Seen on the street in Kyiv.

Words of Advice:

"If Something Seems To Be Too Good To Be True, It's Best To Shoot It, Just In Case." -- Fiona Glenanne

“The Mob takes the Fifth. If you’re innocent, why are you taking the Fifth Amendment?” -- The TOFF *

"Foreign Relations Boil Down to Two Things: Talking With People or Killing Them." -- Unknown

“Speed is a poor substitute for accuracy.” -- Real, no-shit, fortune from a fortune cookie

"If you believe that you are talking to G-d, you can justify anything.” — my Dad

"Colt .45s; putting bad guys in the ground since 1873." -- Unknown

"Stay Strapped or Get Clapped." -- probably not Mr. Rogers

"The Dildo of Karma rarely comes lubed." -- Unknown

"Eck!" -- George the Cat

* "TOFF" = Treasonous Orange Fat Fuck, A/K/A Dolt-45,
A/K/A Commandante (or Cadet) Bone Spurs,
A/K/A El Caudillo de Mar-a-Lago, A/K/A the Asset., A/K/A P01135809

Monday, September 11, 2017

Sixteen Years On

Which means that there are kids getting their drivers' licenses this month who were born in September of 2001.

Here are a couple of retrospective posts that I wrote years ago. Also one I wrote from a Jewish perspective. And what we, as a country, have lost.

To steal from the last link:
In Year Ten Sixteen of the [Afghan] war, the best that the commanders can say at the Five O'Clock Follies is that "tangible progress" has been made. Many more American fighting men and women will be killed and maimed. At least another trillion dollars will be spent. There is no end in sight for this war.
Sixteen years on. The Middle East remains a chaotic mess due to the aftermath of the Iraq War, a completely unnecessary endeavor. As I wrote in some of the posts linked above, thanks to the ignoring of the situation in Afghanistan for seven years, any chance of securing that country was squandered.

At home, we surrendered rights and liberties without much debate because we took a sucker punch. There has been no serious attempt to repeal or roll back the Bush Police State Patriot Act. The Republicans have been foaming to repeal health insurance because health insurance is tyranny. But allowing the Feds to search though your bank records without a warrant isn't tyranny, I guess. Neither are "sneak-and-peak" searches, nope, no tyranny there. The United States became a nation that resorted to torturing people. A significant percentage of Trump's base is pro-torture. Nobody has ever been held accountable for ordering people to be tortured. The doctors and psychologists who helped oversee torture and, in a couple of cases, designed torture regimes, remain unpunished and in practice to this day. Americans are the "good little Germans" of the 21st Century.

When it comes to civil liberties and freedoms, 9-11 was a defeat for Americans. Between massive deficit spending on the military (always a favorite of the GOP when they have the checkbook) and instability in the Middle East that has its roots in what the United States did post 9-11, it can be fairly argued that al Qaeda accomplished most of its goals for the attacks.

Even though he now rests in a watery grave in the Indian Ocean, the true victor of 9-11 was Osama bin Ladin.

UPDATE: From the comments section:

13 comments:

B said...

I cannot argue with any of this.

Ten Bears said...

Sucks aeh? Don't need a tattoo.

Tod Germanica said...

A brilliant asymmetrical victory by Bin Laden who read the GOP perfectly. Who we made into a martyr by the grandstanding Seals, every one of which wrote a best-selling tell-all book and a screenplay in the standard Sarah Palin, grifter GOP, American Sniper mode. It's the American way, 'Navy Seals-Secretely Blow off the Heads of our Nation's Enemies and Then Blab and Get Rich.' Our many, many teams of paid assassins belive secrecy is outmoded when fortunes can be made.

Comrade Misfit said...

"Don't need a tattoo"... explain, if you please.

Ten Bears said...

To never forget.

Nangleator said...

The biggest, most destructive, and most dangerous vehicle they took control of and crashed into America was the Congress.

Marc said...

I remember, days afterword, pundits saying nobody could have imagined that scenario. I was screaming at the TV Tom Clancy had written a book about using a jet as a guided missile to take out the government. With 'curveball' and all the other failures from our national 'leadership', Operation Iraqi Liberation was a great success for those who sold it - the rest of the country was just there to pay the bill.

3383 said...

Debt of Honor", yes.
I think the surprise was not expecting suicide hijackings coupled with our banning of 4" Pirates of the Caribbean toy flintlock pistols but not box cutters.

Comrade Misfit said...

The Running Man, 1982, ends with the protagonist flying a DC-10 into a skyscraper to kill his antagonist.

dinthebeast said...

And we're still using the AUMF they passed to justify the wars we fight, even ones that don't have a damn thing to do with the attack. Something like 37 military operations in 14 countries.
Barbara Lee has been trying to repeal that AUMF since it passed, and this year she managed to get it into an appropriations bill in committee, only to have Ryan strip it out without a vote.
9-11 has, among other things, been turned into an ATM for defense contractors who tend to be the ones who get rich off of our over-reaction to it.
Then there's this:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WXToviObdoA

"We think we can make ourselves safer by making ourselves less free. I'll tell you something: When you make yourself less free, all that happens afterward is that you are less free, you are not safer."

-Doug in Oakland

Ten Bears said...

The Towering Inferno didn't collapse.

Stewart Dean said...

And hey, boys and girls, guess what? Bin Laden's son is stepping up to the plate and he's pissed. This from West Point:
https://ctc.usma.edu/posts/hamza-bin-ladin-from-steadfast-son-to-al-qaidas-leader-in-waiting

That's America, winning friends and influencing people the world over.

dinthebeast said...

Stewart: I was wondering what would come in to fill the power vacuum being created by the squashing of ISIS. Interesting read.

-Doug in Oakland