shirt and bumpersticker not big enough

[substitute]

Maybe it could be a series of billboards and skywriters, or sound trucks blaring, or a daily TV spot, but it's necessary. People in my country are arguing about the most ridiculous things right now — particularly in an election year, but just generally — and while we all have this big food fight there's a ghost at the party.

It's the war. Nothing comes before stopping it. Please remember that.

Comments

T. Boone Pickens is the new Crassus

[bobby isosceles (from livejournal.com)]

Not to be overly contrarian but for most people the economy comes first.

CAVEATS: True, the shit economy has been exacerbated by war-chest fat cats rattling more than sabers in this pointless war. True, the damage, physical and psychological, to the troops and families of the troops and the resultant strain on an already overburdened and underfunded health care system is going to cause rippling shockwaves to productivity and prosperity. True, the resulting windfall from our weakness is allowing China and Russia to eat our lunches in resource rich areas and drive the price of food, fuel and goods higher and higher.

But the fact is that given a choice between ending the war quickly and fixing the economy slowly, versus fixing the economy quickly and ending the war slowly, most people will act in self-interest and pick the latter, even though it can't really be done unless we resort to individual legionnaires plundering their way back to the Urb.

Re: T. Boone Pickens is the new Crassus

[substitute.livejournal.com]

I said the war came first for me. Anyone else can have their idea. I'm not really interested.

[troymccluresf.livejournal.com]

It's the war. Nothing comes before stopping it.

Commie.

Re: T. Boone Pickens is the new Crassus

[catamorphism.livejournal.com]

Most people are assholes. Your point?

[eamajyn.livejournal.com]

toufuckingche.

There's an upside to that

[rpkrajewski.livejournal.com]

Some judges were paying attention !

http://www.boston.com/news/traffic/bigdig/articles/2008/09/03/time_extended_for_big_dig_prosecution/

Re: There's an upside to that

[substitute.livejournal.com]

Endless war means no statute of limitations? Wow...

Re: T. Boone Pickens is the new Crassus

[bobby isosceles (from livejournal.com)]

Pick one of the following:

- Telling assholes a prescriptive, and correct, statement, will generally lead to disappointment, so don't bother.

- Telling assholes a prescriptive, and correct, statement, will work if you shout louder, harder, more passionately, with better rhetoric and oratory, so try harder.

I don't know which one will work in this case.

Re: T. Boone Pickens is the new Crassus

[catamorphism.livejournal.com]

The truth of the statement is a separate matter from the effectiveness of strategies for persuading people of its truth.

Re: T. Boone Pickens is the new Crassus

[substitute.livejournal.com]

That's what I was trying to say! But these guh bluh duh noises came out instead. Thanks.

Re: T. Boone Pickens is the new Crassus

[bobby isosceles (from livejournal.com)]

Guh bluh duh noises can be forgiven. It's an especially numbing-through-irritation election cycle this year. Insert capitalism/capsaicin play on words.

[handstil.livejournal.com]

I think a lot about this war we're in since E was born, especially. I think a lot of people are starting to forget. The economy, the environment, this buttlips of a VP nom., etc. is all just fodder to get people to feel passionate about voting, at this point.

I am obviously not worried about my vote, or California, but I want there to be record breaking numbers. I want these fuckers to cry themselves to sleep.

Re: There's an upside to that

[rpkrajewski.livejournal.com]

Yeah, for fraud against the US Government (which funded a bit of the Big Dig).

Damn, this could be "good" for Halliburton and Blackwater later…

War on Drugs

[leolo.livejournal.com]

Your country has been at war since... 1971. Maybe the home front is a bit weary?

Re: War on Drugs

[substitute.livejournal.com]

I was referring to war in the traditional sense, not whatever fucked-up metaphor government uses when it wants to do something fucked-up other than an actual war.

PSST

[elserracho.livejournal.com]

did you know that john mccain was POW??

Re: PSST

[jpeace.livejournal.com]

9/11? 9/11.

Re: PSST

[substitute.livejournal.com]

REMEMBER THE BLOODY MAINE SHIRT!!!

Re: War on Drugs

[leolo.livejournal.com]

I realise. I was also trying (failing) to be funny.

However, your governments have so cheapened the word "war" these last 27 years that no seems to notice the 2 current real wars you are fighting.

Just it case I'm still not being clear, I agree with your post.

Re: PSST

[leolo.livejournal.com]

POW is like being in prison, right? Maybe an ex-con isn't the best idea to have as a president.

[smallstages.livejournal.com]

I am so in agreement with you. Words cannot convey ...

[dr-strych9.livejournal.com]

Remember the famous words of Uncle Arlo, who said, "If you want to end the war and stuff, you've got to sing loud!"

when did which war start?

[drieuxster.livejournal.com]

The absurdity is that the folks who want to beleive that we are more at war than we had been under clinton, do not want to look at the authorization process that they want to believe indicated that the nation went to war....

So clearly the first problem is establishing 'what war?" and how would we know we were in it, or out of it...

Re: PSST

[drieuxster.livejournal.com]

but was that because he failed to register to have working papers before he went to north vietnam.

we too are tough on people who illegally enter america, so you may want to think about why you hate america before advocating McCain's Draft Dodging Hiding Out in the HanoiHilton while great war heroes like Karl Rove were keeping the Dirty Stinking Hippies from destroying our white christian america...

Re: when did which war start?

[substitute.livejournal.com]

When I say "end the current wars," you know perfectly well what I mean. End our bloodbaths in Iraq and Afghanistan. You know. The current ones. The hot wars. With all the blood.

The first problem isn't arguing the niceties of which war we're philosophically opposed to, or drawing the elegant historical lines that demonstrate that the entire system is rotten. The first problem is the nauseating thing right in front of our faces. Don't finesse it!

I agree that we've been in a constant state of war since at least 1941. That's not the immediate issue at hand.

Re: when did which war start?

[drieuxster.livejournal.com]

no, actually I do not.

That we have forces in Iraq, Afghanistan, The Phillipines, Bosnia, et al, and some of those contacts are getting varying death tolls sort of complicates the simplistic rhetoric that the nation is in one or more 'wars'.

Especially since we have that small legal problem here in america about the minor constitutionality...

You may like to limit the warring to 1941, but then that would mean you were dissing guys like Gen. Smedley Butler who was honest enough as a Medal Of Honor Winner that he was a hired gun for United Fruit.

So it may help the nation IF we would first resolve whether we want to put combat troops in harms way ONLY when the Nation is 'at war', and not when it is cool enough for the current partisan domestic political agenda.

Re: when did which war start?

[substitute.livejournal.com]

It does indeed complicate the simplistic rhetoric, at a time when some good simplistic rhetoric would do us a world of good. Bigger death tolls are worse than smaller ones, and totally wrecked countries are worse than occupied ones. Stopping the Iraq and Afghanistan adventures would not result in a pre-1898 U.S. free of empire, nor would it solve the problems of unconstitutional private wars by the Executive Branch.

Saying that we should solve our constitutional issues, reverse our century plus of imperial swagger, and rein in the Executive branch before we stop the slaughter is another way of saying it's okay that nothing changes. Because that would be the result.

I do not think the Iraqi and Afghan people would be much impressed with our purity of purpose and ideological consistency in this case.

Once again we're disagreeing about things we agree on. The point of disagreement is whether ending our current hot war would be worth it if we didn't get the entire social revolution we want. I think it would be, and would be a fine start at the rest of the project.

Finally, please don't put words in my mouth in order to make a point I've already made. When I said "at least since 1941" I was, in fact, saying the opposite of "may like to limit the warring to 1941."

Re: when did which war start?

[drieuxster.livejournal.com]

Hum....

Restore law and order in america....

Why not start with that as a part of the issue. A mere 200,000+ dead in iraq, about that much in afghanistan... these are still managable numbers on anyone's time scale.

Getting americans to understand the value of law and order would probably help them understand it's importance, and from there that there is no great gain in having imperial troops around the planet, with or without a 'legally declared war' doing what gets done.

Why not start there, rather than some majikal hope that some majikal change in the majikal perception of 'the war' in WhichEver, got Whatevered...

Then we could have real words, and real americans would know if we were 'in a war' - or was this just the unpleasantry of mere imperial maintenance....

Why gosh, then folks would understand that war crimes were a bad thing, and legally obliged, whether or not the nation was 'in a time of war'...

So why not try the simple solution of getting americans back to a set of words that really mean something, and are not merely marketting hype to be tossed around when it is politically expedient.

Re: when did which war start?

[substitute.livejournal.com]

As before, we inhabit different planets.

Re: when did which war start?

[drieuxster.livejournal.com]

yes, but that is a part of why there are dialogs.

Try to remember that if the 'liberals' had addressed these issues under clinton, it would be a very different ballgame altogether...

If anyone had shown a Lick of Courage after the berlin wall came down....

That it was time to give up the whole 'cold war gamboling' - and find a way to move the nation away from it's imperial desires.... but too many of us came CONUS and went into the whole new hot wave of high tech opportunities, hoping that would offer the communication mechanisms, gosh, like this, that would allow divergent opinions to be expressed by means other than small arms fire and explosives.

Who knows, that too could still happen.

[baconmeteor.livejournal.com]

To me it has always been an occupation. War implies some kind of actual threat and organized military opposition. I was surprised to see you refer to either Afghanistan or Iraq as wars in this post since in my experience it's propagandists on the right (and major media outlets, for some reason) who favor the phrase in order to justify doing various inexcusable things here at home. Anyway someone please SMS me when the Iraqi tanks roll in to Oakland and I will gladly change my mind.