Some misc. thoughts

Careful reading of the Iraq Study Group’s report reveals that it is as was said at the beginning, that this "war" is about oil, first, last, and in between.  Iraq sits on the world’s second or third (depends on whom you ask) largest lake of oil, which is the fuel of the modern world.  Access to and control of oil is paramount to the continued economic well being of the United States, and Saddam Hussein wasn’t playing nice, so we "had" to get rid of him.

It never was really about what a brutal dictator he was.  During the Cold War, and especially during the Soviet occupation of Afganistan at the end of their rule, Iraq was a major US ally against the USSR.  The US fully supported Iraq in their war against Iran (which killed or injured millions).  The US has "hated" Iran since 1979, when the US imposed Shah of Iran was toppled and especially since the US Embassy was sacked in Tehran.

Iraq is a creation of the late British Empire, a composition of three major tribes or societal groups, now know as Sunnis, Shi-ites, and Kurds.  It is not a "natural" nation state.  Looking at conditions in Iraq now, no wonder Saddam Hussein was brutal – look what he had to deal with.  His suppression of the seemingly natural state of chaos was fine with the US as long as he didn’t get too big for his britches, but all that changed in the early 90’s when he decided to invade Kuwait, another large lake of oil.  Bush 1 was urged by the guys in power now to go all out and invade and conquer Iraq, but Bush 1 wisely felt that to do so would be to unlock Pandora’s Box and set free the violent forces which we are seeing now.

Bush 2 is a near classic case of a son trying to exceed his father.  I personally believe he is a puppet in the hands of others, that he is a dim bulb incapable of putting together much of anything without the unseen (and unacknowledged) help of others, who control his puppet strings.

More Iraqis have died during our conquest and occupation of Iraq than did in the dozen years before it.  Saddam was brutal because he had to be to stay in power, to sit on the powder keg that is Iraq.  Our stated motive for conquering him has changed as the years go by – first it was "Weapons of mass destruction", then it was "he’s a danger to the world", and now – I forget the latest justification, but it too will be gone in awhile, as the chaos mounts and soldiers die.

A great deal of the explosives used in roadside bombs and by suicide bombers in Iraq are from the stockpiles of weapons that the US and others sold to Iraq when it was an "ally" of the US, and which were pilfered in the chaos following the conquest of the country because insufficent guard was placed on the ammo dumps.  The US invasion was conducted on the "cheap" – insufficent troops were in place to deal with the destruction of Iraqi infrastucture, and no other American war has seen massive tax cuts inplemented while the war is ongoing.

These tax cuts favor the puppet masters of Bush 2, and the debts created by the war and the tax cuts will be paid by the working class and by the shrinking middle class of the US in the years to come.

I believe that Al Qaeda is largely a myth – the boogy man of the 21st century, invoked at times of convenience for the puppet masters to enable their destruction of the American system developed after WW2, which enabled large numbers of people to rise above the stations in life assigned to them.

This is the "Gilded Age 2", a reflection of the late 19th-early 20th century America, where managers and corporations and the super rich were exhaulted and made into celebrities.  There is more money than ever before available, and more and more of it is being concentrated into fewer and fewer hands.  The large scale corporate corruption is a reflection of the current "get what you can" mentality that the US has warped into.  There is more than enough out there to fully fund health care for everyone, to ensure that there are no homeless people on our streets, that every child could have a bright future – but this conflicts with the unfortunate human impulse to grab as much as one can for onself and fuck the rest.

I believe that no one is given a choice of who to be or what to be when born into life; that we are born into fortune or not on the whim of an unknown chance, and that what we have in life are choices of who to be and how to act after our birth.  Some people make good choices, but many make the choices they think they have and damn anyone else.  A cynic would picture god or the gods shaking their heads at human folly, knowing that by working together we could make this a good life for everyone, not just the few.

It was said that anyone can grow up to be President.  I think Bush 2 is a good example of this – that even a dim bulb can be President, can go to a "good" school, make connections; can raise him/herself to the heights of American status.  I think that dim bulb has squadered a great deal of the influence the US had on world events, has wasted the surplus that was built up after the end of the Cold War, has dragged the US into and through the sewer.  I didn’t think much of Bush 1 and I think less of his sons, and pity my country and it’s fate.

Some believe that these are "the end times" and more or less willingly support the undoing of America, thinking that Armageddon is just around the corner, that the true believers will be saved and the damned will be damned to eternal hellfire.  I don’t buy that, but I do think that these can and probably will be the end times of the American influence on the world at large.

It is little wonder that we are disliked and even hated in the rest of the world.  The corporate style of "Democracy" is a mythical construct that favors the rich and well connected at the expense of everyone else.  This is so wrong – totally against what could be and should be.  I think there is a chance to save the mess we’ve made, but that it won’t happen until we are all swirling down the drain of history, and probably not even then.

 

 

In the meantime, I live my life as best I can, hurting or hindering as few as possible in their pursuit of life and it’s meaning.  I belive that I am smart enough, intelligent enough, to "do anything" I like and succed at it, but that success these days is measured by how many bodies you have trampled on your way to "success", and I chose not to do any of that.

Life is chioces, and I choose to do as little "wrong" as possible.  This is not to say that I am perfect or anywhere near it, but that I have chosen to life my life, given the ch

oices I’ve had, in the manner which suits me best.

 

 

Misc. thoughts on my night off.

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