Showing posts with label military. Show all posts
Showing posts with label military. Show all posts
Obama's a Bitch: Live on Stage
This space used to host the YouTube video-recital of my article "Obama's a Bitch." I've chosen to delete the video from YouTube and direct all inquirers to the original written form; at last concluding the video fails, where the written form exceeds, the test of time.
Obama's a Bitch
Let me tell you why Obama's a bitch.
Obama's a bitch because he didn't withdraw the troops; because he's still trying to make hay out of an indefensible act of unprovoked aggression. Because he thinks he and his staff can do, in eighteen months, what a thousand military and sociopolitical strategists haven't been able to figure in half a decade spent eating, sleeping, and breathing Iraq. That is, to somehow split the nation's oil properties among the three dissident factions in such a way as every one of them can hold the majority alone. And thereby prevent the surely inevitable civil war what came foaming up with the cork when we loosed Iraq from Saddam's, albeit dictatorial, politically steadying influence.
And Obama's a bitch because he won't let that civil war come; because he'd rather silence the will of the Iraqi people under a stifling, American-made government that bids to hold the peace by an unpopulist, overwhelming force, than allow the people of Iraq, for whom those institutions are supposed to be, the self determination of a civil war. No, we've too much invested in Iraq's exports to let the people rise up and have it out. Why, that would lead to burning oil fields and broken pipelines, and we'll be damned if we traveled half way around the world, killed, tortured, and imprisoned all those innocent people, only to walk out the door without a steady flow of natural resources to show for it! Obama's a bitch because he's still trying to make G.W.'s bloodshed pay.
And he's a bitch because he didn't put that bloodthirsty sociopath, his generals, and all the rest of the Bush staff up for war crimes charges. He's left all the evils committed thereby to stand as evidence of their lack of fault. Thousands tortured; tens of thousands imprisoned without cause or means of redress; hundreds of thousands slaughtered by excessive use of force; American citizens stripped of citizenship and imprisoned without charges; warrantless, indiscriminate, nationwide surveillance programs... And all abominations go unrebuked! All are justified in a deafening silence; in the absence of a trial.
A trial is not a conviction, by the way -- it does not mean guilt. It means that there is sufficient evidence for inquiry. Is there not that?! Is there no question in the people or their leaders - in Obama - as to the legality and righteousness of all that has been done in these dark days? Yet here is placidity. Here is tranquility. There is no inquiry, nor outrage for this trial's absence. So it shall be remembered that none were injured. None called for justice, so all must be right and justly done.
Obama's a bitch because he won't apologize to Iraq and the world for a war no man alive can defend or justify. We are all stained black and red with the blood of millions - every one of us - and he bids us all to walk about pretending cleanliness, as though we did a good thing; as liberators rather than the harbingers of murder, unrest, and destruction.
Obama's a bitch because his health care plan is a fucking coupon, and nothing else. Because if he passes his discount 'crap care' plan we're all doomed to another fifty years as the world's only peoples so heartless - so shamelessly greedy - as to have the means but not the interest in establishing a Universal Health package that would cover everybody, all the time. This so-called Christian man, Obama, means to leave this so-called Christian nation, America, an affront to the very God he claims to worship, by keeping health and reasonable care a commodity on the exchange. This one never read the story of the Good Samaritan, it seems.
And if he gets his way we will be saddled with this for-profit, rack'em and stack'em, system of medicine for another half century without the political capital of the people's unrest to move us an inch toward real progress. In other words, I will not, in my lifetime, see a fair and equitable system of health care in America. I will have died before it comes. And presumably of some Cancer, the fighting of which produced costs so great that my wife and children will be left not only widowed and fatherless, but homeless and penniless as well. These I will credit to Obama.
Obama's a bitch because everything he has done and said, with the exception, perhaps, of closing Guantanamo, is a middle of the road, fence-sitting, fiscally conservative, politically viable, corporate-centric, safe and agreeable, popular consensus seeking, "p'weese evew'ybody wuv me awl at wunce," stop-gap half-measure of ambiguity. Because after eight years of unabashed evil, the likes known only under rule of Hitler, Kahn, and the Catholic church, Obama's great answer to these dark ages - his plan to put these moral miseries behind us - is nothing more than a return to slow and steady moderation. Back to the status quo everyone! For Christ's sake, yesterday the ruler of this nation was on TV saying human torture is a-okay, now's the changing of the guard and here's the backlash come in the image of a skinny, straightened man, hands folded neatly over his finely pressed linen suit, saying quietly, "I disagree." You should be fucking shouting! You should be livid! Hell, even if you don't care, for the general morale of the public a leader at least feigns outrage!
Obama's a bitch because, for popularity's sake, for his continued political viability, he has toed the line. He has let every significant injustice of the previous administration go unredressed. We needed a hero for sanity. We needed someone to pull America in a new direction, and to pull as hard, harder still, than Bush had pulled us all toward unfeeling capitalistic imperialism. We needed a hero to lead us into an age of compassion, peace, and charity. What we got was a colorless, odorless centrist. A man so deeply absorbed into the middle ground that he could no more tow us away than he could resist being floated along with the wayward nation himself.
And this man, this is the answer to Bush-brand conservatism? This is the rebuttal? This is the people's response to insanity, oppression, fear, and hatred? You know what? Forget Obama. Obama's not the bitch. You're the bitch... Bitch.
Obama's a bitch because he didn't withdraw the troops; because he's still trying to make hay out of an indefensible act of unprovoked aggression. Because he thinks he and his staff can do, in eighteen months, what a thousand military and sociopolitical strategists haven't been able to figure in half a decade spent eating, sleeping, and breathing Iraq. That is, to somehow split the nation's oil properties among the three dissident factions in such a way as every one of them can hold the majority alone. And thereby prevent the surely inevitable civil war what came foaming up with the cork when we loosed Iraq from Saddam's, albeit dictatorial, politically steadying influence.
And Obama's a bitch because he won't let that civil war come; because he'd rather silence the will of the Iraqi people under a stifling, American-made government that bids to hold the peace by an unpopulist, overwhelming force, than allow the people of Iraq, for whom those institutions are supposed to be, the self determination of a civil war. No, we've too much invested in Iraq's exports to let the people rise up and have it out. Why, that would lead to burning oil fields and broken pipelines, and we'll be damned if we traveled half way around the world, killed, tortured, and imprisoned all those innocent people, only to walk out the door without a steady flow of natural resources to show for it! Obama's a bitch because he's still trying to make G.W.'s bloodshed pay.
And he's a bitch because he didn't put that bloodthirsty sociopath, his generals, and all the rest of the Bush staff up for war crimes charges. He's left all the evils committed thereby to stand as evidence of their lack of fault. Thousands tortured; tens of thousands imprisoned without cause or means of redress; hundreds of thousands slaughtered by excessive use of force; American citizens stripped of citizenship and imprisoned without charges; warrantless, indiscriminate, nationwide surveillance programs... And all abominations go unrebuked! All are justified in a deafening silence; in the absence of a trial.
A trial is not a conviction, by the way -- it does not mean guilt. It means that there is sufficient evidence for inquiry. Is there not that?! Is there no question in the people or their leaders - in Obama - as to the legality and righteousness of all that has been done in these dark days? Yet here is placidity. Here is tranquility. There is no inquiry, nor outrage for this trial's absence. So it shall be remembered that none were injured. None called for justice, so all must be right and justly done.
Obama's a bitch because he won't apologize to Iraq and the world for a war no man alive can defend or justify. We are all stained black and red with the blood of millions - every one of us - and he bids us all to walk about pretending cleanliness, as though we did a good thing; as liberators rather than the harbingers of murder, unrest, and destruction.
Obama's a bitch because his health care plan is a fucking coupon, and nothing else. Because if he passes his discount 'crap care' plan we're all doomed to another fifty years as the world's only peoples so heartless - so shamelessly greedy - as to have the means but not the interest in establishing a Universal Health package that would cover everybody, all the time. This so-called Christian man, Obama, means to leave this so-called Christian nation, America, an affront to the very God he claims to worship, by keeping health and reasonable care a commodity on the exchange. This one never read the story of the Good Samaritan, it seems.
And if he gets his way we will be saddled with this for-profit, rack'em and stack'em, system of medicine for another half century without the political capital of the people's unrest to move us an inch toward real progress. In other words, I will not, in my lifetime, see a fair and equitable system of health care in America. I will have died before it comes. And presumably of some Cancer, the fighting of which produced costs so great that my wife and children will be left not only widowed and fatherless, but homeless and penniless as well. These I will credit to Obama.
Obama's a bitch because everything he has done and said, with the exception, perhaps, of closing Guantanamo, is a middle of the road, fence-sitting, fiscally conservative, politically viable, corporate-centric, safe and agreeable, popular consensus seeking, "p'weese evew'ybody wuv me awl at wunce," stop-gap half-measure of ambiguity. Because after eight years of unabashed evil, the likes known only under rule of Hitler, Kahn, and the Catholic church, Obama's great answer to these dark ages - his plan to put these moral miseries behind us - is nothing more than a return to slow and steady moderation. Back to the status quo everyone! For Christ's sake, yesterday the ruler of this nation was on TV saying human torture is a-okay, now's the changing of the guard and here's the backlash come in the image of a skinny, straightened man, hands folded neatly over his finely pressed linen suit, saying quietly, "I disagree." You should be fucking shouting! You should be livid! Hell, even if you don't care, for the general morale of the public a leader at least feigns outrage!
Obama's a bitch because, for popularity's sake, for his continued political viability, he has toed the line. He has let every significant injustice of the previous administration go unredressed. We needed a hero for sanity. We needed someone to pull America in a new direction, and to pull as hard, harder still, than Bush had pulled us all toward unfeeling capitalistic imperialism. We needed a hero to lead us into an age of compassion, peace, and charity. What we got was a colorless, odorless centrist. A man so deeply absorbed into the middle ground that he could no more tow us away than he could resist being floated along with the wayward nation himself.
And this man, this is the answer to Bush-brand conservatism? This is the rebuttal? This is the people's response to insanity, oppression, fear, and hatred? You know what? Forget Obama. Obama's not the bitch. You're the bitch... Bitch.
Memorial Day?
It's sad to say that fallen soldiers are to Memorial Day as the resurrection of Christ is to Easter. The two just don't synch up anymore.
Societally, Memorial Day is about camping and cookouts. It doesn't really have anything to do with military service or fallen troops. Of course it does to those directly impacted by those things -- just as surely some modest handful of Christians out there still refuse to white wash Christmas with the image of a jolly, gift-giving, fat man. But, demographically speaking, veterans and their survivors can't rival the volume of those of us untouched who 'honor their memory' by getting half-naked, building a bonfire, and tapping a keg.
And who's to blame this generation - my generation - for our lack of reverence? The last noble war was fought long before we graced the glimmer of our parent's eyes. Every 'conflict' since has been an exercise in Rich White Colonials v. Poor People Defending their Homes. At least in Vietnam we could honor the men who had no choice; who were drafted and forced into service. We could at least imagine that these young boys didn't really want to go to the other side of the planet and needlessly kill people on Uncle Sam's dime.
But in this post-Vietnam, draft-less era we find it hard to see any reason to hand military servicemen any special honors. "They put their lives on the line..." sure, but for what?
We're all big boys here. We know that the greatest lot of our troops wouldn't have signed up if their Uncle Sam wasn't handing out scholarships like sucking candy. Uncle Sam sure knows it! Otherwise he wouldn't focus his recruiting efforts so heavily in the projects and the ghettos. He'd be sending his recruiters door to door in gated suburban communities, instead of trailer to trailer in mobile home parks. So let's not pretend that the modern American soldier is a noble-hearted patriot, selflessly protecting the nation they hold so dear. Most joined up as way out of the poverty stricken lives their nation placed them into, and most had their fingers crossed that they'd never need to defend anything in actual combat.
But I have some sympathy for - perhaps I can even respect - the man who knowingly sells himself at auction to escape the cycle of debt, poverty, and slavery holding him in a generational vice. Still, I wouldn't give him a day to celebrate it. I wouldn't fain his to be an act of virtuous nobility. I wouldn't want to confuse him; nor let him forget at any time that his service was meant as a means to an end; That becoming a murderer for hire - even out of necessity - is something to be looked back upon with regret, not championed, nor made into a career.
After all, that's what this generation's military is: an army of mercenaries. They don't prevent genocides or overthrow oppressive regimes anymore. They aren't safe-guarding American soil or protecting any uniquely American 'way of life.' It's about the resources. It's about the oil. It's about the money. That's where and why they kill. So we can't really count them as American soldiers. They're NASDAQ soldiers. And that makes them mercenaries.
You can understand, having watched the passed three decades of this American military's operations why my generation might say, "Memorial Day? Crack me open a brew and bring out the Johnsonville Brats!" We just can't find it in ourselves to truly honor this Army; this Goliath we've so often seen wiping the blood of another hundred thousand humble, little Davids, who simply tried - though all too fruitlessly - to protect and preserve their own ways of life, from his giant red-stained hands and forearms.
This modern army comes to the field of battle with laser guided, bunker busting, nuclear armaments; They come with satellite imaged, unmanned aerial reconnaissance; they come in F-16's, Apache Helicopters, and Abrams tanks; with four-thousand round per minute miniguns, M-16s, P-92s, depleted-uranium rounds, and bullet proof body armor. With these things they come to make war upon whom? but the most meager forces; Foes armed with thirty year old weapons and improvised explosives - made from gasoline and cleaning products.
And then they belittle their enemy and dismiss him. They say he is not a soldier because he does not wear a uniform, when surely any uniformed combatant would be killed of the most incredulous means available. He would be simply blown up using missiles or bombs, and by men stationed miles away in air-conditioned RV's, guiding these weapons to their target using XBOX controllers. Or, if forced to meet face to face, perhaps an American would fire 40mm rounds from a turret atop a Hummer, while his enemy fled, only able to return handgun fire before his limbs and body were separated in a bloody cloud of sinew by the disgustingly dishonorable use of such overwhelming force.
Yet all the while the Pentagon's propagandists continue to wage media campaigns that speak to us of honor, discipline, service, and duty. Perhaps it is the blatant contradiction - this unrepentant lie - that has brought my generation to such disregard of Memorial Day and all it's celebratory cousins.
The man who commits a horror, but for what he thinks a good cause, can sometimes be respected still -- that is unless he tries to sell his sins as deeds of heroism. He who will not bear his shame leaves all around him to brunt the weight. And so, perhaps, we cannot lift him up in celebration of the ill-got gains, while still his shameful doings rest upon us.
I can't say as I've ever, in all my life, seen the military do anything to protect or benefit the people of this nation. I'm aware that previous militaries have done so, but I've never seen it with my own eyes. So I'm not saying that we shouldn't honor the sacrifices historically rendered to preserve us, I'm just telling you why we don't anymore. To me; to my age; the military is merely a tool of powerful men to gain and maintain their power. That's all we've ever known it as. And we can little be expected to separate and distinguish the soldiers from the military they comprise.
Patriotism, nobility, honor... We've mostly never seen these either - not in real life anyway - so you'll excuse us as we stack the logs for tonight's bonfire. But I don't believe this military has ever shown my generation anything worth honoring, has it?
Societally, Memorial Day is about camping and cookouts. It doesn't really have anything to do with military service or fallen troops. Of course it does to those directly impacted by those things -- just as surely some modest handful of Christians out there still refuse to white wash Christmas with the image of a jolly, gift-giving, fat man. But, demographically speaking, veterans and their survivors can't rival the volume of those of us untouched who 'honor their memory' by getting half-naked, building a bonfire, and tapping a keg.
And who's to blame this generation - my generation - for our lack of reverence? The last noble war was fought long before we graced the glimmer of our parent's eyes. Every 'conflict' since has been an exercise in Rich White Colonials v. Poor People Defending their Homes. At least in Vietnam we could honor the men who had no choice; who were drafted and forced into service. We could at least imagine that these young boys didn't really want to go to the other side of the planet and needlessly kill people on Uncle Sam's dime.
But in this post-Vietnam, draft-less era we find it hard to see any reason to hand military servicemen any special honors. "They put their lives on the line..." sure, but for what?
We're all big boys here. We know that the greatest lot of our troops wouldn't have signed up if their Uncle Sam wasn't handing out scholarships like sucking candy. Uncle Sam sure knows it! Otherwise he wouldn't focus his recruiting efforts so heavily in the projects and the ghettos. He'd be sending his recruiters door to door in gated suburban communities, instead of trailer to trailer in mobile home parks. So let's not pretend that the modern American soldier is a noble-hearted patriot, selflessly protecting the nation they hold so dear. Most joined up as way out of the poverty stricken lives their nation placed them into, and most had their fingers crossed that they'd never need to defend anything in actual combat.
But I have some sympathy for - perhaps I can even respect - the man who knowingly sells himself at auction to escape the cycle of debt, poverty, and slavery holding him in a generational vice. Still, I wouldn't give him a day to celebrate it. I wouldn't fain his to be an act of virtuous nobility. I wouldn't want to confuse him; nor let him forget at any time that his service was meant as a means to an end; That becoming a murderer for hire - even out of necessity - is something to be looked back upon with regret, not championed, nor made into a career.
After all, that's what this generation's military is: an army of mercenaries. They don't prevent genocides or overthrow oppressive regimes anymore. They aren't safe-guarding American soil or protecting any uniquely American 'way of life.' It's about the resources. It's about the oil. It's about the money. That's where and why they kill. So we can't really count them as American soldiers. They're NASDAQ soldiers. And that makes them mercenaries.
You can understand, having watched the passed three decades of this American military's operations why my generation might say, "Memorial Day? Crack me open a brew and bring out the Johnsonville Brats!" We just can't find it in ourselves to truly honor this Army; this Goliath we've so often seen wiping the blood of another hundred thousand humble, little Davids, who simply tried - though all too fruitlessly - to protect and preserve their own ways of life, from his giant red-stained hands and forearms.
This modern army comes to the field of battle with laser guided, bunker busting, nuclear armaments; They come with satellite imaged, unmanned aerial reconnaissance; they come in F-16's, Apache Helicopters, and Abrams tanks; with four-thousand round per minute miniguns, M-16s, P-92s, depleted-uranium rounds, and bullet proof body armor. With these things they come to make war upon whom? but the most meager forces; Foes armed with thirty year old weapons and improvised explosives - made from gasoline and cleaning products.
And then they belittle their enemy and dismiss him. They say he is not a soldier because he does not wear a uniform, when surely any uniformed combatant would be killed of the most incredulous means available. He would be simply blown up using missiles or bombs, and by men stationed miles away in air-conditioned RV's, guiding these weapons to their target using XBOX controllers. Or, if forced to meet face to face, perhaps an American would fire 40mm rounds from a turret atop a Hummer, while his enemy fled, only able to return handgun fire before his limbs and body were separated in a bloody cloud of sinew by the disgustingly dishonorable use of such overwhelming force.
Yet all the while the Pentagon's propagandists continue to wage media campaigns that speak to us of honor, discipline, service, and duty. Perhaps it is the blatant contradiction - this unrepentant lie - that has brought my generation to such disregard of Memorial Day and all it's celebratory cousins.
The man who commits a horror, but for what he thinks a good cause, can sometimes be respected still -- that is unless he tries to sell his sins as deeds of heroism. He who will not bear his shame leaves all around him to brunt the weight. And so, perhaps, we cannot lift him up in celebration of the ill-got gains, while still his shameful doings rest upon us.
I can't say as I've ever, in all my life, seen the military do anything to protect or benefit the people of this nation. I'm aware that previous militaries have done so, but I've never seen it with my own eyes. So I'm not saying that we shouldn't honor the sacrifices historically rendered to preserve us, I'm just telling you why we don't anymore. To me; to my age; the military is merely a tool of powerful men to gain and maintain their power. That's all we've ever known it as. And we can little be expected to separate and distinguish the soldiers from the military they comprise.
Patriotism, nobility, honor... We've mostly never seen these either - not in real life anyway - so you'll excuse us as we stack the logs for tonight's bonfire. But I don't believe this military has ever shown my generation anything worth honoring, has it?
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