Tea Partiers might not be left behind at End Times, but that won't stop them from leaving the rest of us behind NOW.
Rambling, yet interesting, analysis of the current NBA lockout.
Up next: Binderclipgate. Thanks, Fox News!
"For that reason, it might be far more effective if the LCD display showed dollar bills flying away as the driver laid on the gas." Figuring out how to turn leadfoots into featherfoots.
A huge black eye for the California Democratic Party
Why the U.S. should leave Afghanistan.

Echo Park

This song came out during the Vietnam War. I was way too young to appreciate its deeper meaning, a tribute to forgotten veterans and those whose lives were forever changed by the loss of those young Americans maimed and killed as a result of our nation's incessant imperialistic drive. These days our government, more than ever, entices our young to be all they can be, but fails to tell them that support, at the other end of their military career, will be worse than ever. Considering how we've most recently coerced and fooled our young into going to Iraq and now Afghanistan for no GOOD reasons, I think this song is even more appropriate today.

"The Best Chance They've Ever Had"

Hard-hitting commentary on Afghanistan War by Rachel Maddow:

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

"We really ask a lot of our young service people out on the checkpoints because there's danger, they're asked to make very rapid decisions in often very unclear situations. However, to my knowledge, in the nine-plus months I've been here, not a single case where we have engaged in an escalation of force incident and hurt someone has it turned out that the vehicle had a suicide bomb or weapons in it and, in many cases, had families in it. That doesn't mean I'm criticizing the people who are executing. I'm just giving you perspective. We've shot an amazing number of people and killed a number and, to my knowledge, none has proven to have been a real threat to the force." - - - Gen. Stanley McChrystal

Wow. Did I ever mention that war is fucked?

Based on the fact that I live next to Long Beach, CA this site calculated the following waste of money:

Taxpayers in Long Beach City, California paid $1.2 billion for total Iraq and Afghanistan war spending since 2001. For the same amount of money, any one of the following could have been provided: 510,171 People with Health Care for One Year 2,208,521 Homes with Renewable Electricity for One Year 22,144 Public Safety Officers for One year 17,510 Music and Arts Teachers for One Year 186,282 Scholarships for University Students for One Year 231,686 Students receiving Pell Grants of $5350 3,710 Affordable Housing Units 463,343 Children with Health Care for One Year 148,268 Head Start Places for Children for One Year 17,803 Elementary School Teachers for One Year 15,655 Port Container Inspectors for One year

There aren't 2,208,521 homes in Long Beach, but you get the idea...

Obama's Afghanistan Speech

The White House Office of the Press Secretary A New Way Forward: The President's Address to the American People on Afghan Strategy Oval Office For Immediate Release December 2nd 8:01 P.M. EDT My fellow Americans, On March 28th, I outlined what I called a "comprehensive, new strategy for Afghanistan and Pakistan." It was ambitious. It was also an attempt to fulfill a campaign promise that was heartfelt. I believed -- and still believe -- that, in invading Iraq, a war this administration is now ending, we took our eye off Afghanistan. Our well-being and safety, as well as that of the Afghan people, suffered for it. I suggested then that the situation in Afghanistan was already "perilous." I announced that we would be sending 17,000 more American soldiers into that war zone, as well as 4,000 trainers and advisors whose job would be to increase the size of the Afghan security forces so that they could someday take the lead in securing their own country. There could be no more serious decision for an American president. Eight months have passed since that day. This evening, after a comprehensive policy review of our options in that region that has involved commanders in the field, the Joint Chiefs of Staff, National Security Advisor James Jones, Secretary of Defense Robert Gates, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, Vice President Joe Biden, top intelligence and State Department officials and key ambassadors, special representative on Afghanistan and Pakistan Richard Holbrooke, and experts from inside and outside this administration, I have a very different kind of announcement to make. I plan to speak to you tonight with the frankness Americans deserve from their president. I've recently noted a number of pundits who suggest that my task here should be to reassure you about Afghanistan. I don't agree. What you need is the unvarnished truth just as it's been given to me. We all need to face a tough situation, as Americans have done so many times in the past, with our eyes wide open. It doesn't pay for a president or a people to fake it or, for that matter, to kick the can of a difficult decision down the road, especially when the lives of American troops are at stake. During the presidential campaign I called Afghanistan "the right war." Let me say this: with the full information resources of the American presidency at my fingertips, I no longer believe that to be the case. I know a president isn't supposed to say such things, but he, too, should have the flexibility to change his mind. In fact, more than most people, it's important that he do so based on the best information available. No false pride or political calculation should keep him from that. And the best information available to me on the situation in Afghanistan is sobering. It doesn't matter whether you are listening to our war commander, General Stanley McChrystal, who, as press reports have indicated, believes that with approximately 80,000 more troops -- which we essentially don't have available -- there would be a reasonable chance of conducting a successful counterinsurgency war against the Taliban, or our ambassador to that country, Karl Eikenberry, a former general with significant experience there, who believes we shouldn't send another soldier at present. All agree on the following seven points: 1. We have no partner in Afghanistan. The control of the government of Afghan President Hamid Karzai hardly extends beyond the embattled capital of Kabul. He himself has just been returned to office in a presidential election in which voting fraud on an almost unimaginably large scale was the order of the day. His administration is believed to have lost all credibility with the Afghan people. 2. Afghanistan floats in a culture of corruption. This includes President Karzai's administration up to its highest levels and also the warlords who control various areas and, like the Taliban insurgency, are to some degree dependent for their financing on opium, which the country produces in staggering quantities. Afghanistan, in fact, is not only a narco-state, but the leading narco-state on the planet. 3. Despite billions of dollars of American money poured into training the Afghan security forces, the army is notoriously understrength and largely ineffective; the police forces are riddled with corruption and held in contempt by most of the populace. 4. The Taliban insurgency is spreading and gaining support largely because the Karzai regime has been so thoroughly discredited, the Afghan police and courts are so ineffective and corrupt, and reconstruction funds so badly misspent. Under these circumstances, American and NATO forces increasingly look like an army of occupation, and more of them are only likely to solidify this impression. 5. Al-Qaeda is no longer a significant factor in Afghanistan. The best intelligence available to me indicates -- and again, whatever their disagreements, all my advisors agree on this -- that there may be perhaps 100 al-Qaeda operatives in Afghanistan and another 300 in neighboring Pakistan. As I said in March, our goal has been to disrupt, dismantle, and defeat al-Qaeda in Pakistan and Afghanistan, and on this we have, especially recently, been successful. Osama bin Laden, of course, remains at large, and his terrorist organization is still a danger to us, but not a $100 billion-plus danger. 6. Our war in Afghanistan has become the military equivalent of a massive bail-out of a firm determined to fail. Simply to send another 40,000 troops to Afghanistan would, my advisors estimate, cost $40-$54 billion extra dollars; eighty thousand troops, more than $80 billion. Sending more trainers and advisors in an effort to double the size of the Afghan security forces, as many have suggested, would cost another estimated $10 billion a year. These figures are over and above the present projected annual costs of the war -- $65 billion -- and would ensure that the American people will be spending $100 billion a year or more on this war, probably for years to come. Simply put, this is not money we can afford to squander on a failing war thousands of miles from home. 7. Our all-volunteer military has for years now shouldered the burden of our two wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Even if we were capable of sending 40,000-80,000 more troops to Afghanistan, they would without question be servicepeople on their second, third, fourth, or even fifth tours of duty. A military, even the best in the world, wears down under this sort of stress and pressure. These seven points have been weighing on my mind over the last weeks as we've deliberated on the right course to take. Tonight, in response to the realities of Afghanistan as I've just described them to you, I've put aside all the subjects that ordinarily obsess Washington, especially whether an American president can reverse the direction of a war and still have an electoral future. That's for the American people, and them alone, to decide. Given that, let me say as bluntly as I can that I have decided to send no more troops to Afghanistan. Beyond that, I believe it is in the national interest of the American people that this war, like the Iraq War, be drawn down. Over time, our troops and resources will be brought home in an orderly fashion, while we ensure that we provide adequate security for the men and women of our Armed Forces. Ours will be an administration that will stand or fall, as of today, on this essential position: that we ended, rather than extended, two wars. This will, of course, take time. But I have already instructed Ambassador Eikenberry and Special Representative Holbrooke to begin discussions, however indirectly, with the Taliban insurgents for a truce in place. Before year's end, I plan to call an international conference of interested countries, including key regional partners, to help work out a way to settle this conflict. I will, in addition, soon announce a schedule for the withdrawal of the first American troops from Afghanistan. For the counterinsurgency war that we now will not fight, there is already a path laid out. We walked down that well-mined path once in recent American memory and we know where it leads. For ending the war in another way, there is no precedent in our recent history and so no path -- only the unknown. But there is hope. Let me try to explain. Recently, comparisons between the Vietnam War and our current conflict in Afghanistan have been legion. Let me, however, suggest a major difference between the two. When Presidents John F. Kennedy and Lyndon Johnson faced their crises involving sending more troops into Vietnam, they and their advisors had little to rely on in the American record. They, in a sense, faced the darkness of the unknown as they made their choices. The same is not true of us. In the White House, for instance, a number of us have been reading a book on how the U.S. got itself ever more disastrously involved in the Vietnam War. We have history to guide us here. We know what happens in counterinsurgency campaigns. We have the experience of Vietnam as a landmark on the trail behind us. And if that weren't enough, of course, we have the path to defeat already well cleared by the Russians in their Afghan fiasco of the 1980s, when they had just as many troops in the field as we would have if I had chosen to send those extra 40,000 Americans. That is the known. On the other hand, peering down the path of de-escalation, all we can see is darkness. Nothing like this has been tried before in Washington. But I firmly believe that this, too, is deeply in the American grain. American immigrants, as well as slaves, traveled to this country as if into the darkness of the unknown. Americans have long braved the unknown in all sorts of ways. To present this more formulaically, if we sent the troops and trainers to Afghanistan, if we increased air strikes and tried to strengthen the Afghan Army, we basically know how things are likely to work out: not well. The war is likely to spread. The insurgents, despite many losses, are likely to grow in strength. Hatred of Americans is likely to increase. Pakistan is likely to become more destabilized. If, however, we don't take such steps and proceed down that other path, we do not know how things will work out in Afghanistan, or how well. We do not know how things will work out in Pakistan, or how well. That is hardly surprising, since we do not know what it means to end such a war now. But we must not be scared. America will not -- of this, as your president, I am convinced -- be a safer nation if it spends many hundreds of billions of dollars over many years, essentially bankrupting itself and exhausting its military on what looks increasingly like an unwinnable war. This is not the way to safety, but to national penury -- and I am unwilling to preside over an America heading in that direction. Let me say again that the unknown path, the path into the wilderness, couldn't be more American. We have always been willing to strike out for ourselves where others would not go. That, too, is in the best American tradition. It is, of course, a perilous thing to predict the future, but in the Afghanistan/Pakistan region, war has visibly only spread war. The beginning of a negotiated peace may have a similarly powerful effect, but in the opposite direction. It may actually take the wind out of the sails of the insurgents on both sides of the Afghan/Pakistan border. It may actually encourage forces in both countries with which we might be more comfortable to step to the fore. Certainly, we will do our best to lead the way with any aid or advice we can offer toward a future peaceful Afghanistan and a future peaceful Pakistan. In the meantime, I plan to ask Congress to take some of the savings from our two wars winding down and put them into a genuine jobs program for the American people. The way to safety in our world is, I believe, to secure our borders against those who would harm us, and to put Americans back to work. With this in mind, next month I've called for a White House Jobs Summit, which I plan to chair. And there I will suggest that, as a start, and only as a start, we look at two programs that were not only popular across the political spectrum in the desperate years of the Great Depression, but were remembered fondly long after by those who took part in them -- the Civilian Conservation Corps and the Works Progress Administration. These basic programs put millions of Americans back to work on public projects that mattered to this nation and saved families, lives, and souls. We cannot afford a failing war in Afghanistan and a 10.2% official unemployment rate at home. We cannot live with two Americas, one for Wall Street and one for everyone else. This is not the path to American safety. As president, I retain the right to strike at al-Qaeda or other terrorists who mean us imminent harm, no matter where they may be, including Afghanistan. I would never deny that there are dangers in the approach I suggest today, but when have Americans ever been averse to danger, or to a challenge either? I cannot believe we will be now. It's time for change. I know that not all Americans will agree with me and that some will be upset by the approach I am now determined to follow. I expect anger and debate. I take full responsibility for whatever may result from this policy departure. Believe me, the buck stops here, but I am convinced that this is the way forward for our country in war and peace, at home and abroad. I thank you for your time and attention. Goodnight and God bless America.

This is the speech Obama should be giving tonight. Unfortunately, he'll instead be announcing an escalation of the war. Good news for insurgents and weapons manufacturers. Bad news for Afghan civilians and U.S. security.

"This Veterans Day, U.S. Soldiers Say 'Stop the War'"

An open letter from war resisters calls for an end to the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. On this day, Veteran's Day, we would like to express to the American public why we, veterans of the Global War on Terror, have chosen to refuse orders to reactivate into military service. We are direct witnesses to the horrors of this war, having experienced its atrocities at their source, and we have decided that we can no longer carry out these illegal and immoral policies. We believe that veterans and active-duty GIs are in a key position to stop illegal and unjust war, and we are inspired by the resistance of troops who stood against the war in Vietnam. One of the preeminent reasons for the U.S. withdrawal from Vietnam was increasing dissent among the active-duty troops stationed abroad and at home. By the end of the war, there were entire units refusing to participate in combat, many going as far as outright mutiny. The United States learned a lesson from the Vietnam War: that it is unlikely, except in the event of self-defense, that regular civilians will execute the life-threatening orders that are given to them by military authority. The solution of policy makers was to create an all-volunteer force that negated the need for a draft. This translates into a mercenary force composed of America's disadvantaged: a sector of the U.S. demographic that is particularly susceptible to military recruitment for lack of other options and finding themselves with deployment orders again and again. To compensate for huge pitfalls in recruitment since the invasion of Iraq, the military has resorted to recalling former service members. This policy is known as "involuntary activation" and utilizes deactivated service members who still have time on their contracts in the Individual Ready Reserves (IRR) to fill shortcomings in specific job specialties. The abuse and misuse of this policy has escalated under the current administration to such a degree that it can now only be viewed as a "backdoor draft" that targets the same disadvantaged individuals the military sought out for enlistment, namely because they are better at not questioning orders. However, we have now begun to question these orders. We are veterans of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and members of the IRR who have refused or will refuse any activation orders that would lead to us serving an unjust and imperial U.S. foreign policy. It is a prevailing notion that this refusal is unpatriotic, but we consider our actions the only choice. Not only did the U.S. invasions of Iraq and Afghanistan do great harm to the people of those countries, but it undermined the ostensible goal with which the wars were begun: Instead of stopping terrorism, it has proliferated terrorism, an expectation that was predicted well before the war started. By refusing activation, we are refusing to participate in wars that serve the purposes of furthering the careers of politicians and high-ranking officers. We openly support other IRR members who follow in these footsteps. The military is a force that rules through fear of retribution for disobeying its will. In reality, more than a third of IRRs simply refuse to report to duty. Most of the rest report out of fear that the military will change their discharge status or prosecute them for desertion, but up to this point, prosecution has been rare. Members of the IRR are not under the Uniform Code of Military Justice (UCMJ), and thus far, the military has had a practice of not prosecuting them with criminal charges unless they report in some form or function to activate. Very few willingly volunteer for activation. There can be no promise that President-Elect Barack Obama will stop the stressful and unfair techniques of back-to-back deployments, "stop-loss" or the "backdoor draft" that are damaging the psychology of veterans in irreparable ways. Nor that he will stop encouraging global violence by unlawful uses of force. It is in this vein that we turn to organizations like Courage to Resist, Iraq Veterans Against the War and many other large-scale and grassroots organizations to solicit change in a largely unrepresentative democracy, and to allow the voices of the people to ring through the halls of the Capital. Benjamin Lewis, former Marine Corps mortarman, Iraq veteran, IRR recall resister, peace activist Brandon Neely, former U.S. Army Military police officer, Iraq veteran, IRR recall refuser.-- Benjamin Lewis and Brandon Neely

I Used to Respect Canada

Robin Long became the first U.S. war resister since the Vietnam War forced to leave Canada and turned over to the U.S. military. Even though on June 3rd 2008 Canada's House of Commons voted in favor "to allow conscientious objectors" to "remain in Canada".

Let's add Canada's Prime Minister Stephen Harper to the long list of bu$h lapdogs.

Prime Minister Stephen Harper may be set on embracing George Bush and his occupation of Iraq, but on Tuesday, June 3, the Canadian members of Parliament extended their embrace to the war resisters. By a vote of 137-110, the House of Commons called on the Canadian government to “immediately implement a program to allow conscientious objectors and their immediate family members… to apply for permanent resident status and remain in Canada.” The motion also called on the government to “immediately cease any removal or deportation actions against such individuals.” All the opposition parties — Liberal Party, the New Democratic Party, and the Bloc Quebecois — came together to reject the policy of the ruling Conservative Party. The motion, however, is non-binding and the Conservative government of Prime Minister Stephen Harper may choose to ignore it.

There are still many "war resisters" trying legally to remain in Canada and stay out of a war they view as unjust. However, with the deportation and jailing of Robin Long it does not look good for these soldiers who wanted to take a legal avenue. I hope his penalty is light.

There is blog up called Courage to Resist. Some of these soldiers have been to Iraq and Afghanistan, some are in Canada, others are awaiting trials in the U.S. They all have one thing in common... they are sick of war, fighting and the military. They are a diverse group; religious reasons, female soldiers who have been threatened, sufferers of PTSD, and others who have been there, seen the inhuman treatment of other human beings.

I hope Long tells every prospective troop who wants to sign up to be sure of what they are getting into. Once they sign the contract, give their word... it's too late to say, "Oops, my bad."

When I enlisted, I never relized it would end up being the single biggest decision of my entire life. I figured a few years serving during a time of peace, get some college money, get out in good health, I'd be set for life. It does work for some... if it all goes according to plan. To enter during a time of war and expect all things to be rosy is idealistic to say the least.

These soldiers have my utmost respect. Canada not so much.

"Veterans not entitled to mental health care, U.S. lawyers argue"

Veterans not entitled to mental health care, U.S. lawyers argue Veterans have no legal right to specific types of medical care, the Bush administration argues in a lawsuit accusing the government of illegally denying mental health treatment to some troops returning from Iraq and Afghanistan. The arguments, filed Wednesday in federal court in San Francisco, strike at the heart of a lawsuit filed on behalf of veterans that claims the health care system for returning troops provides little recourse when the government rejects their medical claims... They said the law entitles veterans only to "medical care which the secretary (of Veterans Affairs) determines is needed, and only to the extent funds ... are available." The plaintiffs say that the department has a backlog of more than 600,000 disability claims and that 120 veterans a week commit suicide...

King George,

They have done your dirty work for you. You extended their tours, preventing them from going home when their commitment was over (stop-loss) and repeatedly sent them back for longer tours.

Damn bu$h, what a sorry SOB! Support the Troops! HELP THESE MENTALLY ILL SOLDIERS!!!

"New Generation Of Homeless Vets Emerges"

From Erin McClam at Huffington Post. What the "new" homeless Veterans are going through.

LEEDS, Mass. — Peter Mohan traces the path from the Iraqi battlefield to this lifeless conference room, where he sits in a kilt and a Camp Kill Yourself T-shirt and calmly describes how he became a sad cliche: a homeless veteran. There was a happy homecoming, but then an accident _ car crash, broken collarbone. And then a move east, close to his wife's new job but away from his best friends. And then self-destruction: He would gun his motorcycle to 100 mph and try to stand on the seat. He would wait for his wife to leave in the morning, draw the blinds and open up whatever bottle of booze was closest. He would pull out his gun, a .45-caliber, semiautomatic pistol. He would lovingly clean it, or just look at it and put it away. Sometimes place it in his mouth. "I don't know what to do anymore," his wife, Anna, told him one day. "You can't be here anymore." Peter Mohan never did find a steady job after he left Iraq. He lost his wife _ a judge granted their divorce this fall _ and he lost his friends and he lost his home, and now he is here, in a shelter. He is 28 years old. "People come back from war different," he offers by way of a summary. This is not a new story in America: A young veteran back from war whose struggle to rejoin society has failed, at least for the moment, fighting demons and left homeless. But it is happening to a new generation. As the war in Afghanistan plods on in its seventh year, and the war in Iraq in its fifth, a new cadre of homeless veterans is taking shape. And with it come the questions: How is it that a nation that became so familiar with the archetypal homeless, combat-addled Vietnam veteran is now watching as more homeless veterans turn up from new wars? What lessons have we not learned? Who is failing these people? Or is homelessness an unavoidable byproduct of war, of young men and women who devote themselves to serving their country and then see things no man or woman should?

PLEASE READ THE REST OF THE ARTICLE AT THE LINK ABOVE.

Why are mentally ill Veterans still being discarded to the trash heap of life? Constanly left to fend for themselves! Yes, they knew what to do in war or in a military environment but being home, after the ordeal they went through, there is no training for that. Invariably, the sick troop is expected to know what's best or where to turn for help... basically, continually told to "buck up"!

I think it's time the military starts a new mandatory program before a soldier gets out, especially a potentially mentally ill soldier, "How to transition back to civilian life!" It would be the last course a soldier takes in their military career. The Pentagon forgets that most young soldiers know nothing else but the military. They were looking at the military as a stepping stone, not being dropped off a cliff.

I know our government has not learned anything from Vietnam with regards to Veteran's care. But some caring individuals have... and it could lead to increased government awareness:

Soldier On is staffed entirely by homeless veterans. A handful who fought in Iraq or Afghanistan, usually six or seven at a time, mix with dozens from Vietnam. Its president, Jack Downing, has spent nearly four decades working with addicts, the homeless and the mentally ill. Next spring, he plans to open a limited-equity cooperative in the western Massachusetts city of Pittsfield. Formerly homeless veterans will live there, with half their rents going into individual deposit accounts. Downing is convinced that ushering homeless veterans back into homeownership is the best way out of the pattern of homelessness that has repeated itself in an endless loop, war after war. "It's a disgrace," Downing says. "You have served your country, you get damaged, and you come back and we don't take care of you. And we make you prove that you need our services." "And how do you prove it?" he continues, voice rising in anger. "You prove it by regularly failing until you end up in a system where you're identified as a person in crisis. That has shocked me." Even as the nation gains a much better understanding of the types of post-traumatic stress disorders suffered by so many thousands of veterans _ even as it learns the lessons of Vietnam and tries to learn the lessons of Iraq _ it is probably impossible to foretell a day when young American men and women come home from wars unscarred. At least as long as there are wars. But Driscoll, at least, sees an opportunity to do much better. He notes that the VA now has more than 200 veteran adjustment centers to help ease the transition back into society, and the existence of more than 900 VA-connected community clinics nationwide. "We're hopeful that five years down the road, you're not going to see the same problems you saw after the Vietnam War," he says. "If we as a nation do the right thing by these guys."

An update on the war we should have finished 5 years ago: