tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12796551.post2691008228082054624..comments2024-03-26T05:18:53.709-04:00Comments on Pen and Sword: The Next New Plan for BananastanJeff Huberhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14146644937683409726noreply@blogger.comBlogger5125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12796551.post-12638238153950609832009-09-03T14:54:44.361-04:002009-09-03T14:54:44.361-04:00Yes, Fil, recognizable words with no meaning.Yes, Fil, recognizable words with no meaning.Jeff Huberhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14146644937683409726noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12796551.post-26331021288072470782009-09-03T13:12:40.688-04:002009-09-03T13:12:40.688-04:00Do you think these guys may use a speech-generatin...Do you think these guys may use a <a href="http://www.trainme.org/speech.html" rel="nofollow">speech-generating program</a>? Just throw in a few seed words, hit 'enter' and Bob's your uncle, as the Brits say.<br /><br />They remind me a bit of cyberpoetry - all the words are recognizable but there is no underlying meaning.<br /><br />I believe one of them said that he would know what "victory" was in Afghanistan when he saw it. I think that was first used several decades ago by a judge when he tried to define obscenity. The irony is not lost.<br /><br />As far as the plans by some nation builders to balkanize Iraq by splitting it into three regions, could the result be called a bananasplit? (Sorry, sorry. I simply couldn't resist.)<br /><br />Shades of Oscar Wilde and "I can resist anything but temptation."Filostratohttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04469903260877069258noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12796551.post-61841414936395159452009-09-03T10:07:07.722-04:002009-09-03T10:07:07.722-04:00Jeff,
One of the main arguments against simply l...Jeff, <br /><br />One of the main arguments against simply leaving Afghanistan is that if we do so, the Taliban and al Qaeda will re-build their strength. My question is: so what? Suppose that they do. Isn't there an implicit admission in the argument above that we won't be able to prevent them from attacking us if they're allowed to rebuild? Isn't that a really scary admission? Is it really serious to suggest that a nation with a 500B defense budget cannot keep out terrorists from a nation with no budget at all (relatively speaking)? Please tell me what I'm missing.<br /><br />Secondly, few ever seem to discuss WHY the Taliban can even be resurgent. Do the people of Afghanistan genuinely like the Taliban? Or is it more the case that the Taliban establishes some rule of law, barbarian as it may be, to give the people some hope there will stability and "justice" ? I guess I don't really know what the average Afghani thinks, and I suspect, neither does anyone in our government.<br /><br />Obama has been a real disappointment in this respect.outlaw josey walesnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12796551.post-6981046276406949702009-09-03T00:02:58.650-04:002009-09-03T00:02:58.650-04:00I totally agree. We can disect the policy, we can...I totally agree. We can disect the policy, we can complain, but none of that changes anything. I am reminded of the advice of an old salt who explained to me ,"A bitching sailor is a happy sailor.". So long as the American public can bitch and compalin about the wars and the goverment provoking them, nothing will change. They just want to have their say.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12796551.post-68646479855062988512009-09-02T11:50:41.085-04:002009-09-02T11:50:41.085-04:00Normally, I don't "cut and paste", H...Normally, I don't "cut and paste", However, P.M. Carpenter, puts my thoughts into words.... on www.Buzzflash.com this morning. This is one of those: "I wish I had said that" commentaries. Too good not to share. <br /><br />'Round and 'round and 'round we could go; and, so goes the scuttlebutt, if General Stanley McChrystal has his way, in Afghanistan we very well might. Which leads to yet another (one would think) unnecessary but invalidating argument, this one foreshadowed by the good general himself. Reports the Times: "The revised strategy articulated by General McChrystal in recent public comments would invest the United States more extensively in Afghanistan" -- and here it comes -- by "taking a page from the 2007 strategy shift in Iraq."<br /><br />In other words, the Myth of the Successful Surge. We came, we saw, we re-escalated, we trained, we retreated; and now they're blowing themselves up, all over again. This is the page from which Gen. McChrystal is reading. To which President Obama should say: "Are you f**king kidding me?"<br /><br />Which is precisely what President Johnson should have asked Gen. William Westmoreland, in 1967, before it was way too f**king late.Elderladyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02268520056042293783noreply@blogger.com