You’re right.

I wish to Chuy it weren’t so.

A whole lot of anger over at the mothership, eh?

Not that my opinion has, or should have any more value than anyone else’s, but I think you pretty much nailed it in the other thread with the observation that some people hate Obama so much that they’re willing to overlook genocide.

The very picture of restraint. No sense sweet talking ‘em TBogg, next time, just tell em.

Good lord.

Those people are insane.

As soon as you can’t figure out the right/wrong of putting a Ranger Company on the ground to end a two decade murder/rape/mutilation spree and “launching a war”, as soon as you can’t figure out who the good guys are between Barack Obama and Joseph Kony, as soon as you can decide the “Right” thing to do is to continue to stand back and do nothing, you may have some kind of weird cred but in the process you have lost your humanity.

TBogg, you’re a better man than I am for wading into that swamp. And no minds will ever be opened, or changed. But thanks for trying, man…

mikey

This is an odd one: for all my life, my peeps on the left have complained about the failure of the US government to intervene in humanitarian crises in Africa. This has been an ongoing humanitarian crisis for over a decade, one recognized by NGOs that are usually respected on my wing of the political spectrum. Sure, there’s reason to doubt the rational for action offered by the US government, but that doesn’t mean putting an end to this outrage is unwarranted or something that should be opposed. Whatever might be motivating our government’s action, LRA is really brutalizing, terrorizing and murdering the people of the regions where it operates.
On the right, on the other hand, Iraq makes it impossible for me to see any kind of crisis of conscience. A crisis of convenience, perhaps, but no crisis of conscience.

What is there to say, but:

Amen, brother TBogg.

Yegads. I would laugh if I could get my jaw up off the floor.

Those people were actually complaining about YOU indulging in “ad hominem assault”?

Wow.

I can’t tell if growing isolationism of the American left is a genuine paradigm shift or simply an artifact of the FDL-type left who, consciously or not, find faults in everything about the current President because of he’s perceived as generally acting against their interests. I want to believe it’s the latter, because I would hate to have to break with my party on foreign policy, which is one of the core issues I really care about. (Which probably puts me in a small minority of voters. Even outrage with Afghanistan and Iraq were more about domestic issues than actual foreign policy. But that’s neither here nor there.)

Dayen’s thread is filled with isolationist thought that I find extremely troubling. I get that Afghanistan and Iraq sucked. But has that honestly poisoned the well for all military action? The thread over there is mostly calls that the US needs to stop “policing the world” and pay more attention to its domestic troubles, because being the world police just causing trouble for the average American. This is classic isolationism, the kind that has prevented the US from getting involved in so many humanitarian crises that have been cause célèbre for the left. Rwanda, Congo, Darfur.. remember these, guys? Your arguments against the Uganda mission apply equally to those places, as well.

This is the second time I’ve been incredibly disappointed in FDL with regards to foreign policy and humanitarianism in particular. The left is becoming increasingly distanced from humanitarian military action. This is flabbergasting. You can’t stop civil wars with food drops and Red Cross camps. Refugee camps are a symptom of continuing and increasing conflict, not a sign that the conflict is ending. But even though the left still decries the atrocities in Africa, we see, like we’re seeing now, deep-rooted opposition when the US does anything serious about it.

What gives? The left used to be the champion of this issue. What’s with the total 180?

On a side note, Dayen’s fear-mongering about a unitary executive is just plain bunk. The law he linked to is not a hard read. It’s short and sweet and pretty clear about what Congress has authorized the President to do. Dayen has not does his due diligence as a journalist. That post has contributed to the hyperventilation about a relatively minor military advisory mission.

He quoted a short part of the law and misrepresented what the law actually says. Notice that he chose not to quote the full portion. I doubt he purposefully is trying to stoke the flames by misleading people into believing this action is unauthorized. But he obviously didn’t fully comprehend the legal aspects before he decided to publish a post essentially calling the move illegal.

On the plus side, the Firebagger gang are on the same side as Rush on this one.

Delurking to say, I’ve looked to TBogg for premium snark since the days of Table Talk, and he never disappoints. But for a while now I’ve felt that firedoglake is a less than optimum venue for him. Or the bassets. Just sayin’.

Well here is a thought. Every single intervention we have engaged in in the last 60 years has always been on the side of light, freedom and to protect the innocents. Every single one. I remember Dr. Tom Dooley in S.E. Asia and his books about the evil enemy we were facing over there published in the 50s.

So maybe we are on the side of the angels this time. It would be nice for a change. Excuse me if I’m somewhat skeptical, however.

once again TBogg — WTF is a brilliant guy like you DOING in a cesspool like this??

You are using facts to support an argument.
That is just not fair.

LEAVE JO-KO ALONE!!!!

The law he linked to is not a hard read. It’s short and sweet and pretty clear about what Congress has authorized the President to do.

Yes, exactly. Specifically, it authorizes

providing political, economic, military, and intelligence support for viable multilateral efforts to protect civilians from the Lord’s Resistance Army, to apprehend or remove Joseph Kony and his top commanders from the battlefield in the continued absence of a negotiated solution, and to disarm and demobilize the remaining Lord’s Resistance Army fighters

Seems pretty clear to me. I have to wonder what bill Dave Dayen read.

The history of post-World War Two American military intervention is extremely checkered. There is, however, no guilt by association on this issue. The verdict is still out on Libya, while a positive case can fairly readily be made for the intervention in the Balkans. Certainly, there need not be any rush to judgment.
I am old enough to remember that factions of the American left were opposed to Vietnam’s invasion of Pol Pot’s Cambodia.

So maybe we are on the side of the angels this time. It would be nice for a change. Excuse me if I’m somewhat skeptical, however.

I’m far too cynical to even get to the skeptical stage, and nearly always assume nothing is ever what is claimed unless some pretty strong evidence shows otherwise. But… even if this operation is a cover for super duper blah blah blah freedom stealing blah nefarious plot, even if it lines the fat cat pockets of cats so fat their feet don’t touch the ground – the price of taking no action at all against the LRA has shown to be horrifically high.

Even including in the moral calculus the inherent corruption/waste/death of innocents/senseless destruction that follows in the wake of all our military adventures, our common humanity requires a gamble that maybe, this time, the benefits outweigh the costs.

I concede the same argument could have been made for the Iraq debacle. I guess my only defense is that the trail of dead bodies and destruction laid by the LRA is a bit more of a slam dunk than a vial of baby powder.

The same argument was made for Vietnam, howed that work out?

The argument is always the same, there are always people in positions of power and humanitarian groups that are in favor of it. Just saying.

WTF is a brilliant guy like you DOING in a cesspool like this??

In T’s defense, it wasn’t always this bad. Things really went to hell in a duffle bag after he moved over here.

No, wait, I don’t mean it was his FAULT….

We know who Joseph Kony is. We know what he has done, and what he has sanctioned. We know that, if left unchecked, he would continue to cut a swath of death and destruction across sub-Saharan Africa that would turn even the most cynical person’s stomach.

So please tell me why is blowing this man off the face of the planet with the fury of God’s own thunder a bad thing? It isn’t like asking him to throw down his weapons and come out with his hands up is a viable strategy here.

The same argument was made for Vietnam

You mean the argument that we had to stop International Communism there or all the other nations in the region would fall — like dominoes — into its eeevil ideological clutches?

Hmm. I don’t see the parallels. Help me out here.

Vietnam? WTF? I am old enough to have protested the Vietnam War, and radical enough to have protested the attack on Afghanistan, let alone Iraq. This is not remotely comparable. I am very ambivalent about this action, on principle, but let’s be realistic.

Ugluks flea writes: I concede the same argument could have been made for the Iraq debacle.

Man, there it is AGAIN. This isn’t a full-scale invasion and genocide with carpet bombing of residential neighborhoods in the name of “shock and awe”. This handful of troops is not on a combat mission. The same argument could not have been made for the Iraq invasion, because it was an invasion from the git, not any sort of minor presence of the type now put forth by Obama.

In short, this isn’t gonna bump Halliburton stock.

Ditto the Vietnam comparison. Please, please, please, can we knock it off with the false equivalencies?

There wasn’t a hint of humanitarian moralizing over Vietnam. It was a proxy war between the U.S. and the Communist Bloc, purely and simply. Kony is a genocidal maniac. If the U.S. could buy off Kony the way they should/could/might have bought off Ho Chi Minh, they wouldn’t need 100 troops or 10 or two. “The Best and the Brightest” really needs to get back into circulation. I also protested Vietnam and most U.S. misadventures and diversions since, I also thought and think Iraq an insane mistake — Afghanistan ended up that way but the original impulse, to punish the mass murderer and his enablers, not so hard to understand.
Obama couldn’t even get 60 Democratic senators to get off their asses and work for health care for poor children; the idea that he’s a war criminal for not prosecuting Cheney and Bush for their war crimes — something he couldn’t possibly have made happen besides having never said he would even attempt it — is absurd.

I guess I’m at a point where I am so cynical of the motives of politicians who say we need military action anywhere, that I will simply never support them again. Just a few days ago, Obama was touting the absurdly premised idea that we “thwarted” a convoluted terrorist attack from some Iranian used car salesman and that seems to be enough to start beating the war drums for Iran for some. At least the Bush Administration made up some creative bogus terror thwartings (“The Dirty Bomber” comes to mind). The problem is that there are plenty of bad guys to point out in the world, but we only seem to care about the ones whose overthrow serves our interests. If Obama really cared about humanitarian implications before making military decisions, he would have pulled us out of Iraq and Afghanistan a few years ago. The fact of the matter is that the U.S. has killed and maimed far more people than any of these bad guys could ever dream of killing. I don’t believe anything that our leaders say anymore and the sad excuse for a news media cannot be trusted to fact check any of it.

I wonder if we have any active or retired military commenting here at FDL. It would be worthwhile to have that, I believe.

It’s disheartening for me to see how pervasive is this mindset that the US military is nearly always at the top of choices to deal with situations such as this. Send somebody else’s kid or family to do the dirty work needed to smash this particular nasty bug. How easy to call for that.

Yeah, I know, that’s what those people risked when they signed up, but these days, sometimes the military is all the choice some of us have left.

When I see calls for action, like beating down the doors of the nearest recruiting station, well . . . .

I don’t have the answers, no individual does. I disagree with Mr. bogg on this issue, but that does not mean I think he’s a bum for having his opinion. I believe Mr. Obama’s presidency will go down as the “Great Disappointment”.

I’ve read you for many years, mostly lurked, usually because someone else beat me to the bon mot, and I will continue to do so, unless you screw the pooch. That’s a joke!

In general, we need to be mature enough to hold differing opinions on controversial issues like this but still have the decency to be decent to each other.

If not, there’s a warlord in Africa waiting to have a dance.

Incidentally, thanks Dylan H, for your comments at David Dayen’s post (yep, I read them all, and was thoroughly disgusted– who the fuck are these people?), a rare instance of sanity amid the mindless stream of shamelessly dishonest bullshit the commenting base there seems to have settled on as their imprimatur of progressive legitimacy.

Well, rare except for Tom’s comments. And mine of course [laughing], but that was pretty much it.

BasilBeast writes: It’s disheartening for me to see how pervasive is this mindset that the US military is nearly always at the top of choices to deal with situations such as this.

What is your evidence that it is? How about reading the letter Obama sent to Congress, in which he points out that negotiated solutions have failed to produce results?

And second, though not a military man myself, I do know a young fella who joined up with the Marines a few months back, his stated reason being a desire to “help people”. Serious, that’s what he said.

Internally I guess I sort of rolled my eyes, because that is often not what our military does, but well, here’s his chance– to do some good.

Well, rare except for Tom’s comments. And mine of course [laughing], but that was pretty much it.

Hey!

TBogg, I just want to tell you good luck. We’re all counting on you.

I wonder if we have any active or retired military commenting here at FDL. It would be worthwhile to have that, I believe.

I’m not officially retired (didn’t put in the whole 20), but I served, and my husband is a retiree. I don’t see how it makes that much difference to my opinions, except to enable me to call bullshit on military worshippers, or to cool down people (and I’m not suggesting you’re one) who act like simply being in the military — over and above any education, reasoning, or level of intelligence — makes their opinion on any military-related subject NECESSARILY worth more.

It’s disheartening for me to see how pervasive is this mindset that the US military is nearly always at the top of choices to deal with situations such as this.

Well, frankly, a “situation such as this” is probably ONLY susceptible to a military solution. A crazy person like Kony is not going to be stopped by asking nicely. There is no scope for negotiation or finesse. So our limited number of guys are going to assist the Ugandan military in solving the problem, by sharing our advanced organizational tactics, strategic knowledge (satellites! AWACS!), battlefield lessons learned, and technical savvy, all of which are US military specialties that in fact only the US military can provide. Hence the fact that the US military is “at the top of choices” to contribute to a solution.

I don’t mean to be snotty about this. I’m just pointing out reasons why deploying a limited number of our combat savvy people is probably a damn good idea in this instance, both in terms of actually being able to get something accomplished and in terms of not exposing more of OUR military personnel to unnecessary (and of course, politically unpopular) risks.

I assume the world could very easily justify an armed military intervention against a murderous villain, assuming the descriptions we’ve seen are correct. But what that should lead to is an internationally sanctioned police action, not a unilateral US military action.

This time, given the asserted facts, people think unilateral action is justified; the next time, it could be some democratically elected leader of Chile, whose crime was the destruction of free enterprise because he nationalized the phone company.

Does one’s preference for a certain principle depend on whether the President is Carter, Obama, Bush, Perry or Ron Paul?

Okay, I’m pretty green at this, but I’ll give it a go—

Shorter Firebagger:

“Teenage rape-slaves demand to see your congressional approval before they’ll even consider being freed.”

“Either we’re the world’s police or we aren’t. Or as the headmistress used to say, until you do everything perfectly there’s no point in doing anything at all.”

“You give me one good reason to hunt down this religious whack-job that I can’t whine into the ground, and I’ll give you my Nader 2000 bobblehead. Still in its original packaging, because PURITY!”

and lastly

“The difference between killing Osama bin Laden and killing Joseph Kony is… um… look, a bully pulpit!”

Do I get a basset now?

So I have a call in to Russ Feingold, who wrote the bill, and I’ve asked him if he thinks this was a justifiable move by the President, an available option under the law he wrote, and I will report back when I get a reply. And if he says it is well within bounds, I’m happy to agree with him.

Hm. Seems to me that brother T’s argument is: it needs to be done, and quickly, while the “opposing” argument is: we’re not the cops for the world and who is Obama to decide someone needs to die?

Besides the obvious need for oh, say….Wolverine…I do think we earthlings need to occasionally be able to circumvent normal rules when some monster decides that even basic civility is out of the question. The other problem is, naturally, we earthlings overdo shit. Ann Coulter doesn’t deserve to die just because she’s a bitch.

But, I agree with T in this case.

What you’re arguing sounds a lot like a rigid, inflexible view that the facts, circumstances, and/or specifics of a situation are irrelevant to a determination of what to do. “If we take action X in situation A, then we can’t complain when X is done in situation B.”

Not to mention that your situation B involves attacking the democratically elected leader of a sovereign nation rather than someone who has no affiliation with any government, and holds no elected or recognized office.

Shorter Firebagger:

“Teenage rape-slaves demand to see your congressional approval before they’ll even consider being freed.”

Well, an argument can be cogently made that there IS congressional approval for “… military … support.”

Ann Coulter doesn’t deserve to die just because she’s a bitch.

No, being a VOMITOUS bitch is arguably not dangerous to the lives of others, but if she were regularly murdering hundreds of people with machetes….

Sigh.

With the exception of TBogg, I left FDL during the 2008 campaign. Seems too many were offended that I brought to the discussion McCain’s Forrestal problem. Oh, the pearl clutching that a former POW also had a family legacy protection possibility.

That, and the incessant greeting each other for the first hour of each thread. Oh, is that too cynical of me? Hey, I’m just one person with a little tolerance for the insufferable. Sue me.

Per the specific thread that inspired this one: I read it. Every single posted comment. There are some progressives who, God bless them, wrestle with the how they are conflating this with the beginnings of Vietnam, or Iraq, or Afghanistan. In their minds, it is an honest conflation. I have room in my brain for that.

But the LRA is not the Chinese supported Viet Cong. And the bill that is referenced in the original post contains the following section:

SEC. 3. STATEMENT OF POLICY.
It is the policy of the United States to work with regional
governments toward a comprehensive and lasting resolution to the
conflict in northern Uganda and other affected areas by—
(1) providing political, economic, military, and intelligence
support for viable multilateral efforts to protect civilians from
the Lord’s Resistance Army, to apprehend or remove Joseph
Kony and his top commanders from the battlefield in the continued
absence of a negotiated solution, and to disarm and demobilize
the remaining Lord’s Resistance Army fighters; (italics mine).

Perhaps Dayen didn’t really read the law. Or if he did, doesn’t understand the what he read. Heaven forbid that he read it, understood it, but wanted to clutch pearls and Hate Obama Anyway.

Now before anyone calls me an Obot, I hate that he hasn’t had Holder go after Wall Street or the Banksters for their Fraud; John Yoo, Bush or Cheney for their rationalizing and gloating about torture. I hate that I am not getting the “Change is Coming to America” that I was promised.

But I won’t just participate in an Anti-Obama screed because it is fashionable with the FDL crowd. I’ll go Anti-Obama for valid reasons against my politics or if he flagrantly violates the law and constitution. With this particular issue, it is not flagrant. He is CiC, and he was given a green light to ‘remove’.

TBogg is the ONLY reason I come to FDL. Once he goes, so do I.

No the unvbelievable cruelty of the enemy.

Yes there was a lot of humanitarian moralizing over vietnam. I remember, sorry. I read it in most of the major weekly and monthly pulbications. You can claim that it wasn’t there but it was.

No the unvbelievable cruelty of the enemy.

After the war was underway, perhaps, (oh those evil punji sticks) as one of the straw-grasping reasons to continue, but that was not THE PRIMARY JUSTIFICATION for getting involved in the first place.

“I was there,” too. I graduated in 1970. I was in the Mobilization. You’re not going to get any bullshit past me on this point.

Yes there was a lot of humanitarian moralizing over vietnam.

I agree. After we got started. We were pretty unbelievably cruel ourselves, REMEMBER?

That a president who hasn’t prosecuted a single one of Bush’s torturers; who hasn’t prosecuted a single bankster; and who has reneged on damned near every one of his campaign promises is suddenly overwhelmed with the urge to Do The Right Thing is mighty suspicious to me. In the absence of mighty strong evidence to the contrary, I’m going to say it’s just another instance of him being a very pliable puppet for somebody or other.

Africa is a big place, and I’m surely not informed about the goings-on over there, but I have heard that something the US of A is mighty short of on the Dark Continent are military bases.

http://blackstarnews.com/news/135/ARTICLE/7709/2011-10-14.html

http://blackagendareport.com/content/africom-and-icc-enforcing-international-justice-africa

Obama, like Bush before him, is all right with dictators and monsters when their activities coincide with US interests.

With all due respect to the site owner, I’d suggest he consider “reconsidering” his position on Obama’s latest gambit.

It’s his opinion. He’s entitled to it. You’re entitled to yours. Don’t try to pull this mealy-mouthed bull about asking with respect that he “reconsider” his opinion just because it doesn’t coincide with yours.

“With all due respect” is just a nice way of saying “kiss my ass”.

Actually you weren’t. I graduated in 1964 I had just joined up when the first big mobilization came on. I do indeed remember the arguments from back in the early 60s.

Just the opposite. Of course the specific facts matter. My comment was directed at who gets to decide them, and how, and who decides what the appropriate response is and whether police/military action is warranted.

Not sure how helpful your A-B distinction is. Suppose the target here weren’t some rogue warlord but was instead the head of security of some state doing the same things. I think there have been such examples. Would we give this statutory power to, say, President Perry?

Zachary,

I’m not going to pretend that I know whether President Obama’s motives are pure and innocent or greedy and hypocritical. I just don’t think, when it comes to a religious whackjob who savages villages for fun, that Obama’s motivation should be your primary concern. Particularly with the teenage rape-slaves and all.

Similarly, if a Republican President had authorized the killing of bin Laden just so he could loop the video on his Youtube feed and watch it while listening to “America, Fuck Yeah!” on his iPod, that doesn’t really take away from the crazy religious mass murderer being dead. Barring zombieness, of course.

And anyone who says “It’s just like Vietnam/Iraq/Sarajevo/Iraq-again/Stalingrad/Thermopylae” is existing in a frictionless two-dimensional universe in which everything is equal and the distance between any two points is non-existent.

and the incessant greeting each other for the first hour of each thread

Whole lot of reach-arounds going on over there….

Not so – I’m perfectly capable of saying “kiss my ass” if it needs saying.

And I do intend to remain polite – so long as this blog stays on my bookmarks list.

What I’ll do here if events merit it is what I did at my former “favorite” political site: Talking Points Memo. When THAT site owner endorsed Obama’s Executive Murder Power, I simply removed that one from the bookmarks list.

This is nuts. The specific law referenced gives a specific president specific leeway to ‘remove’ a specific individual.

hhttp://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/pkg/BILLS-111s1067enr/pdf/BILLS-111s1067enr.pdf

We aren’t in a situation pf “some security of state doing the same things”.

this isn’t a STATUTE.

conflating this with statutory law is insane.

Well sir, I suppose we can agree the African SOB is better off dead. And I suppose we’ll disagree about whether or not selective enforcement of international law is a good idea.

All sorts of horrible “exceptions” to lawful behavior can be justified if one tries hard enough.

Not a visual I want to stay in my head. Love ya, but need a new visual – quick!

Thank you dear. As to “selective enforcement,” I’ll just refer you back to the notion of “Until you can do everything perfectly, there’s no point in doing anything.” Which seems like an awfully helpless way to exist in the world, to be honest.

Or, as Ambrose Bierce so succinctly put it: “A cynic is someone who knows the cost of everything and the value of nothing.”

@Scarecrow

Well, okay. I mean, if Pam Geller was President and she wanted to kill Elmo for gay-marrying kindergartners, I’d probably be against it (the killing Elmo part, I mean. Gay-marrying kindergartners is his right as a Muppet-American.) So yes, if everything about this situation were different, I might have a different point-of-view.

That was Oscar Wilde. Bierce’s definition of a cynic was someone “who sees things as they are, not as they ought to be”.

That was precisely my point. People, once given a new power, over-use it until corrected. An executive ability that I would trust Elizabeth Warren with, I’m sure John Boehner would turn into the Weapon From Hell.

I do not think the US Government should have legal assassination powers. I do think someone needs to. No, I will not argue specifics over *who* that someone should be.

So I read the thread. You’re right, they’re wrong.

I thought wingnuts hated Obama. They don’t. They hate anyone with a (D) next to their name.

Firebaggers? They really, really hate Obama.

Kill Joseph Kony. Kill him now. Kill him yesterday.

In this case motives most certainly do matter. Suppose for a moment that Obama & Company aren’t simon pure about this. That 1) they want another war going to defuse cuts to the military budget and 2) they really do want those African military bases.

I propose that too-quick a success would be every bit as bad for Obama as it would have been for Bush when he had Osama cornered in Afghanistan. How could the Texas Torturer have gotten his war with Iraq if the architect of the 9/11 murders was stretched out on a board full of lots of bloody holes? No, it was necessary for Osama to escape, and that’s exactly what the bushies engineered.

Now back to Africa. Lots and lots of US military infrastructure to be built, lots of extra troops and equipment need to be brought in. All this will take quite a bit of time. In the meantime, the suffering Africans are at least as bad off as they are now, and perhaps worse. Add the “accidents” when our Hellfire missiles start falling on ‘suspicious’ targets full of women and children – like in Afghanistan. Yes, things might very well get worse.

Yeah, sometimes Obama is a little disappointing but he’s at least ten times better than anybody else that has considered running to maybe we could stop all the “perfect is the enemy of the good” stuff, m’kay Dayen? And real big of you to decide that that call from Feingold is the final word there. Nobody says anything when presidents drop bombs on civilian kids in other countries but, when he tries to take out a certified bad guy, everybody get their undies in a bunch??? Yes, I know that it’s complicated and most of the times motives are not pure. There’s always politics and natural resources, etc., etc. But sometimes doing the right thing is pretty obvious and nitpicking over “justifiable” wording is infuriating.

TBogg, you’re right on this one.

They certainly won’t get better if we stand around and do nothing, or simply make a lot of noise and not actually back that up with action. We tried that in 1994, remember?

According to the Great O his very self, this particular African monster has been operating for over two decades. And news accounts I’ve read say the request for aid arrived in November of last year. Nobody has been all that concerned nor in any kind of hurry, so a person has got to wonder what it was that built a fire under the Powers That Be.

[laughing] Sorry!

This not the head of some state. This not us invading some country.

Wish the Bush administration had taken this approach after 9/11 with Osama.

I’m all for killing genocidal maniacs. Just can’t understand why it takes 20 fucking years.

I had just joined up when the first big mobilization came on.

I was talking about The Mobilization, capital M, as in The Mobilization Against the War. I

You are actually telling me that THE PRIMARY JUSTIFICATION for our earliest intervention was NOT to contain communism but merely to prevent the “unbelievable cruelty” of the “enemy” being perpetrated on…whom, exactly? Certain people (but NOT communists) were OUR “enemy” already? Before we had actually engaged them? Or –wait– were they, perhaps, considered enemies of capitalism?

All of this is absolutely fascinating, but I need more information. Lay it out for me. Explain what I don’t remember. Tell me why I — and so many others — remember the justification so differently.

In fact, a lot of people remember that after the Communist victory in China in 1949, the TRUMAN administration was already publicly characterizing the French effort to maintain their colonial domination of Vietnam as a crucial element of the Cold War, the containment of Communism that included the Korean war and assistance to Nationalist China in Formosa (Taiwan), and that from 1950-1954, US aid constituted 78% of the budget of the French military effort. And that the Eisenhower administration, fearing the communist takeover after Dienbenphu, even went so far as to send in the CIA to undermine the treaty the French were finally forced to make with the Vietminh. And so it went from there….

Of course, there was also that 1966 Army training film (“County Fair”) that purported to show members of the Viet Cong in a jungle clearing heating gasoline and soap bars toether to create a particularly vicious “communist invention” called… napalm. So, yeah, there might have been some propaganda out there about the “unbelievable cruelty” of “the enemy” at a few points (like the other atrocity lies that were promoted by a Catholic priest–and CIA operative– in 1954-55 in order to get thousands of Vietnamese to move from the North to the South). But all the lies were in service of the true objective: “Keep the commies contained.”

On a lighter note, has anybody spoken of the Good Side of the Lord’s Liberation Army?

Turns out the answer is a resounding YES!

I now cut/paste from the link:

Lord’s Resistance Army are Christians. They are fighting the Muslims in Sudan. … So that’s a new war, a hundred troops to wipe out Christians in Sudan, Uganda, and — (interruption) no, I’m not kidding. Jacob Tapper just reported it. …

Lord’s Resistance Army objectives. I have them here. “To remove dictatorship and stop the oppression of our people.” Now, again Lord’s Resistance Army is who Obama sent troops to help nations wipe out. The objectives of the Lord’s Resistance Army, what they’re trying to accomplish with their military action in these countries is the following: “To remove dictatorship and stop the oppression of our people; to fight for the immediate restoration of the competitive multiparty democracy in Uganda; to see an end to gross violation of human rights and dignity of Ugandans; to ensure the restoration of peace and security in Uganda, to ensure unity, sovereignty, and economic prosperity beneficial to all Ugandans, and to bring to an end the repressive policy of deliberate marginalization of groups of people who may not agree with the LRA ideology.” Those are the objectives of the group that we are fighting, or who are being fought and we are joining in the effort to remove them from the battlefield.

http://tinyurl.com/5uap665

Yes, Rush ‘druggie’ Limpaugh’s first thoughts on the subject were that people who were whacking Muslims and other evildoers and doing so in the name of Jesus had to be All Right Guys.

How did that old song Old Tin Soldier go? “Do it in the name of heaven, you can justify it in the end.”

Or just wrapping whatever awful thing you wanna do in the US flag works pretty well too….

I’m thinking someone needs to MOVE TO BALLOON JUICE.

Or someplace else where douchebags don’t predominate.

That a president who hasn’t prosecuted a single one of Bush’s torturers; who hasn’t prosecuted a single bankster; and who has reneged on damned near every one of his campaign promises

First, remember that these people acted under the assurance of their DOJ that it was permitted. Makes prosecution difficult. Second re your claim that Obama has reneged on damned near every one of his campaign promises, here’s a list of 149 of them kept. Like you fucking care.

Look, country’s in a lot of trouble right now, and we can’t afford a whole lot more of this kind of stupidity. Please be smarter. We need you now.

I propose that too-quick a success would be every bit as bad for Obama as it would have been for Bush when he had Osama cornered in Afghanistan. How could the Texas Torturer have gotten his war with Iraq if the architect of the 9/11 murders was stretched out on a board full of lots of bloody holes? No, it was necessary for Osama to escape, and that’s exactly what the bushies engineered

You’ve got to be kidding. al-Qaeda exists irrespective of the life or death of Osama bin Laden, obviously. Are you trying to piss people off with a breathtakingly ignorant read of foreign affairs?

Nobody has been all that concerned nor in any kind of hurry, so a person has got to wonder what it was that built a fire under the Powers That Be

Obama wasn’t President twenty years ago, which may help to explain his failure to take action then. Nevertheless, he has commented on this since taking the Presidency. A resolution of Congress, cited in his letter to them upon commencing the action, which I have no doubt you couldn’t be bothered to read, lays out the reasoning you’re asking after.

[muttering] [sotto voce] fucking dolt [muttering]

“First, remember that these people acted under the assurance of their DOJ that it was permitted. Makes prosecution difficult. Second re your claim that Obama has reneged on damned near every one of his campaign promises, here’s a list of 149 of them kept. Like you fucking care.”

Back when I was in college I caught my history teacher after class and challenged him about the behaviour of the Germans during the Holocaust. “How could this happen”, I asked. Two things I didn’t understand at the time were 1) the nature of a police state where speaking out would have fatal consequences and 2) that the concentration camps were run by carefully selected ‘perverts’. Every society has these perverts, and only when they’re given power do they become dangerous. Bush had thousands of honest and honorable DOJ people, so to make his torture schemes work he had to single out the perverts – people willing to disregard both US and international law and all levels of decency. Once located, they willingly wrote up the “interpretations” him and his other cohorts desired.

The obvious solution would be to put the whole bunch of them on trial. Bush/Cheney, the pervert lawyers, and the actual torturers too. Perhaps some reduced sentences would be in order for the foot-soldier torturers. Not that this worked too well for the German concentration camp workers, but Tea Bagger jurors just might buy it.

But Barry O hasn’t tried ANYBODY!

As for those miracles wrought by Barry O, you’re right. I don’t f****** care. The man is willing to deliver the frothy trivia, but things like a decent national health care system he deliberately destroyed in the cradle.

He’s a hopeless hack who is (IMO) going to have a terrible time getting relected. I voted for the worthless *** in 2008, and personally brought along two dozen more votes for him. Most of those people were Republicans! So far as I know, not a single one of us will be making the same mistake again. President Bachman? I doubt if the Power Elites would allow it, but if they can live with her, so can I. Sure we’ll go to hell in a handbasket, but only a little faster than we are now.

My take on 2012: the elites will reelect Obama if humanly possible – perhaps to the extent of turning on the Diebold machines for him. If for some reason that isn’t practical, I fully expect President Romney to be annointed as the next Potus.

America doesn’t have a ‘mixed record’ on this issue, it has an extremely shitty one, one that demands the close scrutiny and cynicism of any military exercise. That this is probably the one instance where that use is justified, I’d still prefer it that the troops were under the control of the UN. I wouldn’t trust the Pentagon to buy an ice cream for a child.

“You’ve got to be kidding. al-Qaeda exists irrespective of the life or death of Osama bin Laden, obviously. Are you trying to piss people off with a breathtakingly ignorant read of foreign affairs?”

So one wonders why the big O even killed Osama? Or why they ceaselessly bray about killing the unending series of #2 or #3 leaders in his organization.

Still, you caused me to have a “light bulb” sort of idea: this new war in wherever-it-is promises to be an unending one too. Kill that top guy Kony, and all his VPs remain. And than all their buddies. Can’t stop the hunt for the newest evildoers until the job is done! And a string of US bases is sitting across the continent of Africa.

Shorter FDL:

Damnit, will somebody please think of the children kidnappers, torturers, and rapists?

In a way, I have to hand it to them; I really do not feel that most people are thinking of those guys.

Can’t stop the hunt for the newest evildoers until the job is done! And a string of US bases are sitting across the continent of Africa.

Let’s see if that comes to pass.

If it doesn’t, can I call YOU a “hopeless hack”?

Off topic follow up to Eric Erickson post:

“We are the 53%” Using Fake Images: such as a photo of a Nigerian Living in Spain
The Nigerian also happens to have more in common with the 99%ers than Ewick, who must be desperate if he’s posting photos of foreign nationals. Hasn’t he got inbred relatives he can post pictures of with fake messages?

A hundred people isn’t exactly an army.

Ordinarily, this blog is the only part of Larry Johnson’s No Quarter USA Firedoglake where I’ll tread, but I took a look at the comments over there… yucch. Wotta bunch of jerkoffs.

It would have been nice if he’d kept the bigger promises, and not watered them down to thin gruel in the doing. FWIW, prosecuting the guys at the DoJ who said torture was legal would have been a really good idea, instead of deciding their argument was actually legally valid and continuing to follow Bush/Cheney’s yellow brick road to hell.

Sure! Don’t hesitate to rub it in!

But in the event something like that actually happens, do you promise to return and agree I’m some kind of psychic?

:)

Glad you didn’t say fucking jerkoffs, cuz some delicate fdl readers (ZacharyM) would’ve been fucking offended and blamed all the fucking swearing on The Big Fucking O who, obviously, is the cause of all fucking evil….

There is middle ground, ya know. I’m one of those fucking fdl readers who really doesn’t fucking like the big fucking O. Also, too. But I know he’s not the cause of all fucking evil, he’s just one of their toys. :-) But, even toy clocks are right twice a day. Motherfucker was way overdue to be right about some action he’s taken.

I don’t dislike fdl, even though sometimes some of their comments sections have a decidedly pansy tone. I don’t have to always agree with them, neither do they have to always agree with me. I do admit I’m a bit startled that in essence they’re agreeing with Rushbo. I use that fat fuck as a barometer….if he’s thinking this way, I lean that way.

But I know he’s not the cause of all fucking evil

word

hey, we are doing that HUMANITARIAN thing in Libya, so why not a few more countries?

Photos of Sirte, Libya.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2049108/Libya-wars-stand-Sirte-Pictures-city-shelled-smithereens.html?ito=feeds-newsxml

Answer: because the USA will probably end up killing even more innocent people than if we had just STAYED OUT OF THERE!!!!

Oh, by the way, the third American civilian was killed by US drones in Yemen yesterday. No need to kidnap, imprison without charges, or torture, like Bush did – just up and kill them…. the Obama way.

No, shorter FDL is:

“They lied to us on Iraq, they’re lying to us now about Iran, so pardon us if we don’t immediately believe the reasons given for this incursion.”

Yes, reflexive cynicism is bad; it’s also very corrosive to morale and saps the energy needed to actually make effective change. But you can’t say there wasn’t any provocation for the cynicality.

My guess is he used the photo of the Nigerian gent because he could then avoid being physically near a black man, much less paying him to hold up a stupid sign.

Funny — the “Hillary would have given us single payer by now” crowd that Mister Racist Ex-CIA Guy represents hates FDL more than you do because they think FDL backed Obama over her in 2007 and 2008, and the Obama Booster Clubbers that essentially hijacked Daily Kos until Markos finally took his own blog back last month are all convinced that FDL was and still is a Hillary blog. The reality is that FDL didn’t take a side, though individual writers may have expressed preferences (mine was for Edwards, and boy are we lucky he didn’t make it past February!).

The truth that neither the Hillary nor Barack acolytes still fighting the primaries will admit is that there’s not much policy daylight between HRC and BHO; she wouldn’t be Obama’s Secretary of State if that wasn’t the case. My own take is that she’s done about as well as a neoliberal Third Wayer could or would, aside from letting herself be spun by Lanny Davis (who was in the pay of the Honduran coup backers) into advising the US not give any active assistance to Honduras’ elected government, which had committed the horrible crime of raising the country’s minimum wage and pissing off the multinational T-shirt makers who set up shop there over the last two decades.

Indeed.

Actually, Gaddafi had already offed a few thousand well before the first NATO planes came on the scene, and was gearing up to wipe out even more. He may seem cute ‘n’ cuddly, but he vied with Syria’s Assad for the most brutal response to the Arab Spring.

Which reminds me: Go read the War Nerd for some straight dope on Libya. Yeah, he’s blatantly politically incorrect, but a lot of that is, I suspect, a put-on meant to give the vapors to various persons who specialize in being professional aggrieved.

The obvious solution would be to put the whole bunch of them on trial. Bush/Cheney, the pervert lawyers, and the actual torturers too. Perhaps some reduced sentences would be in order for the foot-soldier torturers. Not that this worked too well for the German concentration camp workers, but Tea Bagger jurors just might buy it.

Somewhere in ths tortured sentence I deduce that you are unaware that the US is not signatory to the jurisprudence of the International Criminal Court. You do understand that, right?

Right, why’d I ask.

One of the main problems with the Bible Belt is that most of the cool folks that are born here wind up moving to California …which means there are very few cool folks left to help evolve the place….so stupid redneck bigots rule the day. (I live a stones throw from where the end of ‘Easy Rider’ was filmed).
Same thing here….if TBogg leaves FDL , this place will evolve much slower …if at all.

If I were Jane, I’d be encouraging TBogg to comment on every thread.

Or why they ceaselessly bray about killing the unending series of #2 or #3 leaders in his organization

Because, as previously indicated, al-Qaeda exists irrespective of the life or death of Osama bin Laden.

Next stop: rocket science.

President Bachman? I doubt if the Power Elites would allow it, but if they can live with her, so can I

Snarkalishious!

Butt, on a more serious note, I prefer Shakira…..

PJ Evans writes: It would have been nice if he’d kept the bigger promises, and not watered them down to thin gruel in the doing. FWIW, prosecuting the guys at the DoJ who said torture was legal would have been a really good idea, instead of deciding their argument was actually legally valid and continuing to follow Bush/Cheney’s yellow brick road to hell.

His promises are good faith efforts to pursue the intended, and if you wanna put one up where he sold all us out, feel free– but, you and I both know that a President can’t promise everything, only that good faith effort. The thin gruel is the result of dealing with his congress, and you and I gotta admit, they’re no help.

Re the complaint that members of the former admin should be prosecuted for war crimes:

Read your contract (the constitution). I don’t think we can. They enjoy an immunity from prosecution for their actions, save impeachment. Constitiutional lawyers, feel free to set me straight.

Well, as far as promises go, there was his promise to give us single-payer, which then became a promise for a public option to soften the mandate part of the healthcare “reform” plan — and then, when he got into office, he soon traded away Medicare drug-price negotiation as well as the public option for a few extra campaign dollars for the 2010 cycle (and then kept denying he’d done so):

http://news.firedoglake.com/2010/10/05/the-deal-with-the-hospital-industry-to-kill-the-public-option/

http://campaignsilo.firedoglake.com/2009/09/23/carper-public-defends-secret-phrma-deal-in-exchange-for-support-ads/

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/08/13/internal-memo-confirms-bi_n_258285.html

I’d prefer to see these type of operations be handled by a UN type Special Forces unit that can insulate individual nations from having this type of action become fodder for their internal domestic politics…but the Right Wingers would start their word salad processing machine – protesting something about a leftest UN conspiracy of the Black CommieIslamaosocialist world governments and tyranny!, while taking away our USA rights to be the world boss – so I guess that logical option is off the table.

If this becomes another example of surgical precision military action that serves a greater humanitarian purpose, I won’t lose sleep over it. Most likely, Obama shows again that he can make a tough call to take out another impediment to world peace in a focused, limited, and competent manner. I won’t be expecting to hear about a Joe Biden-chaired secret meeting, hosted for campaign contributors and former employers, to divvy up the regional assets as part of the military action deal.

Sounds pretty ugly in that linked thread…no good reason to spike my BP, so I’ll just say that I agree with you…if you ever decide to relocate, leave a forwarding innertube address, will yeah?

Phoenix Woman writes: Well, as far as promises go, there was his promise to give us single-payer, which then became a promise for a public option to soften the mandate part of the healthcare “reform” plan

Ahhhh, single payer is my holy grail, and every effort to get there is crushed by an incredibly powerful insurance and pharma lobby– I don’t know how to fix that. Got any ideas?

So, who’s at fault here?

Hillary Clinton detailed a remarkably comprehensive plan to the senate in 2004, was it, and was crushed. Who was at fault?

Would you accuse her of a broken promise? Why not? What’s the difference?

I did not say the only reason. But one major justification was because of the cruelty and inhumanity of our enemy. I can’t help what you remember. And incidently, I remember the increase in size of the numbers of guys in basic training just and I mean just after I got out and into advanced training.

Getting into an argument about Obama’s other broken promises seems kind of pointless at this point. Especially when someone who takes your positions insists that Obama has been the Little Goldelocks of political compromise: “It was just right.” Or for those of you with a more literary outlook the Dr. Pangloss point of view.

So we will see what happens with this intervention, nothing else the prols can do. We have always been at war with ……………. after all.

You forget Bosnia. That was a good and necessary intervention, and I’m proud that we helped end that abattoir.

Methinks you haven’t visited the comments at Balloon Juice for a loooong time.

LRA has been around long enough to give us decades of (quite horrific) archival information via magazine and newspaper articles, as well as reports from the UN and human rights groups. What is amazing is that it seems people have to re-learn this information all over again, including journalists who should know better. Here’s a report from Human Rights Watch on a massacre they committed in 2009 that also gives a good grounding in exactly what kind of sadistic mass murderers they are. And as an aside, I remember reading years ago an account from one of the escaped child soldiers of how newly-abducted kids were forced to bite another child to death.

I have a lot of problems with Obama…but this sure as hell isn’t one of them. And I’ll await the determination of finer Constitutional minds than mine before accusing him of expanding the unitary executive on this issue.

I do not think the US Government should have legal assassination powers. I do think someone needs to. No, I will not argue specifics over *who* that someone should be.

Umm, you DO realize that this statement is, in fact, an argument over who that someone should be, right?
So, who do you trust more?

100 people isn’t even an infantry company.

U pibbels still talking? Amazing.

Where do you think you are, Eschaton?

For god’s sake, Dave, it’s in the motherfucking text of the bill. Did you not read the damn thing?

Um…no. Obama the candidate never, never, never promised single payer. This is just more ODS bullshit.

David Dayen writes: So I have a call in to Russ Feingold, who wrote the bill, and I’ve asked him if he thinks this was a justifiable move by the President, an available option under the law he wrote, and I will report back when I get a reply. And if he says it is well within bounds, I’m happy to agree with him.

No, David, you will not do any such thing. Having headered your post with the title “White House Starts Mini-War in Africa”, and littered your post with dishonest allegations, you have made clear that you are a zealot with little regard for truth and you will therefore not be truthful about the response if any from the Feingold office, and you will simply lie again. And again. And again.

Fuck you very much.

lawguy writes: Getting into an argument about Obama’s other broken promises seems kind of pointless at this point

If that is the case, and in light of your failure to fucking read the evidence to the contrary I have provided you, then the argument you have put forth (that Obama hasn’t kept any of his campaign promises) falls rather swiftly to the ground, don’t you think?

Next stop, rocket science.

“Somewhere in ths tortured sentence I deduce that you are unaware that the US is not signatory to the jurisprudence of the International Criminal Court. You do understand that, right?

Right, why’d I ask.”

From the fact you’re asking this causes me to deduce you’re unaware torture is a US crime. Don’t need the furriners any way, shape, or form.

Full quote from Obama in 2003:

“I happen to be a proponent of a single payer universal health care program.” (applause) “I see no reason why the United States of America, the wealthiest country in the history of the world, spending 14 percent of its Gross National Product on health care cannot provide basic health insurance to everybody. And that’s what Jim is talking about when he says everybody in, nobody out. A single payer health care plan, a universal health care plan. And that’s what I’d like to see. But as all of you know, we may not get there immediately. Because first we have to take back the White House, we have to take back the Senate, and we have to take back the House.”

Obama speaking to the Illinois AFL-CIO, June 30, 2003.

*************

After those minor hurdles of 1) taking the White House and 2) taking back the Senate and 3) taking back the House were attained, Barry O suddenly discovered that he didn’t like Single Payer after all. (or probably more likely, the wealthy characters who put him in the White House told him to cool it)

So he made very sure it didn’t happen.

He damned well did mention it. He compromised everything that was really good right out of that bill, trying to get some votes from the Rs. And didn’t get those votes.
The guy is gullible: suggest you might possibly vote for his bill if he does this or that, and then don’t do it even after he does, and he’ll try it again.

Bot.

Yes, I read the bill, and now I’m inquiring with the author, and as soon as I get a response, I’ll post it. And it’s entirely possible, maybe even probable, that the response will be exactly the one you assume. Combat-equipped troops and war powers authorizations and all. And I’ll put that up. I too am not a fan of child-enslavers and rapists!

It is true, also, that the authority expressed in Obama’s announcement of the deployment of troops is his “constitutional authority to conduct U.S. foreign relations and as Commander in Chief and Chief Executive.” I do think the precedents for a President Cain are worth thinking about.

http://www.lawfareblog.com/2011/10/obama-sends-100-us-troops-to-uganda-to-help-combat-lord’s-resistance-army/

Pheonix Woman writes: Well, as far as promises go, there was his promise to give us single-payer, which then became a promise for a public option to soften the mandate part of the healthcare “reform” plan — and then, when he got into office, he soon traded away Medicare drug-price negotiation as well as the public option for a few extra campaign dollars for the 2010 cycle (and then kept denying he’d done so):

First, Obama never promised single payer. God knows, he’d like to.

Second, the public option you describe was killed because, as Obama himself succintly put it, “the votes aren’t there in the senate”.

Third, the medicare drug-price negotiation– for those of you in the dark about this, we’re talking about the ability of the gummint to haggle with drug companies over the price of the drugs– was made illegal by the Dubya admin, as part of its negotiation with big pharma over an increased drug benefit to seniors, which Dubya took pains to cite as cred that he was, so help me, a “compassionate conservstive.”

The very words turn to ash in my mouth.

[the set darkens, lightning briefy bathes the scene]

And just to ruin every intimation of me as some kind of hater, no, Obama did not ever promise single payer. He specifically denigrated it in general-election ads, showing his plan as the middle compromise.

David Dayen writes: I do think the precedents for a President Cain are worth thinking about.

Care to unpack this for us?

PJ Evans writes: Bot

Gesundheit.

I’m not assuming anything about any response from Feingold. I’m reading the text of the goddamn bill (quoted upthread for your convenience). How about addressing that text, instead of trying to create a diversion with some bullshit call to Feingold? How about explaining how that text could conceivably be construed as not authorizing combat-equipped troops?

Or better still, you could just stop digging. You got called out on some egregiously dishonest bullshit; do the right thing and admit it.

David: Combat-equipped troops

Is there another kind?

Tom Hilton writes: Or better still, you could just stop digging

Fuck me, I haven’t laughed this hard in ages. Thanks, Tom.

Hey, Tbogg. I just read that entire thread. IMO FDL has become a cesspool of ridonkulous bullshit and this entire strip mall of a blog has descended into madness. As I understand it, there is a standing invitation to come on over to Cole’s place and blog. The readers over there would love to have you and you wouldn’t have to suffer fools in the process.

Unless that’s your sort of thing……. I know you like low hanging fruit, but that was crazy.

Sun’s well up in DC, so David’s got his call from Feingold’s office by now, which he’s gonna share with us– any minute now… any minute now…

But his 2008 Obama-Biden Health Insurance Plan made repeated references to “the new public plan”. And in case one mistook that for another name for the proposed National Insurance Exchange, they used it in an exclusive reference in the same sentence. From the paper itself, which can be found here:

“The Obama-Biden plan will create a National Health Insurance Exchange to help individuals purchase new affordable health care options if they are uninsured or want new health insurance. Through the Exchange, any American will have the opportunity to enroll in the new public plan or an approved private plan, and income-based sliding scale tax credits will be provided for people and families who need it. Insurers would have to issue every applicant a policy and charge fair and stable premiums that will not depend upon health status. The Exchange will require that all the plans offered are at least as generous as the new public plan and meet the same standards for quality and efficiency.”

I know we could have this conversation forever, and now we’re off topic. But even with all the anger I feel at Obama’s numerous realpolitik betrayals, I still can’t bring myself to reflexively oppose this move against the LRA.

There is no Al Qaeda. There is a criminal gang led by the Bin Laden family and protected by rougish elements of the Intelligence Community. They are also protected by Pakistan which is the main supporter of “The Base”.

al-Qaeda exists irrespective of the life or death of Osama bin Laden

Supposedly, a great deal of knowledge about The Base was captured when “former” CIA agent Usama Bin Laden was terminated.

Why is this all still secret? Why is anything about Terrorists kept secret? The answer is that the War on Terror must be kept on endlessly.

Why is this all still secret? … The answer is that …

I don’t believe in Santa Claus, I don’t believe in the Easter Bunny, and I don’t believe in simplistic one-sentence responses to questions born of paranoia and the fecal discharge of male bovines.

That’s not single-payer; that’s a description of the public option. The part about “…the new public plan or an approved private plan” is kind of a tip-off that there’s more than one payer.

Frank33 writes: Why is all this still secret?

Thanks to your efforts, it’s not, and I for one stand foursquare–

Sorry, I just fell off my chair, laughing at you.

I have real reservations about the Obama presidency, although not so much that I won’t vote to reelect him, given the choices. This administration has pursued many policies which I dislike for diverse reasons, including that they were advanced in bad faith. As the premier example of this administration’s bad faith initiatives, I’ll cite its mortgage relief programs, HAMP and its successor, which succeeded in spending less than 3% of the monies allocated to them on assisting homeowners and, after some years, only recently began doing any kind of enforcement against the banks.

There appears to be two sorts of ‘terrorists’: bad ones and good ones. Earlier I mocked Rush ‘druggie’ Limpaugh’s reflexive endorsement of the good Muslim-whacking organization ran by Joseph Kony.

There’s another surprising outfit which has his back.

http://www.mail-archive.com/ugandanet@kym.net/msg03974.html

A 2008 article quotes Ugandan Archbishop John Baptist Odama of Gulu as saying the same thing: talking with the good Catholic Kony is the way to resolve the issue.

You know, given Barry O’s willingness to ‘compromise’ on everything else, here’s a scenario. We send in the troops and get established with our bases. Then, just like with Afghanistan and the Taliban, we discover the need to sit down and extract promises from Kony (or whoever survives him in his organization) that he’ll be a good guy from here on out. No More Evildoing!

The Vatican would be really happy too: their Muslim-whacking guy is sort of reformed, and God’s will continues to be done, albeit on a lower key.

It would be asking just too much for them to excommunicate the fellow right now – you gotta do something really awful like speak for abortion or against the authority of the Papacy for THAT to happen.

As the next link from 2008 says: “Kony needs another chance”

http://www.catholicnews.com/data/stories/cns/0806112.htm

Hey, David Dayan. How we doing? It’s after noon in DC now. Perhaps they dismissed your call as that of a crank; try again, and don’t be crazy-sounding.

Are you laughing at Bin Laden living in comfort for five years in Pakistan? Are you laughing at $100,000 to the 9-11 hijackers from Pakistan’s ISI? Are you laughing at US taxpayers who generously pay for both sides of the Global War On Terrorism?

As the premier example of this administration’s bad faith initiatives, I’ll cite its mortgage relief programs, HAMP and its successor, which succeeded in spending less than 3% of the monies allocated to them on assisting homeowners and, after some years, only recently began doing any kind of enforcement against the banks

I’m guessing you’re a victim of this policy.

Are you fucking insane?

I’m guessing you don’t have a mortgage. And don’t know anyone who’s underwater on theirs.
It’s that or you’re in the DLCC.

No, he isn’t. It’s just that you believe whatever you see on TV or in your newspaper.

So no answers but lots of calling me names. You might regret that. The Obama Administration continues to conceal the truth from the American people.

You have to ask? I think the prima facie evidence makes it quite clear.

Pretty much anyone besides the US Government, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Koch Industries.

I am probably sympathetic to TBogg. Although the issue may be complex and the Dept. of War always lies. But these Obama moran sycophants do not help his case. Do you people know what “links” are, and do you have any?

But you never know, we could be having a dialogue with Cass Sunstein, as the Administration reaches out to Professional Leftists. The previous “vulcan” neocons, reached out to Anwar Awlaki, in the Pentagon. Perhaps the next Administration may reach out to “PL’s”, similarly with drones also.

I’m guessing you don’t have a mortgage. And don’t know anyone who’s underwater on theirs.

I’m a renter, but cannot count the number of friends with, uh, undersea kingdoms.

Frank33 writes Are you laughing at Bin Laden living in comfort for five years in Pakistan?

No. I may consider it in future. Thank you for bringing this to my attention.

Wow, the stupid is strong in here.

So no answers but lots of calling me names.

If you have a question, Frank, ask. I’ll do my best.

So I’ll note for the record that you think the Iranians should be candidates to have UN license to kill anyone anywhere all over the world, on their say so as to who the good guys and bad guys are.
I haven’t asked specifically, but I’ll hazard a guess that Neda Agha-Soltan‘s family, among others, would tend to disagree with you.

Rather a cheap shot, given that you implicitly asked for a case of the administration’s bad faith. I don’t think that there’s any question then that this is one, and turning the point back on me doesn’t change that.
As far as it goes, I’m no more a victim of this policy than all of the other folks in this country who are suffering through this balance sheet recession and a lot less of one than someone who’s still paying a mortgage on an underwater property. I rent now and always have.

Perhaps. But when your links make an extremely dubious case that borders on trutherism (a topic that enrages me on the best of days), it tends to damage one’s credibility.

I have many as do the 9-11 Commisioners. You do not want to speak to the Bushie Crimes which are now Obama coverups. Why is the Administration torturing Bradley Manning? Why is James Sperling being persecuted for revealing that the criminals in the CIA gave Iran Nuclear Weapon technology? How does the President know that “Al Qaeda” wants to get the US into endless wars?

You got me there, bcgister, and you’re quite right. I was out of line. please accept my apologies.

Why is the Administration torturing Bradley Manning?

Nonsense.

You can catch up on the doings of Bradley at Leavenworth at his lawyer’s website.

Any other questions?

Why is James Sperling being persecuted for revealing that the criminals in the CIA gave Iran Nuclear Weapon technology?

Uh, Frank? The link you provided says Sperling spilled an attempt by the CIA to give the Iranians phony technology.

Thanks for acknowledging it. Apology accepted.

Ne’er mind, Tbogg….keep on snarking, and if the powers that be at FDL* give you the boot of sanctimony, remember: we’ll always have Shakira’s ass. Just leave your forwarding address.

*Jeebus, next thing you know, they’ll be banning people for foul language and saying things like ‘these people have gotten so fucking holier-than-thou I thought I’d fallen into Free Republic. If FDL can’t tolerate differing views on policy I’m sure they have openings there or for that matter paying gigs at the Kaplan Daily..er, Washington Post’.

Oops, can I say that? To make my position clear: Joseph Kony has been a boil on the butt of mankind for decades, and is responsible for a huge amount of death and human suffering. Getting rid of the bastard is a Good Thing. There are a bunch of American troops in Africa already doing this and that, and if they can accomplish something worthwhile at least I’ll be getting something for my tax dollars. Yes, yes, I know about all the miserable bastards we haven’t gotten rid of and indeed support. One miserable bastard at a time.

Exactly so. But it has gotten worse and worse for quite a while now such that I cringe when I come here knowing that FDL will get the hit count. Still, I appreciate TBogg fighting the good fight. It’s more than I can stand to do.

See James Risen “State of War”, page 204. The CIA obtained plans for a genuine Russian nuclear weapon. The CIA Anti Proliferation department decided to proliferate nukes to Iran. Of course, blaming Russia, for Iran’s nuclear weapons is also brilliant. There were some slight flaws added to the blueprints. The Russian scientist who delivered the blueprints conveniently noted the flaws to the Iranians. At the time he was paid $5000 a month by taxpayers.

The CIA gave plans for a working nuclear weapon to Iran. This is a crime. Sperling should be rewarded not punished. This was obviously an attempt to provoke a war with Iran. The Nuclear Antiproliferation officials are spreading nukes to terrorists. We should then expect the CIA anti-terrorist unit to be spreading terrorism also.

Since the President lies about all things national security, then people are justifiably critical of new empire building in Africa.

Bradley Manning should be released immediately. His indefinite detention is another assault against the American people by a chickenhawk president.

Bradley Manning should be released immediately. His indefinite detention is another assault against the American people by a chickenhawk president.

Frank, quit being crazy for a minute and listen to me. What Bradley Manning has done is some serious shit, and it’s a military thing. Barack Obama has nothing to do with it.

Barring a presidential pardon, he is going to stand trial in a military court for one of the few things that can get you killed in this country– spilling the military intelligence beans to furriners.

You can go to bat for him if you like, but before you do, at least educate yourself about what he’s done, and the collateral damage of his fucking witless action.

Also, stop getting your news from the Daily Mail. It’s designed to appeal to idiots, and you are– well, just stop getting your news from the Daily Mail.

Before you do that Frank, please back up, with actual evdence, your absurd claim that Bradley Manning is being tortured.

Now. Do it now, Frank, you stupid fuck, before anything else. I hate slander, and I hate slanderers.

That goes for you too, David Dayen, and I’ll apply the stupid fuck appelation to you as well.

God, the sheer number of you assholes fucking wears me out. What, do you hate the human race or something? Is it a disability or mental illness of some kind? What the fuck is wrong with you? whatwhatwhat!

Y’know, I freely admit that Obama’s 1) lack of interest in emptying the wastebasket and prosecuting war crimes, 2) continued pursuit of presidential power regardless of the Constitution and 3) appalling disregard of civil rights at home and abroad were a disappointment to me. Then, miracle of miracles, I, ah, reconceptualized. To wit:

1) Politicians lie. All politicians lie, it’s part of the job description. If they couldn’t lie, they’d be in another line of work. So to be all shocked and shit because Obama lies is naive at best and self-deceptive at worst. He’s no worse than most and better than some, so get over it. Call him on it, but for chrissakes don’t act shocked when he does what politicians do.

2) Politicians spend their lives amassing power. Again, it’s what they do, albeit for different reasons. To expect that someone is going to gain the highest office in the land and then GIVE UP some of the power amassed by their predecessors is, um, unrealistic. If you think Hillary, to name one example, would have done anything differently than Obama in that regard – for example, rolling back some of the most gregious and obnoxious aspects of the Patriot Act – is, again, naive at best. We don’t elect saints as president, we elect mean sons of bitches (figuratively speaking). You have to be that way to gain the office. People of this description don’t voluntarily lay down potential weapons, period.

3) Obama’s claiming the right to do much of what he has done is reprehensible, most of all the right to kill American citizens (much less anyone else) without arrest or trial. Yes, it’s reserved for those engaged in hostile acts or whatever verbiage was used as justification. However, as any lawyer will tell you, what counts is establishing the precedent. Once established, it’s not all that difficult to get it extended. But….it’s not like this is anything new, and it’s not like the government hasn’t done it before. Generally speaking, people who act in ways that the government REALLY doesn’t like or who give evidence that they might actually change things…end up dead, one way or another. Not right – at all – just the way it is.

So if Obama uses some of what I do think are illegal powers to get rid of a maggot like Kony, that in and of itself doesn’t bother me – indeed, I applaud it in this case. But as to getting all pissy because he’s doing in the open what his predecessors have done in the past, if not so openly, well….that train left the station a long time ago, starting with the National Security Act of 1947.

Moron I can’t be bothered to identify writes: Y’know, I freely admit that Obama’s 1) lack of interest in emptying the wastebasket and prosecuting war crimes,

As has been endlessly pointed out, criminal prosecution is not possible because those responsible are protected by the office they served in, which shields them from such.

And again, as has been endlessly pointed out, the US is not signatory to the jurisprudence of the International Criminal Court.

That’s just the first sentence of what you’ve written, and I stopped reading then. See above re stupid fuck appelation.

That’s all folks. This has been another edition of Crack Night in the Ferret Hut.

Politicians lie. All politicians lie, it’s part of the job description. If they couldn’t lie, they’d be in another line of work. So to be all shocked and shit because Obama lies is naive at best and self-deceptive at worst. He’s no worse than most and better than some, so get over it. Call him on it, but for chrissakes don’t act shocked when he does what politicians do.

If you learn nothing else from your brief stay here, know this:

Everybody lies, you dolt. All the time. Not just politicians. Me. And you.

Note for whatever you like what you think I’m thinking or how I believe. It won’t change reality one bit, and if it makes you happy, whatever….

obama is just like rommel!!!

The CIA gave plans for a working nuclear weapon to Iran. This is a crime.

Good golly. Stay safe out there, Frank. Watch out for the mind control rays.

Everybody lies, you dolt. All the time. Not just politicians. Me.

I agree. You are a liar.

Dolt replies after having been fed a straight line so simple even Jay Leno’d get it: I agree. You are a liar.

Duh huh huh. Thought that’d get your attention, simpleton. Now then again: what is your evidence that Bradley Manning is being tortured?

[I swear to God, it's like running rats around a maze]

Obama on YouTube proclaiming himself a “proponent” of Single Payer from June ’08 saying “but first we have to take back the WH”

Never mind, stupid fuck, you can’t back it up because it isn’t true.

Mebbe you heered it on the Limbaugh radee-oh or sumpin, an caint quite amember it propper.

You fucking dolt.

Indefinite Detention is torture. Release Manning NOW, and if the government has evidence put him on trial. But if the evidence is crimes committed by the US government MAnning is a hero.

All the Wikileak docs, official US docs are consistent. All the public statments by “officials” are falsehoods, that protect government or corporate criminality. Again TBogg may be totally correct about this “intervention”. But this neo-con National Security State has ZERO credibility.

This thread may have gotten off topic. But you brought up the oh-so-scary Al Qaeda.

FREE BRADLEY MANNING NOW!

Exactly.

He immediately backed off from single-payer and then pivoted to the public-option compromise — and then dropped that and the drug-price negotiation for Medicare (which would have saved billions from that program without compromising quality in any way) in the hope that the industry lobbyists would honor their promise to only send their money to Democrats in 2010. (A promise they broke, by the way.)

Now, I can kinda-sorta understand why Obama did it; when Bill and Hill tried health care reform in Bill’s first term, they got shithammered with “Harry and Louise” ads from a very-well-capitalized industry — and that, along with the thing that ended the Bush I Recession and started the Clinton Boom (namely, raising taxes), are what’s typically blamed for causing the Democrats to lose both Houses of Congress in 1994. But he isn’t exactly the world’s best negotiator. (See also: Barack Obama Buys a Lawnmower, by that notorious FDL extremist TBogg.)

Indefinite Detention is torture. Release Manning NOW, and if the government has evidence put him on trial. But if the evidence is crimes committed by the US government MAnning is a hero.

Uh– yeah, Manning is considered to be a flight risk, for obvious reasons, and the court is now considering a number of delaying motions brought by Manning’s counsel, attorney David Coombs, who is doing his fucking job, delaying the trial to put as much time as possible between the act and the sentence. That’s his job, and he’s doing it well.

Your contention that incarceration is torture would be laughable, if not for the fact that you diminish the horror of actual torture, by which I mean beatings, waterboarding, more beatings, electrocution, more beatings, sleep deprivation, more beatings, etc, in so doing.

So, you’re an asshole as well as a stupid fuck. Oh, and a liar, obviously.

Again, for fuck’s sake, educate yourself.

TBOGG, possibly the last truly sane voice at FDL.

“Indefinite Detention is torture. Release Manning NOW, and if the government has evidence put him on trial. But if the evidence is crimes committed by the US government MAnning is a hero.”

You have this one wrong. What the Obama boys were doing while they held Manning at the Marine prison was torture. I doubt if he is currently being mistreated nearly as badly at the place to which he got relocated.

But the Nobel-Winning Constitutional Scholar was perfectly ok with the first prison routine.

*******

Last week, Bradley Manning, the soldier accused of giving classified materials to Wikileaks, spent his 23rd birthday in the brig of the Marine Corps Base in Quantico, Virginia. He has been convicted of no crime, but endures the kind of highly restrictive detention that’s usually reserved for the most dangerous criminals in America’s supermax prisons. He is kept isolated in his cell 23 hours a day, where he is cut off from most human contact, denied reading materials and personal items, prevented by the guards from exercising and regularly awakened from his sleep. He has been at Quantico for five months, following two months of detention in Kuwait.

*******

As the US torturers know very well, that drill will eventually destroy a human. And IMO that was their goal – to break him in mind and body to the point he’d be a pliable tool to testify to anything they wanted regarding The wikileaks founder – the Swedish guy whose name eludes me.

Only a vast amount of bad publicity caused Barry O to ‘blink’ and order Manning’s transfer.

http://www.alternet.org/rights/149317/bradley_manning_suffering_extreme_isolation_prison_torture_by_our_goverment_–_courageous_whistleblower_'physically_deteriorating'/

Only a vast amount of bad publicity caused Barry O to ‘blink’ and order Manning’s transfer.

Very interesting. I wonder where some of that “bad publicity” originated?

Last week, Bradley Manning, the soldier accused of giving classified materials to Wikileaks, spent his 23rd birthday in the brig of the Marine Corps Base in Quantico, Virginia

He’s been in Leavenworth for months now. Your claim that Obama “ordered” a transfer is idle speculation and has no basis in fact; in fact, transfer of prisoners to leavenworth from quantico is simply standard procedure.

Well, frankly, a “situation such as this” is probably ONLY susceptible to a military solution. A crazy person like Kony is not going to be stopped by asking nicely. There is no scope for negotiation or finesse. So our limited number of guys are going to assist the Ugandan military in solving the problem

You are “probably” right in your expert military assessment, but the way this present expedition to rescue threatened humanity, especially the little ones and women, is being justified in this thread and in DC sounds a lot like that in 2002/3. Rape rooms, torture chambers, gassing of entire villages, mushroom clouds over NYC. Part truth, part hype, and a whole lot of hypocrisy.

Jane Bussmann investigated on the ground in Uganda, and got possibly the fright of her life, and said in an interview:

Father Carlos Rodriguez, a deep-thinking, kind, mild-mannered Spanish man with no concern for his own safety. He went into the bush armed with nothing but his Bible to rescue 17 children from the LRA. No bullets fired. But when the priest went back to get more kids—and how often can you say that in a positive context—he was sabotaged, and not by Kony, but by the Ugandan government army.

And she’s for foreign military intervention to get Kony.

But how often have we seen this script? Drop in a few folk in the middle of trouble in a foreign country to quash the local baddie, to train the government and its army, both of whom have some factions within them supporting the aforementioned baddie.

I just do not see how this will turn out well.

As for further comment on the rest of our conversation, I know that folk in our military have just as many varied opinions as the rest of us, but they do have that insider’s knowledge of the gap between orders from the top and actual action at the bottom.

Plus, we still need to address issues surrounding our military/policy actions ever since Eisenhower told us we needed to.

But that’s another can to open, though here’s a start.

My solution? If Kony is such an evil force in the world, don’t pussyfoot around. Bring in overpowering force without delay and do not stop until he’s caught or dead. Unseat the sitting government, cleanse the army, and sit there for a couple decades. Do that with a coalition of interested and local parties.

Don’t want to do that, too much time, effort, and money?

No?

Well then, maybe Kony’s not such a bad guy after all. I’ve never known of wars done on the cheap that turned out well.

Very interesting. I wonder where some of that “bad publicity” originated?

David Coombs, Bradley Manning’s attorney, in the time-honored tradition of whupping up sympathy for his client on the courthouse steps. He sold Glenn Greenwald a steaming pile of heavily embellished claims and Glenn, in his zeal to write an “expose”, ate it all up.

Many of the claims are duplicated on David Coombs’ blog, and then they are accidentally debunked by Coombs himself in later posts, apparently having some difficulty keeping his story stright. Greenwald himself was called by an official at Quantico to correct errors in his report, but Glenn decided that Coombs’ story was preferable and blew off the official. That’s some mighty fine reporting there, Glenn.

Nevertheless, the upshot of all this was to conflate Manning’s “isolated incarceration” with the image of Tim Robbins as Andy Dufresne in “the hole” at Shawshank, but in fact was nothing like that. It’s the Shawshank hole that all these experts are talking about, by the way, when they describe the long term effects of this type of incarceration, and was not, repeat not, what Manning was experiencing.

Bring in overpowering force without delay and do not stop until he’s caught or dead. Unseat the sitting government, cleanse the army, and sit there for a couple decades.

OK, this just makes it plain that you haven’t bothered to learn even the simplest facts about this. “Unseat the sitting government”? Of which country? Ugandan, DR Congo? CAR? Sudan? The LRA has been active in all four countries. “Cleanse the army”? Which one?

You bring up Father Rodriguez as if to imply that assistance other than military assistance would be better. The US has been providing humanitarian assistance to the area for years.

Of course, don’t let any of this get in the way of preening your progressive colors.

Sadly, no. Check the date.

Funny how you don’t have any links to back these claims up.

Then again, since you refuse to do anything but shout variants of “You LIE!” at David Dayen, I shouldn’t expect you to have the integrity to back up your claims about Bradley Manning, either.

Speaking of that, you might want to check out the words of David House — who unlike you or I has actually spoken with Bradley Manning — before you venture to take up discussion of that subject:

http://fdlaction.firedoglake.com/2011/01/31/video-david-house-says-bradley-mannings-spirits-down-but-excited-about-egypt/

http://fdlaction.firedoglake.com/2011/01/31/bradley-manning-punitive-psychiatric-status-remains-but-hopeful-about-youth-uprising-in-tunisia-and-egypt/

http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2011/mar/16/hear-bradley-manning-because-chains

The fact is that Manning’s treatment is far out of proportion to his actual alleged crime — which is allowing WikiLeaks to publicly expose the “Collateral Murder” video showing US troops shooting down first obvious and non-threatening civilians (who turned out to be a Reuters photographer and his driver, then the van coming to aid of the shot civilians. In the America I grew up in, he would have been called a whistleblower. Now? He’s imprisoned, and the persons who laughed and joked as they murdered people get off scot-free.

There’s also the question as to why they had been doing things like messing with his sleep/wake schedule (you try to think coherently if the only person you’re allowed to see 99.9% of the time is someone who comes in every five minutes and yells “Are you OK?”). The only way any of this seems to make any sense is if they’re trying to force a confession — which they wouldn’t need if they had a slam-dunk case, right? As it turns out, the government’s case hinges on Adrian Lamo, who isn’t exactly trustworthy:

http://emptywheel.firedoglake.com/2010/12/26/when-did-adrian-lamo-start-working-with-federal-investigators/

http://emptywheel.firedoglake.com/2010/12/30/pulling-some-threads-on-lamos-inconsistencies/

http://emptywheel.firedoglake.com/2010/12/31/lamos-two-laptops/

http://emptywheel.firedoglake.com/2011/01/11/why-did-bradley-manning-allegedly-leak-wikileaks-two-things-before-he-verified-assanges-identity/

OK, this just makes it plain that you haven’t bothered to learn even the simplest facts about this. “Unseat the sitting government”? Of which country? Ugandan, DR Congo? CAR? Sudan? The LRA has been active in all four countries. “Cleanse the army”? Which one?

Why, Thank Yew, Mr. Basement!

This has the makings of one Hell of a ClusterFuck, doesn’t it?

I shall now perch and preen!

The problem with your argument labeling him a “whistleblower” is that he had a specific line he could have followed through the Military Whistleblower Protection Act (link from the Navy’s IG office):

“The Military Whistleblower Protection Act, Title 10 U.S.C. 1034, as amended, prohibits interference with a military member’s right to make protected communications to members of Congress; Inspectors General; members of DoD audit, inspection, investigation or law enforcement organizations; and other persons or organizations (including the chain of command) designated by regulation or administrative procedures. A protected communication is any lawful communication to a Member of Congress or an IG, as well as any communication made to a person or organization designated under competent regulations to receive such communications, which a member of the Armed Services reasonably believes reports a violation of law or regulation (including sexual harassment, unlawful discrimination, mismanagement, a gross waste of funds or other resources, abuse of authority, or a substantial or specific danger to public health or safety).”

He didn’t follow that line. Now we can sit and argue whether that process would have effective or not, but he didn’t even make the attempt to go that route before dumping it off to WikiLeaks.

Thanks for this. And that’s what I was trying to get at it when I overgeneralized about there being no humanitarian moralizing with Vietnam. There was no humanitarian impetus to U.S. intervention and mass escalation. There may have been a little P.R. about it, but the message was damned clear back then: we are in it to stop the Commie scourge and save Asia from a complete Commie takeover. There’s a coincidental feature between Uganda and Vietnam: sending in “advisors” was how U.S. involvement in Vietnam started. They were shooting right away, of course, because they were attacked. Coincidence doesn’t amount to equivalence.

What Bradley Manning has done is some serious shit, and it’s a military thing. Barack Obama has nothing to do with it.

Last I checked, the military in this country reports to the President, not the other way around; if President CareBear wanted to do something about Bradley Manning, he could. Your statement may be the stupidest thing ever written at TBogg’s House O’ Snark and Bassets, and I include anything smoothjazz ever wrote.

As for his treatment, Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch, and Council of Europe don’t seem to be too thrilled by it. Then again, they were probably sold the same “bill of goods” that Glenn Greenwald was given.

Be sure to include the typical ration of “fucking asshole liar” in your response to demonstrate your intellectual and moral superiority.

Hey TBogg,

I read a bunch of the posts over at the original article and all I can say is “bravo.”
I’ve been attacked by some of the same fucksticks for simply expressing an opinion that was counter to FDL groupthink.
What a bunch of narcissistic holier than thou assholes.
And yes, if I said that to them, it would be an ad hominem attack, but instead I’ve politely excused myself from the flamethrowers.

Fuck ‘em all. (Yeah Twain, DWBartoo, OFG and the rest: go fuck yourselves.)