June 17, 2014

Toon: Would I lie to you?

June 17, 2014

Charles Pierce: Open For Business

The Guardian has a solid rundown of the history of Isis, the current Hitlers against whom Huckleberry Butchmeup is hiding under the bed and on whom John McCain would like to make the big boom-boom. These seem to be authentically bad actors who, alas, were empowered at least in part by the dynamics of the clusterfck we unleashed in Iraq for the purpose of finding nuclear bombs, democracy, candy and/or flowers.

…. yes, it’s perfectly fine to remember back when the clusterfck was first beginning, and we tore down Saddam’s statue for a photo op, and then proceeded to let Baghdad descend into a chaos of violence and looting. One place that got looted was the Iraqi National Museum, and 170,000 pieces got lifted, never to be recovered. (We kept the oil ministry safe, however.) And Donald Rumsfeld, riding high as the prince of fools, said by way of explanation, “Freedom’s untidy.”

By all means, let’s listen to these people again.

Full post here: http://www.esquire.com/blogs/politics/Ancient_Aliens

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June 17, 2014

Today's Serenity Prayer

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June 17, 2014

FLASHBACK: Remember When Paul Wolfowitz Said Not to Worry About Sectarian Violence in Iraq?

This past weekend, as the crisis in Iraq intensified, Paul Wolfowitz appeared on Meet the Press to share his wisdom on the current predicament there. Wolfowitz was the deputy defense secretary and an architect of the US invasion of Iraq during the Bush-Cheney administration, and he remarked on the show that talk of sectarian violence in Iraq was misguided: "This is more than just those obscure Shia/Sunni conflict[s]." He advised that the United States should "stick with our friends, and those friends are not always perfect." Wolfowitz seemed to be suggesting that the Obama administration should stand strong with Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, despite Maliki's authoritarian, corrupt, and inept ways. But moments later Wolfowitz said, "It's a complicated situation in which you don't just come up with, 'We're going to bomb this, we're going to do that.'" And then he said, "Maliki is a big part of the problem. He's not a leader of Iraq. We need to find people there."

It was confusing. After the invasion of Iraq, the Bush crew backed a consolidation of power by the Maliki-led coalition of religious-oriented Shiite parties and decimated the Sunni establishment that had previously controlled the government and the military. And now Wolfowitz was saying that Washington should hang tough with its pal—but that its pal was also the problem. Huh? The big brain behind the Iraq war had nothing of consequence to recommend.

But the real question is, what was he doing on television anyway? Like his neocon comrades—Bill Kristol, Charles Krauthammer, Robert Kagan, and others—Wolfowitz does not deserve to be presented as an expert with important ideas about the ongoing mess. He and the rest of this gang should have had their pundit licenses revoked after the Iraq war. They got it all wrong: WMDs, the cost of the war, the consequences of the invasion. And these errors were compounded by the deaths of nearly 4,500 US service men and women—and 180,000 or more civilian Iraqi casualties. (Here's a partial list of Kristol's pre-war errors and misrepresentations.) So why care what they have to say now?

More: http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2014/06/watch-paul-wolfowitz-said-not-worry-about-sectarian-violence-iraq-bush

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June 16, 2014

Seth Rogen comments about smoking a joint...

June 16, 2014

Only in America...

June 16, 2014

The NRA has made millions selling this lie...

June 16, 2014

One of the greatest pictures taken at the White House...

President Barack Obama hugs Presidential Medal of Freedom recipient actor Sidney Poitier during the award ceremony in the East Room of the White House, on Aug. 12, 2009

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June 16, 2014

Toon: "Are the guns ok?"

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June 16, 2014

Toon: GOP Horror

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