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Politics : Stockman Scott's Political Debate Porch -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Sully- who wrote (35607)	1/18/2004 11:33:45 PM
From: laura_bush	Respond to of 89467

Military = Big Business via America's Empire of Bases By Chalmers Johnson, tomdispatch.com January 15, 2004 As distinct from other peoples, most Americans do not recognize – or do not want to recognize – that the United States dominates the world through its military power. Due to government secrecy, our citizens are often ignorant of the fact that our garrisons encircle the planet. This vast network of American bases on every continent except Antarctica actually constitutes a new form of empire – an empire of bases with its own geography not likely to be taught in any high school geography class. Without grasping the dimensions of this globe-girdling Baseworld, one can't begin to understand the size and nature of our imperial aspirations or the degree to which a new kind of militarism is undermining our constitutional order. Our military deploys well over half a million soldiers, spies, technicians, teachers, dependents, and civilian contractors in other nations. To dominate the oceans and seas of the world, we are creating some thirteen naval task forces built around aircraft carriers whose names sum up our martial heritage – Kitty Hawk, Constellation, Enterprise, John F. Kennedy, Nimitz, Dwight D. Eisenhower, Carl Vinson, Theodore Roosevelt, Abraham Lincoln, George Washington, John C. Stennis, Harry S. Truman, and Ronald Reagan. We operate numerous secret bases outside our territory to monitor what the people of the world, including our own citizens, are saying, faxing, or e-mailing to one another. Our installations abroad bring profits to civilian industries, which design and manufacture weapons for the armed forces or, like the now well-publicized Kellogg, Brown & Root company, a subsidiary of the Halliburton Corporation of Houston, undertake contract services to build and maintain our far-flung outposts. One task of such contractors is to keep uniformed members of the imperium housed in comfortable quarters, well fed, amused, and supplied with enjoyable, affordable vacation facilities. Whole sectors of the American economy have come to rely on the military for sales. On the eve of our second war on Iraq, for example, while the Defense Department was ordering up an extra ration of cruise missiles and depleted-uranium armor-piercing tank shells, it also acquired 273,000 bottles of Native Tan sunblock, almost triple its 1999 order and undoubtedly a boon to the supplier, Control Supply Company of Tulsa, Oklahoma, and its subcontractor, Sun Fun Products of Daytona Beach, Florida. Continues........ alternet.org

To: Sully- who wrote (35607)	1/18/2004 11:56:29 PM
From: laura_bush	Respond to of 89467

Bush anything but moronic, according to author Dark overtones in his malapropisms President Toronto Star Nov. 28, 2002. 05:45 AM When Mark Crispin Miller first set out to write Dyslexicon: Observations on a National Disorder, about the ever-growing catalogue of President George W. Bush's verbal gaffes, he meant it for a laugh. But what he came to realize wasn't entirely amusing. Since the 2000 presidential campaign, Miller has been compiling his own collection of Bush-isms, which have revealed, he says, a disquieting truth about what lurks behind the cock-eyed leer of the leader of the free world. He's not a moron at all — on that point, Miller and Prime Minister Jean Chrétien agree. But according to Miller, he's no friend. "I did initially intend it to be a funny book. But that was before I had a chance to read through all the transcripts," Miller, an American author and a professor of culture and communication at New York University, said recently in Toronto. ... "He's a very angry guy, a hostile guy. He's much like Nixon. So they're very, very careful to choreograph every move he makes. They don't want him anywhere near protestors, because he would lose his temper." Miller, without question, is a man with a mission — and laughter isn't it. "I call him the feel bad president, because he's all about punishment and death," he said. "It would be a grave mistake to just play him for laughs." Complete article at: bushbacklash.com

To: Sully- who wrote (35607)	1/19/2004 12:05:20 AM
From: lurqer	Read Replies (4) \| Respond to of 89467

A conversation with you reminds me of when my kids were teenagers. My sentence was But, a year ago, the Admin was claiming that Saddam then possessed large quantities of WMDs, and that as a result he was an imminent threat to his neighbors, and us. Had I known that the word "imminent" was such a sore spot for you, I would have used the word "existing". The point I was making would have been the same. I did note that your first reference included the sentence To be sure, administration sources often suggested imminence. But if the word imminent or imminence bothers you that much, let's ban it from the discussion. If you'll recall there were questions a year ago about why now? And the response was that Saddam already had the weapons so, at any time, he could attack his neighbors or give some to terrorists. Therefore, we couldn't afford to wait. You can use any word you like to apply to that argument, but it won't make the argument any less fallacious, because the weapons just weren't there. lurqer