Today is Sunday November 15. This morning’s New York Times front page has the following “above-the-fold” articles: one about Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan (the alleged “Fort Hood killer”); one about “more than a dozen” members of the House of Representatives using the same words about health care (courtesy of lobbyist Genentech); one about President Obama visiting China; and one titled High Costs Weigh on Troop Debate for Afghan War.
The Maj. Hasan story speculates about his motives. Since he’s currently alive in the hospital, hopefully his lawyers will give him an opportunity to speak for himself eventually. However, that hasn’t stopped people from coming up with their own theories. One intriguing theory is articulated by the following quote:
“Some experts on terrorism say Major Hasan may be the latest example of an increasingly common type of terrorist, one who has been self-radicalized with the help of the Internet and who wreaks havoc without support from overseas networks and without having to cross a border to reach his target.”
In other words…his actions were a result of his own thinking. He was not following anybody’s orders but his own. Scary.
The ‘House Record … Lobbyists’ story talks about how corporate lobbyists spoon-feed sound bytes to Washington lawmakers. Shocking. By all means, let’s do something about it…oh wait…bribing lawmakers is constitutionally-protected free speech. And writing your own speeches is so last century.
The ‘Obama Visits China’ story talks about how the U.S. President is being oh-so-careful to not do or say anything that might make our Asian Overlords angry. ‘Nuf said.
The ‘Troop Debate’ story contains a very interesting estimate — “… the rough formula used by the White House…about $1 million per soldier a year…”. So it becomes trivial to calculate rough estimates of how much money our government is spending on the war in Afghanistan. I suspect our soldiers might find it interesting too, when comparing it to their salaries.
There are currently roughly 62,000 U.S. troops in Afghanistan (according to the National Priorities Project). The current U.S. population is 307 million. Unemployment just topped 10 percent, which comes to 30 million people without jobs. So just by cutting our current troop level in half — not eliminating it, mind you, just cutting it in half — and giving the money saved to all of the unemployed citizens in America — we would instantly turn all 30 million unemployed into millionaires. Some of them might consider starting small businesses, which would hire other people — driving up wages since there would no longer be unemployment. I personally would consider this a good thing for the economy — maybe way better than giving TWO HUNDED TIMES this much money to bail out Wall Street. But I don’t have a degree in economics, and I consider helping out ORDINARY CITIZENS down on their luck at least as important as helping out the millionaires and billionaires who run Wall Street. So clearly I’m out of touch with federal priorities.
Which brings me to a tiny, six-sentence story on page 22 titled Gates Blocks Photographs of Prisoners. This article notes that Secretary of Defense Gates has invoked new powers, granted by Congress and signed by President Obama last month, to block the release of photographs of foreign detainees abused by American captors. This was a result of the ACLU’s having sued for release of the photographs of prisoners in Afghanistan and Iraq being abused by Americans, and federal courts having ruled in favor of the ACLU.
Well it’s just another example of America’s proud tradition of censorship and hiding the truth from that most dangerous faction, the public! We certainly don’t want to give our citizens THE TRUTH, especially the UGLY TRUTH! They might start thinking for themselves!
