Friday, February 29, 2008

The Disasterous End-Game in Iraq

We are looking at a disastrous end-game in Iraq that can have repercussions beyond comprehension. We are seeing the results of a domino effect that began with wrong moves from the very beginning.Everything about staring and ending the war in Iraq was ill-informed.
Re-examine this 20 point exercsise in self-destruct.
1. A preemptive military attack can only be justified if a nation faces eminent invasion itself
2. The claim that Iraq had WMD was false
3. The claim that Iraq aided and abetted Al Queda was false
4. The claim that we were ridding the world of a ruthless dictator was based on a false premise. The bitter ethnic divisions within the country reveal that it could only be held together by a strongman.
5. The claim that Iraq oil would pay for the war was false
6. By bombing major cities in Iraq we destroyed the county's infrastructure and are now paying through the nose to rebuild it.
7. Collateral damage killed thousands of innocent people.
8. By deposing Hussein's dictatorship we destabilize the existing order which led to anarchy and a dangerous insurgency.
9. By disbanding the Iraq army the country was left without the ability to police itself and stop rutheless ethnic cleansing
10. Four million Iraqis have been displaced from their homes and now form the world's largest refugee problem.
Thats the better half of ther news. Now lets get to the after-effects.
11. American world leadership has lost all its former credibility.
12. We can longer take our goodwill to the bank as an asset.
13. The four hundred billion dollar price tag has drained the American economy. Our infrastructure is crumbling and the country is on the verge of recession
14. The Bush administration still has a year to go
15 The rich and powerful inside America are securing their wealth by abandoning the dollar and putting their money in oil - in effect, aiding and abetting the supposed enemy.
16. The bull run on oil has driven the barrel cost up and it will keep rising, driving up the Price at the gas pump - making the oil shareholders richer while sticking it to the man on the street.
17. The on-going cost of the war - three hundred million dollars a day for another three hundred days, added to the desertion of the dollar, heralds the very real possibility of collapsing the entire American economy - leading to a recession that could make the one we experienced in the 1930's look like a picnic.
18. Money for an already over-extended infrastructure will not be forth-coming.
19 The winter of 2009 might be the bleakest in US history.
The answer that could lessen the bitter after-taste.
20. Kick Bush out of office today. Impeach him and his entire cabinet.

Saturday, February 23, 2008

The Dogmatic Political Minds-Set

I was watching a Bill Mahler political satyre last night.He had two Repubilcans as his guests.At one point the relevancy of the Kennedy Administration was raised.Both Republicans said he was irrelevant.If Kennedy had been a Republican, it is certain their opinions would have been reversed.
So who or what is controlling Democracy?Are we all still in lock-step with Party dogma? Or is independent opinion ever to surface?
Thank god the latter is gradually being realizedOne can see why Obama is doing so well