bush said it. I'm not sure you got that point.
Acknowledge the problem. That's the first step to making any progress at all. Please, all of you loyal Dems, see what policies your candidates support - and you vote for them, you cheer them on!
Norman Solomon on many issues gets it, but this is just intolerable. It's like some national disease.
I need something - not an apology, just an acknowledgment from all loyal Dems that this is wrong. And then I need to see them in the streets, pushing Obama to abandon these policies. I'm not hopeful that's going to happen, though. Is this country f**ked or what?
-TIA