"...it's not the training to be mean but the training to be kind that is used to keep us leashed best." ~ Black Dog Red

"In case you haven't recognized the trend: it proceeds action, dissent, speech." ~ davidly, on how wars get done

"...What sort of meager, unerotic existence must a man live to find himself moved to such ecstatic heights by the mundane sniping of a congressional budget fight. The fate of human existence does not hang in the balance. The gods are not arrayed on either side. Poseiden, earth-shaker, has regrettably set his sights on the poor fishermen of northern Japan and not on Washington, D.C. where his ire might do some good--I can think of no better spot for a little wetland reclamation project, if you know what I mean. The fight is neither revolution nor apocalypse; it is hardly even a fight. A lot of apparatchiks are moving a lot of phony numbers with more zeros than a century of soccer scores around, weaving a brittle chrysalis around a gross worm that, some time hence, will emerge, untransformed, still a worm." ~ IOZ

Apr 23, 2010

Sixty Minute Assassinations

When Art Silber and Chris Floyd call the US a death state, they don't play footloose with the language:

"WASHINGTON — In coming years, President Obama will decide whether to deploy a new class of weapons capable of reaching any corner of the earth from the United States in under an hour and with such accuracy and force that they would greatly diminish America’s reliance on its nuclear arsenal.

Yet even now, concerns about the technology are so strong that the Obama administration has acceded to a demand by Russia that the United States decommission one nuclear missile for every one of these conventional weapons fielded by the Pentagon. That provision, the White House said, is buried deep inside the New Start treaty that Mr. Obama and President Dmitri A. Medvedev signed in Prague two weeks ago.

Called Prompt Global Strike, the new weapon is designed to carry out tasks like picking off Osama bin Laden in a cave, if the right one could be found; taking out a North Korean missile while it is being rolled to the launch pad; or destroying an Iranian nuclear site — all without crossing the nuclear threshold. In theory, the weapon will hurl a conventional warhead of enormous weight at high speed and with pinpoint accuracy, generating the localized destructive power of a nuclear warhead."

Source.

So, Imperial Barack arrogates the power of a fiat execution. Then he approves the production of murder tech so nasty that the Russians want the Death State to cough up a damned nuke for every one it builds.

Sarah Palin probably loves it. I hear the moose and wolves recognize her by scent now, in Alaska - and run. She could bring aerial death to a whole generation of ungulates and pack hunters.

But, what of our dear friends, the professional progressives?

Nary a word, as of this hour. Except for Lady Huffington, who definitely puts the buzzkill on the many swooners who graze at her trough:

"In fact, the president is on track to spend more on defense, in real dollars, than any other president has in one term of office since WWII. In that time we've had Korea, Vietnam, the massive military buildup under Reagan, and Bush's funded-by-tax-cuts invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq, but in the most trying economic times since the Depression, Obama's out-gunning them all."

Hear, hear! - for those words of truth.

Worry not, though - Chuck Schumer's on the case.  Er, on Imperial Barack's case, for not cooing softly enough at Bonny Prince Bibi. Yep, giving billions in military and financial support to the Israeli garrison state, plus a blind eye to its myriad war crimes, plus tacit and explicit approval of its ongoing 21st Century colonization and expulsion program equals counter-productive posturing, against Israel. So says Senator Chuck, Democrat, representing the New Amsterdam Banking and Trust.

So much irony, that.

Still, I wonder how the Death State will pay for all this once and future mayhem. Seems Obama fibbed a bit, about the historic health care reform legislation giant fucking hand out to insurance companies. Seems he and his progressive shills fudged the numbers a bit:

"WASHINGTON – President Barack Obama's health care overhaul law will increase the nation's health care tab instead of bringing costs down, government economic forecasters concluded Thursday in a sobering assessment of the sweeping legislation.

A report by economic experts at the Health and Human Services Department said the health care remake will achieve Obama's aim of expanding health insurance — adding 34 million Americans to the coverage rolls.

But the analysis also found that the law falls short of the president's twin goal of controlling runaway costs, raising projected spending by about 1 percent over 10 years. That increase could get bigger, however, since the report also warned that Medicare cuts in the law may be unrealistic and unsustainable, forcing lawmakers to roll them back.

The mixed verdict for Obama's signature issue is the first comprehensive look by neutral experts.

In particular, the warnings about Medicare could become a major political liability for Democratic lawmakers in the midterm elections. The report projected that Medicare cuts could drive about 15 percent of hospitals and other institutional providers into the red, "possibly jeopardizing access" to care for seniors."

The boondoggle will cost a whole lot of treasure. It will "insure" a bunch of poor blokes, by making them captive customers. It will hand predatory corporations (sorry for the redudancy, there) a giant kit of cash, with which to buy better two party clients.

And one day, that bill will hit accounts payable.

I wonder - which people will have to cough up their lives to the Death State, when that bill comes due?

You think Uncle will renege on  its obligation to WellPoint and McDonnel-Douglass-Boeing-ExxonMobil-SAIC-Halliburton-Chevron-ADM-Walmart-Yale-Harvard-TimeWarner-Disney?

Or will it continue to do what it does best?

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