Veteran’s Day 2007: A Remembrance

It was May of 1985, we had been called to D.C. to testify at a hearing before the Nuclear Regulatory Commission on a matter related to our past life. We brought the kids, 15 and 16 at the time, since they had few memories of when we’d lived close enough to Washington to be there for the 4th of July, to visit the Smithsonian museums regularly, to picnic and fly kites on glorious spring days on the Mall.

Because it had been more than a decade since we’d visited, we of course had to make the pilgrimage to The Wall – the Vietnam Veteran’s Memorial finally installed below a berm years after that ill-advised war was over. The overall impression of the polished black granite wall etched with the names of the dead is somber, almost buried, unspeakably sad. My Vietnam-era veteran husband and I were in tears before we even got close enough to read any names.

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Waterboarding: Torture or Not?

It’s just so darned hard to get a straight answer out of policy makers and policy hacks. Though, interestingly enough, it’s not that hard to get opinions from warriors (or prisoners) who have been subjected to it.

Yes, it’s torture. It’s labeled such, known as such, practiced as such. The fact that we subject our SEALs and Rangers and other special forces operatives to it to give them an idea of what torture *is* and how to resist it, tells us that it’s legitimately, objectively classifiable as TORTURE.

So, you might ask with wonder in your eyes, why are Senators and Congresscitters and administration hacks arguing about it in public? Why is it “important” on somebody’s scale of things to do to make this long-ago made distinction? Why won’t AG candidate Michael Mukasey lend us his views on the issue? It’s a fair question, let’s ask it…

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Filed under Anti-War, Appointees, Corruption, History, Humor, Hypocrisy, Military, Republicans, Snark, Torture | Comments (2)

Those Very Strangely “Missing” Nukes

Update w/New Links and List of Deaths

Way back in early September I posted about a strange incident at Minot AFB in North Dakota, where 5 (now increased to 6) stockpiled nuclear warheads were taken out of storage, armed, attached to supposedly decommissioned Advanced Cruise Missiles, loaded onto the pilons of a B-52 strategic bomber, and flown to Barksdale AFB in Louisiana – a forward staging base for deployments to Afghanistan and Iraq.

My analysis at that time was that the whistleblowers who reported the incident to The Army Times – which then broke the story – were just doing their job, which had to do with some rather obvious “Saber-Rattling” by the Bush administration against Iran. In that post I noted that ex-CIA analyst Larry Johnson agreed with my analysis on his blog.

On Halloween investigative reporter Dave Lindorff posted a diary on DKos based on his article for The American Conservative [October 22 issue online]. He titled his diary The Air Force Cover-Up of that Minot-Barksdale Nuclear Missile Flight and it’s full of little tidbits of information from the Air Force’s investigation report on the incident.

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“We Didn’t Think Anybody Would Notice”

U.S. Navy says “oops” nearly 40 years later

At the top of the news today is something a little more humorous than cutting ten million children’s health care off, or rattling sabers at Iran, or even which Republican hypocrite got caught with his pants down. I figure we should enjoy the comic relief whenever we get a chance.

The photograph at left was originally obtained by Google Maps over the internet, and has since proliferated across the ‘net, on YouTube, and in print and video media. For rather obvious reasons. It’s a building housing U.S. Navy SEALs at the Coronado amphibious base near San Diego, California. It was built in 1968, and has been sitting there in a ‘no fly’ zone for 39 years where only Navy and Marine pilots (and passengers) could see it from the air. Until satellite images became public access not long ago…

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Avast, Ye Landlubbers! Arrrrrr…!

Today be International Talk Like A Pirate Day, so I think it be a Cracken good idee to invite me matey Cap’n Randall to spin a sea-yarn for all us swabbies. About dark buckaneers an’ dirty deeds in foreign ports, blunderbuss firing and cannonballs’ thunder, and Davy Jones’ locker.

The Cap’n eats fire, ye bilge rats! Don’ ye cross ‘im or he’ll sent ye straight to Davy Jones!

Follow me below to the bilges if ye dare….

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6 Years Later: Osama bin Laden is still free.

I shed my share of remembrance tears just like everyone else today. They taste more bitter than salty. Guess I’m better at remembering than I am at forgetting.

This Years’ Osama bin Laden

When it was announced last week that bin Laden had sent another of his annual video greeting cards to America, I didn’t even bother to view any out-takes or try to guess if this year’s bin Laden is the real McCoy or just another bad actor too fat or too black to pull it off. I figure if George Bush isn’t concerned enough about him to care, why should I?

Again counter-terrorism expert Larry Johnson agrees with my take, though he beat me to the analysis this time. On his blog he calls it The Bin Laden Video Nonsense and complains about this bin Laden’s dyed beard – Grecian Formula for facial hair.

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Filed under 9-11, al Quaeda, Military, Osama bin Laden, Propaganda, War | Comments (2)

Saber-Rattling 101:

How to Scare the Bejesus Out of Tyrants and Tin-Horns

The buzz on the left has been insistent for a couple of weeks now about what the Bush administration is planning to do about Iran’s apparently insane Shi’ite political leader and his nuclear ambitions. The carrier fleet and their escorts have been deployed to the Gulf, the rhetoric has kicked up a few notches about how accessible Iran’s nuclear facilities are to air and sea strikes, there’s even been some talk of a draft. Because Iran’s got a heck of an army and they could march it into Iraq if it felt the need.

There are of course many reasons to doubt that our current war-loving band of chicken-hawk miscreants in Washington are really dumb enough to attack Iran, particularly since Israel issued a statement on Wednesday that they’d be willing to live with a nuclear Iran. So long as it’s just power, of course, as opposed to weapons.

Thus it was with a wry smile and a roll of the eyes that I saw the several news reports about 5 ACMs – Advanced Cruise Missiles – mounted with 5-150 kiloton nuclear warheads (these qualify as tactical nukes as opposed to strategic ones on ICBMs that boast multiple megaton warheads) that were ‘accidentally’ flown from Minot AFB in North Dakota to Barksdale AFB in Louisiana on August 30. Oops.

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