Birther Nonsense: Still?

[Ancient History]

Seriously, how is this still an issue? At all? For anyone?

[angelfromanotherpin]

Well, Obama hasn't stopped being black.

[infected slut princess]

It's an issue for the mainstream media because it distracts people from talking about anything important, like the American Empire of Mass Murder and Rape.

[sabs]

Please, America is an amateur when it comes to mass murder and rape. Yes, there's incidents. It's to be expected, and the US Armed Forces are getting better every year at instilling a better moral code on their troops.

You've got 18-24 year old boys being put under tremendous strain. You have women in front line positions and combat units. It's an adjustment. The Army is working on shaking it's habit of burying unflattering events, but we still have High Ranking officers who came up during the Cold War. It's going to take time, but it's happening.

Remember most of our troops are the same age as Fraternity Boys. So they do stupid shit like pee on dead taliban and take pictures of it. It's 10-20 soldiers out of 10's of thousands.

We punish those guys, and make examples out of them so it doesn't get done again.

As for US Troops raping locals, that's never been more than single isolated incidents. With a percentage rate lower than civilian reports of rape. Does it suck? Yes. But compared to the Bosnians, or African Tribal conflicts, it's barely a blip.

[name_here]

Yeah, we haven't done anything like building a pyramid out of nine thousand severed heads or repeatedly raping the entire female population of a captured city.

There are things American soldiers do that are bad, but by historical standards it's honestly minimal.

[infected slut princess]

sabs you are a fucking idiot. My soul cries with cosmic despair at how you could write something so uniformed and full of shit. I cannot resist wasting my time to reply to your horrible, horrible post.

Please, America is an amateur when it comes to mass murder and rape. Yes, there's incidents.

So maybe American imperial forces murder and rape, but other people are more "pro" at murder and rape so let's just not talk about the American Empire spreading murder and rape.

And don't try to dismiss this as just a few "incidents" -- when you say that, you prove you just don't get it.

As an example of your lack of perspective, let me remind you that the faction put into power by the US in Afghanistan has a TRIBAL CUSTOM called bacha bazi, which is RAPING LITTLE BOYS. Repeat, the government being propped up by the US/NATO consists of people who rape little boys as a matter of CULTURE. And that is just the beginning.

It's to be expected, and the US Armed Forces are getting better every year at instilling a better moral code on their troops.

You say this, and the Pentagon probably says it, but you will find no
evidence to support this. You will find evidence pointing to the opposite -- deteriorating moral codes within the military.

Remember most of our troops are the same age as Fraternity Boys. So they do stupid shit like pee on dead taliban and take pictures of it. It's 10-20 soldiers out of 10's of thousands.

If they were mature enough to sign up to go kill people, they are fucking mature enough to not use "strain" as an excuse to murder and rape. You must be one of those guys who think mass murderer soldier Robert Bales was fundamentally just a nice guy who was under strain.

And it's not 10-20 soldiers. You obviously have no understanding of what imperial forces DO. You have no understanding of the empirical reality involved with imperial forces OCCUPYING other countries. They murder and rape. That's just how things are. That's WAR, dumb ass. American imperial conquerors are not different just because they are American. You know, the Romans thought they were wonderful, benevolent conquerors with "strong moral codes" as well -- and you know what, they murdered and raped people. Heck, even in Japan, which is not an active conflict zone OBVIOUSLY, the American military forces bring murder and rape. Look at how much people hate the base in Okinawa, because of the CRIME it generates.

FUCK, the US armed services members RAPE EACH OTHER -- to the tune of an estimated 19,000 sexual assaults per year.

We punish those guys, and make examples out of them so it doesn't get done again.

Bullshit.

Abu Ghraib. Bagram. Rape and murder is imperial occupation POLICY. Murder and rape is why US got kicked out of Iraq (protip: it wasn't because Obama "ended the war", because he wanted to stay).

Or what about giving shit tons of money and weapons to one group of assholes to go rape and kill another group of assholes. Naturally, innocents get raped and murdered along the way. Remember how the Libyan rebels, supported by NATO, raped and murdered black women on a massive scale following the fall of the government? or the Ethiopia-Somalia conflict, where America pays one group of black people to rape and kill another group of black people?

Fuck dude, no-knock raids by occupation forces, a key component of the "counter insurgency strategy", where they murder innocent families in their huts is the primary cause of civilian death in Afghanistan. You just have no clue what you are talking about.

As for US Troops raping locals, that's never been more than single isolated incidents.

Uh, yes, it is correct that it is "single isolated incidents" -- MANY single isolated incidents combined. Because again. that is part of what occupying is -- murdering and raping.

With a percentage rate lower than civilian reports of rape. Does it suck? Yes. But compared to the Bosnians, or African Tribal conflicts, it's barely a blip.

You don't know what you are talking about. Barely a blip my ass. The Bosnians or the African tribes have NEVER had an empire the size of America's.

[DSMatticus]

You say this, and the Pentagon probably says it, but you will find no evidence to support this. You will find evidence pointing to the opposite -- deteriorating moral codes within the military.

Step 1: Bitch about lack of evidence.
Step 2: Make a contrary claim without evidence.
Step 3: Herp on herpin' on.

If they were mature enough to sign up to go kill people, they are fucking mature enough to not use "strain" as an excuse to murder and rape.

The fucking fuckity fuck?
1) Saying "strain" is not a magical word that gets you out of punishment. It is a rationale. Having a rationale does not automatically make anything you do okay. Exampli grata, "he slept with my wife," is a rationale for murder, but it won't let you get away with it.
2) Please stop pretending U.S. soldiers are superhumans who are above normal psychology. They're typical 20 something's with 20 something's problems, like a love of booze, bad decision making abilities, and a tendency to think short-term over long-term. They are not different than the standard populace in any special or meaningful way, and pretending NO member of the military should snap and do something terrible even though people in the civilian world do just that all the time under less stress is holding them to a ridiculously high standard and it is incredibly fucking dishonest and shitty of you. The trauma of war is a fucking thing that you can't actually handwave away, and while it is not a justification to do terrible things it is something that actually happens and pretending it doesn't so you can demonize the soldiers because you disagree with U.S. policy is so fucking terrible of you that it makes me taste bile. Or maybe that's the cold I've been fighting. Whatever.

You must be one of those guys who think mass murderer soldier Robert Bales was fundamentally just a nice guy who was under strain.

And here's a use of an anecdotal point as though it means fucking anything. Congratulations; you have conclusively proved there exists at least one, but not more, terrible people in the military. But yes, actually, everything about the Robert Bales case indicates a guy who just flipped the fuck out one day: his military record is completely and utterly mundane until one night he gets drunk and starts murdering civilians.

Yes, that is terrible, Bales is a terrible person, and deserves to suffer the full punishment possible under the law, but that is exactly a scenario of someone caving under stress. That is what it fucking is; completely behaviorally normal, has a bad day (possibly something about his wife), gets drunk, goes out and starts doing stupid fucking things. He was totally in the wrong, but that's not evidence of an institution of rape and murder. That is the sign of one guy snapping at a shitty point in his life. That is not institutional!

You don't know what you are talking about. Barely a blip my ass. The Bosnians or the African tribes have NEVER had an empire the size of America's.

percentage rate lower

There is a reason we don't compare crime between two countries using raw numeric data. Because some countries are smaller or larger than other's. So we measure things as percent rates, because that's the only thing that makes sense. Talking about 'sizes' like they matter is another thing on the list of stupid shit you just said. If the U.S. has a lower percentage rape yet a higher raw number of rapes than a tribal war in Africa front, the U.S. front is doing a better job of not raping people.

Edit: Seriously, just, what the fuck? You are bitching that the U.S. military doesn't have a zero rate of murder and rape. There is nowhere in the fucking world that has any significant number of people and a zero rate of murder and rape. The standard you have set has gone unfulfilled for the entirety of human history. And that seems reasonable to you.

[K]

Don't be stupid.

Populations murder and rape, and thus moving a population of hundreds of thousands of people into an area increases the absolute numbers of murders and rapes. Blaming the US army for the effects of population is disingenuous at best.

It's a certainty that moving 100,000 troops of any nation on the planet into an area will lead to murders and rapes in that area. Heck, moving 100,000 civilians will actually lead to MORE murders and rapes because the higher rates among civilians.

So the real argument against "US imperialist armies" is that murders and rapes by foreigners leads to higher social unrest than murders and rapes by natives. All in all, it's a pretty shitty critique.

As to your examples, places like Okinawa hate the US army base because the Japanese are an extremely xenophobic people, particularly in rural backwaters like Okinawa. Considering that there is a popular political party that still pushes the line that Japan didn't lose WWII that is popular in those backwaters, I don't really take their opinions very seriously.

[name_here]

Robert Bales is one of the strongest points in favor of the US army, because he was immediately arrested and sent to Leavenworth. If it were institutional policy, he would not be awaiting court-martial.

Most probably, his motivation was a combination of long-term stress from being constantly shot at, severe injury to one of his friends by an IED earlier in the day, and the bit where Taliban fighters look exactly like civilians when not actively fighting and the inherent resulting paranoia. But whatever the reason, intentionally killing civilians is not acceptable, hence his arrest.

[infected slut princess]

Oh no i have been sucked into a fucking debate on the internet! ABOUT WAR AND EMPIRE!! I wonder how long we can discuss this before we all want to strangle each other.

First, DSMatticus:

Step 1: Bitch about lack of evidence.
Step 2: Make a contrary claim without evidence.
Step 3: Herp on herpin' on.

What are you actually criticizing? That I did not produce counter-evidence
to his non-evidence? So what?

You apparently noticed he made no reference at all to anything that would establish even the most remote prima facie case for improving moral character of imperial troops. If he decides to do so, I can present evidence to the contrary and the discussion can proceed along those lines if anyone cares.

The fucking fuckity fuck?
1) Saying "strain" is not a magical word that gets you out of punishment. It is a rationale. Having a rationale does not automatically make anything you do okay. Exampli grata, "he slept with my wife," is a rationale for murder, but it won't let you get away with it.

THanks for your Moral Philosophy 101 lesson. But as may have been clear from the general tenor of my earlier comments, I am not interested in EXPLANATIONS, although they are interesting and important -- I am interested in JUSTIFICATIONS. So I really don't care about the strain the troops are under from a moral justification standpoint. That is a matter of psychology, not morality.

2) Please stop pretending U.S. soldiers are superhumans who are above normal psychology. They're typical 20 something's with 20 something's problems, like a love of booze, bad decision making abilities, and a tendency to think short-term over long-term. They are not different than the standard populace in any special or meaningful way, and pretending NO member of the military should snap and do something terrible even though people in the civilian world do just that all the time under less stress is holding them to a ridiculously high standard and it is incredibly fucking dishonest and shitty of you. The trauma of war is a fucking thing that you can't actually handwave away, and while it is not a justification to do terrible things it is something that actually happens and pretending it doesn't so you can demonize the soldiers because you disagree with U.S. policy is so fucking terrible of you that it makes me taste bile. Or maybe that's the cold I've been fighting. Whatever.

I am not pretending that US soldiers are superhumans who can handle all the stress and misery. Obviously, given the rate at which they COMMIT SUICIDE, they are generally miserable fucks.

But still, they SHOULD be held to a higher standard! Because if they behave badly, people get raped and killed. It's not just like 20-year old fratboys behaving badly and getting drunk and passing out in the alley in a puddle of their own puke, with no impact on innocent people's lives.

We HAVE to demonize the soldiers, the same as we do with American foreign policy if we are opposed to empire and that which goes with it. US foreign policy is so aggressive and violent that the soldiers, who sign up voluntarily remember, are accessories to the mass murder carried out for US empire.

And here's a use of an anecdotal point as though it means fucking anything. Congratulations; you have conclusively proved there exists at least one, but not more, terrible people in the military.

That is what it fucking is; completely behaviorally normal, has a bad day (possibly something about his wife), gets drunk, goes out and starts doing stupid fucking things.

Sorry, shooting little kids in the head because you had a bad day (even a REALLY bad day) is not "behaviorally normal" unless you are a psychopath.

He was totally in the wrong, but that's not evidence of an institution of rape and murder. That is the sign of one guy snapping at a shitty point in his life. That is not institutional!

I was not referring to Bales as an example of institutional policy. I have other examples of that.

I referred to Bales as a reductio ad absurdum to what I interpreted as sabs offerring excuses for people doing terrible things ("they get stressed out, yo").

BUT since you mentioned it, there actually is growing evidence that the Bales massacre was not an isolated incident, but part of a PATTERN of no-knock raids committed by US forces to get retribution for friends getting hurt or killed. Gareth Porter is a journalist who has reported a lot on this.

There is a reason we don't compare crime between two countries using raw numeric data. Because some countries are smaller or larger than other's. So we measure things as percent rates, because that's the only thing that makes sense. Talking about 'sizes' like they matter is another thing on the list of stupid shit you just said. If the U.S. has a lower percentage rape yet a higher raw number of rapes than a tribal war in Africa front, the U.S. front is doing a better job of not raping people.

Let us assume for the sake of argument that American invaders rape and murder fewer people per capita than African invaders do. So what?

Because you know what, the absolute amount of crime like murder and rape DOES matter -- TO THE PEOPLE GETTING RAPED AND MURDERED. Amazing, I know, but you really don't seem to think about people who are the victims of the crimes. That is the only way you could say that bitching about that the absolute scale on which rape and murder is done is "stupid". The fact the the American Empire is SO BIG and commits terrible crimes on SUCH A BIG SCALE makes it a BIGGER problem, rather than a smaller one.

Edit: Seriously, just, what the fuck? You are bitching that the U.S. military doesn't have a zero rate of murder and rape. There is nowhere in the fucking world that has any significant number of people and a zero rate of murder and rape. The standard you have set has gone unfulfilled for the entirety of human history. And that seems reasonable to you.

Yeah, seriously... WHAT THE FUCK is right!

So according to you, because I oppose ALL RAPE AND MURDER, particularly the institution that supports rape and murder on the biggest scale (the US government) instead of just rape and murder above X per capita amount that is acceptable to DSMatticus, I am unreasonable? And you are eminently reasonable because you think it's "stupid" to complain about empires killing and raping people.
----------

Now, moving onto K:

Populations murder and rape, and thus moving a population of hundreds of thousands of people into an area increases the absolute numbers of murders and rapes. Blaming the US army for the effects of population is disingenuous at best.

I'm surprised a civilized person could even write something like this.

Because if it is true, then it must be true that we should not blame the Nazis for raping and murdering people when they conquered Poland. Because it was just the natural outcome of moving populations around! It had no connection to the aggressive action of INVASION AND OCCUPATION.

And that is absurd.

So the real argument against "US imperialist armies" is that murders and rapes by foreigners leads to higher social unrest than murders and rapes by natives. All in all, it's a pretty shitty critique.

No. The real argument against ANY imperialist army is that it creates rape and murder. Which is a GREAT critique unless you think rape and murder are awesome things. Maybe you do, I dunno. I doubt it though.

As to your examples, places like Okinawa hate the US army base because the Japanese are an extremely xenophobic people, particularly in rural backwaters like Okinawa. Considering that there is a popular political party that still pushes the line that Japan didn't lose WWII that is popular in those backwaters, I don't really take their opinions very seriously.

I don't deny that Asian people are very racist/xenophobic. I can confirm it is VERY true. However, I think it is quite snobbish of you to say that the fact that US military personnel at the Okinawa base have committed rape and murder (and other crimes) has NOTHING TO DO with the resentment of the Japanese towards the US occupiers, and it hardly deserves a sober comment.

Assuming you live in the US, imagine that Canada took over your country. Imagine they have a base by your hometown. Imagine a Canadian soldiers rape a bunch of local American residents. Imagine the Americans saying, "Get the Canadian base out of the US!" Then imagine the Canadians saying, "Those Americans are just xenophobes!!" It's a little insensitive to victims of rape.

What about bachi baza? What do you think about the US empire subsidizing rapists in Afghanistan? Obviously the northern tribes of Afghanistan would still be raping little boys if the US did not put them in power. But the thing is, the US did put them in power, and now gives them money, weapons, training, and other resources to maintain power. By subsidizing little boy rape, they encourage more of it. That is one facet of teh American Empire of Rape and Murder, and I am interested in hearing whether you think it is a non-issue like you think it is a non-issue that American troops stationed in Japan rape little Japanese girls.

[name_here]

So, your idea of an example of institutional policy is... someone who is getting court-martialed?

That is nonsense. It is clear you are grasping at straws to justify an irrational hatred of US foreign policy. Just like how you conveniently ignore that the group the US forced out of power in Afghanistan also considers rape culturally acceptable and deliberately employs slaughter of civilians as a terror tactic instead of going out of their way to reduce civilian casualties.

True, invasions do lead to civilian deaths, but it is unreasonable and even reprehensible to call it institutional policy when the institution actively works to minimize them.

[Ted the Flayer]

Correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't "murder" kind of important in many soldier's job duties?

Now I'm getting an image of a D&D group where every player took Vow of Nonviolence and Vow of Peace for some reason...

[DSMatticus]

But still, they SHOULD be held to a higher standard! Because if they behave badly, people get raped and killed. It's not just like 20-year old fratboys behaving badly and getting drunk and passing out in the alley in a puddle of their own puke, with no impact on innocent people's lives.

What the fuck? Okay, this needs to be stressed to you: you act like rape and murder are unique to the military. That's fucking retarded. Civilians do that to eachother all the time. But hilariously: I highly suspect that the absolute number of deaths caused by drunk-driving fratboys is higher than the absolute number of innocent civilians killed in Iraq and Afghanistan.

We HAVE to demonize the soldiers

No, we don't. We have a moral obligation to demonize:
1) Individuals who do terrible things.
2) Institutions who encourage members to do terrible things.
The U.S. military does not fall under #2, and most soldiers do not fall under #1. Which means you are using the the almost hyperbolicly terrible actions of people like Robert Bales to demonize people who have fucking nothing to do with him, behave nothing like him, and just happen to wear the same uniform. That is straight up morally reprehensible.

I referred to Bales as a reductio ad absurdum to what I interpreted as sabs offerring excuses for people doing terrible things ("they get stressed out, yo").

We punish those guys, and make examples out of them so it doesn't get done again.

Then you brought up Bales as a bullshit non-response strawman and you should fuck off for being terrible. Because Sabs explicitly said soldiers who behave improperly should be punished.

Again, you don't fucking get this: just because we can provide a psychological rational for someone's actions does not mean we have to waive punishment or responsibility. We punish because it's an essential deterrent, even if in many cases the difference between someone like Bales and any other human being on the planet is a few months of prolonged stress, a handful of really bad days, and a gun. I reiterate: Bales had very a clean psychological record. He was subject to serious head trauma, and was evaluated as a precaution and he scored just fine.

Sorry, shooting little kids in the head because you had a bad day (even a REALLY bad day) is not "behaviorally normal" unless you are a psychopath.

Literacy, yo, you've got a bad track record with it. Notice that that's a list of events in the order in which they occur? Until the day Bales snaps, he is behaviorally normal. He seriously fucking is, according to every test performed on him. So yes, until he snapped and started murdering people like a psychopath, he was behaviorally normal by any and all indications.

Because you know what, the absolute amount of crime like murder and rape DOES matter -- TO THE PEOPLE GETTING RAPED AND MURDERED.

Oh! Here's something that's cool. Let's play a game. Here are some hypotheticals:
1) The military has a lower incidence of rape and murder when deployed than on leave. Ergo, to minimize the ABSOLUTE number of rapes and murders, we should deploy as many soldiers as possible. Amirite?
2) The military has a lower incidence of rape and murder than the civilian populace, whether they are deployed or on leave. Ergo, to minimize the ABSOLUTE number of rapes and murders, we should have mandatory military service. Amirite?

because I oppose ALL RAPE AND MURDER

You don't. You oppose rape and murder committed by the military. It's literally impossible to oppose all rape and murder, because then you are opposed to humanity existing. You would be opposed to alcohol or other intoxicants which impair decision-making ability. You would be pro-massive population controls and pro-massively invasive police state.

What you actually do is weigh the harms of rape and murder against the goods of things that increase the incidence of rape and murder (which is seriously alcohol, yum), and I suspect you shrug your shoulders and go, "ehh, can't win 'em all." And when you do your personal evaluation of the U.S. foreign policy, because you already disagree so stringently with U.S. military policy, you weight the harms of the U.S. military (which are comparatively small) against the zero good you see and your moral decision is obvious.

Then you throw down the "they (sort of sometimes) rape and murder!" card like that would negate any possible justification (it doesn't) and therefore military action is morally reprehensible.

How about you just adopt your honest fucking position?
1) You disagree with the U.S. military action, and see no good in it.
2) It causes any harm, at all, however relatively minor compared to any other reasonable standard.
C) Ergo, U.S. military action is a net harm and we should stop it.

If you just straight up said that, not only would it be less intellectually dishonest, you'd find people who agreed with you. But no: you are deadset on pretending the U.S. military is an unchecked murder-rape machine of unforgivable extent, and that is fucking laughable and terrible.

[K]

I don't deny that Asian people are very racist/xenophobic. I can confirm it is VERY true. However, I think it is quite snobbish of you to say that the fact that US military personnel at the Okinawa base have committed rape and murder (and other crimes) has NOTHING TO DO with the resentment of the Japanese towards the US occupiers, and it hardly deserves a sober comment.

I am saying that it has nothing to do with the occupying forces. In fact, if you replaced those servicemen with Japanese people, there would actually be more rapes and murders since the rates are higher among general populations.

Unfairly demonizing a group over the actions of a few is really easy, and people with an ax to grind do that quite successfully.

For example, the police rape and murder in every nation in the world. Should we dismantle and demonize the police all over the world, or should we just accept that as long as the specific police organizations are not condoning or promoting rape and murder and the rate is lower than the general populace that we should not blame the group?

I mean, the Catholic Church has a policy of protecting rapists and should be set on fire, but on the other hand I'm not going to dismantle the public and private education system just because some teachers have harmed students. The same reasoning applies to foreign armies and any other group or organization.

By the same token, the US supports regimes that promote order. Often those regimes are evil by any objective standards, but the important question is whether they are less evil than the other alternatives. You can't really take the moral high ground when failure to act leads to more harm than acting.

[Koumei]

On the original topic: I guess the economy is improving?

because then you are opposed to humanity existing.

NOW THAT'S MY KIND OF POLICY!

[Chamomile]

Whenever someone starts ranting about the birther conspiracy stuff, I always just tell them I always thought that was a pretty stupid law anyway. It's fun to see them fumble for a response when their hive mind hasn't provided one in advance.

[sabs]

3 of our greatest presidents didn't match the criteria.

George, John, and Thomas.

[name_here]

Well, they were admittedly grandfathered because no one who was 35 had been born in the US on account of it not existing. But the point is valid. Also, Obama is definitely a citizen by virtue of birth because of his mother.

[sabs]

Yes, I've heard this ludicrous claim that both your parents have to be US citizens for you to be a US Citizen. And that's just not true.

It only takes 1 parent.
Now, me.. I can never be POTUS. I didn't become a US Citizen until I was in my 20's.

[name_here]

Well, actually, if only one is a citizen and the birth is not in US territory they must meet certain residency requirements but if both are no such requirement exists. However, Obama's mom did meet them.

[Josh_Kablack]

And if you back up 6 years or so, there was an "Amend for Arnold" campaign coming from the fringe right saying that the USA oughtta change the constitution to allow anyone who had been a citizen for a sufficiently large amount of years to run for president, regardless of their place of birth.

Of course right now, the official line from the Romney camp is that the left is attacking the fringe birthers to district the electorate from the real issue of how poor Obama's record on the economy has been - which is almost reasonable. At least apart from how Obama's weakness on the economy is due to inadequate job creation while Romney is advocating for policies which will cause actual job destruction.

Sign me up with the unicorners here.

[sabs]

Not to mention that 2/3 of Romney's Job Creation in Massachusetts were GOVERNMENT JOBS. And not private sector.

[K]

I don't really know if pointing out the Republican's attempts to tank the economy would be helpful for the Obama campaign.

It sounds like blame shifting even though it is 100% true, so I don't know if it has political weight.

[tussock]

People killed in drunk driver accidents in the 50 states of the US: ~110,000 in 10 years, who are mostly the drunks themselves.

People killed in the last couple up front US wars (ignoring the many sponsored ones) include ~132,000 innocent civilians by direct violence, ~40,000 resistance fighters and ~5,500 occupation and supplicant forces by direct violence also.

Approximately one million extra people have died as a result of the destruction of water treatment facilities and hospitals, disruption of medicine, water, and food supplies, increased cancer rates and birth defects around DU deployment sites, and other associated increases in civilian death rates.

A further two million plus people have been permanently displaced, having lost their homes and businesses to violence and destruction associated with the war.

136 Journalists were killed while attempting to cover the two wars, mostly by US forces, where every single one was deemed an accident, even the guy shot in the back by the guards he'd just passed on the way out of a US compound, on foot, with an ID badge and a big blue press jacket. Or the guy who died when US tanks fired on the hotel they'd forced journalists to stay in, for fun.

The US, in Iraq, has put the primary resistance group in charge, paid them and armed them to keep the peace, retired to secluded permanent bases, and declared victory. They will do the same in Afghanistan once they figure out how to get the Taliban to change their name. The wars cost $4,000,000,000,000 so far, ignoring the further $1,000,000,000,000 spent on various covert "security" actions. They achieved nothing, other than killing two old men with beards that didn't like George W. Bush.

But yeh, drunk driving, eh.

[Chamomile]

That's a damning condemnation of the wars themselves, but not the soldiers fighting them.