Badtux the Snarky Penguin

In a time of chimpanzees, I was a penguin.

Religious fundamentalists are motivated by the sneaking suspicion that someone, somewhere, is having fun -- and that this must be stopped.

Thursday, May 19, 2005

Oops! We broke the Army!

U.S. Army generals have now backed away from rosy predictions that the Army's problems are no big deal because they will start drawing down in Iraq soon, and instead soberly predict that the U.S. will be in Iraq for years with force levels similar to today. Meanwhile, recruiting is down, lots of soldiers are going AWOL or deserting rather than go to Iraq, and Army recruiters are using unethical practices that at the very least are deceptive and only barely removed from the British press gangs that recruited soldiers to fight against George Washington during the American Revolution (and we all know how effective THAT army turned out to be!).

The situation is indeed dire, but the only real solutions -- the draft -- is vehemently dismissed. That leaves only one solution: Destroy the economy so that young people have a choice of either starving to death or joining the Army. The current housing bubble , basically created by the Federal Reserve printing money and giving it to the mortgage companies (it's more complicated than that, they're actually giving the money to the Chinese, who are then giving it to the mortgage companies by buying "mortgage-backed securities"), appears that it may be just the ticket...

I *do* hope you've moved your savings into a stable currency? The Euro is looking REALLY interesting right now. Hmm.

If it ain't drafty in here, bet on the economy collapsing. That's the only other way the neocons can get the foot soldiers for their campaign of perpetual war for perpetual peace. The only problem with a mercenary army of that sort is that, after a while, they tend to tire of their rulers and overthrow their rulers... remember, Alaric the Visigoth, who sacked Rome in 410AD, had originally been a commander of Roman soldiers. If this is the direction our neo-con rulers are intending to go, fear for what little is left of democracy in America.

-- Badtux the "Anybody feel a draft in here?" Penguin

Posted by: BadTux / 5/19/2005 11:44:00 AM

Comments:

There will be a draft, but the Republicans are pushing it off as hard as they can until after the mid-term elections. They know they are on shaky ground right now but believe they can pull off 2006 by yelling "Homos! Homos!" But if there's a draft, bein' a homo who is undraftable will look mighty good to a lot of perfectly happy young men and women, and a draft would sink the Republicans in 2006. So the Republicans are trying to hold it off, but it ain't a gonna wait. There will be a draft. And all the young people who failed to vote will have nobody but themselves to blame, which is kind of why I am not as sympathetic as I probably should be. They aren't going to draft some middle-aged anti-war type like me. It will be nice, apathetic young people who get their asses shot off in the sand. Mind you, I feel for the troops that are over there now. I hate the whole situation and would love to see the whole fiasco ended right now and the troops pulled out, because we aren't going to prevent a civil war no matter what.
# posted by DBK : 20/5/05 12:15 PM

I don't believe there's going to be a civil war in Iraq, other than perhaps on the same lines as happened in Saddam's time (i.e., the Kurds get their Kurdistan up in the north, and the Shia and Sunni come to an arrangement in the south). If we pulled out today there'd be a lot of bloodshed for a couple of months -- Saddam killed maybe 100K people last time we did that -- but sooner or later, a "Saddam Lite" would step up and restore order and everybody in Iraq, at least, would breathe a sigh of relief.

Of ocurse that would be the end of the neo-cons dream of democracy in Iraq, so they're going to fight it tooth and nail, but in my opinion the neocons have already proven it's impossible to impose democracy at gunpoint -- it's time to just get out and let the Iraqis handle what's of interest to the Iraqis, only intervening if our own national interests are at issue. A people has to be ready for democracy before democracy is possible. As the United States proves, not all nations have a population that is ready or willing to do what it takes to create and/or maintain a working democracy, and all that happens if you try to impose it at gunpoint is a lot of dead people.

-- Badtux the Libertarian Penguin
# posted by BadTux : 20/5/05 5:20 PM

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Liberated Iraqis

Children celebrate liberation of parents
More pics of children celebrating
Liberated baby
Liberated women and children
More liberation, yessiree
More to follow, after I finish cursing SOB chickenhawks and get my breath back...

"Keep fighting for freedom and justice, beloveds, but don't forget to have fun doin' it. Lord, let your laughter ring forth. Be outrageous, ridicule the fraidy-cats, rejoice in all the oddities that freedom can produce." -- Molly Ivins, 1944-2007

"The penalty good men pay for indifference to public affairs is to be ruled by evil men."

-- Plato

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