Me: Frank Lynch. Bio These are my daily rants, mostly political. For something less spontaneous, I maintain The Samuel Johnson Sound Bite Page (over 1,800 Johnson quotes), perhaps your best online resource for insight into his thinking.
Current standings for our weekly Set competition (2010):
13 Leslie
10 JL
4 Me
4 weeks called.
Leslie won week 31, and this is my worst year evuh.
Bio: Born 1957, raised in Florida, moved to New York area in 1982; now live in Brooklyn. Married, with one daughter. I work in marketing research for Abt SRBI. My opinions should not be construed as representing those of my employer.
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Wednesday, September 1, 2010
Obama's big "Come Together." No segment of America deserves more praise for what we've done in Iraq than our troops. Not only have they done everything we've asked and done it admirably, but they did so even though we asked far too much of them. While President Obama wants us to praise them and move on to looking forward, we can't really fully praise them without appreciating how much we asked; and we can't appreciate how much we asked while at the same time trying to look the other way about the behavior of the Bush Administration.
Think of the extended tours, the too-brief interstices between tours; think about the stop loss which was instituted. Think about the lack of armor, think about Rumsfeld's callous remarks in his Q&A with the troops. Think about how our time in Iraq was not only unnecessary from the start (more on that...) but also prolonged because of disarray. Think about the ineffective structure we put in, full of twenty-somethings from the right think tanks or who had the right conservative profile. All this happened because of too little planning and too much wishful thinking.
We asked our troops to do all they did under these very difficult circumstances. We, the people, owe them our thanks. Our government owes them an apology.
As for Obama's interest in turning the page, this is getting rather annoying. As he himself said in his speech, this has been a very expensive war. It not only distracted us from capturing OBL, but it also cost the lives of over 4,400 US troops, and used money which could have gone towards investing in our future... or universal health care... If we all agree that these are foregone opportunities, it behooves us to make sure that we don't repeat this mistake in the future. The Left understands this principle, and they understand how much Bush et al got wrong. It's not clear yet how much of the Right understands this, and so I'm not for turning the page yet. To keep the book metaphor, how about if we watch two timelines at once? The elementary school kids do this when they read "Holes;" surely it's something adults are capable of?
Before her mike went out last night, Rachel Maddow was doing a very good job of recounting the flimsy excuses for war which were put out by the Bush Administration, from Bush, Cheney, Wolfowitz, and so on. And Olbermann led into Obama's speech with a reminder that after 9/11, Rumsfeld liked hitting Iraq more than Afghanistan because it had "better targets."
But this didn't all blossom full-grown as a result of 9/11: the interest in invading Iraq was there before 9/11. This needs to be remembered. The Project for a New American Century was on Clinton because they didn't think sanctions were getting them the regime change they wanted, and they advocated war. And Bush met with Hawks about Iraq before he was elected. And Paul O'Neill reported that Iraq was an agenda item on the very first cabinet meeting of 2001.
This did not start with 9/11; it was waiting to be pursued.
Mr. President, we disrespect our troops if we turn the page without making this completely clear. We cannot misuse our troops again.
Snarky faces. Tonight Ab and I watched Michael Moore's "Capitalism: A Love Story." The movie has been out for a long time, and I don't think I can add much about its broad themes and execution. But I do think I can add something substantial about one moment. There's a point where Moore interviews Bernie Sanders, Vermont's socialist Senator. This happens about 80% through the movie, after several tales of corporate greed, revolving doors, Wall Street's hands in Senate pockets, and so on. Sanders talks about how so much of America is underappreciated and underpaid - - the bedrock of teachers, etc.
It reminded me of an off-site I attended when I worked at American Express; based on the location, I know it was pre-9/11. This was when I'd moved on from the market research department and had moved into a research-ish role in the internet marketing group. We had this circle time moment where we each had to identify someone in the company we admired. Reasonable enough. Some people mentioned a boss a few levels up, others mentioned Harvey Golub, others mentioned Ken Chenault. I said I admired the guy who ran us through the fire drills: it was always the same guy, he knew his stuff, and it was his job to make sure we knew what to do in an emergency. I hate to say "the youngsters," but I will: the youngsters snickered over my not picking out some golden calf.
Again, this was pre-9/11. I'm sure there would have been less snark on Sep 13.
Businesses will love this. Joe Miller, candidate for Senate from Alaska, wants to cut the federal deficit by having all the responsibilities devolve to the states. Imagine the patchwork of regulations which businesses would have to cope with, as each state set up its own standards. (And of course, this is to say nothing about the additional taxpayer burden of the redundancies, with each state setting up its own systems. Unless, of course, Miller wants a taxpayer revolt which would lead to minimal regulation.)
Murfreesboro, TN, is absolutely not Islamophobic. But somebody there decided to start a fire at the site of a planned mosque.
I'm sure the site of the arson was randomly chosen. Right, Jonah?
UPDATE: While we're talking about torching, let's remember how ugly it can get. The Miami Herald has an article this morning on a historian's efforts to tell the story of the Rosewood massacre. And with the reactions some people are having to mosques moving into their neighborhoods, it's clear that the evil that engulfed Rosewood still exists today. Then, it was false rape accusations; today it's false fears of terrorism camps.
Are we looking for that last "Honest Man" to lead Afghanistan? Apparently he won't be left standing. And when a graft fighting official (read that link) is fired for fighting graft - - a trait you might associate with patriotism - - well, you have to wonder what kind of nation we expect to leave when we finally leave. I'm not suggesting we leave later, I'm wondering why we didn't do that "a pox upon them all" finger and just leave sooner. The Taliban will be worse; but if we thought we could achieve something better, we didn't do it.
This fired prosecutor deserves someting far better than we can't give. We're just not in a position to give him something akin to "Founding Father" status. That's up to the Afghans. His laudable "prophet in the wilderness" stance is falling on deaf ears, and will likely be relegated to the same shadows as Burke's impeachment of Hastings. Other things to talk about in the history books, move on.
"I'm a big fan of Glenn Beck," said Sanchez, a registered Republican, sitting in her walker in front of the memorial's first step. "He is opening our eyes, teaching us the history we didn't learn in school."
Yeah, well, one of the reasons you didn't learn Glenn Beck's American history in school is because it didn't happen. And it would have been helpful if the Washington Post had interjected that instead of just relating an acolyte's quote. Beck thinks we bought Alaska in the 1950's for its oil (yes, the 1950's... Seward's Folly must have been some kind of musical revue). He's also come out against Fascism from one side of his mouth while praising Henry Ford from the other.
Sarah Palin's imagined threats. Today at the Beck-o-rama:
"Say what you want to say about me, but I raised a combat vet, and you can't take that away from me," Ms. Palin said.
So far as I know, no one has tried to. There's too many opportunities elsewhere. And I also have to ask: is there significance to having raised a "combat" vet? Is serving in a peaceful capacity something to denegrate?
The NRA says "none of the above" for NV Senator. They won't endorse "Second Amendment Remedies" touter Sharron Angle, and object to Harry Reid. It's weird: Reid has had a number of gun-friendly votes, but his SCOTUS votes appear to have rankled them. So you would think they're applying a litmus test. But if so, why not endorse Angle? Do they think there will be no more Obama nominees to the court?
Home-grown terrorists. Not sure how this will shake out in the end, but some evidence a judge struck suggested an FBI agent was working to make sure his target broke the law. Not trying to suggest the accused are angels, but when the Feds are watering the plants...
