RedStateEclectic

Iran: An Anti-War Reminder

Following the anti-war reminder This Imperialism Thing, I want it also on the record that

The United States, European allies and even Israel generally agree on three things about Iran’s nuclear program: Tehran does not have a bomb, has not decided to build one, and is probably years away from having a deliverable nuclear warhead.

Those conclusions, drawn from extensive interviews with current and former U.S. and European officials with access to intelligence on Iran, contrast starkly with the heated debate surrounding a possible Israeli strike on Tehran’s nuclear facilities.

Indeed, this has obviously been true for years. The official position of practically every authority on this subject has been: Iran has no nukes and is not trying to get them. This “impending” threat from Iran is completely bogus. Yet we see the anti-Iranian rhetoric stepping up, month by month, all toward an increasingly likely culmination in the form of war. Insanity.

The source.

The Old Man and the Sea

The first novel I read in English, The Old Man and the Sea tells of the epic struggle between Santiago, an old Cuban fisherman and a giant marlin he is determined to catch.

 

This Imperialism Thing

I am an anti-imperialist. I am opposed to having the eagle put its talons on any other land.
- quoted in A Pen Warmed Up in Hell

It is a healthy thing to remind oneself every once in a while of the full picture of evil madness that destroys the American nation:

It is interesting to note just how well this imperialism thing has worked for the American people. At the end of last year the U.S. was kicked out of Iraq after spending some trillions of dollars and producing the deaths of hundreds of thousands of Iraqis and Americans. Al-Qaeda, which was not present in Iraq when the U.S. arrived, has lately been responsible for bomb attacks that have killed hundreds of Iraqis, mostly civilians. As a result of the ham-handed American intervention, Iraq’s closest friend now is not the U.S. It is Iran.

Appalled by the excesses of the U.S. military, Afghan President Hamid Karzai has followed suit, initially demanding that the U.S. restrict its soldiers to their bases, a move that would mean that the American presence in Afghanistan could well end in short order after the loss of another trillion dollars and the deaths of some tens of thousands of coalition soldiers and Afghan civilians. Even if Karzai accepts a continued U.S. presence that is more managed by his own “sovereign” government, the writing is on the wall, and all that is needed is a firm departure date. Oh, and the Taliban will definitely be coming back in one form or another.

Meanwhile, in neighboring Pakistan, the parliament is debating ending all cooperation with the United States because of the continuing drone campaign, which, true to pattern, kills mostly civilians. Pakistan is nuclear-armed and actually has real terrorists roaming its tribal regions. The departure of Pakistan from the game enables the manifest waste of the past 11 years to become completely clear, with Washington leaving Central Asia in far worse shape than it was when the U.S. Army and the CIA arrived.

[...]

If generally reliable client states such as Iraq and Afghanistan can summon up the courage to pull the plug on Obama, anyone can.

[...]

When everyone finally figures out that they don’t really need what former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright dubbed the “necessary nation” that “sees far,” they will be able to take steps to put their own houses in order. A Middle East without meddling from Washington would mean that the Israelis and their neighbors might actually have to talk to each other and establish a modus vivendi. Afghans and Pakistanis would have to work things out. Iran might even decide that no one is threatening it anymore and lose some of its paranoia. Likewise for the North Koreans. Americans could go back to doing what they used to be really good at: making things, being inventive and inclusive, and living decently without having to invade anyone or tell a government or two how to behave. It would be good-bye to all the things we don’t need and good night, America, finally in a good sense.

The source.

Not Politics, But a Record?

I hadn’t looked at the weather predictions for a few days—had heard sort of vague notions that it’s supposed to be “nice” this weekend.  So, imagine my surprise when I looked at this, this morning:

This is the 5 day forecast for my part of the world.  Now we’ve had upper 70s and low 80s occasionally over the last few weeks, which has had some of us scratching our heads, considering that it’s only March.  But the Saturday and Sunday forecast?  Is this an April Fools’ joke by the Weather Channel?  91?  On April 1?  In Nebraska? 

Maybe it’s payback for the 4 months of cold and snow we had 2 years ago.  Or maybe the other shoe is going to drop. 

Our lilacs—which usually start blooming the end of April—our starting to burst out in color.  Daffodils have already pretty well finished their blooming. 

I’m not complaining—I like spring (although 90 degrees is much more like summer, which I’m not so keen about).  But I remember, back in 1987, when my husband was graduating from medical school, and we were looking for a new apartment the last few days of March and the first of April:  SNOW.  LOT’S of snow.  So much, in fact, that as we were driving around Omaha looking for places inhabit, that we ended up getting stranded at a friend’s place out in one of the suburbs of Omaha, because we couldn’t make it back to our midtown apartment near the medical center…

What’s it like in other parts of the world?  Has South Carolina reached 100 with 100% humidity, yet?  Are the tulips blooming in Michigan? 

LLE

There Are Days…

….and then there are DAYS!

I’ve been on “spring break” from teaching for the last two weeks.  We start back with the spring quarter tomorrow.

For the last 2 weeks, I’ve been trying to get odds and ends of things done—a little bit of cleaning, a few political fires lit, a little bit of reading, some genealogy exploration, a little bit of yard work.  But I’ve never really felt like I’ve had an exceptionally productive day during that time.

I’ve put off getting class prep (and syllabi) completed for the two classes I’m teaching beginning tomorrow (American Government and International Relations), until just about the last possible minute.  The truth was, I was dreading getting out of bed this morning, because I feared that I’d be up late tonight making copies of first day handouts, and re-working my first day of class discussion topics.

I actually amaze myself sometimes (did that sound too egotistical?).  I got moving this morning after I dropped the kids off at school.  Finished one segment of a genealogy project (needed to get to a good stopping point), while I was eating oatmeal at my desk.  Finished by 9 a.m.!

Then I started in on the syllabus effort.  American Government was pretty easy, since there aren’t any major changes in the course from the one I just completed—just needed to change the dates, and reconfigure my online Moodle shell (the link just explains a little bit about what Moodle is).  Started the printing of that by 9:45, and had it done by 10:30.

Oh, and during that time, I’d gotten two loads of laundry and a load of dishes in the dishwasher done…

On to International Relations!  I’d taught that last fall, but there were a few “tweaks” to the course that needed to be made.  Check.  Modify the old syllabus.  Check.  11 a.m.—start the printing!  Oh, but I hadn’t used Moodle the last time around, so I needed to create a shell for that class…

By 11:45, the syllabus printing is complete.  I took a break for lunch (right after I started another load of laundry).  By 12:45, I was creating the International Relations Moodle page, by 1:30, I was done. Another load of laundry (4 people in the house, and dirty clothes all of a sudden appeared from seemingly nowhere!).

Now what?  Let’s get to that first day of class.  American Government I teach so often, I’ve got the spiel pretty well down for the first day, so let’s work on International Relations.  By 2:30, I had the PowerPoint ready for tomorrow morning, and even had time to do a little bit of cleaning before I went to get the kids!

Of course I have a couple of political things that I really NEED to do—but I’ve got a little bit of time yet tonight, now—and I may actually get to bed at a decent hour!

I am going to try and start posting somewhat more frequently—on political issues, not just my crazy life. 

America's Convenient Military Scapegoats

No one really knows what possessed Army Staff Sgt. Robert Bales to go out into that cold Afghanistan night and--as he is accused of allegedly to have done--kill 17 innocent Afghan civilians, more than half of them children. However, we do know that the military acted swiftly and within days had detained, transported, and charged the staff sergeant with 17 counts of murder. Bales is currently being held in a maximum security detention facility in Fort Leavenworth, awaiting trial and a possible death sentence for the murders.

There are many unanswered questions about what happened that night. For example, did Bales acted alone? Justin Raimondo asks, "How did he manage to do so much damage alone?" Not only did Bales allegedly killed 17 people, he also had the time to toss their corpses in a burning pile. And there are reports from witnesses which contradict the "lone gunman" claim of the military. So what is going on here?

I will say this, it is a good thing that the military acted as swift as they did in the arrest of Bales. He will stand court-martial and will most likely be found guilty, and that will be the end of him. However, no punishment--yes, not even Bales' death--will make right what happened that night. And how could it? His death would just be another number in the increasing death toll in the tragedy that is the Afghanistan War.

"When you train men to hate the enemy, you train men to kill the enemy, is it really that surprising that the men we train to hate and kill will act out that hatred?"

When news of the Afghan massacre broke, President Barack Obama was quoted as saying that the incident was "tragic and shocking." Shocking? The only thing that is shocking is that Americans continue to elect leaders who suffer periodic and incurable amnesia. We have witnessed in the past 10 years, both in Iraq and Afghanistan, a number of atrocities and war crimes perpetuated by soldiers: from the tortures in Bagram and Abu-Ghraib, to the massacres in Haditha and the notorious Afghan "kill team." These atrocities--the ones we know about--might be rare, but they are inevitable. When you train men to hate the enemy, when you men to kill the enemy, is it really that surprising that the men we train to hate and kill will act out that hatred? Paraphrasing Dahlia Wasfi, the murders of those Afghan civilians by our soldiers are not exceptional, they are the nature of modern warfare. We are deluding ourselves to think otherwise.

Which brings me to a point, which I raised in the video above, if we were to replace Bales with a missile from a Predator drone, will we be talking about it? The number of people Bales allegedly to have killed pales in comparison to the thousands that have died since the wars started. Bales, just like Lynddie England, Calvin Gibbs, and Frank Wuterich before him, is just another convenient military scapegoat the establishment is trotting out to distract Americans from the true criminals who should be held responsible. Instead of Bales, it is the Bushes, the Cheneys, and the Obamas who deserved to be whisked away to Fort Leavenworth to face justice for the supreme crimes against humanity they have committed. The real criminals here are our civilian leaders who started and continue to perpetuate these wars.

The Worst Get to the Top

This post is by way of addendum to Eric Parks' recent article The last exit ramp on the road to unlimited government. I find Eric's post noteworthy not least because it reminds me of how undiscerning and crude people have become in the face of the most blatant violations of justice and the rule of law. The position taken by the Institute for Justice (see Eric's post) is a pleasant exception, deserving wide dissemination.

On a different level, this post on Hayek's thesis that in a politicised society the worst get to the top forms part of the background to Eric's observations.

I like the author's definition of a statist, i.e. a person passionately asking for leadership by the worst:

“Someone who learns nothing from human nature, economics, or experience, and repeats the same mistakes over and over again without a care for the rights and lives of people he crushes with his good intentions.”

Even the worst features of the statist reality, Hayek showed, “are not accidental byproducts” but phenomena that are part and parcel of statism itself. He argued with great insightfulness that “the unscrupulous and uninhibited are likely to be more successful” in any society in which government is seen as the answer to most problems. They are precisely the kind of people who elevate power over persuasion, force over cooperation. Government, possessing by definition a legal and political monopoly of the use of force, attracts them just as surely as dung draws flies. Ultimately, it is the apparatus of government that allows them to wreak their havoc on the rest of us.

The last exit ramp on the road to unlimited government.

George Will writes about the Institute for Justice’s amicus brief to the SCOTUS concerning Obamacare:

Now the Institute for Justice (IJ), a libertarian public interest law firm, has focused on this fact: The individual mandate is incompatible with centuries of contract law. This is so because a compulsory contract is an oxymoron.

Full Article.

Many oxymorons can be found within government (like army intelligence) so why should this hiccup stop them? Even if SCOTUS buys into the argument, it only means that some detail or another need be ironed out before the mantle of legality is bestowed upon American socialized medicine.

It’s fair to say that both sides want it in some form, depending on where partisan special interests align. Medicare is heading toward unaffordability and both big-government parties wish to ration medical care for the power it can bring. We can place bets, but it seems a lock that SCOTUS will endeavor to keep the door open – even if they nit-pick some legal minutia along the way.

I Refuse to Join!

I hit the half century mark of birthdays in a few months.  I’m not really one to get all that worked up about birthdays (or even anniversaries).   It’s just another day, as far as I’m concerned.

But sometime after my 49th birthday last summer, I started getting occasional letters and e-mails from the AARP (American Association of Retired Persons).  The fact that they are tracking the ages of (presumably) every living person in this country is a little disconcerting to me.  But beyond that, I resent the membership solicitations at this stage of my life.

FIFTY!  As my brother pointed out to me two years ago, when I claimed a “middle aged moment”, the actuarial tables suggest that I’m past the midpoint—probably well past it.  But 50 is really kind of the old 35, isn’t it?  At least in our house, where a 13 year old and an 8 year old reside, I like to think of it that way.

I remember when my grandparents were 50—I thought they were OLD (they lived another 30+ years, and my grandfather didn’t retire until weeks before his death).  Of course my grandparents, at the age of 50, had 5 grandkids already, so maybe that contributed to my notion that they were old, since I was the 10 year old grandchild.

Worrying about how “old” I’m getting, or how much time has passed me by, or how little time (relatively speaking) I have left, just isn’t my way of doing things.  I guess maybe it’s the realist in me.  I’ve seen people live to be 95 in both exceptional and awful health; and I’ve seen people die much younger than I am now—of both accident and disease.  None of us really knows how long we’ve got, so while I look forward to the future with a hope that I’ll see it (and with a sense of anticipation for an afterlife), I guess at some level I try to live  by the notion of carpe diem.  But I digress….

My real point here is about AARP, and their insidious efforts to lump people like me into an interest group made up of self-interested grandparents who are eager not only to save money (AARP does have some good discount deals) but also to grab as much “goodies” away from the government (i.e. their children and grandchildren) as possible—all in the name of respecting the “contributions of our elders.” 

I get that this is the way these things work.  Thousands of “interest groups” are out there, trying to get what they can from the government trough.  I even belong to some of those groups, I guess—but the groups I belong to tend to just want government to leave us alone and quit taking away our rights, not demanding more of them, or expecting to get government goodies.

So, when (if ever), I get to the point where I really feel like I want to “retire”, AARP can be sure it won’t have a friend in me…

LLE

Bubama Advancing

Image credit.

 

It is ironic but perhaps sadly appropriate that Attorney General Eric Holder would choose a law school, Northwestern University, to deliver a speech earlier this month in which he demolished what was left of the rule of law in America.

In what history likely will record as a turning point, Attorney General Holder bluntly explained that this administration believes it has the authority to use lethal force against Americans if the President determines them to be a threat to the nation. He tells us that this is not a violation of the due process requirements of our Constitution because the President himself embodies “due process” as he unilaterally determines who is to be targeted. As Holder said, “a careful and thorough executive branch review of the facts in a case amounts to ‘due process.’” That means that the administration believes it is the President himself who is to be the judge, jury, and executioner.

As George Washington University Law Professor Jonathan Turley wrote of the Holder speech:

“All the Administration has said is that they closely and faithfully follow their own guidelines — even if their decisions are not subject to judicial review. The fact that they say those guidelines are based on notions of due process is meaningless. They are not a constitutional process of review.”

It is particularly bizarre to hear the logic of the administration claiming the right to target its citizens according to some secret selection process, when we justified our attacks against Iraq and Libya because their leaders supposedly were targeting their own citizens! We also now plan a covert war against Syria for the same reason.

I should make it perfectly clear that I believe any individual who is engaging in violence against this country or its citizens should be brought to justice. But as Attorney General Holder himself points out in the same speech, our civilian courts have a very good track record of trying and convicting individuals involved with terrorism against the United States. Our civilian court system, with the guarantee of real due process, judicial review, and a fair trial, is our strength, not a weakness. It is not an impediment to be sidestepped in the push for convictions or assassinations, but rather a process that guarantees that fundamental right to be considered innocent until proven guilty in a court of law.

I am encouraged, however that there appears to be the beginning of a backlash against the administration’s authoritarian claims. Just recently I did an interview with conservative radio talk show host Laura Ingraham who expressed grave concern over using these sorts of tactics against Americans using the supposed war on terror as justification. Sadly, many conservative leaders were silent when Republican President George W. Bush laid the groundwork for this administration’s lawlessness with the PATRIOT Act, warrantless wiretapping, indefinite detention without trial, and other violations. Similarly, as Professor Turley points out, “Democrats previously demanded the ‘torture memos’ of the Bush administration that revealed poor legal analysis by Judge Jay Bybee and Professor John Yoo to justify torture. Now, however, Democrats are largely silent in the face of a president claiming the right to unilaterally kill citizens.” The misuse of and disregard for our Constitution for partisan political gain is likely one reason the American public holds Congress in such low esteem. Now the stakes are much higher. Congress and the people should finally wake up!