I managed it- though there was a good amount of grimacing (to be fair, I’m rarely moved to severe emotion by media);
Another good one for this context (if you can mind the self-serving “I, however, had nothing to do with it”) is Phil Caputo’s “Rumor of War”

Now, what is the goal of the current war: Conquest? Already did it. Destroying the military capability of our enemy? Did that too, the infrastructure’s gone.

So, what we are currently trying to do is stabilise the region; make sure that another dictator doesn’t take control and develop WMDs or team up with the aliens from V or whatever the fuck Saddam was supposed to have done.

Now: How stable is a country where, at any time, a person can come into your house and kill you for no good reason? How does this massacre advance our current goals in Iraq?

Answer: IT FUCKING DOESN’T. It pisses the Iraqis off, and makes them more likely to embrace an anti-American government.

Jesus, you have to be fucking MORON to not care about this shit, never mind the sociopathy.

If atrocities are OK during war, then why don’t we just allow all the troops to rape and pillage? Gah.

miikey

Killing Iraqi civilians: Like we’re supposed to give a shit.

mikey

Fuck that. How many of us have debated assholes who slaver at the thought of “gettin’ dem a few ragheads”? Well, some of those assholes actually sign up now and then!

We all know that some guys and gals in the armed forces are sick, racist fucks who actually enjoy torturing or murdering arabs if they can get away with it. The blame lies with both the ones who pulled the triggers and inserted the glowsticks, AND their enablers in Washington.

…In this case I had just put forward the question, “What would you do?â€? to a hypothetical situation in which several prisoners had been captured who may, or may not, know about an ambush the enemy had emplaced for our unit some distance away. The prisoners appeared to be civilians, taken in a village from which we had, in this notional scenario, recently taken fire.

“OK, how many of you think that this is the correct response?â€? [I asked] Now I was addressing the whole group, most of my company in fact. After a few seconds almost half of the hands went up.

I know nothing about these people but their comments turn my stomach. If the commenters include combat veterans, those individuals need help. But I suspect they’re a bunch of Rambo wannabes who have gone over the edge on way too much need to out jerk the guy next to them lest they be discovered for what they sound like: cowards who need a realworld lesson in the brutality of war.

If these people remain so cavalier in the presence of a dying four year old, after watching somebody burn to death, after handling the proceeds of war day after day after soul-deadening day, then truly they have lost their humanity.

You’re absolutely right about that. I wasn’t really clear. I was talking about the people we’re creating. Think about this. This 20 year old kid walks into a house, and there, amid the screaming, crying, the noise, the horror, there, in a back room this kid takes his rifle off safe, points it at the head of a one-year-old child, and pulls the trigger. This kid, who is so dehumanized, so dead inside, so turned around by what we have made him do, isn’t influenced by the helplessness and terror. BANG! Turns around, walks out. This kid is going to be somebody’s neighbor, maybe a clerk at the grocery store or the mechanic at jiffy lube. Like Colin Powell said about Iraq, we broke him–we own him. He didn’t go over there the first time like that. But that’s how he’s coming home…

mikey

Apart from their atrociousness, these guys share something with most Americans and Canadians; while they may have relatives who fought in wars, they have never experienced war up close and personal. They can talk about it as though it were a video game. Ironic, really. The longer you live in a peaceful environment, the easier it is to contemplate waging war. And much easier still if you are a complete fucking moron.

I’ve got wingnut indigestion.

from the NYT review of Slaughterhouse Five:
During World War II, at the age of 23, Kurt Vonnegut, Jr. was captured by the Germans and imprisoned beneath the city of Dresden, ”the Florence of the Elbe.” He was there on Feb. 13, 1945, when the Allies firebombed Dresden in a massive air attack that killed 130,000 people and destroyed a landmark of no military significance.

The author pronounces his book a failure, ”because there is nothing intelligent to say about a massacre.”

Lileks certainly makes a good case for that.

Next point: He talks about “the Left’s glee over the story….” I call bullshit. Since I can speak for The Left, I will come right out and say that The Left reserves its glee for the schadenfreudelicious thought of Karl Rove going to jail in the wake of Plamegate, or any similar frogmarch moment for the movers, shakers and mouthpieces of The Right. No, The Left feels no glee over Haditha. The overall reaction is one of horror and outrage at the atrocity, along with a smidgen of stunned disbelief that any American could feel anything other than horror and outrage. Much as I detest her, even Malkin seems to have tapped into a current of humanity that escapes this “Jawa” and many of his commenters.

BWM – Breathing while Muslim (alternately, BWB – Breathing while Brown)

I found this amusing:

Vinnie the tool states: Yes, let’s those of us who weren’t there, and never will be, flagellate ourselves over this, without any charges, or Court Martials even being brought.

In response to: But if, if, even a fraction of it is true, it deserves the most vehement condemnation and most severe punishment.

Interesting,

Otherwise wingnutty harpie in rare moment of sanity: Killing innocent and unarmed civilians is wrong.

Ultra-wingnutty response: Stop flagellating yourself! You need not punish yourself with those whips of humanity, this is WAR!

But what I found more amusing is his contention that those on the right condemn the killing of innocents to appease the “left”! Yeah, because that’s been their MO all along. Bog-mindling.