the defeatists!

Dog Parks and the Levant

The Parable of the Dog Park

ISIL, Syria, Iraq and the Illusion of American Power

Once upon a time there were three dog parks. To play in either of the two nicest parks, a dog had to be part of the pack that ran the park and kiss the ass of the Alpha Dog. The third park wasn't anywhere near as nice, but the possibility of being merged with one of the nicer parks, while attractive to some of the dogs, was never attractive enough to enough of the dogs that a merger could happen. To keep the smaller, less nice park from screwing up what was a relatively good thing, the two Alpha Dogs would occasionally send over some extra bones and treats, and the dogs in the crummy park would chow done. The end. 

Welcome to geo-politics from the silly perspective of dueling dog parks. But, while I'm hard pressed to think of anything I'd much agree with Vladamir Putin on besides the idea that Pussy Riot are lousy musicians, I do grant him this much -- for the sake of a stable world, the end of the Soviet Union was a tragedy if you wanted a world that had some sort of overall organizing principle. Humans do well with bi-polar situations -- good/bad, black/white, capitalist/communist. We don't do so well with a world where there are multiple polarities pulling and pushing in multiple, incoherent and ultimately opposing directions.

The basic question asked by the McCains and Grahams and Putins of the world is fairly simple -- WHO THE HELL IS IN CHARGE HERE! Well, nobody is, much to the dismay of the various hobbit-functionaries and bureaucrats who think they're really in charge or should be.

This morning's New York Times illustrates this wonderfully. The headlines announce that Egypt and the Emirates are bombing Libya without letting the US know in advance let alone asking permission.The editorial board has a great discussion of what needs to be done to counter the Islamic State and maybe give some coherence and sense to the region. Maybe. However, it also sums up quiet lucidly the problem that the Big Dog in the Dog Park -- the US -- faces; it's not really our dog park. The local dogs all want someone to do something, but in the meantime they keep doing other stuff. Stuff that makes sense given their local interests and religious interests and economic interests but really don't help in the bigger sense of the region or the world.

The prospects of defeating ISIS would be greatly improved if other Muslim nations could see ISIS for the threat it is. But, like Iraq, they are mired in petty competitions and Sunni-Shiite religious divisions and many have their own relations with extremists of one kind or another. ISIS has received financing from donors in Kuwait and Qatar. Saudi Arabia funneled weapons to Syrian rebels and didn’t care if they went to ISIS. Turkey allowed ISIS fighters and weapons to flow across porous borders. All of that has to stop...

No matter how many American airstrikes are carried out — Mr. Obama is also considering strikes against ISIS in Syria — such extremists will never be defeated if Muslims themselves don’t make it a priority. To their credit, some leaders are speaking out. Among them is Saudi Arabia’s highest religious authority, the grand mufti, who called ISIS and Al Qaeda the “enemy No. 1 of Islam.” But they must go further and begin a serious discussion about the dangers of radical Islam and how ISIS’s perversion of one of the world’s great religions can be reversed.

I've referred before to Churchill's analysis of the region as one of tribes with flags. What the Times isn't getting and what the Administration isn't getting is that the primary concern for the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, and the Emirates and the Assad family is what's good for the various dynasties. The Saudi Royal Family doesn't really see a difference between the Kingdom and the family -- which is very large, very disorganized and very dysfunctional. Same in Kuwait, same in the Emirates. If Assad was primarily a Syrian patriot, things would be better in Syria. Since that's not his primary reality,  this is about maintaining power, control, position and dynastic hegemony as opposed to what's best for the people, the country, the region or the religion.

Militarily, I think most knowledgeable analysts accept that somebody has got to put boots on the ground in Syria and Iraq. I don't see the local powers lining up to do so. Now, from the point of view of stopping the current nonsense, I'd like to see a couple of US Heavy Divisions supported by the Saudi Arabian Army and some heavy forces from Iraq, with Turkish and Egyptian light forces and an Iranian logistics force to provide support and aid. Chances of that happening are slim, none and illusory.

Another problem is that Islam is even less organized than Christianity. The Sunnis and the Shiites aren't equivalent to the Roman Catholic Church and the Orthodox Church. The two most cohesive elements in Islam, Iran and Saudi Arabia, are religious states in a state of ideological and religious conflict for the past 1400 or so years. While it's excellent that the Grand Mufti of Mecca has raised the issue of ISIL and al Queida as an actual threat to Islam, there are other Grand Muftis and Ayatollahs, all of whom envision themselves equally grand. Bin Laden was not a religious figure but he felt perfectly OK issuing Fatwahs, and a lot of Muslims were fine with that. The five fold path involves subjugation to God; no other allegiance is necessary.

So, going back to my dog park parable, what can we do? Consider this -- it's not our damned dog park. We have interests, sure we have interests. But it's their region and they need to work it out, and forcing our interests to the front just adds complications and frustrations. I would say that our best solution in the current world is to stop trying to run their dog park, and stop sending over bones and treats, except in a pure quid pro quo, a formula that should include Israel since they play in that region. Let the fires burn out, because anything we do just fans the flames.

Problems and perspective at the Karma Bar and Grill

If you watched the HBO series “Rome,” you saw a re-enactment of Julius Caesar’s triumph of 46 BC: Caesar riding in a golden chariot, his face painted red, dressed in purple and white robes, a slave holding a wreath over his head. If you had looked up an explanation for this uncanny garb, you would probably have been told: the red paint was there to imitate the red-painted face of the statues of the god Mars; the robes were those of Capitoline Jove; and the slave was to whisper in his ear, “Remember thou art mortal.” 

  There's a combination of schadenfreude and sadness at the Petraeus affairs. A lot of us here know people like the folks involved here, and the problems are basically the fact that we're all human. Too human, maybe. The resignation is a shame in some ways, but in others probably not...it's a distraction, and the timing is pretty awful in that regard. While the beltway press pursues the latest shiney  object, well, who knows what nefarious things will go bump in the night.

Here's the thing that bothers me --There's another problem with this. The affair occurred in Afghanistan while Petraeus was the commanding general. Adultery is a serious violation against the UCMJ. In addition, sexual relations in the combat zone -- and under his desk in Kabul or at that monster base we've got outside Kabul -- certainly qualifies as a combat zone. Soldiers are routinely disciplined for this behavior, and this guy probably signed off on a few court martials and other punishments for this during his career. Fun facts to know and tell about generals -- when they retire, they really don't retire. And, this is definitely contrary to good order and discipline. I would expect that some disciplinary action on the Army side would happen for the affair. Possibly just a letter of reprimand or a fine; possibly a reduction in rank to the last rank at which he served honorably, which was 3 stars. Will be interesting to see what, if anything happens with this one... Of course, Ms. Broadwell was an Academy Graduate. It's interesting to ponder whether or not she retained a reserve commission; if so, an investigation by the Army could conclude that in addition to adultery, there was a violation of the fraternization policy. Basically reflects very badly on his judgement, and he is very clear about that in his resignation. Good for him by the way, and good for her in that she's handling this like an adult.

 But, the teenage crush aspect of it is kind of amusing. He gets to be head of the CIA, she decides to end the affair and he pursues her. Sends her dirty emails supposedly and generally acted like a 19 year old boy.Sheesh...

 I have an odd take on marriage these days. I think we just live too long these days for marriage to work. The fact that Clem and Elma were married for 77 years always elicits the "Cute, oh, they're so cute response." Not from me -- I've been married for 36 years, and frankly, it's a habit and an economic arrangement. We're fond of each other, but except for NCIS and baseball don't really share very much. Petraeus spent most of the his time since November of 2001 either deployed to Afghanistan, Iraq or getting ready to go -- his wife had a life, his kids are grown and GUESS WHAT! They'd been married for 37 years after getting engaged when he was in the Academy. Not an inevitable thing, but the seeds are there. I'm not making excuses for the guy, by the way -- I don't consider the affair particularly heinous, but the hypocrisy and silliness make you wonder. Been there, done that, got the t-shirt. But, I can say that I never let any nuttiness about who was sleeping with who turn into persecution or prosecution when I was in the Army in leadership roles, and stopped more than a few puritanical witch hunts. But, if he ever signed off on a 15-6 for a court martial for any sexual relations issue, he's probably getting a payback in the old Karma Bar, Grill and Continuous Soiree.

 Supposedly he was pretty unpopular in the CIA as a know-it-all, outsider, Army guy. Not terribly surprising in a way -- and I never did get the idea that he'd be a great president. Intellectuals and generals have at best a spotty record as President. Washington, Jackson...and Zachery Taylor? Rutherford B. Hays? William Henry Harrison? Woodrow Wilson? Herbert Hoover? Jimmy Carter? Ike and Jefferson are the only ones I can think of to really set the world on fire...or in Ike's case despite the jingoist paranoia of the age, to not set the world on fire.  I generally don't have a lot of issues with generals, except if you want to talk about being out of touch with the American people, lots of them are so far removed that, well, they tell young people in good physical condition living in extraordinary stress that having sex is a bad idea. And, frankly, the whole counterinsurgency thing was vastly overrated. The Iraqis figured out that we were going to leave and this was a good way to get us out of there earlier. We basically bribed the militias and let the Shiites take over the country. And left...Afghanistan was never going to work, and the smartest thing to do is draw down quickly but not in a panic and leave. Most soldiers with an actual appreciation of history always saw that war as a mistake. Best thing to do with Afghanistan unless you're willing to kill 3/4 or so of the populace like the Moguls did is to bribe the bastards to stay in their cages and retaliate massively when they stick their heads out. And, I know a few Afghanis and I like them. But, substitue opium for moonshine, and they're hillbillies with Korans.

 Petraeus got out of there with his reputation intact because of the Gates-Panetta transfer and the fact that the Rs couldn't oppose his nomination. Logical move on the part of the Obama Administration. But, unlike Colin Powell, Petraeus was not a general with a lot of political experience. He was a light infantry guy, and while not as crazy as a Special Operations Guy like McCrystal, he wasn't used to the corridors of power. Check out his Wikipedia entry and look at his career. His high and mighty assignments were with soldiers. He's a dirty boots kind of guy.

In fairness, he is an extraordinarily bright guy - Princeton PhDs from the Woodrow Wilson School of Public Policy don't come easily -- and had a great reputation as just a helluva soldier as a brigade and division commander. And, in the Infantry you don't get stars by being a total prick and incompetent. You can be either -- most aren't -- but the total douchebags are rare. Tankers are different -- all the noise warps their heads. Special OPs guys have a tendency to be outlaws in a lot of ways. But in some ways this is a shame, in some a gut check for the Army , and in some just irony. And yeah, "the powerful are in fact people" realization is important.

 

Bad news travels like wildfire and good news travels slow...

Sweating in the ghetto with the wetbacks and the poor
The rats have joined the babies who are sleeping on the floor
Now wouldn't it be a riot if they really blew their tops?
But they got too much already and besides we got the cops
And I'm sure it wouldn't interest anybody
Outside of a small circle of friends.-- Phil Ochs

The problem becomes, of course, being able to tell the difference between the two, good news and bad news. Or, becoming aware that they exist in the face of cultural degradation and silliness. This is a day of universally WTF important stories that we are missing because of the Charlie Sheen phenomonon. We've got years of reruns of 2.5 Idiots and there's always Hot Shots and Navy Seals. Stop worrying about Charlie, oh great media machine and pay attention to the things that are going to get the rest of us killed. Oh Tempora, Oh Mores! as that great Italian defense attorney Cicero said in about 64 BCE. Of course, he was talking about viciousness and corruption; we need to add stupidity, greed and the inability to connect the dots. Caesar, Pompey, Cicero, Cato, Crassus, Brutus -- they could all connect the dots. Our politicians and our leaders - not so much.

First of all, there's the latest debacle in Afghanistan. Now, the Afghans are big on blood feuds, revenge killing, pederasty and goats. So, the accidental killing of a bunch of kids herding goats and getting firewood is not just a tragedy, it's symptomatic of everything that's wrong with this war...

Look, it's a low tech place, and kids play while they're doing choirs. See the helicopter and run around -- and, some door gunners think, "Oh shit, Taliban..."  and ratatattat. We've ruined the lives of Afghan families, which will piss off extended families and result in payment of blood money and probably American blood. Shoot my neighbor's kid from the sky while he's doing the equivalent of raking leaves, and I might be predisposed to not want to help you do anything but get the fuck out of my country...Inshallah! If we're worried about Psyops, well, this kind of shit that happens entirely too often is why we can expect no real results from Psyops. It a low tech place, in tough terrain, with a warlike populace who are pretty good at not going along with strangers. It's noble of Petraeus to go and apologize but to the Afghans invovled, he's just another outsider. It's his fault...they may understand that. They won't get accidents happen; collateral damage is inevitable.

I'm all for orderly withdrawals, since the alternative is a fighting retreat, but it needs to happen now...not in two or three or ten years.

The German magazine Der Spiegel reported on its Web site that the suspect was carrying a large amount of ammunition when arrested. The police said they could not confirm that report.A man whose office is near the site of the shooting, speaking on condition of anonymity to protect his business, said witnesses told him that before opening fire the gunman shouted “God is great” in Arabic. --NY Times

Then, there's the murder of two Airmen on their way to Afghanistan as they're getting on a bus at Frankfurt's international airport. The Politzei haven't identified the guy yet,but it appears that the guy works there. The Times points out that there have been no major terrorist attacks in Germany but states that they've been on alert for a while expecting some. The media claims that the guy is a Kosovar who was born in Germany...citizenship in Germany not being easily available to non-Germans. There are about a million Turks, Armenians, and every other type of non-German living in and born in Germany legally who have no citizenship rights. Supposedly the guy got into an argument with the GIs...ok, I can see that. What I don't see is why or how the guy had a gun...Germany has really stringent gun control laws. This non-citizen would not have come close to getting a pistol permit. Hell, he'd have had trouble getting a permit for a sword...I wandered all over that country, and never felt nervous. I stayed away from the docks and red light zones, and saw no evidence of street crime. I recall being on "Courtesy Patrol" -- an oddball Army thing where some NCOs or Officers would put on their Class A or B uniforms and go someplace that soldiers might go and get drunk and in trouble, so they could exert a calming influence at best and at worst haul the bastards back to the barracks. Normal vehicle was a jeep with radio, driver and two NCOs. When I did it, I told the senior guy  to man the phone/radio, and we took a five ton truck so if there were drunks, we'd have room to carry them. Anyway, this particular adventure was at a major Beer Festival in Wurzburg, my favorite city in, oh, the universe. We were standing around over by the main Politzei area, and some belligerent German drunks were dragged into the shed that the cops were using. A huge cop came out, smiled at us, and shut the door, standing against it and bracing his back against the door. Bodies proceeded to slam against walls for a few minutes -- I am not exaggerating to say the walls seemed to bulge. Next, the cop opens the doors and helps drag the drunks, now docile, out and away...I also was involved as a witness and as a translator a couple of times when the Kriminal Polizei were involved. Guns were drawn, and people were very cooperative. Whole Miranda thing not an issue over there. So, while I'm not naive enough to think that there were no guns in the hands of thugs when I was there, I am pretty sure that this indicates that they've lost the bubble on arms trafficking there. Expect more. Why exactly are we flying people into Frankfurt to move them on to Ramstein AFB before flying them to Afghanistan anyway? The piece mentions that we've downsized a lot in Europe, that there are now only 50000 total Army, Air Force, Marines and Coast Guardsmen there. I guess my thought is "Why are there any beyond essential liaison with our allies?" And, if our allies really want us there, why aren't they paying for it? I know that there are overcrowding issues at some US installations, but unmothballing a few and putting soldiers there would make more sense than not. And, create jobs here, by the way. Turning the Yakima Firing Range into an Afghanistan style joint readiness training center would work great...it looks like Afghanistan, and has basically the same sort of weather...hellish.

Then, there's Dr Doom and his merry Gang of Tricksters. Nouriel Roubini sent me this today... Download Gmail - Fwd RGE's Wednesday Note - Fallout From the MENA Days of Rage - March 2, 2011 - [email protected] The good doctor and his think tank are pretty expensive to subscribe to, but I do get some of his newsletters, and his team sent one today that was just marvelous to behold. Here's a bit...MENA is Roubiniese for Middle East-North Africa, by the way.

As RGE Chairman Nouriel Roubini examined in a recent piece, the economic costs of MENA unrest extend far beyond the region, with rising commodity prices the most significant linking factor. A further increase in oil prices would pose a significant downside risk to global growth. We expect demand destruction for fuel products to occur at lower oil prices than in 2008, as U.S. and EU consumers are more stretched. Fuel importers will suffer from higher prices, and global central bankers will face a more difficult job in setting policy. Countries like Turkey and South Korea with extensive goods and services exports to MENA countries could face two challenges from the region’s disruption: a stall in their projects with the countries and a deterioration of external balances from an increase in oil prices.

Beyond food and fuel security risks, the waves of unrest are washing up on the European continent in the form of increased numbers of migrants to southern EU nations. Already, Italy has reported an increase in Tunisians in Lampedusa, and some of the 100,000 Libyans flooding into Tunisia and Egypt may well try to make their way north. An increase in illegal migrants and refugees could stress the broader EU, which is still suffering from high unemployment rates and fiscal austerity...

Here's my problem. Austerity has been proven to not work, to drive down GDP and to screw things up in general. Yet, we have an entire Republican party devoted to saying "we're broke...: Well, not really. What we have is a revenue problem -- we need higher taxes at the state, county, municipal and federal levels. And, the immediate return to the Clinton Tax Rates for the richest makes sense, but we actually need a lot more. As the Wisconsin debacle has shown, we've got issues with reality; nobody likes to pay taxes and have government waste; however, we kinda like things like schools, libraries, roads, sewers and bridges. It takes money to build those things...I suppose we could anticpate our inevitable downfall and institute an annual corvee but that would be incredibly stupid. Expect the Tea Party to immediately endorse it...

Now, Robert Rubin has pointed out repeatedly, that the concentration of wealth at the top end does a disservice to the top end. The Koch Brothers probably think that their ideology makes sense and we're just dealing with hiccups, but not distributing money from the people who have money to do the things that need to be done in society while trying to take it from those who do not have so much money is pretty damn stupid. Now, I'm not rich enough to squirrel away a lot of my money in municipal bonds or state bonds. These are generally tax free, if you can afford to buy them. Earnings from Munis or State bonds are not tax free if part of a mutual fund. Hedge fund managers and portfolio managers love these things for salting away excess wealth -- no risk and the lack of tax makes them more attractive.So trust funds, pension funds, insurance agencies, low risk mutual funds and so on love them. They're considered almost as safe as T-Bills and you get better returns.

So when Doctor Roubini and his band of gypsies tell the Wall Street Journal that Municipals will probably drop about $100 Billion in defaults this year, that's hardly a good thing. It appears, from the Journal's piece that they regard this as being good news that at some level we've got disaster fatigue. The loss of a $100 billion worth of wealth will shaft investors, but will do a number on any municipality or state that happens to have to default. Or, appears threatened. Interest rates will shoot through the roof; when Texas state bonds are accorded junk bond status along with California and a few other places, what the hell, over? Pensions will go under, investors will go crazy, and some one will come up with the great idea of bailing out Hedge Funds...we can't let a trillion dollar industry go south, can we? Think of the children!

And, of course, the hits keep on coming. The Dems cave on this two week funding thing, everybody with any credibility tells the House Republicans and the Tea Party and the General Public that their economic plans are based on bad math, lousy economics and general ideological paralysis of the insane. And, we continue to go merrily down the road...

To Reverend Phelps and his church. Frankly, I tend to almost always side with the Bill of Rights. Free speech should be protected at almost all costs. But, the Founders would be dumbfounded by no constraints. They tolerated a lot, because they had faith that society would punish those who went too far. Hamilton died because he said things that he'd probably said before, possibly to Burr, but this time to someone who published them. The same reasoning that brought us Citizens United and the best Congress the rich can buy has now found in favor of the Westboro "Fag-Hating, Jesus-loving" Baptist Church.

“Westboro’s funeral picketing is certainly hurtful and its contribution to public discourse may be negligible,” Chief Justice Roberts concluded. “But Westboro addressed matters of public import on public property, in a peaceful manner, in full compliance with the guidance of local officials.”

I spent my life dedicated to the cause of free speech among others. This one bothers me...a lot. The only reason that these damn things have not degenerated into blood, mud, fire and riot is that we're far too disciplined in the military and veterans communities, and far too tolerant on the left. Idealism doesn't get in the way of Clarence Thomas or Scalia. I interpret this to mean that cross-burning, which is hate speech by definition, is probably protected speech. Yea! More fun ahead...

Meanwhile, Charlie Sheen has been spotted walking down the Vegas Strip with a gun, a speedo and a feather sticking out of his ass. Oh, half the men in the US have HPV. Which, since the virus is largely assoicated with women, means that a higher percentage of women have it. Which means that maybe we should be vaccinating everybody for it, since the virus itself is not so bad, but the cancers are. Or, maybe we should just skip it. Quick -- shoot Tiger Blood Charlie with a tranquilizer gun using the Siberian White Tiger dose and test him for it!

 

 

 

My brush stroke...

The Sal Giunta Story from SebastianJunger/TimHetherington on Vimeo.

Recently, the Army announced that SSG Sal Giunta, the only living Medal of Honor Winner from the wars of the 21st Century has chosen to leave the service at the end of his tour. The service will miss him. His comments at the end of the piece are so honest and so humble and so angry that I am stunned that this kid is able to show such moral courage, intellectual clarity and situational awareness. This is what we have wasted time and again in Iraq and Afghanistan. Sal Giunta's final brush stroke should energize us all to demand that we get the hell out of the entire Southwest Asian debacle. Whatever he does next, I'm sure he'll be successful at it...courage, self-depreciating humor and rigorous integrity. Hooah.

“Drop everything, cross that river, help your brothers.”

It is easy to take valor for granted when you don't need valor to live, survive or keep from going mad. It is easy to take valor for granted when you are valorous, trying to save friends and do you job. Those of us who do not need valor to live have no right to take it for granted; those who are immersed in it, who display it to an amazing degree, have no choice but to take it for granted or else they become bullies and fools. We are blessed to have valorous young men and women; we waste them at our peril. We are blessed to have valorous young men and women who step up and do the impossible, the dangerous and the gut-wrenchingly horrible things to serve us. But, they don't do it for us; they do it for each other, for their friends without thinking and because it's what they'e there to do. And, they have the right to be angry at the world that doesn't comprehend that, and can't give them back their friends, their limbs, and their ability to sleep calmly, without nightmares and the feeling that they failed their friends who died, who were maimed, who are crazed and demented while they must carry on...the true hero is the one who rejects his own heroism and says that those who are not there are the heroes...

We wasted a lot in the Global War on Terror; blood, treasure, and future. And, as Elizabeth Rubin describes in her piece in this morning's New York Times and as Sebastian Junger explains in WAR or shows in RESTOPO, perhaps for nothing except for valor. Certainly, the geopolitical piece has a major disconnect. Jefferson's comment about the tree of liberty being watered by the blood of patriots and tyrants may be widely misunderstood...but the valorous water it daily, and we all benefit.They may get a mention, a pension, a medal. We get to sleep safe at the cost of their blood, hearts and memories.

And then Giunta said, “All my feelings are with my friends and they are getting smaller. I have sweat more, cried more, bled more in this country than my own. These people,” he said, meaning the Afghans, “won’t leave this valley. They have been here far before I could fathom an Afghanistan.”

“I ran to the front because that is where he was,” Giunta said, talking of Brennan. “I didn’t try to be a hero and save everyone.”

On Tuesday Giunta will become the first living soldier to receive the Medal of Honor since Vietnam. He has said that if he is a hero then everyone who goes into the unknown is a hero. He has said he was angry to have a medal around his neck at the price of Brennan’s and Mendoza’s lives. It took three years for the Pentagon to finalize the award. And it is puzzling to many soldiers and families why the military brass has been so sparing with this medal during the last decade of unceasing warfare.

As for the Korengal Valley, Giunta was right. The Korengalis would never leave or give up. Last April, after three more years of killing and dying in that valley, the Americans decided to leave the place to the locals.

The Americans decided to leave the place to the locals...how about that? If this is a god, and I am comforted today that I do not believe in one, may his blessings shower the valorous, and shame the rest of us who wasted their gift. Giunta's syllogism is correct with some clarification  -- if he is a hero, and he is, then everyone who goes into the unknown for his friends, his duty, because it's his job and he's good at it, is a hero.

Any score less than a B should spell defeat! But, it won't...unless...

"Support the troops!" "Care for the VETS!" and yet, here we are. The Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America is a reasonably non-partisan group and has published a legislative score care of its legislative lobbying and then looked who voted for what. Crusader AXE was not surprised at the lousy scores posted by lots of Republicans, but was kind of amazed at the extent of the correlation. In Arizona, for example, both Senators scored D. Really, John McCain. Linsdsey Graham scored a C and his buddy, Mr. Teaparty DeMint scored a solid F. Mitch McConnell and Jim Bunning both scored Ds. Only 3 of the 57 Democrats posted  a score below a C in the Senate was Russ Feingold (who manages to piss everybody off), Carl Levin, and Arlen Specter who was a Democrat for about 60% of this congress.

It would be interesting to compare the ratings of the Senators in the IAVA poll against a more right wing organization. It's hard to be an upstart organization for Vets and be totally nonpartisan but IAVA tries. But, take the Club for Growth -- they rank people by their adherance to their ideology. Since Vets  Download Comparison of Senators , CFG -IAVA does it on a more specific set of issues, we might see more mix than perhaps between other rankings. Well, we don't...Of the people with the top scores from the Club for Growth, all were Republicans, 1-15. Of the bottom scores, 86-100, all were Democrat, except Arlen Spector who was a Republican since Nixon. Four of the Club for Growth's folks top folks were Vets; four of the Club for Growth's bottom folks were Vets. One of the bottom 15 for the Club was rated by the IAVA as INC; however, Senator Al Franken of Minnesota is trending toward a B, and has voted with the Vets on 6 of 9 issues.

The lowest score of the Club for Growth's Top Performers was 70.16; the highest score for the bottom 15 was 3.01. Conversely, the highest score from IAVA for a Club for Growth Top Performer was C; two of the bottom 15 were rated C by the IAVA, two were rated A and the remainder were rated B. A couple of other interesting trends: one Democrat in a tough race went from an A+ rating to an A (Barbara Boxer) while another went from an A to an A+ (Blanche Lincoln).

Another interesting trend is the VOTE FOR/VOTE AGAINST TOTALS from the IAVA. In the House, I looked for names I'd recognize on the lists. Since Nancy Pelosi doesn't  vote as Speaker of the House unless there is a tie, I really don't know a lot of the Democratic House Members. So, this is totally subjective and perhaps odd, but I would guess that the vast majority of the Democratic Members were listed as C or higher. In the House, since they babble more than Democrats in the Senate, I was kind of stunned at the Republicans on the list that IAVA explains as "These legislators must improve their voting records if they are to legitimately claim that they support Iraq and Afghanistan veterans." Such great patriots as Michelle Bachmann, John Boehner, Eric Cantor, Joe Barton, Roy Blunt, Dan Burton, Darrell Issa, Ron Paul Jean Schmidt and Louis Gomhert all claim to totally for Veterans and the Troops, but scored an F. Not a D, but an F. Now, a few Dems are probably sprinkled in here, I suspect but the only one I recognized was John Conyers of Michigan, who is a somewhat unrepentant leftist. Still...aren't these the people talking about impeaching the Senate and supporting oddball candidates who wander around in Nazi uniforms, worrying about GAYS, GODS, GUNS and "unAmerican congressional members," and so on? Oh, and apologizing to BP? Really -- the district that Joe Barton represents in Texas bleeds RED, WHITE and BLUE as well as Gray and AGGIE Maroon. Joe Barton hates the troops...And, Ron Paul? Seriously...Ron Paul? At least he's consistent. Not unlike Conyers and Feingold, he's not going to pander to a voting group but a D? On Vets issues?

Similar and starker in the Senate. There are nine members of the IAVA's A Team, defined by IAVA as "These legislators showed a consistent commitment to support our troops. On behalf of all veterans of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, we say thank you." All 9 are Democrats, and several -- Boxer, Lincoln and Wyden are in tough to relatively tough races. Some of these folks have nothing to gain electorally by pushing a pro-Veterans agenda. Christin Gillabrand and Chuck Schumer are from New York; the big concentration of veterans in New York are upstate and as a dumbass Irish guy from Syracuse, I know the liklihood of people in upstate going overwhelmingly for the Democrats. Gillabrand is not having a hard time against her opponent, but this is not what's going to put her over the top. 

Now, the Senate's D team is really interesting: Thirty-three members, and 32 of them are Republicans. Russ Feingold is a contrarian asshole, and if he loses, he loses. The Democrats need more party unity, and voting against the Reform Bill because it wouldn't require the appointment of Elliot Spitzer as Witchhunter Profundis with an auxillary of Brandeis Law Students as his sans coulettes for Wall Street showed that he's too pure for the world. And, it's consistent -- he's opposed to all entitlements, even those earned by blood. Fuck him. On the other hand, the Republicans... All those great patriots like Saxby Chambliss who won his seat from a Max Cleland by lying, innuendo and basically pissing on those of us who wore the uniform of this country; Lamar Alexander who took Al Gore's old seat in 2000 and used to look like a moderate Republican. Now, of course, that's a very endangered species. The two Senators from Arizona and the two from Texas are waltzing across the bridge of sighs; Kyl is just a rightwing jerk but McCain, Cornyn and Hutchinson claim strong patriotic, pro-troop, pro-veteran credentials. Well, you can claim whatever you want to; it's up to voters to pay attention. They probably won't but...maybe they will. I can understand Jeff Sessions place here, since a lot of Veterans are people of color, and he's pretty consistently shown he's not in love with people of color, except Clarence Thomas. He's also joined by his leader, Mitch McConnell and Sessions' (the temptation to type Secessions was extreme, but I managed to avoid the pun!) partner from ALADAMNBAMA, Richard Shelby. Of course, that favorite son of the south, John Thune of South Dakota is there...I know that the plains states have a relatively high proportion of veterans so this makes little sense, except he's counting on those farm boys as either being unable to read and count -- fingers and toes having been lost at Inchon or shot off in other conflicts over the years -- or he just plans to lie. Of course, the saints -- Coburn and Imhofe of Oklahoma (which also has a lot of Vets, what the hell is wrong with us? and our organizations? Are we stupid? One must wonder...)are joined by the sinners Ensign and Vitter.

I can dislike Feingold's position and still say that if he's defeated it will on balance be a bad thing; I can admire Ron Paul's attitude toward the Federal Government even though I don't agree with it and respect his consistancy. But, the overwhelming majority of these assholes are the guys who were upset when President Obama didn't wear a Flag lapel pin, and love nothing more than going to a Tea Party Rally and being cheered by folks who think that these guys are for them. They're not. They never have been. They never will be. And, it's up to us to help our deranged brothers and sisters to see the light.

Hey, if you think it makes sense to cut consumer protections and aid to Veterans, the aged and children, more power to you. Goddamn it, campaign on that. However, saying you're for liberty while wanting to cut Social Security benefits or VA medical care is simply impossible. Like an atheist going to Mass, Temple and the Mosque you're nothing more than a goddamned hypocrite. And, maybe someday we'll wake up...

Selfless valour...

The events -- selfless valor, heroism, and comradeship in the face of death --and the life of that platoon in Afghanistan is discussed in detail in Sebastian Junger's War, as well as being discussed in the documentary that Junger did with Tim Heterington, RESTOPO. Frankly, the Huffington Post article doesn't come close to describing what happened. Frankly, neither does Junger -- however, Staff Sergeant Sal Giunta, the first Medal of Honor winner since Vietnam to receive the award alive described the ambush to Junger this way in WAR--

"I did what I did because that's what I was trained to do," Giunta told me. "There was a task that had to be done, and the part that I was going to do was to link alpha and bravo teams. I didn't run through fire to save a buddy -- I ran through fire to see what was going on with him and maybe we could hide behind the same rock and shoot together. I didn't run thourgh fire to do anything heroic or brave. I did what I believe anyone would have done."

SSG Giunta probably actually thinks that. He'll think that for the remainder of his career, the remainder of his life. But, in this case, what he did transcends what some "anyone" would have done. He did it.  Those who seek glory in battle usually get other people killed; those who seek to save their brothers and sisters often do. He's a helluva soldier, and will deserve the salute he's entitled to from every member of the Armed Forces for the remainder of his life.

 

These people? People? Whackjob facist religious nuts...

Just to be clear, despite this asshole''s assurance that he and his lickspittle congregation are prepared to die for their right to burn Korans, they are not the one's who are going to be killed, wounded, psychologically traumatized and bereaved. I hate to disrupt their martyrdom fantasy, but burning a bunch of Korans in Gainsesville ain't going to mobilize the Old Man in the Mountain and his Assassins to descend on Gatorcountry on a mission of revenge. If they want to be martyrs, I recommend they scrap their plan to do this outside their church but to gather all their friends, family and relations and go to...oh, Isreal. Note the irony. Mossad will have their cracker asses in jail in no time; or, go do it at the international airport in Yemen. Just fly in, sit around until everybody is there, grab some trash cans and go do your thing. Burn those Korans...and enjoy hell.

Phil Ochs wrote a song called I ain't marchin anymore that is a classic antiwar song. The chorus is"It's always the old who lead us to war/Always the young to fall/Now look at what we've done with a saber and a gun/Tell me was it worth it all?" I think it needs to be modified to say some something about inbred, ingrate, liars, thieves and nutjobs getting us into situations that kill soldiers.

Seriously, any soldier who is injured or killed, and any bereaved family, and any US civilian who is a victim of reprisal from the whackjobs who will be enraged by the act of these inbred, ingrate, liars, thieves and racist bastards should sue them. Burning the Koran is not an act of worship -- legally, I think it falls under the heading of a Tort. Worth thinking about. And, if anyone is thinking about it in Islam, I think that suing these bastards is probably legally defensible. What reputable figures would testify on their behalf?

Your flag decal won't get you into heaven anymore...

I've been listening to the MSNBC coverage of the last Stryker Brigade to leave Iraq. Interestingly, Stryker Fighting Vehicles are named after two enlisted Medal of Honor Winners, one in WWII and one in Vietnam, and Stryker Avenue on Fort Lewis is one of the main drags through the area where the Brigade -- 4th Brigade, 2nd Infantry Division -- calls home this days. Keith Obermann and others on MSNBC kept talking about how big these things are. They're not all that big--22 feet long, about 8 feet wide, and weighing in at about 16 tons. If you want size, find an Abrams Tank. Or a tank recovery vehicle...

Other friends of mine have speculated that there may be a lot of fun brewing in Iraq. The Brigade goes, and there's only 50,000 or so US types. Well, as Col Jack Jacobs, a Vietnam era Medal of Honor Winner pointed out while I was listening, when he was an adviser with the Vietnamese Army after US Combat Operations were officially over, he was in combat every day. In fact, his biography, "If Not Now, When?"Duty and Sacrifice in America's Time of Need he tells of calling for artillery support one night when they could see a huge North Vietnamese Army convoy coming south, and the only thing available was...the Battleship Missouri. I don't really know of anyone else in Vietnam or anyplace else since possibly Korea who was able to call for and adjust naval gunfire on  target of opportunity. Normally, when you say "Fire For Effect" as Jack points out, the supporting fires are multiple volleys of multiple guns. In this case, the ship's FDC fired one turret and four rounds. Nothing left. The book is a good read, by the way. Jack was a little guy, a ROTC guy and deserves a lot. He fought to get out of a dream assignment -- Command of a Student Officer Candidate School Company at Fort Benning -- to go back to combat. We are reluctant to have our heroes expose themselves multiple times.

So, all those Army guys who are left come with guns. All the advisers come with guns. All those trainers come with guns. All those logisticians come with guns. The Chaplains and the Doctors probably don't come with guns, but they have lots of guys and gals around with guns. The State Department has hired an additional 7000 "Security Contractors" to help out. While definitely not XE(Blackwater), this is also a bunch of guys with guns. I suspect things in Iraq will be quiet until about January 2, 2012 -- by quiet, I mean about the same level of fratricidal madness that's going on now. If the government there can't get it's act together by then, the place will light up like Mogadishu on a Saturday night after the dope harvest has come in...

Permanent Depression, Oil Patch and Dustbowl Blues

I’ve been reading Sebastian Junger’s book War and am finding it painfully accurate; soldiers suffer, the grunts suffer the most, and the experience transcends human life. It makes no sense to many who watch it from the sidelines – firefighters, cops, coal miners and fishermen probably understand it better than most, but ultimately, as he said on a recent interview, it’s about brotherhood.

And then, of course, you come home and life just sucks, and entropy being what it is, generationally it gets weirder –when the World War II generation came home, there were jobs and the GI Bill paid for just about everything. Korean Vets faced a similar situation; Vietnam vets found the GI Bill pretty inadequate, barely covering tuition in a lot of cases; there were pockets of problems on the job front, but there were generally jobs until the chickens all came home to roost starting in 1973 with the awakening of OPEC. The newest iteration looks to be a pretty decent package, although not as good as deserved; but, the job situation is horrible.

A kid comes home to the world and discovers that not only is he alone in terms of his experience, he’s out of work. Lots of veterans are always out of work. The longer you hang out in the service, the less you are likely to dig the ditches that corporate America wants you to dig. When you’ve bet your life on the guy next to you in insane situations, it’s hard when the guy next to you is a sniveling crack head who doesn’t show up that often. Meaningful work is replaced by a stint in telemarketing, or working in a Wal-Mart or some equally silly activity. You go to school, you get an education and find yourself not on the day shift, but working for Labor Ready. Or doing consulting, or writing for a blog. Life gets weirder. The last weeks have shown us how much the Senate and the Republicans don’t get it; I’m not sure to what extent the Democrats get it, when Diane Feinstein starts wondering how long to extend the unemployment benefits.

The idea of not adding entitlements without paying for them seems like a great one, but we’ve killed a lot of our young people and wasted a lot of treasure on two wars without anyone every accepting that we have to pay for them. While I fully support adding prescription drugs to Medicare, they didn't bother to pay for that either, subsidizing largely retired and ergo nonproductive workers at the future expense of somebody...

So Schmedlap comes back, can’t sit in a classroom without feeling claustrophobic and finds himself with no job and no prospects and, since he just got back, 26 weeks of unemployment, if he’s lucky. Some states like to fight unemployment for people leaving the service; after all, it's their fault they're out of work, eh? Bastards...
Now, it’s equally rotten for everybody. But, the unemployment situation for veterans is a great illustration. People are still amazed that a college degree is not automatic employment; well, Veterans’ Status isn’t either; far from it. We’re already seeing pushback from employers wondering about PTSD and TBI and general craziness; when I was last working a W2 gig, I watched my employer start to back away from hiring veterans, and my employer was a Defense Contractor! So, if you do everything you’re supposed to do and there’s nothing for you, what exactly can you do? Well, it is an election year; Veterans need to be angry and vote accordingly against anyone who thinks it’s time to cut back on stimulus and unemployment spending. Anyone who opposes jobs bills or demands that we pay for them up front needs to find a new occupation. Trickle down economics don’t work, and it’s time to spike that puppy through the heart.

The theory that we need to pay upfront for jobs bills is flawed for a lot of reasons. Like it or not, the US is not Iceland or Malta or Greece or the Scandinavian countries. Sorry, Austrian School, but we have assets that Schumpeter and Hayek never considered. I enjoy their work as much as the next fugitive from Economic thought – run away, run away – but the fact is that reality is Keynesian. The way to turn the economy around is to produce excess wealth for all, and the way to do that is to increase production, which can only happen if you maintain and grow demand. The only way you can grow demand beyond subsistence level is to get people spending actual  money, and the only way to get them to spend actual money is to get actual money in their hands. Credit and debt is fine up to a point, but we passed that when someone decided houses make great piggy banks. Unemployment insurance is a way of keeping subsistence demand up, but if you really want to bitchslap it and wake it up, you need to put people to work doing meaningful things.

Paul Krugman has a Nobel Prize in economic theory; Jim Bunning is a goddamn troglodyte; for some reason, Bunning has more impact on the economic direction of the country than Krugman. Frankly, and this is one of my personal bête noirs and hobby horses, I blame the disparity of influence on the basic ignorance of the American people. We don’t understand math, and graphs are confusing. The talking Barbie that said “Math is hard!” may been a sexist statement, but it also spoke for generations. Problem is, Math may be hard and  rigorous, but it is kinda, sorta, oh, FUCKING INCREDIBLY IMPORTANT when you’re talking about money and the economy.

When Vice President Biden says we’re not going to bring jobs back that were lost in the Great Recession, he’s being math-ignorant. We need to create new jobs, lots of the damn things, far more than the 8 million he says we lost. Unfortunately, the world is not static – people keep breeding, and they keeping growing up, and they keep graduating from high school, college and reform schools, boot camps and VA hospitals, and they all need jobs. Real jobs – Americans with MBAs and PHDs and Certificates in System Management and Administration from CISCO and IBM are not going to be satisfied taking jobs away from undocumented immigrants standing outside of Home Depot and Wal-Mart.

I was talking to a senior person with a major defense contractor the other day, and I commented that I was surprised that the DOD hand not been tasked with some greater part of the defense and recuperation of the Gulf. He said not to be surprised when it happened, that for a number of the big contractors, “War, famine, pestilence and disaster are our business.” While I’m not surprised that the Bobby Jindals and Hailey Barbours of the world are sitting on their hands not calling out the authorized Guardsmen and indicating that if the 33 wells that the deep-water drilling moratorium would shut temporarily, everything would be wonderful, I think it’s time to put a helluva lot of people to work tending the silly damn absorbent barriers and distributing respirators and hazmat suits and on and on and on. Instead, BP does a quarter-assed job on shore to go along with the brain dead approach on the water, and the Feds are excited about it. Idiots.

The reason AXE's approach would work is fairly simple. Let’s say we contract to UMR and KBR to run the cleanup properly and pay prevailing wage oil patch wages plus hazardous duty pay to the workers, and do it on a cost plus award fee basis. If you think of the number of people realistically needed, on shore and close in and what they’d need to do the job, you can see a huge economic boost not just to the local area but to the manufacturers of appropriate hazmat materials – respirators, suits, booties, steel-toed shoes, small boats, outboard motors, bottled water, etc. etc. etc. Bubba Dean and Sally Sue will make a living wage and spend it; this will result in additional spending. Which will result in additional production, transportation, distribution resulting in maintaining jobs and starting new ones to meet demand.

The Republican approach is to cut taxes. Seriously, if you cut Dick Cheney’s taxes $100 grand, do you think he’s going to spend it? No. If you take that same $100K and pay it to autoworkers and cleanup crews, they’ll spend it. The people they give it to for goods and services will spend most of it. The people they give it to will spend most of it. The people they give it to will spend most of it. This is the basic of John Maynard Keynes and his thought and why trickle down economics is a failure. The Cheney’s of the world horde their surplus; the working class spends far more percentage wise; the middle class spends almost as much. One reason that the top 5% controls 90% of the wealth is that they can – how many thoroughbred race horses do Lynn, Liz and Mary Cheney need to inherit?

I was interested the night the Senate failed to get a cloture vote on the extension of unemployment to hear Senator Sherrod Brown say that the same day that we failed to get that done, the first $1 Billion Dollar estate was able to be executed without paying any inheritance tax. That’s trickle down at its most obvious, oblivious and odious. It's up to us to do something about it, now and in November.

(Alternatively published on Veterans Today with less swearing, no music and under an assumed name...)