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Ramblings From the Ragged Crumbling Edge Of The Reality-Based Community

Friday, January 12, 2007

An American View From The Arab Street 

...it is said that, after George Bush's jingoist "just like he never left" speech at Fort Benning yesterday, the troops who had been in attendance were ordered not to speak to the press. At first blush, that seems passably odd, but - given the take these fellows have on the whole situation - perhaps its a wise political move after all. It's fiendishly difficult to win the American people over to your side, after all, when the very first hearts and minds you may have to win are those of the troops assigned to carry out your "New Way Foreward"...

...this article initially caught my eye because the first young soldier quoted is from my wife's small home town in Washington state's Grays Harbor country. It was the fetid stench of futility of this episode - the dark redeemed and future promise of wasted lives and squandered resources - that gave this article it's life, though. This is a snapshot of the problems we face and may continue to face, offering a glimpse at the morale of the troops who have been sent to try to create a world that it's own inhabitants don't seem all that anxious to lay claim to. The Vietnam parallels are becoming so starkly bold that a fella needs to stay continually drunk if he's gonna try to avoid seeing 'em: Escalation...er...make that 'surge' (Gulf of Tonkin - check); massive aid for reconstruction and massive training to turn the country over to it's inhabitants (Vietnamization - check); inability to distinguish the good guys from the bad guys either inside or outside of government structure (check); corruption wormholed into every level of both civilian and military governmental structure (check and doublecheck). The only thing we're missing is riotous protests in America's streets, and that may be about to change with one false move on somebody's - anybody's - part at one of the upcoming peace demonstrations...

The story of this Stryker Brigade unit is simply an exposed page of the underreported backstory about why last summer's efforts to quell violence in Baghdad and other cities came off so poorly. This is the legacy that the surging 21,000 coming troops is going to inherit...
Posted by: Jack K. / 9:59 AM 0 comments

Thursday, January 11, 2007

Wierd Winter 

...maybe it's because of global warming; maybe it's just the usual gambler's odds of climate variability. Whatever the reason, it is with a certain shivering bemusement that those of us up here in the upper left corner of the map regard folks on the East Coast marveling at their shirtsleeve weather. Here in the Pacific Northwest, it's cold, and it's going to stay cold for a few days...

It's an almost tragic irony that way-below-freezing temperatures in areas of the Northwest that never get way-below-freezing temperatures can be seen as a respite from the seemingly continual waves of intense winter storms with torrential rains and high winds that have been the theme of this winter, but there ya go. Most school districts in the Willamette Valley, Southwest Washington, and on the Pacific coast are closed for the day, and here on the east side of the Cascade Mountains where snow is more of a winter way of life, it's just cold. So if you're struggling with the unseasonably warm winter weather that has been holding the east in its velvety grip and need a nice bracing blast of reality, contact your travel agent...
Posted by: Jack K. / 7:29 AM 0 comments

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