OT – I just noticed that NED LAMONT had been added to Barbara Boxer’s Pacforachange Actblue page. I’m not sure when he was added, but he wasn’t there the last time I clicked on the link. As of this post, there have been 12 donors to him (there), totalling $482.50 hehe.

Yay Babs!

Must be because I wrote to her yesterday, saying I would not send her any more $ because of her stance concerning the lieberputz.

On this matter, I couldn’t agree less.

IMHO, America’s problem is an excess of testosterone. When Bin Laden, the toreodore, showed a red cape, Bush the Bull couldn’t charge fast enough, with most American males trailing in his dust. But the way of the successful warrior is the way of thoughtful intelligence. In 2003, twelve years after Desert Storm, the second President Bush ignored his father’s advice and invaded Iraq, ostensibly to eliminate weapons of mass destruction. But President Clinton had already achieved that objective, with neither fanfare nor U.S. casualties:

What the ancients called a clever fighter is one who not only wins, but excels in winning with ease. But his victories bring him neither reputation for wisdom nor credit for courage. For inasmuch as they are gained over circumstnces that have not come to light, the world at large knows nothing of them, and he therfore wins no reputation for wisdom; and inasmuch as the hostile state submits before there has been any bloodshed, he receives no credit for courage. [Sun Tzu, The Art of War, 400BC]

If anything, this war on terror is infected with an excess of testosterone. It’s theater of what Molly Ivins calls. “heroic masculinity,” and (most of) the poor kids in Guantanimo are simply purchased props in that horrible thearter. So are the poor kids wearing American uniforms in Iraq. And our sniveling president is quivvering in his costume, hoping to make it to the end of his term without having to admit defeat. He so badly needs to maintain his appearance of studliness.

The problem is that there is no winning a losing game. At Christmas 1990, the CIA and the State Department told his father the two possible outcomes of toppling Saddam Hussein: if the country stays together the 60% shiite majority will dominate and establish an alliance with Iran; if the country splits into three parts (shiite, sunni, and kurdish), Iran gets a piece, and Syria gets a piece, and so does Turkey. Father Bush chose to keep Suddam in power. His son chose protracted war.

When you engage in actual fighting, if victory is long in coming, […] you will exhaust your strength, and if the campaign is protracted, the resources of the state will not be equal to the strain. […] In all history, there is no instance of a country having benefited from prolonged warfare. Only one who knows the distasterous effects of a long war can realize the supreme importance of rapidity in bringing it to a close. [Sun Tzu, The Art of War, 400BC]

This kid’s phone call today was iffy; I could tell he was really on the edge. He didn’t call his dad; he called me at home during the day, very unusual for him, took me by surprise. He was really getting panicky. There’s just no good reason for all of this stress; this kid paid his dues to his nation and then some, having been kept over his expected period of active duty because of stop loss. Why can’t he simply get the support he needs to get on with his life – especially while he’s still in IRR and might yet have to serve his nation? Why does it have to be like this with folks who suffered and still suffer PTSD?

Thank goodness he came back whole in body; I hate to think what kind of a mess we’d be dealing with if he’d been physically challenged by his tour of duty in Iraq.

We all of us deserve better.

Peterr — you know, at one time I’d hoped that my stepson would be deployed to Korea. I had a staffer who’d been there just after Gulf I, who’d learned a lot from that deployment; I’d really hoped that my stepson would benefit in the same way.

Families can be so very messy, without all the additional messiness that the military adds. I hope that your friend’s buddy will come out of his tour with a positive experience and perhaps the comfort that space and time can sometimes offer. By the time he returns, his daughter will be old enough to talk in a way that she can’t now; she’ll understand so much more.

Yes, all we can do is send our best in prayers and thoughts for these folks — and hold their bosses/our employees accountable here.

Amen.