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Jason Day is a beast!
Henrik Stenson brands US Open course dangerous after caddies hospitalized.
Conditions at Chambers Bay, a reclaimed gravel pit, have been criticised
• Two caddies needed treatment after incidents during final practice rounds
U.S. Open - Preview Day 3
Henrik Stenson has branded Chambers Bay 'dangerous' after two caddies were injured on the US Open course.
Henrik Stenson, the world No6, has branded Chambers Bay “dangerous” after his caddie and Stephen Gallacher’s bagman ended up in hospital because of on-course accidents during the final practice rounds for the US Open.
Stenson’s caddie Gareth Lord is expected to appear for Thursday’s opening round despite a fall on the 16th hole on Wednesday, which resulted in a heavy strapping being applied to his wrist and a subsequent x-ray.
Shortly afterwards, Gallacher’s bagman Damian Moore fell when walking in rough on the 6th hole and twisted an ankle. Moore’s prospects of appearing for day one at the US Open are regarded as slim after a protective cast was placed on the injury.
Chambers Bay is ready to produce its US Open champion
Read more
Lord and Moore are two of the most experienced and respected caddies in top-level golf. Their incidents highlight what has perhaps been an unacknowledged danger of Chambers Bay; scorched grasses and slopes mean precarious territory for caddies and spectators alike. The caddie fraternity is unlikely to take a positive view towards the US Open set-up, which will place significant physical demands upon them.
Stenson was quick to acknowledge such problems. The Swede said: “It’s tricky out there. You’ve got to be careful. You see that yellow grass laying down? It’s dangerous.”
Stenson told golfweek.com that he had witnessed a particularly bad fall by a scorer during a practice round at the start of US Open week. Unlike players, caddies do not wear spiked footwear, a move taken to protect greens but which raises questions on weeks such as these.
Gallacher’s management firm paid tribute to the medical assistance and back-up options provided by the USGA. A local caddie has been placed on standby for the Scottish Ryder Cup player, who is due to begin his US Open quest at 2.39pm local time on Thursday.
http://www.theguardian.com/sport/2015/jun/18/henrik-stenson-us-open-course-dangerous-caddies
I wonder who will be fired for not telling the Donald he had spittle in the corner of his mouth while he wasn't bragging. Successful in spite of himself.
http://twitchy.com/2015/06/16/what-is-that-thing-on-his-face-trumps-message-got-trumped-by-this-photos-video/
Rory, DJ, Day, R Streb, & J Donaldson...274...ty
Death Spiral
http://www.stonekettle.com/2015/06/death-spiral.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+StonekettleStation+%28Stonekettle+Station%29
This is the best Conservatives can offer America.
This cast of paranoid clowns, religious pimps, and suicidal fanatics.
I look at the GOP candidates for president I think, seriously? This, this right here, this is the best you can do?
If Jeb Bush was an airplane, it would be like attempting takeoff with one engine on fire.
Bush opens his bid for President this coming Monday with an underfunded campaign in disarray and already in damage control mode to the accompaniment of headlines that keep using the phrase “Failure To Launch.”
Starting out on the defensive? Not really the most auspicious beginning for the scion of a hereditary political dynasty and the guy who was supposed to pull Republican chestnuts out of the fire.
Still, that's better than Mike Huckabee, who apparently doesn't actually know anybody who isn’t under investigation. These two are the GOP's front runners, that’s right, the Stephen Baldwin of the Bush family and a guy who pals around with child molesters. Now, look, I’m not saying the Democratic lineup is all that spectacular either and sure, you could maybe argue Hillary Clinton also hangs out with a certain sexual predator, but at least so far the Democratic candidates aren’t in any danger of screwing up so bad they literally kill off their own party.
And that’s exactly what GOP Chairman Reince Priebus is worried about.
Wednesday on the The Laura Ingraham Show, Priebus showed no confidence whatsoever that any of the unsavory bunch in the current GOP lineup would be able win the White House in 2016. And that loss, he declared, will be the end of Republicans “as a national party.”
Ingraham: On a scale of one to ten, how do-or-die is the 2016 presidential race?”
Priebus: “Ten. Ten. Eleven. Twelve. I mean, we don’t exist as a national party if we don’t win in 2016. You can’t compete sixteen years out of the White House, it’s just not possible. ”
The end of the GOP as a national party? Aww, gee, tough break, fellas.
Republicans have nobody, no goddamned body, to blame but themselves.
The thing that worries Reince Priebus the most? It’s not that the best he can offer America is a squalling pack of unlikeable fanatics, candidates so incredibly shitty they actually make conservatives get down on their knees and pray Mitt Romney will stage a coup at the GOP National Convention and run again, it’s that his own party is about to shoot itself in the head and there’s nothing he can do about it.
You see, sometime this month, the Supreme Court of the United States will rule on King vs Burwell.
And it’s possible, even likely, that ruling will be in Republicans’ favor.
And if that happens, if conservatives win and Obama loses, it will essentially destroy the Affordable Healthcare Act – i.e. Obamacare.
That victory, should it happen, will very likely be a pyrrhic one for the GOP – and the last one they ever win.
It’s entirely possible that victory, should it come to pass, will be the place where historians mark the demise of the Grand Old Party.
And that, that right there, is what keeps Reince Priebus awake and sweating in the night. If he wins, he loses.
You see, when the Individual Mandate – the provision of the ACA that requires every American to have healthcare insurance – went into effect in 2014, more than five million Americans signed up for health insurance. Many were overjoyed that they could finally afford healthcare for themselves and their families.
But not everybody was happy about it.
One of those people was a limo driver from Virginia, a guy named David King. King is sixty-four years old and makes a bit less than $39K per year. Before Obamacare, he didn’t have health insurance.
Now, Virginia, being the birthplace of Thomas Jefferson, liberty, and America Fuck Ya! itself, loudly told Obama to go screw himself and petulantly refused to set up a state healthcare exchange. So, in accordance with the provisions of the ACA, Washington D.C. stepped in and set up a federal exchange.
Under the ACA and against his will, David King purchased a healthcare plan with a monthly premium of $648.
$648. That’s a lot for a guy making less than $40K a year. But see King didn’t have to pay that much because under the ACA he qualified for a federal subsidy which reduced his premium to just $275 per month. Now, if you’ve ever had to buy your own insurance, you know that $275 for a sixty year old male is a pretty damned good deal indeed. And in fact, given his age it’s likely King wouldn’t be able to qualify for healthcare insurance no matter how much he paid if it wasn’t for Obamacare in the first place.
But, King, he wasn’t happy and he resented anything to do with Obama, healthcare, or federal handouts.
So he and three others sued.
And conservatives, particularly those in Congress and a number now running for president, cheered them on and offered up outspoken and enthusiastic support, both moral and financial.
Anything to stick it to Obama, right?
Of course, they have no hope of overturning the law itself, that ship sailed long ago, rather King vs Burwell is attempting to have the federal subsidy itself ruled illegal.
You see, the entire case hinges on four words, a single sentence out of a law that totals more than eleven million, five hundred and eighty-eight thousand words.
King vs Burwell contends that in the portion of the law used to calculate federal subsidies it specifically says a healthcare insurance exchange “established by the State.” The State. Literally. That’s their entire case. Those four word, “established by the state” as in a state not the federal government. Despite the fact that the rest of the law, not to mention two hundred years of legislation, make it abundantly clear that’s not what congress intended. Nevertheless, conservatives insist that’s how the law is written and therefore the subsidies are only legally available to people who are lucky enough to live in the states which chose to set up their own state-run healthcare exchanges and aren’t run by selfish assholes.
Thirty-four states opted not to create their own exchanges, including Virginia.
Thirty-four.
And if King wins in front of the Supreme court, if the Supreme Court agrees that only those in state run exchanges and not federally run exchanges qualify for the subsidy, more than six million people in thirty-four states will immediately lose their subsidies and will no longer be able to afford healthcare.
King doesn’t care. Fuck ‘em. That’s exactly what he wants.
What matters to King is that if he doesn’t get the subsidy then he doesn’t have to buy insurance at all because at his income level, $648 per month would cost him so much he would then qualify for an exemption to the Individual Mandate. He’s actually willing to stick it to six million people just so he doesn’t have buy healthcare.
And it’s worse than that, because without those six million people, the ACA goes into a death spiral.
Of course, if you’re paying attention, you realize that any minute now, David King will be eligible for Medicare.
Also, I may have forgotten to mention, King is a Vietnam Veteran, and he could get free healthcare through the VA and be exempt from having to buy healthcare insurance out of pocket at all. This entire fight is a scam – what? You thought a limo driver could fund a legal fight all the way to the Supreme Court on his own, did you? You’re so darned cute. King is nothing but a conservative stalking horse who wants to screw six million people out of medical coverage while he himself gets taken care of under a federal healthcare program.
That’s the kind of selfish self-centered scumbag Republicans championed.
Just to stick it to Obama.
Only one little problem.
You see, the majority of the states which refused to cooperate with the ACA were, naturally, red states. And the vast majority of the six million who will lose coverage? Lower middle-class white conservatives in Southern states.
According to The new Urban study:
“…the biggest regional loser from the court case would be the South. More than 60 percent of people who would lose their individual health insurance live there. Among different income groups, the largest reductions would come for those earning between 200 and 400 percent of the federal poverty level—or between about $40,000 and $80,000 for a family of three. Forty-seven percent of the people who would lose insurance have full-time jobs, and 34 percent have part-time jobs. Sixty-one percent are white. Forty-seven percent have attended at least some college. Ninety-two percent would probably describe their health as better than fair.”
In other words, the people who will get screwed the most if Republicans win King vs Burwell are … Republicans.
In an election year.
Brilliant. Just … brilliant.
The thing is, the Republican majority Congress could easily fix the situation with a single amendment, a single line of text, but hardline conservatives won’t let them do it. They’d rather 6.4 million people lose healthcare at the end of this month, most of them conservatives in the battleground states of Illinois, North Carolina, Ohio, and Wisconsin, right before the primary debates begin.
And now you know why Reince Priebus is popping anti-depressants like Tic Tacs.
John Boehner and Mitch McConnell will be thoroughly screwed if they win King vs Burwell, they’ll go down with the party boat. They’re damned if they do and damned if they don’t and they’ve got nobody to blame but themselves. If subsidies are thrown out by the court, they will either have to craft a fix to Obamacare, something that is absolutely anathema to majority of hardline conservatives, or they will have to take responsibility for millions of their most devout constituents losing healthcare coverage.
Darrell West, director of governance studies at the Brookings Institute says,
“It does create a political problem for the GOP because there could be millions of people who got health insurance as a result of ObamaCare who lose it. There’s a chance Republicans will get more of the blame because they’re in control of the House and Senate. Unless they can produce legislation, the blame will rest in their corner.”
And don’t think these disingenuous hypocritical sons of bitches don’t know it either.
Wisconsin Senator Ron Johnson who is facing a tough reelection in the swing state of Wisconsin wants to extend subsidies until August 2017. Thirty-one Republican senators have co-sponsored the measure, including Mitch McConnell.
Johnson says,
“My bill is a transition piece of legislation that will allow the American people a voice in what our health care system will look like beyond the 2016 election. It acknowledges political realities by preventing turmoil and disruptions should the Supreme Court rule subsidies cannot be paid through federal exchanges.”
Transition.
Transition piece of legislation.
Right.
Remember how they called Obama’s “If you like your health care plan, you'll be able to keep your health care plan” the lie of the year? Well that fib has nothing on Ron Johnson. Because while Obama believed what he was saying, Johnson is lying directly to your face and he knows it. What Johnson isn’t telling you is that his bill has some very dire consequences. It’s nothing but a bribe, a payoff, to republican voters.
Johnson’s bill is not designed to let you keep your healthcare, it’s designed to let you keep your healthcare just long enough to get Johnson and his cronies reelected.
Once he’s safely returned to office, the bill phases out federal subsidies and replaces them with … nothing. Fuck you.
If Johnson’s bill passes, more than six million people will lose their healthcare as soon as the election is over.
But it’s worse than that.
Johnson’s bill would not only get rid of federal tax credits in states with federally run exchanges, it would also eliminate them in states that set up their own exchanges, drastically increasing the number of Americans without healthcare insurance. More, Johnson’s bill would eventually eliminate the Individual Mandate, removing the ACA’s foundation, drastically driving up costs and decreasing accessibility for those who still have healthcare.
The number of people in the United States without healthcare is currently at historic lows, but if those who couldn’t afford insurance without the subsidies go back to being uninsured the number of people without coverage would almost immediately increase to record highs.
Meanwhile, Nebraska Senator Ben Sasse proposed his own similar idea, legislation that would restructure subsidies … and then gradually eliminate them over the next year and a half.
That’s right, do the math on both of these proposals and you see exactly what republicans are up to: They intend to bribe conservative voters long enough to win reelection and then screw those very same people once they are safely back in office.
Johnson, Sasse, Republicans are not even keeping it a secret, they have just exactly that much contempt for their own dimwitted fanatical base.
That said, it’s unlikely Boehner or McConnell will allow either bill to reach a vote – their hardline masters won’t allow anything that gives even the vaguest appearance of refunding Obamacare, election or no election. They’d rather lose the White House and Congress than allow that.
Republicans in fact have five plans, none of which are anywhere near ready for prime time and neither John Boehner nor Mitch McConnell have made any effort to rally their respective houses behind any one plan – with less than two weeks remaining before the hammer falls. McConnell claims to have something up in his sleeve, but he’s provided no details and there’s been no discussion or debate in the Senate.
The simple truth of the matter is that Republicans have managed to hoist themselves on their own petard.
They somehow managed to put themselves in a position where they are mortally terrified of winning in front of the supreme court.
Ironic, isn’t it?
Predictably, the only thing Republicans can agree on in the face of this looming GOP disaster is that it’s somehow all Obama’s fault.
Don Stewart, Mitch McConnell’s spokesman, attacked Obama for having no contingency plan in case the court rules for King,
“Unlike the Obama administration, which has no plan, Republicans are working to protect families from the consequences of ObamaCare.”
Right.
Protect families by leaving them uninsured and uncovered. Brilliant. Just … brilliant.
You know, America for better or for worse is country of the people, by the people and for the people. And if millions of the most hardcore conservatives lose access to medical care because the intractable sons of bitches they themselves elected to run this country would rather screw us all instead of doing their jobs, well, you know there’s a certain degree of poetic justice there.
And if those same hardcore conservatives have to get screwed, have to go sick, have to watch their kids go without access to medical care, in order to finally wake up to the damage their selfish shitty ideology has done to this country, to the world, well, there’s a certain poetic justice in that too.
And if, like Reince Priebus fears, this really is the end of the once great party of Lincoln, I will shed not one goddamned tear.
Good bye and good riddance.
Posted by Jim Wright at 11:17 AM
Frazey Ford - Done [Official Music Video]
Can Bernie Sanders Beat Hillary Clinton?
Joni Mitchell-A Case of You
Joni Mitchell Had An Aneurism In March, Remains In Serious Condition
http://jezebel.com/joni-mitchell-had-an-aneurism-in-march-remains-in-seri-1707760455
the interview in this link is very cool
Whom Will We Honor Memorial Day?
Posted on June 2, 1976 by Howard Zinn Website
Memorial Day will be celebrated … by the usual betrayal of the dead, by the hypocritical patriotism of the politicians and contractors preparing for more wars, more graves to receive more flowers on future Memorial Days. The memory of the dead deserves a different dedication. To peace, to defiance of governments.
In 1974, I was invited by Tom Winship, the editor of the Boston Globe, who had been bold enough in 1971 to print part of the top secret Pentagon Papers on the history of the Vietnam War, to write a bi-weekly column for the op-ed page of the newspaper. I did that for about a year and a half. The column below appeared June 2, 1976, in connection with that year’s Memorial Day. After it appeared, my column was canceled.
Memorial Day will be celebrated as usual, by high-speed collisions of automobiles and bodies strewn on highways and the sound of ambulance sirens throughout the land.
It will also be celebrated by the display of flags, the sound of bugles and drums, by parades and speeches and unthinking applause.
It will be celebrated by giant corporations, which make guns, bombs, fighter planes, aircraft carriers and an endless assortment of military junk and which await the $100 billion in contracts to be approved soon by Congress and the President.
There was a young woman in New Hampshire who refused to allow her husband, killed in Vietnam, to be given a military burial. She rejected the hollow ceremony ordered by those who sent him and 50,000 others to their deaths. Her courage should be cherished on Memorial Day. There were the B52 pilots who refused to fly those last vicious raids of Nixon’s and Kissinger’s war. Have any of the great universities, so quick to give honorary degrees to God-knows-whom, thought to honor those men at this Commencement time, on this Memorial Day?
No politician who voted funds for war, no business contractor for the military, no general who ordered young men into battle, no FBI man who spied on anti-war activities, should be invited to public ceremonies on this sacred day. Let the dead of past wars he honored. Let those who live pledge themselves never to embark on mass slaughter again.
“The shell had his number on it. The blood ran into the ground…Where his chest ought to have been they pinned the Congressional Medal, the DSC, the Medaille Militaire, the Belgian Croix de Guerre, the Italian gold medal, The Vitutea Militara sent by Queen Marie of Rumania. All the Washingtonians brought flowers .. Woodrow Wilson brought a bouquet of poppies.”
Those are the concluding lines of John Dos Passos angry novel 1919. Let us honor him on Memorial Day.
And also Thoreau, who went to jail to protest the Mexican War.
And Mark Twain, who denounced our war against the Filipinos at the turn of the century.
And I.F. Stone, who virtually alone among newspaper editors exposed the fraud and brutality of the Korean War.
Let us honor Martin Luther King, who refused the enticements of the White House, and the cautions of associates, and thundered against the war in Vietnam.
Memorial Day should be a day for putting flowers on graves and planting trees. Also, for destroying the weapons of death that endanger us more than they protect us, that waste our resources and threaten our children and grandchildren.
On Memorial Day we should take note that, in the name of “defense,” our taxes have been used to spend a quarter of a billion dollars on a helicopter assault ship called “the biggest floating lemon,” which was accepted by the Navy although it had over 2,000 major defects at the time of its trial cruise.
Meanwhile, there is such a shortage of housing that millions live in dilapidated sections of our cities and millions more are forced to pay high rents or high interest rates on their mortgages. There’s 90 billion for the B1 bomber, but people don’t have money to pay hospital bills.
We must be practical, say those whose practicality has consisted of a war every generation. We mustn’t deplete our defenses. Say those who have depleted our youth, stolen our resources. In the end, it is living people, not corpses, creative energy, not destructive rage, which are our only real defense, not just against other governments trying to kill us, but against our own, also trying to kill us.
Let us not set out, this Memorial Day, on the same old drunken ride to death.
Published by the Boston Globe • June 2, 1976
Republished at Common Dreams
Absolutely Nothing: A Veteran’s Savage Indictment of the Iraq War
http://aattp.org/absolutely-nothing-a-veterans-savage-indictment-of-the-iraq-war/
Posted by: Jim Wright in Most Popular on AATTP, Op-Ed, TEApublican Smack Downs, World June 14, 2014
Tragically, all we’ve fought for in Iraq, all that 4,500 American lives were shed to gain, is on the cusp, potentially, of vanishing.
– Mitt Romney, “Ideas Summit,” 6/13/2014
mission-accomplish BEST
All we fought for in Iraq.
All we fought for in Iraq is on the cusp of vanishing.
That’s what Mitt Romney says.
We fought for. We fought for. We.
Oh, so it’s we now, is it, Mitt?
We.
I must have missed you over there, but it was a busy place. We. The guy who helped set up “pro-draft” rallies and yet somehow managed to avoid service in Vietnam is upset about losing what “we” fought for? We.
Yeah, fuck you, Mitt.
And you’re all welcome to quote me on that.
Somebody stepped into my office yesterday and asked how I felt about it. He wanted to know how I felt about “losing” Iraq.
How do I feel about losing all we fought for?
I don’t know.
First, I’m going to need somebody to explain to me exactly what it was that we were fighting for.
What was it? What is it that we gained, according to Mitt Romney? And what is on the cusp of vanishing? What is that? No, really, somebody please explain it to me.
Because I’d love to know.
The Wikipedia says Operation Iraqi Freedom started on the 20th of March, 2003, which is just another reason why you shouldn’t believe anything you read in the Wikipedia (don’t, just don’t). That’s not correct, the war began a day earlier. See, I was there on the night the war really started, at precisely 2200 hours, on the 19th of March in the Northern Arabian Gulf. I was there when US Navy SEALs and Polish GROM stormed the MABOT and KAAOT oil terminals a full day before Saddam Hussein discovered that his time was finally up. In point of fact, I had arrived there four months before, a few days before Christmas in December of 2002. From the day of my arrival (and before that really) to the day the war started, and for months after, I was a Navy intelligence officer working in support of the invasion force. There’s not much I don’t know about the events leading up to war and the aftermath of the invasion.
Well, not much except for that one little detail.
Why.
All these years later, and I still don’t know why.
Oh, I mean, I know what they told us, sure, Saddam Hussein attacked America on 9-11. Right? That’s what they said, that’s what the Commander-in-Chief told us. Saddam Hussein was in league with Al Qaida, remember? The son of a bitch and his stinking nation of terrorists attacked us. The Iraqis had it coming. And Georgie Boy was going to finish what his daddy started. Hooray! Right? That’s what they said.
Except those of us in the professional intelligence community looked at each other and thought, wait, what? How the hell did we miss that? Saddam and Osama bin Laden are working together? Buwah? But Rumsfeld, he had his own little extra-constitutional intelligence outfit staffed with his simpering cronies who he paid to blow smoke up his pinched grey ass until his colon resembled beef jerky and he sure didn’t have much use for us – after all, we were just the military he had.
Ours, as they say, is not to reason why, ours is to but do and die, right? At least that’s what Rummy told us and you know, you go into war with the Secretary of Defense you have, not the one you’d like to have. And if Rumsfeld says he’s got the real scoop, it must be true? Right? Sure, that justifies his contempt for us, sure it does.
Except, Rumsfeld’s little masturbation fantasy turned out not to be the case.
But hey, never mind that, Saddam Hussein was threatening us anyway, wasn’t he? Sure he was, in fact, that’s the first time you heard the phrase “Weapons of Mass Destruction” isn’t it? The bastard had nukes and germs and war gas and he was just itching to use them on America, wasn’t he? Heck we even had pictures of “mobile weapons labs” to prove it, isn’t that what Colin Powell told the UN and the world? And by damn Saddam had been buying Yellow Cake uranium from Niger, right? Colin Powell wouldn’t lie to us, would he? He was a hero, a general, he wouldn’t send his comrades into war on a lie now would he?
Except all that turned out to be bullshit too, and Colin Powell was either a dupe of staggering proportions or he was the kind of Soldier who would fuck his buddy right in the ass without so much as a reach-around and I’ll leave it up to you to figure which one is worse.
But by the time we figured out we’d been ass-raped by Colin Powell, we were shoulder deep in Iraq, Baghdad was burning, Iraq’s army had thrown down their weapons and taken off their uniforms and had melted into the population, Saddam had vanished and his sons were dead, and the President of the United States had already declared victory from the deck of an American aircraft carrier.
And so, the objective became … what?
Hearts and minds and freedom and democracy and nation building and magic bunnies who fart sunshine and rainbows.
Unfortunately, it turns out we’re real good at the blowing shit up part, not so good at the magic bunnies part.
Which in retrospect, shouldn’t be all that surprising – given that in order to build a civilization it helps if you actually have some vague familiarity with the people involved. Needless to say, we didn’t. And we didn’t care. To America, they were all little brown towelheads, sand niggers, raggedy-assed camel jockeys who ought to be grateful to America for burning down their shitty country. Sunni? Shia? Turkman? Baathists? What’s that? What do you mean they hate each other? They’re all Muslims aren’t they? They’re all Aayrabs, right? What do you mean they hate each other? And it all fell apart, disintegrating into insurgency and murder and bloody civil war – just exactly as anybody who actually knew something about the region and its people and its history could have told you it would. We lost less than a hundred soldiers in the actual war, the “peace” cost us nearly 5000 more. And the Iraqis? Who the hell knows? A hundred thousand? A million? It’s impossible to tell.
And it turns out that freedom and democracy and magic flying bunnies were as elusive as Iraq’s supposed WMDs.
So, what was it again that we were fighting for?
They had no idea what we were fighting for, those saber-rattling Chicken Hawks, the cowardly connected wealthy weasels who’d managed to avoid serving in their own war, who kept their children out of uniform, but just couldn’t wait to send us into one of their own making. They sent us off with parades and marching bands and cheering crowds … and brought the bodies home in secret, hidden away from the TV cameras and the public.
They had no plan and no idea what we were dying for, but they assured us what the war wasn’t about – it wasn’t about religion.
Oh no, sir, we weren’t fighting to eradicate Muslims, it wasn’t about Islam.
The Evangelical Christian religious extremists who started this war told us it wasn’t about religion.
Heh heh, riiiiiight. And Vietnam was really about containing communism. Sure.
Maybe they should have had Colin Powell tell that wopper to the UN, but he’d quit by then and was suddenly as invisible to America as those flag draped metal boxes arriving at Dover Air Force base in the middle of the night.
Americans who a few years before had been proudly waving their little flags as Johnny marched off to war were suddenly all shifty-eyed, they slapped a $5 dollar made in China magnet on the bumper of their giant gas-sucking SUVs, Support Our Troops, and with sardonically raised eyebrows complained to each other over the pumps about the immorality of a war fought for oil.
But that wasn’t true either, was it?
Iraq’s oil fields, the ones we fought and died to preserve on orders from the White House, the off-shore terminals the SEALs and the GROM risked their lives to save on that night back in 2003, the precious Iraqi oil that was going to pay for the war and pay to rebuild the country we’d blown up, well, that oil is nowhere to be found today, is it?
So, tell me again, what exactly is it that’s on the “cusp of vanishing?”
I mean it sure isn’t peace.
It’s not freedom for the Iraqi people, despite the war’s idiotic name.
It sure isn’t regional stability.
It’s not the end of terrorism or the near universal hatred of America in the Middle East.
And now that Halliburton and KBR and Blackwater and Dick Cheney have made their billions and cashed out, it isn’t even about long-term economic investments and American business.
Hell, it’s not even about cheap gas.
So, go on, enlighten me. Because even though I was there, I’ve got no goddamned idea what it is that we’ve lost in Iraq beyond the 4,487 men and women we shipped home in metal boxes, beyond the 32,223 wounded and maimed, beyond the trillions of dollars we spent in our rage and our drive for revenge and our lust for blood.
Today, John McCain and Mitt Romney and the rest of the conservative war machine are railing against the President.
McCain stirred from the yellow fog of his bamboo cage and proclaimed in his best Old Man Yelling At Clouds voice, “We won Iraq! Obama lost it!”
Really Johnny Walnuts? Tell me, what did we win? And what have we lost? Please be specific, because I’d really like to know.
We no more “won” Iraq than McCain’s own father “won” Vietnam.
McCain claims he “predicted” the sectarian violence now tearing Iraq apart. Really? Where the hell was clairvoyant John McCain back in 2003 when he voted along with the rest of them to send us into war? And later, where was his great predictive ability when Iraq began tearing itself apart? I guess he was at a Dixie Chicks concert, he must have been out in the lobby ordering a plate of Freedom Fries when his pal George W. Bush let Iraq disintegrate into civil war.
And so here we are.
The same old motley cast of characters, the warhawks and the chickenhawks and the billionaires and the simple-minded saber-rattlers and the same old hate-filled pundits, they just can’t wait to jump back into Iraq.
Mitt Romney, John McCain, one who never served and one who damned well ought to know better, men who both wanted to be President of the United States and who both lost to Barack Obama, they just can’t wait to send other people’s kids back into the meat grinder.
Here’s my question.
Why?
Why, John McCain?
Why, Mitt Romney?
Why, conservatives?
This time you fuckers goddamned well tell me why.
What’s the goal? What’s the objective? Is it to end terrorism? Is it to enforce peace at the muzzle of a gun? Is it it to make defense contractors rich? Is it for jobs? Or is it for magic flying bunnies who shoot rainbows and cheap gasoline out of their little assholes to the sound of Yankee Doodle Dandy?
Or, or, is it just because you hate Barack Obama?
That’s it, isn’t it?
It is.
You sons of bitches one and all, you simpering capering madmen, this time at least have the courage to face the cameras, to look into America’s eyes, and tell them that their sons and daughters will be dying because you John McCain, because you Mitt Romney, because you Dick Cheney, because you Donald Rumsfeld, because you George W. Bush you lying bastard, because you conservatives hate Barack Obama…and for no other reason.
Go on, tell us, go on. Wave your little flags and beat your fleshy chests, roll out the marching bands and tell us just how many more American soldiers should die. Go on, put a number on it. Ten? A hundred? Fifty four thousand? How many of us have to die? How many more bodies will it take to satiate your mindless hunger for blood and revenge? How many more American lives are worth your insane hatred of the president? How many? How much further into debt should we drive our nation, another trillion dollars? Two? Ten? A hundred? Put a price on it you insane sons of bitches, go on, give me a number, write me a check. Tell me how much you’re willing to pay, show me the goddamned money. How many more years? How many? One? Five? Another decade? Fifty? What is it? Don’t wave your hands and make some vague prognostication, give me a number, how many lives, how much money, how many years? You look us in the eye and you fucking tell us.
I’ll tell you what, let’s go back to Iraq.
Oh, yes, let us do that.
I’ll dig out my uniform and strap on my pistol and gird up my sword and ride into battle yet again.
Just so long as Donald Rumsfeld, Dick Cheney, George W. Bush, Rush Limbaugh, Anne Coulter, Glenn Beck, Michael Savage, Paul Ryan, Sarah Palin, Rick Perry, and every single one of those powdered, Botoxed talking heads at Fox News are in the vanguard. That’s right, you cowards, you put on a uniform and you lead the charge this time around. The Koch brothers and Mitt Romney can pay for it, every goddamned penny, we’ll bleed them until they’re dry and then we’ll pull the gold fillings from their teeth to pay for it right along with the rest of their Wall Street cronies. You fuckers got rich off the last one, you can damned well pay for this one. And when you run out of money, we’ll take your blood, fair’s fair.
Strap John McCain into the cockpit of an A-4 Skyhawk and let him fly air cover.
If he gets himself shot down and taken prisoner again, well, you know what? Fuck him, leave him to the enemy because frankly his hate and bile and raging insanity have done more damage to this country than Bowe Bergdahl ever did.
The terrorists can keep him.
Peace love and understanding tell me
Is there no place for them today
They say we must fight to keep our freedom
But Lord knows there’s got to be a better way
War what is it good for
Absolutely nothing…
– Edwin Starr, “War” 1969
me too, cheers
Christian values on display in Ireland today....Good job Brig and Paddy!
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/05/23/world/europe/for-one-irish-couple-backing-gay-marriage-is-a-matter-of-family-values.html?_r=0
nice! ..... the 1st tee calls...enjoy the day
Voice 2015 - Blake, Adam, Pharrell & Christina: "The Thrill Is Gone"
I think they did a hellofa job with this BB King tribute....
great version Star.....
hope all is well in your world.
Jer
Spencer Davis Group Every Little Bit Hurts
thx for the share, I remember way back when I first heard him, thought to myself....yup another black group gonna be huge. Then when I heard he was a 17 year old white kid I was speechless for a week.
I couldn't get the album fast enough!
one song is all the trigger I needed, I'm on a young Stevie Winwood binge.
Let Me Down Easy - The Spencer Davis Group
Georgia on My Mind Spencer Davis Group
Spencer Davis Group - Til the End Of Time Live Dec 1966
André Rieu - Adiós Nonino (Farewell father) Watch this one if you can. Wow!
2014 Jeffrey Osborne Golf Classic Sing-Off
BARRY WHITE LIANE FOLY JUST THE WAY YOU ARE
ICE ICE BABY cover by Marty Ray Project
mirrors, they were doing it with mirrors....wow magical
Andy nails it.
http://www.newyorker.com/humor/borowitz-report/desperate-residents-of-austin-completely-surrounded-by-texas
AUSTIN (The Borowitz Report) – In a deepening humanitarian crisis, residents of the city of Austin report that they are completely surrounded by Texas, a situation that locals are calling “dire.”
Austin has traditionally enjoyed freedoms as a semi-autonomous region, hosting film festivals and literary events without the interference of its hostile neighbors, but there are growing fears that those days may be coming to an end.
Alarmingly, citizens of Austin report, extremists within the city limits have taken over the Capitol Building and installed a militant government with dominion over its residents.
In recent days, Austin has made desperate requests for assistance to the U.S. military, which will be conducting exercises in Texas in July.
The city is hoping that the United States will use its military might to liberate the isolated municipality and transform it into an independent state along the lines of Kurdistan.
But those who live in this besieged city are growing increasingly desperate as they await military aid. In the words of one resident, “We feel so alone here.”
McIlroy, Day, D.Johnson, J Walker, & R Palmer. 274
thx for the game
boggles the mind
I love to listen to his first hand stories and
occasionally ask the dumb questions that he permits from me. wow I can relate, reminds me of our conversations here.
frikin love Rock Steady, great ear worm
how cool to have that shit in the memory bank, thx for sharin
another great album...Aretha Franklin - Young, Gifted and Black ATLANTIC (1972) Full LP
do you recall which Aretha record that was?
Chain of Fools?????
guess that explains why I liked them so much, not sure if I dislike anything Atlantic
AWB never sounded so good. not sure why that album wasn't a huge success.
nice, I'm a fan of Bernies, hell who was putting money on Barack at first.
how did I never hear this album? nice!
will definitely check it out, was talking with my friend from England today about AWB, was a bit surprised that they were a Scottish band, did not know that.