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Perpetual war is here — and Americans are getting used to it

Cold Highway

Cold Highway

Dispenser of Negativity
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Republican and Democratic members of Congress met with Mr. Obama at the White House this week to deliver their exhortations, all of them promising to back whatever decision is reached, and the president saying he'll need some time to make his decision. That was to be expected, considering that it took him eight months to figure out what kind of dog to get for his daughters. The one thing he has promised - and this certainly feeds the public's resignation about the war - is that he won't, under any circumstance, withdraw from Afghanistan.
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Long live the American empire. :roll:

Perpetual war is here — and Americans are getting used to it -- baltimoresun.com
 
PeteEU said:
Dude, America has been at war under every single President since at least Carter if not before. It is not something new...
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The level of propaganda and visibility of war is new though. A lot of things are taken care of "behind the scenes" sort of speak. Clinton bombed a bunch of people, but we weren't outright invading. Troops were places, but we didn't have such a visible war, made visible by the government and protected by the government. I think there needs to be a lot of changes. The US has engaged in interventionist policies for a long time and has been in conflict for a long time. The outright war we're currently running, the forever war we seem to be setting up is probably one of the most dangerous things we've had in some time. We have to end the war, end the vast majority of our interventionism policies, end black ops and things of that nature, end the forever war. Forever war never leads to good places.
 
On the upside it keeps a substantial portion of U.S. soldiers with actual combat experience.

That could serve us well in the future.

Unlike in 1983 when some U.S. Army Rangers actually panicked when under fire for the first time...in Grenada.
 
Ikari said:
We have to end the war, end the vast majority of our interventionism policies, end black ops and things of that nature, end the forever war. Forever war never leads to good places.
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Ridiculous. It is what built us as a modern day Superpower and the world is a much better place for it. Let's not go all isolationist, although that is a strong political thread in our history. We have been is a close constant state of war since the founding of our country. We are an expansionist power. We need to continue to export democracy, take down bad regimes and set the world on the straight and narrow.
 
I don't know where you find basis for that sort of comment, though I suppose it's good that you're sufficiently candid so that others on this board can note the mentality of interventionists while lacking actual power to implement your favored policies. Regardless, U.S. ruling administrations have traditionally been and continue to be among the foremost of political regimes directly or indirectly responsible for anti-democratic coups and support of dictatorial political conditions throughout the world. This pattern has been particularly stark in Latin America, with the CIA-backed removals of democratically elected leftists Jacobo Arbenz in Guatemala and Salvador Allende in Chile (who was to be replaced by the brutal military dictator Augusto Pinochet), and support of the Contras and the Somoza family of Nicaragua, Manuel Noriega of Panama, Rafael Trujillo of the Dominican Republic, the Duvalier father and son pair of Haiti, Fulgencio Batista of Cuba, etc.
 
Agnapostate said:
I don't know where you find basis for that sort of comment, though I suppose it's good that you're sufficiently candid so that others on this board can note the mentality of interventionists while lacking actual power to implement your favored policies. Regardless, U.S. ruling administrations have traditionally been and continue to be among the foremost of political regimes directly or indirectly responsible for anti-democratic coups and support of dictatorial political conditions throughout the world. This pattern has been particularly stark in Latin America, with the CIA-backed removals of democratically elected leftists Jacobo Arbenz in Guatemala and Salvador Allende in Chile (who was to be replaced by the brutal military dictator Augusto Pinochet), and support of the Contras and the Somoza family of Nicaragua, Manuel Noriega of Panama, Rafael Trujillo of the Dominican Republic, the Duvalier father and son pair of Haiti, Fulgencio Batista of Cuba, etc.
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Pinochet killed at most a couple of hundred people per year on the average.

That makes him a liberal progressive compared to most communist dictators.
 
Dayton3 said:
Pinochet killed at most a couple of hundred people per year on the average.

That makes him a liberal progressive compared to most communist dictators.
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"Communist dictator" is an obvious oxymoron considering the fact that communism involves the abolition of money, markets, and the state. The fact that you're familiar with nothing but the Western contrivance of a "communist state" doesn't speak well for the objectivity of your perspective, which is why I'm not surprised to see you fail to condemn authoritarianism here.
 
Agnapostate said:
"Communist dictator" is an obvious oxymoron considering the fact that communism involves the abolition of money, markets, and the state. The fact that you're familiar with nothing but the Western contrivance of a "communist state" doesn't speak well for the objectivity of your perspective, which is why I'm not surprised to see you fail to condemn authoritarianism here.
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No govt. has ever fully abolished money, markets, or the state.

As communist advocates are fond of saying "there has never been a true communist state".

By "communist dictator" I'm referring to any dictators who proclaim themselves "communist", "socialist", or accepted support from the Soviet bloc.
 
Dayton3 said:
No govt. has ever fully abolished money, markets, or the state.

As communist advocates are fond of saying "there has never been a true communist state".

By "communist dictator" I'm referring to any dictators who proclaim themselves "communist", "socialist", or accepted support from the Soviet bloc.
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It's probably excessive to claim that communism itself has never existed; I'd say that it was probably existent in the rural parts of Aragon during the Spanish Civil War. However, it's not inaccurate to note that "communist dictator" is an oxymoron just as "socialist dictator" is because of the fact that both socialism and its specific communist variant necessitate participatory collective ownership and management to a degree incompatible with dictatorship. The "socialist" self-descriptions of many authoritarian political regimes were used as crude appeals to populist sentiments and should not be accepted without challenge any more than the Chinese Communist Party's reference to China as a "people's republic" should.
 
Dayton3 said:
Pinochet killed at most a couple of hundred people per year on the average.

That makes him a liberal progressive compared to most communist dictators.
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Pinochet killed at least 500 people per year. Higher estimates would put the rate at 1700 per year. Moreover, much of the killing was concentrated in the early on during his rule. Thousands of people were tortured, killed in public executions and their bodies were just dumped in the streets. Deaths like those of songwriter and guitar Victor Jara were agonizing. He was beaten and tortured. Bones in his hands and ribs were broken, while soldiers mocked him and told him to play is guitar. They then killed him with a machine gun in the soccer stadium. There are at least 10,000 of these terrifying and tragic stories.

These deaths shouldn't be belittled to make a point. By belittling these deaths you are not giving more importance to the suffering under other brutal regimes. 200 deaths of perfectly per year for 17 years is an underestimation. Still insinuating that the underestimation is a tolerable threshold is still an attempt to legitimate repression and the terror that came with it.
 
I've always felt that the war in Middle East is largely about resources. The next generation will see an increase in resource based wars, more so than in the past... especially when it comes to water.
 
reefedjib said:
Ridiculous. It is what built us as a modern day Superpower and the world is a much better place for it. Let's not go all isolationist, although that is a strong political thread in our history. We have been is a close constant state of war since the founding of our country. We are an expansionist power. We need to continue to export democracy, take down bad regimes and set the world on the straight and narrow.
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Yea? Are you willing to risk your own life for that? Your son or daughter?
 
Also, no one was advocating isolationism; it's non-interventionism, which is different.
 
I don't believe so. Americans will put an end to the current broad-based war on terrorism with or without a measure of success. Patience is already running thin with Afghanistan (to my disagreement, but it is a growing reality), and Iraq was obvious.

There will come a point in the next few years where Americans will reevaluate the entire venture and what its measure for American interest and security will be. It is more or less built into the republican and democratic ideal.
 
Ethereal said:
Okay? Are you willing to sacrifice your life in order to bring democracy to a foreign country? How about your son or daughter?
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Yes........
 
Ethereal said:
Okay? Are you willing to sacrifice your life in order to bring democracy to a foreign country? How about your son or daughter?
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A son yes.

But daughter no. Women should not be in combat.
 
Fiddytree said:
Patience is already running thin with Afghanistan (to my disagreement, but it is a growing reality), and Iraq was obvious.
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Fiddytree, could you talk about your disagreement to leaving Afghanistan? I recommended we do that (leave Afghan.) in another thread. I just don't see how we can help establish a stable political situation, which I view as the objective. Pashtuns are just too influential and not playing ball.
 
reefedjib said:
Why not? If it is their choice...
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Please don't derail this thread going down the discussion of women in combat. There are many other threads addressing this topic.
 
Polynikes said:
Please don't derail this thread going down the discussion of women in combat. There are many other threads addressing this topic.
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I haven't seen those, and I don't mean to derail.
 
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