If you have something to say...
Say it on the Huffington Post
If you have something to say...
Say it on the Huffington Post
For defense contractors, the government officials who write them mega checks, and the hawks in the media who cheer them on, the name of the game is threat inflation. And no one has been better at it than the folks at Booz Allen Hamilton.
We're Americans, aren't we? We're the good guys. Our traditional role is to rein in the bad guys, like Iran, isn't it?
With what we know (and of course, from American actions in the past), it seems that the American government is OK with supporting terrorists. How much of a stretch is it to believe they may support groups who use chemical weapons?
While the tale of the tape suggests that, in a democratic battle, the majority opinion will dominate against a passionate minority, the reality is far different.
As a father, I question myself: what am I -- and what are we - -going to do over the next two decades to ensure that our children, when their time has come to lead, have a better world in front of them, just as we have had?
A decade after the beginning of the first modern Sunni-Shiite civil war that resulted from the American invasion of Iraq in 2003, Syria has become the center of gravity in a regional sectarian bloodbath that displays every indication that it will get far more bloody.
Today, events in Syria and their spillover across the region are defying the notion of nation-state and reversing national boundaries into sectarian ones. Arab social nationalism has disintegrated back to the basic ethno-religious entities.
The folks at Booz Allen, and its parent company the Carlyle Group, love that world as a fabulous profit center, and it is truly inspiring that there are still folks like Edward Snowden whom they can't buy.
Two bruising wars have left America bankrupt and its military enervated. While our footprint might intoxicate Washington's elite and the military brass, our recent failures call into question whether America has over-extended itself.
Thank God for Drones. I've been worried sick that my gaming 11-year-old would have no future in the job market. What a breath of relief for parents today to know down the recession road their elementary school kids have job security out of college policing the Middle East as a Drone pilot.
The United States has spent well over $3 trillion on its Iraq War, while suffering and inflicting much mayhem. Yet it is the studiously neutral government of China that has most clearly benefited from George W. Bush's folly.
Democratization is not a simple process that is achievable overnight. I have several family members who have lost their lives in the battle against the police-state of Syria. Unfortunately, democratization is a messy and bloody process that necessitates sacrifices.
When I hear Senator John McCain calling for more arms, air strikes, no-fly zones and the like; when I hear the dangerous pronouncements coming from apologists for the various sides, I want to ask "do you know where are you going, and where is this taking Syria, its people and the region?"
The difficulty in finding a solution to the crisis in Syria is the fact that there are many players whose interests are incompatible with one another and there is no political solution that can mitigate these incompatibilities.
If a U.S. senator can unwittingly pose for pictures with terrorists in Syria, how can we guarantee that the arms McCain supports sending there won't also end up in the same place McCain did -- with terrorists?
War should be noticeable. It should be about sacrifice. When there are men and women dying, we should be paying attention.
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