Beating the Drums

*Thump* *Thump* *THUMP*

Hear that?  Those are the drums of war, beating again.  Once again, Obama's Nobel Prize is looking like an ever-more-foolish selection by the Nobel committee.

Once again, we're hearing the same familiar refrains about how, this time, things will be different.  Somehow, many more people will not be killed (except, you know, THOSE bad guys).  Somehow, this will not be expensive (even though cruise missiles cost over $1M apiece, and the smallest of the plans being contemplated (that I've heard) involves launching several hundred of those).  And somehow, this will increase our standing in the world.

Never mind the man behind the curtain, who would reveal that killing more people in the Middle East would only feed terrorist organizations (no, I'm not echoing what Assad is saying, I'm saying that it would provide more propoganda material for them).  And that we would be violating the UN Charter.  And that it's likely that we're giving up more money (in some form or another) to placate would-be allies to give us cover to violate that charter.  And that we've been allowing a great many people over there to die for a long time (and far more to be violently displaced from their homes).

And that violence never begets peace (unless you completely destroy the violent; at which point you need to rebuild their countries.  Yeah, past experience shows that that's a cheap operation.  And again, that it gives you a lot more terrorists to fight).

Once again, a not-terribly-close look reveals that there is no endgame planned.

Our military has gone off half-cocked entirely too many times in the last forty to fifty years.  Let's not repeat the experiment.

As a weird thought, why don't we instead plow that $0.5B (again, I haven't heard an idea that would possibly cost less than that) into helping refugees and providing medical help to Syrians.  That would be the long play towards winning hearts and minds in the region.  Just think about al Qaeda's reaction to that.  Or Saudi Arabia's.  Or Iran's.

Senselessness in Beantown

I don't know that I have much to say about what happened in Boston, but I did want to comment on it a little bit.

I had heard, the morning it happened, the things they were doing for the marathon to honor the victims from Newtown.  So my first thought when I heard about the explosions was that it was some gun nuts in some sort of senseless protest.

I was very happy to be wrong about that.

But I'm not sure I understand what did happen any better.  I'm very glad they got the younger brother alive; I hope he sheds some light on why they did this.

But I really don't understand why a couple of Chechens would do anything like this.  I mean, if they were attacking something Russian, it would make a little more sense to me.  But this?  No comprehension at all.

I hope the motive comes out; however it happens.  Just so senseless; my heart goes out to the families affected (especially that of the boy who was killed, and whose mother and sister were also badly injured.  I literally can't imagine how they're coping).

Wow, this is depressing

I read most of Glenn Greenwald's columns (and have been, since before he was at Salon). Unfortunately, I find most of them pretty depressing. But this latest one... ugh.

I remember reading a couple of Clancy's older books, back when I was in high school (when Clancy was still a local; at the time, we went to Church in the same town where Clancy sold insurance), and he had south americans talking about how the norteamericanos were such imperialists. At the time, it didn't make much sense to me. But now? It's hard to see how you avoid such a conclusion.

Everything seems to be an excuse for war, or at least bombing.

The Nobel committee admitted that they awarded Obama the award more aspirationally than for deeds done; he apparently never got the message. And that's sad, because his rhetoric when running was really dead-on. But his execution as president has been terrible. He hasn't just forgotten his campaign promises, but has actively worked to undermine some of them, especially as relates to foreign policy, transparency, and civil liberties. It's very disappointing.

It's hard to avoid the thought that the Yemeni push will be used as an excuse to increase attempts to murder al Awlaki (sp?) as well. As I said, damned depressing.