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TechnoratiWall Street Journal Loves Obama's Drone War Vs. Pakistan: 'Unmanned Bombs Away'
The paper’s editors attack unembedded journalists who report the Pakistani deaths. Instead, they say, we should all just shut up and listen to U.S. intelligence agencies.
The Wall Street Journal is officially in love with President Obama's undeclared air war inside of Pakistan's borders. In an unsigned editorial, the paper enthusiastically endorses Obama's use of predator drones to bomb areas throughout Pakistan. The WSJ editors praise the administration, saying "to its credit, [the White House] has stepped up the use of Predators." The editors declare: "When Pakistan's government can exercise sovereignty over all its territory, there will be no need for Predator strikes. In the meantime, unmanned bombs away."
The paper accurately notes some of the reasons for opposing drone strikes: "the belief that the attacks cause wide-scale casualties among noncombatants, thereby embittering local populations and losing hearts and minds." The WSJ also accurately reports:
Lord Bingham, until recently Britain's senior law lord, has recently said UAV strikes may be "beyond the pale" and potentially on a par with cluster bombs and landmines. Australian counterinsurgency expert David Kilcullen says "the Predator [drone] strikes have an entirely negative effect on Pakistani stability." He adds, "We should be cutting strikes back pretty substantially."
But Bingham and Kilcullen are naive fools, according to the WSJ editors. Moreover, they are fools who have been suckered by evil un-embedded reporters. "If you glean your information from wire reports - which depend on stringers who are rarely eyewitnesses," the editors quip, "the argument [against drone attacks] seems almost plausible." Right, these "stringers" who often risk their lives to reveal the human toll of U.S. bombings are far less credible than the fat cat editors of the WSJ (some of whom are probably in the Hamptons having servants clip their toe nails or mix their Martinis as I write this).
The WSJ editors descend from their thrones to mingle among the mortals and teach us the error of our ways:
Yet anyone familiar with Predator technology knows how misleading those reports can be. Unlike fighter jets or cruise missiles, Predators can loiter over their targets for more than 20 hours, take photos in which men, women and children can be clearly distinguished (burqas can be visible from 20,000 feet) and deliver laser-guided munitions with low explosive yields. This minimizes the risks of the "collateral damage" that often comes from 500-pound bombs. Far from being "beyond the pale," drones have made war-fighting more humane.
Ah, yes, that famous humane war we have all been waiting for. Finally!
The WSJ editors then reveal the highly independent, impeccable source for their information: "A U.S. intelligence summary we've seen corrects the record of various media reports claiming high casualties from the Predator strikes." Wow. Remember when the Bush administration was correcting all those errors about Saddam's WMDs? Not surprisingly, the WSJ states that "In each of the strikes in 2009 that are described by the intelligence summary, the report says no women or children were killed. Moreover, we know of planned drone attacks that were aborted when Predator cameras spied their presence."
The WSJ wants this U.S. "intelligence" shared with the American public and the world, arguing, "We understand there will always be issues concerning sources and methods. But critics of the drone attacks, especially Pakistani critics, have become increasingly vocal in their opposition. They deserve to know about the terrorist calamities they've been spared thanks to these unmanned flights over their territory."
It is very telling that the WSJ editorial-with no apparent shame-fails to mention the U.S. drone attacks last month that may have killed more than 80 people in Pakistan, including as many as 70 people in a U.S. bombing of a funeral procession in a tribal area. The WSJ editors defend the attacks, saying they are killing "high value targets," saying of those killed by U.S. drone strikes, "Is the world better off with these people dead? We think so." But the fact is that some statistics from the Pakistani government suggested that of the 700+ people killed in these U.S. drone strikes since 2006, 14 were "high value targets" or "al Qaeda" leaders and the vast majority were civilians. In this case, the real question is: "What does it say about the U.S. that its government authorizes the killing of these civilians?"
47 Comments so far
Show All"Ah, yes, that famous humane war we have all been waiting for. Finally!"
Aye, well said. Can hardly wait for the next 'advancement'...
The day Rupert Murdoch took over the Journal was the day we ended our subscription. This is a fine example of why.
How appropriate that the WSJ, factotum of the ruling class, should be celebrating our death-dealing ways in Pakistan ( & Afghanistan & Iraq & all the hundreds of sites around the globe where we have imposed our bases). Nothing is more productive of profit than war. It is the Ultimate Market: stuff is produced (& sold -- either to other countries, paid for by US taxpayers, or to our own military enterprise, paid for by US taxpayers) for the purpose of destroying both itself and whatever it hits. It's quicker than built-in obsolescence: its whole reason for being is to destroy itself and have to be replaced.
It is appalling to think that the WSJ considers the American public to be so lacking in basic human feeling that they can get by with such a barbaric paean to murder & destruction. I hope they will be drowned in a tidal wave of outrage..
I searched for a heart in the bunkers of DC;I searched for a heart in the expanses of Nevada and all that was found were drones in the skies over living hearts and turning them to dead hearts.Insanity is the art of american politics.We will pay every whit;the guilty and not so guilty.Tony
It's all about deception.
Dress in a burqua and you are a woman to that camera 20,000 ft above.
So we judge people from 20,000 ft.
That's why we bomb weddings and funerals.
Want to understand the WSJ that Jeremy Scahill describes? One way to do this is to very carefully listen to and consider what John Perkins, author of "Confessions of an Economic HIT MAN" (EHM) and his more recent book, "The Secret History of the American Empire". Would you like some video suggestions? If you do, then there are three in the following post I made earlier today.
(url broken over two lines, but if you don't feel like copying the two and joining them, etc., then just use the plain CD url and search the page - once loaded, of course - for "John Perkins")
http://www.commondreams.org/video/2009/07/13-0
#comment-1249521
Like EHM's and CIA operatives, the U.S. msm "news" media also work for the corporatocracy, corporate oligarchy, of the USA; corporate oligarchy being a referenced learned from John Perkins in his videos over the past day or so. John Perkins worked for oen or more corporations, but as he says, this was through the U.S. NSA, National Security Agency, which, of course, the NSA, or at least U.S. State Dept, denies, while trying to discredit John Perkins, who does not strike me as someone who can be so easily discredited. Well, like the NSA, the CIA is officially part of the government of the USA, too; but neither truly works [for] the government, because the government is The People. No, no, no. Instead, they work for the corporate oligarchy, the chiefs of which use the government for cover, as well as for carrying out strategic operations ... of conquest ... and domination.
Well, all of that requires complicit "news" media. Right? Damn hell, but right; it's the way the corporate chiefs operate.
The U.S., for its corporate oligarchy, the OIL faction part anyway, strategically needs to achieve control of and therefore dominance over Pakistan. It's for the OIL pipeline that the war on Afghanistan is really about; besides also being for spreading or expanding NATO far, far beyond its legitimate boundaries and, through that, spreading U.S. military dominance in Central Asia, and, from there, being able to threaten the two "biggies" out there, Russia and China. Well, the pipeline is to pass through Afghanistan and then go into and through Pakistan, so the U.S., with its dumb animal supporters in NATO, strategically needs to gain dominance, control over both of these countries.
Major Doug Rokke speaks of this latter topic in his following presentation. Other people also have been saying the same thing for years in terms of describing the path intended for the pipeline, but Doug Rokke specifically adds that the U.S. aims to gain control power in Pakistan; full dominance.
"9-11.. Hello!: Major Doug Rokke" (10:35), Aug 19 2007
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pGVSHGWZ3JM
The corporate oligarchy and their stooge U.S. President need to try to keep the public misinformed, disinformed, "hopefully", they think, brainwashed, dumbed down, ...; therefore, they try to fill our minds with all kinds of absurdities while hoping that we'll believe them, that they are sane, make sound sense, ... They need their "news" media for this "job".
[Wall Street] Journal? Hmmm. Who does the WSJ work for, Wall Street, that is, the WS "elites", who are part of the corporatocracy in the USA, by any chance? Surely. WSJ is corporate media, big, and that sure isn't something to trust when what we want is truth and nothing but truth; real journalism, so investigative journalism; journalism that is [sane], instead of insane; etcetera.
It's not to say that the WSJ, like other msm "news" media in the USA, doesn't occasionally publish good articles, but whoa; when it comes to Pakistan today, then keep what I said, above, carefully in mind. A serious faction of the corporate oligarchy in the USA definitely wants to have a firm hand over Pakistan.
And if Big Oil USA wants this, and it does, then don't forget; the BANKSTERS are present, too. They always are. It's how they get rich off of other peoples' money; by investing it for major profits, while trickling a little to the people who actually own this money, the account holders or depositors. These investments vary, but there surely are large amounts invest in profitable corporations or economic sectors. And the BANKSTERS are the top "elite", from what I've gathered. They have power individual sector corporations lack. Something like that, anyway; and I guess the documentary entitled, "The Money Masters", is one way to learn about how powerful the BANKSTERS really are; including when compared to the largest of corporations in specialised sectors, such as the MIC, oil, all types of manufacturing, hi-tech, ....
The banksters can cause depressions, etc., when they please, given that the U.S. government atrociously approved of making the Federal Reserve privately owned; by banksters.
Iow, whenever we have a U.S. corporation seeking to position itself in control over the resources of another country, or even in the USA, then there will always be the banksters backing and majorly profiting from this.
Corporate oligarchy? No sh*t!
Check out the above-linked resources; the videos with John Perkins and the one with Doug Rokke. "The Money Masters" is available at Google, too.
What's left to say? Is there any shred of decency, morality, fairness, kindness left in this country? I read Common Dreams in the morning with my coffee and toast. It's getting more difficult to swallow between the nausea and choking back tears of anger and acute sadness. Can you imagine being a person who sees those drones overhead ("predators can loiter over their targets for twenty hours")Do you run and hide, or are you afraid to do that? These poor people must live in constant fear...of the Taliban, of the US drones and how do they actually have a normal day and a normal existence. And we just go on and on in our normal lives here without thought to what we are doing. I am so saddened. The Iraquis, the Pakistanis (and who knows who's next) and the US citizens who are aware and those who are too busy trying to survive from one week to the next, live in an episode of "The Twilight Zone." But, after it's over, Rod Serling is not going to calmly step in and sum things up. It's real.
It's breath taking how much is going on here that involves the US doing so many immoral things and the government ignoring it or "moving on," How can this country move on? You MUST address the wrongs we have committed, the people we have killed and tortured before we move on. And why, Mr Obama? Because, obviously, when an individual or nation commits such atrocities and doesn't admit their wrong, they just go on to commit more and more heinous crimes against others. It's human nature, Mr Obama. Oh, I forgot, or...we can just pay off people for those we accidently killed. We are disgusting and deserve whatever we get. You know, Rev Wright was a bit nuts, but he was right when he talked about the chickens coming home to roost. Look out US! Heads up!
what we have become:...."Is the world better off with these people dead? We think so." It is not a big jump to see that this statement implicitly supports torture......us against them/scarcity...barbarism
We need to remember the past 8 years, and blame Bush who got us into the mess in the first place, as attacking other countries, and blame Obama, for continuing to follow.
Remember that the WSJ is now owned by the same Zionist that owns the JPost.
I ignore Rupert and all his propaganda machines.
I don't believe Rupert Murdoch owns the Jerusalem Post. I believe that would be David Horovitz - he has owned it since 2004.
In recent weeks Obama has been praised by all the extreme forces of the Right, Kissinger, the WSJ, etc. but it's still not enough for Obamabots to see through the con-artist.
Democratic voters are incredibly misinformed, usually just plain stupid, different from Republicans, who are misinformed, but also evil and selfish. And if you have the combination of a Democratic voter AND black, then forget about saying anything offensive against President Obaminable, you're wasting your time.
And what does it say about Western "justice" that we conduct such extrajudicial killings with an equal absence of shame? The tragic and catastrophic error post September 11th, the deicision to pursue a military and not a police response, here reaches its inevitable end. Our lack of faith in justice means our culture has descended into a vigilante cult of vengeance. And vengeance only spawns endless cycles of violence.
Sioux Rose
BRIAR: Well-said, and it's everything Jesus would NOT do/advocate; yet it's largely the religious who support these "crusades."
Those who order or direct bombings by drones or otherwise have never heard the moanings of the people struck on the ground. The people, believe it or not, are real human beings with genuine histories and contexts. Our policy, ignorant as usual, creates ever more hatred toward us. The use of airpower is barbaric and should be considered a war crime by whomever uses it. No matter what the war planners say about the drones being successful, they are committing Nuremberg-type war crimes. Listen to the moaning, because their moaning is our moaning too. I painfully learned this in Viet Nam after bombings of inhabited villages.
remember Hemingway's line?
"ASK NOT FOR WHOM THE BELL TOLLS....it tolls for you".
as WSJ and other americans of like mind celebrate the "success" of this or that war , surge, "push", "humane" murder, etc....
they actually , bloodlessly, and coldly many times over become worse than the worst terrorists or "enemies" they portray as "deserving" of being "defeated"....
it is THEY that have lost any decency or humanity in them...for it is the USA that has NO business being in other regions trying to dominate - and it is the USA that has NO justification for its wars.....
while those that fight back in their own lands against the US intrusions at least have the REAL justification that the USA USES :
"we are being attacked - our way of life is under assault"........
BY the USA.
The WaPo is FoxNews for the landed gentry.
But it is a volatile propaganda organ pushing the NeoCon agenda.
And NeoCon is just subtly obfuscated wording for Israel.
Was it Sharon that said don't worry, "we" control the US? I believe Tel-Aviv favors this assault in Pakistan, and it is reflected in the Fawning Corporate Media as our assault on Iraq was previously.
WSJ = Willfully Sardonic Jerks
May All Beings Be Blessed.
No Restrictions Or Limitations Shall Apply.
They say a man can be measured by the enemies he makes. Conversely, a man can be measured by those that love him. The WSJ loves Obama. How fitting.
Clearly, Wall St and the Pentagon are blood brothers.
I am so-o-o glad I no longer have to use newspapers as a source of information.
I have to empathize with you genuine journalists out there. Push has to come to shove soon, folks. WSJ cannot satisfy even its base for long pumping this drivel-they-want-to-hear. At some point deeply hallucinatory POV's make trouble for investors.
**The editors declare: "When Pakistan's government can exercise sovereignty over all its territory, there will be no need for Predator strikes. In the meantime, unmanned bombs away."**
Let's try this: "When the US government can exercise sovereignty over all the bad actors on Wall Street, there will be no need for Predator Accountant strikes. In the meantime, unmanned accountants away! Oops, did we hit office 405? I meant 406. Sorry. You all look alike from Nevada.
Our government is corrupt. They can't even run Washington. Now they plan to rule the world by putting every human being under the threat of death, stupid death, raining down at the behest of a Richard Perle, a Dick Cheney or the Wall St. Journal's editors.
Mercy.
Why are we fighting in Afghanistan and now Pakistan? Is it the Taliban terrorists who may board wooden feluccas and invade our shores? Or is to bring democracy and freedom? to liberate the Afghan women?
Hell no, it's all about oil and gas, as usual, and it bears repeating over and over because people are dying and being maimed everyday, innocent people, the elderly, women, and children. Massive amounts of hardship and suffering is being created in the name of US corporate control of energy.
See Pepe Escobars' excellent articles; Pipelineistan Goes Af-Pak
www.commondreams.org/view/2009/03/25-1
www.globaliamagazine.com/?id=764
A moron co-worker of mine explained it to me when I asked why Obama was escalating the war in the ME when he was supposed to be the anti-war candidate: "Oh, that war, oh it's the Taliban." This simpleton believes that for the last eight years we've expended $4 billion dollars a month and countless lives because the Taliban are bad leaders.
I guess it never occurred to him we have bad leaders right here and that the world is full of bad leaders starting with the ones who just overthrew the democratically elected leader in Honduras, Manuel Zelaya and we aren't invading those countries.
i have become convinced that most americans have their minds "made up" - it will be like talking to a brick wall once they have decided personally "HOW FAR" they are willing and are SATISFIED about understanding the TRUE extent of the USA's central and rooted role in the global mess - of which WARS are JUST one , although the most terrifying aspect because of its Imperialism and Militarism. that's why most americans will have their eyes GLAZE OVER if one even suggests that "there is MORE to the story than JUST : 'oh, it's the taliban'...or 'oh. it's because of these immigrants who hate the usa'...or 'oh...the chinese took our jobs away'..."
as an american poet said - which I like to repeat often:
"WE AMERICANS -- carefully nurture a studied attitude of indifference to the suffering of others......even if WE are the cause of it".
THAT - to me - seems to be an american trait..which attracts and swallows up those that believe in the "almight goodness" of america and all its Myths.
and their RESOLUTE climax of their adulthood - perhaps even to the end of their days - passing it on as their LEGACY to their own children is:
to have become SIMPLETONS who THINK they "know" politics, economics, world events, history and "america" and "the world". when in reality
they are just WILLFULY ignorant, racist and prejudicial
and above all - XENOPHOBIC about the world and anything or anyone or any other way of seeing and living that they don't feel "Comfort" in and don't think is "american". .........
and it is
PRECISELY BECAUSE they can call themselves "americans".
to them being able to call themselves "americans" (and this also applies to immigrants who sneer at OTHER "immigrants" : 'these immigrants who are taking advantage' . they say...)
gives them somehow the divine right to FEEL and BE exceptional....just like the country they profess to "love and respect".......
to the point of justifying its VERY EVILS - as NOBLE.
it is a sickness.
It wouldn't be so bad if the CIA had not created Al Qaeda......It would not be so bad if the United States did not put the Taliban in power....It would not be so bad if the People of the United States knew that they had already been repsonsible for over 1.5 million deaths in Iraq and Afghanistan......It would not be so bad if the President of the United States had not deceived the American People.....
What is bad is that the United States has been taken over by a "Ruling Class" that is willing to kill millions of people for "Personal Gain"..........An Iraqi has "0" value. An Afghan has "0" value. A Pakistani has "0" value.........An American Low Income Soldier has a value of "$500,000".......
Everyone knows that the "Power Elite" needs one more major disaster and that "They" may use a nuclear device (As suggested on Fox News) to gain the American People's support for a "Total Takeover" of the "Middle East Oil Fields and Black Sea Oil Fields".
Looks like all that time our youth spend on barbaric video games is paying off in spades...trouble is you cannot leave the playing card on the dead body like in Nam. Seeing the face of Death can now be avoided with the escape key. No captured pilots to force confessions from...we'll miss the "finger" in the group shots too!
Anybody out there hear any talk of cease fire negotiations and figuring out the shape of the table to discuss a lasting...
Peace
"Far from being "beyond the pale," drones have made war-fighting more humane."
I'm still having a hard time believing I read that.
Wow. How far detached from compassion have so many of this country become that this statement becomes true for them? How high in their own hubris and have people flown that they advocate such Orwellian thinking?
As noted by others here: the WSJ editorial page has always been more than ready to roll up its sleeves, flex its muscles, and shout: let's you and him fight!
· Yr Obd't Servant
A couple of questions to ponder. Exactly what did Hitler want the Jews to do when he took power? What could a Jew do to please Hitler? Did Hitler give Jews any way out of being Jewish? Did he offer them any way of coexisting in the world that Hitler was creating? The only way the Jews could please Hitler would have been to kill themselves. Now let me pose this question. Exactly what does Mr. Obama want the tribes men and women of the Swat Valley to do to please him? What does he want the children of these tribes people to do? Mr. Obama has left these people, some of the poorest on this earth, no more of a choice than Hitler left the Jews. Mr. Obama has not even given them the opportunity to renounce their identity. He's simply killing them. He's not shipping them off in boxcars to concentration camps. No, he's surrounded them with aerial robots and killing them with Hellfire missiles, shooting fish in a barrel. Something tells me, he's just getting warmed up.
Well put.
Half the motive here is target practice. You have to know someone's gathering stats, interviewing the trigger-men at home and running psychological assessments, crunching numbers to see whether or at what point the cost benefit makes it sensible to send the kid to combat, knowing you're causing trouble with the family and winding up with a high % of lifelong disability cases, and when building all that digital equipment costs too much.
All in a day's work for our valiant military to kill however many Arab "terrorists" (anyone we choose to so designate) stand in the way of ... what? Our profit potential? Our God-given right to rule their lives and lands to suit our greedy purposes? Naturally the WSJ approves of Obama's Predator drone war on Pakistan. The more we kill the freer they feel. They don't give a shit who it is--just so we're constantly killing random numbers of people somewhere. Keep the fear of death in those people, whoever they are. Call them all Taliban, whatever. Just keep slaughtering them. That's what we do. Good business practices pay off for Wall Street, and Obama is their man.
Did the Wall St. Journal address the legal authority under which the U.S. is conducting military operations in Pakistan?
Of course not, and that is part of the 'fog of wars' that America finds itself stuck within.
A war with no name (GWOT, WOT, Long War - now what?)
A war never declared (Congress authorized Bush to name the enemy and attack them)
A war with no victory (Congress set the military goal as 'preventing future terrorism')
by the way, -- "Is the world better off with these people dead? We think so." --
that's the reasoning of people who think that future terrorists have been killed, IMHO.
I repeat once again, and apologize for again being repeatedly redundant, that Public Law 107-40 must be dealt with, or this insanity will not stop.
Remember, everyone is a potential future terrorist.
Public Law 107-40 (signed Sep 18, 2001) starts with the statement: "To authorize the use of United States Armed Forces against those responsible for the recent attacks launched against the United States."
I didn't know the Paks/Talibs/Wazis were "responsible" for 9/11. The multinational global conspiracy theory implicit in holding several countries responsible for 9/11 holds even less water than those conspiracy theories that claim the US Govt orchestrated the attacks.
Are our politicians and military commanders nuts or what?
We need Leaders, not politicians.
WSJ = War Shit Jingoism
...In the meantime, unmanned bombs away."
----------------------
This editorial should be enough evidence to have whoever wrote it locked away forever as criminally insane.
Seriously, if this person was a family member of mine I'd use every tool at my disposal to have them committed.
The cowardly MoFo's wouldn't even sign the editorial.
Not signing makes it official WSJ opinion. Management signed by printing.
I don't recall a time in history when Wall $treet never loved wars. It's as if there has always been some kind of a relationship between war and big money. Keep the poor fighting so that the wealthy can stay wealthy. No hard work for the wealthy to do there other than keep those wars running.
What else should we expect from the WSJ?
"Trust us" is their philosophy, as they steal, rape, and murder our children. "Trust us".
According to the Wall Street Journal's editors, "critics of the drone attacks, especially Pakistani critics, have become increasingly vocal in their opposition. They deserve to know about the terrorist calamaties they've been spared thanks to these unmanned flights over their territory."
I agree. Let's see the empirical evidence, linking the corpse of each high value terrorist target killed, with the pile of Pakistani, Afghan, or American corpses who were spared calamitous death. Proof, please.
And when you're done with that, please compile and publish a comparable ledger, identifying each high value detainee subjected to the Bush regime's enhanced interrogation torture techniques whose reliable, credible intelligence information prevented those dozen or so post-911 terrorist attacks Dick Cheney claims otherwise would have taken place, averting the loss of tens of thousands of innocent American lives.
Such a macabre calculus. Real world dead bodies versus hypothetical calamities spared. Actual war crimes victims versus imaginary or theoretical ones.
"Is the world better off with these people dead? We think so."
And just who are "we", and who ever designated "us", to draw such grandiose moral judgment about the consequences of our own blood stained handiwork?
Bill from Saginaw
Bill from Saginaw: "Such a macabre calculus. Real world dead bodies versus hypothetical calamities spared. Actual war crimes victims versus imaginary or theoretical ones."
A neat encapsulation of the "thinking" that goes into U.S. war-making policy, "calamaties spared" being the first cousin of "fighting them over there so we don't have to fight them over here" with no proof at all that the over-there fighting has "spared" over-here fighting; but with perhaps the strong suspicion that our anger-making actions over there have increased the likelihood that retaliatory violence will be visited on American shores.
The "calamaties spared" formula also reminds me of another fuzzy-thinking idea that has been used to justify questionable public policy. This is the continuing justification of economic stimulus programs that don't seem to be stimulating much, certainly not the jobs, jobs, jobs that Obama says is the rationale for them. But coming to save the day is an amendment on the promises of jobs "created" (which obviously isn't happening) by citing those "saved" (which happens every time an employer threatens to lay off workers and doesn't at the last minute when Mighty Mouse stimulus funding rides to the rescue). So we're still in a "calamity" of near-depression proportion, but think how we've been spared the even greater calamity that would have occurred had we merely "done nothing" about the situation.
Sorry Mr. Lincoln, you can fool a hell of a lot of people a hell of a lot of the time as this "calamaties spared" foolishness permeates the debate on public policy.
I suppose that is why the brokers of Wall Street, who read the Wall Street Journal, backed Obama in the campaign. The love of blood flowing down the streets of foreign countries to show our power and strengh.
Early in his presidential campaign Obama promised to bomb Pakistan...can't fault him for keeping his camapaign promises. Too bad he has broken all of his campaign promises concerning health care.
Well, it's not just the WSJ that's "in love with" drone attacks or indeed of any form of "air war" that relieves the toll of war on our "brave" men and women in uniform, especially in a form in which the operators are totally out of "harm's way." U.S. governments have long learned the lesson that popular opposition to war (as in Iraq) is dampened whenever we move to the "air war" option. Whatever the level of collateral damage in civilian casualties, the public is more tolerant of war when the casualties don't involve so many U.S. dead and maimed bodies. All we have to do is just tweak our national hubris about how our soldier's fight and die and give their lives for their country.
Americans immediately became more comfortable with war when the Penatgon coined the euphemism "collateral damage" during the Gulf War.