Author: jellee (Page 8 of 8)

Why is Iranian Nuclear Containment Insufficeint?

November 8, 2014 / jellee / 0 Comments

3/7/13

Slim Pickens, Dr. Stranglelove

Let me start out with this – if I had my druthers, there would be no nuclear weapons at all.

Unfortunately, I do not reside in Shangri-la, so this is obviously not the case. But, we do have many Nuclear Arms Control Treaties – and that’s progress.

I personally believe that weapons capable of ending all humanity are inherently inhumane, and we should strongly oppose uranium enrichment beyond 20% for nefarious purposes, pie-in-the-sky as that may be. As far as nuclear power goes, far more resources should go to ensuring that the process is done as safely as possible.

Yellow cake uraniuim

That being said – why is it so important to us that Iran specifically be denied access to not only nuclear weapons, but of even nearing the capability to do so?

The US has thousands of nuclear warheads. China has hundreds of them, as does Russia. France & the UK have around a hundred apiece. Pakistan has them. India. It is widely assumed Israel has 150-200.

And we do have a stated historical policy in these regards, and it’s called containment. We did, in fact, survive the Cold War with this policy in place, if memory serves.

Are we really to believe that a nuclear-armed Iran would pose a greater threat to Americans than the old Soviet Union throughout the entirety of the Cold War? Have we weakened so much since then?

We certainly haven’t slowed our defense spending.

Now former Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad

Granted, Iranian President Ahmadinejad has proven time and again that he is an unabashed loon, but his presidential term runs out soon enough, and he’s mostly just a figurehead like the Queen of England. Fact is, the Supreme Leader holds more power, and in my uneducated opinion is far less an inflammatory provocateur. Feel free to correct me if I’m wrong here, but at least publicly, the Ayatollah seems far less hostile to the West than is Ahmadinejad.

Ayatollah Seyed Ali Khāmenei

I do know this – Iran is a real country. Iran is not at all like Iraq or Afghanistan. There are 75 million men, women, and children in Iran. They have apartment buildings and office buildings. They have an $830 million shopping mall in Shiraz.

Iranian President Hassan Rouhani

And they love Americans. They love our culture. Believe it or not, the US has positive approval ratings among Iranians.

To be clear, I am not pro-Iran, and I don’t endorse any nuclear procurement or proliferation efforts – I just don’t quite understand all of the jitters we seem to have with Iran specifically.

Kim Jong-un

Meanwhile in Pyongyang, Kim Jong-un threatens a preemptive nuclear strike on the US in response to anticipated UN sanctions on North Korea. The official North Korean website, Uriminzokkiri, recently produced a video depicting a US city being bombed. North Korea also recently threatened to cancel the 1953 Korean War cease-fire.That being said – why is it so important to us that Iran specifically be denied access to not only nuclear weapons, but of even nearing the capability to do so?

So where exactly is our Red Line with North Korea? What about China?

During the 2012 US Presidential campaign, President Obama and Governor Romney jostled for position along the Red Line for Iran. We were assured that indeed, all options are on the table, including military force. In 2008, Republican presidential-nominee Senator John McCain, giddily joked about “bomb, bomb Iran.”

So why is Iran taken so seriously as a threat, and North Korea is… less so.

The elephant in the room, of course, is our relationship with Israel.

The US & the West in general are largely Judeo-Christian. Many of us believe that the Holy Land belongs to God’s Chosen People, and that eventually the rapture occurs and a time later Jesus/God covers the earth and it’s non-believing Gentile inhabitants with fire – leaving the entire planet for Christians. Zionism.

Iran & the Middle East in general are largely Muslim, and they lay claim to Jerusalem as their Holy Land as well. And while I’m no theology major, there’s that whole infidels and jihad thing.

“The last hour will not come unless there is much bloodshed.” Hadith Sahih Muslim 41:6903

Thus, America and Israel are best buds (with a nod to Saudi Arabia).

While I may have some concerns with Intifadas & building on settlements and overnight shellings and whatnot – Israel is in a tough spot considering their geographic vulnerability.

With the fall of Mubarek, all of Israel’s borders seem tenuous at best. So they really could use a big buddy with seemingly infinite funds for seemingly infinite weapons capabilities.

Of course, Israel has their Iron Dome missile defense system.

And let us not forget the Stuxnet computer virus. Assassination of nuclear scientists. US drones that just happen to accidentally stray into Iran.

So should we have any Red Lines for Israel as well? (GASP!)

If Israel & Iran went to war, regardless of how it started, would the US have any choice at all but to join our ally in battle?

What if Israel were to preemptively strike Iran? Would we still be compelled to saddle-up?

By the time of the Iranian Islamic Revolution in 1979, US intelligence were already spreading the word that Iran had “set up a clandestine nuclear weapons development program.”

Then in 1984, West German intelligence suggested that Iran’s proliferation of a nuclear weapon “is entering its final stages.”

Recall the Wyle E. Coyote-style bomb art, with a literal Red Line, that Bibi shared with the UN in 2012.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wwZW83VH6tA

So how close is Iran to weaponized nukes really?

Israeli President Bibi Netanyahu claimed in 1992 that Iran was “close” to said nuclear weaponization, and in his 1995 book that Iran was “three to five years” away.
The House Republican Research Committee reported, also in 1992, with “98 percent certainty that Iran already had all (or virtually all) of the components required for two or three operational nuclear weapons.”
Israeli Prime Minister Shimon Peres told ABC in 1996 that, “I believe that in four years they [Iran] may reach nuclear weapons.”
Israeli Minister of Defense Binyamin Ben-Eliezer told reporters, “As far as we know by the year 2005 they will, they might, be ready.”
Bush 43 warned in 2007 that a nuclear-armed Iran would inevitably lead to “World War III”.
Then-US Ambassador to the United Nations John Bolton predicted in 2008, that Israel would attack Iran before President Obama took office in January 2009.
On Meet the Pressin 2012, Netanyahu asserted that “They are very close, they are six months away from being about 90 percent of having the enriched uranium for an atom bomb.”
Barack Obama in March 2013, “Right now, we think that it would take over a year or so for Iran to actually develop a nuclear weapon.”

For argument’s sake – let’s say that we go through with a preemptive attack Iran in an effort to cripple their nuclear program. How long would that delay their nuclear ambitions? A few years? Then what? Would we occupy Iran in perpetuity so as to ensure that their nuclear capabilities do not come to fruition?

We simply cannot go around the world assassinating scientists and occupying nations forever.

Bipartisan Corporatism: Free Trade Edition

November 8, 2014 / jellee / 1 Comment

The slaughter that was the 2014 election leaves us once again with divided government. Come January, President Obama will have an entirely Republican-controlled congress for the remainder of his presidency. With Harry Reid no longer able to serve as Obama’s pocket-veto in the senate, we will get a chance to see what our elected leaders agree upon. Unfortunately, bipartisanship often means screwing over Joe Public. You know, compromise.

Leaders of TPP members

A leaked draft of the Trans-Pacific Strategic Economic Partnership (TPP) emerged last winter. This along with the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership – dual trade agreements, details of which were fucking putrid (more on that shortly). Speed of respective negotiations given, deals could have simply been legally fast-tracked with simple up/down votes, and one or both could be signed into law at any moment. And that would have been that.

TTIP protest, London, 6Jul14

Emails were sent and petitions signed. Both TPP & TTIP needed to be debated at length in congress. Our representatives would have to go on record supporting these twin travesties, and the public would have a chance to see the gory details. Instead, silence. Word on the streets (…) at the time was that there would be no debate, and a finalized deal(s) would be fast-tracked and announced over the holidays (possibly in a Friday afternoon news-dump), attracting as little attention as possible.

Now when I was in school, we were taught about the tariff system, which we had for over two-hundred years. Apparently, at some point the very reasonable people decided that since globalization was kicking in, and workers in places like Mexico and Bangladesh could be paid in pennies, all of the multinational corporations would pack up and move American jobs abroad.

Hence, trade agreements. We will remove the tariffs, and they agree to improve working conditions, especially pay. This is meant to level the playing field, and unleash the economy! Unfortunately, these standards are rarely, if ever, enforced. Thus, trade agreements in practice result in American jobs being outsourced to the countries with whom we make these pacts. NAFTA, for example.

With the midterms past and holidays fast-approaching, Obama and his counterparts in congress – namely Mitch McConnell and John Boehner – are being asked on where they find common ground. Trade agreements are at the top of the list (with corporate tax cuts a close second, unfortunately).

Honestly, these dual debacles seem like some sort of crazy conspiracy crack-pottery. And as a caveat, still being negotiated and are therefore unfinalized. So what are the TPP & TTIP, and why are both political parties licking at their chops to push it through?

The TPP is a trade agreement being negotiated between the United States, Japan, Canada, Mexico, Australia, Chile, Peru, Brunei, Malaysia, Vietnam, New Zealand, & Singapore (possibly China, India and/or Bangladesh). And TTIP between the US and the EU. The most critical aspect is the Investor State Dispute Settlement mechanism. This would establish an international court (appointed by corporations, not voters) which would have the jurisdiction to overrule laws passed in the nation-state signees.

TPP members

Far reaching in scope – from internet, financial, environmental, pharmaceutical, & agricultural regulations, to copyrights, intellectual property and patents.

Secretary Kerry at TPP negotiations, 8Oct13

You want to pass banking and financial market regulations to try and prevent another recession? Sorry. Want to ban fracking in your town or state? Too bad. Want to ban certain pesticides or GMOs from your food? Nope. Want patent reform so poor folks in third world countries can gain affordable access to pharmaceuticals and medical devices? Uh-uh. Want illegal downloading settlements to be set at retail price per song/movie? Well yes, you can have that.

You see, if a corporation can prove that your law hurts their bottom line, they can have your law overturned in an international court. So long, sovereignty.

Trade ministers of TPP members

In a vacuum, the TPP seems completely & utterly insane. How can it be justified? It can’t, which is why congress refuses to debate it.

Why are both parties allowing it to advance, largely unnoticed? And why are Republicans, who whine incessantly about the tyrannical dictator that is Obama, willing to simply hand him the keys without question (fast-track) on an issue as important as trade?

To partisans, there is a vast gulf between Democrats and Republicans. While this is true in many ways, they have one very important thing in common – they all have to get (re)elected, which costs a shit-ton of money. This thanks to a string of disastrous Supreme Court decisions that have torn campaign finance regulation asunder. Respective party leaderships instruct our representatives to literally spend the vast majority of their time begging wealthy people for money. They have little choice. Their political careers are based upon their ability to solicit large sums of money, so not only do they only hear the perspective of the wealthy, but they owe them for the continued existence of their careers. Their real job is fundraising, not governing. Politicians actually brag about how much legal bribery they can accrue, and the media cheers them on. Of course the media does, most of it go straight into the pockets of the corporate media conglomerates for all of those shitty ads. And that’s why they won’t tell you about shitty trade agreements, let alone the whys and hows of our broken political system – or the steps we can take to fix it.

Sensing a pattern here?

Vox

Capital Punishment – Why Everyone is Wrong

October 20, 2014 / jellee / 1 Comment

7/6/14 Follow @jelleesnacks

My tax dollars are used in all sorts ways with which I disagree, one of the more egregious is state-sanctioned, premeditated murder of fellow US citizens as a form of discipline.

While the civilized world has largely shrugged off such barbaric tendencies, and while more and more private companies refuse to sell us their pharmaceuticals if used to incite death – the US remains stuck in the Middle Ages when it comes to murder as punishment.

Perhaps in a perfect world we would enact perfect laws, perfectly charged & perfectly prosecuted, perfectly defended & perfectly adjudicated before perfectly reasonable jurors, with perfectly impartial application to perfectly sinister criminals, in an effort to perfectly dissuade perfectly logical otherwise-criminals in a perfectly logical world.

Instead, we hide quasi-professionals behind closed-doors and away from prying eyes, to murder our fellow citizens in a disturbing effort to satiate our blood-lust for revenge. We support and defend a barbaric policy which not only wrongly murders innocent people, but does so in an extremely racist manner. Perhaps some (only some) of this could conceivably be overlooked, if in fact capital punishment could be shown to be an effective form of dissuasion. If.

There are plenty of people among us who may very well deserve to die for the despicable things that they’ve done – but how many of us deserve to kill? Even if the vast majority of people sentenced to death may seem unworthy of sympathy, how many collateral innocents is it okay for us to murder in the pursuit of exterminating the bad people?

And the idea which makes the least bit of sense is the idea that we can teach people not to kill people – by killing people! Do not as I do, but as I say...

Ah yes, reason.

Christian Conservatives

“…He who is without sin among you, let him cast the first stone.” -John 8:7
“Judge not, that you not be judged. For with what judgment you judge, you will also be judged; and with the same measure you use, it will be measured back to you.” -Matthew 7:1-3
“But if you do not forgive men their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses.” -Matthew 6:15
“Therefore, whatever you want men to do to you, do also to them, for this is the Law and the Prophets.” -Matthew 7:12

“If someone slaps you on one cheek, turn to them the other also. If someone takes your coat, do not withhold your shirt from them.” –Luke 6:29
And He said, “Woe to you also, you lawyers! For you load men with burdens hard to bear, and you yourselves do not touch the burdens with one of your fingers.” -Luke 11:46
“But go and learn what this means: I desire mercy and not sacrifice…” -Matthew 9:13
“These people draw near to Me with their mouth, And honor Me with their lips, But their heart is far from Me. And in vain they worship Me, Teaching as doctrine the commandments of men.” -Matthew 15:8,9

Fiscal Conservatives

The cost of prosecuting a capital punishment case versus a ‘life’ case is a difference of $90,000 per inmate, per year of incarceration.

Another way to think about this – US life expectancy is 78 years*, if a defendant is 18, then it costs $90k x 60 years = $5,400,000 more to kill a fellow US citizen than to keep them alive and in prison.

(*US average. Men live shorter lives than women, black men live shorter lives than white, and I would venture to guess that folks in prison have shorter overall life expectancies – but you get the point.)

Libertarians

And if you want to talk hypocrisy, those small-government folks take the cake. They want a government so small that it murders it’s own citizens. On purpose. Libertarians cannot be pro-capital punishment.

Establishment Democrats

To those spineless abhorrents who think they have to balance their beliefs that women can control their own bodies, and that equality means for gay people, too – by being tough on crime.

It doesn’t work. If you learn one thing from Obama, it’s that they don’t like you. Doesn’t matter how tough you are on crime, how hawkish you are with Iran, how much you talk national security and counter-terrorism, how much you thump your bible or clutch your rifle – they don’t like you.

They won’t cooperate. They think effective government hurts their brand, they will not play nice, even when they agree on policy. Divided gov’t is broken gov’t, you have to win control. You win moderates by being more reasonable and making better (populist) arguments. By showing the contrast, not by going juuuust to the left of your opponent.

Liberal Progressives

Make no mistake (and it’s certainly no mistake) – the justice system is anything but.

Private prisons use their profits to (legally) bribe politicians who pass laws that keep those private prisons profitable, by filling them with non-violent drug offenders and guaranteeing a minimum number of beds-filled (or else the tax-payers reimburse the private prison).

Blacks are more likely to be (aggressively) charged for crimes with (racist) mandatory-minimums. While using/manufacturing/selling drugs at roughly the same rates, blacks are far more likely to be convicted for drug crimes. Blacks and Latinos consist the vast majority of death row inmates while consisting of less than half the population. As with the bible verses, I could go on…

When we murder someone (yes murder, it’s premeditated), we can’t take that back. We have tens of thousands of DNA tests waiting to be done, and innocent people are rotting in prison for it. A recent study showed that 1 in 25 death row inmates were innocent! That is collateral damage that none of us should be comfortable with.

Once in prison, we throw people in solitary for decades at a time, or leave them in a prison gang and rape culture that only makes matters worse. What happened to rehabilitation? Isn’t that why we called them penitentiaries in the first place?

Medical Professionals

Hippocratic oath. First, do no harm. Luckily, every major medical association refuses to allow members to participate in a state-sanctioned murder. Unfortunately, this means that barely-trained volunteers are tasked with carrying out the premeditated killing. (Hence the mishap in Missouri a while back, where they went straight through the vein and as result the drugs were absorbed into the muscle tissue rather than into the blood stream and thus their intended destination.)

Kudos medical professionals. Huzzah. And boo to those vile volunteer cads carrying out the evil deed.

Pharmaceutical Companies

Profits. Pharmaceutical companies are (at least 50%) publicly traded, which means that fiduciary responsibility to share-holders takes precedent. In this particular case, we have a positive side effect to an injurious disease.

When you sell pharmaceuticals, it is very bad marketing if your company is associated with death. More specifically, you don’t want your brand of anesthetic known for killing people. Too easy.

Compounding companies on the other hand?

The States

Red states are turning to compounding pharmacies for single-use batches with exactly zero FDA oversight/approval and no assurance of ‘cruel and unusual’ compliance.

The SCOTUS has approved lethal injection under the 8th Amendment only under specific conditions, including the specific drugs to be used and specific injection-sites on the body.

We are now passing laws in states that not only hide the identities of the folks performing the executions, and laws hiding the producers of the drugs, but laws even hiding which drugs are being used to murder our people – clearly at odds with SCOTUS.

We also have states (FL) trying to expedite the process so innocent death-row inmates have minimal for appeal.

If we’re going to make such a fuss over how we kill people, if we are going to eschew the 8th Amendment…

Old Sparky

‘Murica

Pay-per-view. Weekly.

We could do it in four weekly installments. The initial sentencing phase would handle people convicted of crimes carrying possible life-sentences. Produce short videos on the cases; was the crime especially gory, is anyone involved pretty? We bet on the sentences. Tons of gambling revenue for the state. Put it on C-SPAN and rake in ad revenue.

Week two, we broadcast the sentencing. Judges would rise to Simon Cowell-levels of fame. Judge Judys handing out death sentences. Gold! Networks would pay a pretty penny to carry the show. Sure, sentencing guidelines would be thrown into chaos – but we’re talking about criminals here, am I right?

In phase three, those sentenced to death step up and spin – the Wheel of Death! Guillotine? Lions? Firing squad? Disemboweling? Crucifixion? Burning at the stake? Drowning? The chair? Not only would it be ratings gold, this allows for all the more wagering!

And of course, the main show. Pay-per-view. How much would people pay to watch an execution compared to a fight or a concert? Just think of all of the tax-breaks we could give to billionaires!

The (Other) Ugly Side of Fear-Mongering Ebola/ISIS

October 20, 2014 / jellee / 0 Comments

10/16/14

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The summer/fall of 2014 has seen wall to wall pants-shitting over two emergent and omnipresent storylines – ISIS & Ebola. While neither should be ignored, the mass hysteria surrounding each far outweigh either’s respective/relative level of threat.

Ebola has so far killed nearly 5000 people so far this year, the vast majority of which have occurred in Western Africa. A single person has died in the United States. One.

Yet, the American corporate news-media establishment (90% of American media is owned by six corporations) have been going mad fear-mongering Ebola to the American public. To the point that nearly 40% of Americans believe that they or someone they know will catch Ebola in the next year.

Odd, considering the fact that more people die from AIDS worldwide every single day than have died from Ebola this year. Or the fact that roughly one hundred Americans die from the plain old flu every single day.

Five hundred American kids in forty-three states caught Enterovirus D68 this past summer. Four kids died of various causes, and tested positive for the mysterious disease; another who tested positive caught pink-eye and didn’t wake up the next morning. We don’t have a clue how all of these kids are catching it, nor what exactly the symptoms are – some get cold-like symptoms, others get polio-like symptoms. And yet, the corporate media tells me to be afraid (be VERY afraid!) of Ebola.

There are certainly valid concerns surrounding Ebola. Of primary concern are the people of West Africa. The threat of Ebola to Americans will remain so long as it keeps spreading in Africa, no matter what measures we attempt to put into place here in the US (including counterproductive travel-bans). The biggest immediate threat of Ebola to Americans is the fact that we only have capacity to effectively disinfect the by-products (fluid loss of up to 20 liters per day) of roughly ten Ebola patients. With additional investment in man-hours, we could likely double that. Twenty beds for 300+ million people is certainly not ideal. But rest assured, Nigeria and Senegal have effectively rid themselves of Ebola, it just takes the wherewithal and commitment to studious attention to the individuals at risk until the incubation period (21+ days) has passed. Again – Nigeria and Senegal.

ISIS/Daash? Those people are abhorrent, they are despicable. If the term ’terrorist’ means anything anymore, they are certainly deserving. But Boko Haram are easily as demented. Daash behead people, but our A#1 ally Saudi Arabia beheaded 31 people in August alone. Daash occupy and invade Iraq, we occupied and invaded Iraq. Daash kill civilians & enemies with guns & bombs, we kill civilians & enemies with drones & air-strikes. Daash execute with knives, we execute with needles. They have hostages, we have Guantanamo.

Why are we so afraid? Fear sells, and the corporate news-media has an endless supply on demand. They are the megaphone for their fellow profiteers of fear.

General Smedley Butler

Defense contractors always want more war, war is their raison d’etre. Generals (et al) know they have cushy jobs with defense contractors waiting for them, and they want to please their future bosses. The Pentagon is the hammer who sees everything as a nail, and need to justify the ever-increasing defense budget. Our politicians are already being paid by the defense contractors by way of legal bribery, and have defense-lobbying jobs waiting for them, so they are basically towing the company line. And the election is fast approaching, so anything they can possibly use to point a finger at Obama, goes.

War makes money for an elite few. It is the people who suffer.

But why are we so easily moved?

For starters, fear is a rational and necessary feeling. Secondarily, the profit-motives of the elites listed above. And perhaps as disturbing – an ugly amalgamation of nativism, xenophobia, and Islamophobia.

Ebola is killing Africans, and that’s where black people come from, so it’s easier to fear-monger Ebola in largely-white America. And ISIS/Daash are Muslim, so it’s easier to fear-monger them in largely-Christian America.

It’s disgusting.

Drones: National Security or Domestic Threat?

October 14, 2014 / jellee / 0 Comments

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Meet your new neighbor – the Unmanned Aerial Vehicle.

7/11/12 Follow @jelleesnacks

MQ9 Reaper

General John Meyer

“They save lives!” General John Meyer said of drones in 1972.

“The only reason we need (UAVs) is that we don’t want to needlessly expend the man in the cockpit”, explained General George Brown – also in 1972 – the year before public admission of the existence of a drone program in the U.S. military.

In a practical sense, if an aerial vehicle is to be lost, that loss is very much preferable if not accompanied by the loss of an airman in the process.

Thus, drones save lives.

Click HERE for Obama White Papers

Anwar al-Awlaki

Unfortunately though, for a certain 16 year-old born in Denver, Colorado, the inverse turned out to be the case. Abdul-Rahman al-Awlaki – American-born citizen – was specifically targeted and killed via drone attack in Yemen apparently for his crime of having radical kinfolk.

White House Secretary Robert Gibbs explained that he should have had a “far more reasonable father“.

“Due process and judicial process are not one and the same,” according to U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder, “Citizenship alone does not make such individuals immune from being targeted.” Apparently not.

Attorney General Eric Holder

We learned recently of a so-called kill-list: photos and stats similar to baseball cards of the top 30 al-Qaeda members, and charts resembling year-book pages of the targets and their likely companions. “How old are these people?” Obama is said to have queried, adding “If they are starting to use children, we are moving into a whole different phase.” Indeed.

The POTUS himself reportedly identifies targets to be pursued, and hopefully eliminates any mistakes involved in delegating such responsibility. Added national security advisor Thomas Donilin, “He’s determined to keep the tether pretty short.”

CIA Director-Nominee John Brennan

According to the CIA, since May 2010, there have been exactly ZERO accidental civilian casualties resulting from drone strikes. This thanks, in no small part, to our policy of posthumously declaring all military-aged males as militants. Which of course, makes it very difficult to appeal those charges.Identity strikes, like those on al-Awlaki, target a specific individual. There may be a certain level of collateral damage, but the attack is focused in it’s intent. The signatures strike, however, is a tactic which identifies targets whom display suspicious behavior. Unfortunately though, traveling in a caravan might look a bit suspicious. Outdoor group activities, especially calisthenics and the occasional wedding party (sadly, it’s happened), might look a bit suspicious.

Hopefully unfounded for the repulsiveness of content, there are now reports (by the Bureau of Investigative Journalism) of strategic double-tap tactics being carried out by UAVs. This double-tap is the second attack, which occurs once the responders arrive on the scene of the initial attack. Also, follow-up attacks of mourners and funeral processions. Hopefully these incidences have been coincidental and not strategic.

In 2009, President Obama’s initial UAV endeavor wound up accidentally killing 19 people with all of five missiles, and all of whom turned out to be civilians. By July 2012 – nearly 300 drone strikes later (after 52 under Bush) – upward of 3000 people, including around 800 civilians, had been killed (BIJ).

The USAF 100th Strategic Reconnaissance wing flew nearly 3500 drone missions in Vietnam. Today, at least 50 countries worldwide are advancing drone warfare. We enlist Reapers, Predators, Ravens, Shadows, Hawks, and their brethren; which are deployed in Yemen, Iran, Somalia, Libya, Pakistan & Afghanistan. The Pentagon currently counts some 7000 UAVs among it’s fleet.

RQ-1A Predator

Collateral Damage & Toxic boots

The use of combat drones allow opportunistic circumvention of the political toxicity surrounding boots-on-the-ground conflict, while further disconnecting the majority of the populace from the 1% representing us overseas in combat. Rather than dealing with the hassle of being open with the public; rather than dealing with the political calculus of gaining Congressional for approval of war; rather than uprooting troops from their families and shipping them off into harm’s way on foreign lands… Instead we can simply deploy an army of flying robots. And the best part? The drone pilot can carry out ordered assassinations, and then go home and play with the kids in the yard. What’s not to love?

RQ-7 Shadow

Let’s not forget about the money. We can never forget about the money. An RQ-1 Raven has a unit cost of $35,000, with a program cost of $250,000 (GlobalSecurity.org). The MQ9 Reaper has a $36.8 million unit cost and $11.8 billion program cost (Department of Defense). The MQ1Predator is $4million and S2.38 billion (DofD), and the RQ-7 Shadow is $750,000 and $15.5 billion (Aeroweb).

Drones are relatively inexpensive compared to the B-2 Spirit, with a $1.07 billion unit cost and a whopping $44.75 billion program cost (or $2.1 billion apiece) through 2004 (US General Accounting Office). Or the F-22 Raptor with a $150 million unit cost and $66.7 billion program cost (USAF). In other words, the price tag on a single B-2 bomber equals the cost of 65 of even the most expensive drone unit.

A160 Hummingbird

Eastern Gateway Community College?

As the war in Afghanistan inevitably winds to a close, domestic drone use is on the verge of an explosion. The Federal Aviation Administration Modernization and Reform Act (2012) welcomes commercial drones onto the scene, as the FAA projects 30,000 domestic drones and has reportedly approved 82 drone models (including nano/hummingbird drones) and issued 285 licenses while streamlining the process. Mostly utilized as Patriot Act surveillance apparatus, Seattle PD, WSDOT, & Eastern Gateway Community College (?) are all “permitted drone operators.” A Reaper MQ-9 drone recently assisted North Dakota sheriffs in apprehending suspected cattle-rustlers.

MQ-1C Warrior

Imagine, if you will, a future in which patrolling UAVs are so commonplace as to become unnoticed. Or quiet enough to go largely unheard, and small enough to remain largely unseen. Thirty-thousand approved drones potentially patrolling the country-side. What happens when Wal-Mart’s seemingly inevitable drone fleet (I’m kidding) falls prey to cyber-terrorists? What about a single drone armed with chemical weapons?

Curtiss N2C-2

An airliner was not generally seen as a potential form of munitions until 9/11.

So yes, it’s a nuanced issue – what determines the palatability are not the drones themselves, but the manner in which drones are used. Are drones programmed with Geneva Convention rules acceptable? Would we rather have tens of thousands of boots on the ground in Yemen and Pakistan? I get that. But the drone program further separates the public from sacrifice of battle. And by incessantly reigning down death from the sky upon civilians, we just create more and more backlash in the form of terrorism.

OQ-2A

There is a compromise to be made here, by much more intelligent folks than myself, and it lies somewhere between the need of surveillance for public safety, and the privacy concerns of individual citizens.

Two BQM-34 Firebees

Can we have this conversation please?

RQ1 Predator sensor operator’s chair

Obama’s War With ISIS

October 14, 2014 / jellee / 0 Comments

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10/1/14

War. Again.

Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi

Two American journalists were beheaded, so President Obama took to the Cross Hall of the White House to declare that the US would ’degrade and destroy’ ISIL. ISIS. IS. Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi is the ‘caliph’ of DAASH (Dulat al-Islam fi al-Iraq wal-Sham), so that‘s what we‘ll call them. Google it.
Daash are despicable. They’ve beheaded journalists and aid workers. They’ve enslaved hundreds (at least) of women and sold them into slavery/forced marriages. They’ve shot rows of blindfolded, kneeling men in it the back of their heads, filling mass graves along their way. They kill Christians, they kill Yazidi, they kill Shia. Their message is: convert, or die.

Yazidi refugees

So, what do they want, how did we get here, and what should we do? Luckily, I have answers.
First, we need to know what Daash wants – they’re aim is to unite under a single political border, all majority-Muslim areas of the world, to be ruled by their religious leader.
To that end, they want to bait the West into more war on the ground in more Arab countries, in an effort to unite the Muslim world against the West in a world-wide religious holy war.

What makes them think that this is a reasonable goal to be attained?
The Prophet Muhammad ruled the first Islamic caliphate (state led by religious leader) for 10 years before dying in 632. They were of course in need of a successor (caliph). Some (Shia) wanted a blood-line caliph (Ali, cousin/son-in-law), while others (Sunni) believed that the Prophet had personally appointed his close companion, Abu Bakr. Hence the Sunnia-Shia divide.

By 750, the caliphate grew to include basically the entire Middle East – as far as modern-day Pakistan to the east; Syria, Iraq, much of Turkey to the north; and all of Saudi Arabia, Yemen, Oman to the south – and west to include the entire southern coast of the Mediterranean (Egypt, Libya, Algeria…), even Spain.
What got us to this point?
Well, it goes back to the post-WWI, Sykes-Picot Treaty of 1916. Westerners (Britain and France specifically) ignored all religious, ethnic, and tribal borders – and scratched out their own Middle Eastern borders, likely (kidding) on the back of a napkin over a cup of Starbucks…

Iranian Prime Minister Mohammad Mossadeq

Of course, this only served to push local tensions to the fore. By 1949, the US had little choice (…) but to force regime change in Syria. A few years later, Iran’s democratically elected leader was ousted via coup d’etat, again pushed by the US (CIA specifically, and admittedly).
The Iraq-Iran War began in 1980. President Reagan decided that Saddam Hussein was the more preferable/moderate option, so he had Iraq removed from the ’State Sponsors of Terrorism’ list, and sent Rumsfeld over to shake Saddam’s hand and reaffirm US intelligence and material support for Iraq. In the process, Reagan illegally traded weapons to Iran in exchange for hostages (Iran Contra).
The month the Iraq-Iran cease-fire was signed (Aug ‘88), our main man Saddam turned the chemical weapons he had used to defeat the Iranians, toward ethnic Kurds in northern Iraq. Two years later, he invaded Kuwait. At that point, we realized that the guy we thought was cool so we helped him, wasn’t so cool so we had to drop some bombs on his head.
Oops.

While the Iraq-Iran War was being waged, Russia was fighting jihadis in Afghanistan (1979-1989). You know – enemy of your enemy. So, we (US) launched Operation Cyclone, and armed the Mujahideen. It worked in the short-term, Russia was bled financially, which led Gorbachev to seek the end of the Cold War with the US. Success!
Until 9/11.
Nineteen Saudi hijackers, plotted out in Germany. So of course, President George W. Bush lied (well, Halliburton gave Cheney a $34 million exit bonus quid, so he lied to Dubya), and we went to decade-plus wars in both Iraq & Afghanistan (whilst Halliburton made a $40 billion quo). Not Saudi Arabia, where the attackers were actually from, but Iraq & Afghanistan. Bin Ladin? Bin Ladin was Saudi, was funded by Saudis, and was captured in Afghanistan by JSOC via Seal Team Six. Not by declared war or 100k boots-on-the-ground, but by intelligence and special forces.

Our main man from the 1980’s, Saddam, wound up being decapitated by way of hanging at the hands of his own people. Hundreds of thousands of Iraqis died in the process of deposing him. Eventually, Iraqis decided it was time for us to leave, so they refused to allow our military personnel legal amnesty for their actions. Dubya had little choice, and agreed to pull out. Obama was elected, and had little choice but to follow through with Dubya’s forcedwithdrawal. Luckily, we spent 7 years training and arming Iraqi gov’t forces…

Al-Maliki

Our new main man in Iraq, Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, took over in 2006. His predecessor, Saddam, was Sunni, and ruled with an iron fist. Al-Maliki is Shia, and when forming his gov’t, chose not to include Sunni representation, but to simply turn the tables. The entire country was torn asunder. And we were the instigators.

The most vile of these groups has apparently turned out to be Daash, excommunicated from al-Qaeda, the previous ‘worst guys on the planet‘ . How have Daash risen above the rest, at least in the minds of the West? (I’ll take this time to note Boko Haram.)
Well, Daash are good at social media. They’ve adopted some Capone or Pablo-esque tactics – they publicly do nice things for folks in order to curry local favor, and to distract from their blatant abhorrence and brutality.
Meanwhile in Syria, ongoing civil war has seen the deaths of hundreds of thousands, as President Bashar al-Assad has unleashed chemical weapons on his own people (sound familiar?). Just one year ago, Obama was calling for the ouster of Assad, and calling on Congress to let him drop some good-ole American freedom-bombs on Assad’s head. Congress said no, so we worked with Russia, and confiscated/disposed of Assad’s chemical weapons cache.
Success!
As per usual, US success in the Middle East could only be short-lived. Given the power vacuum in Iraq, and the rise of rebels in Syria, numerous militant/rebel groups have risen like phoenix from the ashes.
Most importantly, they’ve taken oil fields. Ah yes, Texas tea. Daash is making $2-3m/day off of stolen oil. Given Daash’ income, they can afford to pay tens of thousands of mercenaries to join their cause. And of course, winning breeds band-wagon support (there‘ve been reports of ‘Islam for Dummies‘ being shipped by Amazon to Daash recruits en route). Daash’ social media aptitude also includes video of beheadings and mass killings.
These public displays of brutality have dissuaded the Iraqi (Shia) gov’t forces – which, again, the US spent 7 years training and arming – from risking their literal necks to defend Sunni territory in Iraq. Thus, Iraqi gov’t forces have simply dropped their (made in the US) equipment and tucked tail, rather than defend people they don‘t particularly care for.
Here inlies one of our bigger problems – Iraq is really three countries in one.

Sunni=Orange, Shia=Green, Kurd=Peach

Ethnic Kurds are the majority in northern/northeastern Iraq, bordering Turkey and Iran. Shia are the majority in eastern Iraq, along the Iranian border and south to the Persian Gulf. Sunni control the majority of Iraq, including the entire western and southern regions.
Biggest problem with a three-state solution? Iraq is largely land-locked, with a scant 36 mile coastline along the Persian Gulf. This renders control of the sister oil terminals of Al Basrah & Khor al-Amaya a matter of great import. The Kurds would certainly be land-locked, and the Sunni & Shia could conceivably fight ad infinitum over control over the all-important port cities. Sunni and Shia have never been in agreement, and aren’t likely to be. But as they say – you can disagree without being disagreeable.
So how can there be peace?
We can be certain of a few things: the US/West dropping freedom-bombs on Middle Eastern heads, and the US/West placing our thumbs on the scales where political rule is concerned, does not produce desired results. We overthrow democratically elected rulers, it turns out poorly. We defend brutal dictators, it turns out poorly. We prop up strong-men, it turns out poorly. We arm the rebels, it turns out poorly. We assist the supposed moderates, it turns out poorly.
We need to stop.
Since we have a lot to do with the current situation, it could be argued that we cannot simply wash our hands of it. And of course, the world is dependant upon their oil. The solution to that problem is the same as before, we need to stop. Unfortunately, moving away from oil-guzzling autos and single-use plastics, and toward renewables & advanced energy storage/portability are not exactly short-term propositions.
Moreover, Daash itself is a symptom. Daash could be wiped off the face of the planet, but another worst of the worst would simply take it’s place. Employment is low, poverty is high, and foreigners have been occupying their land for over a decade.
So what do we do now?

There is a possible ‘wash our hands’ solution. Daash could have their own Islamic State (apart from Kurdistan and say, Shiastan or what-have-you). Just because Daash is good at beheadings and social media, does not mean that they are capable of governing. Governing requires roads and schools and assisting the poor, elderly, & disabled. Daash forbids soccer and music, movies and dancing – all are distractions from faith. If allowed to govern, Daash would collapse under their own weight.
Of course, there is still the matter of the 40-odd journalists/aide workers held by Daash. Personally, I don’t think 40 hostages demand a full-fledged war. But simply wishing that the Kurdish Pershmerga, the Free Syrian Army, and the Iraqi gov’t forces are capable of taking back Mosul, Tikrit, Fallujah, Raqqa, et al does not make it so.
So how do we get them back? By currying support among Arab nations.
Daash has a hit list. It includes Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Turkey, Lebanon, Jordan, the UAE. We need Egypt, whom we give $1.5b/year in aid, to step up. We need Qatar, with their vast wealth (natural gas), to stop funding terrorists and get on the right side here. Same goes for Kuwait. Most importantly, we need our A#1 ally, Saudi Arabia, to get right. Not only have they funded extremists, possibly including Daash specifically, but the Saudi gov’t beheaded 31 people in August alone! (Cut to Rick Perry sighing with envy…)
Arab states must figure out how to stand up for themselves. If they require air-support, let them (plural, not just Iraq) ask for it explicitly before we go jumping in head-first to yet another perfectly avoidable, decade-plus debacle that we cannot afford.

Obama’s ISIS Gamble

October 14, 2014 / jellee / 0 Comments

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In the summer of 2014, a group known as ISIS was reported to have acquired, either by force or payment, roughly forty Western journalists & aid workers.
ISIS (Daash, Dulat al-Islam fi al-Iraq wal-Sham) was also reported to be threatening genocide against a group known as the Yazidi. Daash believed the Yazidi to be devil worshippers, and were forcing them to convert or die. Tens of thousands of Yazidi fled atop Mount Sinjar, and were dying from lack of sustenance.

Yazidi refugees

And whom emerged from the sky to answer the prayers of the Yazidi? Good ole Uncle Sam, that’s who. Uncle Sam came to air-drop aid for a dying people. Unfortunately, food and water didn’t change their being trapped on a mountain, with certain death lurking below. So, President Obama announced that the US would begin air attacks on the Daash fighters at the foot of the mountain, so that the Yazidi could flee to safety in neighboring Syria.
And that, folks, is what it means to be a superpower. This is what superiority is supposed to look like.

Alas, Obama thwarted any goodwill earned by helping the Yazidi, by using their plight as cover for his broader mission. In the very same speech Obama said ‘America is coming to help’ the Yazidi, he also announced that the US would be launching additional strikes against Daash apart from the mission to save the Yazidi.
We attacked them. Not just to save the Yazidi, we attacked them under the guise of helping the Yazidi. They were but a pawn.
In response, American journalist James Foley was executed. Daash wanted a $132 million ransom for Foley. The US does not negotiate with terrorists*, and the Foley family was advised that paying ransom equates to funding terrorism. So he was beheaded, and the US was warned that there would be further beheadings should the US continue air strikes against them. Which we did. And they did. Steven Sotloff was beheaded next.
At which point, the US media went into a state of hysteria from which they‘ve yet to escape.

Fear sells. War sells. War equals ratings. Ratings equal ad revenue. US media, from television networks and newspapers, from movie studios to books and magazines – it’s all owned by six mega-media conglomerates. And they’re hungry. They get fed when we get scared. And boy are we good at being scared. (We have an entire political party in this country that is based upon a perpetual state of fear.)
So, on September 10th, 2014, Obama gave address which had the distinct look and feel of a war declaration. We would be launching attacks against Daash, in an effort to ‘degrade and destroy’ them. However, he also assured us that Daash posed no imminent threat, and that there would be no boots-on-the-ground.

Why the obfuscation? (Obamafuscation?) As a constitutional scholar, Obama was well aware that an official declaration of war would put him on the clock. The War Powers Act authorizes the executive to deploy military force on an emergency basis, but demands the Congress formally & affirmatively approve and deployment beyond 60 days. Sixty days from September 10th is roughly a week after the midterm elections.
Obama doesn’t want to be on that clock. He was turned down last time he asked Congress for permission to go into Syria. Not all Congressfolk are nincompoops, some of them remember that Hillary lost to Obama because of how she voted on Iraq.

Hillary Clinton & Lindsey Graham, Hawks of a Feather

Boehner

Speaker Boehner has said that the House doesn’t plan to vote until next year. In fact, Boehner called upon Obama to call upon Boehner to call for a vote. Leader Reid neither seems to have any inclination to hold a vote any time soon. Those 60 days will be long-passed come 2015.
What’s a president to do? Lie and obfuscate.
There’s no immediate threat, and there won’t be ground troops. We’re going to war, but not call it war.
For two days. Day-and-a-half. On September 12, White House surrogates were sat in front of cameras and microphones to drone on the brand new talking point: We’re at war with ISIL, in the same way that we are at war with al-Qaeda.

Al-Qaeda? The president said ISIL. Apparently, Obama and his legal team have determined that the 2001,3 Authorization(s) for Use of Military Force in Iraq and Afghanistan respectively, were broad enough to authorize force in Syria over a decade later. Oh by the way, the same AUMF this same President said just last year should be repealed. Funny that.
And more importantly, since when do underlings get to declare war? Especially against a group that the president himself poses no immediate threat to the homeland?
Oh, don’t worry your pretty little head about the Constitution. There was yet another twist: Khorasan. Dun-dun-dun.

Al-Qaeda

A group which no one had ever heard of. A group which no one in Syria had ever heard of. Khorasan was the new worst of the worst. Even more worse that the other worst of the worst: ISIS. Which was even worse than the previous worst of the worst: Al-Qaeda.
Khorasan was supposedly an elite offshoot whom were plotting an imminent attack on the homeland.
Of course they were. Hindquarters legally covered.

Muhsin al-Fadhli

Then miraculously, the leader of Khorasan was killed seemingly the next day. Threat averted. Phew, that was a close one. Thanks Obama!
In the weeks following, we learned that Khorasan is an ancient term, which US intelligence used generically. We also heard that if there was an actual Khorasan group, their threat was simply aspirational, they had no imminent plans on the homeland. Other reports told of a rogue French agent, whose name was found on a list of 13 individuals, under the heading of Khorasan. Regardless, either the bad, bad boogeymen simply didn’t like us, or a single rogue agent was on the loose, hence legal basis for war in Syria. See how that works?
Maybe Obama doesn’t care about traveling to Switzerland, but he needs to be concerned about his job security.

The ICC

Rep. Jack Kingston (R-GA) lost his primary. He won’t be returning to Congress in 2015. He can finally afford to tell the truth.
“A lot of people would like to stay on the sideline and say, ‘Just bomb the place and tell us about it later.’ It’s an election year. A lot of Democrats don’t know how it would play in their party, and Republicans don’t want to change anything. We like the path we’re on now. We can denounce it if it goes bad, and praise it if it goes well and ask what took him so long.”
Hear that Obama?
Those 60 days will pass. The election will pass. More specifically, those 60 days will be up a week after the mid-term elections. Those in the know expect Mitch McConnell will be Majority Leader come January. Sending us to war on shaky legal grounds, with the prospect of the GOP controlling both the Upper and Lower Chambers in a few months? The moment anything goes awry in Syria, the Republicans will pounce. Democrats will want Hillary to come fund-raise for them on the campaign trail, and Hillary will be running against Obama nearly as much as against the republican nominee. The democrats won’t save him.
Obama is playing a dangerous game.

Myanmar – Genocide for Oil

October 14, 2014 / jellee / 0 Comments

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4/26/2013

Despite the escalation of ethnic cleansing in Myanmar, international sanctions are being lifted – most recently by the European Union.

Hundreds of thousands displaced, thousands of homes burnt, thousands thrown in interment camps, and scores of murders.

How could this be? It’s simple – and it comes down to the money.

The CIA estimates Myanmar is sitting on 50 million barrels of oil & 283 billion cubic meters of natural gas. State run Myanmar Oil & Gas Enterprise (MOGE) puts those estimates at 226 million barrels of oil and 457 billion cubic meters of natural gas. This oil is worth an estimated $29b over three decades for Myanmar.

In 2011, Myanmar granted approval for deep-water oil exploration covering nine ocean blocks in the Bay of Bengal. In April 2013, Myanmar accepted bids on 30 offshore blocks for exploration from (but not limited to) Chevron, Total (France), PPTEP (Thailand), EPI Holdings (Hong Kong), Geopetrol International (Malasia).

All of this crude needs some place to go. Thus, MOGE and the China National Petroleum Corporation (CNPC) began the Shwe Gas Project to construct a pipeline. This 500 mile pipeline transects 21 Burmese townships between the Arakan state port of Sittwe and the Shan State northern border to the Yunnan Province in China. The Shwe Gas Project is going forward despite there being no environmental impact or social impact studies.

As result, the Rohingya feel the brunt of progress. Daily “fighting” occurs along the Shwe pipeline. Mass killings have been levied upon the Rohingya in June 2012, October 2012, and most recently in March 2013. Mass graves have been uncovered. Rohingya are subject to curfews and land seizures.

While multinational corporations stand to profit the most, are they culpable?

Ethnic tension has been felt in Myanmar (formerly Burma) dating at least to World War II, when Rohingya Muslims sided with Allied forces and served as spies – many Rohingya were killed in the aftermath.

A 1982 law Citizenship Law identified eight “national races” of Burma (not include the Rohingya) in the wake of the 1978 cleansing of 200,000 Rohingya. Another 250,000 Rohingya fled in 1991-92. As result of the Citizenship Law, Rohingya (who once accounted for one third of the population) are not legally permitted to open a business or even to marry – 800,000 Rohingya have no rights as citizens of Myanmar, and account for only two percent of the population.

Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina

These are a people without a country; without a home. Neither neighboring Bangladesh, Thailand, nor India seem willing to accept any more refugees.

“Well, why we should allow to enter our country?” – Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina of Bangladesh

While numbers are hard to pin down – at least 125,000 Rohingya have been displaced (as of July 2012), at least 500 have drowned.

The Rohingya are forced to choose between starving in internment camps, and taking their chances at sea. 1800 Rohingya “boat people” washed up on Thailand beaches in January 2013 alone.

Why is the world – and the media – casting a blind eye toward the Rohingya? Why are international sanctions being lifted in spite of an ongoing campaign of human rights violations?

Perhaps the money is the cause. Certainly oil money is behind the vanishing sanctions and the absence of President Thein Sein.

Obama with President Thein Sein

Perhaps it is because the Rohingya are Muslim. Perhaps the western world has accepted the narrative that all Muslims are guilty of terrorism simply by association.

Surely this cannot be the case. Surely we would not view all world issues through a lens of religious-based bias. Surely we would not condemn 1.5 billion people as terrorists – simply because of who they pray to.

Perhaps it seems strange to us that Buddhists would display such violence. Burmese Hindu have taken to sporting the bindi so as to not be mistaken for Muslims – as the violence has spread to non-Rohingya Burmese Muslims as well.

The Dalai Lama has expressed that he is “deeply saddened.”

One very big question remains; where is that great bastion of hope and democracy – Aung San Suu Kyi?

President Obama & Secretary of State Hillary Clinton visited Myanmar in November, 2012 and Obama specifically lauded Suu Kyi’s “courage and determination.”

He added – “I believe deeply that this country can transcend its differences, and that every human being within these borders is a part of your nation’s story.”

October 12, 2014 / jellee / 0 Comments

#Irreverent #Progressive #Populist #Feminist #LoveisLove #BlackLivesMatter #FreePalestine #BDS #FreeSnowden #SolitaryisTorture #EndCapitalPunishment #RighttoDie #ProChoice #AtheismisaLuxury #GetMoneyOut #BanFracking #ArrestSnyder #NeverTrump #NeverHillary

Leaked Emails Prompt Hillary to Fan Cold War Flames

Echo Chambers: A Brief History of US Media

“Free” Country

Fight for $15 is Asking Nicely

Superstar Jimmy Graham

Apple/FBI Squabble Concerns Everything but Sand Bernardino

Why Should I Vote?

Nation Lost – How to Restore the Dream

Myanmar – Genocide for Oil

Iran – Why is Containment Insufficient?

Meet your new neighbor – the Unmanned Aerial Vehicle.

Contents

Leaked Emails Prompt Hillary to Fan Cold War Flames