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Thursday, October 18. 2007
Living in Fantasyland
Writing everyday has its limitations, but recently a new motivation has come into my life — Witchy, known more formally as His Witchy Woman. Just wanted to make that clear before anyone gets any notion that the old Timbini has found the love of his life.
Just to be perfectly clear, the love of my life will have appeared in Playboy, or on Playboy’s web site, and her name has to be Roxanne or Nikki … or maybe Christina, Erica, Lindsey, Lindsay, Colleen or Spencer! I’m casting a wide net, but you get the drift. I’m living in Fantasyland, happily so, I might add.
Witchy, as her formal title implies, is a married woman, happily so, I might add and that’s something to celebrate. She has a web site, Click Here, and read it. It’s one of my favorite daily stops on the Internets. Witchy, as her informal name implies, is a witch. A nice one too! She might have a potion or spell for whatever might ail you! So, everyday for the past few it’s been my mission to publish something here.
There’s no lack of news to write about. Just today the Pentagon released information, through anonymous sources of course, they were going to call up eight National Guard units to send to Iraq and Afghanistan. Here’s the kicker: they won’t be deployed until the end of next summer. That’s August 2008. So much for a troop draw down. Apparently, seven will go to Iraq, including two full combat brigades and one to Afghanistan.
Right now there are 171,000 U.S. service personnel in Iraq and the belief is that by the time the seven guard units deploy to Iraq, there will only be 135,000 troops there — pretty much the number before the president started his escalation.
If you’re in the Guard in Hawaii, Oklahoma, North Carolina and Illinois, get ready to deploy.
Iraq is the center of attention — it has to be. Unlike the days of the Vietnam War, most people go about their daily lives almost as if the war doesn’t exist, even in an area like San Diego, which is heavily populated with military personnel and their families. Most of the young people I know, who are not in the military, don’t really think about the war because it doesn’t affect them. My nephew, 22, has a couple friends in the military, one Army and the other Navy. I’m not really sure how much he thinks about the war, but I got the distinct impression his relationship to it is tied specifically to the lives of his friends who serve. And maybe that’s as it should be, but the fact is, there are fewer of our citizens directly involved in the war than there were during Vietnam, A direct consequence of the all-volunteer military.
Of course, you will find veterans concerned about it, on both sides of the issue, and that’s because we know what it means to be separated from our families for months and even a year or more at a time and if you’re a Vietnam-era vet you know what means to have so few give a damn and so many despise you for serving. One thing I appreciate about the climate today, the vehemence against this war is directed at the ones who started it, not on the rank-and-file who actually have to do the duty. I salute every Soldier, Sailor, Airman, Marine and Guardsman serving today, whether you agree with my views or not.
The other story out of Iraq today is the Blackwater Security Company, which provides security details for diplomats and other civilians when they leave the “Green Zone” of Baghdad. A while ago they opened fire on Iraqi civilians, killing 17 in what preliminary reports say was an unprovoked attack. I know a guy who worked for Blackwater. He had a six-figure income. A few years earlier he did the same work as a military man and was paid significantly less. Would you rather be an NCO in the Army for about $25,000 a year, or be a civilian contractor making two or three times that much doing the same work in the same war zone? D’uh.
I’m too old, with a bad heart — and I’m way out of shape — but that sounds like a good deal to me. I’d slide my political views to the side for that kind of opportunity, but anyone who has served will tell you, be in the best physical shape of your life or you will surely die.
Anyway, Blackwater’s contract with the State and Defense Departments is up in May 2008 and according to the anonymous Pentagon sources, their contract will not likely be renewed. Not to fear though, there are plenty of other contract security companies ready to fill in the holes.
And, as we gear up for a military confrontation with Iran and fret about the enormous trade imbalance with China, the country that is sending us inferior goods that could kill us from their shoddy workmanship and lack of quality control, this bit of news from Iraq: the Iraqi government has awarded electricity contracts to those two countries, the biggest going to Iran. Now that’s democracy in action! What did Donald Rumsfeld say, shortly after the Hussein regime had fallen, “Freedom’s untidy, and free people are free to make mistakes and commit crimes and do bad things. Stuff happens.”
I wonder if he actually said, “Shit happens.”
When I think back to all the real happy rhetoric from the president and his backers, of how each new election in Iraq was bringing that country closer to a democracy; and with each new failing of that slowly approaching democracy, the ideals and definitions of “success” eroded, did anyone — anywhere in government — think to ask the question: will the Shi’ite majority align itself with Iran? Actually, a few did, but their voices were drowned out by the drumbeats of war.
So, our young men and women are dying in Iraq so Iran can be the dominant player in that country? None of those who created this fiasco thought about it, or at least let on that they were thinking about it, but someone must have envisioned it; over two thirds of Iraq is Shia. The neocons’ favorite Iraqi at the time, Ahmed Chalabi, is Shi’ite and was making less than clandestine trips to Tehran until it was learned he was acting as a double agent.
Chalabi is the one Iraqi who almost single-handedly convinced the Bush Administration invading Iraq would be a good thing and that Iraq would remain intact and secular. Well, Mr. Chalabi apparently got his facts wrong. Iraq will surely split into three factions and be loosely connected, if connected at all.
The Neocons once called Chalabi the “George Washington of Iraq.” Ahh … those were the days my friend, we thought they’d never end …
The kicker from the news that Iran and China will get the contracts to supply Iraq with power plants: We have sunk over five billion of our tax dollars into Iraq’s power grid since 2003. The fact that, after five billion and four years, no section of Iraq has full-time power and most of Iraq gets a couple hours a day at best seems to have escaped any wide-spread coverage in the news. Oh, we hear about it now and then, the lack of electricity, but it was in Wednesday’s New York Times that I read the facts and figures concerning the amount of money poured into Iraq’s power grid.
Makes you wonder how many billions were spent on water works that don’t work — most of Iraq doesn’t have clean water — and we learned last year and the year before the schools and hospitals that were touted as successful developments lacked things like windows, doors, furniture, floors, school supplies and of course electricity and clean water.
You gotta wonder: who the fuck is responsible for this fiasco? Well, we don’t really wonder. The buck stops with President Bush and Vice President Cheney.
Yeah, I may be living in Fantasyland when it comes to romancing Playboy models, but the fantasy of an Arab Democracy in the Middle East strongly aligned with the United States and a counterbalance to Iran, a fantasy that was sent on its way to reality five years ago when Congress gave the president authority to start this war, has resulted in hundreds of thousands of U.S. men and women going to war — and nearly four thousand giving their lives — to achieve exactly the opposite of what we were told was going to happen. And that is criminal.
Just to be perfectly clear, the love of my life will have appeared in Playboy, or on Playboy’s web site, and her name has to be Roxanne or Nikki … or maybe Christina, Erica, Lindsey, Lindsay, Colleen or Spencer! I’m casting a wide net, but you get the drift. I’m living in Fantasyland, happily so, I might add.
Witchy, as her formal title implies, is a married woman, happily so, I might add and that’s something to celebrate. She has a web site, Click Here, and read it. It’s one of my favorite daily stops on the Internets. Witchy, as her informal name implies, is a witch. A nice one too! She might have a potion or spell for whatever might ail you! So, everyday for the past few it’s been my mission to publish something here.
There’s no lack of news to write about. Just today the Pentagon released information, through anonymous sources of course, they were going to call up eight National Guard units to send to Iraq and Afghanistan. Here’s the kicker: they won’t be deployed until the end of next summer. That’s August 2008. So much for a troop draw down. Apparently, seven will go to Iraq, including two full combat brigades and one to Afghanistan.Right now there are 171,000 U.S. service personnel in Iraq and the belief is that by the time the seven guard units deploy to Iraq, there will only be 135,000 troops there — pretty much the number before the president started his escalation.
If you’re in the Guard in Hawaii, Oklahoma, North Carolina and Illinois, get ready to deploy.
Iraq is the center of attention — it has to be. Unlike the days of the Vietnam War, most people go about their daily lives almost as if the war doesn’t exist, even in an area like San Diego, which is heavily populated with military personnel and their families. Most of the young people I know, who are not in the military, don’t really think about the war because it doesn’t affect them. My nephew, 22, has a couple friends in the military, one Army and the other Navy. I’m not really sure how much he thinks about the war, but I got the distinct impression his relationship to it is tied specifically to the lives of his friends who serve. And maybe that’s as it should be, but the fact is, there are fewer of our citizens directly involved in the war than there were during Vietnam, A direct consequence of the all-volunteer military.
Of course, you will find veterans concerned about it, on both sides of the issue, and that’s because we know what it means to be separated from our families for months and even a year or more at a time and if you’re a Vietnam-era vet you know what means to have so few give a damn and so many despise you for serving. One thing I appreciate about the climate today, the vehemence against this war is directed at the ones who started it, not on the rank-and-file who actually have to do the duty. I salute every Soldier, Sailor, Airman, Marine and Guardsman serving today, whether you agree with my views or not.The other story out of Iraq today is the Blackwater Security Company, which provides security details for diplomats and other civilians when they leave the “Green Zone” of Baghdad. A while ago they opened fire on Iraqi civilians, killing 17 in what preliminary reports say was an unprovoked attack. I know a guy who worked for Blackwater. He had a six-figure income. A few years earlier he did the same work as a military man and was paid significantly less. Would you rather be an NCO in the Army for about $25,000 a year, or be a civilian contractor making two or three times that much doing the same work in the same war zone? D’uh.
I’m too old, with a bad heart — and I’m way out of shape — but that sounds like a good deal to me. I’d slide my political views to the side for that kind of opportunity, but anyone who has served will tell you, be in the best physical shape of your life or you will surely die.
Anyway, Blackwater’s contract with the State and Defense Departments is up in May 2008 and according to the anonymous Pentagon sources, their contract will not likely be renewed. Not to fear though, there are plenty of other contract security companies ready to fill in the holes.
And, as we gear up for a military confrontation with Iran and fret about the enormous trade imbalance with China, the country that is sending us inferior goods that could kill us from their shoddy workmanship and lack of quality control, this bit of news from Iraq: the Iraqi government has awarded electricity contracts to those two countries, the biggest going to Iran. Now that’s democracy in action! What did Donald Rumsfeld say, shortly after the Hussein regime had fallen, “Freedom’s untidy, and free people are free to make mistakes and commit crimes and do bad things. Stuff happens.” I wonder if he actually said, “Shit happens.”
When I think back to all the real happy rhetoric from the president and his backers, of how each new election in Iraq was bringing that country closer to a democracy; and with each new failing of that slowly approaching democracy, the ideals and definitions of “success” eroded, did anyone — anywhere in government — think to ask the question: will the Shi’ite majority align itself with Iran? Actually, a few did, but their voices were drowned out by the drumbeats of war.
So, our young men and women are dying in Iraq so Iran can be the dominant player in that country? None of those who created this fiasco thought about it, or at least let on that they were thinking about it, but someone must have envisioned it; over two thirds of Iraq is Shia. The neocons’ favorite Iraqi at the time, Ahmed Chalabi, is Shi’ite and was making less than clandestine trips to Tehran until it was learned he was acting as a double agent.
Chalabi is the one Iraqi who almost single-handedly convinced the Bush Administration invading Iraq would be a good thing and that Iraq would remain intact and secular. Well, Mr. Chalabi apparently got his facts wrong. Iraq will surely split into three factions and be loosely connected, if connected at all.
The Neocons once called Chalabi the “George Washington of Iraq.” Ahh … those were the days my friend, we thought they’d never end …
The kicker from the news that Iran and China will get the contracts to supply Iraq with power plants: We have sunk over five billion of our tax dollars into Iraq’s power grid since 2003. The fact that, after five billion and four years, no section of Iraq has full-time power and most of Iraq gets a couple hours a day at best seems to have escaped any wide-spread coverage in the news. Oh, we hear about it now and then, the lack of electricity, but it was in Wednesday’s New York Times that I read the facts and figures concerning the amount of money poured into Iraq’s power grid.Makes you wonder how many billions were spent on water works that don’t work — most of Iraq doesn’t have clean water — and we learned last year and the year before the schools and hospitals that were touted as successful developments lacked things like windows, doors, furniture, floors, school supplies and of course electricity and clean water.
You gotta wonder: who the fuck is responsible for this fiasco? Well, we don’t really wonder. The buck stops with President Bush and Vice President Cheney.
Yeah, I may be living in Fantasyland when it comes to romancing Playboy models, but the fantasy of an Arab Democracy in the Middle East strongly aligned with the United States and a counterbalance to Iran, a fantasy that was sent on its way to reality five years ago when Congress gave the president authority to start this war, has resulted in hundreds of thousands of U.S. men and women going to war — and nearly four thousand giving their lives — to achieve exactly the opposite of what we were told was going to happen. And that is criminal.
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