War, Economy Can’t Be Decoupled
By Rep. Ron Paul

What is the importance of the war in Iraq relative to other current issues? This is a question I am often asked, especially as Americans continue to become increasingly aware that something is very wrong with the economy. The difficulty with the way the question is often asked relates to the perception that we are somehow able to divide such issues, or to isolate the cost of war into arbitrarily defined areas such as national security or international relations. War is an all-encompassing governmental activity. The impact of war on our ability to defend ourselves from future attack, and upon America’s standing in the world, is only a mere fraction of the total overall effect that war has on our nation and the policies of its government.

The cost of this particular war is enormous, and therefore it’s of great importance. There is no single issue that is more important at this particular time. The war has, of course, made us less safe as a nation and damaged our credibility with allies and hostile nations alike. Moreover, years of growing deficits have been spurred on by the high price tag of war, and the decision to pay that price primarily by supplemental spending rather than traditional “on-budget” accounting.

War takes what would otherwise be productive economic capacity and transfers both that capacity and the wealth it would generate in normal, peaceful times into far less economically viable activities. It also impacts budget priorities in ways that are detrimental to our nation. I have often pointed to the fact that we are building bridges in Iraq while they are collapsing in the United States .

All war, but most particularly war funded by monetary inflation, bleeds a country in multiple ways. Obviously, many of the young people who are in the military literally give their blood, and sometimes their lives, fighting in wars of this type. Meanwhile, those who do not fight the war, but fund it, are forced to pay both the immediate costs, as well as seeing their long-term purchasing power erode, as the twin pillars of debt and inflation are foisted upon the backs of current taxpayers and future generations. Neither conspiracy nor coincidence explains steep increases in the price of gas as the war drags on. No, this is simply a reality of the inflationary policies that, among other things, make this war possible.

As people are continually asked to choose whether our nation’s teetering economy or the failed foreign policy of the past several decades is more important as we look forward, it is well for those of us who understand that these two issues are closely linked to continue to explain this fact to our fellow citizens. To fix the problem requires a proper diagnosis.

Tom Engelhardt presents this clear and lucid piece revealing all the hocus-pocus surrounding the administration’s specious claims about the efficacy of their ’surge’ and the corporate media’s complicity in propagating them. Another excellent and sobering work from Engelhardt.

Think of the top officials of the Bush administration as magicians when it comes to Iraq. Their top hats and tails may be worn and their act fraying, but it doesn’t seem to matter. Their latest “abracadabra,” the President’s “surge strategy” of 2007, has still worked like a charm. They waved their magic wands, paid off and armed a bunch of former Sunni insurgents and al-Qaeda terrorists (about 80,000 “concerned citizens,” as the President likes to call them), and magically lowered “violence” in Iraq. Even more miraculously, they made a country that they had already turned into a cesspool and a slagheap — its capital now has a “lake” of sewage so large that it can be viewed “as a big black spot on Google Earth” — almost entirely disappear from view in the U.S.

Of course, what they needed to be effective was that classic adjunct to any magician’s act, the perfect assistant. This has been a role long held, and still played with mysterious willingness, by the mainstream media.”

————-

The administration that rashly invaded Iraq, used it as a laboratory for any cockamamie scheme that came to mind, and threw money away profligately in one of the more flagrantly corrupt enterprises in recent history, now wants us to believe that future planning for draw-downs or withdrawals must be based on the need to preserve whatever we brought — and are still bringing — into the country.

In the land the Bush administration “liberated,” violence remains at a staggering daily level ; electricity is a luxury ; the national medical-care system has been largely destroyed ; perhaps 4.5 million Iraqis have either fled the country or become internally displaced persons; approximately 70% lack access to clean water; and 4 million, according to the UN , don’t know where their next meal is coming from. Yet, even with such a record before us, the logic of the moment in Washington and in the media remains clear: The last thing we should be doing is getting out of the country with any alacrity. After all, if we do, a disaster, a bloodbath, even genocide might happen.

Put another way, the most self-interested party in the “withdrawal” debate continues to set the terms of that debate. Imagine if, in football, the quarterback calling plays for his team also had the power to assess penalties, declare first downs, and decide whether a ball was caught in or out of bounds.

Read the complete essay Making Iraq Disappear: The Million-Year War

This video pretty much sums it up. So do you feel like you’re getting your money’s worth?

if you have a few more moments and feeling like weighing in on this situation, you can sign this petition to Congress to defund the Iraq War and to re-fund human needs at home and in Iraq.

An American veteran of Iraq takes issue with Mike Huckabee’s declarations about how the war in Iraq must be continued ‘for’ the troops’ ‘honor’. As detailed by this former combat soldier, there is no ‘honor’ regarding the situation there. For one, this combat veteran explains how he thought we were fighting for ‘freedom’ and ‘democracy’, not honor. He also goes on to point out that regardless of this discrepancy, this war has nothing to do with ‘honor’ or ‘freedom’ or any some such, but instead is predominantly about economic profiteering multinational corporations such as KBR and geopolitical strategy for enabling a fatally delusional Neo-Con wet dream of American empire.

Watch The Video

Additionally, Huckabee’s comments are dangerous on many levels, but most notably to me is his insistence that “United We Stand” in America means we must unite behind The Leader and national policy, no matter how criminally misguided and dangerous it is. To Huckabee, to be an American in the 21st Century is no different than the responsibilities of being an Italian in the 30’s or a German in the early 40’s. Pretty disturbing stuff, especially the hearty applause he receives for making such comments by all the ‘Good Germans’ who seem to make up the membership of the modern GOP.

Update: It seems the video file has been pulled. Hopefully the Iraq veteran who originally posted it will be able to re-post it or update it.

The Detroit Metro Times’ Curt Guyette and W. Kim Heron ask arms expert Scott Ritter why he is so sure the US plans to attack Iran. This interview is highly enlightening and informative, and a must-read for people who care about the future potentiality of another war-of-choice by the current American regime.

John H. Richardson’s “The Secret History of the Impending War With Iran That the White House Doesn’t Want You to Know” in the November issue of Esquire magazine is particularly eye-opening. Richardson, using two former high-ranking Middle East experts who worked for the White House as his primary sources, warns that the Bush administration is “headed straight for war with Iran” and that “it had been set on this course for years.”

———–

First of all you have to note, from the public side, that very few Americans actually function as citizens anymore. What I mean by that are people who invest themselves in this country, people who care, who give a damn. Americans are primarily consumers today, and so long as they continue to wrap themselves in the cocoon of comfort, and the system keeps them walking down a road to the perceived path of prosperity, they don’t want to rock the boat. If it doesn’t have a direct impact on their day-to-day existence, they simply don’t care.

There’s a minority of people who do, but the majority of Americans don’t. And if the people don’t care — and remember, the people are the constituents — if the constituents don’t care, then those they elect to higher office won’t feel the pressure to change.

———–

It’s not just supporting Israel. It’s not just taking down Saddam. It’s about geopolitics. It’s about looking down the road toward China and India, the world’s two largest developing economies, especially the Chinese, and the absolute fear that this resurgent Chinese economy brings in the hearts of American industrialists and the need to dictate the pace of Chinese economic development by controlling their access to energy. And controlling central Asian and Middle East energy areas is key in the strategic thinking of the Bush administration.

So, there’s a lot of complexity at play here. But you say why do they want to do this? It’s about as Condoleezza Rice continuously says before the U.S. Congress: It’s about regional transformation, inclusive of regime change. It turns the Middle East into a sphere of interest that we have tremendous control over. That’s what’s behind all this.

Note: This interview was done before the release of the 2007 National Intelligence Estimate on Iran that states there is no evidence Iran has a nuclear weapons program underway.

Read The Interview

Here’s an ever-relevant oldie from Truthout delving into the sordid and hypocritical history of American policy towards Iran and Iraq. The page also contains related writings from Michael Klare of TomDispatch.com.

This is important reading in giving some better perspective on the full nature of the real issues we are facing in the half-concocted threat of Iran.

“Memory is a complicated thing,” says Barbara Kingsolver in her novel Animal Dreams. “It’s a relative of truth but not its twin.”

The deadly missile attack on the USS Stark was unleashed by a Mirage F-1 jet - flown by an Iraqi pilot who mistook the U.S. warship for an Iranian vessel. At that moment, Saddam Hussein’s Iraq and Ayatollah Khomeini’s Iran were in the seventh year of a war that had begun in 1980 with a surprise Iraqi invasion.

The act of aggression that claimed the lives of the Stark’s precious men and women in uniform elicited a fierce barrage of angry denunciation from the United States. The assault was despicable, villainous, and depraved. These were the words of a bellicose U.S. establishment and they were aimed - at Iran.

Glory to the gospel of perpetual dividends. This was the 1980s, after all; a time when the Reagan administration was still busy fondling Saddam Hussein.

There would be no counter-strike at Iraq, of course. Not then. And the angriest criticism would come from Secretary of State Caspar Weinberger, who described the attack as “indiscriminate.” “Apparently,” said Weinberger, the Iraqi pilot “didn’t care enough to find out what ship he was shooting at.”

“We’ve never considered them hostile at all,” was the way President Ronald Reagan described Saddam’s military. “They’ve never been in any way hostile… And the villain in the piece is Iran.”

Read The Articles

Phil steps up to the plate once again with his provocative and wrenching film “Body of War”, premiering the fall of 2007 around the nation and the world (co-created with Ellen Spiro).

This from The New York Observer…

Mr. Donahue was in from Connecticut for the afternoon to put the final touches on his first feature-length documentary, Body of War. Mr. Donahue recently described the movie as a “non-nuanced, anti–Iraq War documentary,” about a “heartland kid who suddenly went from a social life of single bars and courtship to a daily routine of catheters, puke pans and erectile dysfunction.”

“Little Miss Sunshine, we are not,” said Mr. Donahue.

So far, Mr. Donahue doesn’t have a distributor for the film, which he has financed with his own money. He hopes to begin showing Body of War at film festivals by the end of the summer. The market for Iraq documentaries, said Mr. Donahue, was growing more crowded by the day, but he felt confident that his would stand out. “There are no tanks in this movie,” said Mr. Donahue. “No Humvees. Nothing that goes BOOM.”

“This is Baby Jessica in the well in Texas,” said Mr. Donahue.

Body of War focuses narrowly on the physical and political struggles of Tomas Young, an injured veteran adjusting to life in a wheelchair. Mr. Young, a freckle-faced twentysomething native of Kansas City, Mo., joined the Army a few days after Sept. 11. He had expected to fight in Afghanistan. Instead, he went to Iraq. On his fifth day in combat, he was patrolling Sadr City when a shot ripped through him.

Read more on the film from this write up in Variety

John DeFore also comments on the film for Reuters Here, which includes some video clips from the film.

That was then, this is now.

You know what they say, ‘9/11 Changed Everything.’

Watch The Video

The top story in the Guardian of the U.K, but not mentioned in US papers.

It serves to highlight yet one more aspect of the whole sordid, part Machiavelli,
part Rube Goldberg policy devices the neo-cons and Busheviks in Washington are employing. This, like all these kinds of ‘games’, are doomed to failure. Its truly sad, and so completely unnecessary, especially the incalculable costs to life and treasure that this is entailing for people everywhere.

The US military has embarked on a new and risky strategy in Iraq by arming Sunni insurgents in the hope that they will tackle the extremist al-Qaida in Iraq.

The US high command this month gave permission to its officers on the ground to negotiate arms deals with local leaders. Arms, ammunition, body armour and other equipment, as well as cash, pick-up trucks and fuel, have already been handed over in return for promises to turn on al-Qaida and not attack US troops.

The US military in Baghdad is trying to portray the move as arming disenchanted Sunnis who are rising up in their neighbourhoods against their former allies, al-Qaida and its foreign fighters. But the reality on the ground is more complex, with little sign that the US will be able to control the weapons once they are handed over. The danger is that the insurgents could use these weapons against American troops or in the civil conflict against Shia Muslims. Similar efforts by the US in other wars have backfired, the most spectacular being the arming of guerrillas against the Soviet Union in Afghanistan.

Read The Full Article

Boston University professor Andrew J. Bacevich publicly ruminates in an article in The Washington Post over the death of his son in Iraq, and pinpoints the true nature of this war’s cost, the cynicism behind its supporters and the cause for its continuation.

Bacevich gets to the point here…

To whom do Kennedy, Kerry and Lynch listen? We know the answer: to the same people who have the ear of George W. Bush and Karl Rove - namely, wealthy individuals and institutions.

Money buys access and influence. Money greases the process that will yield us a new president in 2008. When it comes to Iraq, money ensures that the concerns of big business, big oil, bellicose evangelicals and Middle East allies gain a hearing. By comparison, the lives of U.S. soldiers figure as an afterthought.

Memorial Day orators will say that a G.I.’s life is priceless. Don’t believe it. I know what value the U.S. government assigns to a soldier’s life: I’ve been handed the check. It’s roughly what the Yankees will pay Roger Clemens per inning once he starts pitching next month.

Money maintains the Republican/Democratic duopoly of trivialized politics. It confines the debate over U.S. policy to well-hewn channels. It preserves intact the cliches of 1933-45 about isolationism, appeasement and the nation’s call to “global leadership.” It inhibits any serious accounting of exactly how much our misadventure in Iraq is costing. It ignores completely the question of who actually pays. It negates democracy, rendering free speech little more than a means of recording dissent.

This is not some great conspiracy. It’s the way our system works.

Bingo.

Read The Full Article