The Nobel Prize for War 2009 goes to ...

kelber at mindspring.com kelber at mindspring.com
Wed Dec 2 13:54:17 CST 2009


 Polls show that 50% of Americans -- a lot of them Republicans and Independents -- are opposed to building up the troops in Afghanistan. This is one situation where Obama's hands aren't tied by the bureaucracy of congress. The decision is his to make.  He can take a lesson from the Republicans:  pander to your base if you plan on getting re-elected.  Lots of progressives worry about the situation of women and girls in Afghanistan.  It's dreadful, but can't think of any case where war improves the situation of women.  Will the quasi-governmental "army" we provide with weapons police the rights of women and girls?  Not likely. Even before the Taliban, Afghani women had few rights.  When the Soviets marched in, one of the first things they did was declare equal rights for women.  The American response?  Fight them tooth and nail, flooding the area with weapons and creating the Taliban and al Qaeda.  Now, of course, we're all for fighting for women's rights.  Except in Saudi Arabia.  Or Darfur.  Saddam's secular Iraq was, ironically, one of the more women-friendly countries in the Muslim world.  Are we planning on killing everyone in the country who's sympathetic (out of ideology or fear) to the Taliban?  How can we tell who's who?  By torturing them?  Bribing them?  When we've created this humanistic, feminist governmental force, where none's ever existed before in a mere 18 months, won't the Taliban fight them as soon as we magically leave?  Do al Qaeda operative need obstacle course training in Iraq, or can they get by with a couple of apartments and computers in London or Madrid or Kansas?  Obama's addressed none of this, leaving one to suspect he marches to the step of the military contractors.

Laura

(Sorry for the rant)

-----Original Message-----
>From: Robert Mahnke <rpmahnke at gmail.com>
>Sent: Dec 2, 2009 2:16 PM
>To: pynchon-l at waste.org
>Subject: Re: The Nobel Prize for War 2009 goes to ...
>
>I've been trying to figure out how to say what I want to say about
>this since I saw Kai's post, and just now I saw a blog post that gets
>at part of it:
>
>http://yglesias.thinkprogress.org/archives/2009/12/a-center-right-nation.php
>
>I would like to think that if I were in Obama's shoes I would do
>things differently, but I also hope that he is smarter, more
>knowledgeable, and better advised than I am.  He certainly inherited a
>crappy situation.  But the bigger point is the one Yglesias makes,
>which is that this is a country where there is broad popular support
>for aggressive foreign policy, and unless and until that changes there
>is not that much that individual politicians can do about it.
>
>Just my two cents.
>
>On 12/2/09, kelber at mindspring.com <kelber at mindspring.com> wrote:
>> We were actually relieved to find that my nephew's being deployed to the relative safety of Iraq - a country that actually had a centralized government at one time.  Uh, wait a minute -- isn't "troop withdrawal from Iraq" one of Obama's great promised accomplishments, as exulted over in Slate and the DailyKos?
>>
>> Laura
>>
>> -----Original Message-----
>> >From: rich <richard.romeo at gmail.com>
>> >Sent: Dec 2, 2009 11:41 AM
>> >To: Kai Frederik Lorentzen <lorentzen at hotmail.de>
>> >Cc: pynchon-l at waste.org
>> >Subject: Re: The Nobel Prize for War 2009 goes to ...
>> >
>> >I got lost driving home last night in the really shitty part of
>> >Newark, NJ--and I wondered all the waste overseas while place like
>> >Newark rot in front of our eyes
>> >
>> >I think that whole support the troops nonsense is a unconcious defense
>> >mechanism against the reality of: sorry your son or daughter died for
>> >nothing
>> >
>> >shameful
>> >
>> >rich
>> >
>> >On Wed, Dec 2, 2009 at 9:30 AM, Kai Frederik Lorentzen
>> ><lorentzen at hotmail.de> wrote:
>> >>
>> >> .. Barack Obama!!
>> >>
>> >> I'm through with the guy.
>> >>
>> >> kfl
>> >>
>> >>
>>
>>




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