COLLECTIVE MADNESS


“Soft despotism is a term coined by Alexis de Tocqueville describing the state into which a country overrun by "a network of small complicated rules" might degrade. Soft despotism is different from despotism (also called 'hard despotism') in the sense that it is not obvious to the people."

Tuesday, February 19, 2013

“Since Bush 1, when some of us began to argue loudly that a mindless ideological pursuit of free trade would imperil America’s industrial base, the total of U.S. trade deficits in goods with the world is approaching $10 trillion — 10 thousand billion dollars!"




BUCHANAN: WHO KILLED THE MIDDLE CLASS?


By: Patrick J. Buchanan
2/19/2013 02:15 AM

“It is our generation’s task, then, to reignite the true engine of America’s economic growth — a rising, thriving middle class.”
So said Barack Obama in his State of the Union.
And for one of his ideas to reignite that engine, Republicans applauded.
“And tonight, I am announcing that we will launch talks on a comprehensive Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership with the European Union — because trade that is free and fair across the Atlantic supports millions of good-paying American jobs.”
One wonders if any of those in the hall who rose robotically at the phrase “free and fair” were aware of the trade results just in from 2012.
What were the 2012 figures for the European Union?
U.S. exports to Europe fell, imports from Europe rose, and our trade deficit with the EU shot up 16 percent to $116 billion.
We ran a trade deficit with Italy of $20 billion, with Ireland of $25 billion, with Germany of $60 billion. The Europeans are eating our lunch.
What about South Korea, the country with whom we signed a free-trade deal in 2012?
U.S. exports to Korea fell last year, and due to a surge in imports our trade deficit in goods with South Korea soared 25 percent to $16.6 billion.
Seoul’s trade minister who cut that deal and cleaned our clock should get a medal and the kind of bonus Americans reserve for people like hedge fund managers and the folks who ran Fannie and Freddie.
And Japan? Last year, Nippon ran a $76 billion trade surplus with the United States, second largest of any country.
But that is insufficient for Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, who has bullied the Bank of Japan to drive down the yen 20 percent against the dollar in three months — to increase exports to America and cut imports.
Look for the U.S. trade deficit with Tokyo to explode.
What about that NAFTA treaty the establishments of both parties heralded in the Clinton era? How has that worked out for Uncle Sam?
Last year, the United States ran a trade deficit of $32 billion with Canada and twice that, $61 billion, with Mexico.
What was America’s overall trade position in 2012?
We ran a global trade deficit in goods of $736 billion. That is 5 percent of the U.S. economy. We are hemorrhaging jobs, factories, wealth.
In banking, consulting, lawyering — i.e., services — we had a nice surplus. That’s what we Americans do now.
Since Bush 1, when some of us began to argue loudly that a mindless ideological pursuit of free trade would imperil America’s industrial base, the total of U.S. trade deficits in goods with the world is approaching $10 trillion — 10 thousand billion dollars!
Might this humongous dumping of foreign goods into the U.S.A., killing our factories, and the liberation of our transnational elite to close plants, outsource production, and bring foreign-made goods back free of charge into the U.S. market, have had something to do with killing the middle class?
The U.S. median income stopped growing in the mid-1970s, the same time we began to run 40 straight years of ever-expanding trade deficits.
And how are we doing with China?
Well, if one reads the weekend Wall Street Journal, Feb. 9-10, on page A3 in the lower left-hand corner is a box with a story headlined, “Trade Gap Shrinks 21 Percent as Oil Imports Decline.”
A positive headline, but about December only. In the 10th paragraph, however, was this tiny item: “Although the trade deficit with China narrowed 15.5 percent in December … the year-long deficit grew to a record.”
“Grew to a record”? What did that mean?
Elsewhere, one learns that the U.S. trade deficit in goods with China was not only an all-time record, but the largest between any two nations in the history of the world — $315 billion.
China now exports 6.3 times as much in manufactured goods to the United States, $417 billion’s worth, as we export to China.
Over two decades, Republicans in the lead, America granted Beijing most favored nation status, then permanent normal trade relations. Then we squired Beijing into the World Trade Organization.
And since the courtship began, the trade surpluses China has run with the United States have enriched, empowered and emboldened her so that, today, brimming with ethnonational arrogance, China has laid claim to all the islands in the South and East China seas and is telling the U.S. Navy to stay out of the Yellow Sea and Formosa Strait.
And the free-trade fanatics responsible for building up this Asian colossus challenging us in the Pacific now tell us we must “pivot” — i.e., shift — our planes, ships and troops out of Europe and the Mideast to Asia and the Western Pacific to contain the mighty and mammoth power their stupidity created.
Every nation seems to understand what our baby boomers were never taught. A trade balance is a measure of national power that reliably identifies rising and falling nations.

76 comments:

  1. This guy nails it:

    XSANDIEGOCA • 14 hours ago
    Perot was right! Remember that Giant Sucking Sound? It's louder than ever. What was the debt at that time? 1-2 Trillion? How quaint! Just 20 years ago...seems like only yesterday. Look at it now. What is ironic is whom Perot debated. Why it was none other than the sneering, condescending fakir, Al Gore, who just sold his TV network to Al Jazeera for Big Bucks. This underscores the point. When it comes to Free and Fair Trade, the elites have manage to skim the cream off the top. Life at that level has never been better, supassing the Gilded Age! The masses have had to content themselves with cheap goodies made by foreign slave labor. We have an economy where profits have been privatized and costs have been socialized. Now we have the prospect of 75MM Baby Boomers advancing with hands outstretched looking for their Social Security and Medicare. We might have been able to finesse it with a vibrant economy but we don't have it. Looming immediately in front of us is the 100 foot ObamaCare Tsunami that we neither understand nor can afford. Throw in some "comprehensive immigration reform" and 30MM new patients, who will bring in another 30MM new patients within 5 years, and you have the receipe for a complete financial collapse. The OverSeas Money Masters are growing weary of Bearded Ben debasing the collateral. All the Saudis and Russians have to do is tie their oil to gold and it will be game over for America. It is obvious we must erect tariffs and mandate that if you sell it here you make it here. It is obvious we must drill here and drill now. Alas, I have come to the reluctant conclusion our government is incapable of dealing with this challege for the simple reason that so many of them have sold out. As for the benighted Middle Class, it is toast. Bread and Circus Time ... but what will happen when the bread gives out? We are about to find out. Martial Law, anyone?

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  2. On the previous post, i was challenged for changing on my support for our idiotic military adventurism throughout the Middle East. Someone has not been paying attention. The sad fact is that every year we become poorer, less informed, dumber and less free. I am not interested in the idiotic stories in MSM and am sick of the deceptions and the lies by the elites that run this country for the benefit of themselves and their clique.

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    Replies
    1. It's the one sidedness. And I think lives might have been saved by the intervention rather than not.

      Opinions would differ, I am sure.

      Whether this kind of thing should be thought of as being covered by the authorization to use force I don't really know. We didn't actually do all that much, and more American lives were lost at Benghazi, four, than in the intervention itself, which I recall as being zero. Though I suppose one could consider Benghazi as being part of the package.

      Delete
    2. .

      Right, as long as no American lives were shed what does it matter? The money invested? Who cares? We can always print more. And look at all the good will it has bought us. Sure our actions probably cost more lives than we said we were going to save, but heck, at least we did something.

      Oorah!

      .

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    3. What you are saying is you don't give a flip about lives in Libya, or about the 70,000 dead in Syria.

      Fine with me, many people agree with you. Including American Thinker, concerning Syria, below.

      heh

      Now I notice you are down from "no doubt" to "probably cost more lives than we said we were going to save".

      Keep thinking about it, I know it is hard, and you might someday come to the realization that more lives were saved by the intervention overall than lost. Now if the country were divided up in an amicable divorce, future conflict might be avoided. Who knows? Maybe not, they are all an emotional and wild people. It might be worth a try. Just a suggestion.

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    4. .

      What you are saying is you don't give a flip about lives in Libya, or about the 70,000 dead in Syria.

      More nonsense. I've already told you 10,000 potential deaths we were told to expect in Benghazi was a number someone pulled out of their ass, a trinket for the sheeple. Funny how no one ever asked them how they came up with that number instead of 8,000 or 15,000. Well, at least we tried? The fact that there are many more deaths in Libya due to our intervention than the initial 10,000 projection? Well, I guess shit happens. We tried.

      As for Syria, I ask you the same question I asked you yesterday,

      Intervention?

      Intervene for who? Assad? Iran? The Islamists? The Jihadists? The Muslim Brotherhood? Hezbollah? The Alawis? The Shia? The Sunni? The Kurds? The Syrian Girl Scouts? We haven't a clue who the 'good' guys are or even if there are any. It's just as it was/is in Libya.


      But hey, if you have a clue, why don't you let us know. On the other hand, I guess we could give it a try. I'm mean we have screwed up every other place we have intervened. It's almost like the law of averages would be on our side.

      It might be worth a try.

      Sure, like we tried in Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya, Egypt, like we've tried all the way back to Vietnam. Well, at least we tried. Thousands of lives lost, millions of refugees created, trillions of dollars spent, but hey, we tried.

      And the 70,000 lives lost in Syria? Sounds terrible. At least until you put it in perspective. The opportunity costs for the $ trillions we've wasted in similar misadventures? The millions of lives that could have been saved by spending that money on desease control programs, or food or water projects, or if you are not inclined to go maudlin over humanitarian efforts, think of the infrastructure that could have been built or refurbished in this country, the numbers employed. But hey, at least we tried. What's a few trillion bucks?

      And look at all the friends we have created through our efforts. I'd post the latest polls on how we are viewed throughout the ME but you've seen them before.

      It might be worth a try.

      Pathetic.

      This is the last post I make to you on the subject. Our views are way too divergent to reach any consensus on the issue.

      .

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    5. This comment has been removed by the author.

      Delete
    6. Looks like Bob won another argument, the slickers having left the range for the bunkhouse.

      Buck

      Delete
    7. I've already told you 10,000 potential deaths we were told to expect in Benghazi was a number someone pulled out of their ass, a trinket for the sheeple. Funny how no one ever asked them how they came up with that number instead of 8,000 or 15,000.

      I don't care what you've told me.

      I want to ask you - how did you come to your numbers? You must have some, otherwise you wouldn't be able to say with such - growing uncertainty - that more lives were lost because of the intervention than saved.

      I know where you got them - you pulled them out of your ass.

      Delete
    8. .

      Chicken.

      How much time can a sane person waste on a doofus like you?

      Revisit Einstein's discription of insanity. It might help if you looked it up in The Great Big Book of Neat Quotes (recommended ages 3 to 5). Get your wife or daughter to read it to you.

      As for my numbers look them up. I've provided links to them here before.

      .

      Delete
    9. One can't put exact numbers on lives saved. It's not that kind of argument. The idea, doofus, is that by stopping the fighting, lives were saved. How many exactly no one can ever know. Just like we don't actually know how many died during the fighting.

      I know this is hard to understand for you.

      If you put numbers up, then you got your numbers out of someone else's ass.

      Delete
    10. .

      And who is one to believe in Libya?

      I merely took the low estimate of deaths wich was higher than Hillary and Obama said would be massacred in Benghazi. If you think less were killed cite the source and show how they came up with their numbers.

      In July 2011, the International Contact Group on Libya, made up of NATO and Arab League countries and other nations, recognised the National Transitional Council (NTC) as the legitimate government of Libya. On 22 August 2011, rebel forces entered Tripoli and on 20 October 2011, Gaddafi was confirmed killed. Three days later, the NTC declard Libya "liberated" and NATO officially ended its mission on 31 October 2011. The conflict has reportedly cost the lives of between 12,700 and 25,000 people and caused around 900,000 to become refugees. The number of civilian casualties due to NATO airstrikes remains contested.

      Others have said it's possible 100,000 would eventually be found. that's based on the fact they were still uncovering mass graves, 20 here 30 there. I ignored this type of estimate.

      A more reasonable estimate, IMO, comes from the new Libyan government, a US ally who I doubt would want to exaggerate the death toll (note that they revised their estimate of the deaths from 30,000 to 25,000 as they verified more information.)

      At least 30,000 people were killed and 50,000 wounded in Libya's six-month civil war, the interim health minister said, offering a first detailed estimate of the high cost in lives of bringing down Moammar Gadhafi.

      There have been rough estimates in the past, but Naji Barakat, the health minister in the new Libyan leadership, said his figures are based, in part, on reporting from hospitals, local officials and former rebel commanders...


      The Guardian

      If you cut the numbers in half, you still have more than we said we were going to save. Plus they explain where they got their numbers from.

      You admit you haven't a clue how many people we 'saved', if any. The current government is weak and hasn't the resources to reign in the various militias that rule most of the country. How much killing is going on is anyones guess but you want to start the whole process over again in Syria.

      Brilliant.

      .

      Delete
  3. The spokeswoman said Kerry thinks of the trip, his first since taking over from Clinton on February 1, as a “listening tour” that will allow him to touch base with key allies in Europe and the Middle East and to focus on the upheavals in the Arab world.

    ...

    Since the street revolution that toppled former Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak two years ago, Egypt has witnessed constant political strife among Islamists, secularists and former regime supporters.

    The country’s economy has steadily deteriorated, with foreign exchange reserves dwindling, tourism drying up and the currency, the Egyptian pound, having lost 14 percent of its value since the 2011 revolt.

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  4. On this day in 1847, the first rescuers arrived at a lake in the Sierra Nevada Mountains in California, where a group of pioneers from Illinois, the Donner Party, had gotten stranded. The spectacular tales of the party’s travails, including cannibalism, captivated the nation.

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  5. All the Saudis and Russians have to do is tie their oil to gold and it will be game over for America

    Which is exactly what Libya tried to do. The only thing holding the dollar up is OIL. The US must fight tooth and nail to keep the petro dollar the only currency with which to by oil. Otherwise, game over, at least for the US dollar anyway. Scary? You bet your ass.

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    Replies
    1. I'm starting to think that moron Obama might actually nix the Canadian pipeline. If he does I think it shows he really is out to simply harm the United States, no argument. It is half built, and everything is in place to go.

      Delete
  6. https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=_-5nXod4H_k

    Sometimes the calf beats the cutting horse.

    :)

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  7. Lordy, that article by Buchanan is just one stinking huge pile of sour grapes. The USA is having trouble competition and he foams at the mouth yelling about a lack of market stifling protectionism. Who would have think such a guy would embrace old school Soviet crap?

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    Replies
    1. Goddamn phone!

      Competition = competing

      Think = thunk

      Delete
    2. Hey, Ash, did you catch on about the authorization to use force? I was trying to help you out with your 'no war declared' non sense.

      Delete
    3. Herman Cain just said on Fox "we have a severe ignorance problem in this country". Just trying to help.

      And he says another four years of suffering may wake people up. He still has faith that enough people will wake up, and "get out of the Ignorance Zone".

      Delete
  8. Beheading comes to the United States -

    Authorities in New Jersey allege a Muslim man beheaded two Coptic Christians, burying their bodies and heads and hands in separate graves near Philadelphia, bringing the horror of the persecution of Christians in Islamic nations to the United States.

    According to New York’s WABC-TV, the Muslim was identified as Yusuf Ibrahim, 28. He was taken into custody after the bodies were found.


    The report said investigators alleged Ibrahim killed the victims then severed their heads and hands, and buried the remains in the back yard of a home in Buena Vista, N.J.


    Read more at http://www.wnd.com/2013/02/muslim-accused-of-beheading-2-christians-in-u-s/#iGOGVpGU03vidu6h.99



    All cultures are not equal in worth.

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  9. SALLISAW, Okla. (CBS Houston/AP) — Sequoyah County authorities say a man who died in a fire at his home may have spontaneously combusted.

    Danny Vanzandt, 66, died in the blaze on Monday.

    Sequoyah County Sheriff Ron Lockhart says several neighbors entered the home when they saw smoke and assumed trash had caught fire. Then they realized a person was burning.

    Lockhart said the remains were in the kitchen and there was no other damage in the home. The sheriff says there was no apparent source of the fire.

    “This is a case that I’ve never seen before,” Lockhart told KFSM-TV.

    Authorities say the man had a history of heavy drinking and smoking.

    No cause of the fire has been determined and Lockhart says spontaneous combustion has not been ruled out.

    “I think there’s only about 200 cases worldwide, and I’m not saying this happened. I’m just saying that we haven’t ruled it out,” Lockhart told KFSM.

    The body was sent to the state Medical Examiner’s Office in Tulsa for an autopsy.

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  10. With less than two weeks to go before the latest fiscal face-off, rhetoric heated up Tuesday as the political parties exchanged fire over whom to blame if looming spending cuts take effect.

    With Congress in recess this week, Republican and Democratic leaders sent lawmakers home armed with fact sheets about the $85 billion in across-the-board federal spending cuts due to start March 1, and talking points on how to blame the other side. Meantime, the White House and lawmakers are making no progress toward forging a compromise to avoid the reductions, which are known in Washington as the sequester.

    ReplyDelete
  11. Damn American Thinker, just a bunch of f_ _ king troglodyte neo-cons -

    February 19, 2013
    Obama rethinking arming Syrian rebels
    Rick Moran

    Because arming the Libyan rebels worked out so well.

    New York Times:

    When President Obama rebuffed four of his top national security officials who wanted to arm the rebels in Syria last fall, he put an end to a months of debate over how aggressively Washington should respond to the strife there that has now left nearly 70,000 dead.

    But the decision also left the White House with no clear strategy to resolve a crisis that has bedeviled it since a popular uprising erupted against President Bashar al-Assad almost two years ago. Despite an American program of nonlethal assistance to the opponents of the Syrian government and $365 million in humanitarian aid, Mr. Obama appears to be running out of ways to speed Mr. Assad's exit.

    With conditions continuing to deteriorate, officials could reopen the debate over providing weapons to select members of the resistance in an effort to break the impasse in Syria. The question is whether a wary Mr. Obama, surrounded by a new national security team, would come to a different conclusion.

    "This is not a closed decision," a senior administration official said. "As the situation evolves, as our confidence increases, we might revisit it."

    Mr. Obama's decision not to provide arms when the proposal was broached before the November election, officials said, was driven by his reluctance to get drawn into a proxy war and by his fear that the weapons would end up in unreliable hands, where they could be used against civilians or Israeli and American interests.

    As the United States struggles to formulate a policy, however, Mr. Assad has given no sign that he is ready to yield power, and the Syrian resistance has been adamant that it will not negotiate a transition in which he has a role.

    The opposition is still hopelessly divided (the Muslim Brotherhood is the only organized faction in the new opposition group), and jihadists from as far away as Pakistan continue to join with the Free Syrian Army to help defeat President Assad.

    It is inevitable that any increase in the flow of arms, as well as their sophistication, will only help the jihadists in any post-Assad political environment. ((Obama may see that as a plus, however, given his support for the Muslim Brotherhood elsewhere.)) Nor is it likely that any increase in weapons we give to the rebels will make a decisive difference on the battlefield.

    ((((A bad idea whose time will hopefully never come.))))


    Read more: http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2013/02/obama_rethinking_arming_syrian_rebels.html#ixzz2LPgqIjYl
    Follow us: @AmericanThinker on Twitter | AmericanThinker on Facebook


    I think it could get us into a big tussle with the Russians, which we definitely don't need.

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  12. Article on Syria - seems the killing will continue -

    Stalemate Made Worse

    Two years into the rebellion, Syria's civil war remains locked in a strategic stalemate, reports of a renewed rebel offensive notwithstanding. The slow but steady erosion of the regime's grip on much of the countryside underscores the fact that the rebellion has become an irreversible political-military fact, but its failure to capture a single major population centre suggests the regime's better-equipped forces have lost neither the will nor the ability to fight.


    http://www.thenational.ae/thenationalconversation/comment/syrias-strategic-stalemate-made-worse-by-us-inaction#page1

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  13. I just read that Nato (US) fired 506 drone missiles at the tribesmen of Pakistan and Afghanistan, most of whom could not find the USA on a map and none at Saudi Arabia who supplied all the people, organization and reason for this mindless violence.

    I'm sure there is a reason for all this but it's as clear as mud to me.

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  14. Here Jenny is a good reason not to listen to or even watch Fox News -

    February 20, 2013
    Fox News and the Saudi Prince
    Andrew G. Bostom

    Diana West has provided a uniquely incisive critique of Fox News' coverage of Islam -- its ongoing bowdlerization, or "Bin Talalization"-with a fascinating chronology that includes coverage of how the network reacted to billionaire Saudi "Prince" Bin Talal's rejected offer of $10 million in assistance to "The Twin Towers Fund" during the immediate aftermath of the 9/11/2001 jihad terrorist attacks. The ongoing 12-year evolution of its coverage has not been salutary.

    Here is a synopsis of her argumentation:

    If we examine Fox's body of work I believe the unspoken guidelines for coverage and discussion become quite clear. As noted above, Fox News covers terrorism, war, national security. It does not cover, let alone chronicle, the introduction of sharia -- Islamic law -- into the West. It does not cover the massive ongoing Islamic movement by which the Western world is being rapidly Islamized. It does not cover what the Muslim Brotherhood calls "civilization jihad." It does not cover the disappearance of Western culture in Europe. What we know as "political correctness" probably keeps such issues off the air in the MSM, but Fox makes a point of rising above such PC. I think the news vacuum we can see on Fox is at least partly a result of News Corp.'s Saudi influence. Such influence does not serve the American public interest.

    Please read the entire interview.


    Read more: http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2013/02/fox_news_and_the_saudi_prince.html#ixzz2LQjmqxhr
    Follow us: @AmericanThinker on Twitter | AmericanThinker on Facebook

    I have noticed this too. To make up for this lack of coverage of the seamier side of things read JihadWatch, recently unhacked.

    ReplyDelete
  15. Let us all kneel down and fervently pray that Ash doesn't get a hold of this -

    A new application will soon allow users to keep posting Twitter updates from beyond the grave, independently using intricate knowledge of your online character to create a virtual continuation of your personality after you die.

    ­“When your heart stops beating, you'll keep tweeting,” says the new application’s tagline.


    Ghost writer: New app to keep you tweeting after death

    Published: 19 February, 2013, 18:03

    http://rt.com/news/twitter-dead-network-liveson-559/

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  16. This is a reasonable article on saving lives in Libya -

    To point out that the killing continued after that point is hardly proof that Nato caused more suffering than it prevented. The opposite conclusion – that western intervention saved lives – still seems far more convincing.


    Libyan intervention was a success, despite the aftermath's atrocities

    No military intervention is ever free of moral hazard. But what Nato did in Libya can hardly be called a 'catastrophic failure'.

    http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2011/oct/28/intervention-libya-success

    But Quirk is in the bunkhouse, sound asleep.

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  17. Why all the hubbub about drones. The US has been killing individuals for decades they deem as enemies. And there has always been collateral damage. The drone is just the favored weapon of the day. Silenced .22s, long range sniper rifles, poison, gas, knives, exploding cigars, car bombs, and now drones. All in a days work.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I think all the "hubbub about drones" is because, unlike the other methods of assassination you mentioned, they are a rather blunt instrument making a lot of 'collateral damage' - rather more than, say, a single sniper shot. There also seems to be more moral revulsion felt when a kid working a joy stick safely many miles away kills someone as opposed to an assassin getting up close and personal risking his own life to make that kill. Yet, I do agree Gag, that the basic facts are the same - the USA is summarily executing folk.

      I find the current "hubbub" interesting in that much of the criticism is coming from the 'right'. This could simply because the hated Obama is doing it where if a person from the right were doing it they would hail the efficiency of waging war against the evil enemy with little loss of US personnel.

      On a side but related note I saw this in my local rag supplied by WSJ:



      Drone Makers Take Aim at U.S. Market

      "WASHINGTON—American firms that make drones are aiming their sights on the U.S. market as the next frontier for the controversial technology.

      With a declining defense budget expected to limit spending on the vehicles, used primarily to monitor and target combatants on foreign battlefields, manufacturers are seeking opportunities on the domestic front, where universities, police departments and border patrol agencies—as well as commercial enterprises— could use unmanned aircraft, known as drones.

      In response, the Federal Aviation Administration has begun a search for six U.S. test sites that will serve as proving grounds to determine where drones can be safely integrated into ..."

      http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424127887323764804578314501943739028.html?KEYWORDS=drone+manufacturers

      Delete
  18. If you think about it, a drone and an IED have an ironic similarity in their purpose, lethality and legitimacy.

    ReplyDelete
  19. Replies
    1. At 1st I was going to disagree. But then I thought on it..

      I like it now...

      Yep, Now if we could add some bacon fat to the Drone rocket? I'd be all on board

      Delete
    2. AND if we wanted to be like IED's? We'd need to set a 2nd strike when the bad guys come to rescue their wounded and hit them again....

      Delete
    3. .

      Try reading the papers.

      That is already the complaint in Pakistan and Yemen.

      .

      Delete
    4. Cool...

      BTW, thanks for the attempt at an insult.

      I notice that you dont provide any links to back up your assertion that America is using follow up strikes when Red Crescent/rescue workers appeared.

      I googled it several ways and came up empty.



      Delete
    5. .

      Try googling better...

      Civilians are being "terrorised" 24 hours a day by CIA drone attacks that target mainly low-level militants in north-west Pakistan, a report by Stanford and New York Universities says.

      It claims that follow-up strikes are also killing rescuers who set out to treat the injured.


      The Telegraph

      In a just-released, richly documented report, the Bureau of Investigative Journalism, on behalf of the Sunday Times, documents that this is exactly what the U.S. is doing — and worse:

      The CIA’s drone campaign in Pakistan has killed dozens of civilians who had gone to help rescue victims or were attending funerals, an investigation by the Bureau for the Sunday Times has revealed.

      As I indicated, there have been scattered, mostly buried indications in the American media that drones have been targeting and killing rescuers. As the Bureau put it: “Between May 2009 and June 2011, at least fifteen attacks on rescuers were reported by credible news media, including the New York Times, CNN, Associated Press, ABC News and Al Jazeera.” Killing civilians attending the funerals of drone victims is also well-documented by the Bureau’s new report:


      Salon

      It appears that drone activity has declined in 2012, although that may be an artifact of the time it takes to gather data. Aside from the raw numbers, though, Glenn draws particular attention to this passage from the report:

      The US practice of striking one area multiple times, and evidence that it has killed rescuers, makes both community members and humanitarian workers afraid or unwilling to assist injured victims. Some community members shy away from gathering in groups, including important tribal dispute-resolution bodies, out of fear that they may attract the attention of drone operators. Some parents choose to keep their children home, and children injured or traumatized by strikes have dropped out of school. Waziris told our researchers that the strikes have undermined cultural and religious practices related to burial, and made family members afraid to attend funerals.


      The Daily Mail

      Using the search "US accused of killing rescue workers with drone strikes" there were over 79,000 hits. These three were from some known news outlets on page one.

      .

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    6. excellent! that's how you can prove a point.

      as for the funeral attacks, not part of the discussion.

      as for the attacks on the rescuers?

      excellent. after all it's an islamic technic that the arabs used against the Israeli's. Glad to see it used in reverse.

      Delete
  20. .

    An interesting backdrop to the immigration issue. In developed and developing countries around the world, the birth rate is dropping precipitously. In order to maintain growth and help pay for aging populations many countries are no trying to promote procreation. Part of the recent decline is due to the worldwide slowdown since 2008, but still...

    In Singapore, the current birth rate is 1.2. In the U.S. it's dropped to 1.9 or so, in the EU it's around 1.5, in Canada around 1.32. Japan, China, India are all suffering the same thing. You need a rate of around 2.1 just to maintain the population much less grow it.

    In Singapore,

    The rally at Speaker’s Corner was provoked by the publication of the government’s white paper on population, published on January 29th, which projects a possible rise in Singapore’s to a whopping 6.9m by 2030. This would make what is already by most measures the most densely populated country in the world…yet more densely populated. Moreover most of this population surge is to be achieved, apparently, by immigration rather than by procreation. Singaporeans, it seems, have given up on the bedroom; the “total fertility rate” here, at 1.2, is among the lowest in the world.

    At the rally on February 16th speakers young and old, Chinese, Malay and Indian, the articulate and the less so, all queued up to denounce this policy. They say that immigration on such a large scale will destroy Singapore and its way of life. There were a lot of complaints as to how the sheer crush of people has already led to clogged roads, bursting buses, higher prices and fewer jobs for locals. (There was also some resentment at being told how badly they were performing in-between the sheets, for instance in the following Mentos ad, a work of monumentally poor taste.)


    The actual reason I put this up is because of the Mentos ad. Check it out in the following link.

    Let's Get It On

    .

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. :)

      Good Grief.

      You are just trying to change the subject.

      Delete
  21. We obviously must show restraint when using drones. You have to assume we have identified targets and the order to push a button on a joy stick comes from a much higher level than a "kid."

    We hear over and over again to "bring our boys home." I think drones are the alternative to having boots on the ground. I don't think you can have it both ways. Bad guys learnwd along time ago to surround rhemselves with innocents to prevent getting killed,

    As far as comparing them to IEDs? What's good for the goose!



    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. .

      You have to assume we have identified targets and the order to push a button on a joy stick comes from a much higher level than a "kid."

      Of course. It comes from a high-level 'informed' official.

      .

      Delete
    2. Where would you prefer the decision come from Q?
      Obama? Between golf swings?

      Delete
    3. .

      Obama is the one who gives the final authorization. Or so he says.

      As I've said before, I don't object to drone strikes on specific targets if justified. But how does one know its justified when they won't officially acknowledge they have even initiated 'specific' attacks? How does one know it's constitutional if court challenges are blocked by 'national security' concerns?

      Acting as judge, jury, and executioner? No review, warrant,
      indictment, or trial? Under these circumstances, it makes little difference to me whether it is the president or some high-level 'informed' official.

      .

      .

      Delete
    4. And my point is it has been going on for a very very long time, regardless of who is potus. They are only temporary inhabitants of the WH.

      Why the hubbub now?

      Delete
    5. .

      You ignore the trend.

      WOT

      Patriot Act

      NDAA

      Obama Doctrine (or Obama 'Secret Doctrine' if you like)

      And the trend continues to grow like Topsy. No transparancy. No recourse to the courts. More disheartening, the sheeple continue to baa and graze.

      .

      Delete
    6. No I think you are confused as to when the trend started. G'nite.

      Delete
  22. Anyone buying this bullshit?

    The Pentagon notified Congress on Wednesday it will be furloughing its civilian workforce of 800,000 employees if sequestration goes into effect March 1.

    Defense officials have warned lawmakers that sequestration will devastate the military and lead to a hollow force, but the civilian furloughs will be one of the first major impacts felt by the across-the-board cuts.

    ReplyDelete
  23. If it happens, that'd be a "Good Thing"...

    Discover just how "secure" we remain without those 800,000 civilians in the way.

    ReplyDelete
  24. hmmm, is this the kind of 'protected' business model that ole Pat Buchannan is thinking of?:


    "Keep your ‘so-called workers,’ U.S. boss tells France

    The CEO of a U.S. tire maker has delivered a crushing summary of how some outsiders view France’s work ethic in a letter saying he would have to be stupid to take over a factory whose staff only put in three hours work a day.

    Titan International’s Maurice “Morry” Taylor, who goes by “The Grizz” for his bear-like no-nonsense style, told the left-wing French industry minister in a letter published by Paris media that he had no interest in buying a doomed plant.

    “The French work force gets paid high wages but works only three hours. They get one hour for breaks and lunch, talk for three and work for three,” Taylor wrote on Feb. 8 in the letter in English addressed to the minister, Arnaud Montebourg.

    “I told this to the French union workers to their faces. They told me that’s the French way!” Taylor added in the letter, which was posted by business daily Les Echos on its website on Wednesday and which the ministry confirmed was genuine.

    “How stupid do you think we are?” he asked at one point.

    “Titan is going to buy a Chinese tire company or an Indian one, pay less than one Euro per hour wage and ship all the tires France needs,” he said. “You can keep the so-called workers.”

    ..."

    http://www.theglobeandmail.com/report-on-business/international-business/european-business/keep-your-so-called-workers-us-boss-tells-france/article8878721/

    ReplyDelete
  25. A drone is certainly a weapon of terror. Killing a “bad guy” and his family is a message that would terrorize most anyone, proven or unproven of being a belligerent.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. A drone is certainly to be feared but I think the "Shock and Awe" campaign against Iraq was a more egregious act of Terror.

      Delete
    2. IN DEFENSE OF DRONES -


      In Defense of Drones
      They're the worst form of war, except for all the others.

      By William Saletan|Posted Tuesday, Feb. 19, 2013, at 11:40 PM



      “UN: Drones killed more Afghan civilians in 2012,” says the Associated Press headline. The article begins: “The number of U.S. drone strikes in Afghanistan jumped 72 percent in 2012, killing at least 16 civilians in a sharp increase from the previous year.” The message seems clear: More Afghans are dying, because drones kill civilians.

      Wrong. Drones kill fewer civilians, as a percentage of total fatalities, than any other military weapon. They’re the worst form of warfare in the history of the world, except for all the others.

      Start with that U.N. report. Afghan civilian casualties caused by the United States and its allies didn’t go up last year. They fell 46 percent. Specifically, civilian casualties from “aerial attacks” fell 42 percent. Why? Look at the incident featured in the U.N. report (Page 31) as an example of sloppy targeting. “I heard the bombing at approximately 4:00 am,” says an eyewitness. “After we found the dead and injured girls, the jet planes attacked us with heavy machine guns and another woman was killed.”


      Jet planes. Machine guns. Bombing. Drones aren’t the problem. Bombs are the problem.

      Look at last year’s tally of air missions in Afghanistan. Drone strikes went way up. According to the U.N. report, drones released 212 more weapons over Afghanistan in 2012 than they did in 2011. Meanwhile, manned airstrikes went down. Result? Fifteen more civilians died in drone strikes, and 124 fewer died in manned aircraft operations. That’s a net saving of 109 lives.

      On Monday, Afghan President Hamid Karzai banned his security forces from requesting NATO airstrikes in residential areas. Why? Because a week ago, an airstrike killed 10 civilians. What kind of airstrike? Bombs.

      In war after war, it’s the same gruesome story: crude weapons, dead innocents. In World War II, civilian deaths, as a percentage of total war fatalities, were estimated at 40 to 67 percent. In Korea, they were reckoned at 70 percent. In Vietnam, by some calculations, one civilian died for every two enemy combatants we exterminated. In the Persian Gulf War, despite initial claims of a vast Iraqi death toll, we may have killed only one or two Iraqi soldiers for every dead Iraqi civilian. In Kosovo, a postwar commission found that NATO’s bombing campaign killed about 500 Serbian civilians, almost matching the 600 enemy soldiers who died in action. In Afghanistan, the civilian death toll from 2001 to 2011 has been ballparked at anywhere from 60 to 150 percent of the Taliban body count. In Iraq, more than 120,000 civilians have been killed since the 2003 invasion. That’s more than five times the number of fatalities among insurgents and soldiers of Saddam


      http://www.slate.com/articles/health_and_science/human_nature/2013/02/drones_war_and_civilian_casualties_how_unmanned_aircraft_reduce_collateral.single.html



      Quirk likes numbers. But he is back to the bunkhouse again.

      Delete
    3. Over the years, I’ve shared many worries about the rise of drones: the illusion of withdrawal, the militarization of the CIA, the corruption of law, the evasion of congressional restraint, the risk of mission creep, and the proliferation of signature strikes. But civilian casualties? That’s not an argument against drones. It’s the best thing about them.

      Delete
  26. After Gulf War I Saddam killed something like 100,000 shias in the south. We hadn't dissolved his Army.

    ReplyDelete
  27. .

    I'm gone.

    Same arguments and life's way too short.

    .

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Awwww quirk don't get your knickers in a twist! Bob is a boob, we all know that, so just scroll on by. You will never knowingly, at least in the short term, know if you actually sway anyone, but over the long term, if your args are good, some actually move your way. I've been impressed with some folks evolution of thought over the years - including mine.

      Delete
    2. Take Rufus, or rat, for example - lordy they could be insufferable but we do miss them when they are gone.

      Still, they are just dicks!

      Delete
    3. Promise us you won't Tweet from beyond the grave, Ash, pretty please.

      Delete
    4. I don't think I could stand it, Ash. Serious. Have mercy.

      Delete
  28. I agree with your wife - lighten up!!

    ;)

    ReplyDelete
  29. Yes, boob, we allowed the Iraqi Army to use helicopters to kill Shiite civilians and
    rebels, after George HW Bush urged them to revolt, then left them out on their own to die.

    More feckless behavior by the US than we saw in Libya.
    Incremental improvements in tactics.

    ReplyDelete
  30. The US intervention in Iraqi politics, without the will to "Stay the Course", responsible for those
    Shiite deaths.

    Now you promote military intervention in Syria to support the Muslim Brotherhood, to "protect" the Christians, from the Alawi. Assad and the Alawi, who Daniel Pearl tells US are Christians, more so than they are Islamoids.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Now you promote military intervention in Syria to support the Muslim Brotherhood, to "protect" the Christians, from the Alawi.


      No I don't.

      And the Christians are allied with Assad.

      What I said was, theoretically speaking, it might 'save lives'. And I suggested in that case, the place ought to be broken up.

      Delete
    2. Here is the article I quoted, with ((( ))) around the stuff I thought important --

      It is inevitable that any increase in the flow of arms, as well as their sophistication, will only help the jihadists in any post-Assad political environment. ((Obama may see that as a plus, however, given his support for the Muslim Brotherhood elsewhere.)) Nor is it likely that any increase in weapons we give to the rebels will make a decisive difference on the battlefield.

      ((((A bad idea whose time will hopefully never come.))))


      Read more: http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2013/02/obama_rethinking_arming_syrian_rebels.html#ixzz2LPgqIjYl
      Follow us: @AmericanThinker on Twitter | AmericanThinker on Facebook

      I also mentioned we might be at risk of a tussle with the Russians, which we certainly don't need.

      I also pointed out the people at American Thinker have all sorts of differing opinions.

      Delete
  31. IN DEFENSE OF DRONES -


    In Defense of Drones
    They're the worst form of war, except for all the others.

    By William Saletan|Posted Tuesday, Feb. 19, 2013, at 11:40 PM



    “UN: Drones killed more Afghan civilians in 2012,” says the Associated Press headline. The article begins: “The number of U.S. drone strikes in Afghanistan jumped 72 percent in 2012, killing at least 16 civilians in a sharp increase from the previous year.” The message seems clear: More Afghans are dying, because drones kill civilians.

    Wrong. Drones kill fewer civilians, as a percentage of total fatalities, than any other military weapon. They’re the worst form of warfare in the history of the world, except for all the others.

    Start with that U.N. report. Afghan civilian casualties caused by the United States and its allies didn’t go up last year. They fell 46 percent. Specifically, civilian casualties from “aerial attacks” fell 42 percent. Why? Look at the incident featured in the U.N. report (Page 31) as an example of sloppy targeting. “I heard the bombing at approximately 4:00 am,” says an eyewitness. “After we found the dead and injured girls, the jet planes attacked us with heavy machine guns and another woman was killed.”


    Jet planes. Machine guns. Bombing. Drones aren’t the problem. Bombs are the problem.

    Look at last year’s tally of air missions in Afghanistan. Drone strikes went way up. According to the U.N. report, drones released 212 more weapons over Afghanistan in 2012 than they did in 2011. Meanwhile, manned airstrikes went down. Result? Fifteen more civilians died in drone strikes, and 124 fewer died in manned aircraft operations. That’s a net saving of 109 lives.

    On Monday, Afghan President Hamid Karzai banned his security forces from requesting NATO airstrikes in residential areas. Why? Because a week ago, an airstrike killed 10 civilians. What kind of airstrike? Bombs.

    In war after war, it’s the same gruesome story: crude weapons, dead innocents. In World War II, civilian deaths, as a percentage of total war fatalities, were estimated at 40 to 67 percent. In Korea, they were reckoned at 70 percent. In Vietnam, by some calculations, one civilian died for every two enemy combatants we exterminated. In the Persian Gulf War, despite initial claims of a vast Iraqi death toll, we may have killed only one or two Iraqi soldiers for every dead Iraqi civilian. In Kosovo, a postwar commission found that NATO’s bombing campaign killed about 500 Serbian civilians, almost matching the 600 enemy soldiers who died in action. In Afghanistan, the civilian death toll from 2001 to 2011 has been ballparked at anywhere from 60 to 150 percent of the Taliban body count. In Iraq, more than 120,000 civilians have been killed since the 2003 invasion. That’s more than five times the number of fatalities among insurgents and soldiers of Saddam


    http://www.slate.com/articles/health_and_science/human_nature/2013/02/drones_war_and_civilian_casualties_how_unmanned_aircraft_reduce_collateral.single.html



    Quirk likes numbers. But he is back to the bunkhouse again.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Over the years, I’ve shared many worries about the rise of drones: the illusion of withdrawal, the militarization of the CIA, the corruption of law, the evasion of congressional restraint, the risk of mission creep, and the proliferation of signature strikes. But civilian casualties? That’s not an argument against drones. It’s the best thing about them.

      Delete
    2. Hiding behind the saddle rack.

      Buck

      Delete
    3. Quirk him probably selling horse manure scoops at the ranch, at a markup - under trade name HorseManuresRUs.

      Chief Plenty Coups

      Delete