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I'MMA LET YOU FINISH

frist?
gjking | 11.15.04 - 9:19 pm | #

Frist
eric | 11.15.04 - 9:20 pm | #

Amen, sister.

And if it's too "icky" then we shouldn't be doing it.

I want my country back.
Vicki Stein | 11.15.04 - 9:21 pm | #

The evening news, sanitized for your convenience.

Can't show truth, however. It's too icky.
Pollen Boy | 11.15.04 - 9:22 pm | #

You know, they say generals always plan to fight the last war, not the next one.

Hecate, is the same true of peace activists?

We can't count on stopping this war the same way we stopped the last one. Though one comparison is fundamental: the resistance of the Iraqi people to imperialist occupation.

Problem is, that's a long process, and a lot of people get killed...
litho | 11.15.04 - 9:22 pm | #

Are the troops fighting in these really nasty battles (ok, they're all bad, but Fallujah is bad to the 10th power sounding) EVER going to come home? I would think a few of these guys speaking up might get some people's attention. Iraqi Veterans Against the War. Or something.

Tow
TheOtherWashington | 11.15.04 - 9:22 pm | #

Someone at NBC needs to leak that tape. This type of shit is happening every day over there.

Sy Hersh in Berkeley:

A word of advice, from Seymour Hersh, as recounted by Seymour Hersh: "Just shut up."

Mr. Hersh, the garrulous investigative reporter who broke the news of My Lai and Abu Ghraib, was telling an audience in Berkeley on Oct. 8 about a phone conversation he’d had with an American soldier in Iraq. The soldier, Mr. Hersh said, had called to tell him about a massacre of friendly Iraqis by another platoon of Americans. "He was hysterical, totally hysterical," Mr. Hersh told the crowd, in remarks captured on digital video and archived on the Web.

Was another My Lai–grade exposé on its way? Not from Mr. Hersh. "Complete your tour," he said he’d told his would-be source. "Just shut up. You’re going to get a bullet in the back."
Old Hat | 11.15.04 - 9:23 pm | #

Word, Hecate.

It's okay for us to ignore it because we can't see it, we aren't forced to. And in the name of not upsetting the almighty American people, TV stations back off.

Fuck that shit.

The soldiers have to live it, and so do the civilians there. Least we can do is look at it for five minutes.

A.
Athenae | Homepage | 11.15.04 - 9:23 pm | #

atrocities like this are inevitable! after fighting street to street, and house to house, the milk of human kindness isn't going to be running in the veins of these guys. they have been put into a bad situation by our esteemed leader.

the situation in iraq will now move from clusterfuck to conflagration!
expect much more ugliness.
dan hoppe | 11.15.04 - 9:24 pm | #

When I was a young girl, I saw a South Vietnamese officer shoot a suspected Viet Cong soldier point blank in the head on television.
Have American sensibilities grown more delicate in thirty five years, or have the broadcasters grown more pusilanimous?
Sweet Sue | 11.15.04 - 9:25 pm | #

P.S. The "American value" thing is getting old, IMHO.
Old Hat | 11.15.04 - 9:26 pm | #

Whyever is anyone surprised?

The GOP campaigned on a platform of greater promptness, and greater efficiency, in killing swarthy people who worship the wrong God in greater numbers than the other guy, and the issue won the election for them.

This might be the only campaign promise that they actually deliver on....
Davis X. Machina | 11.15.04 - 9:26 pm | #

I can understand why they don't show that man's brains being splattered all over the wall (just guessing - I haven't seen the actual footage). I'm rather glad that the story is being TOLD AT ALL.

What Vicki said - we shouldn't be doing this.
MasterD | 11.15.04 - 9:26 pm | #

I would think a few of these guys speaking up might get some people's attention. Iraqi Veterans Against the War. Or something.

Veterans Against the Iraq War.
james | Homepage | 11.15.04 - 9:28 pm | #

Sweet Sue, it's both. Broadcasters hold their hands over the viewers eyes, and the viewers don't mind at all. Nothing to see here.
When's Survivor on?

Tow
TheOtherWashington | 11.15.04 - 9:29 pm | #

I can understand why they don't show that man's brains being splattered all over the wall (just guessing - I haven't seen the actual footage).

I don't know.

I think the fuckwad flagwavers who think war is a sanitary Tom Clancy novel or a Nintendo game and Mr. and Mrs. Oblivious American deserve to have their gag reflexes tested and the foul taste of bile fill their mouths a litte bit.
Old Hat | 11.15.04 - 9:30 pm | #

Connecting ones genitals to electrodes IS an American Value!
USSC Justice Estrada | 11.15.04 - 9:31 pm | #

Thanks, James!
TheOtherWashington | 11.15.04 - 9:31 pm | #

I bet some Troll already has a WMV of the thing— that's high-five material for them.
Pollen Boy | 11.15.04 - 9:31 pm | #

I think all civilian war whores - including Friedman types - should be forced to do some kind of penance in Iraq.

But what? Tend to the wounds of the injured and maimed? Hand out bottled water to the poor? Sweep up the rubble of a mosque?
smarty jones | 11.15.04 - 9:31 pm | #

kent coined a phrase the other day: Fallujapalooza war porn. I'm just surprised they pulled the money shot... though they were sure to tell us what it was, so our imaginations could fill in. I picture Quentin Tarantino, myself.

And I like the American Values thing, Hecate, if my opinion counts any. It's an important reframing technique, and we all need to be on message with it.
NYMary | 11.15.04 - 9:32 pm | #

Please read this post and give critque/feedback via comments provided there. Thank you!
The Liberal Avenger | Homepage | 11.15.04 - 9:34 pm | #

Oh, and Old Hat? There's nothing unreasonable in making sure a young man protects himself while simultaneously making sure the horror he has to tell gets told.
NYMary | 11.15.04 - 9:35 pm | #

P.S. The "American value" thing is getting old, IMHO.
Old Hat

In more than one way.
Although, here, so far, not so much.

.
agave | 11.15.04 - 9:36 pm | #

This will be swept under the rug along with Abu Gahrib. Nothing to see here. Move along.
This is pathetic.
Molly Merlot | 11.15.04 - 9:36 pm | #

But what? Tend to the wounds of the injured and maimed? Hand out bottled water to the poor? Sweep up the rubble of a mosque?

How about strap them with machine guns and have them fight this fucking war they love so much.

Can anyone else actually feel themselves slowly becoming radicalized? I am so angry at these millionaire elitist fucks who decide everything and suffer zero consequences for whatever stupid idea is fashionable in Washington.

I'd love to strap Friedman into a seat and force him to watch this tape a la A Clockwork Orange.

"Do you see what war is, motherfucker? Do you see what this shit actually looks like, you parasitic motherfuckers?"
Old Hat | 11.15.04 - 9:36 pm | #

And I like the American Values thing, Hecate, if my opinion counts any. It's an important reframing technique, and we all need to be on message with it.
NYMary

I second NYMary.

Good job, Hecate.
Wile E. Odysseus | 11.15.04 - 9:37 pm | #

And I like the American Values thing, Hecate, if my opinion counts any. It's an important reframing technique, and we all need to be on message with it.
NYMary

I second that emotion. I've been using that phrase all the time lately ~ I even slipped it into a marketing piece that I was writing today when I was addressing quality, strength, and durability ~ "American values" that you can trust.
Vicki Stein | 11.15.04 - 9:38 pm | #

I can guarantee you one thing - they start showing things like this murder, and there are going to be furious people writing and calling and bitching and moaning about showing bad stuff that will make us lose the war by allowing us to see the truth. Happens every fucking time now.

You saw what happened with trying to show just a relatively realistic movie on Veterans Day. These people are loud and for some reason they get heard. It's kind of beyond my understanding, frankly. I suppose they really just work for the government.
Tena | Homepage | 11.15.04 - 9:38 pm | #

There's nothing unreasonable in making sure a young man protects himself while simultaneously making sure the horror he has to tell gets told.

I never said what Hersh was doing was unreasonable.
Old Hat | 11.15.04 - 9:38 pm | #

Just to clarify: the combatants were in a mosque, which the Marines had taken the day before. They came back he next day to make sure the wounded had died.

In a mosque. We're making lot of friends, I'm sure.
NYMary | 11.15.04 - 9:38 pm | #

The (two) Bush supporters that I know think that this is all okay. They've already absorbed Abu Graib and accepted it. They overlook the deficit and the economy, thinking that it must be okay. They don't think about Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz and whether there is any plan for Iraq. They don't believe there will be a draft, and if there is they don't believe it will affect them.

I used to believe that if these otherwise (what I thought was) decent people knew the truth, they would change their mind about this administration. I used to believe that we would never have another Manzanar. I used the think the horrible days of lynching would never again occur in an enlightened America.

But now I think I was just naive.
Phredd | 11.15.04 - 9:38 pm | #

He was just letting off steam, people. A little hazing is all. Imagine what they'r going to be like when they're back home, with Bushco cutting their benefits. maybe they'll hunt republicans...
Ronjazz | 11.15.04 - 9:39 pm | #

They may be admitting this for the purpose of damage control. There have been so many war crimes in Fallujah that the administration may believe that if they have an investigation of this it will help them to maintain that the US doesn't do this sort of thing as a matter of policy.
Today in our local paper there was a story of a woman who is a member of the National Guard unit which is being shipped out to the Middle East. She is married with two children, ages 5 and 8. This is an example of the administration's committment to family values - tearing a mother away from her two young children to carry out their perverted agenda in Iraq.
Jerry | 11.15.04 - 9:40 pm | #

These people are foul beyond belief.

And stupid beyond belief too. Do they think this stuff isn't getting out to the Iraqis?

They made this clusterfuck- they and all their little warmonger supporters own this karmic disaster.
fourlegsgood | 11.15.04 - 9:40 pm | #

Principles are pretty important, too.

The values thing is/was just vague
enough to make people to be selfish;
to make them think of how it applies
to them, their families and their communities (if indeed, they are truly concerned about that last one).

American Principles are enshrined in
the Constitution, The Declaration of Independence and pretty much every state constitution. It has everything to do with the rule of law and what makes this country pretty great. Too bad people, ahem, some voters, don't really understand this concept. If more of them did, we'd be awaiting the day our newest president starts his job. Instead, well...you know the score. More of the same anti-American principles being followed at home and abroad, being done in this country's name.
sigh.
enh whatever | 11.15.04 - 9:41 pm | #

this tape is one of three that have come up lately, two of them ARE on the web.

One of the others shows a marine executing a wounded iraqi down an alley but you do not see the body.
he says "he's done" after he kills him

another tape shows a wounded iraqi laying in the street and one marine taking pot shots at him from 20m away.

When he kills the guy--who is laying in the street writhing in pain--the rest of them cheer.
steveeboy | 11.15.04 - 9:41 pm | #

Also too icky for TV:

the injured hundreds arriving at Landstuhl, apart from those with 'presentable' injuries. As the CNN guy said, 'we're not going to show you those'. God forbid. Colin's spawn at the FCC would throw a fit.

And they're definitely going to try and keep the armless, legless, brain-damaged Iraq vets from gathering in one place. Back home they go, back to the local VA, a two-minute piece on the local news if they're not too badly disfigured and sixty years of disability to look forward to.
pseudonymous in nc | 11.15.04 - 9:41 pm | #

I think it took the mainstream media about five seconds to come up with a spin for this: last I saw, the story on MSNBC was that because there were Coalition fatalities from boobytrapped corpses, shooting the wounded insurgent was self defense. I can actually accept the reality that war and fatalities go hand in hand which is why so many people are vigorously anti-war. I am also open to explanations concerning the mental assault and twisting of the mind which creates a new morality in its actors which war produces. But the "exploding corpses" spin was just too much to stomache.
GN | Homepage | 11.15.04 - 9:41 pm | #

Old Hat:
Sorry. Missed what was quote and what was commentary. Long day.
NYMary | 11.15.04 - 9:42 pm | #

Hope this works-I'm real new at posting links. If it doesn't, the gang over atFirst Draft have it up.

If any thinking reasonable person still beleives that we are in Iraq to bring democracy and freedom to the Iraqi people, this type of report puts paid to that delusion real fast.

I could almost beleive in our fourth estate if this showed up on the front page of every major metropolitan newspaper.
left rev. | 11.15.04 - 9:42 pm | #

Do you see how it works?

We show charred corpses of dead contractors hanging from a bridge for 72 hours straight on cable

We don't show our boys capping wounded guys lying on the floor in cold blood, or dead Iraqi kids.

Get it?
Old Hat | 11.15.04 - 9:42 pm | #

If it's too icky to show, maybe it's too icky for us to be doing it?

Sounds like the Democrats' platform.
Anonymous | 11.15.04 - 9:43 pm | #

Arrgh! I'll get this figured out eventually.

Don't blame me, I'm a humanities major.
left rev. | 11.15.04 - 9:43 pm | #

Old Hat,

I like your suggestion about A Clockwork Orange.

Wile E: not bad either.
smarty jones | 11.15.04 - 9:44 pm | #

last I saw, the story on MSNBC was that because there were Coalition fatalities from boobytrapped corpses, shooting the wounded insurgent was self defense.

Well, that's bullshit. The Marines in Fallujah have taken huge casualties this past week, and you can understand, if not accept, that some of them want a bit of retribution on 'haji'.
pseudonymous in nc | 11.15.04 - 9:45 pm | #

But you have to realize that this is exactly what Bush supporters WANT the soldiers to do.

The sooner you come to grips with that the easier it will be to find an answer to this madness.

They are more than willing to sacrifice hundreds and hundreds more of their own countrymen and women so they can feel "safe" in their SUVs. You think they give a shit about another Iraqi insurgent?

As someone so elequently put:
We are fucked.
Guy | 11.15.04 - 9:46 pm | #

left rev.,
So if you're female, can I picture you as the Minnesotan minister who comes to Hank Hill's town on King of the Hill?
NYMary | 11.15.04 - 9:46 pm | #

Old Hat-

Got it.
Pollen Boy | 11.15.04 - 9:47 pm | #

The (two) Bush supporters that I know think that this is all okay. They've already absorbed Abu Graib and accepted it.

Yep. My bush loving acquaintences are wondering why I'm so cold to them now.

I just tell them they voted and said this shit was okay.

They are dead to me now.
fourlegsgood | 11.15.04 - 9:47 pm | #

Sorry NYMary. I haven't watched network TV in a long time. Is this a good thing?
left rev. | 11.15.04 - 9:47 pm | #

slightly ot,

but has Simone Ledeen been nominated for Sec. of Commerce yet?
smarty jones | 11.15.04 - 9:47 pm | #

I read that over 500 American soldiers have been seriously injured in the assault on Fallujah. I should have noted the publication, but I can tell you it is a reliable source.
Vicki Stein | 11.15.04 - 9:48 pm | #

Oh, and Hecate. You are doing a great job here. I really appreciate the ideas for reframing our discourse. Live by the word, die by the word.
left rev. | 11.15.04 - 9:50 pm | #

I don't know showing it. People get desensitized pretty quick.
Foundling | 11.15.04 - 9:50 pm | #

My pro-Kerry mother-in-law was babysitting two grandchildren from a red wing of the family, boys ages 8 & 9. During the debates, the younger said to her, "I can't believe it, grandma, YOU are for Kerry?" Grandma replied, "yes, boys, because of the war". These beautiful little blonde boys replied in unison, "what war?"
ErinPDX | 11.15.04 - 9:51 pm | #

The moment war is declared, however, the mass of the people, through some spiritual alchemy, become convinced that they have willed and executed the deed themselves. They then, with the exception of a few malcontents, proceed to allow themselves to be regimented, coerced, deranged in all the environments of their lives, and turned into a solid manufactory of destruction toward whatever other people may have, in the appointed scheme of things, come within the range of the Government's disapprobation.

The citizen throws off his contempt and indifference to Government, identifies himself with its purposes, revives all his military memories and symbols, and the State once more walks, an august presence, through the imaginations of men. Patriotism becomes the dominant feeling, and produces immediately that intense and hopeless confusion between the relations which the individual bears and should bear toward the society of which he is a part.
pseudonymous in nc | 11.15.04 - 9:51 pm | #

left rev,
It's not bad, except for when e fed Bobby Hill lutefisk and he got intestinal distress. She's a nice woman.
NYMary | 11.15.04 - 9:51 pm | #

I think now would be a good time for a large supply of blue valium. I don't know how we are going to make it through 4 years of this.
Tena | Homepage | 11.15.04 - 9:52 pm | #

We show charred corpses of dead contractors hanging from a bridge for 72 hours straight on cable

And why were those four contractors killed and mutilated, and celebrations held over their corpses? Would it have anything to do with their connection to say, Abu Ghraib?

And let's not forget "hero" Johnny Spann, the CIA agent killed in a prison uprising.

Nothing to see here, people. Move along.
Ned Beaumont | 11.15.04 - 9:53 pm | #

I'm Swedish by descent and lutekefish would give me intestinal distress.
Hecate | 11.15.04 - 9:54 pm | #

I hate to tell you this, but the invasion forces have been committing war crimes since the war started.

The war itself is a continuing crime, for example. And blocking access to ambulances and medical personnel is also a war crime. And on, and on...
Seraphiel | 11.15.04 - 9:54 pm | #

I don't know showing it. People get desensitized pretty quick.

I just want to let you know, I think the Navy SEALS rock!
Katie Couric | 11.15.04 - 9:55 pm | #

I think now would be a good time for a large supply of blue valium. I don't know how we are going to make it through 4 years of this.

One day at a time, Tena.
just me | 11.15.04 - 9:55 pm | #

tena, just give me enough quaaludes to knock me out for four years.
Vicki Stein | 11.15.04 - 9:57 pm | #

I'm not sanguine about disgust for war ever developing, at least not among Americans.

If that were to happen, surely the Civil War would have done it.

Anyway, I heard a comment by Noam Chomksy that was interesting. He was asked, after a lecture, about the draft; whether or not it would be reinstated, what he thought about it, etc. He said he didn't think the draft would recur, for a simple reason: Army generals learned in Vietnam never to use civilian troops in an imperialist endeavour.

He claimed the Army was disintegrating in Vietnam, that civilian troops (draftees, in essense) simply won't do what is necessary for an imperialist war, that it's too nasty for the Average Joe.

I would note, here, that the atrocity under discussion was by a Marine. Marines have always been volunteers.

He cited examples from European history, where mercenaries (the French Foreign Legion; the Ghurkas; etc.) or troops from the colony (the Iraqis don't seem to be cooperating, on that score) were used to fight the colonial battles necessary to maintain control.

So, if he is right, will we ever be disgusted? Especially since the children who are dying are not "our" children. They are someone else's children. I do believe that Vietnam turned when enough middle class families had sacrificed enough children to the war machine to be tired of it, if not entirely disgusted. But I'm not sure we were disgusted by Vietnam. Kerry was right about the atrocities, but 35 or so year later, people still want to call him a liar. And My Lai, like Abu Ghraib, still seems to have been the fault of a few, not a system (as Anmericans, our hands are always clean).

The simple answers (swift, certain change, such as revulsion over atrocities) have been taken from us. The hard answers (work for justice, a la Martin Luther King, Jr.) are all that remain.
Robert M. Jeffers | 11.15.04 - 9:57 pm | #

Put down the lutekfish and back away slowly! That's it...

Fly, be free lutekefish...

Is leuktefish related to gefilte fish?

Seems an odd choice for Communion...
left rev. | 11.15.04 - 9:59 pm | #

if they were so worried about booby traps, they would be in the mosque in the first place.

And the disgrace to the uniform that executed the wounded iraqi wouldn't have been standing 3 feet away from him when he shot him in the head.

the freaks at FR are all over themselves calling for the reporter's--Kevin Sites-head on a platter because "he is a tritor."

funny, but before this came out they were linking to Sites blog because it has lots of good pictures of fallujah and other iraq news.

now, they are calling for an end to the embedded journalists.
steveeboy | 11.15.04 - 9:59 pm | #

I'm all for qualuudes. I mean, if anyone's got any. Qualuudes are lots and lots of fun, but they have the distressing tendency to make me want to fuck anything that moves. Animate or inanimate, it doesn't matter, for it puts the love within my heart.
Backslider | Homepage | 11.15.04 - 9:59 pm | #

I think all civilian war whores - including Friedman types - should be forced to do some kind of penance in Iraq.

But what? Tend to the wounds of the injured and maimed?

they should work as orderlies in Walter Reed Hospital. and the richie-richs who funded the propoganda, Scaife, Ahmanson, et al, should be made to to the same in the local veterans hospital. seriously, I think we should write them letters and say since they wanted this war they need to be fighting it. If they are too old for the field, well, they can work at the local veterans' hospital.
Alice Marshall | Homepage | 11.15.04 - 10:00 pm | #

Whooohooo! America is the great Satan after all! Remember those party hats you all put in storage on Nov. 3? Well, break them out again. We got a party up in this place.
Hand Wringer | 11.15.04 - 10:00 pm | #

Lutefisk (prounounced loo-ta-fisk) is a well-known food of Norway and Sweden which consists of white fish soaked in lye as a preservative, then dried until it hardens. It is edible after multiple rinsings of water to remove the otherwise poisonous lye, and has a jelly-like consistency after washing.

It is usually served with akvavit. It is also very popular in Scandinavian-American areas of the United States, such as Minnesota.

The dish has sometimes subjected Scandinavian-Americans to jokes about the personality traits suggested by serving chemically-treated white fish with a white sauce. It is somewhat notorious for its intense odor, even within Scandinavia.
just me | 11.15.04 - 10:01 pm | #

Slow down here. I said along time ago that this would turn into our soldiers killing people because the enemy would become the people of Iraq. BUT, this is only one instance of one soldier, so far. There could be much more to it, much more to come out and maybe not. So far, I have seen no evidence of anything close to the Viet Nam kind of thing.
Don’t get all worked up because some kid lost it, in a hell most of you and I will never understand. Get worked up because he’s there, but don’t discredit yourselves in the mean time. There’s reports of soldiers shooting at anything that moves, but, what would you do? Me, I just wouldn’t be there, but I’m somewhat, but not a lot fortunate.
agave | 11.15.04 - 10:01 pm | #

The Iraqi people need a voice in the media. Someone needs to be a talking head for them. Perhaps a woman, perhaps a college kid that can speak out against the crime that is the US occupation.

If these idiots weren't so completely incompetent they might of had a chance of actually succeeding in bringing democracy to Iraq. Unfortunately I doubt that was even plan B. It was just a massive welfare program for Haliburton and other US companies to loot the American taxpayer.
Bluto W Bush | 11.15.04 - 10:02 pm | #

Alice Marshall,

that is a good idea; however, these people should be airlifted to Iraq itself. I think by day they should help Iraqis and by night console our wounded.

During their spare time, they can eat their own shit.
smarty jones | 11.15.04 - 10:02 pm | #

just me,
Sounds tempting, but I think I'll stick to catfish (bottom feeders) and suckin' the heads of crawdads. You know, Southern cuisine.
Backslider | Homepage | 11.15.04 - 10:02 pm | #

He claimed the Army was disintegrating in Vietnam, that civilian troops (draftees, in essense) simply won't do what is necessary for an imperialist war, that it's too nasty for the Average Joe.

That's about right. Though the backdoor draft is useful for the state here, because it provides the necessary inoculation for the Lynndie England Corps: pizza deliverers from rural WV who signed up for the Guard to get college money. They're draftees who've had the civilian rebellion trained out of them in advance.

How sustainable that is, I dunno. But I do know that in the UK, where the Territorial Army isn't anywhere near as big an inoculating presence, there's no way that ops in Iraq are sustainable for more than the near future.
pseudonymous in nc | 11.15.04 - 10:04 pm | #

Sure, every war has atrocities. It's rather naughty to commit them, but it's even worse form to talk about them!
Plenty | 11.15.04 - 10:04 pm | #

So far, I have seen no evidence of anything close to the Viet Nam kind of thing.

How many tens of thousands of Iraqi civilians dead? What is our exit strategy? Why are we there in the first place?

Did you read the thing I posted about Sy Hersh getting a call from an officer saying his unit executed 50 Iraqis?
Old Hat | 11.15.04 - 10:05 pm | #

I just saw an excellent PSA from (I believe) a Halifax broadcaster... dunno if my description can do it justice...

Scene: Dad in the kitchen, coaching an offscreen child, saying things like, "Now make an 'L'. No, that's an 'i', but it's close." He does this while stirring pots on the stove. Camera shows son, in front of television, asking when dinner's going to be ready. Dad, with a great tinge of frustration in his voice, says "Soon, kiddo." Back to Dad, who's sitting down at the table talking to child (blocked by refrigerator), saying "There! Now you've spelled your name!"

Camera pans around, and we see that the 'child' off-camera is, in fact, his wife.

It's a workplace safety ad. It brought me to tears because I can't imagine how many similar scenes will play out in American and Iraqi households in the near future...
Charlotte Smith (nee Beavers) | 11.15.04 - 10:05 pm | #

Qualuudes are lots and lots of fun, but they have the distressing tendency to make me want to fuck anything that moves.

Aye, matey. I've got stories I could tell you from my hippie dippy days...we'll save that for another thread when Steve Simels is around to bronze the couch!

But that's for another time. What can we do about this war? Will Bush bail next year? I don't think so, as I see the hornets nest growing exponentially in relation to Bush's mistakes.
Vicki Stein | 11.15.04 - 10:05 pm | #

I am made nuts by this war. I am the great mass of populace whose money has made this war. I failed to stop it. I have to live with my family and neighbors who find nothing wrong with it, indeed applaud it. I wonder how much a person can stand.
Sharkbabe | 11.15.04 - 10:05 pm | #

Ummm... get Backslider some 'ludes and sit back and watch the fun...

IIRC, the church in Arlen, TX got a new, comically Minnesotan, female reverend. Hank was horrified. Bobby took a whole pan of lutekefisk under the table and ate it all, got sick, and had to light a match in the bathroom to clear the stench, setting the church on fire.
NYMary | 11.15.04 - 10:06 pm | #

Former Marine/Managing editor of SE Asia News.......

http://tinyurl.com/4eekz
smkngman | 11.15.04 - 10:06 pm | #

they should work as orderlies in Walter Reed Hospital. and the richie-richs who funded the propoganda, Scaife, Ahmanson, et al, should be made to to the same in the local veterans hospital.

Bedpans and bedbaths. I want Richard Perle up to his elbows in shit. I want Jonah Goldberg cleaning dressings. I want Ann Coulter sloshing the disinfectant.
pseudonymous in nc | 11.15.04 - 10:06 pm | #

I think we are all starting to get it and Hecate you are leading the way in the framing of issues. I like the angle.
Erik | 11.15.04 - 10:06 pm | #

tena, just give me enough quaaludes to knock me out for four years.
Vicki Stein

deja vu, if I remember right.

.
agave | 11.15.04 - 10:07 pm | #

All of the civilian war whores should
have all of their assets seized to build a military hospital similar to John Griesemer's book,
No One Thinks of Greenland.

Then they would be required to care for the human wreckage they created.
Doremus Jessup | 11.15.04 - 10:09 pm | #

That was you, agave? Ah, now it's all coming back...
Vicki Stein | 11.15.04 - 10:11 pm | #

Hecate should start a blog called framing.blogspot.com.
Erik | 11.15.04 - 10:12 pm | #

Will Bush bail next year? I don't think so, as I see the hornets nest growing exponentially in relation to Bush's mistakes.

Well, first Bush will have to admit a mistake. Which would be a first.

He will eventually withdraw from Iraq (probably under public pressure; I don't think Congress is going to be nearly as cohesive as he expects it to be, and he'll have no end of trouble if he pulls stunts like changing the cloture rule or getting Cheney to pull some hijinks as President of the Senate). If he does, he'll declare it all good, even as the region descends into Lebanon-like chaos and instability. And we continue to get not a drop of oil from them (us, or anybody else).
Robert M. Jeffers | 11.15.04 - 10:13 pm | #

i think this event is just a reminder, again, why we didn't want this war. when war starts, you tend to look at the little things and say 'see, i told you this would happen.'

but in reality, everything about his war is what we didn't want. we didn't want our country to devolve into a swamp of ugly rhetoric, we didn't want the rampaging xenophobia that suddenly becomes tolerable when a war is on, we didn't want the deaths on either side, but especially with civilians who had nothing, absolutely nothing, to do with this. republicans will come on and say 'this is part of war', but what they don't get is that we saw this coming all along.

my mom and stepfather had this spiritual thing where they spent a complete 24 hour period confessing all their lives secrets, and he ended up telling her about the time in vietnam when he was forced by his lieutenant to execute a mom and her daughter in front of a village as an 'example', or whatever.

this type of stuff HAPPENS. john kerry knew it because he was there. you'd think maybe if bush had gone, he'd know what was gonna be occuring and maybe thought twice about it.
wastelandusa | 11.15.04 - 10:13 pm | #

NYMary,
Pretty much, yeah. Until the cops come, anyway.

As for if Bush will pull out...I dunno. The worst case scenario I see for Iraq is something along the reasoning Nixon gave for "sticking with it" in Vietnam: can't have "peace without honor" and all that rot. Plus, he would totally lose his base if he split - no more "he sticks by his words despite what people think" hoo-hah - and that would burn the GOP. I don't think they're willing to take the political damage just for Junior's "legacy".

And besides, there's a shit-ton of bread to be made in a war, oil or no oil. You don't think the military-industrial complex isn't making out bandits? That touted $87 billion spent and yet the troops are still underequipped? That money's goin' into someone's pocket, dear hearts, by hook or by crook.
Backslider | Homepage | 11.15.04 - 10:14 pm | #

I'm very afraid that the United States will be eaten by its hubris for a very long time. It was a long time coming.

I've always thought that with the decline in sucsess of the European brand of colonialism, the United States collectively has thought of itself as occupying a moral high ground when it comes to relationships with the rest of the world and never felt inhibited in taking our own version of "Manifest DEstiny" to wherever we'd like. Even the isolationalism that we projected during the early 20th century was symptomatic of a country rejecting what it thought was a world that would contaminate us with failure and disintegration of established order. It took a worldwide conflagration to shake us loose from our illusion that we could remain detatched from the rest of world on our terms. Instead we than began to engage the world, on our terms, and haven't stopped since then.

The self-inflicted blindness of our nation concerning what the practice of war does to our humanity is again part and parcel of our apparent inability to see the world through any eyes but our own.

If there is anyway for our eyes to be open, it wil be because enough citizens of this country determine that they are willing to prop open their eyes with splinters as we sail between the Scylla of dehumanizing foreign policy and the Charybdis of active nation building to see who we have corporately become and take us safely through to the other side where we might reclaim a sense of righteouness that stems from our actions and not from our delusions.

My two cents, if its worth that much.
left rev. | 11.15.04 - 10:15 pm | #

Didn't I see this trailer at the movies over the weekend before "Polar Express?" I think it was for "Apocalypse Once Again":

A Marine approached one of the men in the mosque saying, "He's fucking faking he's dead. He's faking he's fucking dead."

The Marine raised his rifle and fired into the apparently wounded man's head, at which point a companion said, "Well, he's dead now..."

Directed by McG, starring Charlie Sheen as Willard, Jr. and Bernie Mac as Kurtz' brother...
dave | Homepage | 11.15.04 - 10:15 pm | #

pseud in nc - I like it - that's perfect. It really is - they should be made to work in the hospitals for the wounded. That is inspired.

War is one of man's most futile endeavors. I don't have high hopes for our ever outgrowing it, frankly. But at the very least we could learn that we have to pay a price for it. Those who apparently pay no spiritual price for it should then have to pay a material price - let them care for the wounded.
Tena | Homepage | 11.15.04 - 10:16 pm | #

We're on the same thought, Mr. Jeffers. I do hope you weren't warped by the experience.

The Little King's whole shtick - his whole reason to be - is his "steadfastness". He "doesn't waver". He "never backs down". Even though he does all the fucking time. This particular Texas two-step, however, would be hard for the lazy bastards in the media to ignore.
Backslider | Homepage | 11.15.04 - 10:17 pm | #

wastelandusa -

Your comment moved me. The reality of your stepfather, what he did in time of war and will never be able to forget, this will be repeated again and again, with the young men coming home from this 'atrocity' called Iraq. I don't even like to call it a war, I realize, because that assumes two sides, and, well, I only see one. Us. The aggressor, and those from the invaded country who are, by necessity, defending themselves. (sorry for the run-on sentences...)
*
Jenny from the Blog | 11.15.04 - 10:18 pm | #

john kerry knew it because he was there.

Wasteland, yes. That is why what Rove did to bring in the SBVT was absolutely sick and wrong on the deepest possible level...he knew the atrocities were true and used it malign public opinion against John Kerry. All for political gain.

I hope Mr. Rove dies a lonely man. For he surely will die morally bankrupt.
Vicki Stein | 11.15.04 - 10:18 pm | #

A Marine approached one of the men in the mosque saying, "He's fucking faking he's dead. He's faking he's fucking dead."

The Marine raised his rifle and fired into the apparently wounded man's head, at which point a companion said, "Well, he's dead now..."

CNN just played the (censored) video. I feel fucking sick.
Old Hat | 11.15.04 - 10:19 pm | #

Atrios, 28-7 Iggles. Looking forward to the first all-PA superbowl.
rococco | 11.15.04 - 10:20 pm | #

They are trying to crush the insurgents and they will start using tactical nuclear weapons when that becomes neccessary. They think force is the answer. If it works in Iraq, then on to Syria and Iran.
Jerry | 11.15.04 - 10:22 pm | #

CNN just played the (censored) video. I feel fucking sick.

Too little, too late?

I feel fucking sick.
pie | 11.15.04 - 10:22 pm | #

And the longer this mess goes on, the worse it's going to get, because out troops are in Hell. There's really no other word for it. They are in hell, and Hell is not run by Angels. There are no good deeds to be done in Hell, there is only Satan to be pleased. One difference; you have to die to get into the Hell we were warned about in Sunday School, you have to die to get out of this one...
Doozer among Fraggles | 11.15.04 - 10:23 pm | #

smkngman @ 10:06

Truth from the Patron Saint

I'm snapping in every day,
because it's coming our way.
Doremus Jessup | 11.15.04 - 10:23 pm | #

That was you, agave? Ah, now it's all coming back...
Vicki Stein

Can't believe I survived, glad you did too.

.
agave | 11.15.04 - 10:24 pm | #

I gotta say, though, I'm slowly rethinking my opinion of this Embedded Reporter thing...
Doozer among Fraggles | 11.15.04 - 10:25 pm | #

This sounds nutty, but last night, around two or three AM, I woke up and "heard", "there are massacres going on in Fallujah, and they are being done in your name. What are you going to do about it?"
I spent the rest of the night asking for forgiveness-from whom-God, Iraqis-the future?
Am I just wound too tight these days? Is anyone else haunted like this?
Whaddya bet Bush sleeps like a baby?
Sweet Sue | 11.15.04 - 10:25 pm | #

Then again, the US Military probably is, too.
Doozer among Fraggles | 11.15.04 - 10:25 pm | #

I remember it well. Evening news, live coverage, a troop truck hit a land mine. It was so horrible I couldn't believe my own eyes.

pacem in terra
Agathena | 11.15.04 - 10:26 pm | #

I saw that on CNN as well. Plus the follow up story on the violence elsewhere.

It's unbearable to watch.
fourlegsgood | 11.15.04 - 10:26 pm | #

Folks , do me a quick favor ...it may sound pandering or pedestrian , but we need to exhort at least one media outlet to air this video intact .

One correspondant/ anchor I KNOW has an aversion to santization . Aaron Brown . I know it sounds weird but if we put a ton of pressure on him , remind him that he detests censorship and that he has a Broader Responsiblity to his audience , as a sort of tarriff for the airways, a price that must be paid , both to the soldiers who would tell us if they could , and the people who need to know what is being done in thier name . Remind Aaron that he is on at 10 and nothing to fear from Jr. at the FCC.

I know one or two people who know Brown and they say that he can do anything he wants of he can show his bosses that there is a place and an interest and a case to be made . He is a good guy , but he needs to hear it from us .

Click my homepage for the form , hit him hard and often . Remember , there aren't that many newspeople who even read emails from Progressives , but he does , so ask firm , but ask nice .

Lets do it , Tell Aaron to show the tape . Show the tape . Show the tape .

With duty and honor , defend your nation from those in power .

Peace to each of you Escatonians.
A.s.H. | Homepage | 11.15.04 - 10:26 pm | #

Things are already growing even worse for the US as far as international respect and cooperation go--and the first four years still aren't over.

Chirac is openly calling bullshit:

Tony Blair and Jacques Chirac clashed openly last night over the future course of Europe's relationship with the United States as the prime minister insisted they must work together for world peace and the French president suggested it is increasingly pointless.

Mr Chirac, speaking ahead of his state visit to London, said that Britain had gained nothing in return for supporting the US over Iraq and that he did not think "it is in the nature of our American friends today" to pay back favours.

"I'm not sure, the US being what it is today, whether it is possible for anyone, even the British, to play the role of the friendly go-between," he said.

rorschach | 11.15.04 - 10:27 pm | #

Hey Jeffers, we've got a mission for you.

There's a new statue in Houston that needs some dressing up.

Are you game?
fourlegsgood | 11.15.04 - 10:28 pm | #

Victory in Fallujah: U.S. Army critical
care nurse Cpt. Marvetta Walker checks
on a 9-year-old Fallujah boy who was
wounded in the face and stomach, while
at the 31st Combat Support Hospital in
Baghdad, Iraq Monday, Nov. 15, 2004. The
boy was in critical condition. The
hospital has been treating both American
wounded as well as civilians from the
Fallujah fighting. (AP Photo/John Moore)
Clevinger | 11.15.04 - 10:28 pm | #

I hope Rove dies a lonely man.

Hell, I hope he dies in screaming agony.

And that it takes a really long time.
fourlegsgood | 11.15.04 - 10:29 pm | #

CNN just played the (censored) video. I feel fucking sick.

Too little, too late?

It's way late, but I wouldn't call it too little. I worry it might be too much for some, though, and cause a backlash. The backlash would be against CNN, and whatever courage we might think they just found could get lost again in a hurry.
Doozer among Fraggles | 11.15.04 - 10:29 pm | #

I hope Rove dies a lonely man.

Hell, I hope he dies in screaming agony.

And that it takes a really long time.
fourlegsgood | 11.15.04 - 10:29 pm | #

Sweet Sue,

{{{{Hugs}}}}

I'm haunted, lately, in an emotion I've yet to identify. It's numbness and despair, but it's something else, too.

Keep praying for goodness in this dark world.
Vicki Stein | 11.15.04 - 10:30 pm | #

I am so horrified by the war, I have grown children 19-28.

My father was in WW2 and my grandmother told me that when he came back, he never went hunting again. He even told me that he could never bear to shoot at any living thing again. The Greatest Generation, the untold story. Don't get me started.

Ot. Everyone here must read Whats the Matter With Kansas? Its a must read. I was thinking of buying it for all my friends for xmas but its too depressing.
rococco | 11.15.04 - 10:31 pm | #

Am I abdicating residency in the reality based community if I say I only wish we could put aside America as we know it and strive towards America as we can vision it.

God, we need a prophet.

I tried to view some clips from Fallujah online, and I just couldn't. My heart goes out to all of you with the fortitude to look it in the face.
left rev. | 11.15.04 - 10:32 pm | #

Fuck this fucking country. I want all this horseshit done with, so we can rebuild. Bring on the collapse, so we can rebuild.
Sharkbabe | 11.15.04 - 10:32 pm | #

I hope Rove dies a lonely man.

Hell, I hope he dies in screaming agony.

And that it takes a really long time.
fourlegsgood

"Let him feel that he is dying."
Caligula (the Roman One) | 11.15.04 - 10:34 pm | #

I like the idea of forcing these neocons to face the human consequences of their blood lust, but I wouldn't have them working in any VA hospitals. I doubt that any of them have enough humanity and compassion to be able to touch a wounded person without hurting him worse.
Nora | 11.15.04 - 10:35 pm | #

Caligula, when karma catches up with Rove he's going to be well and truly fucked.
fourlegsgood | 11.15.04 - 10:35 pm | #

I don't know how Bush sleeps at night. I really don't. He never looks a bit pained, never stooped in sorrow. Always the [bad] jokester. My stomach turns.

One word: sociopath.

He doesn't care that millions of us cannot sleep at night because of his actions, or that thousands of us (and many more of "them") will never wake up again.
rorschach | 11.15.04 - 10:35 pm | #

Fourlegs : here here and fuckin a bubba.

Word
A.s.H. | Homepage | 11.15.04 - 10:36 pm | #

I like it - that's perfect. It really is - they should be made to work in the hospitals for the wounded. That is inspired.

You know, during the Great War (and this is the month to remember it) the daughters of the upper-class in England didn't do a Jenna and not Jenna. They worked as nurses in hospitals for the gassed, the shell-shocked and the disabled. They changed dressings. They emptied bedpans. They did what they could.

Because it was everyone's war. Yes, it was a grotesque game for the ruling classes when it began, but it claimed rich and poor alike at the Somme and Ypres. War entailed sacrifice. And when Waugh talked about the few 'hard faced men who did well out of the war' entering parliament in 1919, it was with the utmost disgust.

Where's the fucking sacrifice among the greatest cheerleaders? All I see are hard-faced men (and women) who are doing well out of the war.
pseudonymous in nc | 11.15.04 - 10:36 pm | #

Here's what I wish for Rove - that in his final moments he suddenly understands clearly how evil his every action has been and the horror that he brought into the world.

That's all I ask. I would like each and every one of them to have that moment of clarity and realization just before he or she dies.

That would be just.
Tena | Homepage | 11.15.04 - 10:38 pm | #

rorschach -

Remember how beaten Lyndon Johnson always looked. All of our presidents, good, bad or indifferent, have, at least for the cameras, if nothing else, shown the burden of their office. This president is, yes, a sociopath through and through.
*
Jenny from the Blog | 11.15.04 - 10:38 pm | #

Where's the fucking sacrifice among the greatest cheerleaders?

Absolutely. There is no sacrifice ~ not in the present. But we will pay, and I fear it will be dearly.
Vicki Stein | 11.15.04 - 10:39 pm | #

America as we know it will be finished before this sham war is over. I hope you folks are ready for internet clampdown/purge/shutdown of sites like these. We have a de facto dictatorship under Patriot I, and it's just a matter of their pushing it to its logical end, with the help of the next terrorist attack.
Sharkbabe

No shit.
UnAmerican activities. Not supporting the president. If they can do it to the CIA?........
I see it coming also.
God make me be wrong, but we will never hear Plame again, or anything like it, in any sense that makes sense.

.
agave | 11.15.04 - 10:40 pm | #

Where's the fucking sacrifice
among the greatest cheerleaders?

Sacrifice?

They're fucking making a fortune.
Central Scrutinizer | 11.15.04 - 10:40 pm | #

Wow, Tena, you're more forgiving of them than I am, at least at this moment.
Vicki Stein | 11.15.04 - 10:41 pm | #

That's all I ask. I would like each and every one of them to have that moment of clarity and realization just before he or she dies.

That would be just.

Err, no, that would be mercy. Justice would demand that each and every one of them relive the death and agony of each and every human being that suffered and died because of what they did. For eternity.
just me | 11.15.04 - 10:41 pm | #

...and the French president suggested it is increasingly pointless.

He's right. Damn. He's so right.
pie | 11.15.04 - 10:42 pm | #

A quick note: Kevin Sites, the NBC reporter, is a blogger (when his bosses allow). He's pretty much tied by military restrictions, but it might be worth Atrios emailing him on behalf of the blog...

(On a lighter note, Chirac's interview mentions that when he arrives at No. 10 for his London visits, he asks to say hello to Leo Blair, Tony's four-year-old. Leo comes in and says 'Bonjour Monsieur Chirac'. I'm sure that if Republicans in Congress get wind of the fact that Blair's youngest kid is speaking French, Britain will be consigned to Old Europe.)
pseudonymous in nc | 11.15.04 - 10:42 pm | #

you know what makes me cry?

to know that these people responsible for this hell were within 130,000 or so votes in Ohio from being shamed, ostracized and possibly in jail.
smarty jones | 11.15.04 - 10:43 pm | #

and now they are rubbing our faces in their feces.
smarty jones | 11.15.04 - 10:44 pm | #

Perhaps it's too easy and facile an explantation, but 5 decades of godawful TV have probably de-sensitized many Americans, to the point where nothing shocks them.
old grizzly | 11.15.04 - 10:44 pm | #

Strange things that pop into your head. I hated this when I was younger, not sure if I still don't, but it started running around in my head in the last day or so.

"Now the valley cried with anger,
"Mount your horses! Draw your sword!"
And they killed the mountain-people,
So they won their just reward.

Now they stood beside the treasure,
On the mountain, dark and red.
Turned the stone and looked beneath it...
"Peace on Earth" was all it said. "
EkCenTrik | 11.15.04 - 10:45 pm | #

Yes, Jenny. That is the scariest thing of all. This soi-disant "war president" feels NO burden when sending people to kill and die.

Of all his many failings, that's his greatest, both as a leader and as a human.
rorschach | 11.15.04 - 10:45 pm | #

actually, I did think Bush looked old and beaten 2 weeks ago. He doesn't now.
NYMary | 11.15.04 - 10:46 pm | #

I've put together a little summary of Condi lies. It's very incomplete but includes cites and links where possible.

So will we -- Senate Ds -- attempt to block her. I doubt it but will we at least use this opportunity to call a liar a liar?
Don | Homepage | 11.15.04 - 10:47 pm | #

NYMary

Of course, he has just removed the only burden he has carried. he won, everything is peachy keen. Anyone for a round of golf?
EkCenTrik | 11.15.04 - 10:48 pm | #

NYMary -

He might have looked beaten because he thought he would be, on Nov 2. The political is the personal...
*
Jenny from the Blog | 11.15.04 - 10:48 pm | #

smarty jones interrupts this horror show to remind you that while war crimes may be a growing american value, the japanese value competetive eating!

"Japan's record hot-dog eater branches out to put down 69 hamburgers"

TOKYO (AFP) - A slender 26-year-old from Japan who is the undefeated champion in hot-dog eating competitions has broadened his repertoire, wowing an American crowd by munching 69 hamburgers in eight minutes.

Takeru Kobayashi, who has made a full-time career out of his unusual talent and become a celebrity in Japan, took home 10,000 dollars after stuffing himself at the contest in Chattanooga, Tennessee, media reports said.

"Kobayashi is, without a doubt, the greatest eater ever to live upon planet Earth," said David Baer of the International Federation of Competitive Eating...
smarty jones | 11.15.04 - 10:48 pm | #

smarty,
I believe the recount request was filed today. It was supposed to be.
NYMary | 11.15.04 - 10:48 pm | #

Wartime brings the ideal of the State out into very clear relief, and reveals attitudes and tendencies that were hidden. In times of peace the sense of the State flags in a republic that is not militarized. For war is essentially the health of the State. The ideal of the State is that within its territory its power and influence should be universal.

As the Church is the medium for the spiritual salvation of man, so the State is thought of as the medium for his political salvation. Its idealism is a rich blood flowing to all the members of the body politic. And it is precisely in war that the urgency for union seems greatest, and the necessity for universality seems most unquestioned.

The State is the organization of the herd to act offensively or defensively against another herd similarly organized. The more terrifying the occasion for defense, the closer will become the organization and the more coercive the influence upon each member of the herd. War sends the current of purpose and activity flowing down to the lowest level of the herd, and to its most remote branches. All the activities of society are linked together as fast as possible to this central purpose of making a military offensive or a military defense, and the State becomes what in peacetimes it has vainly struggled to become - the inexorable arbiter and determinant of men's business and attitudes and opinions. The slack is taken up, the cross-currents fade out, and the nation moves lumberingly and slowly, but with ever accelerated speed and integration, toward the great end, toward the "peacefulness of being at war," of which L.P. Jacks has so unforgettably spoken.
pseudonymous in nc | 11.15.04 - 10:49 pm | #

This soi-disant "war president" feels NO burden when sending people to kill and die.

Feels no burden?
He fucking loves it.

Remember how many people he had executed in texas?

Remember "Feels good", and the fist pumping?
Central Scrutinizer | 11.15.04 - 10:49 pm | #

Right now I wish we were all in the same damned city. We need a group hug.
*
Jenny from the Blog | 11.15.04 - 10:49 pm | #

Sweet Sue -

I don't know how Bush sleeps at night. I really don't. He never looks a bit pained, never stooped in sorrow. Always the [bad] jokester. My stomach turns.
*
Jenny from the Blog

I'm curious, think I've seen it, but look at a pic of Bush 2000 and compare to 2004. We've seen this before.
He's not the dude he's cracked up to be (duh). It's taking it's toll.

.
agave | 11.15.04 - 10:51 pm | #

What I wish for Rove et al at their moment of their death: to last an eternity while all their senses experience the horror they created - the smell of burning innocent flesh, the agonizing screams of little children, the shooting pain of a thousand bullets as they enter the body, the sight of rivers of blood and the agony of wanting to scream but having nothing come out of their mouths.
And I wish them this through all eternity.
Lima | 11.15.04 - 10:52 pm | #

Yep, CS, and I remember him mocking the woman on death row...

True class. True Christianity.
rorschach | 11.15.04 - 10:52 pm | #

The CNN footage is on http://www.crooksandliars.com/
C&L | Homepage | 11.15.04 - 10:53 pm | #

He's not the dude he's cracked up to be (duh). It's taking it's toll.

agave, interesting. I'll take your assessment as fact. Can't stand to look at him, myself...
*
Jenny from the Blog | 11.15.04 - 10:54 pm | #

Does anyone know why DU has shut their doors? They went the way of the Dodo. Anyone know why?
Davemiester | 11.15.04 - 10:55 pm | #

This Marine will pay for what he has done, as if this were the first time anything like this has happened in the war.

He will pay in Military court, and he will pay like so many others, in his sleep, in his waking hours, straight through until night, and he will continue to pay for the rest of his life.

This Marine did nothing shocking, nothing different than any other warrior in times of carnage. Yet he will pay, and he will be made to be sorry, and the media will make sure you know.

The media will tell you what happened, and what will be done. They've been wrong so many times before, but you can trust the media on this one.

And the war machine will steadily march on. And the war machine isn't sorry, its just sorry this one Marine got caught.

And the media isn't sorry either, they're just conflicted between showing the glory and showing the gore.

The only one who will be sorry, is the one Marine, who on just another sweltering day in Iraq, did what he had to do, what he was told to do, and the only thing he remembers how to do.

And the dead Iraqi? The pentagon, to be sure, will add him to the toll of insurgents killed, because there is a body count to keep, and the existence of progress to be proven.

The more we kill, the more progress we make. The more of our soldiers that get killed, the more desperate the enemy in the face of our progress. Freedom is on the march.

Do you think this will end in January? Do you think it will end next year? When do you think the killing will stop?

Another curly tale of war pigs.
jps | Homepage | 11.15.04 - 10:55 pm | #

EkCenTrik ~

Thanks for that blast from the past. So pertinent now...
Vicki Stein | 11.15.04 - 10:56 pm | #

"War Crimes Are Not an American Value"

I'm sad to say it, but I think war crimes ARE an American value.
synykyl | 11.15.04 - 10:57 pm | #

It's funny that war crimes were defined by acts of tyrannical nations like Nazi Germany.

Now, we have people in power who want to go above these laws.

That's not so funny.
Jesse | Homepage | 11.15.04 - 10:58 pm | #

Bush threatens mankind, says Caldicott
By David Williams
http://tinyurl.com/5cm6p
November 16, 2004

Nobel Peace Prize nominee Dr Helen Caldicott fears US President George Bush's re-election will lead to Armageddon and she isn't sure if mankind would survive another four years.

"This is the most serious election that has ever occurred in the history of the human race, without a scrag of doubt," she told smh.com.au.

"I don't know if we'll survive the next four years ... I don't think the Americans have, on the whole, the faintest idea - and I have to say also I don't think most Australians do either. But it's not just the threat from nuclear war. It's the threat of what's happening to the environment, the global warming which is occurring rapidly now, to ozone depletion, to species extinction, to deforestation - it's the whole thing."

Speaking from her son Will's Boston home, the Australian paediatrician, who runs the Nuclear Policy Research Institute in Washington, has just spent a frantic two-and-a-half months criss-crossing America to deliver her anti-nuclear and anti-Bush message. She discovered the country was more divided than at any time since she first stepped onto American soil in 1966.

Early on election day she was convinced Democratic challenger John Kerry would win but reality soon set in.

"This is what I've been afraid of and I actually can't believe it's happening," she said. "The voter turnout was so high, which should have supported Kerry.

"I don't think I've ever felt so personally, politically devastated in my life and that includes when [former president Ronald] Reagan won a second term of office - which was pretty devastating for me as I was so heavily involved in the anti-nuclear movement in those days.

"But this is worse, these people are much worse than the Reagan people."
standa | 11.15.04 - 10:58 pm | #

How do you figure that it would be merciful to know that you were responsible for such evil? The regret alone would kill me. I'm aware they feel no remorse now - I want every bit of remorse that exists in the universe to be the last thing each one of them experiences. I can't even imagine such pain and helplessness - to me it would far surpass anything physical.
Tena | Homepage | 11.15.04 - 10:59 pm | #

Our whole duty here in the "blogosphere" now, in my opinion, is to get this kind of news out to our fellow citizens.

I strongly believe that many, many people voted for Bush only because they had been lied to over and over and over again. We can hardly blame many of them for believing the sanitized and distorted news reporting they see every day on every television channel.

Exactly how are people supposed to find out that they cannot trust anyone in the conventional news organizations to tell them the truth?

I say it simply isn't reasonable to expect many or most people to penetrate this thicket of lies without some assistance.

If people don't belong to an academic community, and don't read the weblogs, and don't see, you know, the New York Review of Books - AND WHY SHOULD THEY HAVE TO? - they just have no way to know how the facts and tenor of the news is being distorted.

I find it impossible to imagine that John Kerry would not have gained another 3 or 5 or 10 or 15 percentage points if these criminal lies and distortions had been explained to television viewers across the country.

The only thing we can really do now - aside from burning ourselves on the sidewalk outside the White House - is to figure out many innovative ways, both big and small, to get some honest information out to the public.
Ralph | Homepage | 11.15.04 - 11:00 pm | #

I just got into DU. Must have been a technical problem.
NYMary | 11.15.04 - 11:00 pm | #

I don't think I've ever felt so personally, politically devastated in my life and that includes when [former president Ronald] Reagan won a second term of office - which was pretty devastating for me as I was so heavily involved in the anti-nuclear movement in those days.

I voted for Reagan twice. I liked the dude. He was a pretty good Prez.
DemTX | 11.15.04 - 11:01 pm | #

http://digbysblog.blogspot.com/

Digby has a incredibly painful photo of a 2 year old baby form Fallujah who lost a leg in the attack.
Lima | 11.15.04 - 11:02 pm | #

Remorse and Shame - a universe of Shame.
Tena | Homepage | 11.15.04 - 11:03 pm | #

A little something I whipped up 100 years ago...

War Prayer
Mark Twain | 11.15.04 - 11:03 pm | #

Ralph - I think you've hit the key. We cannot deal with the media. We have to get the information to people who don't or won't get online and get it for themselves. Some can't. I don't see any other way.
Tena | Homepage | 11.15.04 - 11:04 pm | #

Ralph -

You know, when congress gave authorization to Bush as a go-ahead for preemptive war, I had never visited a blog.

The first time I heard, stunned, the word "Iraq" come out of this President's mouth in response to 911 I felt a body blow and a sense of horror. I had never visited a blog.

I understand what you are saying, but it just seemed so obvious and ridiculous and bizarre at the time... I don't know how much independent research a person would have to do to call bullshit on something so transparently crazy.

I'll never understand...
*
Jenny from the Blog | 11.15.04 - 11:07 pm | #

I remember hearing Helen Caldicott speak in New York state near one of the Air Force bases, many years ago. She said, "Americans are always saying how important their children are to them and how they must make the future better for them. Well, if you really cared about your children you would go over there and shut that Air Force base down. Go and shut it down; shut it down!!"
Jerry | 11.15.04 - 11:07 pm | #

Shooting unarmed and seriously wounded POWs is a war crime. So is cutting off vital supplies such as water to an entire city. Come to think of it, so is invading a nation that posed no threat to your national security, but I digress.

The Battle for Fallujah. What a fucking joke this is turning out to be. Like history will even remember this operation a year from now; like we are not on course to face down dozens of Fallujah's in the coming months; From the Independent:

Yesterday, the Marines said they had taken more than 1,000 prisoners in the battle for Fallujah. Colonel Michael Regner, operations officer for the 1st Marine Expeditionary Force at Fallujah, said at least 1,052 prisoners had been captured in the battle. No more than about two dozen of them were "foreign fighters", he said.

In other words, welcome to the Popular Iraqi Resistance movement, that reaches every corner of the ravaged state and which is uniting Kurds, Sunnis and Shiites in their common desire to overthrow the colonial master.

And make no mistake about it. If Fallujah has demonstrated anyting, it is that we ARE the master...
tobor | 11.15.04 - 11:08 pm | #

Fricken' Condi!!!

Goddammit could we have a more obvious, worse; more innefectual choice for the position?

Okay, okay. Yes, we could. Yes. I know. Never misunderestimate the power of faith-based ideologs.

People be gentle with me, as this is my first blogwhore... Check it out at my homepage link. The threads here are just too long for me to get my vainity jollies on expressing my viewpoint anymore. NOt that I don't still read and (obviously) post here or anything.

Okay, enough with all that.

This war was creeping me out before we even got started with it, and now it just makes me nauseous. I feel an obligation to read about what's going on in Iraq, but dread it now like I never truly imagined I would. That Americans sit around their livingrooms and family rooms and root for our soldiers out there committing these atrocities just makes me all the sicker.

We've gone, in the space of three years, from pushy bully to murdering psychotic in terms of our foreign policy. Right now, our army is engaged in actual and cultural genocide, and our news media cheers it and hypes it up like an adolescent at an action movie...

You know, like that one Marine, Jones, he was a little bit off -- he was fuckin' crazy, dude! It was so awesome -- and he shot that one guy all cold-assed and shit. Semper Fi, dude! Now back to you, Wolf. This is CNN...
Monica_CA | Homepage | 11.15.04 - 11:08 pm | #

The video running on CNN is probably on a 24/7 Al Jazeera loop as we speak. Way to capture those hearts and minds...
*
Jenny from the Blog | 11.15.04 - 11:10 pm | #

http://fallujapictures.blogspot.com/

I can't stop crying.
Lima | 11.15.04 - 11:12 pm | #

One thing I see is that it make take a bit for this shooting as well as many of the other events to sink into the general psyche.

24/7 I can see depictions of people being shot or blown up or treated with violence and brutality. And this is provided as entertainment. I would venture there are more than a few folks who have not made the leap from Hollywood Action to Real People Dying. Which is sad.
EkCenTrik | 11.15.04 - 11:13 pm | #

i just spent some time going through a sliver of the growing galleries of souls at www.sorryeverybody.com who want the world to know how underwhelmed so many of us are by the junta. it's worth a look.
when i lived in san francisco it was said that the city had so many restaurants that one could dine in a different one every night for 8-9 years and by that time new ones would have arisen. the gallery of photos there (people trying to apologize for the busheviks) seems like that. many and then more and then more all the time. i'll be adding mine soon, and i hope to see you there too.
mr. wu's pigs | Homepage | 11.15.04 - 11:14 pm | #

"War Crimes Are Not an American Value"

I'm sad to say it, but I think war crimes ARE an American value.
synykyl

These are the kinds of "values" bush has brought this country. We should be shouting it from the rooftops.
Dawna | 11.15.04 - 11:15 pm | #

Ralph- the effort needs to be made
zipher | 11.15.04 - 11:15 pm | #

Dang it!

Was saying, the effort needs to be made, but just ancedotal- every Bush supporter I know either doesn't care about the facts or supports Bush regardless. (at least one even spitefully)

There's a core group of americans who just won't turn- some seem to be replaying Vietnam through Iraq (ie, if Iraq works, it means they were justified in Vietnam).
Others just seem to be entirely stuck on american 'rightousness'.

But the outreach needs to be made to those who are just poorly informed. Ideas for hitting the non-internetted or non-politically interested needed.
zipher | 11.15.04 - 11:21 pm | #

fallujahpictures.blogspot.com Now we know that we were not exaggerating when we compared Bush to Hitler. None of this had to happen. Apparently it makes him feel like a man.
Jerry | 11.15.04 - 11:21 pm | #

Lucky we opted out of the ICC!
Citizen Cain | 11.15.04 - 11:22 pm | #

Lucky we opted out of the ICC!

I don't think the ICC opted out of us though.

And I don't really care if the President* didn't sign our country onto the treaty. He was never rightfully in that office anyway.

They all must be put away for the rest of their wretched lives... But since there's no justice left in this world, they'll probably die rich and fat from their war profiteering.
Seraphiel | 11.15.04 - 11:27 pm | #

40 years from now, we will learn that the soldiers that reported this incident are traitors, and that this never happened.
eric | 11.15.04 - 11:28 pm | #

What have we become?
myrna minkoff | 11.15.04 - 11:28 pm | #

zipher - I wish I knew the best way to get the information out. I really don't. But I'll think about it.
Tena | Homepage | 11.15.04 - 11:29 pm | #

Kaye Bailey Hutchinson on the Daily Show.

Maybe tonight her well-coiffed head will split open and the evil snake-creature within will reveal itself, spitting venom and tequila and slime.

And why is she wearing a Nazi ingignia on her blazer? No Godwin's Law shit, that's what it looks like...
Thersites | Homepage | 11.15.04 - 11:29 pm | #

And Hecate - I do love your American Values posts - keeps us honest!
myrna minkoff | 11.15.04 - 11:30 pm | #

About the ICC - at what point does the world just put a stop to this, even if we didn't sign an international treaty?

I guess never. Look at the atrocities the world has and will continue, to ignore. Rwanda, the Bosnian concentration camps, and too many more to name.
*
Jenny from the Blog | 11.15.04 - 11:31 pm | #

my own damn senator Kay Bailey Hutchison on Daily Show.... oy...where to start
jeebs | 11.15.04 - 11:31 pm | #

It's time to regain our Liberal label - proudly! Let's push back - let's shove those pictures in every conservative face, in every face that backs Bush and Rove. Let's print them in color and pass them around. Make people look at them!
Lima | 11.15.04 - 11:31 pm | #

mine too and I know just what you mean, jeebs.
Tena | Homepage | 11.15.04 - 11:32 pm | #

Kay Bailey - Lordamighty - what a creation!

She's actually a "normal" repub - or was at one time. Pro-choice and all. I think she's supposed to hate Rick Perry and want to run against him for governor.
'

We shall see.
myrna minkoff | 11.15.04 - 11:33 pm | #

Mark Twain, Thank you for that. i heard it or read it in the 60s and I've been looking for it recently.Its so apt now.
rococco | 11.15.04 - 11:33 pm | #

Dear god. What kind of monsters have we become? I am ashamed of the America GWB has advanced.
bigvic | 11.15.04 - 11:33 pm | #

Hutchinson was as bland and evil as a kindergarten teacher. Washington's fine, the Sente is fine, America's fine....

What an evil bitch.
NYMary | 11.15.04 - 11:34 pm | #

ICC? Feh.

Geneva Convention? Quaint.

Whatcha want me to do next, America?
Alberto Gonzalez | 11.15.04 - 11:34 pm | #

40 years from now, we will learn that the soldiers that reported this incident are traitors, and that this never happened.

Why do our troops hate America?
Capital J | 11.15.04 - 11:34 pm | #

Lima - if the Religious Right can do it with pictures of bloody fetuses, then why can't we do it with pictures of what is being done in Iraq?
Tena | Homepage | 11.15.04 - 11:35 pm | #

That's all I ask. I would like each and every one of them to have that moment of clarity and realization just before he or she dies.

That would be just.

No, it would be letting them off easy. They're sociopaths- they'll go to their deaths thinking that everything they did was justified.

Nope- physical pain of unimaginable dimension is what they deserve.
fourlegsgood | 11.15.04 - 11:37 pm | #

Kay won't stand up for choice - she has ambitions. I can't believe that halfbright vanilla wafer has ambitions.
Tena | Homepage | 11.15.04 - 11:37 pm | #

Guy that set himself on fire was terror informant outed by ashcroft:

Terror Informant Ignites Himself Near White House
Yemeni Was Upset at Treatment by FBI

Alanssi's identity was leaked, along with details of his role, and the case was the subject of a Washington Post story in 2003 and accounts in the Yemeni press. As a result, Alanssi said, his family had been harassed and threatened in Yemen, where Moayad, 55, is a prominent leader in Islamist circles.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp...- 2004Nov15.html
hadenough | 11.15.04 - 11:37 pm | #

Kay Bailey - Lordamighty - what a creation!

Seeing her in her days as a local TV newsbint in Texas (on the 'Frontline' pre-election film) was an eye-opener. It's only a matter of time before it's Senator Daryn Rushfucker and Senator Kyra Dumbass.
pseudonymous in nc | 11.15.04 - 11:37 pm | #

What have we become?
myrna minkoff | Email | Homepage | 11.15.04 - 11:28 pm | #

What, you think this is a new development? Hell, sister, this ain't even an American creation. War crimes are as old as war itself. The shit Alexander The Great did to people would curl/straighten your hair.

Now, what's disappointing is we've reached the moon and plumbed the depth of the subatomic world, but we - as a nation, as a species - are still fighting wars and still committing war crimes. If that don't make you stop and think, I don't know what will.
Backslider | Homepage | 11.15.04 - 11:38 pm | #

Somebody upthread mentioned drugs and loving everybody - I'm thinking that was Ecstacy - but could be wrong.
myrna minkoff | 11.15.04 - 11:38 pm | #

Tena -

Let them see what they have done, there is no hiding from the truth. I am printing and posting them around my neighborhood.
Lima | 11.15.04 - 11:39 pm | #

But, but, but...

Kay adopted a dear little baby!
Citizen Cain | 11.15.04 - 11:39 pm | #

fourlegsgood - Let me try to explain this again. I know they don't feel it. I am saying I want them to feel it, all of it, every bit of it in their dying moments.

Would you want your last thoughts to be "my god, what have I done? my god, I'm a monster"? That's what I'm talking about.

Y'all think outside what you're thinking for a minute. I'm saying I want them to suddenly grow consciences in their last seconds on earth and face what they have done. And feel every bit of shame and remorse that the universe holds.
Tena | Homepage | 11.15.04 - 11:40 pm | #

And die in utter spiritual and mental agony.

Now, is that sufficiently vicious for y'all?
Tena | Homepage | 11.15.04 - 11:41 pm | #

http://fallujapictures.blogspot.com/
s.e. | Homepage | 11.15.04 - 11:41 pm | #

"Sweet Sue -

I don't know how Bush sleeps at night. I really don't. He never looks a bit pained, never stooped in sorrow."

Meanwhile, those with a true heart and soul have trouble sleeping. We need to turn this around.
Peaches | 11.15.04 - 11:42 pm | #

Lima - if the Religious Right can do it with pictures of bloody fetuses, then why can't we do it with pictures of what is being done in Iraq?

Eg-bloody-zackly.

And in the name of preserving life, as well.

That's how you take back the moral values, cats and kittens.

A.
Athenae | Homepage | 11.15.04 - 11:42 pm | #

Too 'icky'photos, well maybe. Arms and legs cut off, face disfigured. Just the detrious of Iraqi 'freedom fighters'. Maybe only someone getting even, largely outside of, or covered by, the Fallugian shootemup. Who knows. If it turns out to be the blonde Polish aid worker, it's just another stake in the heart of the arguement that all this is just more of some Iraqi's natural defense of their country from the furriners, interlopers and infidels. But the first two categories are also fellow Arabs from all over. Pretty bad, and sad, however one expects more of the same.
G | 11.15.04 - 11:43 pm | #

Just want to say. It's a global media market now. What shows on our TeeVees shows all over the world. We need to act accordingly. Sure there's a fog of war, but it's all documented and on screens in every goddamn cafe in the whole Arab world, thanks to our strong penetration there.
So, yeah, yay for us.
Not sure if Alberto Gonzalez is such a great choice.
stinky feet | 11.15.04 - 11:43 pm | #

Tena - I get your drift - let them actually KNOW what hell they have wrought! But will they care/

BAH!
myrna minkoff | 11.15.04 - 11:43 pm | #

Tena, I'm just saying they're incapable of it. You and I would fnd that agonizing, they'd just say, "oh, that old stuff?"

Nope, hideous, deforming painful disease is the ticket.

Of course I'm not nearly as nice as you are.
fourlegsgood | 11.15.04 - 11:45 pm | #

Tena -

and I would like them to experience the horror of seeing their loved ones dying in the manner those pictures show. Let them see their children being blown up, Bush will see their loved ones faces on the charred and mutilated bodies - Jenna and Barbara and Laura, Lynne, Mary and whatever the other one is, all of them - blown to pieces. Let their psyche construct the horror of all horrors and let them become prisoners of their nightmares for eternity.
Lima | 11.15.04 - 11:46 pm | #

Adding insult to injury is the lying. If you want to be a war criminal administration, just do it. Stand up and tell the world you want to level it, torture its people for your own gain, and move ahead with your dirty deeds.

Don't stand up and call yourselves protectors of freedom, for christ sake. I'm sick of the lying and hypocrisy. Just call a spade and spade -
*
Jenny from the Blog | 11.15.04 - 11:46 pm | #

I've done it! I am Myrna Minkoff to Haloscan! Praise the Lord and pass the biscuits!

We are going to be okay too - by the way!
myrna minkoff | 11.15.04 - 11:46 pm | #

The Wise Goddess is right - we're fighting for America's soul. If we go at it with that in mind, we can't go wrong.

Let's fight all the lies with the truth. Let's go after the hypocrisy and self-righteousness with a sense of some humility - not in any cowed sense, but by not being overly pushy about our own self-righteousness. Let's show what real cruelty looks like.

Let's reclaim the moral high ground in this country. It is lying there to be picked up.
Tena | Homepage | 11.15.04 - 11:46 pm | #

fourlegsgood - Aaaaarrrgh! How many times do I have to say I know they are incapable of it? I am wishing upon them that capability.

I give up.

It has nothing to do with being nice - it is literally the greatest pain I can think up to inflict upon them. I can't believe you can't understand this. I want them to have all our sensibilities and to see all the suffering they caused and to know it and feel it in their last moments. How is this being nice?
Tena | Homepage | 11.15.04 - 11:50 pm | #

Do we need permission to re-print those pictures? I am willing to spend some money in doing this.
Lima | 11.15.04 - 11:50 pm | #

And die in utter spiritual and mental agony.

Tena,

Vicious enough for me.
bigvic | 11.15.04 - 11:51 pm | #

We are fighting for America's soul and for the children of America. I have two girls - too young to be caught up in today's war machine - but, still.

You WILL NOT HAVE my children for your corrupt war machine. YOU WILL NOT!

We're still gonna be OK.
myrna minkoff | 11.15.04 - 11:52 pm | #

I read George Lakoffs' Don't Think of an Elephant after the election, and am now reading Moral Politics.

Has anyone else read it? It's pretty straight forward and very enlightening. Democrats need to recruit George Lakoff for a position in the DNC, then start sending out his talking points ASAP.

No kidding.

I'm not a regular poster, but I read every night when I get home from work. You guys are GREAT!!
csg | 11.15.04 - 11:52 pm | #

The marine shouldn't have done it -- he should have just let the bastard bleed to death. Waste of good American bullets.

Really, I don't know why you guys would care about terrorists. They're not people, just whack 'em.
Richard Head | 11.15.04 - 11:53 pm | #

This kind of thing makes me truely believe the election was hacked. I refuse to think most Americans are OK with this ruthless brutality.
bigvic | 11.15.04 - 11:54 pm | #

Regarding spreading the pictures. I think that would be great, really, but hey, guys. Horrendous photos have been shown already, it was all Abu-Ghraib, an entire weekend, remember? Not the worst of them, but enough horrible images to bring the point home.

In a realistic universe that should have buried, absolutely buried this administration. Nada.

Sorry, but it's still all about the ignorant, the selfish, the greedy, the apathetic and the fundies waiting for the rapture. I honestly don't think it's gonna make a bit of difference. These people don't put the same value on Iraqi lives that they put on their own.

It's worth the effort, getting the pictures out, if it only affects one of two people, don't get me wrong. But there will not be a sea change of opinion in this country... not until our own soldiers' blood is pouring out into the streets. That's the only thing that will bring out the kind of uproar which will end this war. IMO, hope I'm wrong. Pray I'm wrong.
*
Jenny from the Blog | 11.15.04 - 11:56 pm | #

We are not OK with the senseless brutality - but - we are a selfish culture/nation. We really cannot see beyond ourselves. We are, basically, ignorant and proud of it!
myrna minkoff | 11.15.04 - 11:56 pm | #

Really, I don't know why you guys would care about terrorists. They're not people, just whack 'em.

The bees build in the crevices
Of loosening masonry, and there
The mother birds bring grubs and flies.
My wall is loosening; honey-bees,
Come build in the empty house of the state.

We are closed in, and the key is turned
On our uncertainty; somewhere
A man is killed, or a house burned,
Yet no clear fact to be discerned:
Come build in the empty house of the stare.

A barricade of stone or of wood;
Some fourteen days of civil war;
Last night they trundled down the road
That dead young soldier in his blood:
Come build in the empty house of the stare.

We had fed the heart on fantasies,
The heart's grown brutal from the fare;
More substance in our enmities
Than in our love; O honey-bees,
Come build in the empty house of the stare.

--W. B. Yeats, from "Meditations in Time of Civil War"
Thersites | Homepage | 11.15.04 - 11:58 pm | #

I hope you folks are ready for internet clampdown/purge/shutdown of sites like these. We have a de facto dictatorship under Patriot I, and it's just a matter of their pushing it to its logical end, with the help of the next terrorist attack.
Sharkbabe

OMG, Sharkbabe, this is the same skipping 45 that has been spinning around in my head since the Day After (the stolen election). No one has called you any names over it yet; does this mean the reality of what we have lost is setting in?

The quote from Robert Finnegan:
"And a final warning to young Marines – should you fire on American civilians in some future domestic insanity, you will be destroyed by your own kind – that’s right kids – your parents in the “Old Corps” will see to it that the likes of you will never plague the earth again. rang like a funeral bell in my brain. That day is coming, but i don't believe there are enough "Old Corps", nor are they well armed enough, to stop the slaughter.

i work near a University with an ROTC. Every day i see a car in the ROTC lot with a sticker; "Viva Bush!" Like we are some sort of bananna republic. They are enthusiastic for killing but not for thinking.

They probably think that they are rich enough to ride out a nucular war, so why worry about it?

Democracy was born in blood; we are seeing it end the same way. Mainly Arab blood now...American blood in buckets soon right here at home soon, and the oligarchs laughing as they watch it on the monitors.
cory | 11.16.04 - 12:00 am | #

bigvic - I wish I could prove it was hacked, but I believe it. I really do.
Tena | Homepage | 11.16.04 - 12:00 am | #

Sweet Sue,

{{{{Hugs}}}}

Right back at you Viki Stein!
Sweet Sue | 11.16.04 - 12:02 am | #

"there is a time when the operation of the machine becomes so odious, makes you so sick at heart, that you can't take part; you can't even passively take part, and you've got to put your bodies upon the gears and upon the wheels, and upon the gears, upon all the apparatus, and you've got to make it stop. and you've got to indicate to the people who run it, to the people who own it, that unless you are free, the machine will be prevented from working at all."
--mario savio

monkeywrench the machine.
mr. wu's pigs | Homepage | 11.16.04 - 12:04 am | #

The subject called "Richard Head" should immediately check into a mental health facility. He is a danger to himself and others.
Freud | 11.16.04 - 12:04 am | #

Well, they clamp down on the internet. You start underground printing presses. YOu stay in touch on disposable cell phones.

You become real freedom fighters, not with guns, but with intelligence. It will be an underground intelligence network.

I don't know why so many people seem to think that we are supposed to just cry Horror! and lie down and die.

There are ways to accomplish most things. There is time. The end isn't here yet.
Tena | Homepage | 11.16.04 - 12:04 am | #

I don't think Bush's apologists will be moved by these pictures.

They've seen worse... They've seen some of the more mild photo shoots from the modeling sessions at Albert Gonzalez' Amazing Grandiose Adventure of the Grotesque at Abu Ghraib.

The people who voted for George W. Bush will see this filth, this horror, and they will say to themselves, "he's just doing God's will." Logic and human decency do not have any value to these people... These sickening pictures won't reach them.
Seraphiel | 11.16.04 - 12:05 am | #

"Really, I don't know why you guys would care about terrorists. They're not people, just whack 'em."

Trolling

But that is one of the very points that we have maintained in this country for many years. Push to shove, we move to compassion even when it gets the better of us. I would rather die by dint of my foolish compassion then to grow old knowing my soul was dark and very empty.

At this moment, we are raging about individuals who combatant or not have been supposedly not granted the basic sense of being human.

Consider the larger sweep of this insanity. Like a little brother calling out the bullies then running like hell and telling them his big brother is going to get them, we have been walked into the edge of a World War class altercation.

Bin Laden is slowly moving people to his view, we have helped that view by grotesque attitudes and actions. We are doing nothing to show the middle east and the Islamic follower that we are the good guys.

We will remove Bush and his people, but I am very much afraid that we cannot go backwards. Like a wounded man with an arrow being pulled on through his chest, we are going to suffer a great deal of pain and having to be those barbarians to resolve it.

Bush played with firecrackers but set the ammo dump on fire.
EkCenTrik | 11.16.04 - 12:05 am | #

Winning hearts and blowing minds.
..
nattering nabob | 11.16.04 - 12:05 am | #

Not OT cuz its a war thingy...the new SEVEN THOUSAND freaking mile per hour "scramjet". THAT is gonna be one hell of a cruise missile. Probably won't even need a warhead. The Bushies will probably name the weapons system "Terrible Swift Sword" or something similar.
cory | 11.16.04 - 12:06 am | #

heart, mes amis. We may yet get to feel as if our lives are movies and we are the maquis. It seriously wouldn't be the worst way to die.

Good night.
Tena | Homepage | 11.16.04 - 12:06 am | #

(cursing and gnashing of teeth in background)

that second "gears" should have read "levers". sorry, mario.
mr. wu's pigs | Homepage | 11.16.04 - 12:07 am | #

But there will not be a sea change of opinion in this country... not until our own soldiers' blood is pouring out into the streets. That's the only thing that will bring out the kind of uproar which will end this war. IMO, hope I'm wrong. Pray I'm wrong.

Well, you're wrong. The casualty list from the Fallujah operation is staggering: +30 dead, over 200 wounded, all within the span of a couple of days. This is a dramatic escalation of the conflict no matter what measure you use; but these numbers barely get any play. Instead, we get silly headlines like: "Fallujah 88% Secure!"
tobor | 11.16.04 - 12:08 am | #

Goodnight, Sister Tena.
*
Jenny from the Blog | 11.16.04 - 12:08 am | #

tobor -

30 dead is not enough. 1,000+ soldiers dead hasn't been enough. sadly, no.
*
Jenny from the Blog | 11.16.04 - 12:10 am | #

Whisky Tango Foxtrot...I'm hopeless at recovering from 2 November when the media is filled with images of US troops offing the wounded??? And now this from Amnesty:

Fallujah is in the midst of a bloodbath involving the remaining civilians in the city. US troops murdered in cold blood 20 hospital employees and dozens of civilians in a clinic.

So are we removing Bush from office, or what?
kathy | Homepage | 11.16.04 - 12:11 am | #

Tena, I understood you the first time.

I just don't think it's sufficiently horrible.

That's all I'm saying. Let's just meet in the middle and say we hope they come to a bad end.
fourlegsgood | 11.16.04 - 12:11 am | #

This was in front of the press. What do they do when the press is not around?
Jax | 11.16.04 - 12:13 am | #

We should not be a people who give safe haven to people who slice through the necks of other people. Leaving those people without heads.
Anonymous | 11.16.04 - 12:13 am | #

This was in front of the press. What do they do when the press is not around?
Jax | 11.16.04 - 12:13 am | #

We should not be a people who give safe haven to people who slice through the necks of other people. Leaving those people without heads.
Anonymous | 11.16.04 - 12:13 am | #

CSN said it best:
How many more?

The answer may well be "most of us."
cory | 11.16.04 - 12:16 am | #

My upstairs neighbor, Gigi, is a French Hare Krishna. Right now she's upstairs chanting away - saw her the other day and she didn't even know there was an election.

On a night like tonight I wouldn't mind trading places with her. Just for a minute or two...
*
Jenny from the Blog | 11.16.04 - 12:16 am | #

Did anyone see this diary on Kos?

Here is the evidence, which includes an insider whistleblower, from Graham's letter to Bev Harris:

Specific evidence includes copies of internal memo's and emails as well as testimony of the MIS Director of one Florida facility where much of the hacking was perpetrated. The work was replicated and limited to one location to avoid easy detection.

The MIS Director is currently in hiding. Jeff can reach him.

By internally tampering with Diebold Optical Scanners as well as Diebold Electronic E voting machines, the hacking, ( done from remote locations under the control of Mel Stembler's facilities ( see below ) , votes were altered, switched , deleted or detroyed in numerous Florida, Ohio and New Mexico counties and then switched from John Kerry to George Bush.

They seem to know a lot of the details:

The vote fraud system was first tested in 1999. Used in the Florida Presidential Election in 2000. Tested again successfully in Jeb Bush's race against Janet Reno and then Bill Mc Bride and finally in the 2004 Presidential Election. Also Georgia.

The second part of this scheme seems to be that they also cover their tracks by using the names of Felons and others purged falsely onto the Felon voter roles. This I believe allows them to seem to use legitimate numbers by first inflating the roles and them flipping or using them in some places with out drawing to much attention. This also may be why we saw so many overvotes in places where there weren't enough felon votes. This last sentence is my speculation.

jsg | 11.16.04 - 12:17 am | #

Why not the same outrage when the terrorists blow up a marketplace in Baghdad, knowingly slaughtering innocents? Instead you wallow in the "failed policies" of the Bush administration and celebrate it's mistakes, our mistakes as a nation. Every questionable isolated incident invloving our actions is taken by the left and molested into a supposed reflection of Bush administration policy.

This incident is not typical of the operations in Iraq, yet, is a part of the war on terror. Force must be met with force. Surrendering is one thing, playing dead is not. Calling err from the safety of your pc is easy, determining whether or not a wounded enemy who wishes you death is clutching his last grenade, hoping to find his martyrdom, is not.
ether | 11.16.04 - 12:18 am | #

We should not be a people who give safe haven to people who slice through the necks of other people. Leaving those people without heads.

Not sure where you're going with this, but are you suggesting one act of barbarism merits another? One act is evil and the other is just?
bigvic | 11.16.04 - 12:22 am | #

Ether,

We invaded the man's country. How are you arguing that it had anything to do with protecting the existence of our nation against terror.

You blind hawks are always in agreement in the crucial need to skip over that litlle awkward fact.

Also, to shoot a man in the head who is clutching that "grenade" of yours would be stupid thing indeed to do if you wish to remain in one piece.

You people and your convenient John Wayne outlook at the world are going to get us all killed.
Think For A Change | 11.16.04 - 12:23 am | #

This incident is not typical of the operations in Iraq, yet, is a part of the war on terror. Force must be met with force. Surrendering is one thing, playing dead is not. Calling err from the safety of your pc is easy, determining whether or not a wounded enemy who wishes you death is clutching his last grenade, hoping to find his martyrdom, is not.

My poor scapegoat,

I almost love you
but would have cast, I know,
the stones of silence.
I am the artful voyeur

of your brain's exposed
and darkening combs,
your muscles' webbing
and all your numbered bones:

I who have stood dumb
when your betraying sisters,
cauled in tar,
wept by the railings,

who would connive
in civilised outrage
yet understand the exact
and tribal, intimate revenge.

--Seamus Heaney, from "Punishment"
Thersites | Homepage | 11.16.04 - 12:23 am | #

Well, now, icasualties.org just informed me that, in terms of US death rate per diem, this is now the second deadliest month over in Iraq, exceeded only by the fatality rate of the first month of the war.

And no one in the SCLM mentions that, nor that although Fallujah has been the current big show, most of the recent dramatic increase in deaths are from elsewhere in the country. As in, all over the damned country.

i need alcohol and several Benadryl or there will be no sleep at all this night, just waking nightmares and watching the lights outside make scary shadows on the ceiling.

Good night all; forelornly, i wish you peace.
cory | 11.16.04 - 12:23 am | #

ether -

Don't you get it? We invaded the wrong fucking country! What's so hard to understand about that? We should not be there.

*why am I bothering?
*
Jenny from the Blog | 11.16.04 - 12:23 am | #

Lima wrote:
>http://fallujapictures.blogspot.com/
>I can't stop crying.

Thanks Lima! I enjoyed seeing dead terrorists left to rot in the streets like the roach food they are.
Richard Head | 11.16.04 - 12:25 am | #

How many parties do ya think we'll have by the next election?

Yes Jesus Loves Mes

Moderate Wingnuts

Republican Loyalists (Ahnuld will be their VP/lapdog)

McCainiac Giulianists (the gravitas ticket)

Contrarian Libertarians (Ron Paulists)

Old School Libertarians

etc etc etc
jeebs | 11.16.04 - 12:27 am | #

Why not the same outrage when the terrorists blow up a marketplace in Baghdad

I'll go over this again, and I'll try to use small words.

As Americans, we are not responsible for the conduct of terrorists, however reprehensible that conduct may be. There is outrage, but expressing that outrage won't do anything to stop the terrorist element from doing whatever it will do...

However, we do have some responsibility (whether we like it or not) for the actions of the US military, and their actions can directly impact our security here in the US.

If a terrorist blows something up, that's horrible... but if the US military bombs a hospital, not only is that horrible, but it radicalizes even more people into joining with the terrorists.

Do you get it now?
Seraphiel | 11.16.04 - 12:28 am | #

I lost a black kitty cat in New York city. If anybody see's it let me know. It's my best friend.
Anonymous | 11.16.04 - 12:29 am | #

Sounds like they have old Tactius for a leader. Led by idiots and mental cases, but they love it. Good luck, boys, we'll take care of the women while you're gone. Smucks.
mario | 11.16.04 - 12:30 am | #

*yawn* A marine blows away a raghead and you guys are up in arms...what a surprise. Of course if it was the other way you psuedo-americans wouldn't be near as "outraged". Keep it up, and watch in dismay as you lose more congressional seats in 2006 because you are falling further and further away from the mainstream.
Avestus | 11.16.04 - 12:31 am | #

Force must be met with force.

Right, the insurgents saw their country invaded, bombed, machine gunned and set on fire by an invading force with aircraft carriers, tanks, bombers, artillery, mortars and satellite guided cruise missiles. They saw their apartment buildings turned into rubble, their water turned into sewage and their hospitals turned into morgues. They saw their resources looted, their way of life destroyed, their neighbors raped, tortured, murdered and packed in ice with grinning soldiers giving the thumbs-up sign for the cameras, after they were thrown in jail on trivial charges.

Who fucking started this war? What is the reason we're there in the first place? Oil? WMD? Democracy? Saddam Hussein? Terror? 9/11? What's the fucking reason we're there in the first place?

This war is a bloody, endless lie that you egg on, you coward. You're not dying. Your house and children aren't being crushed with 500 bombs. Your neighborhoods aren't being looted after an invading army failed in every way to secure the country. Your churches and museums aren't being robbed. Your government isn't a puppet government set up by the CIA, controlled by a former Baathist hitman.

Wake up! Wake up! This war is a sham, a lie, a bloodbath!
Old Hat | 11.16.04 - 12:31 am | #

*yawn* A marine blows away a raghead and you guys are up in arms...what a surprise. Of course if it was the other way you psuedo-americans wouldn't be near as "outraged".

You imbecile! If it is so HO-HUM to shoot this man in the head, then why is the MILITARY investigating it as a possible illegal shooting?

Out of the mainstream? I don't want to be anywhere NEAR your piss-filled stream!
Think For A Change | 11.16.04 - 12:34 am | #

Don't have to worry about old Avestus going to Iraqi. To busy thanking his lucky ass he's not there.
mario | 11.16.04 - 12:35 am | #

Really, I don't know why you guys would care about terrorists. They're not people, just whack 'em.

Typical of the gun toting, militia (lack of) mind set. The farkin' insurgents are citizens of their own country. While I despise the fact that they are killing our soldiers, nobody invited us to come in there and impose *democracy* at the gun barrel. I would fight to the death if a foreign power came here and imposed their will on me.

The lack of empathy from the GOP is repulsive. It is sociopathic.
bigvic | 11.16.04 - 12:35 am | #

And a final warning to young Marines –should you fire on American civilians in some future domestic insanity, you will be destroyed by your own kind – that’s right kids – your parents in the “Old Corps” will see to it that the likes of you will never plague the earth again.
..................................After studying Bushs' personality I feel he has two pathological thoughts in his head.The first is to drop the big one somewhere and the second is to rid the nation of his critics.And please dont get me started about his toilet training or we'll be here all night,but maybe mother Barbara should not have shoved the boys face into his own feces.
notch | 11.16.04 - 12:35 am | #

Old Hat, were you born this stupid? Those insurgents are only defending their country in the sense that they want to reimpose a Baathist dictatorship, and each of them hoping to be set up well within that state.

The only sham, lie, or fraud is your so called compassion. You just hate Bush and are therefore against the war. God, you are a disgusting piece of filth.
Avestus | 11.16.04 - 12:36 am | #