Michael Maiello's picture

    The Greatest Scandal Of Our Time

    So the "soldiers out of Afghanistan" date is now... 2014.  We're spending hundreds of billions of dollars a year on this and we will continue to do so until at least 2014 and probably beyond.  This while I'm being told that Social Security benefits have to be cut because we're broke.

    I've learned my lesson.  I will never again support another war.  I made an after 9/11 exception and decided to support invading Afghanistan, kicking some Taliban butt and dragging bin Laden back here to be used as part of 2001's Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade.  Wiser people than me said it wasn't going to be that easy.  But seriously, 13 years and not even bin Laden in chains to show for it?

    Sorry government, you've completely lost my confidence.  I will never again support a war.  I don't trust either party to run one effectively or to know when to stop.  How is it that nobody's even been publicly fired over this?  How is it that we haven't had high profile congressional hearings about what went wrong and why?

    It's almost as if, so far as the federal government is concerned, a 13 year occupation of Afghanistan is an entirely acceptable result.  It's almost as if they don't realize that it is a complete fiasco and that it's entirely unacceptable.

    Sorry for harping on this but we never actually caught bin Laden.  Sometimes I think I'm the only person in the U.S. who thinks that's important.  But it's kind of important!

    Comments

    Bob Herbert had a piece on the war in Afghanistan, "Killing and Dying", in yesterday's NYT:

    http://www.nytimes.com/2010/11/13/opinion/13herbert.html?_r=1&ref=bobherbert


    That's just damned depressing.


    2014?! This, to me, would be the main reason to mount a primary challenge to Obama in 2012.  Any anti-war candidates out there?


    Yes, and Gates is looking for a new SOFA in Iraq to extend our time there...of course we knew he would...

    Here's the McClatchy piece I posted last week:

    http://www.mcclatchydc.com/2010/11/09/103468/obama-administration-moving-away.html

    I'm also disappointed to hear that Obama told India that the US wouldn't help India and Pakistan negotitate over Kasmir.  I know when he'd brought it up in Nov. India got pissed, but still; he and Clinton have to help fix that.  It's the driving force of terrorist acts there (Mumbai, etc.) and keeps the Pakistanis interested in derailing things in Afghanistan. 


    This will make your stomachs ache some more.  Not only is the mega-base and embassy in Islamabad a go, there is more from Tom Englehart: 'Three Mother Ships':

    Leaving???  2050?  Never??  More likely.

    http://www.tomdispatch.com/post/175320/tomgram%3A_engelhardt%2C_war_to_t...


    Would another really big 9/11 change your mind? WMD that threaten the world in ......? I bet you would change your mind with visions of mushroom clouds?

    Couldn't help seeing the pictures of the 28 story steel frame building on fire in Shanghai and wondering why it hasn't collapsed at free-fall speed like WTC#7. I am not a conspiracy 'nut' but I never achieved total faith in the Bush administration's explanations what went down on their watch......


    It really wouldn't change my mind.  Not again.


    Well, only the repubs could turn a monumental fiasco (ignoring warnings, etc) of the worst disaster EVER into a win/win.  Be aware:  If it happens on Obama's watch (even though Bush increased terrorist recruiting, etc against us) it will be another story.


    Maybe if someone had flown a jet full of fuel into it ...?


    Rice: "Who could have imagined such a---"..well, actually Tom Clancey and probably Flash Gordon.


    You're just crazy Destor.  These wars and invasions have been resounding successes.  The Military Industrial Complex is making money, and that's good for America, freedom, and Capitalism.  Bin Laden was, and remains a sideshow in what's really going down.  Take a quaalude and chill man.  ;)


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