Thursday 24 June 2010

I'm just saying...

What’s in a word?

I had begun this post some time back as the policy of vocabulary change of the current White House administration concerns me. After the fiasco with McCrystal yesterday I am pissed.

I get it. I get it. It was stupid to allow the reporter access. But it was a special ops solider, a general with more on the ground combat time than any other current serving general, who committed a stupid political move. He is not a political man, he is a solider. He is not a stupid man, he came out of the field to attend the War College and get his advanced university degrees. But he is not a political animal – obviously.

Bringing him back to Washington like a recalcitrant schoolboy did not sit right with me – you do not treat such a warrior in such a manner. Call him to task for the dumb interview, have him apologise, and let him get back to work. I realize Obama, who is falling out of favour with this voter, had to look all in-charge but if he could have put his bloody testosterone on hold and looked at the greater good he would have accepted an apology. He ended the career of a great soldier who has sacrificed much for his country and risked his life more times than I can count. “Allowing him to resign” is the bloody same as firing him.

My feeling about the crap for brains and shit for judgement reporter shall go unmentioned.

Is no one reading his or her history? Shiva! This region has been ungovernable, undefeatable (is that a word?), and unmanageable for more years going back further in time than the written word. I think the Taliban is one of the worse regimes since my guy Genghis Khan, who came through the region, but unless we colonize Afghanistan we are never going to be able to govern it nor set up a democratic government that puts the people first. This will not happen until more people in the country want it than are too afraid to die for it. Democracy cannot be imposed, it can only be won.

I said the same thing about Iraq – if we are going, throw away the pretence, colonize the place, get it in order, then stay and run it or pull out all together and leave them to it.


President Karzai – what an idiot and why are we supporting him? Karzai controls a one km area around Kabul, or rather the western forces in country control a one km area, and that’s it. That’s it. You understand that? He has no control over the rest of the country, and like all Afghanistan politicians I have ever known, he is on the take from anyone willing to pay out.

Petraeus is an army wiener, he was in charge of Iraq and look how well that went - all I have to say on that.

The White House policy on nuclear weapons and changing the vocabulary of the War on Terror….taking out “Islamic Jihad”, “Islamic extremism” and substituting less onerous terms borders on the absurd if it was not so inherently dangerous.

Calling it something different will not make it go away; it will not protect citizens of America, Israel (who I don’t see rewording anything), France, Britain, Morocco, or any other nation. Words are important, they give an issue weight. You want to change the wording on something, how about changing the wording on the “War on Drugs”? There’s a bureaucracy that has outgrown it’s purpose, and the DEA can now only exist as an entity if there is a “WAR on Drugs” – not a lot of incentive to end off eh?

Hoover began the trend with his “First War on Crime” back in the day of Dillinger, to use an issue to build a bureaucratic empire and finance it with taxpayer dollars.

Yes, I expect a great deal of disagreement with these views, so knock yourself out. I’m still pissed.

Ciao.

8 comments:

Ian Lidster said...

I must love you, darling, because I agree with virtually every word you put down there. The inanity of the conflict applies as much to Canada as the US, and the attitude of officialdom -- at least our leading general was sacked for screwing an underling rather than bad-mouthing the boss-man, but the overall effect is the same.

scarlettscion said...

Ahem.

""Any commissioned officer who uses contemptuous words against the President, the Vice President, Congress, the Secretary of Defense, the Secretary of a military department, the Secretary of Transportation, or the Governor or legislature of any State, Territory, Commonwealth, or possession in which he is on duty or present shall be punished as a court-martial may direct."


UCMJ Acticle 88.

You KNOW this, Mom. I know you do!
The people run the military, not the other way 'round, and the whole point of Obama and Bush being the boss of men like McChyrstal is that they *are* civvies.

scarlettscion said...

...and when did you change your views on nuclear disarmament, by the way?

Not to mention the face that the last time I check, you disliked the blanket overuse of terms like "Islamic Jihad" and "Islamofascism" as much as I did....

And by the way--there is a substantial left-wing discourse in Israel, they are not all war hawks. Many are far more liberal than your average American Jew on certain issues.

I Beatrice said...

I agree with every word! I have been feeling pretty pissed-off myself with Obama lately. (And there's an expression you don't often hear from the lips pf the oh-so-genteel IBeatrice!)

It has all put me in mind a bit of the court of Henry V111 - when for a wrong word against the king, it was off to the tower with you!

lady macleod said...

Ian
Of course you love me! I am your cyber babe (she said smugly) and "the inanity of the conflict" says it well!
Thank you for coming by.


Scarlettscion
See? This is what happens when you rear a child to think!
Yes dear, I do know that "any commissioned officer..." but it still pisses me off.

Not changed my views on nuclear disarmament - but on defining when and where America will use those weapons against a threat - ie biological! Is a bad fucking idea.

Overuse of the terms yes, elimination of a proper definition - no.

I never thought or said that all in Israel (I was visiting that country before you were born) are war hawks; I was speaking of official policy.

I love you. Thank you for coming by and keeping your Mom thinking fast :-)

lady macleod said...

I Beatrice
Whoo! You ARE upset! Oh my what will the flowers in your garden do? Well said dear but lordy I hope not so bad as Henry eh?
Thank you for coming by.

I Beatrice said...

Who is Henry?

Not James I trust? He pisses off a lot of people, I know, but never, ever me.

(I tried sending this comment before, so hope it doesn't pop up twice.)

I Beatrice said...

Oh my word - how slow on the uptake am I?

You don't answer my question 'who is Henry', so I'll answer it myself. It has taken me these several days though, to work out that the Henry you speak of is of course my own (or anyway England's own) Henry V 111! I'd quite forgotten I had mentioned him.

But all the same, what a dim-wit eh?