Today's American Neo-Con Made

Today's American Neo-Con Made Americans just ignore the devil in the details or (Americans just engage in willful ignorance) I AM not a love-it-or-leave-it American. I'm an in-it-for-the-long-haul American, celebrating progress, lamenting regression, and plugging away for the new and improved. But I'm perplexed about one problem plaguing the state of the union that is particularly resilient to rescue. I'm afraid we are afflicted with an outbreak of shallow thinking in the land. The condition is widespread and the cure is elusive. In our own time -- and especially since the ascendancy of George Bush to the presidency -- "neoconservative" has become a term frequently associated with "in your face attacks," and extreme arrogance. But the heat generated by the term also stands as a backhanded tribute, an acknowledgment that the neoconservative impact has been substantial. It is today too soon to offer a comprehensive assessment of that impact. The discussion of neoconservatism offered here has a more modest objective, namely, to suggest that one aspect of the neoconservative legacy has been to foster the new "Wild West Shootouts around the World," and the emergence of the new American militarism, and the lack of any sizeable American opposition or any mass public outcry concerning American foreign policy. "They love talking about expanding democracy throughout the world (at least, the oil-producing world) but care little about favored authoritarians and tyrants. They are the people who led this country into Iraq where more than 1,600 GIs have been killed (official figure,) not to mention the many thousands wounded in body and mind (30,000) and over 100,000 Iraqi civilian deaths. But guess what? Virtually no neocon offspring are to be found on the front line in Iraq or Afghanistan. They praise war and warlike virtues and denounce the decadence of intellectuals. They want women to return to children, cooking, and the church. They delight in the profusion of flags: flags on cars, flags on houses, flags worn in lapels. They encourage citizens to inform on their neighbors. They plan to establish a new world order to rival Rome." Referenced from .... *Leo Strauss and the Politics of American Empire Bush Fantasy Matrix The Bush White House has masterfully used the public's general indifference to all things overseas to its advantage in war and peace - but mostly war. It has successfully reinforced the notion that finessing foreign sensibilities is a fickle experiment at best and citizens need not trouble themselves unduly over multilateral tangos. Moreover, to display its faux affinity for the common man, the administration has boiled down the whole foreign relations thing to one easy understanding. You're either fer or agin' us, said the man from Midland, Texas. Simple, straightforward, and as shallow as they come. Yet it was all the gunslingers in Washington had to say to the world before shooting their way into Baghdad to spread democracy, topple an evil empire, and destroy weapons of mass destruction. Well, one out of three ain't bad. And it's good enough for a homeland largely afraid to doubt the wisdom of a done deal or question a kick-ass commander in chief gunning for retribution in the Middle East. Despite protests to the contrary, people preferred to believe that the President must know more than they do about dreadful Iraq and were content to leave it at that. Neo-Con Commandments Three years and more than 1,600 American deaths later (official figure,) with the U.S. nowhere close to escaping the warfare it started there, Americans still nod like lemmings when the President insists "democracy is on the march" amid the rubble of Iraq and resurging Taliban influence in Afghanistan. More Lies & Coverups "Between 40,000 and 50,000 US military personnel are in Iraq despite serious medical conditions that should have ruled them out of combat, according to the National Gulf War Resource Centre. The GI Rights Hotline, which counsels troops, says it fielded 32,000 calls last year from soldiers seeking an exit from the military, or suffering from post-combat stress." .... *American Wounded In the Field "Actually, and I have seen the figures from the Pentagon, over 8,000 are dead ...." *the Real Dead & Wounded "The Americans are losing the war in Iraq and in their frustration have started using chemical weapons and napalm bombs on civilian populations," .... *U.S. using chemical weapons against civilians Frankly, shallow is good enough when too much reflection might bring reality into focus. And if the genuine article is dramatically different from the official version, then what? We live in fast-food times with little patience for complexities or shades of gray. We are not a country predisposed to ponder too many variables in life. The need to know is overrated. Not surprisingly our politicians mirror the society they serve. They craft easy-on-the-ears stump speeches that a first grader could repeat word for word. They perfect catch phrases to sum up everything from war to welfare guaranteed to appease the not-so-inquiring minds of their audiences. And if the malleable masses are spoon-fed disaster packaged as appealing dessert, darned if they don't line up for more. Neo-Con Spooks In the prevailing shallowness of America, the shrewd can inherit the earth. They can lead an anxious but trusting nation into a war of choice by sounding as if they had no other option. They can push through tax breaks that cost trillions and plump up record deficits by sounding as if fiscal restraint would be folly. They can promote private accounts as saving supplements to Social Security by sounding as if personal investment is preferable to government checks, reliability notwithstanding. Shallowness allows schemers to gut environmental programs by sounding as though they advocate them with cleverly named initiatives that only a profit-seeking polluter could love. They can sell their propaganda as mainstream news without disclaimer by sounding sincere in their unorthodox approach to winning friends and influencing voters. They can even obscure the tangled web of deceit that Condi Rice lugs around in first-term baggage by sounding like 2008 could be her year. Next Neo-Con Vice-President And America the beautiful will bite at whatever sounds good or seems right if it's smartly delivered by someone who simply must know more than the average bloke about politics, prosperity, and pre-emptive war. Besides, how wrong can it be when those leading us all off the cliff sound as if pain is precluded altogether? If the consequences of poor policy from fiscal to foreign ever raise the specter of sacrifice, as they surely will and surely are, the shallow won't know what to think. It's that bad and policy makers only pray it gets worse. Neo-Con War On Iraqi Children On U.S. Inauguration Day, most didn't seem to notice. Oh, they played a few clips that night of the American president saying, "The survival of liberty in our land increasingly depends on the success of liberty in other lands." On the front page of The Irish Times was a large four-color picture of a small Iraqi girl. Her little body was a coil of steel. She sat knees up, cowering, screaming madly into the dark night... Reference and Complete Article .... *What the Rest of the World Watched on Inauguration Day Neocon Treason In a chapter that is must reading for every American who thinks President Bush should be reelected, Buchanan asks: "Who are they, the neoconservatives?" When you find out, you will want nothing further to do with the president who sponsored them and gave them unbridled power to launch America into permanent war in the Middle East. The neocons have declared America at war with 1 billion Muslims who have done us no harm. Simultaneously, the neocons destroyed our traditional alliances. Instead of isolating a terrorist enemy, neocons have isolated America. Al-Qaeda is not a state or a country. It is a non-governmental organization that rejects America's decadent culture and opposes the U.S.-Israeli alliance that brutally oppresses Palestinians to the shame of all Muslims. It is impossible to fight al-Qaeda by invading and occupying Muslim countries. Bush's invasion of Iraq has achieved nothing for the U.S. but death and expense. For al-Qaeda it has radicalized the Muslim world and created recruits. Reference and Complete Article .... *Neocon Treason Five American Presidencies Waring Against Iraq This is the 14th year of the War Against Iraq (including the embargo years.) As of this writing, the insurgency is able to mount an average of 100 bombing attacks a week; 400 a month, killing scores of Iraqi civilians. These attacks are continuing unabated despite 90% of all funds allocated to Iraq having been spent on security not for Iraqi infrastructure. (A total of 56 billion dollars has actually been spent in Iraq. Where is the rest of the money?) In Iraq, for every dead U.S. soldier, there are 14 other deaths, 93 percent of them are civilian. But those things happen in war, the story says. It's all for a greater good, we have to remember. It's all to free them. It's all being done to spread liberty. From where I stand, the only question now is who or what will free us from the 21st century's new definition of bravery. Who will free us from the notion that killing children or their civilian parents takes courage? Reference .... *What the Rest of the World Watched on Inauguration Day Liberator Stumble It!

Today's American Neo-Con Made

Today's American Neo-Con Made Americans just ignore the devil in the details or (Americans just engage in willful ignorance) I AM not a love-it-or-leave-it American. I'm an in-it-for-the-long-haul American, celebrating progress, lamenting regression, and plugging away for the new and improved. But I'm perplexed about one problem plaguing the state of the union that is particularly resilient to rescue. I'm afraid we are afflicted with an outbreak of shallow thinking in the land. The condition is widespread and the cure is elusive. In our own time -- and especially since the ascendancy of George Bush to the presidency -- "neoconservative" has become a term frequently associated with "in your face attacks," and extreme arrogance. But the heat generated by the term also stands as a backhanded tribute, an acknowledgment that the neoconservative impact has been substantial. It is today too soon to offer a comprehensive assessment of that impact. The discussion of neoconservatism offered here has a more modest objective, namely, to suggest that one aspect of the neoconservative legacy has been to foster the new "Wild West Shootouts around the World," and the emergence of the new American militarism, and the lack of any sizeable American opposition or any mass public outcry concerning American foreign policy. "They love talking about expanding democracy throughout the world (at least, the oil-producing world) but care little about favored authoritarians and tyrants. They are the people who led this country into Iraq where more than 1,600 GIs have been killed (official figure,) not to mention the many thousands wounded in body and mind (30,000) and over 100,000 Iraqi civilian deaths. But guess what? Virtually no neocon offspring are to be found on the front line in Iraq or Afghanistan. They praise war and warlike virtues and denounce the decadence of intellectuals. They want women to return to children, cooking, and the church. They delight in the profusion of flags: flags on cars, flags on houses, flags worn in lapels. They encourage citizens to inform on their neighbors. They plan to establish a new world order to rival Rome." Referenced from .... *Leo Strauss and the Politics of American Empire Bush Fantasy Matrix The Bush White House has masterfully used the public's general indifference to all things overseas to its advantage in war and peace - but mostly war. It has successfully reinforced the notion that finessing foreign sensibilities is a fickle experiment at best and citizens need not trouble themselves unduly over multilateral tangos. Moreover, to display its faux affinity for the common man, the administration has boiled down the whole foreign relations thing to one easy understanding. You're either fer or agin' us, said the man from Midland, Texas. Simple, straightforward, and as shallow as they come. Yet it was all the gunslingers in Washington had to say to the world before shooting their way into Baghdad to spread democracy, topple an evil empire, and destroy weapons of mass destruction. Well, one out of three ain't bad. And it's good enough for a homeland largely afraid to doubt the wisdom of a done deal or question a kick-ass commander in chief gunning for retribution in the Middle East. Despite protests to the contrary, people preferred to believe that the President must know more than they do about dreadful Iraq and were content to leave it at that. Neo-Con Commandments Three years and more than 1,600 American deaths later (official figure,) with the U.S. nowhere close to escaping the warfare it started there, Americans still nod like lemmings when the President insists "democracy is on the march" amid the rubble of Iraq and resurging Taliban influence in Afghanistan. More Lies & Coverups "Between 40,000 and 50,000 US military personnel are in Iraq despite serious medical conditions that should have ruled them out of combat, according to the National Gulf War Resource Centre. The GI Rights Hotline, which counsels troops, says it fielded 32,000 calls last year from soldiers seeking an exit from the military, or suffering from post-combat stress." .... *American Wounded In the Field "Actually, and I have seen the figures from the Pentagon, over 8,000 are dead ...." *the Real Dead & Wounded "The Americans are losing the war in Iraq and in their frustration have started using chemical weapons and napalm bombs on civilian populations," .... *U.S. using chemical weapons against civilians Frankly, shallow is good enough when too much reflection might bring reality into focus. And if the genuine article is dramatically different from the official version, then what? We live in fast-food times with little patience for complexities or shades of gray. We are not a country predisposed to ponder too many variables in life. The need to know is overrated. Not surprisingly our politicians mirror the society they serve. They craft easy-on-the-ears stump speeches that a first grader could repeat word for word. They perfect catch phrases to sum up everything from war to welfare guaranteed to appease the not-so-inquiring minds of their audiences. And if the malleable masses are spoon-fed disaster packaged as appealing dessert, darned if they don't line up for more. Neo-Con Spooks In the prevailing shallowness of America, the shrewd can inherit the earth. They can lead an anxious but trusting nation into a war of choice by sounding as if they had no other option. They can push through tax breaks that cost trillions and plump up record deficits by sounding as if fiscal restraint would be folly. They can promote private accounts as saving supplements to Social Security by sounding as if personal investment is preferable to government checks, reliability notwithstanding. Shallowness allows schemers to gut environmental programs by sounding as though they advocate them with cleverly named initiatives that only a profit-seeking polluter could love. They can sell their propaganda as mainstream news without disclaimer by sounding sincere in their unorthodox approach to winning friends and influencing voters. They can even obscure the tangled web of deceit that Condi Rice lugs around in first-term baggage by sounding like 2008 could be her year. Next Neo-Con Vice-President And America the beautiful will bite at whatever sounds good or seems right if it's smartly delivered by someone who simply must know more than the average bloke about politics, prosperity, and pre-emptive war. Besides, how wrong can it be when those leading us all off the cliff sound as if pain is precluded altogether? If the consequences of poor policy from fiscal to foreign ever raise the specter of sacrifice, as they surely will and surely are, the shallow won't know what to think. It's that bad and policy makers only pray it gets worse. Neo-Con War On Iraqi Children On U.S. Inauguration Day, most didn't seem to notice. Oh, they played a few clips that night of the American president saying, "The survival of liberty in our land increasingly depends on the success of liberty in other lands." On the front page of The Irish Times was a large four-color picture of a small Iraqi girl. Her little body was a coil of steel. She sat knees up, cowering, screaming madly into the dark night... Reference and Complete Article .... *What the Rest of the World Watched on Inauguration Day Neocon Treason In a chapter that is must reading for every American who thinks President Bush should be reelected, Buchanan asks: "Who are they, the neoconservatives?" When you find out, you will want nothing further to do with the president who sponsored them and gave them unbridled power to launch America into permanent war in the Middle East. The neocons have declared America at war with 1 billion Muslims who have done us no harm. Simultaneously, the neocons destroyed our traditional alliances. Instead of isolating a terrorist enemy, neocons have isolated America. Al-Qaeda is not a state or a country. It is a non-governmental organization that rejects America's decadent culture and opposes the U.S.-Israeli alliance that brutally oppresses Palestinians to the shame of all Muslims. It is impossible to fight al-Qaeda by invading and occupying Muslim countries. Bush's invasion of Iraq has achieved nothing for the U.S. but death and expense. For al-Qaeda it has radicalized the Muslim world and created recruits. Reference and Complete Article .... *Neocon Treason Five American Presidencies Waring Against Iraq This is the 14th year of the War Against Iraq (including the embargo years.) As of this writing, the insurgency is able to mount an average of 100 bombing attacks a week; 400 a month, killing scores of Iraqi civilians. These attacks are continuing unabated despite 90% of all funds allocated to Iraq having been spent on security not for Iraqi infrastructure. (A total of 56 billion dollars has actually been spent in Iraq. Where is the rest of the money?) In Iraq, for every dead U.S. soldier, there are 14 other deaths, 93 percent of them are civilian. But those things happen in war, the story says. It's all for a greater good, we have to remember. It's all to free them. It's all being done to spread liberty. From where I stand, the only question now is who or what will free us from the 21st century's new definition of bravery. Who will free us from the notion that killing children or their civilian parents takes courage? Reference .... *What the Rest of the World Watched on Inauguration Day Liberator