The title of this article is rich with irony. Did the withdrawal of troops from Afghanistan ever begin, in the first place??

All these so-called withdrawal dates are just BS for the sheeple. AMERICAN BUSINESS; IS THE WAR BUSINESS! The most evil business known to man. Real peace, would be like a catastrophic depression to this war business racket. ENDLESS ENEMIES,FOR ENDLESS WARS, FOR ENDLESS PROFITS!

One of the most elementary insights contained in Orwell's "1984" is that a totalitarian empire requires perpetual war to sustain the parasitic dystopia that it creates.

War is good for ab-so-lute-ly nothing for the ordinary unprivileged citizen. But it's just the ticket for keeping warmongering plutocrats prosperous, looting and pillaging material resources wherever they're found, and keeping the domestic masses in control and checked by a permanent state of irrationality and fearful hysteria.

After Vietnam, the burgeoning Amerikan Imperium made do with a few safe, manufactured boutique "wars", e.g. Panama and Grenada. But those were small potatoes. As the PNAC neocons recognized, it would take a much more sustained and concentrated "war" to fully mobilize and rationalize Imperial Amerika's capacity for unilateral military violence and mayhem.

And so we had a Nine-Eleven to Change Everything.

Oh, the Amerikan Dictator du jour continues to make "sensible" noises about "ending" criminal aggressive military extravaganzas in Iraq and Afghanistan. But even that is mostly a matter of glibly re-branding and shifting around the shells so that the putrescent pea of combat and provocative espionage operations remains downwind and virtually out of sight.

It seems obvious to me that Yemen and even Iran are being groomed on the back burner to serve as targets if and when the Afghanistan Phase of Imperial Amerikan Permawar is diminished.

Terrorist retaliation on Amerikan soil? It's a win-win event for the warmongers! That's why the status quo encourages the possibility. And if authentic acts of terrorism don't occur, or are insufficient to sustain public outrage and a collective thirst for vengeful retaliation, state security agencies will happily stage them.

After all, only "kooks" and deluded malcontents believe that a government would victimize its own innocent populace to serve its nefarious political policies and ambitions.

Iraq and Afghanistan are just pirouettes in a perpetual War Dance.

Tom Hayden is finally showing signs of waking up.

Back in March 2009, he was defending Obama, writing
"After years of frustrating ambiguity, President Obama has clearly committed to a complete withdrawal of all US troops in less than three years."

Many of us were then already fully aware that Obama was NOT "committed" to troop withdrawals, much less "clearly committed".

Since people here are hesitant to do anything earth-shattering, how about hiring British university students to come here and thrash our ruling parties' headquarters and call for ending our senseless wars against evil and our senseless catering to the rich?

We seem to have a penchant for conflict. Is this endemic of our species? Do we just shrug it off and say, 'what has always been will always be'?

There was a recent documentary on Nova about dogs. To answer the nature/nurture debate, scientists tried raising wild "dogs" - wolves (that share identical DNA with dogs) - as pets. At a certain age, these wolves become more aggressive than dogs and are generally uninterested in humans - therefore, untrainable.

But in a study with foxes (who also share DNA with wolves), where the less aggressive foxes were separated and interbred with other less aggressive foxes, they became domesticated (or peaceful) animals after about 5 generations.

Also, most interestingly, the foxes' actual physical appearance genetically modified toward the "cuter" end of the spectrum - curly tails, fluffier coats, etc.

We need to somehow 'weed out' all of the aggressive humans (male and female) and get all of the more passive individuals to fuck like crazy. Any which way. Doesn't matter, just eventually make babies. Teach them well. Weed out the more aggressive of these offspring. Repeat.

This will also satisfy the over-population problem.

Ya mean that after 9 years of an occupation by a hi-tech US military that has 8 (eight) times more armed forces than Taliban militants whose only weapons are pickup trucks, Ak-47s and unexploded US ordnance, yet the Taliban control 80% of Afghanistan, ya mean that we finally geddit? One word: Defeat. The US military was whipped, pure and simple, and no amount of spin can change that fact.

So bring the troops home, tend to their (life-long) wounds, give them a medal, and spend the savings on rebooting our economy.

As usual, there is no mention that it is AFGHANS who are primarily suffering the costs -- human, environmental, economic, cultural, moral, et al -- of this US war of occupation.

Tom Hayden should know better.

Taylor Caldwell predicted our endless wars against enemies not easily conforming to the traditional concept of "enemies". She predicted that years, and years, and years ago.

Old Peculiar, I liked your commentary on dogs, wolves, and foxes. I am sure that I read somewhere that there is a "cute pet" gene that separates dogs from wolves.

Last year, I read the most amazing article in "Scientific American". Apparently, pet cats descended from Yemeni, Saudi, and Israeli wild cats. The article went on to say that there are more genetic differences between the Italians and the French than between the wild cats of those countries and ordinary house cats.

After seeing some of those wild cats in some of those countries, my question is: What are the genetic differences between the French and the Italians?

It occured to me on 11/11 that my grandfather,father,brother,and a child of mine could all have died in wars in other people's homeland, an insane paradigm. If this is freedom I'll take bondage.

Troop Withdrawal one box at a time From Afghanistan for ever and Ever without End

The other article "Consider Smaller Afghan Force: US Panel" here on CD is one that reports the findings of a study group of the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR). Whether by accident or deliberately CD did not provide a comments section for that article. Therefore I am posting here.

The article does not introduce the CFR at all. Like the title it just sort of lets us assume that the CFR is some sort of government body. But it is nothing of the sort.

The CFR now has its own website and facebook pages.
http://www.cfr.org
But these web pages, like the wikipedia pages do not truly introduce the CFR at all. These web pages, like the "common members" such as Angelina Jolie etc, serve to give the CFR a comfortable facade.

The existence of the CFR used to be secret. If you mentioned on radio talkback, you were told that no such organisation exists. it was a conspiracy theory, and all conspiracy theories were false. Its meetings were in secret, and its executive meetings probably still are. Its membership used to be what is now referred to as its "executive membership". They included: Rupert Murdoch, David Rockefeller, Henry Kissinger, Peter G. Peterson, George Soros, Maurice Greenberg, Robert Rubin, George P. Shultz, Alan Greenspan, Zbigniew Brzezinski, Richard B. Cheney, and George Tenet-as well as individuals whose membership is more unexpected, such as John Sweeney, Jessie Jackson, Jimmy Carter, Bill Clinton, Katrina vanden Heuvel, Richard J. Barnet, and Daniel Schorr. Yes, "membership" now redefined to be the "executive membership" reads like a list of the most powerful people in the USA.

http://www.thirdworldtraveler.com/Foreign_Policy_Institutions/Council_Foreign_Relations.html

If you look hard enough, you will find the CFR behind all the wars including the Iraq war and the Afghan war. I find it utterly weird to have an article reporting the CFR's "findings" here on CD. The CFR website wont tell you what seedy side of the CFR does. This video will:-
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=3968544393356669182#

I rather suspect that the occupation of Afghanistan will end when the pipeline is completed. Does anyone know how that little venture project is going, btw?

The occupation will end when the American people wake up and stop voting for the warmongering parties- Democrats and Republicans.

Vote Independent and Green.

War has been a very visible part of the United States policy since before independence. And it is never going to be absent from its relations with other countries. The wars in Iraq and Afghanistan are preludes to war against Iran and other middle east countries.These will be waged and justified with the consent of government in the name of "our continued war on terror"and in the name of "homeland security". These are two fraudulent thesis to extol continued fear and insecurity in the people. The bush administration and now obama's have used these two terms very well not only to wage unjustified war against two of the most poor and illiterate countries but to prepare us for further war in the future against a developing country--Iran in the guise of stopping that country from developing Atomic weapons.

War with Iran is almost inevitable. The deaths of millions of innocents, including our own will become our legacy to the world in the United States pursuit to become the most ruthless and blood thirsty country ever. And all for the pursuit of political and economic gain. Is'nt Democracy grand??!!!................and the beat goes on.

Tom Hayden wants to cut Obama some slack, and allow him a partial withdrawal of troops from Afghanistan in the next year or so. He's even calculated the deaths expected to occur in the interim.

Is this the same Tom Hayden who called for U.S. withdrawal from Vietnam at the DNC in 1968? Why be so accommodating with the Afghanistan war, Tom? I don't think anyone in the antiwar movement agrees with this unilateral offer to extend the killing time. Why not call Obama a liar and demand the troops out now?

And who cares that Obama's war extension hurts him politically. He's not on our side. Whose side are you on, Tom - the antiwar movement or the Democratic Party's. You chose correctly once upon a time in 1968. Why not now?

-TIA

When Will Troop Withdrawal From Afghanistan Ever End?

by Tom Hayden

When millions gather on the steps of the white house every week, from all walks of life, from all religions, especially right wing Christians,
and you declare a global police force be created to handle terrorists, that Terrorism is not an entity that requires a military solution and storm trooping into country's because terrorist might be there is not a legal remedy.

Then, and only then, will the occupations and the wars end.
When the reality of terrorism being organized crime and not an excuse for war fare is the only sane definition understood by the whole world.

When the whole planet understands why terrorists really hate the US government, and not the American people.

When Will Troop Withdrawal From Afghanistan Ever End?

by Tom Hayden

When millions gather on the steps of the white house every week, from all walks of life, from all religions, especially right wing Christians,
and you declare a global police force be created to handle terrorists, that Terrorism is not an entity that requires a military solution and storm trooping into country's because terrorist might be there is not a legal remedy.

Then, and only then, will the occupations and the wars end.
When the reality of terrorism being organized crime and not an excuse for war fare is the only sane definition understood by the whole world.

When the whole planet understands why terrorists really hate the US government, and not the American people.

Christian viewpoint: Thou shalt not kill

I offer this as food for thought. I’ve said this before, but it sounds like it needs saying again: If you join the armed services, what are you if not a murderer for hire? How can there be “good men and women” in the armed forces?

Do good men and women really offer to kill for others? I really can't see it. How many people did Hitler kill? One, that we can be reasonably certain of, since it is general knowledge that he committed suicide. As for millions of other deaths generally attributed to him, as in, "Hitler killed six to ten million Jews," it robs so many others of proper credit and is thus unfair, since Hitler did not kill those millions--other people did it for him.

In the same vein, George Bush did not kill anyone, nor did Osama bin Ladin, as far as I know. They have others do the killing for them [I'm not suggesting 9/11 here, as that remains an open question]. If you are willing to kill another human being, what business have you on this planet?

If you want to kill someone, I say kill yourself. I won't even get into the opportunities lost, because we squander over half our taxes on the military (which, incidentally, can't catch a cave man after nine years). I do not support our troops.

I support our conscientious objectors, and other thinking people.

I support nurses, doctors, teachers, construction workers, garbage men, laborers, cooks, waiters and waitresses, writers, inventors, organic farmers, architects, scientists, engineers, computer programmers, landscapers, and all those who choose to actually do something with their lives.

To the destroyers I say: Why don't you get a life? Far better to be a prostitute, even, than to be a military person. You are at least hiring out to bring pleasure to others, not misery and destruction.

If you can't bring yourself to kill yourself, and you still feel a vague need to kill someone, at least get to know a great many people first. Then pick the one you like the least. It will probably be a Republican.

Then you may have some real personal reason to kill, rather than doing so because politician wants others killed, but can't seem to do it him or herself.

What hopes do we have for an 0bama presidency outside of termination? The president isn't waffling, and he normally does not: he is lying to camouflage a continued occupation. This is psychopathy, not diffidence or incompetence.

So many commentators get stuck on this idea that 0bama's policies are somehow an oversight. The proposition is absurd:

---- Oops! I didn't mean to leave those troops in Afghanistan.
---- Gosh, I plum forgot about the contractors, too.

I'm sorry. All of this has long become humorless, probably for all of us. One could go down the list, but the principle is rather simple:

0bama's
policies
are corporatist-conservative
and reactionary statist
in every single area.

So why would someone like Hayden, who has some analytical chops, indulge reader fantasies, if not his own, in "hopes for the 0bama administration"? Is this hope not constructed entirely of despair, despair that the gross betrayal committed by 0bama and most of the Democratic leadership will indeed lead to another Republican White House, and likely a Republican majority in both houses?

If that's hope, my cigarettes are herbal air fresheners.

Sadly, most hope is outside of the electoral process these days. I don't like that, and it's no reason to not do something as simple as voting, but our hopes for the 0bama administration should be the same as our hopes for the Cheney-Bush administration before it: may the perpetrators have their day in court, and may the public force a change of policy.