No More Butter, But Keep the Guns!

The title of the article is encouraging. After all, who could argue with taking steps to remedy the gargantuan, ever-increasing federal debt? However, things are not as good as they seem:

The White House is in the early stages of considering what bigger moves it might make for next year's budget. The Office of Management and Budget has asked all cabinet agencies, except defense and veterans affairs, to prepare two budget proposals for fiscal 2011, which begins Oct 1, 2010. One would freeze spending at current levels. The other would cut spending by 5%.

Why is it that the necessity of our astronomical defense budgets are never questioned? Why is it impossible for Americans to act like adults and not have knee-jerk reactions whenever the words "cut defense spending" are used? Are we that beholden to our dark fears of bogeymen and terrorists that we can't think rationally about the facts? Like the reality that we spend nearly as much on defense as the rest of the world combined? Or the fact that 59% percent of our discretionary tax dollars go towards the military?

I think that if the American people were better informed about how their money is spent they would think differently. Studies from the Center on Policy Attitudes seem to back me up:

Steven Kull, the director of COPA, explained that these findings by no means should be interpreted as a sign that Americans don’t want a strong military. As a matter of fact, he said, 78 percent of Americans (based on a recent Gallup poll) want defense spending to at least remain unchanged or go up.

Only when respondents were shown the percentage of the federal discretionary budget
that goes to defense (59 percent) were they inclined to re-distribute the wealth. Discretionary spending does not include off-budget programs such as Medicare and Social Security. “In the focus groups that we conducted, people expressed great surprise at the amount devoted to defense,” said Kull. “When they see the distribution of the discretionary federal budget, they say ‘this looks like a world’s policeman budget.’”

If it looks like a world policeman, and smells like a world policeman, it probably is a world policeman. The people sense in their gut what the sychophants in DC are loathe to admit. We pay trillions each year to police the globe and prop up a neo-imperialist, expolitative economic system. It stinks to high heaven, and it ought to end.

Crying Wolf...Again

Last week, the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, ADM Michael Mullen, gave remarks at the National Press Club in which he declared that a nuclear Iran would pose an existential threat to Israel. It is unclear whether ADM Mullen went on to refer to the 2007 National Intelligence Estimate (still supported by the US intelligence community) which concluded that any nuclear weapons program that Iran did have ended after 2003. And while not explicitly mentioned in the article, it is clear that the Chairman made no reference to the fact that Israel is armed with numerous nuclear weapons, which due to their deliverability pose a significant and credible deterrent to any nation in the region.

It's laughable the length to which American officials will go to bow to their Israeli counterparts and play this ridiculous game of denial, insisting that the Jewish state has no such weapons. After Mordechai Vanunu's disclosure, the existence of Israeli nuclear weapons is all but open source information. To pretend this capability does not exist is not only disingenuous, it is dangerous, as it risks the United States being pulled into another war in the Middle East which has nothing to do with the security of it's citizens, but everything to do with access to cheap energy supplies.

While various sources cite different estimates of the number of Israeli nuclear weapons in existence, it is known that Israel possess nuclear warheads for its Jericho missiles, nuclear bombs capable of being mounted on fighters, and various tactical nuclear weapons. Additionally, it is widely speculated that IN Dolphin class submarines are equipped with an indigenously developed nuclear cruise missile. Given the strategic depth of Israel, this delivery system would provide the only credible, survivable deterrent.

Regardless of the details and wonkery, our military officials and intelligence professionals should be loyal enough to the American people to admit what even civilian observers already know: that the nuclear power in the Middle East already is Israel. To pretend that Iran, a nation which can barely project conventional military power beyond it's own borders and does not even have a nuclear weapons program, much less a deliverable, survivable arsenal, is a threat to our client is patently absurd.

And as for the fearful folks who lie awake thinking about an Iranian nuclear weapon falling into the hands of terror groups, there is a simple solution. Israel admits the existence of its nuclear weapons program, adopts a "no first-use" policy, and adds a particular caveat. Any nuclear strike on the Israeli homeland will be regarded as a strike by Iran, and will invite nuclear retaliation. Case closed; deterrence made simple. And if Israel doesn't like the idea of being a pariah state given the fact that they are not party to the Non-Proliferation Treaty? Tough luck, pal. See how much the Israelis like it without the billions in foreign aid that make wealthy Israel the largest recipient of American tax dollars. Wait, gutting foreign aid and military sales would require our elected representatives to have the spine to stand up to AIPAC and friends. Drat!

I've got all kinds of simple answers like this. Nugget for Secretary of State?

Religion Baiting, Fox Style

The shooting rampage at Fort Hood, TX, which have left 12 dead and over 30 wounded has been a tragedy in its own right. Soldiers dead, families left morning without a father, or brother, or daughter. But added to this mess was the invariable Muslim-baiting that is inevitable in a military and a society that is ignorant enough to believe it lives in a "Christian Nation" and that the "Global War on Terror" is really a codeword for a crusade between god-fearing evangelicals and the radical, satanic hoard of Allah. Head cheerleaders for this despicable insinuation? The know-nothing talking heads on Fox and Friends, Brian Kilmeade and Gretchen Carlson. The crew wonders aloud if Muslims in the military need to have "special debriefings" for Muslims and how the military could be "so politically correct" by treating all soldiers the same. I mean, how dare the military accord each service member his or her constitutionally guarenteed rights and not discriminate?



We know very little, if anything about the motivations of the alleged shooter, Army Major Nidal Malik Hasan. Perhaps Hasan was an radical Islamist, a man willing to kill others and himself to do the work of some higher power. While he may have blood on his hands, his religious convictions would not be so unlike many other officers in the increasingly radical military. Maybe he was a man who expressed empathy and felt a deep revulsion at the suffering of other Muslims around the world. Muslims who are living under occupation in two countries, and under the corrupt rule of western-backed dictators. Or perhaps he was a man simply driven to the edge, unable to cope with the idea of being deployed to occupy foreign lands; unable to continue to minister to the young men and women whose lives and minds are being destroyed in our perpetuals wars abroad. These are all valid lines of inquiry. But unlike the despicable Muslim baiting from the fools on Fox News, these questions would actually require the ignorant sheep who call themselves American citizens to pull their eyes away from the television and use their brains.

(H/T: Salon)

Update: Keith Olbermann's got my back.

Update: Read this excellent post from Lew Rockwell's blog. Dovetails with what's discussed here.

Mayor of Kabul

News reports from Afghanistan are indicating that President Hamid Karzai's main election rival, Abdullah Abdullah, is pulling out of the second round of election run offs. Despite widespread fraud during the election, Karzai was not able to gain enough votes to ensure a second term. I won't belabor the details of the election corruption of the shananigans of Karzai's self-appointed Independent Electoral Commission.

The main point here is well summarized by Simon Tisdall in an article for the Guardian:

In Afghanistan's disreputable 2009 presidential election, everyone's a loser. Hamid Karzai's "victory", achieved by fraud and now by default, has left him a tarnished, diminished figure. The US administration that orchestrated the whole process still lacks the credible partner in Kabul it says is essential for success.

No insurgency will be defeated unless the central government in question is credible and has the support of a large group of the populace. The fact that has been widely hidden from the American public is that Karzai is little more than the mayor of Kabul, leader of a government that is widely corrupt, has no legitimacy in the eyes of most Afghans, and whose domain extends little further than the city limits of the capitol. A government like this cannot and will not extend its reach over all of Afghanistan and as a result, our efforts to support this faction in their battles against forces across the countryside are doomed to failure. It becomes increasingly apparent that NATO forces are doing little more than paying off warlords and arming more Afghans to battle against Pashtun tribes in the south; tribes that is most cases care little for the Taliban, but like in the days of the Soviet occupation, will not bow to what they see as a foreign invasion. The point is simple, we're aligned on one side of an internecine struggle; a struggle that has gone on for a very long time. Our armed forces don't exist to fight other people's civil wars.

Pegasus

I haven't posted for quite awhile here, and this is the reason.

Other than having my head in the books for too long, it's been a bit of a challenge in the air. Learning to work as a member of a team is very different from the "me king of airplane" routine in primary. That much being said, it's nice to have an extra body next to you, handling radios and running checklists. It's a shame I'm destined for much more of that when I hit the fleet, rather than hours with my hands on the controls.

But nuisances aside, change brings good things as well as bad. It's strange to walk out to an airplane that's much bigger than me, one where I cannot even touch the tail. It's odd to climb the airstair and worm my way up the cabin. It's strange to have an overhead panel and windshield wipers and two engines to play with. And it's odd to feel the solid, heavy control forces of the T-44. Less thoroughbred, more quarter-horse.

But to walk up to something bigger is a strange new step for me. It reminds me of when I first started flying, when I would hang out next to the FBO and watch as a King Air would taxi up to the ramp. Turbines whining, spitting out kerosene, props humming as they went into beta. It was an impressive sight, seeing something big and fast and expensive cruise by. I remember envying the men who stepped off that plane, wishing it was me who had my hands on that hardware. Funny how things change.

T-44 Pegasus from VT-31 on the ramp at NAS Corpus Christi

Cheerleaders for Militarism

In the wake of the Nobel Peace Prize being awarded to President Obama, New York Times maven Thomas Friedman, soothsayer of the Iraq war, and unrepentant neo-con Liz Cheney, had harsh words for the President, and unbridled praise for militarism. In a Sunday Op-Ed, Friedman channels the speech the President ought to have given, declining the Nobel and instead praising American troops, the greatest peace-keepers of the last century.

“Let me begin by thanking the Nobel committee for awarding me this prize, the highest award to which any statesman can aspire. As I said on the day it was announced, ‘I do not feel that I deserve to be in the company of so many of the transformative figures who’ve been honored by this prize.’ Therefore, upon reflection, I cannot accept this award on my behalf at all.

“But I will accept it on behalf of the most important peacekeepers in the world for the last century — the men and women of the U.S. Army, Navy, Air Force and Marine Corps.

Cheney, who like her father, seems never to have met a war she didn't like, gushes on about the American fighting man:

“But I do think he [Obama] could send a real signal here. I think what he ought to do frankly is send a mother of a fallen American soldier to accept the prize on behalf of the U.S. military and frankly to send the message to remind the Nobel committee that each one of them sleeps soundly at night because the U.S. military is the greatest peacekeeping force in the world today.”

This is evidence that we are truly living in Bizarro world, a twisted, upside down place where Orwellian double-speak is paramount. In the New American Century, war somehow equals peace. Note that while both commentators praise the nobility of our military adventures abroad in the last century, they are strangely silent about the human costs of any conflict. No mention of the millions of civilians dead in Vietnam, no mention of the innocent victims of carpet bombing in Europe, or nuclear attacks in Japan. No reference to the tens of thousands of Iraqis who have perished in the violence since the invasion in 2003. No mention of the hundreds of thousands of American men and women who have returned home from wars with broken limbs and tortured minds; scars both visible and invisible from man's most horrid of pursuits.

No, because for people like Cheney and Friedman, chickenhawks who have never worn the uniform, war is a giant social experiment. A force for social change, for spreading democracy. Notice that the rhetoric of defense of the homeland or defense of the American people is almost entirely absent from their words. No, the real reasons are different: freeing Western Europeans from Communist rule, delivering relief supplies to disaster victims, saving women and girls from religious fanatics. While these things are not evil, they come with a cost, the most dear of costs. The life of an American soldier, airman, sailor, or marine.

However, little matter to the Cheney's and Friedman's of the world. These costs don't phase them:

“So for all these reasons — and so you understand that I will never hesitate to call on American soldiers where necessary to take the field against the enemies of peace, tolerance and liberty — I accept this peace prize on behalf of the men and women of the U.S. military: the world’s most important peacekeepers.”

Notice how the man is brazen enough to never even mention the defense of the United States. And even if they did, men and women like them are so insulated, so removed from the realities at work that they do not realize the true cost of any war. The true horror and suffering that comes with any conflict. And if they do realize this, perhaps they are deluded or psychotic enough to ignore this suffering in their fellow man. I wonder how people like Friedman and Cheney would change their tune if their sons and daughters carried a rifle on the front lines.

The Winds of Change

I was reading an interesting article from the Guardian about the desire of Arab states to make oil transactions in currencies other than the dollar. While the article is enlightening and illustrative of the precarious position of the dollar in the wake of the credit crunch, it was the last article that gave me pause:

Iran announced late last month that its foreign currency reserves would henceforth be held in euros rather than dollars. Bankers remember, of course, what happened to the last Middle East oil producer to sell its oil in euros rather than dollars. A few months after Saddam Hussein trumpeted his decision, the Americans and British invaded Iraq.

Maybe a suspicion like this is giving too much credit to the strategic planning of the folks in DC. However, the information that Iraq had begun to sell in currency other than the dollar was something I was not aware of. Cause for concern? We'll have to wait and see.